Pulse of Murasa

Today I want to talk about the card that has been powering out many of the top decks in the recent Standard Pauper tournaments: Pulse of Murasa. When I originally reviewed Oath of the Gatewatch, I thought that the card had some potential, but I never would have predicted that it would become a cornerstone of Green decks in the format. So what makes this card so good?

While the general consensus is that Lifegain cards aren't very good, it turns out that in Standard Pauper they can prove to be quite important. Past cards like Lone Missionary and Sylvok Lifestaff have been surprise hits in the format, and it seems that Pulse of Murasa is following in that same tradition. In a similar vein, cards like Reclaim or Disentomb are pretty bad in most Limited and Constructed formats. But when you put these two effects together, you end up with something that somehow is greater than the sum of its parts.

Additionally, it must also be mentioned that this card is both reasonably costed and an Instant, making it easily slot into any Control archetype that has access to Green mana. Place this in a format that has above average removal, and where most decks are geared around winning the long game, you have a perfect environment for Pulse of Murasa to be at its best.

So are there any good ways to deal with this card? Unfortunately, at the moment the format lacks any method of dealing with opposing creatures once they are placed in the Graveyard. Therefore, your only real option is to directly counter the spell using permission spells like Negate. Alternatively, you can also use removal like Complete Disregard or Oblivion Strike to ensure that your opponent's best creatures never end up in the Graveyard in the first place.

What has your experience with this card been? Got any good strategies to deal with decks that utilize it? Let me know in the comments below.

Oath of the Gatewatch Top Picks: Green

Oath of the Gatewatch prereleases officially begin on Friday on Magic Online, and I know many players are eager to get their hands on the new cards. Both Part One and Part Two of my Standard Pauper review of the set are available now on PureMTGO, so I encourage you to check those out for more detailed analysis of all of the cards.

I've already written about the new colorless mana from the set as well as a first look at the new Lands at Common. Today, I finish up my evaluation of my top two picks at Common from each of the five colors for Oath of the Gatewatch. So far I've looked at White, Blue, Black, and Red. All that's left then is Green.

Best Green Common: Scion Summoner

Nest Invader is reborn as a 3/3 for 2G, albeit split among two creatures. Even better, the Eldrazi Scion potentially both ramps and fixes your mana if you need Colorless, and is probably one of the best ways to generate Colorless mana in Oath of the Gatewatch. Green would gladly play a vanilla 3/3 for 2G, and while this isn't quite that good, the extra versatility helps make up for what it lacks in raw power. I would love to see a Green Ramp deck come back into the spotlight, and this card seems like it would be a natural inclusion.


Green Runner Up: Stalking Drone

This card seems good if you have access to Colorless mana, but is otherwise fairly mediocre. Giving it a virtual Holy Strength for a single Colorless mana is a great deal, potentially allowing this to attack as a 3/4 on Turn 3. Better yet, since this would most natural fit in a Green Stompy archetype, getting access to Colorless mana should be relatively easy. Also worth noting is that often simply the threat of being able to pump this up will often be enough to discourage your opponent from blocking it. At the end of the day, the only thing holding this back is the requirement that you have consistent access to Colorless mana.

Overall I thought Green was much better here than in the previous set. What do you think?