Magic: the Gathering Aetherdrift Review, Part 4 of 4: Red and Green Cards

Magic’s newest expansion takes us back to the plane of Avishkar, formerly known as Kaladesh, as the New Culture Collective prepares for their second annual multiplanar Ghirapur Grand Prix death race. A new set means new cards, and we’re continuing our review with the white, blue, and black cards.

Aetherdrift will release to Magic: the Gathering Online and Arena on February 11th, 2025, and to the tabletop on February 14th.

Last time we covered the white, blue, and black cards, and this time as usual we won’t be looking at everything, but what we will be looking at, we’ll be looking at primarily but not exclusively with an eye for Commander play.

 

Boommobile

Marcy: The refund is neat, although probably harder to use than just four mana directly. I do like the overall card here though, as I think this set will want to and have ways to use this mana.

Loxi: This is pretty decent, refunding itself and providing a one-time removal spell is a decent package. It being only usable on abilities is the one caveat here, and while that does mean it can fuel up a removal spell for itself, that ends up being a pretty expensive removal piece with a body. It’s fine, I think if you have more other abilities to juice with this it’s not too shabby.

BPhillipYork: There’s definitely some way to abuse this with flicker or something; other than that it can blow something up once which is neat.

 

Burnout Bashtronaut

Marcy: A lot of text on a one mana card, for sure, and more proof that Max Speed is really, really easy to get.

Loxi: The abilities this has end up working really well with anthems, which goblins have in spades. Speeding up shouldn’t be a hassle for the decks that like this as well. Solid stuff, it’s a good one drop for most goblin decks to get smackin’ from the start.

BPhillipYork: Okay, sure, for goblin decks and aggro it’s fun.

FromTheShire: Really good speed enabler, and combined with a couple other cards on our list may actually lead to a playable Goblin deck in Standard which is awesome.

 

Chandra, Spark Hunter

Marcy: I was starting to wonder if we’d see any actual Planeswalkers, but here’s Chandra! She’s kind of scary, actually, because she can make a 3/2 creature with haste on her turn that sticks around, and also has good draw discard.

BPhillipYork: That emblem is awesome. Three turns to get there is rough out the gate but activating vehicles is potentially nasty. There are some big fat artifact creatures, mainly out of the Universes Beyond set; why can’t Chandra ride a Necron Monolith like a motorcycle? It’s canon.

 

Count on Luck

Marcy: Pretty much Red Phyrexian Arena with no real downside, actually. An amazing card I think.

Loxi: Phrexian Arena is a staple for a good reason, and while some people don’t like to run that as much these days, it’s hard to deny that long-term card advantage can be really helpful in a lot of scenarios. I often prefer these types of cards to short term draw spells in decks that always need to be keeping fuel in their hand, and while this doesn’t really provide a full card in hand it doesn’t make you lose life like Arena. I wouldn’t run this in spell heavy decks, but I can see lots of play for this in Aggro/creature focused strategies that can use this to just drop extra bodies every turn.

BPhillipYork: Card draw is card draw. Super strong for certain kinds of decks that want to play from exile, and otherwise just more card draw, effectively.

 

Daretti, Rocketeer Engineer

Marcy: Considering how many free artifacts you can have, this could be a pretty scary card–really kind of like Greasefang in some ways, although without the haste aspect. I think this card could certainly see some competitive play.

Loxi: I like that this provides a reasonable threat/win condition for this strategy, as old Daretti, Scrap Savant is mostly control focused. While this is a bit slower, it gives you a reliable way to do artifact loops all in one card and still wallop people with a potentially pretty big commander.

BPhillipYork: Looping through big artifacts is really unpleasant, but so slow and telegraphed that it’s probably not a big deal. At 5 mana and no haste, this thing is taking forever to leave the station.

 

Draconautics Engineer

Marcy: I get why you can only do this once, but it does kind of feel a little whatever because of that.

Loxi: One mana to give the board haste is neat, but I often would rather play things like Hammer of Purphoros or Anger that can just always keep it around, even if you lose the bodies initally.

BPhillipYork: The highlight is the haste, giving that out en masse is dangerous.  Making a dragon is mostly funny, but still kind of neat.

FromTheShire: This is another valuable piece for the Goblin deck, which is running Krenko, Mob Boss at the top end. Running Krenko out with summoning sickness is a terrible plan, with haste though he becomes wildly dangerous. Engineer is your backup plan in that department since you have to pay for it, but this is still a card you’re absolutely including.

