MTG Top 10: Dragon Legends

Back when I first started really getting into Magic: the Gathering, it was during the Invasion block (Invasion, Planeshift, Apocalypse).  Right off the bat, I was introduced to some of my favorite cards—strictly speaking in terms of flavor, not versatility—of all time: legendary dragons.

At the time, there was a quintet of dragon legends—one of each color—in the Invasion set, being these:

Darigaaz, the Igniter: red
Rith, the Awakener: green
Treva, the Renewer: white
Dromar, the Banisher: blue
Crosis, the Purger: black

Dear God, I was fascinated with them in my early MTG playing days.  Of course, I didn't own any of them until much later.  And before I got my own copies, I was usually pounded to death by the opposition, who continuously trounced me with these monstrosities.

Years went by and I have the quintet tucked away in my binder of rare cards.  But as my knowledge of MTG expanded, I realized that these weren't the only legendary dragons around.  There were old ones very similar to these.  And as new expansion sets were released, more dragon legends found themselves in decks and collections.

So here is a list that I came up with that counts down, in my opinion, the best of the legendary dragons.

10. Crosis, the Purger

As fun as constantly bringing out and attacking with massive creatures, sometimes you just have to go the evil, malicious route.  Black-colored spells and abilities are notorious for its nasty elements, and Crosis, the Purger, the black representative of the Invasion dragon legend quintet, is that master of cruelty.

If you happen to be playing against a deck that focuses heavily on a single color, Crosis can single-handedly ruin all your opponent's plans.  Having flying grants you a pretty good chance that an attack will successfully go through, allowing you to activate Crosis's ability.

I didn't think I'd start with one of my favorite dragons from my old days of playing... but constantly forcing your opponent to abandon essential pieces of his deck is just plain mean.  When Crosis is used in combination with cards like Painter's Servant, you basically force your opponent to throw out everything he has in his hand each time Crosis successfully deals combat damage.  If not, you can always have something like Telepathy and just pick out what you want discarded.

Crosis is simply a great addition to any decks focused around the discard strategy.  Cards like Liliana's Caress, The Rack and Abyssal Nocturnus all provide synergy with Crosis's ability.  I was often on the receiving end of Crosis's evil in my early days.  I still remember those moments vividly.

9. Bladewing the Risen

One of my favorite playing strategies is "reanimation."  Reanimation styles of play involves intentionally dumping your creature targets into your graveyard, followed by using spells and abilities to throw them directly onto the battlefield, bypassing heavy mana costs involved to traditionally cast them.  Typical methods include using Entomb or Buried Alive to dump creatures into the graveyard, then using Exhume or Animate Dead to bring them onto the battlefield.

So what we have here is Bladewing the Risen, which in the MTG storyline is the dead version of Rorix Bladewing.

Look at the art.  Bladewing the Risen undoubtedly screams reanimation, especially in reanimation decks that feature powerful dragons.  Say you start off the game by laying down a Swamp.  You then proceed to cast Dark Ritual, netting you 3 black mana to cast Buried Alive.  You throw out Bladewing the Risen from your deck, along with two big dragons... for instance, Hellkite Overlord and Balefire Dragon.  The following turn, you cast Exhume, and assuming your opponent has no creatures in his graveyard as of yet, you place Bladewing the Risen onto the battlefield.  Now as soon as Bladewing enters play, his ability triggers, allowing you to bring back one other dragon you tossed with Buried Alive the turn earlier.  Say you pick Hellkite Overlord.  Now you have a 4/4 and 8/8 flying beasts out on the second turn.

To go even further, say you play Recurring Nightmare on your third turn.  Now you get to kill off Bladewing the Risen to return Balefire Dragon to play.  Given that Bladewing's now in your graveyard, you get to throw more dragons into your grave, reanimate Bladewing, thereby reanimating more dragons.  You can rinse and repeat with Recurring Nightmare until you're blue in the face (or black and red in this case).  This is some serious, scary stuff.


8. Rith, the Awakener

Ah, yes.  I'll have to admit, I've always had a soft spot for... A massive swarm of weenie 1/1 creatures that remind me of Starcraft's Zerglings.  And this is exactly what Rith, the Awakener can do for you.

