Summary
Journey into the center of one of Magic: The Gathering’s most fun planes with the Lost Caverns of Ixalan. This set brings you back to a world filled with massive Dinosaurs, armored Vampires, hidden Merfolk, and treasure-hungry Pirates.
Along with the set comes four preconstructed Commander decks, each designed around one of the four main factions from the set. Among the most terrifying of the decks is the Veloci-Ramp-tor deck, based around the scaly, massive lizards native to Ixalan and the Sun Empire. There are tons of cool cards in these decks so let’s take a look at some of the best cards you can find.
10Earthshaker Dreadmaw
A Strict Upgrade Over Its Colossal Cousin
The once-powerful Colossal Dreadmaw is getting power crept in Lost Caverns of Ixalan with the release of Earthshaker Dreadmaw. This six mana 6/6 Dinosaur comes with trample, matching Colossal Dreadmaw, and only gets better from here.
When you have Earthshaker Dreadmaw enter the battlefield, you get to draw a card for each other Dinosaur you control. While this Dreadmaw requires other dinos in play to get the extra value out of it, you have tons of potential to refill your hand, especially in a Dinosaur kindred deck.
9Rhythm Of The Wild
No More Counterspells For You
Making sure your Dinosaurs make it to the battlefield isan important part of the game, especially when you’re up against any deck that happens to play blue. Rhythm of the Wild pulls double duty here, making your creatures uncounterable while at the same time giving your nontoken creatures riot.
Riot lets you pick whether you want your creatures to come into play with haste, an important mechanic when it comes to pushing damage through, or a +1/+1 counter on them when they enter the battlefield, making them bigger and synergizing with cards like Doubling Season.
8Wrathful Raptors
A Dinosaur Never Forgives
The last time Ixalan came around it brought with it plenty of fun fight cards and creatures whose abilities trigger when they take damage. Wrathful Raptors keeps the trend going with a powerful ability spread across all your Dinosaur creatures.
Anytime a Dinosaur you control would take any type of damage, it in turn deals that damage to anything else, so long as your target isn’t a Dinosaur as well. The most interesting thing about this card is that you can target your opponents too, meaning you can drop cards like Blasphemous Act to deal a tremendous amount of damage to your creatures as well, and then redirect that damage to your opponent’s life totals.
7Ripjaw Raptor
Rip and Tear
Speaking of fighting creatures, Ripjaw Raptor gives the best bang for your buck if you’re looking to get some value from fighting creatures. With its enrage ability, Ripjaw Raptor draws you a card when it is dealt damage.
You don’t only have to fight things with Ripjaw Raptor, you can draw cards whenever it takes any type of damage. Generally speaking, your opponents probably won’t want you to draw tons of extra cards so you can reliably keep Ripjaw Raptor back as a blocker to stop most incoming attacks.
6Curious Altisaur
The Answer To All Your Dinosaur Questions
If you want to maximize your combat damage with your attacks, you’re going to want to start accruing extra value from your attacks instead of just making your opponents lose life. That’s where Curious Altisaur andits special Dinosaur-based ability comes in.
Anytime a Dinosaur you control deals combat damage to a player, you get to draw a card. Sure, you have to deal damage to an opponent to get the most out of the ability, but it all but guarantees that your opponents will have to make bad blocks to stop you from drawing cards.
5Akroma’s Will
Two Modes To Help You Win
Four mana to turn all your Dinosaurs into unstoppable monsters is a small price to pay for the ability to potentially win the game out of nowhere. This modular spell give you two choices, to either give all your creatures flying, vigilance, and double strike for the turn, or to give them all lifelink, indestructible, and protection from all colors.
The best part of Akroma’s Will is that you can pick both options if you control your commander, letting you turn each creature you control into a massive killing machine if you can keep your commander around when you cast it. Since it’s at instant speed, you can also use Akroma’s Will to save your creatures from most mass removal spells or to block a deadly attack.
4Regal Behemoth
A King Among Monsters
There are few more impactful mechanics in Magic than that of the monarch. This ability lets you draw an extra card at your endstep if you’re the monarch on your turn. Regal Behemoth gives you this title when it comes into play. Then, anytime you would tap a land for mana while you’re the monarch, you add one extra mana of any color, ramping you up to your bigger dinos.
You lose the monarch status anytime you take combat damage, but that shouldn’t be too much of a problem since your deck is stuffed full of all these massive Dinosaur creatures with trample like Regal Behemoth.
3Scion Of Calamity
There Can Only Be Four Scions
Another incredibly powerful ability slapped on to a Dinosaur exclusive to the Veloci-Ramp-tor preconstructed deck is myriad. Anytime a creature like Scion of Calamity attacks, it creates a token copy of it attacking each other opponent.
Now that you have at least three Scion of Calamities out, your odds of hitting a player with it are much higher, letting you trigger its ability to destroy an artifact or enchantment that the player controls. Pair Scion of Calamity with cards like Doubling Season to multiply your token generation and you’ll have tons of tokens all across the battlefield.
2Wayta, Trainer Prodigy
An Alternate Commander With A Strange Effect
A three-mana commanderis already pretty aggressively costed, and giving it haste only sweetens the deal, and with Wayta, Trainer Prodigy, you have plenty of opportunities to make use of her abilities.
For three mana you can tap Wayta to make two creatures fight, so long as you control one of them. If both of your targets are creatures you control, this ability only costs one green mana to activate. While it might not seem the best to damage your own creatures, if they have any sort of abilities like enrage on Ripjaw Raptor, that ability triggers two times instead.
1Zacama, Primal Calamity
A triple-threat Dinosaur in just one creature, Zacama, Primal Calamity is a combo machine when it comes to getting all sorts of value out of it. Zacama lets you make the most out of your spare mana, with three abilities that all impact the game in different ways.
For three mana, though a different color for each ability, you can deal damage to a creature, blow up an artifact or enchantment, or gain life. You also get to untap all your lands when Zacama comes into play, giving you space for infinite combos when you pair it up with cards like Temur Sabertooth.
Next:Magic: The Gathering – The Best Multicolored Cards In The Lost Caverns Of Ixalan