 

Fuel the Flames

Marcy: Probably okay-ish at red that wants to control other aggro from overrunning it, but it is a little expensive at 3 mana.

Loxi: I always feel like a broken record, but stuff like this shines in Torbran, Thane of the Red Fell and should be kept in mind for other decks where instances of damage can get some bonuses like that.

BPhillipYork: Damage based board clear is okay; the threshold is generally having 3 toughness and this is true to form there. Slightly buffed with 2 colorless 1 red and cycling from previous iterations.

 

Full Throttle

Marcy: Assuming your deck is set up to take advantage of this, I assume this will be a game ending card for sure, right?

Loxi: Extra combats are scary. Two are absolutely terrifying. Aside from infinite combat shenanigans, this can be timed well to just outright win the game, and it should be used as such. This is basically a finisher for any combat focused decks, which rules pretty hard as it gives a more unique take on red combat finishers rather than a big ol’ board buff.

BPhillipYork: Yeah, that’s a dangerous card. Especially the second paragraph has implications for other creatures that generate extra combat phases but have limiters on untapping. For 6 mana it’s potentially playable, though it’s kind of a win more. 2 isn’t enough, generally, so the extra cost actually makes it probably not worth it even if it’s more efficient mana to combats ratio, because if you really need this to go off several times this doesn’t do it.

 

Gastal Thrillroller

Marcy: I really like these vehicles that come in and are ‘creatures’ so they can do stuff without being crewed. I don’t know if it is very good otherwise, but honestly this is a solid body that can come back.

Loxi: Not a commander piece for sure, but I really like this for limited. This can really slug people down and easily get crewed up by pilots or other 1-2 drop bodies.

BPhillipYork: It’s neat, but like, meh. I like the design but for Commander doesn’t really do anything.

 

Greasewrench Goblin

Marcy: The art on this card fucking rules.

Loxi: Nah, it’s fine but it’s not worth it for commander decks. I’d rather play a more proactive or dangerous early drop and run more efficient other draw spells rather than have them stapled together.

BPhillipYork: It’s okay if you’re fishing or kind of wanting to mill things for some reason, but there’s so many more useful goblins with repeatable abilities.

 

Hazoret, Godseeker

Marcy: Oh hey Hazoret, nice to see you again. Also, she’s going to attack literally immediately, isn’t she; let’s be real. I’m not really looking forward to seeing how she impacts red aggro.

Loxi: Unblockable creatures can get really dangerous, and having access to them in mono-red is pretty handy. Getting max speed isn’t hard at all for low to the ground aggro decks, especially when you enable them getting in for reliable damage. Most importantly? She’s a two drop. Good stuff here.

BPhillipYork: This seems mostly like a way to start your engines and then, I dunno, crew stuff. It’s fine for that, cheap if you need mount or crew 5. The unlockable is potentially really powerful to slip in things your opponent really doesn’t want to get hit with, unblockable Master of Cruelties is an unpleasant thing.

 

Howlsquad Heavy

Marcy: I’m wondering if this will help Goblins become a typal in Standard again. This certainly would give them the boost they need and really serves as a solid engine for it.

Loxi: Now this is a goblin. This just does an absolute ton of stuff for one card and will absolutely be a goblin staple. That max speed effect is dangerous if you have any board state at all, and any goblin that makes more goblins is always fantastic. Adding haste to the mix is just aces. Probably my favorite card in the set as far as slam-dunks into existing decks.

BPhillipYork: Wow, that’s a solid thing for 3 mana. Haste all around for goblins, make more goblins, they attack, and once you have max speed generating a ton of mana to really go off. Solid piece for Krenko and other goblin token generator decks.

FromTheShire: This is the big one to get Goblins going. The haste is wildly powerful for enabling Krenko and chaining together the mana ability if you have multiples, and with Dropkick Bomber and Rundvelt Hordemaster as lords the token punches above its weight as well. All-Star.

 

Marauding Mako

Marcy: So again, the shark pirates want you to draw discard, but why don’t their ‘icon’ character help facilitate this? This card also doesn’t do that on it’s own.

BPhillipYork: I guess this guy could get really big then he’s basically a big vanilla beater, which is fine. It only costs 1, so you can just plunk it down to generate threat. Oh it’s shark guy, that’s fun.

 

Push the Limit

Marcy: I love this card just because it has 4 giant hippos.

