Streets of New Capenna Constructed Set Review and Decklists: Red

Streets of New Capenna Constructed Set Reviews

Streets of New Capenna Limited Set Reviews

---

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.

---

Urabrask, Heretic Praetor

We’re starting off with a bang with Urubrask! A 5 mana 4/4 Haste is a reasonable stat line, but it does get hurt by the lack of evasion. However, on each upkeep you get one impulse draw and on the opponent’s upkeep, the next time they would draw, they get an impulse draw rather than a normal draw! So Urubrask is this weird value engine that can net you additional cards and then threaten to stifle the opponent out of draw steps if the card they want to play isn’t the one they just exiled.

While this seems like it would be insane, I do have a couple of issues with it. One, again, is the lack of evasion making this body less than ideal. Two is no ETB ability which hurts the odds of it having a strong impact on the board. Standard is in a spot where 5 drops need to be pretty nuts to see play and I’m not sure Urabrask crosses that threshold. I may have been poisoned by every 5 drop needing to be Goldspan Dragon so I very well could be underrating this card as well.

Rating: 2.5-3/5

---

Arcane Bombardment

Even more spice! So the first spell you cast on any turn, an instant or sorcery at random gets exiled and you get to cast a copy of each spell exiled by Bombardment for free! That’s pretty powerful! You may think that this is a Commander card (and it is), but this is actually much closer to constructed playable then you might think! Although slow, this seems extremely difficult to beat once it gets going as you’d only need a turn cycle or two to accrue insurmountable advantages.

While I want to give this a higher rating, it is obviously held back by the abundance of removal that can remove it. Vanishing Verse, Rite of Oblivion, and now Void Rend all answer this cleanly and effectively. While that may be too much to bear, I could believe that the power of this card may just be good enough to justify anyway. 6 mana is expensive, but with the abundance of Treasure tokens and how fast this kills, I think this is much better than it looks.

Rating: 2.5-3/5

---

Structural Assault

While this is an amazing Commander card, I’m not seeing the Constructed applications of this card. For what it’s worth, this card is probably insane against Azorius Affinity in Historic, but beyond that, I don’t see how else you could use this.

Rating: 1.5/5

---

Widespread Thieving

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

Rating: 2.5/5

---

Hoard Hauler

Similar to Structural Assault, this card likes the opponent having a lot of artifacts, and once again, I can’t really see why you’d need this. Furthermore a 4 mana 5/5 Crew 3 that only does it’s effect on hit is also pretty bad for rate.

Rating: 1/5

---

Devilish Valet

While this card is super cool, there isn’t a way to make it particularly strong unless you can have this down and get minimum two creatures on board afterwards. This would work really well with Rally the Ancestors if it was on Arena, but without it, I can’t really see how you can abuse this. I don’t want to completely pan it in case I’m missing a cool interaction, but I feel this is unlikely to see play.

Rating: 1.5-2.5/5

---

Jaxis, the Troublemaker

Now this is an interesting card! So this is like a weird Fable of the Mirror-Breaker with the copying aspect, but instead of it being free, this is filtering as you get rid of a card and get to draw a card when a copy dies. If you have a lot of cards you need to filter through and not a lot of mana, you could even Blitz this, copy something else, and get to see two new cards once the turn is over.

My biggest issue with this card is that it seems much worse than Fable of the Mirror-Breaker, but I could definitely see a deck that wants a lot of this effect. Despite saying that, a worse Fable of the Mirror-Breaker is still probably a pretty good card.

Rating: 2.5-3/5

---

Professional Face-Breaker

A 3 mana 2/3 Menace is not an amazing stat line, but getting a Treasure token when you connect is solid. Furthermore, being able to convert Treasures into cards is also a nice bonus. My biggest issue with this is that you don’t get a Treasure for each creature that connects making this a slow card advantage/mana engine which isn’t helped by the smaller body.

Rating: 1.5-2/5

---

Torch Breath

A Fireball effect that can’t hit face isn’t great, but an uncounterable one that can burn Blue creatures and planeswalkers is pretty nice. While this card seems pretty good, this seems substantially worse than Roast on rate, but it is better when it targets something else. Overall I’m not too keen on this as a color hoser, but it is reasonable.

Rating: 2.5/5

---

Riveteers Requisitioner

A 2 mana 3/1 isn’t necessarily playable on rate, but one that makes a Treasure token on death and can Blitz is a bit more interesting. I think this is probably still too weak overall versus other two drops you could play, but it is at least a consideration.

Rating: 2/5

---

Glittering Stockpile

While Manalith type cards generall aren’t playable, The Celestus proved that they can still rumble in Standard. While Stockpile doesn’t have the card filtering aspect and only makes one color, you can produce a big burst of mana later in the game which could be a particularly powerful ability. I do think this is worse than The Celestus regardless, but it definitely should be considered moving forward despite it dying to a good amount of removal.

Rating: 2.5/5

---

Call In a Professional

While 3 mana for 3 damage isn’t an amazing rate, but preventing life gain and damage prevention is definitely interesting. Skullcrack was a staple back in the day, and while this is worse, being able to target anything shouldn’t be underestimated either. While this will still be going face most of the time, this could be a solid card in the face of Titan of Industry or Workshop Warchief.

Rating: 2.5/5

---

Rob the Archives

While this is still no Light Up the Stage, Reckless Impulse is better than most people give it credit for and this is strictly better. If you have a lot of sacrifice fodder sitting around (which you’ll want for Ob Nixilis, the Adversary anyway), I could see this being a pretty potent card. My main contention with this is that it’s at odds with Deadly Dispute which is probably better, but this may find it’s spot in a Burn deck or a Mono Red shell.

Rating: 2.5/5

---

Unlucky Witness

Here we have a super simple design! One mana 1/1 that when it dies you get some card advantage! While there’s already a good amount of solid sacrifice fodder, getting some more can never hurt! There’s not many 1 mana creatures that accrue card advantage on death so this may even be better than it looks.

Rating: 2.5-3/5

---

Sticky Fingers

Believe it or not, this card is actually pretty good! This does a lot for one mana as giving evasion, gaining mana advantage, and then netting a card at the end of it is a pretty great Enchantment despite Auras not normally being Standard playable. I could see this in a Boss Sligh deck if those existed, but unfortunately the existence of The Meathook Massacre pretty much prevents Boss Sligh from ever being a viable option in this meta.

Nevertheless, if Boss Sligh ever rears it’s head, this will be a part of it.

Rating: 2.5/5

---

Goldhound

While this isn’t incredible, an evasive 1/1 that can be sacrificed to make a mana is definitely pretty interesting in decks like Mono Red that can use the damage early and the mana late. Interesting card and it may play out better than it looks.

Rating: 2.5/5

---

Big Score

So this is Unexpected Windfall, but strictly better? Ok.

Rating: 3.5-4/5

---

Strangle

So this is Frost Bite, but at the cost of being a sorcery you don’t need Snow lands and it always deals 3! This will be a meta dependent card so the big question is how relevant 3 toughness creatures are, but this will range from ok to very good depending on the popular creatures.

Rating: 2.5-3/5

---

CONCLUSION

While Red doesn’t have too many standout cards, it has a lot of playables and a lot of options for a myriad of decks. Right now, Red is my frontrunner for best monocolor in the set considering how many options it can give you.

Thank you for reading!