MTG Top 10: Worst Enchantments | Magic: the Gathering | Episode 109 

i think it’s hilarious that you can use food tokens while you have Fasting on the board

Wizards obviously thought life gain was a much more powerful effect than it is in early sets.

At least the art on Unlikely Alliance is amazing.

I ship foofy shirt man with cyclops snu-snu woman.

fasting is really bad indeed but its a win flavor-wise

Unlikely Alliance really doesn't sound all that bad when compared to some others in the list

Unlikely Alliance is a terrible card, but Phil Foglio's artwork is so flavorfuly great. Still not playable. Awesome as always.

If an enchantment sees play in a Zedruu deck, that is a bad sign

Im puzzled at why unlikely alliance is at #1... I mean, its no game winner but 2 mana to ensure a creature(s) of yours always takes a decent trade or survives damage based removal before or after combat has way more use than some of that other jank that pings stuff for 1 and costs twice as much.

Hypothetical justification for Deep Water in edh: Your win condition in a 5 color deck is a 2 card infinite combo between some easy to access card (such as your general) and [[Mind Over Matter]]. You already run a bunch of enchantment tutoring to get the Mind Over Matter so getting the card is reasonable. In addition your deck has to lean pretty heavy green so you can run enough mana fixing and ramp to actually get started. You also run [[Palinchron]] for fixing and infinite mana. I'd consider running [[Deep Water]].

But Unlikely Alliance could potentially be good in a Doran deck that somehow has enough extra mana to go crazy with it. Although they could probably just block the one creature you used it a whole bunch on. Dang that sorcery speed is just a killer on it.

Actually Unlikely Alliance might be good in a Doran deck. Regular anthems are probably more efficient though.

lmao the Foglio's draw some amazing cards

I actually am loving that art on Unlikely Alliance.

Unlikely Alliance is going straight into my Pang Tong, "Young Phoenix" deck.

Unlikely alliance is ok in arcades EDH

Reckless Assault would be great with no mana cost for the ability. I’d definitely play an on-demand Gut Shot. Unlikely Alliance seems weird at #1. There are plenty of Doran players who would probably like that effect, and there are a number of times when the activated ability will be more useful than Assault Formation’s. Maybe they just don’t know about it?

Upside of oath of lim-dul is his pinky looks really long on the artwork and you get to look at it on the field

unlikely alliance, if you played against a lot of control players who only are ever red and blue, this could be able to put oyur creatures out of range of removal spells, especially if your commander already has 3 or 4 toughness like grand arbiter or medomai, the ageless. No, it's not a good card, but if you only ever play with the same people, take what you can get if they're THAT one dimensional in their removal spells.

Use unlikely alliance when you have a card or planeswalker that makes target creature deal damage to other target creature. Vivian, and Domri both let your creatures fight target other creature and Huatli makes creatures deal damage equal to its toughness. Depending on how smart you lay it I can see it actually doing some good.

Carnival of Souls, it tricks you into trying to build a deck around it!

Hey man, love your work, could you do a top 10 cards that fit in more decks?

how could you leave farmstead off the list

For fasting could it help if your library is about gone. It could help you stall for time I guess...

Wow I almost got a friction burn on my ear drums from how fast he was speaking in this one.

Unlikely Alliance is actually kinda decent in a Doran the Siege Tower or Arcades the Strategist EDH deck - especially in Arcades decks since they can combo off with infinite mana of any color. With Unlikely Alliance that means infinite damage - however Assault Formation IS a better option, but players that want an infinite damage option in white can most definitely go for Unlikely Alliance imo :) Plus the art work is sweet!

Reckless Assault is pretty bad, but funny enough back in the day I had an EDH Lyzolda deck that used this + Death Pits of Rath, to be able to ping things and destroy them if they take damage. I ran Repay in Kind as a finisher too... admittedly the deck had some jank, but when it worked it was amazing.

Top ten fun ruining cards!

Top 10 vintage cards! I NEED IT IN MY LIFE!

You can boost your creature with unlikely alliance at the end of your opponents declare attackers step.

I played a truly horrifying UB deck way back when that relied on Oath of Lim-Dul and Donate--it is such a bad card that it becomes win condition if you have a way to transfer it to your opponent, which, ironically, makes it pretty good card in the right deck. Donate the oath to the opponent and this enchantment becomes an anchor around their neck that has no upside if they aren't playing a black deck. Back then, there weren't as many mass removal cards for enchantments, and most targeted ones hit the opponent's cards. In addition to this combo, the deck just consisted of a bunch of control tools and life siphon cards to deal direct damage while gaining some life.

