Each character in Magic Spellslingers has a unique ability - who has what it takes to rule the Arena?
Magic Spellslingers differs considerably from the original Magic: The Gathering. One of the key differences is that decks are built around a specific character from the Magic lore. Your chosen Spellslinger not only determines the color(s) of your deck, but also adds unique cards and a signature ability that will dramatically impact your play style.
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Unlocking every Spellslinger can take a long time, so if you have a specific deck in mind or just like to play a certain way, be sure to choose the character that works best for you. We've ranked all sixteen Spellslingers based on their overall power - how does your favorite stack up?
Magic's authority-averse pyromancer is the starting character given to all players. While her aggressive, straightforward style is great for learning the ropes, her special ability is by far the weakest in the game. At the start of each match, she deals four damage to her opponent, and that's it. After that initial burst of flames, you may as well be playing with no character at all for all that Chandra can affect the outcome.
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There might be games where that four damage is the difference between victory and defeat, but those scenarios will be the exception rather than the rule. Besides, if Chandra's mono-red deck can't find a way to make up that four damage somewhere else, something has gone horribly wrong.
Nissa is one of the game's two mono-green Spellslingers, and her primary focus is on having more mana than her opponent at all times. She uses spells like her signature Rampant Growth to earn additional mana gems, and whenever she does so she gains one life.
Even with the most aggressive ramp build, that's only going to add up to a handful of life over the course of a match. Nissa gets much more value out of her signature creature Joraga Druid, who draws a card whenever the condition for Thrive is met.
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Unlike other Spellslingers, Nissa can splash as many colors as she wants in her deck, and can use any Land in your collection. This versatility might lead to some slick combos down the road, but for now Nissa doesn't have the resources she needs to excel.
The leader of the Gatewatch has a once-per-game ability that can be activated by spending a large amount of mana. The cost starts at twenty and is reduced by one for each card Jace draws, including his opening hand.
When activated, Multiverse Mind changes the mana cost of every card still in Jace's deckto one, then draws a card. Jace excels at board control, so using Multiverse Mind is simply a matter of drawing the game out long enough while preventing your opponent from establishing a position. Using cards like Second Sun's Dawn to load your deck with high-cost bombs that will benefit from the ability is a sure way to set up a finisher.
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While Multiverse Mind has lots of combo potential, it begs the question; if you've taken control of the game such that you can activate Jace's ability, chances are you've already won. How much difference will a big flashy storm of one-cost spells really make?
If you want to play big creatures - really big creatures - then Kiora is the Spellslinger for you. Like Nissa, Kiora's goal is to ramp up her mana with as many additional Gems as she can get her webbed hands on. Her signature creature, Kiora's Tideshaper, helps with this, and Kiora's blue-green color pairing has plenty of other ways to keep the mana train rolling.
Kiora starts the game with an 0/1 Fish in play, which is a useful target for early buffs - a surprise Giant Growth is a great way to get the upper hand on an unsuspecting opponent early.
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When Kiora reaches ten, fifteen, and twenty Mana Gems, sherandomly adds one of three Leviathans to her hand. Each Leviathan is an enormous creature that costs ten mana, but is often powerful enough to win the game if her opponent can't deal with it immediately.
On the surface, Nahiri's ability is pretty lackluster. Once per turn, she can spend one mana to give her Stoneforged Blade to a creature, granting it +1/+0 until her next turn. Perhaps more than any other Spellslinger, Nahiri relies on the synergy between her signature cards and her ability to win.
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Willful Smith and Nahiri's Outburst enhance and capitalize on the power of the Stoneforged Blade, respectively. Once both Smiths have been played, the Stoneforged Blade becomes a +3/+0 buff and Nahiri's Outburst can be used to destroy blockers and clear the way for the Blade's wielder.
True to his origins in Magic: The Gathring, Gideon isn't afraid to enter the fray himself and fight alongside his creatures. Whenever Gideon attacks with three or more creatures, he appears on the board as a 4/4 attacking creature, then vanishes at the end of the battle.
Gideon doesn't count toward the limit of five creatures in play, so he will join the battle even if your board is full without having to sacrifice any creatures.
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Not only does Gideon add an extra threat that your opponent has to deal with, but he doesn't trigger traps when he attacks. The trick, of course, is establishing enough of a board presence that you can attack with three creatures simultaneously. If you're playing against Gideon, it's usually worth it to spend the extra mana and cards to keep his army down to two creatures.
The Multiverse's pre-eminent necromancer excels at bringing creatures back from the dead. Whenever Liliana causes a creature to leave either graveyard for any reason, she gains one life and gives the resurrected creature a permanent +1/+1. Resurrecting the same creature multiple times will stack this bonus.
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While Liliana can empower any resurrected creature, she excels at working with Zombies thanks to her signature cards Diehard Fan and Zombify. Her heavy hitter, Liliana's Goliath, doubles its power whenever it leaves the graveyard on top of the bonus from Grave Ambition, making it a powerful but somewhat fragile threat.
Like Liliana, Vraska is more than happy to sacrifice her creatures, but the Golgari Gorgon isn't as interested in bringing them back. As long as they die on her turn, Vraska's creatures trigger their Finale effects twice. Merchant Of Death draws two cards, Vraska's Grub provides two Fragile Mana Gems, and so on!
