Against non-infect decks, this card is terrible.
An Incinerate that can only hit creatures, in an
era ruled by Lightning Bolt? Who would want it?
In that scenario, it's just Limited filler.
Limited decks might get use out of it, since
Scars of Mirrodin block has no Lightning Bolt to
draft and removal is so important (and the bar
for playable removal is so much lower).
But against an infect deck, it's a great card.
Effectively a Searing Blaze with less stringent
mana requirements, that always works regardless
of landfall. That'd be one of the best kill
spells in Red, if it hits an infector.
Since the card's quality is so dependent on what
kind of creatures your opponent plays, Burn the
Impure is a sideboard card. A good sideboard
card, but not good enough to be promoted to
maindeck. In Limited it might be maindeck
worthy, if you're short on removal. I'd snap it
up early in a draft, but that doesn't guarantee
I'd want to maindeck it.
There's really no problem with Burn the Impure.
Three damage kills a surprising number of the
creatures in the infect deck, and the additional
damage is a great bonus (for no extra cost,
yet). The thing holding this card back from
adoption in constructed is that it's not as
versatile as Lightning Bolt. If the infect deck
becomes common in your area, it could be a
reasonable choice. Also keep an eye open for it
in limited scenarios, as infect is a popular
strategy there - and you always care about their
life total, even if they don't care about yours.
Today's card of the day is Burn the Impure
which is a two mana Red burn spell that deals
three damage to a target creature and an
additional three damage to the controller if it
had Infect. This is not a particularly
impressive card in Constructed formats as you
shouldn't often run into Infect style builds,
but it could possibly work in certain metagames
or as a sidedeck card. As the Standard
format rotates it might see a bit more play if
Infect gains more traction.
For Limited where Infect is fairly common and
any removal is valuable this is an excellent
common card and well worth playing even if the
second condition isn't triggered. In
Sealed this should always be included in a Red
build and can combine with Tainted Strike as an
unexpected play for Black/Red. For Booster
this can be drafted as early as the second pick
and multiples work well to control the
battlefield when supported with any form of
aggressive creatures.
Welcome to the card of the
day section here at Pojo.com. Let us have a look
at Burn the Impure from Mirrodin Besieged. Burn
the Impure is a one generic and one red mana
instant that deals three damage to target
creature and if that creature has infect, deal
three damage to that creature’s controller. Oh
this is one of my favorite cards from this set,
and I will be too happy to explain why.
This card is extremely effective in Phyrexia vs Mirran decks,
because that is what it was designed for. But
what if you are playing against a normal deck,
or another Mirran deck? It is still three
damage, but you really want to exploit the full
potential of the card, which is why you put the
card in the deck in the first place. So you
combo it with Tainted Strike. You can always run
an infect deck with out using infect creatures.
But that is a different topic for a different
day. Right now, let’s look at the main point.
Use Tainted Strike on a creature you could kill,
and then finish it off with the Burn the Impure
so that the creatures controller takes the
three.
The card is a fun card, especially when it is exploited.
Standard three damage is still fun to use. But
it is even better when it is three damage to the
creature and to the player, and all for two
mana.
