Great Train Heist – Outlaws of Thunder Junction
Date Reviewed: May 20, 2024
Ratings:
Constructed: 4.00
Casual: 4.37
Limited: 5.00
Multiplayer: 3.88
Commander [EDH]: 4.13
Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale. 1 is bad. 3 is average. 5 is great.
Reviews Below:
You probably know that I like Relentless Assault effects, even though they’re sometimes considered to be not very good. They’re a part of the subclass of cards that breaks the rules in an “official” manner – we tend to give more thought to the ones that break the rule about only drawing one card a turn, just because they’re the most powerful ones. But just as attacking is viscerally satisfying, breaking the rule about one attack per turn sends a thrill up my spine. And an instant-speed variant turns that feeling up to 11, with applications beyond the obvious ones and some appealing bonuses for accepting additional costs (most sorcery-speed variants don’t cost more than about four or five mana). Ironically, it works better when you have lots of mana, possibly lots of Treasure tokens (possibly from an earlier Great Train Heist), but even the seemingly smaller modes will be a lot of fun to just toss out there and ride all the way to Texas.
Constructed: 4
Casual: 4.5
Limited: 5
Multiplayer: 4
Commander [EDH]: 4
choo choo
Great Train Heist is quite a neat combat party trick. both on offense and defense. On offense, you can use it to loot the train of all their valuables…repeatedly. Four mana makes this basically a Relentless Assault, and one more mana makes for insane Treasure production with a decent board. The middle mode also is useful if you have to get past blockers, as first strike can turn a fight around. That this is an instant means you can also do some surprisingly subtle things here, like untapping your board and blocking an opponent out of nowhere…even if it is six mana, it’s a lot more tricksy than red usually tends to be, and I value being tricksy pretty highly.
I do think this shines brightest when used offensively, though. While all of the modes together are a Lot, two mana to generate loads of treasure is actually a decent starting point, and this scales sharply if you can spend more. I do think this is a surprisingly subtle red card that still works as a blunt instrument, and Relentless Assault has always been acceptable as far as baselines go.
Constructed: 4
Casual: 4.25
Limited: 5 (this is the kind of card that can swing games in a hurry)
Multiplayer: 3.75
Commander [EDH]: 4.25
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