Magic: The Gathering's newest expansion set, Kaldheim, is turning some heads with its Norse mythology theme and Sagas in Limited, but that's not the only exciting set coming out in early 2021. The Time Spiral Remastered set is right around the corner, and like Kaldheim, this set will appeal mainly to longtime players.
The spoiler season has begun, and Time Spiral Remastered's white cards are shaping up in interesting ways. Earlier previews introduced the white cards of the white-black Rebel archetype, and the newest white cards are ready to enter and leave the battlefield in a swirling vortex of chaos. These white cards are tricky to pin down.
Time Spiral Remastered's White Creatures Have Powerful ETB Effects
Time Spiral Remastered features many aggressive or tricky white cards that are ready to confuse and frustrate the opponent with their nifty abilities, many of which involve entering or leaving the battlefield. This is nothing new; for years, white mana has focused on "blinking" creatures or using powerful ETB effects, and Time Spiral Remastered is cashing in on that.
Many of these new white creatures have diverse abilities when they hit the battlefield. Angel of Salvation is a 5/5 flying beater with flash and convoke. This makes it cheap and unpredictable, and when it enters the battlefield, five damage will be prevented, spread out across any number of creatures, planeswalkers or players. This can save a creature from a Lightning Bolt, for example, or spare the player five damage from an enemy attacker. This might even save the player from defeat.
Thraben Inspector hails from the dark world of Innistrad, and it's a 1/2 Human Soldier that makes a Clue when it enters the battlefield. Card draw is weak in white mana overall, so the Inspector helps white-based Time Spiral Remastered decks resist that trend and get some extra cards. Flickering this creature or returning it to the hand will yield even more Clues, a fine reward for playing into this strategy.
Ivory Giant is a 3/4 with Suspend, and it can tap nonwhite creatures to clear the way for an all-out assault on the opponent's life total. Finally, Stonehorn Dignitary is a defensive 1/4 that will nullify the opponent's next combat step, buying the player all kinds of breathing room. Flickering that will make the whole game totally one-sided, combat-wise.
How Time Spiral Remastered Tosses White Creatures Around
A variety of creatures and noncreature spells alike appear in white, to help re-use a deck's best ETB effects and squeeze extra value from its cards. Whitemane Lion is a 2/2 for {1}W with flash, and it will return another friendly creature to the hand. Doing that to Thraben Inspector means re-casting it for just W, and getting another valuable Clue token, for example.
Flickerwisp and Restoration Angel are both staples of the Modern Death & Taxes deck archetype, being flying beaters that can exile friendly creatures and put them back onto the battlefield. This serves two purposes: re-using ETB effects for extra value, and saving a friendly creature from harmful effects, such as combat damage, removal spells and negative Auras. Flickerwisp does all this at sorcery speed, but it can still help get rid of negative Auras or -1/-1 counters on an ally, and re-use its ETB effects. Restoration Angel can do all that with flash, and it has more toughness. However, it cannot target other Angels.
Stonecloaker is a 3/2 Gargoyle that also has flash; it will bounce a friendly creature to the hand, just like Whitemane Lion. Stonecloaker will also exile a card from a graveyard, meaning it can weaken the opponent's graveyard effects such as flashback cards or reanimation. This can neatly deny the opponent their best moves, and Stonecloaker can start attacking and blocking as a 3/2 flier in battle.
Finally, this set's white cards include Momentary Blink, an instant costing {1}W that will exile a creature, then put it right back onto the battlefield. This card inspired the term "blink" to describe such an effect, and it can save friendly creatures from death and re-use their ETB effects for cheap. It also has flashback, costing {3}U, which suggests a white-blue blink archetype for games of booster draft Limited. Together, white and blue cards will be bouncing all over the place in Time Spiral Remastered, and no opponent can hope to keep up.