Big mana always finds uses. This one needs you
to build an army first, though, so it's not
really "turn two Chandra" material. It could
definitely be used to help drop the dynamite in
a red aggro deck, maybe to power up a creature
with firebreathing. Maybe in a Naya ramp deck to
power out a lethal Red Sun's Zenith. But it's
not Lightning Bolt. You can't just throw it into
any deck and expect it to be awesome. You have
to know what you want to use it for first.
I'm a little surprised this card wasn't in Rise
of the Eldrazi. After all, that set had a theme
of very long games and expensive spells, and
every color was encouraged to have a lot of
creatures in play. Outside of that sort of
environment, Battle Hymn becomes less
consistent, but it's still capable of
interesting things - casting four spells in one
turn despite only controlling two lands is a
powerful and underrated form of advantage. I
think there are Keldon Warlord decks that would
absolutely love this card, too.
Today's card of the day is Battle Hymn which is
a two mana Red spell that gives you one Red mana
for each creature you control. Mana
acceleration is usually good and Red has higher
cost and X spells that can benefit from an early
influx of mana, but a build using this with
swarm mechanics to maximize the effect will also
need something to spend it on which is a little
too complex to be reliable. With two or
less creatures this is a dead card and without
an higher yet within reach cost, X effect, draw
power, or something that can be paid multiple
times this card and any number of creatures in
play won't help either.
Goblins, kobolds, multicolor token decks, or
zero cost artifact decks may try running this
for a gimmick finishing move or minor
acceleration, which can occasionally work,
though simply using another creature or support
should help out far more often. Overall a
card that looks strong on the surface that just
requires too many things lining up and deck
specialization to work most of the time.
For Limited the only likely benefit this will
ever have is color fixing in multicolor decks by
allowing access to extra Red mana when Mountains
or other Red mana sources are in short supplu,
but not completely absent. That minor use
really shouldn't justify any deck slots and this
isn't a card to be taken out of the Sealed
sidedeck in most situations.
It is even worse in Booster where a more
carefully crafted deck is possible and color
shortages should be rarer. Even when the
concern of a lack of Mountains is considered you
would have to have this in hand, at least one
Mountain, and control two or more creatures
(which is difficult when running short on a core
color.) A vanilla 2/2 for two will help
more than this particularly when considering the
mana excesses of later turns leaving Battle Hymn
with fewer uses after the early game where
creatures are in short supply.
Welcome back to
the Pojo.com card of the day section. Today we
are looking at Battle Hymn from Avacyn Restored.
Battle Hymn is a common red instant that costs
one generic and one red mana. Battle Hymn says
you add one red mana to your mana pool for each
creature you control.
I love Battle Hymn. It can be the most crazy mana
ramp spell in Standard for it’s run therein. But
what makes me love it even more is combining it
with some older formats and just watching chaos
ensue. Sure in Standard we certainly can get a
bunch of creatures out and then benefit from a
massive mana boost. Cards such as Thatcher
Revolt could get us an easy three mana alone.
The true question becomes what do we then do
with the mana? In Standard it could easily go
towards either casting a Moonveil Dragon, or if
it is in play, extra mana to boost your
creatures up. In older formats it is definitely
a card worth consideration in most decent dragon
decks. If you bolster your field with little
critters, big dragons are coming fast. I
personally use it in Goblin decks. They come out
so fast and furious that you can get some
incredible mana again to cast just about
anything!
