Magic: The Gathering‘s latest set, Secrets of Strixhaven, is already shaping up to be one of the game’s very best in quite some time, leveraging specific color combos for the Strixhaven colleges to push forth unique strategies.
Between Prepared spells, new Elder Dragons, and college-specific mechanics, there’s a whole host of ways to show off your playstyle, but there are some sneaky combos to be found, too.
We’ve done some digging, and here are some of our favorite combos and interactions between new Secrets of Strixhaven cards and some older cards. It’s worth stressing, however, that many of these combos aren’t legal in Standard and some other formats, but if you’re looking to surprise your pod in Commander, maybe it’s time to consider using one of these in a deck.
Witherbloom and Sprout Swarm for Infinite Saprolings
Arguably one of the most devastating combos to emerge from Secrets of Strixhaven involves the elder dragon Witherbloom, the Balancer and Sprout Swarm as a loop that can go infinite.
Witherbloom has affinity for creatures, and it also gives your instants and sorceries affinity for creatures as well, reducing the casting cost by one colorless mana for every creature you control. Sprout Swarm also has convoke, so its cost is reduced by one mana for each creature you tap. Let’s say you have four creatures on the field, and one of them is Witherbloom. Affinity for creatures reduces the buyback cost on Sprout Swarm to zero.
So you can create a 1/1 saproling, return Sprout Swarm to your hand for the (free) buyback cost, and then you can keep convoking that saproling you just created to give yourself infinite Saprolings.
Lorehold and Library of Leng discounts instants and sorceries
Look, spellslinger decks often have access to cost reduction for their instant and sorcery noncreature spells, but this new combo is really fun.
It uses Lorehold, the Historian, and Library of Leng. The former will let you discard a card at the start of an opponents’ upkeep, while the latter lets you put that card on the top of your Library instead.
Given Lorehold’s other ability is to drastically reduce the cost of cards in your hand that were the first card you drew this turn, you can essentially make all of your Instant and Sorcery cards cost just two generic mana — even on an opponents’ turn.
Pensieve Professor and Wizard Class make a really big wizard
Increment is a new mechanic in Secrets of Strixhaven that triggers when you spend mana greater than a card’s power or toughness, and it’s found on the relatively humble Pensive Professor.
Pair that with Wizard Class, an enchantment, and reach Level 3, and you can alternate between drawing cards and putting +1/+1 counters on the Pensive Professor ad infinitum.
Card draw, and making a colossal creature? We’ll take it.
Bloodletter of Aclazotz and Pox Plague
The Bloodletter of Aclazotz is a 2/4 flier that causes opponents to lose twice as much life as they normally would during your turn, making it an ideal card for any aggressive strategy that has access to black mana.
Once it’s out, you can play Pox Plague to remove half of every player’s life, force them to discard half the cards in their hand, and sacrifice half the permanents they control. With the Bloodletter, that means they lose just about all of their life.
The rounding down part is key, because an even life total will be culled, while an odd life total will see a player stuck on a single life.
Emeritus of Abundance and Time Warp
Time Warp needs little introduction for many players, but for those unaware, it grants an entire extra turn. It’s kind of wild, but what makes it even more broken is Emeritus of Abundance.
Because Abundance has the Prepared spell Regrowth, it can return Time Warp to your hand over and over again.
You’ll need Emeritus to attack each time and to have eight lands, but if you can make that work, you’ll upset the entire table.