BPhillipYork: So this is Wacky Races the card TM? I mean, for 7 mana can you even deal 120 damage with your yard loaded? Funny, because you’d have Angels and cards and Necrons and stuff being generated, but still kind of meh.

 

Road Rage

Marcy: That sort of weird red removal burn that may be useful in certain situations but probably isn’t that useful in the long run.

Loxi: This is actually really solid removal for vehicle decks, if you have at least one or two things on board this can snipe a huge chunk of threatening creatures that you won’t be able to tackle with combat.

BPhillipYork: So it’s like Shock but slightly improved. Shock is playable so this is too.

FromTheShire: Not being able to go face is a definite downside.

 

Skycrash

Marcy: Less good Abrade, but you can cycle it, so that’s good.

Loxi: It’s pretty solid, I still think I usually prefer Abrade with the double flexibility, but in scenarios where both forms of that aren’t going to be useful, this will outclass it a bit.

BPhillipYork: Just solid artifact removal with cycle in case you don’t need it, very cheap, seems good.

 

Afterburner Expert

Marcy: Sure, I guess? If Exhaust were repeatable or something this could be okay, but it feels pretty… whatever.

Loxi: I’d see some merit with this in aristocrats-y decks, but I think you likely wont have enough exhaust effects on cards in a singleton format to leverage this.

BPhillipYork: It’s cute but like, meh.

 

Agonasaur Rex

Marcy: Another pretty good cycling card to add flexibility, but I am unsure of how useful it will be in Standard at the moment; I would be curious to see if this rekindles Dinosaurs, or helps do so anyway.

Loxi: I can see this going into a lot of Dinosaur decks as a way to have a really flexible protection spell that can function as a good body or buff in a pinch. Solid stuff and pretty great stats.

BPhillipYork: The cycle is the real upside here, potentially handing out trample or the biggie indestructible. Also a big fattie if you need that, dino deck go.

 

Defend the Rider

Marcy: The cost is what makes this card really useful, for sure; any more and it would have been far, far less useful.

Loxi: Being one mana makes this slot really easily into a lot of decks, and even sometimes just making a chump blocker can be handy if you don’t have a ton of vehicles in your deck. It targets any permanent, which is really nice to dodge some niche things like spot land removal as well.

BPhillipYork: Solid indestructible hexproof modal instant to protect something you need or just generate a random pilot if that is what you need.

 

District Mascot

Marcy: So, assuming this thing doesn’t immediately explode or die, you can really abuse taking counters off of this, and a deck that wants to remove counters and mess with them might see this card pop up.

Loxi: Optimally, this is something you want in a deck that will make sure it can get extra counters from other sources. I don’t think it gets enough on its own to keep it safe from dying before you can get more than a single activation from it, but in dedicated counter decks it can do some serious work without even really needing to attack as much. It’s a solid one drop for sure, and I can see this going in a lot of decks that just distribute counters like Costco samples.

BPhillipYork: Neat, I like this card. It’s a cute dog for one thing and has nice card design, I guess you can ride it. Obviously fun to ride it with like Kozilek, for reasons. Getting it big enough to survive artifacts blowing up is a chore, but it’s a nice set of trade offs.

 

Dredger’s Insight

Marcy: For self mill, I think this is a pretty good card to help you stay alive if you are taking a lot of damage while trying to find your combo pieces.

Loxi:  This is a really good mill piece, two mana to mill 4 and replace itself is solid in itself, providing a bunch of lifegain from thereon out is wild value. It’s not going to win you the game but I genuinely think this is a great card for any permanent heavy graveyard deck.

BPhillipYork: Potentially a way to gain infinite life with certain loops, useful for that or if you can use your life aggressively as a resource in a mill/reanimate type deck.

 

Lumbering Worldwagon

Marcy: Wow, this could be really scary in a ramp deck. Even in a non-ramp deck, a green deck is going to have slight excess of lands, meaning by around turn 6 this thing is gonna be punching hard.

Loxi: Whew, this has the potential to ramp you a lot if you play enough creatures to make sure you can attack reliably with this. It’s slow enough that I wouldn’t just jam this in every land-based strategy, but if you have enough reliable early power to make sure this is attacking ASAP when you play it on curve, it’s got a pretty scary ceiling.

BPhillipYork: Solid ramp card, crew 4 is disappointingly hard to get to but it auto ramps the first time you drop it and worth it to get those lands coming out. If you are doing land matters deck will probably get scarily big quite fast.

