This was easily one of the craziest cards in
Fifth Dawn. An extra turn and the possibility of
another one in the future? Not even Time Walk
can deliver that without a second card of some
sort. Conventional wisdom was, for a long time,
that the card's mana cost was prohibitive for
anything that wasn't a one-trick deck of some
sort; yet nowadays, there is more than one type
of deck that considers reaching eight or nine
mana a fundamental of its gameplan. If you can
cast an Eldrazi, you can cast Beacon of
Tomorrows. (And as always, you get bonus points
for going singleton - don't forget Tainted Pact
from last week!)
Today's card of the day is Beacon of Tomorrows
which is an eight mana Blue sorcery that has
target player take an extra turn and it gets
shuffled back into the library. This a
relatively high mana cost even for a powerful
effect and is more likely to see play in
Commander, Multiplayer, or possibly a stall deck
with a combo to repeatedly cast the effect.
There are multiple other cards for a lower mana
cost that grant an extra turn, so this is only
reasonable when block choices are limited or if
the library aspect can be supported.
In Limited this adds an extra turn and returns
to a likely very small library, making it an
incredibly powerful card in the format. An
absolute first pick in Booster and should force
Blue in nearly any Sealed pool. The high
mana cost does keep it to the end steps of the
game, but it offers a huge advantage at that
point and at worst is a topdeck into another
topdeck.
It's kind of a reusable extra turn spell. It's
neat. with omniscience and enter the infinite,
it's its own infinite win condition. On paper,
it looks like an auto-pick for anyone who is
going to run the new U/R legend of C15. aside
from that, odds are unless you come up with some
sort of crazy combo, you'll be more or less
wasting a turn (save combat and draw) just to
cast it. That said, it's probably up there in
terms of extra-turn spells.
