Welcome back to Possibility Storm, the weekly MTG puzzle series available exclusively through MTGCanada and PossibilityStorm.com.
Ixalan season is officially open! Here's the first puzzle of the season, which was solved by our Patron Erin Vaartjes in a blazing 8m 01s..
(Click to enlarge)
Think you've got it? Check your answer against the solution below:
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- Cast Walking Ballista for X=1, spending two mana.
- Cast Skulduggery, targeting the Warrior token and your Sun-Crowned Hunters. This is key for two reasons. The first is that with the Warrior down, your opponent's only remaining blockers (which also no longer includes Oketra the True), have double strike, which means that if they blocked Sun-Crowned Hunters, they would trigger its Enrage ability twice. The second is that by boosting the Hunters' power to 6, you guarantee that it will deal 6 damage either blocked or unblocked.
- Attack with your Vicious Conquistador, Desperate Castaways, and Sun-Crowned Hunters. The Conquistador triggers and deals 1 damage, taking your opponent to 14.
- Because of the guaranteed 6 damage thing, your opponent's only reasonable block is to stop two smaller guys. 6 damage comes through, taking your opponent to 8.
- Post-combat, activate Walking Ballista to deal 1 damage to Sun-Crowned Hunters, triggering its Enrage to deal 3, taking your opponent to 5.
- Cast Hungry Flames targeting Sun-Crowned Hunters and your opponent. It deals 2 damage to your opponent, taking them to 3, and 3 damage to Sun-Crowned Hunters, killing it while also triggering its Enrage trigger one more time to deal the final 3 to your opponent for the win.
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Does something need clarification? Check out the official Rules and Assumptions to see if your answer lies within.
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How did you do? Tune in again next Monday for the next puzzle in this series.
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Thanks and see you next week!
