You've all been waiting for it and here it is! My thoughts on the best 50 wrath cards in Commander. If you missed my Top 50 Spot Removal Cards, do check it out. I plan on doing quite a few of these, but I want to wait for a while between each list to have the chance to finely tune it. My general process for making these lists will be: Look up every relevant card I can find, filter it down to 50, give it to the community to look it over and offer suggestions, and then finalize it with my tournament competitive friend. Other lists I've already drafted up and will post in the future include: Recursion, Tutors, Mana Ramp, Counters and Lands. If there's a list you'd specifically like to see, let me know and I'll release that one next after I've finalized this one.
Abridged About Me:
I just started Magic in Innistrad when my college roommate told me to try it out. That was right when the playgroup was getting into Commander. We were relatively casual at first, but one player in our group was vastly more competitive than we were, and he was unrelentingly combo-ing out turn 3 or sooner each game. Thus, we had to adapt and we've become a very cut-throat group of players. Luckily, that competitive friend of ours was very helpful, constantly offering suggestions and helping us build our decks. You can check out my competitive Ghave deck list here.
Now that that's out of the way, here's my current draft of the top 50 wrath cards in Commander. I define a wrath as a card that seeks to remove multiple permanents from the board without targeting and without dependency on other cards. Also, I am rating the cards based on the overall power of the card, not by the power of its wrath ability. I try to establish criteria for the power of the card by its speed, versatility and mana efficiency.
I am very open to suggestions and re-ordering, especially in this very early draft. I'm sure there are very good wraths that I've either missed or underestimated. I want this to be a list that the community helped sculpt and tune. So let me hear it, tear my list apart, because that's the only way it can improve!
I would rank Wrath of God and Damnation higher on the list due to their lower mana cost. Yes, Austere Command is more versatile, but it also comes out two turns later which could very well mean you died while waiting to play it.
I love these types of lists as they show the difference in perspectives on the format and other playgroups. I do believe you should to take versatility into account as opposed to raw power.
I can't agree with you on any of the pure Armageddon effects. They don't do enough on their own and require considerable preparation and strategy. Things like Austere Command and Merciless Eviction top my list because they are always useful in variable board states.
I also really enjoy Chain Reaction and Desolation Giant. They have uses in specific decks, but I would have them in the top 50.
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"If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world."
-Thorin Oakenshield
The Hobbit
J.R.R. Tolkien
Is there a way to quantitatively generate a list? Say, compile a list of wraths, and then see which are the most common in the decklist database? Just an idea.
In a vacuum, I think the power level of Hallowed Burial is far above Rout in this particular format. In general, I'd rank removal modes like this:
Tuck > Exile > -1/-1 counters / Sacrifice > Destroy & can't be regenerated > Destroy > Deals X damage to everything > Bounce
Ixidron deserves a mention, for changing every other creature without morph into a vanilla 2/2 that can't change back.
Global Ruin also deserves special mention, since, with Prismatic Omen, not only do I now have five lands to your two or three, but my five are better than yours. You have, what, some duals? I have a friggin' Gaea's Cradle. It's my "mountain", you see. (On the flip side, this makes you very vulnerable to Tsunami and friends.)
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Card advantage is not the same thing as card draw. Something for 2B cannot be strictly worse than something for BBB or 3BB. If you're taking out Swords to Plowshares for Plummet, you're a fool. Stop doing these things!
No Overwhelming Forces, False Prophet, or Vandalblast? Overwhelming Forces is something of a targeted strike, but it lets you keep your creatures and at least in my meta there's usually only 1-2 players who are relevant to creature sweep at the table. False Prophet is easy to recur. Vandalblast is one of the best red "sweep" options.
I think for this kind of list, it might be helpful to sort by color. That makes it much more relevant to deckbuilders.
Terminus and Hallowed Burial should be ranked higher. The ability to tuck a commander with an untargeted effect should not be underestimated. They're also wraths that bypass Indestructible and similar effects. I do however agree that Austere Command should be at the top and Wrath of God and Damnation can go a little lower (though Damnation should be higher than *** because white has plenty of options, but black is more limited). The concern that you will be dead unless you wrath the board at turn 4 is a valid one in Standard, Modern or Legacy, but most EDH decks don't really start playing threatening creatures until later turns and decks that win on turn 4 are artifact-based combo decks that couldn't care less about Wrath of God. A few more mana is well worth the added versatility.
