The Elderspell

Sorcery

Destroy any number of target planeswalkers. Choose a planeswalker you control. Put two loyalty counters on it for each planeswalker destroyed this way.

Legality

Format	Legality
1v1 Commander	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
Pioneer	Legal
Planar Constructed	Legal
Planechase	Legal
Quest Magic	Legal
Tiny Leaders	Legal
Vanguard	Legal
Vintage	Legal

Discussion (46)

Necramus on Nicol Bolas and the Elderspell

5 months ago

ZacKrell valid and I totally get it! I ran Nicol Bolas Dragon God grixis in standard, as soon as WotS dropped. It totally turned into a mid-range super friends list where I used elderspell to sac all my own walkers to ult Dragon God. The only reason it was consistent is because it was standard and everything was 4 of. AS SOON as Fires of Invention came out, the deck turned into Grixis Fires.deck and dropped The Elderspell shenanigans.

Bolas is my favorite character in all of MTG. So, when I saw your list pop up on the front page, I got super excited and came to see if there was anything I could steal XD. I'm currently running Nekusar, the Mindrazer as my Grixis commander, but it came from the ashes of a Nicol Bolas, the Ravager  ^Flip deck. I leaned pretty hard into super friends and stax for that list. Feel free to check out my Nekusar build and see if you've got any suggestions for me :)

Gleeock on S U P E R F R ! E N D S

1 year ago

Haha, yeah. I playtested it & that bridge is just so strong autoplaying a bunch of high cmc walkers. A couple of games I aggrowipe won. Others, your boardwipes (Obliterate)) just totally ran away with it.

I'm one of the few people that run the super-niche The Elderspell It might be solid in this deck since it is pretty easy to bridge-summon a walker & even The Elderspell another one after you minus, then get that surprise ult. Also makes for a cornercase blowout/walker superiority against other decks either superfriending or using walkers as the commander.

Gleeock on The Great Planeswalker Debate

1 year ago

Now, as far as my opinion of planeswalkers?

I think there needs to be more feasible hate or punishment for them, especially hate that synergizes with other decks in fun ways & isn't a dead card otherwise... Speaking of dead cards, I will toot my own horn & say I have effectively used The Elderspell more than most :)

For example, with all this accessible proliferate there REALLY should be some sort of version of (-1/-1) counters that actually bleed walkers over time, but also transfer over to other permanents as well. Something triggered by proliferate would be sweet, like a counter that caused proliferate effects to gnaw away at loyalty, so if you chose to proliferate elsewhere, be prepared to trigger some punishment. I also like punishment by gifting: whenever an opponent activates a loyalty ability draw a card, whenever an opponent proliferates draw a card for each permanent gaining a counter, whenever an opponent activates a loyalty ability they sac a non-token permanent. These options should be explored for the sake of balance.

Vicarian on Elderspell Exploits (Arena Superfriends)

1 year ago

Could be like every other blue superfriends player and include Narset, Parter of Veils to stop people from drawing more cards. She's pretty frustrating (could make people concede just by playing her), and could help you find The Elderspell faster. Should have been rare and cost a few more generic mana at the bare minimum.

Gleeock on Card Analysis #1 - Dreadhorde …

2 years ago

Yeah, you might actually be entertained by the evolution of that deck, since you like War of The Spark alot. I've actually totally Bolus'd my own walkers before with The Elderspell, speaking of less-used bombs from that arc. Crazy what you can do with counters, weenies, lifegain, & Orzhov-friends. But yeah, opponents don't typically remember the ever-important lifelink clause on this spell - this was just good card design with the addition of a simple keyword (WoTC design take note!)

TheOfficialCreator on Card Analysis #1 - Dreadhorde …

2 years ago

Hello, everyone!

I thought I would try my hand at creating an article series centering around the beauty of different card designs, as each card truly is unique in its own way, and I wanted to make my appreciation of that into a tangible form so that everyone could experience it.

A general outline of how this article series will go is this: a basic introduction (similar to what you’re reading now), cost versus effect, the flavor of the card, how the card interacts with its limited environment, cards that are similar to it and a short little blurb on what makes them different, a custom card inspired by the analyzed card and a short explanation of the process used to create it, the legacy of the card, and finally, a conclusion to round it all out.

That being said, let’s begin!

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The card of today’s analysis is Dreadhorde Invasion, a card I chose to kick off the series with not only because War of the Spark is my favorite set, but also because it will give us a good platform to walk through the steps of this article series.

Dreadhorde Invasion is an oft-overlooked card that provides its user with a Zombie Army (a mechanic introduced and incredibly localized to War of the Spark, excluding a few exceptions such as Lazotep Chancellor) at the cost of a single life each turn. Obviously this adds up quickly, and the Army that is produced is rather clunky, as it is easier to remove (a la Fading Hope), non-evasive, and rather small even in its beginning stages. For {1}{B} it gives you a 1/1 creature on turn 3. That’s not a great payoff, especially for more advanced formats.

