Table of Contents – Ultimate Guide to AFR Limited and Prerelease
Chapter 1 - Top Commons for Limited and Prerelease
Chapter 2 - Top Uncommons for Limited and Prerelease
Chapter 3 - Guide to Combat Tricks and Removal Cards by Colour
Chapter 4 - Guide to Dice Rolling
Chapter 5 - Guide to Dungeon Venturing
Welcome all to the Ultimate Guide to Adventures in the Forgotten Realms Limited and Prerelease. It’s time for the Guide to Dice Rolling. Magic has had a history of cards that allow you to roll dice, but it’s either been in Un-sets or limited to rolling a D6 on rare occasions. When you play Dungeons & Dragons, dice rolling is a large part of playing the game, so it just makes sense to bring that aspect of the game into Magic for this set.
To make it easier, I’ve broken the dice rolling cards for this set down by colour so you can have an easier reference to what you’re looking for.
White Dice Rolling Cards
If you want to be rolling dice in your Limited games, White is not the colour to be playing. There are zero dice rolling cards for White.
Blue Dice Rolling Cards
Dice Rolling Cards (Seven Cards)
Arcane Investigator is an early two-drop you can throw on the battlefield and hope that your opponent forgets about it until the later game. Aberrant Mind Sorcerer is a strong uncommon to pick up as it can get back a dice rolling instant or sorcery. A good instant to get back would be the card drawing Contact Other Plane. This is a great instant way to gain some card advantage and who knows you might even draw three cards 5% of the time. Djinni Windseer acts as a strong 3/3 Flying creature on the battlefield but also gives you a crucial Scry trigger thanks to the dice rolling ability.
Power of Persuasion is a tempo card, but wouldn’t recommend playing this out at sorcery speed. A good creature to pick up though would be the 2/1 Flash creature Scion of Stygia. It can tap down a threat at instant speed and can potentially lock it down for an extra turn. One of the dream late-game cards to have for a dice rolling deck is Wizard’s Spellbook. It gives an almost Flashback-type feeling to all your instants and sorceries you’ve cast and half the time they'll only cost you one mana or less to cast.
Dice Rolling Payoff and Helper Cards (Two Cards)
Now that you have all these dice rolling cards in your deck, it would be nice to have a payoff card and Blue has that in the form of Feywild Trickster. It makes every dice rolling card more valuable by making a 1/1 Faerie Dragon token. If it's better dice results you want, look no further than Pixie Guide. This will start by doubling the number of dice you are rolling each time, helping you achieve that higher dice result and therefore better value out of each dice rolling card’s abilities.
Black Dice Rolling Cards
Dice Rolling Cards (Two Cards)
Black only has two dice rolling cards that you can play in your deck. The best one is probably Lightfoot Rogue. It’s a cheap two-mana creature that can get Deathtouch and potentially extra power when it’s attacking. A hard creature for your opponent to block if they don't have some cheap creatures to block it with. Herald of Hadar is a reasonable creature but its dice rolling ability is expensive at six mana. If you can have it survive until the late game though, you can put a slow clock on your opponent with its ability and would work well if there was a creature stalemate.
Red Dice Rolling Cards
Dice Rolling Cards (Six Cards)
We start off with one of the best dice rolling cards in the set, Chaos Channeler. This is one you want to look out for as it can provide you with some major card advantage. If you have a high luck skill you might just want to play Delina, Wild Mage. It has the possibility to go infinite if you can hit the 25% jackpot on each roll. Having cards that allow you to roll extra dice will be helpful in going infinite (Or at least allow you to create a bunch of tokens). Two of the best targets for this ability are Feywild Trickster and Pixie Guide that we saw above from our Blue payoff and helper cards. Earth-Cult Elemental is a strong 6/6 body late in the game that will most likely make your opponent sacrifice a land. Another sub-par dice rolling creature is Hoarding Ogre.
If you like Goblins, try out Swarming Goblins that gives you the chance to put between one to three Goblins onto the battlefield over and above the 4/3 creature you get to start with. There are times when it can attack and provide you some tokens, but you're also left with a Hill Giant for four mana. If you're looking for the cheapest dice rolling card you can find, look non further than Goblin Morningstar. It can provide a 1/1 Goblin early on and a Trample giving Equipment later in the game. There is only one removal spell that gets you to roll the dice, and that is Farideh’s Fireball. If you get a little extra luck it will only deal two damage to your opponent as well.
Dice Rolling Payoff and Helper Cards (Three Cards)
Critical Hit is an interesting combat trick that you can use to give any creature Double Strike for only one mana. If you have enough dice rolling cards in your deck, you can get it back in your hand if you ever roll a twenty. Brazen Dwarf can be used to ping your opponent each time you roll dice and is a reasonable blocker with three toughness. The best overall helper and payoff card though is Barbarian Class. At Level 1 it can allow you to roll additional dice for your dice roll abilities and at Level 2 it can give one of your creatures +2/+0 and Menace to help get in for some damage.
Green Dice Rolling Cards
Dice Rolling Cards (Two Cards)
Green only has two dice rolling cards and neither of them are overly special. Sylvan Shepherd is a great way to gain some repeated life if you’re able to keep it alive over multiple combats. Loathsome Troll can be pesky and keep returning after it dies but it costs a total of nine mana to bring back, which will most likely be spent over multiple turns.
Multicolour and Artifact Dice Rolling Cards
Dice Rolling Cards (Three Cards)
For artifacts, you have three that will provide you with some dice rolling fun. Spiked Pit is an interesting removal spell for the cost of six total mana. Next up are two of my favourite cards in the set. Treasure Chest is an artifact with a total cost of seven mana to trigger that allows you to roll one dice to see what Treasure you get. Ideally you would like to draw three cards and gain three life but having five extra Treasures lying around can help you cast your spells for the rest of the game.
I’ve saved the best artifact for last with Deck of Many Things. This is a card advantage machine. No matter the result (other than zero or less of course) you'll get something advantageous to you for only two mana. This'll allow you to have a better chance of playing the cards you draw or get back. Who knows, you might get lucky with zero cards in your hand and roll a twenty!
Dice Rolling Payoff and Helper Cards (1 Card)
There's only one dice rolling payoff card in multicolour and that's Farideh, Devil’s Chosen. With the right luck, you can start drawing some cards, but with each roll, you'll probably be getting in for three damage with double evasion in the form of Flying and Menace.
I hope that this AFR Guide to Dice Rolling will get you excited to grab a D20. You'll be amazed about how good it feels when you roll your first Natural 20 and get to make three Goblins instead of one or two. Thanks again for reading Chapter 4 of the Ultimate Guide to AFR Limited and Prerelease. Next up is Chapter 5 and the Guide to Dungeon Venturing. If you’ve missed any of the other chapters for this guide, click below to check them out.
Table of Contents – Ultimate Guide to AFR Limited and Prerelease
Chapter 1 - Top Commons for Limited and Prerelease
Chapter 2 - Top Uncommons for Limited and Prerelease
Chapter 3 - Guide to Combat Tricks and Removal Cards by Colour
Chapter 4 - Guide to Dice Rolling
Chapter 5 - Guide to Dungeon Venturing
