Streets of New Capenna Constructed Set Review and Decklists: Blue

Streets of New Capenna Constructed Set Reviews

Streets of New Capenna Limited Set Reviews

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Hello everyone! With the full spoiler for Streets of New Capenna live, we can finally get into breaking down the cards with constructed applications! For this set, I’m going to be splitting this into 11 articles, 5 for monocolored, one for each 3 color sect, then one for colorless and the stray multicolors. Since I did individual card reviews already, rather than repeat myself, I’ll link the article, but still give the verdict and decklist if that’s what you’re more interested in. For this, I’m going to cover every Mythic, every Rare, and then choice uncommons and commons that have potential. Let’s get into it!

As always, here’s the scale I’ll be using to label the new cards that potentially have constructed applications.

• 0/5 – Unplayable in every sense.
• 1/5 – Extremely niche play or very unlikely to see play.
• 2/5 – Niche to no play, maybe playable in certain conditions.
• 3/5 – Reasonable playable. Not format breaking, but has the power level to see play in some strategy (or strategies).
• 4/5 – Very strong card, but not the best the format has to offer. Has the power level to see a lot of play.
• 5/5 – The very top of the format. This card will create a huge impact going forward on the format.

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Even the Score

So the easiest comparison for this card is Blue Sun's Zenith as they have the same casting cost and pretty much the same effect. However, the biggest contrast is that while Blue Sun shuffles into your library, Even the Score could get a huge cost decrease if the opponent has drawn 4 or more cards.

Realistically, I think Blue Sun's Zenith has been power crept out as a viable option and the cost reduction seems really difficult to reliably get in Arena formats. I did see some talk for this in Legacy where Brainstorm on your main phase is a common play, but even still, I’m not seeing much Constructed applications for this. Maybe as a 1 of in a Control shell, but not much more than that.

Rating: 2/5

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All-Seeing Arbiter

This is an interesting card as it reads like a good Control wincon, but I feel it would play out much worse. A 6 mana 5/4 Flier is a fine stat line, but nothing to write home about. However, drawing 2 and discarding one on ETB and attack is decent for filtering and it shrinks a creature temporarily on top of that. So with all that text, why do I think it isn’t good? It’s 6 mana! Sure it does a decent amount of things, but at 6 mana, this still seems relatively weak overall.

Maybe it’s good enough against the creature decks to see some play as shrinking a good attacker is pretty nice, but simply getting small filtering and losing it to any removal spell for 6 mana is a pretty bad play pattern.

Rating: 2.5/5

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Undercover Operative

A Clone with a Shield Counter? That’s pretty good! Are Clones good in Standard though? Not really! This is the best CLone variant in awhile, but unless they have a stronger upside like Clever Impersonator or Phantasmal Image, they pretty much never see play.

Rating: 1.5/5

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Reservoir Kraken

While seeing large beaters that have a downside isn’t uncommon, it’s rare to see them in Blue! A 4 mana 6/6 Trample, Ward 2 is definitely nothing to sneeze at, however I would argue that downside is relatively brutal. An opponent being able to lock it down with their worst creature and the worst that happens if you get a 1/1 Unblockable isn’t negligible, but definitely not super relevant either.

Overall, this may be a decent card against Control or some utility as a sideboard card, but it doesn’t seem particularly strong.

Rating: 2=2.5/5

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Errant, Street Artist

Blue in this set really seems to have all the weird cards! So this is a 1 mana Flash 0/3 that lets you copy copies of spells. This may have some utility in decks that look to copy their spells as win condition (Mill, Turns before the ban), but a big advantage of those decks were the lack of creatures which helped blank the opponent’s interaction. While this may be better than it seems, I don’t see too much utility for it right now as it’s an early game card that’s only useful much later in the game.

Rating: 2/5

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Wiretapping

Streets of New Capenna Hideaway Enchantments: Bulk Rares or Standard Staples?

Rating: 1.5/5

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Cut Your Losses

Blue has it rough this set. So it’s a 6 mana Traumatize that can potentially do more, but you’d have to sacrifice a creature with one power or greater. Normally that wouldn’t be an issue, but the only creature Mill typically plays is Ruin Crab which has no power. Overall I think this is less consistent than copying Tasha’s Hideous Laughter as a win condition.

Rating: 1.5/5

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Ledger Shredder

For the final Rare we finally have a card I’m somewhat excited about! A 2 mana 1/3 Flier isn’t an amazing stat line, but the third toughness is definitely nice for avoiding some removal. Then when ANY player casts two spells in a turn, you get to connive and potentially grow Shredder to a sizeable threat. This doesn’t have a myriad of shells it could go in, but this could slot nicely into a Magecraft build.

Rating: 2.5/5

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Slip Out the Back

Although this looks like a perfect card for Magecraft builds, phasing out your creature is leagues worse than giving it hexproof or a Shield counter. This has some more utility than Hexproof against specifically board wipes, but it’s not a great answer like the others we have available to us.

Rating: 1.5/5

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Out of the Way

4 mana Repulse isn’t a Constructed playable rate, but one that’s two mana against Green permanents is pretty powerful. Simple, yet strong is a solid card.

Rating: 2.5-3/5

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An Offer You Can’t Refuse

Cheap permission is always such an exciting prospect, especially when it’s a hard counter. However, giving two treasures back is definitely a scary proposition. If we didn’t already have Spell Pierce, maybe I would be more excited by this, but I think Spierce is going to do most of the job that Offer does at a better rate; so for me, this is an offer I can refuse.

Rating: 1.5/5

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Disdainful Stroke

It’s nothing new, but it’s Disdainful Stroke which is obviously a great card.

Rating: 3/5

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Make Disappear

Despite it being very far from Mana Leak, Quench did see some Standard play in tempo decks and this is a strictly better version of it. While I’m not sure if it’ll be good enough to make the cut regardless, I definitely won’t sleep on this like I did Quench.

Rating: 2.5/5

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CONCLUSION

Overall I’m unfortunately pretty disappointed in Blue. I feel like the card quality is super low and even the playable cards are pretty niche. Thankfully, I’m only examining Blue from it’s mono colored cards and not the guilds so I’m sure I’ll be more impressed there.

Thank you for reading!