Mabel, Heir to Cragflame – Bloomburrow
Date Reviewed: March 8, 2024
Ratings:
Constructed: 3.75
Casual: 4.13
Limited: 4.13
Multiplayer: 3.63
Commander [EDH]: 3.88
Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale. 1 is bad. 3 is average. 5 is great.
Reviews Below:
“I am that is!”
Magic doesn’t have much of a history with animal fantasy, but animal fantasy has a great tradition of magic swords, and Mabel’s sword is apparently a very powerful one. The list of abilities recalls Embercleave, albeit without quite as much blowout potential. Casting her on curve (her actual mana cost) doesn’t usually net you much right away, outside of a Mouse-themed kindred deck, though it’s worth noting that waiting until you can equip her with her own sword gets you something like a Lightning Angel. That card was once a tempo all-star and still sees play in casual; and thus Mabel seems potentially strong, and not just in Mouse decks.
And on a different note, I kind of (really) like the idea of a Mouse Soldier powerful enough to go toe-to-toe with Boros patrol guards and Phyrexian biomech horrors!
Constructed: 3.5
Casual: 4
Limited: 4
Multiplayer: 4
Commander [EDH]: 4
The set this card is from, Bloomburrow, is months away from release at the time of this review, so take all of these grades with a grain of salt.
In a world bereft of humans and humanoids, you get some unlikely heroes, and Mabel, Heir to Cragflame seems to do the job well. She brings a trusty sword with her that sticks around even after she falls, and she’s a good tribal lord otherwise for…a tribe with few extant members in sets up to now, but I have to imagine that Bloomburrow will have one or two, and mice feel like a perfect fit for a go-wide strategy that her Boros colors imply.
Three toughness is the only real knock, but if you cast her later, she can immediately take up Cragflame and jump to a bit more of a threat, and that modality is pretty decent. I’d be surprised if there wasn’t a place for Mabel, and I imagine she’ll have a home besides in Commander; she does a lot of little things nicely, and those little things can add up rapidly.
Constructed: 4 (caveat: the format in a few months may be very different, but she does enough that I think she’ll do decently)
Casual: 4.5
Limited: 4.25 (may be higher if Mice are strong, but she’s a pretty self-sufficient threat)
Multiplayer: 3.25
Commander [EDH]: 3.75
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