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Pojo's Magic The Gathering Card of the Day
Daily Since November 2001!

Halt Order
Image from Wizards.com

Halt Order
Scars of Mirrodin

Reviewed December 22, 2010

Constructed: 2.00
Casual: 1.40
Limited: 3.00
Multiplayer: 1.40

Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale
1 being the worst.  3 ... average.  
5 is the highest rating

Click here to see all of our 
Card of the Day Reviews 

BMoor

Halt Order

This is an interesting card. In Limited it's bound to find a target, but do you want to leave up 2U in case your opponent plays a good artifact? I suppose if you could do it in a way that doesn't broadcast your intent to your opponent, then sure, why not? It even draws you a card, so it eliminates one card of theirs for no card investment of your own. But it does require you to invest mana, mana you could have spent on your own artifacts. I guess that's the eternal conundrum of counterspells. Do you leave mana up for them, or do you develop your own board and brace yourself for whatever your opponent has to drop?
But as counterspells go, I'm not too happy with this one. If your opponent isn't running artifacts, it's a dead card. And if they're running just some artifacts, you have to anticipate the turn on which they intend to cast said artifact without leaving your mana fallow on too many other turns. Negate, by contrast, is versatile enough that you can usually count on it, but you'll still find scenarios where the one card you need to counter with it turns out to be a creature. Halt Order is going to find many more such scenarios, having a more restrictive target requirement, and thus I have my reservations.

Constructed- 1.5
Casual- 1.5
Limited- 2.5
Multiplayer- 1.5

David Fanany

Player since 1995

Halt Order
 
Judging by this card's flavor text, it seems the financial crisis has spread to Mirrodin. Fortunately, planeswalkers like you and me can still get some good value out of a spell like Halt Order. In tournament play, it may gain more value as more of the block is released and artifacts become more common in those types of decks. For non-tournament play, you'll need to judge whether there are enough powerful artifacts to risk the somewhat restricted targeting requirements. In any event, anything that gives blue decks without red or green a potential answer to crazy cards like Sword of Body and Mind is worth keeping an eye on.
 
Constructed: 2/5
Casual: 2/5
Limited: 3/5
Multiplayer: 2/5

Paul

Magic The Gathering Card of The Day: Halt Order 
 
Welcome back readers today's card of the day is an interesting card to combat the influx of artifacts in Scars of Mirrodin.  In standard this is strictly a sideboard card if artifact decks become extremely popular as of now there is not enough powerful artifacts to warrant playing this card. In extended once again a big artifact deck isn't present so this is a rather mediocre card. In eternal Annul and straight up hard counters are often a better alternative to this card, even with the cantrip. In casual and multiplayer hard counters beat this situational counterspell, there is plenty of ways to deal with artifacts I don't recommend playing this card. In limited I doubt I would pick this highly or main deck it, but scars has a plethora of artifacts and this could be used to counter a bomb artifact. Overall a situational counterspell that can draw a card, nothing to write home about.
 
Constructed: 2.0
Casual: 1.5
Limited: 2.5
Multiplayer: 1.0

Michael "Maikeruu" Pierno

Today's card of the day is Halt Order which is a three mana countermagic that only works on artifacts, but does allow you to draw another card. 
The extremely limited nature of this restricts it to a sideboard at best unless you know your local metagame to be really full of artifacts. 
Otherwise play some other option whenever possible and leave this out of your deck entirely.  Even with the card draw you probably want to counter other spells more than artifacts and usually they can counter artifacts too.
 
For Limited this is quite a bit better as many cards and quite a few of the big threats are artifacts and the draw power is a welcome addition. 
Three mana with only one Blue is nice and easily worked into decks with multiple colors, so there is little reason to leave this out if the color is available.  In Sealed this should be played whenever your pool allows and in Booster if you are drafting Blue this becomes one of your top picks.
 
Constructed: 1.5
Casual: 1.5
Limited: 4.0
Multiplayer: 1.5

John
Shultis
Phoenix
Gaming

       Today’s Card of The Day is Halt Order from Scars of Mirrodin. I find this card especially functional in just about every environment, due to the fact that a lot of decks run artifacts. It may not be a main deck card in every format, but it is definitely a side board card.

      The applications for Halt Order in Standard are obvious, everything is about artifacts in standard. And being able to counter an artifact and then draw a card is very nice. Not necessarily as functional as say a Stoic Rebuttal, Turn Aside, or even Deprive, but still very practical if trying to save direct counters for non-artifact spells.

      In casual vintage type play, this is a side boarder. The mana cost is more than the basic Counterspell, which would almost always see more play than a type-specific counter. And for the exchange of a colorless mana for a blue, Cancel runs the same mana cost, only can counter anything. Again, the main difference is the card draw. But is limiting the kind if spell able to be countered for a card worth it in casual play? I say certainly not. In casual play if card drawing is that important to your deck, there are plenty of other ways to go about it.
 
Limited: 3/5
Constructed: 3/5
Casual: 1/5
Multiplayer: 1/5


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