Magic the Gathering - Dragons of Tarkir Cruel Plots Intro Pack Deck Review

by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

The Cruel Plots Intro Pack from Dragons of Tarkir is all about the Exploit mechanic. Exploit is an optional ability allows you to sacrifice a creature in order to gain an effect. As many creatures also have a "when it dies" effect, this makes Exploiting a creature doubly useful.

The Deck List:

Creatures (26)

2 Shambling Goblin
1 Hand of Silumgar
2 Palace Familiar
2 Dutiful Attendant
1 Minister of Pain
1 Gurmag Drowner
2 Youthful Scholar
2 Rakshasa Gravecaller
2 Sidisi's Faithful
2 Qarsi Sadist
1 Ukud Cobra
1 Vulturous Aven
1 Wandering Tombshell
1 Profaner of the Dead
2 Silumgar Butcher
1 Necromaster Dragon
2 Ruthless Deathfang

Instants (6)

1 Negate
1 Silumgar's Scorn
1 Coat with Venom
1 Ultimate Price
1 Gravepurge
1 Death Wind

Artifact (1)

1 Silumgar Monument

Sorcery (1)

1 Mind Rot

Enchantment (1)

1 Reduce in Stature

Land (25)

1 Evolving Wilds
13 Swamp
11 Island

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Creatures

Necromaster Dragon is the cover card of the deck, but he has nothing to do at all with the Exploit mechanic. His ability activates when he deals combat damage to a player, and it costs 2 colorless mana to activate. That ability both gives you a 2/2 Zombie creature token and each opponent puts the top 2 cards of his or her library into the graveyard. You can use these tokens as Exploit fuel, of course. He's a 4/4 flyer for 5 mana, so it's possible he'll connect fairly often. "Milling" opponents is not really what this deck is about, so you're playing him mostly to get the tokens.

Ruthless Deathfang, however, makes a lot more sense for this deck's purposes. He's a 4/4 flyer for 4UB, and each time you sacrifice a creature, a target opponent must sacrifice a creature as well. It's sort of like a worse version of Dictate of Erebos. It's really good with Exploit.

So what nifty Exploit creatures do we have? We actually have a pretty good one in Profaner of the Dead. While he's not a "money" card in the set, the Profaner is quite playable. He costs 3U to cast and is a 3/3 Naga Wizard. His exploit abiity is quite powerful. When the Profaner exploits a creature, any of your opponents' creatures with toughness less than the exploited creature's toughness return to their owners' hands. With Exploit, the creature can in fact sacrifice itself to its own Exploit ability. This would mean any of your opponents' creatures with two or less toughness would be "bounced." A creature like Profaner is the answer to aggressive decks that really don't want their creatures going back to the hand.

Sidisi's Faithful is a one-drop Blue Exploit creature, and its ability is to bounce a creature to its owner's hand. Otherwise it's just a 0/4, which can be useful for defensive purposes. Qarsi Sadist is a 1/3 for 1B that has an Exploit ability of gaining you 2 life and costing an opponent 2 life. Vulturous Aven is a 2/3 flyer for 3B that Exploits for two cards at the cost of 2 life.

Minister of Pain is another Exploit creature, and his ability is to give opponents' creatures -1/-1 until end of turn. This is really good against decks that play a lot of tokens or otherwise small aggressive creatures. Gurmag Drowner's Exploit ability lets you look at the top 4 cards of your deck, choose one, and throw the rest in the graveyard. Rakshasa Gravecaller Exploits for two 2/2 Zombie tokens. Silumgar Butcher is a 3/3 for 4B that Exploits to give a target creature -3/-3.

There are some creatures in the deck that also actually benefit you by being sacrificed. Shambling Goblin gives a target creature -1/-1 when it dies. Palace Familiar draws you a card when it dies. Dutiful Attendant gives you a creature back from your graveyard to your hand. Youthful Scholar gives you two cards.