Blasphemous Act probably deserves to be a bit higher, probably in the 20's range. Especially in multiplayer (which more of Commander is), it's often a really cheap wrath is a color that usually has trouble getting rid of larger creatures. You should probably keep color restrictions in mind. Any wrath that is white should be judged more harshly because it competes against so many other good cards, whereas something like Oblivion Stone should be regarded more favorably on account of being a wrath that can be played in mono-blue or mono-green. For this reason, I would also rate Child of Alara much lower, definitely lower than Planar Cleansing at least, for being five colors and requiring you to jump through hoops, just to get a Planar Cleansing effect.
Cards that should be included in the list:
Gaze of Granite: I see Pernicious Deed is already in the list and this is just it's sorcery cousin. Deed should be a little higher ranked than Gaze, but not by much. Deed is more versatile because you can split up the mana cost, but in practice, I rarely see anyone play Deed and then let it sit for a turn and wait for their mana to untap.
Scourglass: Sure, it commits the cardinal sin of having to sit there until your next upkeep, but it does have the benefit of probably leaving most of your own board intact and being relatively easily recoverable.
Vandalblast: Plague Wind against artifacts for five with the option of casting it as a Shatter for one in a pinch? I'd put it in every red deck I run.
Mutilate: Probably high-tens, low-twenties range. It has the restriction that it's only good in mono-black, but it does pull a lot of weight there.
Barter in Blood: Depends on whether you count this in your definitions. It's devastating against Voltron-type decks (except Sigarda) and less so against token, ETB creatures type decks. On the bright side, it's fairly easy to tweak your own deck to suffer minimal loss from it.
Fracturing Gust: Instant, gets rid of two types of permanents and gains you some life to boot. Unless your own deck very heavily depends on artifacts and/or enchantments, any WG deck should run this.
Is there a way to quantitatively generate a list? Say, compile a list of wraths, and then see which are the most common in the decklist database? Just an idea.
Probably, scoeri does it with a Ruby script, unfortunately I'm not familiar with the language, nor do I have all the card metadata (he made it sound like a pain to do). I may just count by hand with a little ctrl+f?
Ixidron deserves a mention, for changing every other creature without morph into a vanilla 2/2 that can't change back.
I had never heard of Ixidron, it actually seems really good for Commander, especially if your opponents general was out. Now they have to wrath the board just to replay it! I also added Global Ruin.
... Blasphemous Act probably deserves to be a bit higher, probably in the 20's range ... I would also rate Child of Alara much lower, definitely lower than Planar Cleansing at least
I agree, I made those changes and I also put in the other cards you suggested. Thanks for all of your input everyone! The list has been updated so it's time for a second round of scrutiny.
I feel like this should be three or four separate lists. A list of the top "wrath effects" shouldn't have Armageddon or Hurkyl's Recall. Those aren't wrath effects, not by a long shot. "Wrath effects" really ought to be limited to creature sacrifice, exile, tuck, destroy, -/-, bounce, and damage. Those aren't strictly wraths, mind you, but "creature sweeper" is what pretty much everyone thinks of when anyone says "wrath effect".
Then there should be another list for best artifact/enchantment sweepers, and maybe a mass land destruction list. But having all of them on one list is really, really disorienting. Some cards like Austere Command or All is Dust would go on more than one list, and that's fine.
Oblivion stone is definitely higher. Honestly I'd put it in top 5. For 1, it hits everything, which makes is very valuable to colors that can't deal with certain permanent types, i.e. everything that isn't white. Second, it's instant-speed, which means you can set it off in response to an attack (or not, if that attack is at someone else, etc etc). instant-speed is major bargaining tool. And third, if people get all non-committal to the field, you can just start putting counters on your permanents so when you DO set it off, you lose nothing important. AND, it's more recurrable than instants or sorceries to almost every color.
i mean, compared to planar cleansing it's faaaar superior. cleansing is sorcery speed, requires white (and a lot of it)(and white can kill any permanent type so hitting everything is less useful), can't protect your own stuff, and is very hard to recur. Plus you can set it off earlier, if you're willing to risk it getting destroyed. planar cleansing is like, maybe in the 30s or 40s. o-stone might actually be #1.
also I think you're underestimating geddon because everyone hates it. It's still crazy good. Although I will say that geddon serves a very different function that wrath. You want a wrath when your field position sucks. You want a geddon when it's good, and you want to seal the deal.
