Reanimation spells are always a tough cookie when it comes to Magic design. Make them too cheap, like Reanimate and Exhume, and they come online too quickly to be dealt with. Make them too expensive like Zombify and Rise from the Grave and they are too easy to answer from an already developed board state. Well, recently Wizards of the Coast found the happy medium they were looking for:

Adding haste to your five mana reanimation spell means your reanimation target can affect the board immediately, giving you value and the ability to damage your opponent's board state even if they are able to answer it on their turn. Haste is one of the best keywords in Magic, and you get all the power of a card like Through the Breach with the added benefit of not losing your threat.

If only we had something really good to give haste...

Core Set 2020 delivers again!

Time Stamps:

Match 1 - 00:05:54

Match 2 - 00:29:15

Match 3 - 00:48:35

Match 4 - 01:27:49

Sultai Reanimator | Core Set 2020 Standard | Jim Davis

• Creatures (8)
• 4 Tomebound Lich
• 4 Drakuseth, Maw of Flames

• Planeswalkers (6)
• 2 Narset, Parter of Veils
• 4 Tamiyo, Collector of Tales

• Instants (4)
• 2 Cast Down
• 2 Disfigure

• Sorceries (18)
• 2 Cry of the Carnarium
• 2 Duress
• 2 Ritual of Soot
• 4 Bond of Revival
• 4 Chart a Course
• 4 Thought Erasure

• Lands (24)
• 2 Island
• 2 Swamp
• 3 Breeding Pool
• 3 Hinterland Harbor
• 3 Overgrown Tomb
• 3 Woodland Cemetery
• 4 Drowned Catacomb
• 4 Watery Grave

• Sideboard (15)
• 2 Duress
• 2 Negate
• 2 Enter the God-Eternals
• 1 Noxious Grasp
• 1 Search for Azcanta
• 4 Thief of Sanity
• 1 Ritual of Soot
• 2 Ashiok, Dream Render

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Wrapped around a very nice Sultai (but essentially just Dimir) midrange shell, Bond of Revival for Drakuseth is a home run of an endgame. Most of our core cards like Thought Erasure, Cast Down, Narset, Parter of Veils, and friends all have quite the pedigree already, and enablers like Chart a Course and Tomebound Lich fit right in perfectly.

Tamiyo, Collector of Tales is our only Green card, but she is well worth the splash as she does basically everything we could ask for. She fills the graveyard, helps us play our midrange control game, and makes it super easy to find the right pieces to reanimate Drakuseth. By keeping the mana base mostly Dimir we also have very easy mana with a number of basic lands as well.

If you're looking for fun and power wrapped up into one nice little Standard package, Sultai Reanimator is where it's at. You get to have an insanely powerful and fun win condition, but also play a lot of great proven cards as well, which is typically a recipe for success in Standard.

So go forth an burninate the Standard countryside!