Can you imagine a reckless assault without the pay one mana in a deaths shadow style deck??

In my enchantress Tuvasa EDH deck, I have Attunement, a decent card made great in enchantress with the "Return this card to owner's hand:" mechanic like Cycle of Life.

Some of these would be extraordinary in a Zedruu deck.

I'd play Pyromania as a last choice card in sealed maybe and as a sideboard card in draft. It's a very lategame card where you are topdecking. It turns unwanted extra lands into pings.

I love the plains art behind the white cards. What's that from?

With the alliance one, can't you buff the creature before it's considered attacking/blocking? Like I could buff my 1/1 into a 1/5 during my opponents main phase 1 just so they know I can block their 4/x?

I've played unlikely alliance in Doran. It worked fine and is defenitly beter than all the cards before the number one spot.

I got an Oath of Lim-Dul in my first starter deck, along with Despotic Scepter and Orcish Librarian

You know, you could put Indestructible on Fasting. That would make it not a good but at least playable card, i.e. one for combos for mill decks with stuff like Howling Mine. So they had to add the Hunger Counters to make sure nobody will ever want to play this!

Deep Water when combining with Tron lands or Mage-Ring Network turns those into Blue Mana producers, it could also hose other Land mana changing cards like Evil Presence, or Pale Moon. It would also give your Imprisoned in the Moon enchanted card more use other than just colorless.

unlikely alliance is way better than most of the other cards on the list. The non-attacking clause is mostly irrelevant, and the non-blocking clause is almost always 100% irrelevant. Not a good card by any stretch, but compared to all the do-absolutely-nothing enchantments, I can see it actually being an big problem if a limited game went long, since my opponents creatures would be nearly unkillable with enough mana.

i would like a top of cards that went from zero to hero like horrible cards that with the pass of time turned broken

I had a deck with fasting and necropotence back in the day. Since you didn't actually draw the cards it kinda? worked.

Fasting had a really strong showing during the Necropotence and Stasis days. But those decks only dominated the meta for a very brief part of Magic history.

In an Arcades deck you could play Unlikely Alliance and pump all your creatures before declaring attackers. That way all of your creatures deal damage equal to its toughness when attacking. That card actually seems really good in one of those type of decks

The art on unlikely alliance is like an Unglued card

Unlikely Alliance seems like a weird choice for the #1 slot, even before considering combo potential in Arcades. There are plenty of situations where giving a creature 2 or 4 temporary toughness could allow it to swing safely into your opponent's board, or set up a safe block to prevent your opponent from attacking. Don't get me wrong, it's clearly a bad card - you'd be much better off running an Instant speed combat trick so you can actually punish your opponent for attacking or blocking into your untapped mana rather than just denying the attack/block - but it does something that is at least somewhat useful reasonably often, for a mana cost that isn't completely exorbitant, without any absurd downsides. That janky graveyard hate enchantment, and some of the abysmal life gain enchantments, all seem pretty clearly like worse cards than this. Once you're down to single digit deck inclusions on EDHRec, I don't think the exact numbers are meaningful anymore, so this being in 1 or 2 less terrible EDH lists shouldn't outweigh the fact that it is a less terrible card than many of the other terrible cards on this list. I think a good rule of thumb test for comparing dumpster tier cards is "how often would I rather draw this than a vanilla creature with a bad statline?" With a card like Fasting, the answer is pretty close to 'never.' With Unlikely Alliance, I think it's actually not that rare that you'd prefer it over a bad vanilla dude.

WOW I'm dying of laughter here!!!! AWESOME video!! Keep me laughing sir

I would love to be a fly on the wall when the creators were discussing some of these cards.

Now do top 10 legendary sorceries

@Deep Water: I know a ges applications for that. For example I am playing Baral Artefacts in EDH and sometimes you need just a little bit more blue mana to counter stuff, I think that could fix the problem to some degree.

You missed Farmstead, its WWW to get into play on your land, and then you have to pay WW on your upkeep to gain a single measly life.

How did you not find room on this list for Carnival of Souls? It's so bad, I thought of making a donate deck based around it.

Unlikely alliance would actually be good for an enrage pyrohemia edh deck

There are some truly wretched enchantments in Magic, but my vote for worst non-Aura has to go to Carnival of Souls, a card that is very very very bad now, as it essentially involves spending a card to give your opponent a free Corpse Knight while minimally accelerating you after the point where such acceleration matters, but was mind-numbingly awful when mana burn existed, since it would usually result in losing TWO life every time your opponent played a creature (and often when you played one yourself).