Some stuff is harder to quantify though. ie global ruin is garbage in mono-white. in my 5-color decks, though, it's crazy good because I'm running all duals and fetches so I always keep 5 lands. But for most decks, it won't be that good.
starstorm probably belongs on the list. Imo it's far superior to BSZ. BSZ is meh at best, it's a crazy expensive way to deal with ulamog or any indestructible you're likely to care about. That's what targeted removal is for - make 'em sac it after the rest of his board got wiped, or tragic slip it or whatever. definitely prefer starstorm to chain reaction too. magmaquake is pretty decent too, as is fault line. instant speed uber alles.
also, supreme verdict at #2? what? yet obliterate is way down the list?
and steel hellkite is a fine creature, but when you need a wrath you don't want to topdeck a steel hellkite.
ok, let's see, my top 10:
oblivion stone
austere command
hallowed burial
terminus
armageddon/ravages
jokulhaups
pernicious deed
decree of pain
cataclysm
catastrophe
I feel like this should be three or four separate lists. A list of the top "wrath effects" shouldn't have Armageddon or Hurkyl's Recall. Those aren't wrath effects, not by a long shot. "Wrath effects" really ought to be limited to creature sacrifice, exile, tuck, destroy, -/-, bounce, and damage. Those aren't strictly wraths, mind you, but "creature sweeper" is what pretty much everyone thinks of when anyone says "wrath effect".
Then there should be another list for best artifact/enchantment sweepers, and maybe a mass land destruction list. But having all of them on one list is really, really disorienting. Some cards like Austere Command or All is Dust would go on more than one list, and that's fine.
I, for one, don't typically associate "wrath" with creatures exclusively. I know it comes from Wrath of God, but I still tend to just think of "wrath" as short hand for "mass removal".
I, for one, don't typically associate "wrath" with creatures exclusively. I know it comes from Wrath of God, but I still tend to just think of "wrath" as short hand for "mass removal".
I would generally consider it to be for mass removal of non-land permanents. Because as I said, when you want to wipe lands, it's usually not because someone else has better lands, it's because you have better creatures/artifacts/enchantments/planeswalkers and you want to lock them down. When you're playing a "wrath", imo, it's because you're behind in board position and you want to make the field even again.
I'd put cyclonic rift in the top five, if not number one. It gets around shroud and hexproof and leaves your board completely in tact. You get their artifacts, enchantments, creatures, and planeswalkers. You set back people ramping with rocks an additional turn or more while they recast them. I've seen rift do some pretty nasty things to people relying on mana reflection or gauntlet effect type rocks. Oh, and on top of all that, it's an instant.
You may want to specify some more specific definitions of wraths. One major distinction that I've noticed is the specific purpose of the card. Generally speaking, a wrath card is understood to be a card that is meant to be played when you're behind in terms of board position, for the purpose of resetting the board to an even state.
In that regard, cards like Cataclysm and Razia's Purification should not be considered wraths. They are cards that are meant to secure your victory once you're ahead, but not to be played when you're behind. In fact, playing these cards when your board state is bad will generally be your own death sentence. I would argue that effects like Armageddon fall under it as well. You do not play Armageddon when your opponent is ahead. I mean, Desolation Angel is a victory condition all by itself when played on an empty board, but once again, you don't drop it when your opponent has better critters.
To some extend, comparing Shatterstorm with Wrath of God has a bit of an apples/oranges feel to it, but at least they both serve the purpose of clearing the board of threats. I think it can be generally agreed that in terms of threat, the order is generally Creatures >> Artifacts > Enchantments > Lands (if you kill lands, you usually do so as resource denial, not because you're afraid that the lands will kill you if left unchecked). Vandalblast would be the best card ever if it dealt with creatures instead of artifacts. As it is, dealing with a less threatening permanent type, it's perfectly balanced. The list can be adjusted with this ranking in mind, but I do think that things like Cataclysm should be removed as they cannot be compared, since they serve an entirely different purpose.
