The white part of the Magic: The Gathering color chart has always sported varying and interesting interactions, thanks to its plethora of enchantments, focus on aggressive creature strategies, and access to creatures with lifelink as well as board wipes. Altogether, it makes for a color that is often used in all kinds of unique decks including taxing builds, traditional control decks, and even builds whose primary game plan is flooding the board with enchantments.
As we return to Dominaria once again, we are going to receive reprints of cards that embody white cards' versatility across these many different strategies. Without further ado, let's take a look at some of the color's all-time greats.
8/8 Savannah Lions
Old school Magic players often refer to any creature that costs a single mana for two power and one toughness as a Savannah Lion. This is because Savannah Lions was the first such unassuming creature with these stats, and it was a key piece of the earliest aggressive decks.
Compared to modern day Magic creatures, Savannah Lions obviously leaves a lot to be desired. However, this relic of the past is a testament to the strength of aggressive decks despite the fact that they often play creatures that look rather underwhelming.
7/8 Pacifism
Cheap removal is premium in Magic no matter what format you're playing. While Pacifism may not technically remove an opposing creature, it usually gets the job done by simply taking it out of combat for the rest of the game.
Of course, enchantment removal like this does come with a lot of downfalls. Creature with activated or passive abilities will still cause problems even if you drop Pacifism on them. Furthermore, this enchantment can be removed if your opponent has access to enchantment destruction or other cards that allow you to target nonland permanents. Nonetheless, the low cost of this ancient removal technology still makes it a great card.
6/8 Sevinne's Reclamation
Sevinne's Reclamation allows you to cast your best nonland permanent spells additional times. You can sort of compare placing this card in your deck to putting additional copies of your best permanents with mana value three or less in your deck. Obviously, if you could play more than four copies of your best cards, you would do so in a heartbeat.
Sevinne's does still require that your best nonland permanents end up in your graveyard in the first place though. Exile removal and graveyard hate can both quickly make this sorcery spell incredibly lackluster. That being said, these aren't tools that the majority of decks you run into are going to employ. The flashback on this spell is especially good because it allows you to return two more permanents from your graveyard instead of just one like on the first cast.
5/8 Divine Sacrament
Anthems like this are one of those unique card types that white maintains a firm grip on. It's incredibly rare to see this kind of permanent power and toughness boon in a color other than white, which speaks yet again to the unique effects white offers.
Notably, you'll need to only be playing white creatures in order to get the most out of what this anthem offers. Furthermore, you'll need to put a fair amount of cards in your graveyard if you want to really unlock the power here. Thankfully, token generating spells like Battle Screech and Captain's Call flood the board with white creatures while also immediately adding to your graveyard.
4/8 Enlightened Tutor
Remember all those great enchantment spells we mentioned earlier? Well, here's the best way to make sure you draw them every single game. A single white mana to tutor your entire deck for the exact enchantment or artifact you need pretty much speaks for itself in terms of power.
It's honestly ridiculous that this card also provides you with access to artifacts as tutoring your deck for just enchantments would already be an incredibly strong effect. Any deck that's mostly made up of enchantments will want to include this tutor spell to ensure you have consistent access to the cards you need for your ultimate game plan.
3/8 Lyra Dawnbringer
This is a bomb plain and simple. Creatures with this amount of power often win games of Magic all on their own if left unchecked. Lyra is especially powerful in control decks where her lifelink can be put to use, taking you from what seems like an unwinnable low life total position to cruising through the rest of the game.
That being said, Lyra is also such a strong creature that she plays perfectly fine as a top end finisher in midrange decks as well. And all of this is without even mentioning the anthem effect she provides to other Angels if you happen to fill your deck with this fan favorite creature type.
2/8 Wrath Of God
This is one of the original board wipes printed in Magic. Even all these years later, four mana is the standard for this incredibly powerful effect. Unfortunately, it's also almost always a bit too slow in older formats. Even games of Standard are starting to encroach on making wraths at this cost useless due to power creep and the ever increasing speed of all formats.
The clause preventing regeneration on this card is largely irrelevant, but it can come in handy in niche cases. Despite wraths like this no longer being as powerful as they once were, a timely Wrath of God is very much capable of winning games.
1/8 Swords To Plowshares
Premier removal spells are often few and far between. Swords to Plowshares is another card that isn't quite as good as it once was, but it still stands tall as one of the greatest removal spells ever printed in the game. As we saw with Sevinne's Reclamation, exiling creatures can often be a very relevant act that disables all kinds of decks that rely on stacking their graveyards.
The life gain this removal spell offers your opponent is what has ultimately led to Swords falling to the wayside in older formats as new removal spells have been printed, but the life gain doesn't matter in lengthier and more protracted games of Magic more often than not.
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