Sarkhan Vol Spoiler (Badass Planeswalker)

September 8, 2008

We finally get the full card text of Sarkhan Vol

Back in June, on Magic The Gathering’s official site, we were shown Sarkhan Vol without his stats or abilities. Today, they gave us the full spoiler of this awesome planewalker from Shards of Alara.

Sarkhan Vol big image

What can I say? This guy is a serious beating.

He’s got 4 loyalty so he can’t even be killed by Flame Javelin. (Right after you play him, you get priority back. This allows you to up his loyalty to 5 before Flame Javelin can kill him.)

Let’s look at each of his abilities.

[+1]: Creatures you control get +1/+1 and gain haste until end of turn.

This ability works well with the red/black decks that make a lot of tokens. Here is one of those decks from the top 8 of German Nationals.

Black/Red Tokens

Maindeck:		Sideboard:
3 Greater Gargadon	4 Auntie's Hovel	2 Puppeteer Clique
2 Marsh Flitter	2 Ghitu Encampment	1 Sudden Death
4 Mogg Fanatic	3 Graven Cairns	2 Word of Seizing
4 Mogg War Marshal	3 Mountain	4 Thoughtseize
4 Murderous Redcap	4 Mutavault	2 Everlasting Torment
4 Nantuko Husk	1 Pendelhaven	4 Dragon's Claw
3 Siege-Gang Commander	2 Sulfurous Springs
	5 Swamp
3 Sudden Death

3 Profane Command
2 Torrent of Souls

4 Bitterblossom

However, I’m not sure if the red/black token decks can survive with the loss of Mogg War Marshal. Maybe there will be a cheap token generator in Shards of Alara.

Also, I can see Sarkhan Vol’s first ability working well for green decks with lots of creatures. Here’s a list with over 30 green creatures that made top 8 in German Nationals.

Green Aggro

Maindeck:		Sideboard:
3 Boggart Ram-Gang	1 Pendelhaven	4 Faerie Macabre
4 Bramblewood Paragon	16 Snow-Covered Forest	2 Guttural Response
4 Groundbreaker	4 Treetop Village	2 Snakeform
4 Llanowar Elves		3 Seal of Primordium
4 Nettle Sentinel		4 Pithing Needle
3 Talara's Battalion
4 Twinblade Slasher
4 Wren's Run Vanquisher

4 Giant Growth
2 Might of Old Krosa
1 Stonewood Invocation

2 Garruk Wildspeaker

I would replace both Garruks and the one Stonewood Invocation with 3 Sarkhan Vol. Adding 4 Karplusan Forest and 4 Fire-Lit Thicket would fix the manabase.

[-2]: Gain control of target creature until end of turn. Untap that creature. It gains haste until end of turn.

Sarkhan’s second ability also fits very well with the above two decks. Oftentimes aggro decks with many creatures just need to get rid of creature of one turn to swarm over for the win. This ability may be better than pure removal in many circumstances because you can attack with the creature that you steal for one turn.

[-6]: Put five 4/4 red Dragon creature tokens with flying into play.

Dragon Token

Sarkhan’s ultimate ability is one of the most powerful planeswalker abilities. I had to do a double take to make sure these dragons had flying. If your opponent doesn’t have Wrath of God, you should win the turn after you use this ability.

I think Sarkhan will definitely see play in the Shards of Alara Standard environment. He’s similar to Garruk, the only planeswalker that consistently appeared in top level decks by a wide margin. He’s cheap and each of his abilities affect the board in a big way.

Posted by Dee | Filed Under Shards of Alara News