This is where the second clause comes in. If your Army can make it to six power, then Dreadhorde Invasion rewards you handsomely with an added lifelink, allowing you to gain back all that lost life and quickly breaking symmetry with your life versus your opponents. It’s not incredibly cost-effective (heck, a Forced Adaptation is more cost-effective in general), but it’s very fun to play with and can provide a lot more when juxtaposed with the rest of the game. But we’ll get into that later.

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The flavor of Dreadhorde Invasion is perhaps my favorite part of the card. The Eternals are probably one of the most unique MTG villains (I mean, come on, they’re blue metal zombies that can cross between worlds and steal planeswalker sparks), and definitely one of my personal favorites. The idea of Dreadhorde Invasion is that Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker is executing his plan to become Nicol Bolas, Dragon-God, invading the plane of Ravnica with his army of Eternals empowered by The Elderspell in order to steal the sparks of the planeswalkers, trapped there by The Immortal Sun and invited there by the Interplanar Beacon. The invasion is eventually quelled by a joint effort by Liliana, Dreadhorde General, Gideon Blackblade, Ugin, the Ineffable, God-Eternal Oketra, and God-Eternal Bontu, with the defeat of Bolas wrapped up in the brilliant card Despark. Dreadhorde Invasion more than anything flavor-wise represents the whole of War of the Spark, perhaps better than any other individual card in the set (except maybe Enter the God-Eternals). And that is why I love it so much; it is a testament to my favorite set of all time.

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As far as Dreadhorde Invasion’s performance in Limited goes, I must say that it has quite an unitive feel to how it operates in multiple deck strategies, similar to how it unites the flavor of the set. It has the keyword amass on it, which is the new ability introduced in the set, and which synergizes well with proliferate. Zombie Armies themselves receive gracious tribal support in the form of Gleaming Overseer, Eternal Skylord, Widespread Brutality, and the like. Beyond this fairly obvious synergy, however, there are many more options for how Dreadhorde Invasion can function in this set. For example, the creation of a creature every turn lends itself very well to sacrifice strategies revolving around Spark Reaper, Ahn-Crop Invader, and Spark Harvest, or even Liliana, Dreadhorde General and God-Eternal Bontu. In addition, the lifelink that can be attained on later turns goes well with Ajani's Pridemate and fits into a subtheme of life gain that the set has.

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Dreadhorde Invasion-style effects are somewhat rare, but there is precedence for their existence. The most obvious example is Bitterblossom, an enchantment well-known for its splashes in Modern and which creates small flying threats every turn at the cost of some life. However, there is also Ophiomancer and Endless Ranks of the Dead, or more recently Jadar, Ghoulcaller of Nephalia. The thing that sets Dreadhorde Invasion apart from these other cards is its unique combination of losing life and gaining life alongside its ability to make a token larger versus just creating a new token.

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Here is a custom card that I made that was inspired by Dreadhorde Invasion.

The process I went through to design this card went something like this.

1) Look at Dreadhorde Invasion and think about what the card is wanting you to do. What's the general theme of the card?

2) Build a general shell around the idea of losing life to gain life, pulling in inspiration from cards like Bloodghast.

3) Adding a tribal element to make it feel like a Dreadhorde card.

4) Adding a fitting name. "Vowmage" gives a feel of some kind of sacrifice to fufill an obligation, especially to a being like Bolas.

5) Adding flavor text that is both quippy and fits the situation. In this case, I chose to show who the Vowmage's vow is to.

6) Finding some art from DeviantArt that fit the theme. This art is from user Ryushadow, and is the only Eternal art I could find.

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Dreadhorde Invasion, like most of its amass kin, is largely forgotten especially in competitive play where it is not a contending strategy. Zombie Armies are incredibly weak to removal and usually aren’t very cost-effective, so their weakness of being a single lone creature that just gets bigger and can be chump-blocked can’t really be ignored. War of the Spark as a whole is a largely forgotten story arc, and despite its misgivings it’s still a shame. Dreadhorde Invasion does not truly have a legacy, though it was reprinted in the Midnight Hunt commander set as a part of Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver’s commander deck. Hopefully, one day, we will see Amass return in a future set with greater support so that Dreadhorde Invasion may one day be viable.

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Alright, everyone! That is the end of my article for today. Please let me know what worked for you and what didn’t so that I can sculpt this new article series to your feedback!

Speaking of user feedback, I would like to have every tenth card be voted upon by the community. If you want to submit an idea for what card we will go over, just let me know in your comment. The comment with the highest number of upvotes will have their card in the tenth article of the series.

Thank you all for the wonderful community we’ve made together! See you soon.

lcarl3035 on Would you rather die to Najeela or Ultimates?

2 years ago

Any thoughts on The Elderspell? I use in in my historic brawl Nicol Bolas, Dragon-God deck and its a pretty good win-con to destroy all my unneeded Planeswalkers so that I can Ult Bolas.

OdinPlaysGames on Niv-Mizzet is your Superfriend!

3 years ago

Oh I almost forgot! The Elderspell. If you have a game winning ultimate on a walker, just elderspell your own walkers to fuel it, and get to the ultimate quicker.