Welcome all to the Daily Dose of Theros Beyond Death. Today I’m going to be talking about a brand-new enchantment that is looking to turn your unused enchantments into powerful creatures. That’s right folks, Birthing Pod is back! Well, kind of, and I’ll get to that card in a moment. Birthing Pod type cards have been very popular and powerful with many cards trying to replicate the power of the original Birthing Pod. Most recently, we have seen Prime Speaker Vannifar take advantage of this ability to search your library for higher and higher casting cost creatures with the hopes of triggering some sweet enter the battlefield or dying triggers. So what exactly is this new card, let’s have a look at Enigmatic Incarnation.
Enigmatic Incarnation
I’m a big fan of this card, because it's designed to for you to build a sweet deck around it. There is deck building choice of how many enchantments vs. how many creatures do you play in your deck. You also need to have creatures with different casting costs for Enigmatic Incarnation to be successful. One of the great things is that Theros Beyond Death lets you double dip thanks to Enchantment Creatures.
Now that we know what the card does, the deckbuilding ideas are coming a mile a minute. One of the immediate ideas that come to mind is using Leylines to get out 5-casting cost creatures earlier than expected. I think the fastest way to do that is with this beauty, Leyline of Abundance.
Leyline of Abundance
With mana creatures like Gilded Goose and Paradise Druid getting a boost from Leyline of Abundance, there is a chance to cast Enigmatic Incarnation on turn two or three. Are there enough strong 5-mana threats that you want to search for? Let’s have a look at the best of the best. (I’ll limit them to having blue, green and colourless for now)
Biogenic Ooze
Biogenic Ooze – Why get one creature when you can end up with two. Not only that, but two that get larger every turn!
Cavalier of Thorns / Cavalier of Gales
Cavalier of Gales / Cavalier of Thorns – This pair are no brainers, with amazing enter the battlefield abilities. Imagine having one of these threats on the battlefield on turn two or three.
Chulane, Teller of Tales
Chulane, Teller of Tales – Getting this creature out early in the game means that all your subsequent creature casts will just give you more card advantage.
Golos, Tireless Pilgrim
Golos, Tireless Pilgrim – This allows you to have an early game ramp, but might not be the best at finishing off your opponent.
God-Eternal Rhonas
God-Eternal Rhonas – This is a great fetch later in the game if you want to find a way to finish off your opponent.
Niv-Mizzet Reborn
Niv-Mizzet Reborn – This might be the best and most ambitious creature to fetch from your deck. If you build your deck the right way, it could really payoff with a ton of cards to refill your hand.
Roalesk, Apex Hybrid
Roalesk, Apex Hybrid – You’d be able to pump up one of your mana creatures to turn it into a threat and have a 4/5 Flying Trample creature to boot.
Does Theros Beyond Death provide us any additional 5-mana threats?
Nessian Boar
Nessian Boar – You get a 10/6 creature that will clear out any blockers your opponent might have while providing some card advantage.
And this is just 5-mana creatures. Enigmatic Incarnation allows you to get any creature based on what casting cost you’re searching for. Some of the best creatures that you could use will be the enchantment creatures, that will be able to be both sacrificed and searched for. Here are just some of the new cards from Theros Beyond Death that could go into a Enigmatic Incarnation deck.
We know of all the great creatures, but what about non-creature enchantments for you to sacrifice?
Omen of the Sea
Omen of the Sea – This allows you to draw a card, get a Scry trigger, then allow itself to be sacrificed to find a nice three drop creature you need.
Mantle of the Wolf
Mantle of the Wolf – Not only can you temporarily pump up one of your creatures, you can later search for a 5-drop creature and get two 2/2 Wolf tokens.
As you can see, there is a lot of resources available to make a Simic Enigmatic Incarnation deck work. I’m sure that it can be expanded to extra colours if needed, but I think I’ll try a Simic deck to start. Thanks again for reading the Daily Dose of Theros Beyond Death. Join me again tomorrow as I investigate some new X mana spells from Theros Beyond Death.