In a vacuum, I think the power level of Hallowed Burial is far above Rout in this particular format. In general, I'd rank removal modes like this:
Tuck > Exile > -1/-1 counters / Sacrifice > Destroy & can't be regenerated > Destroy > Deals X damage to everything > Bounce
While I think I agree with your removal type ranking, Rout in particular gets a huge bump in my mind for the ability to cast it as an instant. Instant-speed sweeper is huge.
-Terminus > Hallowed Burial. There are a lot of cards that can setup a miracle that are played in EDH, plus just getting a miracle on itself makes it a better card. 1 more mana cost to hard cast it is not significant.
-Cyclonic Rift is one of the best wipes in EDH, if only because it is one-sided... oh, and hits everything. Not sure where I would rank it, but definitely somewhere in the top 6.
-Jokuulhaaps should not be that highly rated. It's pretty situational and not seen in casual play at all.
Oblivion stone is definitely higher. Honestly I'd put it in top 5. For 1, it hits everything, which makes is very valuable to colors that can't deal with certain permanent types, i.e. everything that isn't white. Second, it's instant-speed, which means you can set it off in response to an attack.
This is definitely true, though it does cost 8 for the wrath instead of six, and people will be able to anticipate and play around it while it's on the field. Still though, you've convinced me to move it up.
You want a wrath when your field position sucks. You want a geddon when it's good, and you want to seal the deal.
In a lot of scenarios you're correct. Marelt brought this up too. But others (having a Crucible of Worlds or Life from the Loam or in a Jhoira of the Ghitu deck) will take you from a place of potentially being behind to essentially winning the game. You also give a great top 10 and I'll take those highly into consideration for my next update.
In that regard, cards like Cataclysm and Razia's Purification should not be considered wraths. They are cards that are meant to secure your victory once you're ahead, but not to be played when you're behind. In fact, playing these cards when your board state is bad will generally be your own death sentence.
In any scenario where one card an opponent controls is causing you to lose, this is true. But let's say you have a powerful creature like an Ulamog, while your opponents have several creatures that can kill you with pure damage. You're going to lose the game when your opponent attacks you, but a Cataclysm would bring you from dead on board to ahead.
While I enjoy both your threads so far, I think you need a better defined frame. Meaning what criteria is the highest ranking? Is speed or access/mana cost (both CMC and color restrictions) the most important? If so your top 10, would look rather different. Or is versatility the key criteria? Or something else?
I completely agree, and I haven't really done that as well as I should have. I try to take into account speed, versatility, and cost. There may be more criteria I could be missing, let me know if you come up with more. Having clear cut definitions like this would definitely help me establish a less arbitrary ranking.
-Terminus > Hallowed Burial. There are a lot of cards that can setup a miracle that are played in EDH, plus just getting a miracle on itself makes it a better card. 1 more mana cost to hard cast it is not significant.
This is definitely true, though it does cost 8 for the wrath instead of six, and people will be able to anticipate and play around it while it's on the field. Still though, you've convinced me to move it up.
In a lot of scenarios you're correct. Marelt brought this up too. But others (having a Crucible of Worlds or Life from the Loam or in a Jhoira of the Ghitu deck) will take you from a place of potentially being behind to essentially winning the game. You also give a great top 10 and I'll take those highly into consideration for my next update.
Well you can just set o-stone off immediately if necessary.
But the thing I love about o-stone isn't playing it on a field where I'm losing badly where it's just an 8 mana planar cleansing (which is still way better than planar cleansing, if only for the color restriction and recurrability), it's playing it on a field where I'm evenly matched or even a little ahead. Because then you can force your opponents to overextend MORE to force you to set it off, otherwise you just beat them on board, and in the meantime you can protect your own stuff from o-stone so that your advantage is insurmountable when you do set it off.
Personally I think it's pretty much required in any mono-black deck, and nearly so in any non-white deck. For white decks it isn't required but I'd still usually run it. It's not quite as ubiquitous as soul ring, but nearly so among my decks. It has a crazy number of advantages over almost any other wipe.
Btw, why is DoJ so many spots below ***? I have a hard time believing regeneration is really that important, very few playable creatures have it. Plus you can actually take advantage of regeneration yourself with DoJ, so ***'s prevention is a double-edged sword.
Sure you need a draw engine and a tutor to set it up for instant speed, but damn is it nice to pre combat tuck everyone's team.