Just like Crosis, if you're facing a deck with predominantly one color, Rith would have a field day pounding out waves after waves of 1/1 Saproling tokens.

So I was surprised I would pick Rith—being that she's (that's right, she) a dragon legend from my old, naive days of playing—but I can't help but notice that Rith is indeed a very powerful creature.  I mean, there are only so many creatures—or cards for that matter—that can continuously generate an army for you by simply... well, doing what she does best, just being on the battlefield and attacking whenever possible.

Let's say your opponent is in a tight spot.  He doesn't have any creature capable of blocking Rith.  All right, and he has two green creatures and a white enchantment on his side of the field.  Meanwhile, you have Rith, who is red, green and white all in one package, two other white creatures, a green enchantment—let's say it's Rancor just for fun—attached to Rith, and a random red enchantment.  So we have a total of four green permanents on the field, three white, and two red.  When you attack with Rith, the clear choice to pick when activating her ability is green.  By doing so, you put four green 1/1 Saproling tokens into play.  What's great about this scenario is that you can attack with Rith the next turn, choose green as the color again, and this time put out eight 1/1 tokens.  Guess what?  The next turn you can put out 16.  Then 32.  Then 64... Hmm.

Of course, your opponent is one Wrath of God away from saving him a lot of trouble, but you can anticipate such a plan and throw a Caller of the Claw out right after and replace Rith and all your 1/1's with 2/2's.  Point being, there is so much you can do with Rith and her horde of Zerglings.

7. Teneb, the Harvester

Remember how I said reanimation is one of my favorite playing styles?  Well, here's another legendary dragon that falls into the category of reanimation.

Teneb, the Harvester is part of a quintet of dragon legends similar to the Invasion block one that I mentioned earlier.  Teneb's the representative of black, a very suitable job given that his ability deals with reanimation.

What's great about Teneb is that he isn't limited to resurrecting creatures from your grave.  He can "put target creature card from a graveyard onto the battlefield under your control."  That's right, find a way to Terminate your opponent's Platinum Angel, successfully attack your opponent with Teneb, pay the cost of the ability, and make that dead angel your new minion.  And you can keep doing this as much as you want as often as you want.

Certainly, Teneb's great and all, but he's best used in conjunction with other cards, specifically reanimation based ones and those that clear away your opponent's creatures.  That way, you can have a steady base of dead creatures to resurrect every time you swing with Teneb.

6. Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind

When you combine blue and red with a dragon wizard—really, a dragon wizard?—you get only one card in the entire MTG universe.  And that's Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind.  Red and blue is already an odd combination.  Originally, when I saw "Legendary Creature" and "Dragon Wizard," I was confused.  What in the world?

Niv-Mizzet, when he first showed up in the Guildpact expansion, he had an infamously ridiculous flavor text: 

(Z–>)90º – (E–N²W)90ºt = 1

Do this.  If you tilt your head 90 degrees counter-clockwise,  "(Z–>)90º" becomes "NIV" and "(E–N²W)90ºt" becomes "MIZZET" (N² is simply NN).  How ridiculous is that?  My mind was blown.  That's a dragon wizard for you.  The formula says he's as intelligent as any wizard and as narcissistic as any dragon.

Moving along, what makes Niv-Mizzet such a dangerous creature is his ability to simply tap to let you draw a card—giving you card advantage—and deal damage to a target—clearing the board or hurting your opponent directly.  His triggered ability, which is responsible for the damage dealing, can occur multiple times in one go.  If you decide to cast Brainstorm, you draw three cards, automatically letting Niv-Mizzet dish out three damage to a single target, or split up to three different ones.  This also means he automatically pings a target for one damage during your upkeep when you undergo your draw phase.

The possibilities for advantage is boundless.  You can use Brainstorm for the auto-three damage.  You can combine Niv-Mizzet with Arcanis, the Omnipotent... drawing three with Arcanis to deal three damage, drawing more with Niv-Mizzet himself and dealing more damage.  You can use Mind Spring and draw a ton of cards and deal a ton of damage.

