Happy Friday everybody! I hope you’ve had a fantastic week. It’s been a busy one for me! We’re all busy getting ready for our upcoming Extra Life event, I’ve been working on painting our new AV room, and doing my normal day-to-day things on top of that! There’s never a slow day here at ABU – and I love it!
Speaking of Extra Life, I’m going to take a minute to plug it. Basically, people all over the world game for 24 hours to help raise money for their local Children’s Hospital. ABU has participated for the past four years, and we’re gearing up to do it again! If you’re local, you can come down for all sorts of awesome 24-hour gaming fun. The full schedule is here. If you’re not local, I hope you’ll consider donating! We’ll (hopefully) be streaming on our Twitch Channel all day. You can donate directly to ABU’s Extra Life page here, or if you want to donate to my page (which should count towards ABU’s total because I’m on their team) you can do that here. Gaming is awesome and so is helping kids, so please check it out if you have a moment!
Now, let us get to this week’s FFF! We had another insanely close one. We had a local favorite, Lord of Atlantis, back in the ring and facing off against Elvish Champion this time. We have a lot of passionate Merfolk fans on our page and in our shop, but by the end of the poll, Elvish Champion had taken the lead with 51% of the vote. Like #1 Merfolk Fan Corey Checketts said on the Facebook poll, “everyone knows elves is a bad matchup!” I didn’t think it was THAT bad, but the vote seemed to think different! Never fear, you can’t keep a good lord down. I’m sure Lord of Atlantis will get yet another chance… someday.
Before we dig into the champion of the Elves, I’m sure you all want to know who won the lil’ Infect care package from last week’s article! Congratulations Blaine Frisbey, you’ve won!
And for all you Elves fans, we’ll be giving away a foil 8th Edition Elvish Champion this week! All you have to do to win is:
- Like the ABU Games Facebook Page
- Like the post announcing the giveaway
- Comment on said post telling us what you love about Elvish Champion or elves in general!
Now, let’s get started!
History:
Elvish Champion was first printed in Invasion, released in October 2000, and has since seen four regular set printings, and two “other” printings (once in a Duels of the Planeswalkers deck and once as a European Junior Series foil).
Originally, Elvish Champion wasn’t actually an elf! Its original text has its creature type listed as the now-defunct typing of “Lord.” When they went back to re-type the card, Wizards had to change the rules text to specify that Elvish Champion could only target “other” elves otherwise it would be too bonkers!
What Makes This Card So Cool?
It makes all of your elves bigger! AND all of your opponent’s elves! And their opponent’s elves too (if you’re doing some sweet elf on elf bloodbath multiplayer). Plus, I just think the history behind the “Lord” creature type is cool! Seriously though, this card has the chance to be so incredibly powerful, especially if you can force your opponent to have a forest (if they don’t already have one)! Forestwalk is nothing to sneer at, especially in Commander, so if you have some Lush Growth tricks up your sleeve or something it can pave the way for a giant elf token army to overwhelm the opposition!
What Formats Is This Card Played In?
I haven’t seen a ton out of Modern Elves lately, but when I face it I’m usually pretty impressed! Elves are one of those tribes that can easily overwhelm the board and smash your face in. Here is a 5-0 list from a competitive Modern League back in August:
The only other format that Champion really shines in right now is Commander. I’m sure you can imagine how powerful it could get if your whole deck was built around Elf strategy! Here is an Ezuri list that features the champion.
In Conclusion:
This elf is crazy! I’m honestly surprised that Lord of Atlantis didn’t end up winning the vote, but it was pretty awesome trying to dig into the history of this Elf Lord. What do you think? Do you have any awesome brews that feature our Elvish Champion? Any suggestions for next week? Hit me up in the comments! Have a great week everybody!