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Choosing blockers can be a tense game of cat-and-mouse both when you're playing as Vraska and when you're playing against her. She's usually more than happy to send her creatures in all-out attacks, knowing that blocks will result in a double-dip Finale. Conversely, she might be less willing to block if she doesn't absolutely need to do so, hoping to get extra value by letting creatures die on her own turn.
Kaya has a powerful ability, but it requires a very specific deck to be effective. When Kaya deals three damage to her opponent on a single turn, she gets one of three Unchained Spirits added to her hand. The next time Free Spirit triggers, it requires four damage, then five, and so on throughout the match.
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Unchained Spirits are 2/1 creatures with an assortment of evasion abilities, so as long as they survive they make it easy for Kaya to complete her mission again and again. Kaya relies on using cheap, expendable creatures with Flying and Stealth, along with some direct-damage spells, to flood the board with spirits and overwhelm her opponent.
In Spellslingers, as in Magic: The Gathering, it can be advantageous to play creatures after you attack to keep your opponent guessing. Angrath is a great character for picking up this habit, thanks to his pragmatically offense-oriented play style.
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Whenever Angrath summons a creature, it gets +1/+0 if his opponent took damage earlier in the turn. As a black-red Spellslinger, Angrath has plenty of ways to deal damage directly to his opponent, but the surest way is often a good old-fashioned attack. Once a creature gets through, Angrath can play cards from his hand to get the Power bonus for next turn!
Domri likes to play lots of creatures, and they only get bigger the more Mana Gems he accumulates. Every fifth time Domri summons a creature of any kind, he adds a War Boar to his hand. War Boars are 3/2 creatures that cost zero mana, and playing a War Boar counts toward the next one!
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Playing swarms of cheap creatures early is a good way to get War Boars into play quickly, though this can deplete your hand. An early goal for any Domri deck is to play Rampaging Boaron turn four; this card gives all of Domri's present and future War Boars +1/+1 for the rest of the game! From that point on, keep playing progressively stronger creatures to muscle your opponent out of the Arena.
Traps are a standout feature in Spellslingers. Every deck makes use of them, and nobody does so better than Teferi. For every third trap that Teferi activates, he draws a card.
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It may not be flashy, but Teferi's ability keeps him in the game and gives his deck consistency just for doing what a white-blue deck was going to do anyway. With his signature cards Teferi's Staff and Teferi's Acoltye, he'll always have at least a few traps at his disposal, including his personal counter, Absorb!
Teferi is the oldest character in Spellslingers' roster, first referenced in Magic: The Gathering in 1996. The second-oldest characters in Spellslingers - Ajani, Chandra, Jace, and Liliana - didn't appear until the Shards Of Alara set, twelve years later!
The guildmaster of the Izzet League is at his best when he's able to cast spell after spell after spell. Every third spell he casts in a single turn has its cost reduced by two, and casting it deals a point of damage to his opponent. His signature cards all revolve around drafting and casting more spells while gaining extra benefits from doing so, making him the Spellslinger of choice for combo players.
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Ral can run into problems with an empty hand, but as a blue-red character he's got plenty of ways to top up. His Chaos Lightning can be a terror for opponents, randomly distributing damage among his enemies equal to the number of spells he's cast over the course of the game (to a maximum of ten). Card games usually have at least one broken combo turn up eventually - it's a fair bet that when Spellslingers' turn comes around, Ral will be the culprit.
Vivien is a bit mana-hungry, since her ability costs one mana to activate, but as a mono-green Spellslinger she won't usually have much trouble making up the difference. When Nurture is activated, Vivien banks a random upgrade that is given to the next creature she summons. Only one upgrade can be stored at a time.
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While she can't control exactly which upgrades her creatures get, Vivien ensures that every creature in her deck is - at minimum - just a little better than the same creature would be in her opponent's deck. She's also allowed to have up to eight non-green creatures in her deck, letting her mix and match her mighty menagerie.
The famed Leonin planeswalker is all about resilience - not only does he have the most Health out of all the Spellslingers in the game at twenty-eight, but with a white-green deck he can throw around buffs and heals like candy. Best of all, he's incentivized to do so!
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Whenever Ajani targets a friendly creature with any effect - a spell, a trap, an artifact, or even a Finale or Debut ability - the next creature he draws gets +1/+1. Upgrades, stat boosts, and healing all count for this, and it's possible to grant the bonus to the same undrawn creature multiple times.
With Ajani, all your beneficial cards are effectively a double dip, giving you something now and something later!
Ashiok is the most intimidating Spellslinger, and with good reason - any game against them is a race against the clock as Nightmares close in on their opponent.
Whenever Ashiok adds a card to their hand that didn't start in their deck, one of the top ten cards in their opponent's deck gains a Nightmare. The same thing happens whenever Ashiok plays a card that didn't start in their deck.
Whenever Ashiok's opponent draws or mills a card with one or more Nightmares attached, each Nightmare drains one life from them, granting it to Ashiok. By using cards like Isochron Scepter and Eldritch Tutor to draft cards out of thin air, Ashiok can stack their opponent's deck with Nightmares and bide their time.
Beating Ashiok requires finishing them off before they can create too many Nightmares. Ashiok has the lowest starting Health of any Spellslinger at twenty-two, but don't be fooled - the Nightmares will keep this sinister dream-mage healthy throughout the match.
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