Locations
Welcome back! If you haven't seen my two prior articles going over the best X spells in the game, definitely check those out first, for the first 18 of my choices. Today we'll be going over the final nine. This list was very hard to whittle down, and I had to use a lot of personal opinion this time, since there were just so many good, fun, playable X spells. Either way, I think what we ended up with has been a solid list, and all of the cards on it are deserving of their spots.
Let's begin!
Meltdown
Meltdown has to be one of the best artifact removal spells of all time. So good, in fact, that it was recently reprinted into Modern in Modern Horizons 3. This assumes, however, that the artifacts you want to get rid of are no- or low-cost artifacts that you can afford to get rid of. If you're playing against Affinity, for example, it should be pretty easy to get rid of everything that costs three-mana or less, but it likely won't be too easy to take out those Myr Enforcers. Meltdown also happens to be great against all of the artifacts on these lists, ironically, since it will only cost a mana to destroy them. (I'm looking at you, Chalice of the Void.)
Mind Twist
Mind Twist is the best discard spell of all time. It's right up there with Thoughtseize and Hymn to Tourach. In fact Mind Twist was so good that it was "fixed" in Ice Age as a card called Mind Warp, which added three generic mana to the cost, and let you choose which cards the opponent would discard. It was then fixed again as Mind Shatter in Morningtide, which added another Black mana to the cost. This was a much better version that saw a good amount of play, but two Black mana plus X is far worse than one Black mana plus X.
Pest Infestation
One thing a lot of these cards seem to have in common is that so many of them are Vintage Cube all-stars. Pest Infestation also fits that bill. It reminds me a lot of Forth Eorlingus! in that you're getting a lot of power for the mana you spend here. Only, with Pest Infestation you're also able to destroy any artifacts and enchantments you might need to. But...the thing about Pest Infestation is you don't need to destroy anything to cast it. You can cast it just to make creatures!
Prismatic Ending
Prismatic Ending is a pretty sweet removal spell. It's very similar to Meltdown in that you basically pay the same amount of mana as the thing you want to kill. Only with converge, that mana needs to be of different colors. Typically with Prismatic Ending - similar to Meltdown - you're often casting it for three or less mana to get rid of permanents that cost three or less mana. Getting rid of a mana dork for one White mana has big Swords to Plowshares energy without any of that obnoxious life gain.
Rakdos's Return
Remember when we were talking about Mind Twist? Rakdos's Return is basically what you get when Mind Twist and Fireball have a baby. It's interesting to see multiple X spells on this list combine into a single, toned-down X spell. While the discard isn't random here (which was huge), being able to just straight up kill the opponent with this - or one of their planeswalkers - was considerably backbreaking.
Shoal Cycle (Blazing, Disrupting, Nourishing, Shining)
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I would say 80% of the Shoal cycle was playable at one point or another. In fact Blazing Shoal was banned in Modern - and still is - and Nourishing Shoul was a key component in the Grisel-shoal-brand combo deck (you should definitely Google that one). Disrupting Shoal is just a free counterspell! I think the only Shoal that didn't really see any competitive play was Sickening Shoal, but the rest were all aces, even if they were rarely cast for X mana.
Sphinx's Revelation
Remember when we were talking about Rakdos's Return? Well Sphinx's Revelation was basically the opposite of that. Aren't you loving all of the connections the cards on these lists have? I think they're pretty neat. Aside from being a competitive all-star, I absolutely love cards that have mirror versions. Like the Flash and Reverse Flash, to use a DC Comics reference. This card was a four-of in control decks for a while, and it still sees play in Pioneer control decks.
Walking Ballista
Walking Ballista is like Triskelion's big brother. Or little brother! Really depends on how much mana you pump into it, but Walking Ballista has been a banger of a card ever since it was printed. Being able to cast this as a 1/1 for two-mana or a 3/3 for six-mana makes it extremely versatile. Not to mention the fact that Walking Ballista is a fantastic win condition with any card that makes infinite mana or can put infinite counters on a card. Back in the day, we would have Winding Constrictor to add another counter to the Ballista when it entered the battlefield!
Wargate
Wargate is a weird one, and a wild way to end these lists, but it's been the centerpiece of multiple decks over the years in formats like Extended, and more recently Modern. Think of it as a Green Sun's Zenith that costs two more mana, but can search up any permanent rather than just Green creatures. Late last year, a deck with Tameshi, Reality Architect was making the rounds in Modern with Wargate, and it was kind of wild to see it doing well in competitive events again.
Anyway, thanks for reading and I'll catch ya next time!
Frank Lepore
