So after a few weeks of doing everything from home remodeling to sipping pina coladas at a swim up bar at a resort in Cancun, your ol' Uncle's back from the brink to bring you an exciting new installment of (Bringin' It) Back From The Brink, my favorite way to talk about Magic's low-key horizontal card cycles.
Today I'm going back to our first tour of Mirrodin to re-visit the Pulse cycle. So let's get started.
PULSE OF THE FIELDS
Right off the bat, we have some serious life gain. If you're familiar with a lot of Cube Drafts and Limited from Mirrodin, this card is basically responsible for turning "Red Deck Wins" into "Red Deck Loses."
In our fun little format though, this is one of the better life white life gain spells. As you'll see with the rest of this cycle, the trick to casting these cards with value will be predicated upon you being behind.
What's nice about Pulse of the Fields is that you can leverage this effectively if you've set yourself up to be the threat early on. Mono-White Darien decks like quick little life gains because they help keep the Soldier factory going and it's not as gigantic of a spell as Beacon of Immortality. Slow and Steady life gain is underrated, particularly when you can keep up mana and use it as an Instant. If it were a Sorcery this would be terrible. Thank goodness it isn't.
PULSE OF THE FORGE
From experience, this card isn't really what you want to be playing in EDH. I tried this out for a while in Hidetsugu, thinking it would be great against Aggro decks that try to attack HH downhill.
It's a bit of a trap. There's not a lot of extra casting that is going to be done if your red deck is playing well, and if you're behind, chances are it isn't enough damage to get you back in the game, even in the late-late.
This is definitely a card that was made for Standard and Limited, and I think it should be left there to shine.
PULSE OF THE TANGLE
That isn't to say this card is terrible. Sorcery speed is particularly crippling, but there is still a little appeal. Decks needing Chump Blockers and Sac Outlets could control their creature count well. Additionally, Rogue Control decks that splash Green could find some appeal too.
Pulse of the Tangle is the sketchiest card to try out of this cycle. It's silly, but there are plenty of deck designs that could benefit from having a creature token maker that is tougher to interact with.
PULSE OF THE DROSS
One of the different things about this card is that it's easy to defend if your opponent can out draw you and is able to remember the cards they've shown you.
Ideally, this card doesn't really want to be cast over and over again, I don't think. It's best in a place where you and your opponent are almost to top deck mode (around 3-4 cards each), which is a little too specific for my tastes.
I really do with they'd revisited this kind of card in Scars versus the Chancellor cycle.
PULSE OF THE GRID
Last up is the big blue beats. Recurrable Catalog is legitimate, even in a color where card draw is a thing.
Blue decks love cards that provide flexibility and card advantage. At Instant speed, PotG gives any blue deck the opportunity to game manage and dig for answers.
One of the biggest drawbacks to this card is that if you're looking to get too far ahead of your opponent, Pulse's ability prevents you from abusing it.
Still, this card thrives in non-control decks where blue is a splash color and spells are getting played. It is hands down the best Pulse.
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| The most obscure "V for Vendetta" Reference I could make. |
Until then, You Find Your Own Tree.
Happy Guy Fawkes Day. Make sure it's a 5th of November you'll never forget.
-UL
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