Breaking the colorful world of Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings intoMagic: the Gathering’s color pie wasn’t particularly difficult, but that still left a number of tools, weapons, and stale bread to categorize. Luckily, Magic is just as colorful even when it doesn’t apply any colors, and Tales of Middle-earth will be no exception.
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With the entire card list of Tales of Middle-earth revealed, we’ve been able to scour the set for the best colorless cards, including artifacts and lands. Some of these will be ideal additions to older artifact decks, while others will be perfect pairings for Standard.
10Wizard’s Rockets
In a set as colorful as Tales of Middle-earth, mana fixing will be an important factor in building your decks. Wizard’s Rockets offers mana fixing in spades while also providing you with a cantrip in a colorless bottle.
For older decks, Wizard’s Rockets offers another cheap artifact that draws a card and does something else helpful at the same time. You can never have too many Chromatic Stars, and Wizard’s Rockets is another to add to the pile.
9Lembas
On the surface, Lembas looks kind of boring. Scry 1 and then draw a card is fine for two colorless mana, and later getting three life is not a bad deal. What makes Lembas interesting is its potential for late-game limited play.
Imagine surviving to your dozenth turn in a draft game where both you and your opponent are down to just a handful of life points. Then you draw Lembas, and suddenly you have life gain and a card that’ll keep you from drawing yourself to death. That’s something worth keeping in your sideboard at least.
8The Grey Havens
Scrying on a land is pretty great, and having that land come into play without needing to wait for it to untap is even better. The mana fixing is nice, but it’s going to be tricky when that legendary creature card needs to be dead for it to offer up its colors.
The Grey Havens might not make it out of Tales of Middle-earth, but if you play a Commander that likes to play in the graveyard, this is a land worth picking up.
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7Phial of Galadriel
Yes, Phial of Galadriel is essentially a mana rock, but it’s a mana rock with bonuses. Being able to draw extra cards when you’ve hit rock bottom is good enough, but gaining twice as much life when you’re on the ropes is even better.
This is a surefire pick for aggressive Commander decks, and it’s also something worth considering for ramping Tales of Middle-earth decks. Don’t sleep on this one.
6Horn of Gondor
Just like in the book, the Horn of Gondor can be your salvation. For a deck centered around humans, Horn of Gondor just keeps pumping them out until your opponent can’t deal with them anymore.
It’s an escalating threat that can absolutely destroy opponents that don’t mainboard artifact hate. In draft, Horn of Gondor is even more threatening and is the perfect end-game for a human-centric control strategy.
5Mithril Coat
Mithril Coat is the perfect way to foil your opponent’s plans. Surprise indestructibility can suck removal cards out of your foe’s hand and protect your preferred legendary creature from meeting an unfortunate demise. On top of that, they get to keep the armor to become indestructible for as long as they’re wearing it.
Just be wary of red mages that might want to Cast into the Fire. Volcanoes don’t just kill fancy rings.
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4Palantir of Orthanc
In general, it’s not a great idea to give your opponent any options, but Palantir of Orthanc offers such delightful opportunities for playing mind games that you just can’t ignore it. Early on, opponents are probably going to be fine with losing what will likely be a small amount of life, but once Palatir of Orthanc has three or four counters is when the real fun begins.
Scry 2, make a face, and then ask your opponent whether they want to let you draw a card or take damage. Then watch them squirm as they agonize over letting you draw that card or losing potentially a game-ending amount of life. It’s delicious.
3Glamdring
Gandalf’s signature sword is the perfect accompaniment to a spell-focused deck. It’s ideal when used a creature with some form of evasion as it will let you cast instants or sorceries for free, and after a few turns of this, you’ll wind up with a powerful threat.
Just be sure to make sure those spells replace themselves (such as Birthday Escape or Council’s Deliberation), otherwise you’ll find yourself without instants or sorceries to cast.
2Anduril, Flame of the West
Another sword that should be in everyone’s arsenal, Anduril, Flame of the West is a spirit-infused beatdown machine. You’ll want to equip Anduril to a legendary for its most powerful effect, which throws in a pair of 1/1 white spirit tokens with flying to help in your assault.
There aren’t too many cards that care about spirits in Tales of Middle-earth, but King of the Oathbreakers could be the perfect pair for Anduril. One token swarm to rule them all.
1The One Ring
You probably saw this coming, but The One Ring truly is the real deal. Ever since the days of Necropotence, Magic players have known that trading life for cards is more than a fair exchange, and The One Ring is able to deliver that deal to every deck regardless of their colors.
The only problem with The One Ring is that the life you lose escalates every time you use it. This artifact shouldn’t be wielded without the utmost care, and most importantly of all, a plan. Otherwise, you’ll find yourself consumed by The One Ring’s seductive power.
Next:Magic: The Gathering – Lord Of The Rings: Tales Of Middle-earth Previews
