A "Charm" spell is a good place for black's
usual trick of exiling cards from graveyards.
It's a nice ability to have in certain
circumstances, especially any format that
contains the word "Golgari" as well as coming
off of Innistrad's Flashback and zombie madness,
but if your opponent isn't playing a deck like
that, it's useless. Rakdos Charm has other uses.
Its second use is to destroy an artifact. These
days practically all decks run at least a few
artifacts. Scars of Mirrodin may be rotating
out, but mana artifacts and Equipment have
gotten ubiquitous enough that you should be able
to maindeck this.
So what do you do if your opponent has neither
graveyard recursion nor artifacts? You have each
creature deal 1 damage to its controller. This
could win you the game right then and there, or
at least bring an opponent within range of your
other burn spell, but again, that could be of
limited use. I'd like it more if I were running
some lifelink creatures, or if my opponent were
running a swarm deck. But if you're playing
Rakdos, you probably already killed a good chunk
of his creatures, didn't you?
All three uses have the potential to get stuck
in your hand on their own. But because they're
all on the same card, and the circumstances that
nullify each effect are different enough, I'd be
comfortable maindecking this card and being
confident in my ability to adapt to whatever my
opponent tried to do.
Why, Wizards, oh why would you put that last
ability on this card? My Rise of the
Eldrazi-inspired Wall deck is a little sad. I
have a feeling the most-talked-about mode,
however, is going to be the first one - the
number of times it appears in Return to Ravnica
alone is probably the closest we're ever going
to get to an admission that Snapcaster Mage is
totally ridiculous. The fact that it's a modal
spell makes it more than worthwhile; based on
recent sets, I doubt any of the three modes is
ever going to be entirely useless.
Today's card of the day is Rakdos Charm which
is a Red/Black instant that allows you to either
exile all cards from a target player's
graveyard, destroy target artifact, or have each
creature deal one damage to its controller.
Graveyard removal, artifact removal, and
response to swarm are three very common themes
for sidedeck cards and having all of them in one
will make this a staple in the sidedecks of
Red/Black builds in many formats. As it is
not particularly useful when you have an
opponent with no major artifacts or graveyard
recursion, based on the number of creatures in
play and current life points, keeps this from
really working in the maindeck.
In Limited this is particularly effective
against a Golgari build, but just destroying an
artifact can be useful and the burn is a
potential game-winner in a stalemate. An
automatic inclusion in a Rakdos sealed and
usually a solid second or third pick in Booster
after a Black/Red rare.
Welcome to
another great card of the day review for you
right here at Pojo.com! Today we are looking at
the Rakdos Charm from Return To Ravnica. Rakdos
Charm is an uncommon instant that costs one
black and one red mana. Rakdos Charm has a few
abilities to choose from upon casting. The first
is exile all cards from target players
graveyard. Or you can choose to destroy target
artifact. The last choice is each creature deals
one damage to it’s controller.
I have always loved the charms, from any set. The
new charms from Return to Ravnica are simply
amazing though. And the Rakdos Charm has
certainly “charmed” me. I love choices when I
cast a spell, and that is the ultimate reason
charms are so fun. Why only be able to do one
thing, when the situation very well could
dictate another course of action? Why limit
yourself and your deck when instead, gain
yourself options. Now normally artifact
destruction is a sideboard at best ability,
unless it has some other form of gain. Most
decks have at least an artifact or two thrown in
there, but there are a lot that do not. So in
most cases, you sideboard something to handle a
deck that runs and utilizes artifacts. Exiling
graveyards is another sideboardable ability, as
half of the time when something goes there, it
stays. But there are decks that abuse the
graveyard, but mainstreaming the ability to
exile it would be deck suicide. However, the
Rakdos Charm allows you to main deck these
abilities, without fear of a dead card in your
hand, and the reason is the final ability. Each
creature deals one damage to it’s controller.
Now it may not seem like much, but if you have
been dropping the hammer on your opponent, and
they have a few life left, it well could be a
kill shot, and on their turn, perhaps after
dropping out a few more creatures in a feeble
attempt at holding you off. This allows you to
have a game ending ability, mixed with some
removals that would normally have to sit in the
sideboard.
I think that the main question about the Rakdos Charm,
or any of the Charms, simply is what will you do
with the space they create in your sideboard?
Welcome back readers todays card of the day is a
powerful charm from the Rakdos Guild. The first
ability to deal damage equal to the number of
creatures in play can hurt token decks and
provide an extra source of damage for agro decks
to punch through some of the last points of
damage. The ability to remove a player’s
graveyard from the game helps against reanimator
strategies and other decks in multiple formats
using the graveyard. The final ability
destroying an artifact is a decent niche that
gives this card even more versatility. In
standard this is a nice sideboard card for
rakdos colored decks that can do lots of niche
things making it a definite sideboard card that
can handle a lot of potential problems. In
modern this card puts a damper on Splinter Twin,
nullifies Tarmogoyfs, can hose graveyard combo
decks and just take out powerful artifacts. In
legacy and vintage the same concept applies this
provides a decent amount of versatility for
players making it an interesting potential
candidate. In casual and multiplayer even having
the versatility doesn’t make it worth running in
your multiplayer deck however in casual it can
be a nice card in aggressive decks that may want
an answer to artifacts in your main deck. In
limited it’s a solid sideboard card that can be
used as the situation calls for it. Overall one
of the most powerful charms and provides so much
versatility in so many formats it is a powerful
card.