But I agree the tuck and exile wraths are superior to your standard blow up stuff cards. Avacyn is abused in my meta and damnation just doesn't cut it some times.
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The EDH stax primer When you absolutely, positively got to kill every permanent in the room, accept no substitutes.
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Abridged About Me:
I just started Magic in Innistrad when my college roommate told me to try it out. That was right when the playgroup was getting into Commander. We were relatively casual at first, but one player in our group was vastly more competitive than we were, and he was unrelentingly combo-ing out turn 3 or sooner each game. Thus, we had to adapt and we've become a very cut-throat group of players. Luckily, that competitive friend of ours was very helpful, constantly offering suggestions and helping us build our decks. You can check out my competitive Ghave deck list here.
Now that that's out of the way, here's my current draft of the top 50 wrath cards in Commander. I define a wrath as a card that seeks to remove multiple permanents from the board without targeting and without dependency on other cards. Also, I am rating the cards based on the overall power of the card, not by the power of its wrath ability. I try to establish criteria for the power of the card by its speed, versatility and mana efficiency.
2 Merciless Eviction
3 Hallowed Burial
4 Terminus
5 Rout
6 Cyclonic Rift
7 Oblivion Stone
8 Armageddon
8 Ravages of War
9 Decree of Pain
10 Catastrophe
11 Cataclysm
12 Supreme Verdict
13 Pernicious Deed
14 Jokulhaups
15 Obliterate
16 All is Dust
17 Akroma's Vengeance
18 Wrath of God
18 Damnation
19 Final Judgment
20 Planar Cleansing
22 Fracturing Gust
23 Razia's Purification
24 Blasphemous Act
25 Gaze of Granite
26 Black Sun's Zenith
27 Chain Reaction
28 Apocalypse
29 Shatterstorm
30 Starstorm
31 Life's Finale
32 Overwhelming Forces
33 Global Ruin
34 Day of Judgment
35 Phyrexian Rebirth
36 Void
37 Nevinyrral's Disk
38 Wildfire
39 Mass Calcify
40 False Prophet
42 Kederekt Leviathan
43 Decree of Annihilation
44 Death Cloud
45 Soulscour
46 Sunder
47 Evacuation
48 Hurkyl's Recall
49 Devastation Tide
50 Plague Wind
Banned Wraths
1 Worldfire
2 Upheaval
3 Balance
4 Limited Resources
5 Sway of the Stars
2 Myojin of Cleansing Fire
3 Scourglass
4 Magus of the Disk
5 Solar Tide
6 Desolation Giant
7 Martial Coup
8 Winds of Rath
9 Mutilate
10 Child of Alara
11 Hour of Reckoning
12 Magma Quake
13 Fault Line
^ Cyclonic Rift
v Jokulhaups
I am very open to suggestions and re-ordering, especially in this very early draft. I'm sure there are very good wraths that I've either missed or underestimated. I want this to be a list that the community helped sculpt and tune. So let me hear it, tear my list apart, because that's the only way it can improve!
Sharuum | Damia | Hermit Druid
Signature and Avatar by Inkfox Aesthetics
I can't agree with you on any of the pure Armageddon effects. They don't do enough on their own and require considerable preparation and strategy. Things like Austere Command and Merciless Eviction top my list because they are always useful in variable board states.
I also really enjoy Chain Reaction and Desolation Giant. They have uses in specific decks, but I would have them in the top 50.
-Thorin Oakenshield
The Hobbit
J.R.R. Tolkien
I don't like soulscour due to its 10 mana cost.
I'm a little confused about black sun's zenith as 5th best board wipe.
BBB Two Hundred Zombies BBB
Duel Commander
WR Tajic, Wrath of the Manlands RW
BGW Doran Destruction WGB
Commander
GUB Mimeoplasm, Screw Politics BUG
BR Mogis, God of Slaughter RB
RGW Marath, Ramp and Removal WGR
WUBRG Karona, Jank God GRBUW
It's a good one. Right up there with Mutilate since they can get rid of indestructible stuff. I don't think it's top 5, but it's a good one.
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In a vacuum, I think the power level of Hallowed Burial is far above Rout in this particular format. In general, I'd rank removal modes like this:
Tuck > Exile > -1/-1 counters / Sacrifice > Destroy & can't be regenerated > Destroy > Deals X damage to everything > Bounce
stuff
I like Pestilence too, but mostly because I have ways to make it not hurt me, or even make it beneficial.
