Chancellor of the Spires
Ignore the weird "opening hand" clause. You
don't want to keep an opening hand with this
card in it, because you're so far off from being
able to cast it that you may as well have
already mulligan'd anyway. Sure, you might think
this would be cool to run in a milling deck, but
if you're running this for the seven-card mill,
you're right for the wrong reasons. This is a
solid card, especially in a mill deck, because
it's a big flying finisher that gets you an
extra free spell out of your opponent's
graveyard. By the time you hit seven mana, your
opponent will have cast at least one instant or
sorcery spell. And if you're a mill deck, then
your opponent is that much more likely to have
something worth stealing in his graveyard. The
only trouble is making it to seven mana-- you
need to be a control deck to make it work.
I seriously can't remember a single Sphinx in
the original Mirrodin block. And since we saw
that some of the Scars of Mirrodin block took
place in familiar locations like Taj-Nar,
Mephidross, and Tanglebriar, you'd think there
should have been some hint. Were they all busy
or hiding when Glissa and her friends were
running around? Perhaps they were in the same
place the Ouphes, Atogs, and Sliths went for the
Scars of Mirrodin block.
Even though it smells like a retcon, the fact is
that Chancellor of the Spires is a fairly
appealing card, given the right style of deck. I
wouldn't expect it to succeed if just thrown
into any sort of blue deck you have lying
around. While the impact it has won't be
consistent, even in the sort of mill deck
designed to take advantage of the cards it
forces into the opponent's graveyard, its
prospects are better in multiplayer where more
graveyards are around. There are very few
playgroups where nobody will ever have a decent
target. (Try some crazy chain thing with
Reversal of Fortune!) The opening hand clause is
kind of a bonus, albeit the kind that will
occasionally pre-emptively remove something
critical to your opponent's game plan and make
you very, very glad it's there.
Today's card of the day is Chancellor of the
Spires which is a seven mana Blue 5/7 with
Flying that can be revealed from your opening
hand to each opponent mill seven cards at the
beginning of the first upkeep and when it enters
play you may play target instant or sorcery from
an opponent's graveyard without paying the mana
cost. While the seven mana 5/7 with evasive body
isn't overly impressive, the second effect makes
up for that by adding to the value when played
or blinked. The first effect is a nice little
bonus for having it in your opening hand which
is normally the last place you'd want a top of
the mana curve card like this. The mill effect
feeds into the second effect well if it kicks in
and while this sphinx may not see much play, it
isn't bad overall and could work as an alternate
finisher in some sort of hybrid blink and mill
design.
In Limited milling for seven is a decent
impact on a forty card deck and a seven mana 5/7
with Flying is very playable. The free spell
from an opponent's graveyard attached to the
creature is more than enough incentive to run
this in a Blue deck, though the three symbol
requirement puts this well out of the splashing
range. A solid first pick in Booster or
foundation in Sealed that works well with no
major support necessary.