But the greatest of combinations must be Niv-Mizzet with Mind Over Matter.  With these two cards, you can tap Niv-Mizzet to draw a card and deal one damage to your opponent.  You can use that freshly drawn card as payment for Mind Over Matter.  By discarding that card, you can untap Niv-Mizzet, allowing you to draw another card and deal another point of damage.  Now you can discard that card and untap Niv-Mizzet with Mind Over Matter.  Do it again?  Yes, please.  Essentially, you can smack your opponent for one damage at a time for as many cards you have in your library.

Sure, the Niv-Mizzet + Mind Over Matter combo is rather mana-cost expensive, but it's pretty much along the lines of certain victory.  Of course, you can use Quicksilver Dagger on any other creature in most cases, but this is just to prove how versatile a single creature like Niv-Mizzet can be.

5. Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon

Infect is a very interesting way of going about your path to victory.  Back in the old days, cards that meant infect had text that simply explained "poison counters."  Nowadays, the term infect replaced all of that.  Poison counters are still the term, but they are merely markers for creatures that deal damage via the infect ability.  MTG rules state that if any player, at any point in time, is marked with 10 or more poison counters, he or she instantly loses.  A 6/6 creature with infect does not deal six damage to creatures or players.  If all six damage hits a player, that player gets six poison counters added on to any poison counters from before.  As for combat damage to creatures, the creature with infect adds -1/-1 counters to any creature that comes in contact.  So a 6/6 creature with infect will die to an 8/8, but the 8/8 will be marked with six -1/-1 counters, making it a 2/2 until it leaves play.

Now that that's out of the way, here is the only dragon in the game of MTG that has the infect ability: Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon.  And he's the only "Dragon Skeleton" in the game, as well.  Anyway, sure, he's not as big as most of the others, being 4/4; but can fly, he can regenerate himself, and he can have haste if you choose to pay one more mana when he enters the battlefield, thereby allowing you to throw four poison counters at your opponent if there are no blockers in the way.

Find some way to pump up Skithiryx—for instance, Dragon Breath—and/or give him trample and you will have yourself a quicker way to victory than constantly dealing traditional damage.  The ability to place -1/-1 counters on other creatures is great, too, given that Skithiryx can regenerate if he gets killed by someone fatter than him.  He blocks a 7/7 beast?  Okay, Skithiryx dies, but he regenerates.  Now the 7/7 is permanently a 3/3.  No longer an issue for Skithiryx.  This, everyone, is a fun legendary dragon.

4. Scion of the Ur-Dragon

Try not to be annoyed, but I'll apologize in advance.  Given the situation, I will have to return to the topic of reanimation yet again.  This dragon legend, Scion of the Ur-Dragon, can go hand-in-hand with Bladewing the Risen in a dragon-based reanimation deck.

How would you like to be able to play as any dragon in your deck without ever drawing it into your hand?  How would you like to skip all the Entombs and Buried Alives and just use this one card?

This is exactly what Scion of the Ur-Dragon can do.  In a reanimation deck, it shouldn't be difficult for you to resurrect it as a target from your graveyard.  And when you do reanimate it, you can start using its ability to move more dragons from your deck into your graveyard, thus providing more dragons as reanimation targets.

But then again, that's not all that's great about Scion of the Ur-Dragon's abilities.  Sure, it's great that you can dump more dragons for reanimation, but as a result, Scion of the Ur-Dragon becomes that dragon for a turn.  You pay two mana and dump out Rith.  Scion of the Ur-Dragon temporarily becomes a copy of Rith.  You attack, you activate what would have been Rith's ability (see above) and gain a horde of Saproling tokens.  You pay two mana and dump out a Hellkite Overlord.  Scion of the Ur-Dragon is an 8/8 flying, trampling monstrosity that can regenerate and get pumped up with each offering of red mana.  The options continue.  And after the effect wears off, why not reanimate that dragon you tossed out?

3. Keiga, the Tide Star

Something's awfully intriguing about mass mind control in sci-fi novels or movies.  It's always somewhat nightmarish to the imagination.  But control elements in MTG tend to be blue in color, not the nightmarish black.