 

March of the World Ooze

Marcy: Green will have no problem getting this down, and if you can’t get rid of it, this card is going to be a huge problem that generates 3/3s that then become 6/6s.

Loxi: This is a card for a small green deck that wants to do big green things. The Ooze part doesn’t override your initial type, so I can see this going bananas in things like Elves or Insects that almost always will be weaker than 6/6.

BPhillipYork: Neat. I mean it’s too expensive, but it is full of ooze, and I like it makes elephants that are auto-oozes.

 

Molt Tender

Marcy: Tap: Mill a Card. What else do you want it to do? Actually, I really like this. It is a little bit of ‘extra steps’ Birds of Paradise, but it’s quite usable.

BPhillipYork: Really solid card, mana dork and mill thing. Neat. Yet another card that massively benefits from you running the good search lands.

 

Oviya, Automech Artisan

Marcy: The biggest thing on this card that stands out to me is the wording. I suppose it has to say this to specify against, say, Planeswalkers or Battles?

Loxi: I’m always happy to see new archetypes being pushed, and this really enables big green artifact creatures really well. While it doesn’t do anything particularly groundbreaking outside of some extra group slug, it opens up a solid choice if you want to go the green ramp route but jam big artifact creatures instead of the typical green beatsticks.

BPhillipYork: Wow, empowering things that are attacking your opponents is nice, and just dumping out creatures and vehicles is super strong. Interesting commander, though it’s probably not going to do what it seems to want to, which is dump out vehicles, but rather just big huge creatures.

 

Plow Through

Marcy: Maybe good for Fight Club decks, but otherwise probably not that great. Bite Down is still probably a better card.

Loxi: The potential to just one-shot a vehicle is pretty terrifying, and with the growth of vehicles as a type being pretty relevant even outside of this set, you might often have some really good targets for that part. It might be a bit of a meta call, but I do think you could pretty reliably jam this in a lot of mono-green stompy decks without fear.

BPhillipYork: Wow G fight card is really good and has an alternate mode. Powercreep.

 

Point the Way

Marcy: I mean, you’re getting 4, which isn’t bad, but this is neither unfair or overpowered. It is just kind of a card.

BPhillipYork: Yeah, so it’s ramp once you should be playing to win rather than ramping, so it’s okay, but pretty much by definition too slow.

 

Regal Imperiosaur

Marcy: Shockingly cheap for a 5/4 banner, but not otherwise very remarkable.

Loxi: Dinosaurs go decently tall, so this has a bit less value than in some other Kindred decks that make a ton of bodies. That being said, it’s pretty efficient if you just want a bunch of extra stats on board, and anthems are never bad if you already have developed your board a bit. I wouldn’t rush for it, but if you have some extra slots it can be a nice include.

BPhillipYork: It’s a dinosaur lord that’s way undercosted. If you find that intriguing, then you’re probably running a dinosaur deck and can go for it.

 

Run Over

Marcy: A fight card for 1 mana, basically, and thus going to be very strong.

Loxi: It’s a great fight spell for green if you have the respective cards. If you have enough mounts and vehicles to warrant this, definitely go for it.

BPhillipYork: Really solid bite card for green; nice to see lots of solid green interaction.

 

Thunderous Velocipede

Marcy: Already, I think this is the type of ‘make big thing bigger’ card you expect in Green, and so it does what it says on the package. I don’t think there’s much else to say about this card, it does exactly what it says.

Loxi: This ends up being a lot of stats for the bigger vehicles. Play this if you have a lot of big vehicles and you want to smash some face, pretty straightforward. I think this only might struggle because a lot of vehicle options outside of this set don’t veer towards green, but it seems like there might be enough juice to keep the archetype going strong.

BPhillipYork: Green is really stacking up these “enters with +1/+1 counters” to a degree that is getting fairly alarming, there’s now enough to completely build around this and have a lot of little creatures that are getting disgustingly big really fast.

 

Webstrike Elite

Marcy: Cycling Naturalize? It is pretty expensive over Naturalize, but I think this has some cool utility that is maybe not to be overlooked.

Loxi: I’d only play this in a deck where you can benefit from discarding this/putting it in your graveyard and having it on a creature body when it’s down there. This art slaps though.

BPhillipYork: Neat cycling alternate cost which gives you some choices.  I wouldn’t play it, but it’s neat.

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