Flame Lash

Instant

This deals 4 damage to any target (creature, player, planeswalker or battle).

Legality

Format	Legality
1v1 Commander	Legal
Alchemy	Legal
Archenemy	Legal
Arena	Legal
Block Constructed	Legal
Canadian Highlander	Legal
Casual	Legal
Commander / EDH	Legal
Commander: Rule 0	Legal
Custom	Legal
Duel Commander	Legal
Gladiator	Legal
Highlander	Legal
Historic	Legal
Historic Brawl	Legal
Legacy	Legal
Leviathan	Legal
Limited	Legal
Modern	Legal
Modern Beyond Horizons	Legal
Oathbreaker	Legal
Pauper	Legal
Pauper Duel Commander	Legal
Pauper EDH	Legal
Pioneer	Legal
Planar Constructed	Legal
Planechase	Legal
Pre-release	Legal
Quest Magic	Legal
Standard	Legal
Standard Brawl	Legal
Vanguard	Legal
Vintage	Legal

Discussion (51)

berryjon on Pattern Recognition #153 - Teferi …

4 years ago

ClockworkSwordfish: Quicken says it does!~

Also, it was the first four-damage red spell that came to mind. Lava Coil can't target 'Walkers or players so I suppose a better example should have been.... Lightning Blast or more recently Flame Lash.

Tzefick on Two Life-Draining Spells

5 years ago

WizardOfTheNorthernCoast But Warleader's Helix is generally considered overcosted - although that's maybe not entirely a fair appraisal.

Lightning Helix is the combination of Healing Salve and Lightning Bolt. We all know the value of Lightning Bolt, but much less so that of Healing Salve. These days, Lightning Bolt is too strong for Standard and we refer to Lightning Strike for a more appropriately costed card for that damage range. If we look at specifically instants or sorceries that deal 4 damage, we come into the midrange territory and the costs are similarly higher or with extra conditions or restrictions. Char, Collective Defiance, Electrify, Flame Lash, Exquisite Firecraft, Lightning Blast, Slaying Fire, Stoke the Flames. On the cheaper side we have Cut, Flame Slash, Heartfire, Galvanic Blast, Lava Coil, Reckless Abandon.

I think at the least we can say that dealing 4 damage to any target unconditionally is more likely a CMC 4 spell that usually has some additional benefit stuck onto it or a 3 CMC with some requirements. So the raw unconditional 4 damage is somewhere around 3,X CMC.

Now healing 4 is way cheaper and can be done with Life Goes On for a single mana, at instant speed, with a condition to gain more life. The only other card to note is Sacred Nectar, which I believe we can quickly agree is overcosted and underperforming. All other cards that gain life around these ranges have something else going on for them, Feed the Clan, Blessed Alliance, Life Burst. As such, the raw 4 life is not even worth a mana.

So 4 damage is roughly worth 3,X CMC and 4 life is worth 0.Y CMC. Put those effects together on a multicolor card and Warleader's Helix seems like a fairly costed card at uncommon. Although fair does not equal good.

That was a rather long way to go just to say that Warleader's Helix is a fairly costed card... but not a very good one.

A condition may shave off a mana in the cost, but that leaves us at 3 CMC for a 4 damage, 4 life spell. The Vampiric Helix is definitely undercosted by 1 or needs a tougher condition, say control 2 or more vampires.

Now the biggest issue I take to this card is the ability to play it mono black. Mono black is not that efficient, seeing cards like Consume Spirit or Agonizing Syphon, Pharika's Cure. However neither red nor white has these effects by themselves. I think a good midway would be to have black as a required cost and then have the supplementary color be hybrid: would be fair in my eyes. Alternatively you could have white as the primary color and black/red as the supplementary, but that is not very flavorful as far as Vampire tribal goes. To compensate the increased cost, you could have the base version be 3 damage/3 life.

JakeHarlow on KeldSnipe

6 years ago

Good point, man. Detection Tower is a strong answer for that situation. Maybe bringing a copy or two into the main board is correct here. Fight with Fire will kill Shalai (as will Flame Lash, but we'd rather strike face with that), but with tech like Blossoming Defense, it may be necessary to use tech that strips hexproof entirely. However, the +2/+2 still stops most of our removal from killing her. I think Blossoming Defense is going to be a tough card to beat because even without hexproof, it's going to give us issues killing Shalai. So I like the Detection Tower plan. Strip hexproof off of your opponent, ignore Shalai, and keep pointing burn spells at their face.

Good comment, definitely will keep this in mind!

Grubbernaut on Pauper RG

7 years ago

Firebolt is probably a safer play than Flame Lash

Mannu_1978 on Axis of Mortality Combo

7 years ago

Planned Changes:

Diabolic Tutor -1; Painful Lesson +1 (really strong in that deck)

I'm dubious about Flame Lash. When I got it in the tournament it was so useful (I killed a Chandra with it)... But still "normally" a flavor card.Cut proved to be good too, maybe I should get 3 and remove the Lash.

Sideboard: Fatal Push out (suprisingly, I have enough cards to manage creatures already), Ashes of the Abhorrent OR Crook of Condemnation x2 in. The choice is tough, in play Ribbons and Ashes would lock it.

Any advice?

dommi on 6 million, choose one

7 years ago

RedMan929, I think that I am going to use Hungry Flames instead of Flame Lash because of the card cost and you can do 2 things at once. I will be ultimately replacing that card with "lightning strike" from the new set most likely.

RedMan929 on 6 million, choose one

7 years ago

Of course, no problem. Hungry Flames might be OK, or perhaps Flame Lash as a replacement.

Atroxreaper on

7 years ago

Will do I'm very happy with Lightning Strike being released can always run Cut instead of Flame Lash.