Pyromania looks like Chandra with her flame-hair trick making a super early appearance. (And sure, Unlikely Alliance may not be a great card... but it's worth having just for the art! I really miss the variety of art from the older sets, newer cards look a lot more "samey" without artists like the Foglios that have their own unique styles.)

Combine the Oath from number 9 with the card donate.

I can see using Fasting to prevent death to mill decks for 5 turns , but that's about it.

Unlikly allaince is pretty good in Arcades decks now.

would a card like City of Solitude be DQ from the list?

with Unlikely Alliance is only good in Doran The Siege Tower due to his ability, you put a good amount of mana to get a little more "power" to his next attack for that Commander damage and you can use it in response of an attack too like, Mage-Ring Responder trying to kill a very important creature you need to live.

I would like to argue that Fastening is the worst, since using it means you are actively shooting yourself in the foot, it is a literal trap.

Oath of lim-dul plus zedruu the greathearted. Not only does your opponent lose cards when they're damaged, you gain life and draw a card on your upkeep because they have your card.

Reckless Assault was a card I've always tried to make work but have always failed.

Where does Thought Lash fit in here?

Spiritual sanctuary can actually combo pretty well with tainted remedy. punish people who control plains with a life on their upkeep every time

There's only over 1000? That's so little, it feels like there would be more

There's a way to make opponants lose life if they were to gain life. If they're playing white Spiritual Sanctuary could be a great side board

Isn't the non-attacking-non-defending text on unlikely alliance just there to stop it from being used during the two actions, and said creature keeps the buff if they later in the turn do either

When did Lim Dul join the gatewatch?

YES!!!! Finally.

I liked Convalescence! I used it back in the day.

i love your videos

3:07 It can also target a creature you cast this turn, which makes it even worse.

That last enchantment could be useful in a deck with dismiss into dream and that white card from the epic cycle.

Top 8 mtg camels! (Would do top 10 but there may or may not only be 8 of them...)

Number 1 wouldn't be bad in a Doran EDH. You can pump a treefolk +2T for 2 mana. And then play any number of the green, black, white cards that do things based on toughness. Or you can boost one creature with it and equip it with Dragon Throne Of Tarkir.

I'd put that last one in a doran siege tower deck in a heartbeat

Number 3 is good if you use multiples. It only costs 2 to play and it can keep you in the game if you have 3-4 on the field. Plus it's a cheap enchantment, so it can keep a mid-game enchantment deck going early on against an aggressive burn deck

Lichs mastery seems like a fixed oath of lim dul

#1 is awful but... it's a Phil Foglio (of Girl Genius fame) art card so that makes it special enough to put one in your collection. Also... it did see some play with pestilence among my friends group back in the day (yes yes get off my lawn) so nostalgia powers activate.

I used Search the city in one of my mono blue decks for casual managed to get 5 Islands on top so it isn't completely useless.

Unlikely Alliance honestly doesn’t seem that terrible in a Wall EDH deck. If you have a deck set up to give your walls the ability to attack, like with Arcades, then it’s a great mana sink.

Mortiphobia is a card I feel could be great if it only cost a single black mana. Throw something into your graveyard to reanimate it later while also hating on a graveyard? Hell yeah, shame the card costs so much

let me understand, n°1 is actually the best card of the ten worst?

I can see unlikely alliance working with doran

I know Oath of Lim-dûl looks terrible, but it's absurdly powerful if you can give it to another player. Suddenly you've just given shock annihilator 2.

a bad enchantment i found recently is 'tefiri's veil' it just makes your attacking creatures phase out after combat. it wont save them from combat damage, and it does not make them leave/enter the battlefield. even the flavour text questions the usability of the card: "...just what did teferi think he is doing". the only thing i can imagine it helping with is sorcery speed removal.

So weird to see a card I've got as number 1. I've puzzled over how weak that spell is.

I actually like reckless assault. It is actually very efficient at killing goblin welders deathrite shamans etcetera.

Art for pyromania reminds me of Chandra a bit.

Oath of Lim Dul isnt the best but I still love this card.

What about top ten best charms or cantrips

I got two iceage gems I think are worse than most of these, and they even combo together! Snowfall, Reality Twist

Wow! These cards make Armistice look good!

Unlikely alliance is great counter to burn decks. They can never bolt or pyroblast your white knight 🫠

Carnival of Souls

I just wonder how a baby from unlikely alliance would look like

Deep Watee could be good in blue devotion