The Best Explorer Cards To Craft From Khans Of Tarkir – MTG Arena

The addition of Khans of Tarkir to the Magic: The Gathering Arena metagame is sure to rock the Explorer format to its core. Aside from being one of the most memorable draft formats of all time, Khans of Tarkir featured many powerful cards and mechanics: some of which still see play in the game’s oldest constructed formats.

Others have been banned from these same formats for simply being too powerful. The reason for these bannings is the delve mechanic, which allows you to pay for the generic casting cost of spells by exiling cards from your graveyard. Suffice it to say, it may only be a matter of time before these same cards are banned in Explorer. In other words, play them while you can.

10 Anafenza, The Foremost

Unleash The Siege Rhinos

Anyone who played Standard back when Khans of Tarkir was originally released may still be haunted by this creature in their nightmares of Standard past. Anafenza into Siege Rhino was a jaw-droppingly aggressive curve at the time that made many players question why they were playing any deck other than the green, white, and black Abzan.

Nowadays, this card primarily sees play in Commander. However, its ability to exile creature cards instead of seeing them go to an opponent’s graveyard could prove useful against some of the biggest baddies of the Explorer metagame, including Arclight Phoenix and Greasefang, Okiba Boss.

It’s a shame that she doesn’t exile creatures already placed in the graveyard though, and this downfall may be enough to prevent her from ever seeing legitimate play.

9 See The Unwritten

Cheat Out Big Creatures And Fill Your Graveyard

Yet another Commander favorite, See the Unwritten is a great way to cheat out multiple creatures with high converted mana costs. There’s an inclination to compare this card to Storm the Festival and conclude that it’s just a worse version, however, the mana cost limits that Storm the Festival places upon your targets end up making these two cards very different in play.

Additionally, nonselected cards from See the Unwritten go into your graveyard whereas Storm the Festival puts them at the bottom of your library. This allows for graveyard shenanigans later in the game which is even more important now that the delve mechanic has been introduced to Explorer.

There are a ton of great creature targets for this card including Trumpeting Carnosaur; Atraxa, Grand Unifier; and many more. Furthermore, Topiary Stomper makes for a perfect creature to trigger the ferocious condition.

8 Bloodsoaked Champion

Back From The Dead

There isn’t currently an aggressive dredge or black deck in the Explorer metagame. However, this could be an important piece of such a build in the far future. This is a good turn-one play for an aggressive creature deck, and its recursion makes it relevant even into the late game.

It’s worth noting that this card also shares the Human creature type, and Humans have been an incredibly successful deck in Explorer’s past. That being said, there’s a much more interesting Human for such a deck later on in this list.

7 Mantis Rider

A Bug Riddled With Keywords

The slew of keywords that this card features make it a powerhouse creature, even though it dies to lightning bolt. Haste and flying work wonders together, and vigilance adds an extra insurance policy against aggressive opponents.

If you were looking for a reason to lean more Jeskai (white/blue/red) in your Humans deck, this is it. Alternatively, the recent release of Cavern of Souls makes playing Mantis Rider in a four or even five-color Humans deck entirely doable. If nothing else, this could just end up being a mirror breaker for Humans decks against opponents who are good at gumming up the ground.

6 Ghostfire Blade

A Good, Clean Equipment

We’re not entirely sure that there’s a home for this equipment, but it’s at least worth noting due to its power level. As long as you’re targeting a colorless creature, this is a permanent +2/+2 boon that only costs one generic mana to equip.

It doesn’t get much better than that as far as fair equipment is concerned. Some kind of artifact creature or other colorless aggro strategy may just find a use for this limited all-star.

5 Deflecting Palm

The Art Is Gross, Sorry

Believe it or not, this card still sees play in the sideboard of Modern Burn decks. While extremely situational, a well-placed Deflecting Palm can turn a loss into a victory by redirecting a critical amount of damage to your opponent.

Don’t have any illusions about putting this card into your mainboard, but it has already proven its worth as a sideboard card in a format much more powerful than Explorer. Aside from being good in races, this card can also prove useful against decks looking to clock in with a single large creature.

4 Murderous Cut

Dredge Up Some One-Mana Removal

Cheap removal is always a solid inclusion in any deck. Murderous Cut is a bit different in that it only works in decks that are filling their graveyard to some extent, however, a destroy effect for a single black mana is a hard deal to pass up.

As with all delve cards, the addition of fetch lands coming to the format with Khans of Tarkir as well will make consistently casting this card for a very low cost much more reliable than you might first imagine. Say hello to the newest iteration of premium removal.

3 Stubborn Denial

Nope.

Arguably the least impressive card on this list, Stubborn Denial is consistently better than most players imagine. Not too long ago, this card saw a ton of play in Pioneer. If you consider how important it is for decks to curve out and make use of all of their mana on every turn, you realize that many times opponents don’t have a single mana to spare.

Besides, decks that can trigger the ferocious effect of this card effectively transform it into a one-mana negate. We all know how powerful a well-placed counterspell can be, and if you don’t, you’ll surely find out soon.

2 Dig Through Time

And Now, A Lesson In Why Dredge Is So Powerful

Finally, we come to the delve cards that have been banned from both Modern and Legacy as well as restricted in Vintage due to their sheer power. Perhaps unsurprisingly, both cards are draw effects that can be cast for criminally cheap as long as you’ve tossed a handful of cards into your graveyard.

Dig Through Time is the better of the two cards as far as card selection is concerned. However, it’s hindered by the fact that its casting cost contains two blue pips. Seeing as delve can only account for colorless mana costs, this means that Dig Through Time will always cost a minimum of two blue mana.

1 Treasure Cruise

One Of Tarkir’s Most Infamous Cards

Coming in at common rarity, Treasure Cruise is the most fearsome card to have been printed in all of Khans of Tarkir. Drawing three for a single blue mana is akin to casting Ancestral Recall: a card that is also restricted in Vintage.

Furthermore, this card has the perfect home in Izzet Phoenix and is one of the key pieces that deck was missing in Explorer. It’s already one of the dominant decks in the metagame in Pioneer, so there’s no doubt that the same will be true in Explorer sooner or later. Our guess would be on sooner though.