The other creatures in the deck are mainly defensive. Hand of Silumgar is a 2/1 with Deathtouch, Ukul Cobra a 2/5 with Deathtouch, and Wandering Tombshell is a 1/6. (Note: the Cobra and Tombshell are excellent Exploit targets for Profaner of the Dead.)

Non-Creature Spells

As far as Intro Packs go, there is quite a fascinating assortment of non-creature spells, primarily so with the instants. There's one artifact, the obligatory Monument for this deck, which is in this case Silumgar. Having the ability to fix for blue or black mana and get a 4/4 Dragon when you need it isn't bad. The lone Enchantment in the deck is Reduce in Stature, an Aura that enchants a creature, turning it into a 0/2. Mind Rot is the only Sorcery in the deck, a card seen in many sets, that makes a player discard 2 cards. Its inclusion here seems a bit odd, as there's no other discard component to this deck.

The Instants are where these spells get interesting. Negate is a simple counter-spell for non-creature spells. Silumgar's Scorn can counter any spell unless its controller pays an additional 1 mana, but counters that spell completely if you reveal a Dragon card from your hand or have a Dragon in play as you cast it. Coat with Venom is an interesting spell that gives a target creature +1/+2 and deathtouch until end of turn for only a single Black mana. It's a very defensive spell, and seems better suited for a Theros block Heroic deck than this Intro Pack – but it is good.

Ultimate Price is a reprint from Return to Ravnica, which destroys a mono-colored creature for 1B. It was a card that was very popular in its days in Standard, and should be quite good again. While there are plenty of strong multi-colored creatures, there are also many mono-colored creatures that you'd want to hit with this card.

Gravepurge is another reprint, this one from Dark Ascension. It allows you to put up any number of creature cards from your graveyard to the top of your deck, then draw a card, for 2B. Being Instant speed, it's probably best played at the end of an opponent's turn. Optimally you'd want to do so in order to draw one creature right away and have another one at the beginning of your next turn. You can stack as many as you wish, allowing you to reuse Exploit effects over and over. It's not a card you would typically see in competitive decks, but it's good in this case for an Intro Pack.

The last non-creature spell, Death Wind, is also a reprint, this one originally being printed at common in Avacyn Restored. It was bumped up to uncommon for Dragons of Tarkir. Death Wind is an X cost spell, and for X and a single Black mana, target creature gets -X/-X until end of turn. Because it's -X/-X indestructible abilities do not apply if the creatures toughness becomes 0 – it still dies. Not only can it be a useful removal spell, but even as a combat trick, as well.

Improving the Deck

The best Exploit creature in the Dragons of Tarkir set is easily Sidisi, Undead Vizier. Her Exploit ability allows you to add any card from your deck to your hand. On top of that, she's a 4/6 creature with Deathtouch. Not much can get around that. Some decks in Standard played two copies of her as soon as she was released.

Dragonlord Silumgar saw some Standard play upon release, as well, and his ability to steal an opponent's creature or planeswalker is extremely powerful. Speaking of planeswalkers, until he rotates out of Standard, Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver is a great candidate for this deck. Not only does he exile cards from your opponent's deck but also allows you to play any creatures you exile with Ashiok's ability.

Silumgar Sorcerer is another very good creature with Exploit. It's a bit surprising that no copies of him were included in this Intro Pack. He's another Exploit creature that has seen Standard play in Mono-Blue Devotion. He costs 1UU to cast and has Flash, meaning you can play him on an opponent's turn. He is a 2/1 flyer and his exploit ability counters a target creature spell. He's a creature you'll want a full playset of in a deck.

The deck probably also wants a bit more removal and another copy of Ultimate Price could replace the seemingly random Mind Rot. An extra copy of Silumgar's Scorn in place of Reduce in Stature seems like a good plan, too.

Of the Dragons of Tarkir Intro Packs, this one has a pretty solid strategy. It may not have a chase rare like Myth Realized or Secure the Wastes, but it's a solid introduction to the Exploit strategy.