Eidolon of the Great Revel – MTG Throwback Thursday (2014)

David
Fanany
Player
since
1995

When the Theros block was in Standard, it was a neighbor to first Return to Ravnica and then Khans of Tarkir. It turns out those combinations lend themselves to a lot of decks that are either slower or have a diverse range of mana costs, which left little for Eidolon of the Great Revel to do in Standard constructed. Once you start adding more and more sets with more and more cheap spells, his value goes through the roof: a simple card like Opt becomes a little dangerous when he’s in play, and he can make a lot of Storm builds nearly unable to win as long as he’s in play. He also has the distinction of being almost as good against Modern burn decks as he is in those same decks, which is kind of cool.

Constructed: 4/5
Casual: 3/5
Limited: 2/5
Multiplayer: 3/5
EDH/Commander: 3/5

Eidolon of the Great Revel is basically the creature version of Pyrostatic Pillar, just swapping a generic mana in its cost for a red one and a killable body. That said, Eidolon of the Great Revel is a legitimately solid card, thanks to its burn rider being perfect in a lot of formats dominated by cheap spells. Which includes Pioneer, Modern, and even Legacy, it turns out. A 2/2 can put in decent work in terms of beating your opponents down, and there will be games where Eidolon burninates your opponents rather nicely.

It’s not the card for every deck: double red can be awkward in a multicolored shell, and Eidolon of the Great Revel is a symmetrical effect. This can sometimes be awkward when playing it, since red decks want to go low and to the ground in many cases, but you can usually outrace the self-burn if you’re coming out ahead in many trades, and the sheer amount of incidental damage the Eidolon can cause in non-rotating formats means it’s more than worthy of inclusion in burn decks that see turn 1 as the start of the midgame.

Constructed: 4.5
Casual: 4
Limited: 3.5 (a bit awkward, since mana costs tend to be all over the place, but it can definitely put in some work here)
Multiplayer: 3.5
Commander: 4

Phat
Pack
Magic
YouTube

Hello everyone and welcome back to Pojo’s Card of the Day! We’re looking at an old-school card that gave me a headache back in Journey to Nyx.

Eidolon of the Great Revel isn’t anything special at the first glimpse of it, a 2/2 bear for RR is okay but it’s that text on it that really makes this Enchantment Creature dangerous.

“Whenever a player casts a spell with converted mana cost 3 or less, Eidolon of the Great Revel deals 2 damage to that player.”

In similar fashion to Bonecrusher Giant this guy is a punisher for targeted removal i.e. Doom Blade, Abrupt Decay, Cast Down, etc. Effectively acting as a 2 for 1 against your opponent. (They use a Card to deal with your Card, and get a ‘Shock’ to the face in the process putting you ‘up’ a card.)

The only issue with this card is that like Sulfuric Vortex, you’re pulled in to the whirlpool of pain of your own making.

So where does this guy fit in now?

Unfortunately this guy isn’t going to be doing much in Commander. With life totals starting off at 40 and lifegain all over the place, he’s no Sulfuric Vortex for the table to deal with and if you drop this in your Multiplayer game it’s going to be one guy giving you the bored glare while he pays 2 life to toss your precious spirit to the graveyard.

Draft is also kind of a dud for this guy, especially in Theros Draft where 3 cmc or less is roughly less than 10% of their library and Eidolon will get quickly outclassed by thicker and better threats.

This guy is very niche, he goes in high efficiency formats like Legacy and Modern where there’s numerous ways to drop this guy early like on turn 1. (Chrome Mox + Land, Eidolon) and dropping this against a person playing with a deck like Delver which is almost exclusively filled with cards with CMC 3 or less is going to make frowny faces!

The other place for this guy is Cube, and almost every cube that is running Mono Red as a viable archetype is going to be rocking this guy. In highly efficient cubes with low curves this guy gets even better, being able to simply spam-ping people in the face with your 2/2 dude means eventually they’re going to have to bite the bullet and deal with him pretty fast.

Constructed 3/5 – He’s a very niche card, but he’s amazing at what he does.

Limited 1/5 – Mono Red Aggro is incredibly tough to build in Theros/BotG/Nyx and that’s where this guy goes. Pass him down the line to someone else.

Commander 1/5 – He’s not a goblin so he doesn’t work well with Krenko, hard pass.

Cube 4/5 – Mono Red is almost always an archetype and this is a great card for that deck, and chances are you never have to force Mono Red so if you feel like going for it, pick up this dude!

Phat Pack Magic is a channel dedicated to Magic: the Gathering and creating awesome coverage of local events for formats like Cube, rare pack drafts, and now FNM Pioneer videos! Check it out at https://YouTube.com/PhatPackMagic