by Richard Rowell, Gaming Successfully Staff
The Call of Blood Intro Pack for Battle for Zendikar is a White/Black deck featuring a lifegain and “drain” theme - that is, cards that gain you one life and make each opponent lose one life. While it’s a good place to start, and offers a good finisher in Felidar Sovereign (and to a lesser extent, Defiant Bloodlord) it is missing a couple of things that would make this truly good out of the box.
The Deck List
Creatures (25)
2 Kitesail Scout
1 Zulaport Cutthroat
2 Serene Steward
3 Stone Haven Medic
1 Hagra Sharpshooter
2 Malakir Familiar
3 Nirkana Assassin
1 Shadow Glider
2 Drana's Emissary
2 Courier Griffin
2 Bloodbond Vampire
2 Kalastria Nightwatch
1 Felidar Sovereign
1 Defiant Bloodlord
Non Creature Spells (9)
2 Dutiful Return
2 Demon's Grasp
2 Gideon's Reproach
2 Tandem Tactics
1 Roil's Retribution
Lands (26)
1 Blighted Steppe
2 Evolving Wilds
2 Mortuary Mire
10 Swamp
11 Plains
The Call of Blood Intro Pack for Battle for Zendikar is a White/Black deck featuring a lifegain and “drain” theme - that is, cards that gain you one life and make each opponent lose one life. While it’s a good place to start, and offers a good finisher in Felidar Sovereign (and to a lesser extent, Defiant Bloodlord) it is missing a couple of things that would make this truly good out of the box.
The Deck List
Creatures (25)
2 Kitesail Scout
1 Zulaport Cutthroat
2 Serene Steward
3 Stone Haven Medic
1 Hagra Sharpshooter
2 Malakir Familiar
3 Nirkana Assassin
1 Shadow Glider
2 Drana's Emissary
2 Courier Griffin
2 Bloodbond Vampire
2 Kalastria Nightwatch
1 Felidar Sovereign
1 Defiant Bloodlord
Non Creature Spells (9)
2 Dutiful Return
2 Demon's Grasp
2 Gideon's Reproach
2 Tandem Tactics
1 Roil's Retribution
Lands (26)
1 Blighted Steppe
2 Evolving Wilds
2 Mortuary Mire
10 Swamp
11 Plains
Synergy
For the most part, there’s plenty in the deck to complement the themes of the deck. However, there is a missed opportunity to inflict even more damage. With the amount of Allies in the deck, it’s a bit surprising that they decided not to include the common Kalastria Healer, an Ally that gains you 1 life and causes an opponent to lose 1 life each time a Healer or another Ally enters the battlefield under your control. The deck as it’s build seems more intent on gaining life and having Serene Steward put +1/+1 counters on your flyers - creatures that outside of their ability to fly and take the best advantage of those counters seem at odds with the flavor of the deck.
Grade: B-
For the most part, there’s plenty in the deck to complement the themes of the deck. However, there is a missed opportunity to inflict even more damage. With the amount of Allies in the deck, it’s a bit surprising that they decided not to include the common Kalastria Healer, an Ally that gains you 1 life and causes an opponent to lose 1 life each time a Healer or another Ally enters the battlefield under your control. The deck as it’s build seems more intent on gaining life and having Serene Steward put +1/+1 counters on your flyers - creatures that outside of their ability to fly and take the best advantage of those counters seem at odds with the flavor of the deck.
Grade: B-
Value
Felidar Sovereign was a fairly valuable mythic rare from Zendikar before being reprinted as a rare in Battle for Zendikar and seeing its value pounded into dust. That being said, it’s still a popular card among casual players and has single-handedly won many a Commander game with its alternate win condition ability. It’s a fine rare to have. Defiant Bloodlord, while being a bit slow mana-cost wise, is also playable in Commander as an alternative to the enchantment Sanguine Bond. Being a creature, though, it has the downside of being much easier to remove than an enchantment. Being a 4 / 5 flyer isn’t nothing, though. Since the deck offers an alternate art foil version of the Bloodlord, it’s a much better investment than the traditional non-foil set version. So as far as intro pack rares go, these are just fine.
The real value is in the Zulaport Cutthroat, which while only a complementary piece to this particular deck, can be a drain engine in the right deck, especially one that can crank out cheap creatures and sacrifice them for value (a theme which appears in the Battle for Zendikar Event Deck in a very playable manner.) Also, the two copies of Mortuary Mire are good to have, as it’s a utility land that is very playable.
Grade: B
Felidar Sovereign was a fairly valuable mythic rare from Zendikar before being reprinted as a rare in Battle for Zendikar and seeing its value pounded into dust. That being said, it’s still a popular card among casual players and has single-handedly won many a Commander game with its alternate win condition ability. It’s a fine rare to have. Defiant Bloodlord, while being a bit slow mana-cost wise, is also playable in Commander as an alternative to the enchantment Sanguine Bond. Being a creature, though, it has the downside of being much easier to remove than an enchantment. Being a 4 / 5 flyer isn’t nothing, though. Since the deck offers an alternate art foil version of the Bloodlord, it’s a much better investment than the traditional non-foil set version. So as far as intro pack rares go, these are just fine.
The real value is in the Zulaport Cutthroat, which while only a complementary piece to this particular deck, can be a drain engine in the right deck, especially one that can crank out cheap creatures and sacrifice them for value (a theme which appears in the Battle for Zendikar Event Deck in a very playable manner.) Also, the two copies of Mortuary Mire are good to have, as it’s a utility land that is very playable.
Grade: B
Improving the Deck
The first thing to do would be to have a full playset of Kalastria Healers in the deck. You’d also want two more Drana’s Emissary and at least one more Zulaport Cutthroat. A really good card for this deck would be March from the Tomb, which can bring back up to 8 converted mana cost worth of Allies back to the battlefield for 3BW (3 colorless, 1 Black, 1 White). This allows you to get multiple triggers from Kalastria Healer and make your Bloodbond Vampires really big in a hurry.
Overall this deck is probably a B or B-minus out of the box, but it’s fairly inexpensive to improve afterward. It’s also quite likely you’ll get one or two Kalastria Healers out of the two packs included with the product.
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