The mass mind control master for dragon legends happens to be blue, but there's nothing really nightmarish to think of him... except by your opponent, of course.

Keiga, the Tide Star is part of the legendary Japanese dragon quintet—yes, like the others, made up of a representative of each color.  Keiga represents blue and serves to mind control your opponent's creatures.  But how does this end up as mass mind control?

In MTG, rules state that there can only be one "legend" of a certain name on the battlefield at a given time.  If there are two, both are instantly destroyed.  Both will be on the field though, if only for a split second.  Here's where the strategy comes in.  You will have Keiga on the battlefield.  However, you will intentionally try to get more Keiga's out onto the field, thereby killing them all.  And when Keiga dies, you gain control of an opponent's creature.  The most infamous method, by far, is using Rites of Replication.  If the spell is kicked, you can pump out five copies of Keiga.  And because all of those copies are considered "legends," they all essentially kill themselves, granting you a total of six creatures you get to steal from your opponent.

Mass mind control.  If your opponent's sole game plan was to finish you off with Blightsteel Colossus or Emrakul, the Aeons Torn... well, there goes that idea.

2. Nicol Bolas

Honestly, I should've swapped the positions of Keiga and this guy, Nicol Bolas.  But I am heavily biased, given that Nicol Bolas is a staple in the MTG universe, story-wise and ancestry (the original printing was in 1994 and the reprinted one in 2008).  This isn't to say he's anything short of a face-smashing beast.

Just look at this card.  He's pretty simple.  He costs eight mana as a 7/7 flyer.  Reasonable.  There's the unfortunate per upkeep cost of three mana, else you sacrifice him.  Fine, that's not too big of a problem.  But every time he deals damage to an opponent—not just combat damage, any damage—your opponent discards his entire hand.  That's evil.  Evil as in the flavor text, "Dominaria's most ancient evil," evil.

I thought Crosis and his constant discard effect was brutal, but Nicol Bolas, being the "elder" dragon, puts the little one to shame.  Something simple as a Fire Whip attached to Nicol Bolas effectively gives him this ability: "Tap: target player discards his or her hand."

That.  Is.  Dumb.

As long as you have the blue, black and red mana ready during your upkeep to pay his maintenance cost, if he's enchanted by something like Fire Whip, he can really keep your opponent from ever doing anything for the rest of the game.  "Oh, you drew a card?  Tap.  Oh, you can't play it because it's not an instant?  Well, that card's gone, sorry."  Dumb.

If you can make Nicol Bolas a reanimation target (remember as long as you can afford the upkeep costs), things get even dumber.

1. Kokusho, the Evening Star

It's those Japanese dragon legends again.  Like Keiga, Kokusho, the Evening Star likes to kill himself in order to do anything fancy.  Mass mind control is pretty fancy, but that's not what Kokusho is here for.

Sure, taking all your opponent's creatures may give you a very good chance at winning, but that is nothing.  That is too slow compared to what Kokusho can do.

The same strategy employed with Keiga works for Kokusho.  Here's a refresher.  There can only be one legendary permanent of a certain name on the battlefield at any given time.  Once the second hits, both move from the battlefield into the graveyard.  Now take a look at Kokusho's ability.  Once he dies, your opponent loses five life and you gain five.  Not too shabby.  That won't win you the game, though.  What will win you the game is if you use the aforementioned Rites of Replication, kick it, and throw down a total of five additional Kokusho's.  That's six Kokusho's heading for the graveyard at once.  That means 30 life instantaneously down the drain for your opponent.  I believe he is dead at that point.

There are other ways to do this besides Rites of Replication, of course.  You can use Iname, Death Aspect to dump four copies of Kokusho into your graveyard (here we go with the reanimation tactic again) and then bring all four back simultaneously with Twilight's Call or Living Death.  Boom, the Kokusho's kill each other.  Your opponent loses 20 life lost.  Game.

Decks built around Kokusho can simply stall and disrupt the opponent until the necessary pieces are arranged.  It's a pretty straightforward and extremely deadly game plan.