Ixidron deserves a mention, for changing every other creature without morph into a vanilla 2/2 that can't change back.
Global Ruin also deserves special mention, since, with Prismatic Omen, not only do I now have five lands to your two or three, but my five are better than yours. You have, what, some duals? I have a friggin' Gaea's Cradle. It's my "mountain", you see. (On the flip side, this makes you very vulnerable to Tsunami and friends.)
On phasing:
I think Exile > Tuck since tucking still allows critters to be tutored.
-Thorin Oakenshield
The Hobbit
J.R.R. Tolkien
The two is very close. Tucking is a better solution for generals while exiling is better for everything else.
I think for this kind of list, it might be helpful to sort by color. That makes it much more relevant to deckbuilders.
Blasphemous Act probably deserves to be a bit higher, probably in the 20's range. Especially in multiplayer (which more of Commander is), it's often a really cheap wrath is a color that usually has trouble getting rid of larger creatures. You should probably keep color restrictions in mind. Any wrath that is white should be judged more harshly because it competes against so many other good cards, whereas something like Oblivion Stone should be regarded more favorably on account of being a wrath that can be played in mono-blue or mono-green. For this reason, I would also rate Child of Alara much lower, definitely lower than Planar Cleansing at least, for being five colors and requiring you to jump through hoops, just to get a Planar Cleansing effect.
Cards that should be included in the list:
Gaze of Granite: I see Pernicious Deed is already in the list and this is just it's sorcery cousin. Deed should be a little higher ranked than Gaze, but not by much. Deed is more versatile because you can split up the mana cost, but in practice, I rarely see anyone play Deed and then let it sit for a turn and wait for their mana to untap.
Scourglass: Sure, it commits the cardinal sin of having to sit there until your next upkeep, but it does have the benefit of probably leaving most of your own board intact and being relatively easily recoverable.
Vandalblast: Plague Wind against artifacts for five with the option of casting it as a Shatter for one in a pinch? I'd put it in every red deck I run.
Mutilate: Probably high-tens, low-twenties range. It has the restriction that it's only good in mono-black, but it does pull a lot of weight there.
Barter in Blood: Depends on whether you count this in your definitions. It's devastating against Voltron-type decks (except Sigarda) and less so against token, ETB creatures type decks. On the bright side, it's fairly easy to tweak your own deck to suffer minimal loss from it.
Fracturing Gust: Instant, gets rid of two types of permanents and gains you some life to boot. Unless your own deck very heavily depends on artifacts and/or enchantments, any WG deck should run this.
Great suggestions! I agree and I made those changes.
Probably, scoeri does it with a Ruby script, unfortunately I'm not familiar with the language, nor do I have all the card metadata (he made it sound like a pain to do). I may just count by hand with a little ctrl+f?
I had never heard of Ixidron, it actually seems really good for Commander, especially if your opponents general was out. Now they have to wrath the board just to replay it! I also added Global Ruin.
Added! Also, I plan to eventually sort by color once the list is finalized.
I agree, I made those changes and I also put in the other cards you suggested. Thanks for all of your input everyone! The list has been updated so it's time for a second round of scrutiny.
Sharuum | Damia | Hermit Druid
Then there should be another list for best artifact/enchantment sweepers, and maybe a mass land destruction list. But having all of them on one list is really, really disorienting. Some cards like Austere Command or All is Dust would go on more than one list, and that's fine.
Edit: Mass Calcify? Mad good in white decks. Winds of Rath is an absolute bomb in tron decks. Hour of Reckoning for token decks. Razia's Purification is right up there alongside Apocalypse and Jokulhaups as the best full-board sweepers.
i mean, compared to planar cleansing it's faaaar superior. cleansing is sorcery speed, requires white (and a lot of it)(and white can kill any permanent type so hitting everything is less useful), can't protect your own stuff, and is very hard to recur. Plus you can set it off earlier, if you're willing to risk it getting destroyed. planar cleansing is like, maybe in the 30s or 40s. o-stone might actually be #1.
also I think you're underestimating geddon because everyone hates it. It's still crazy good. Although I will say that geddon serves a very different function that wrath. You want a wrath when your field position sucks. You want a geddon when it's good, and you want to seal the deal.
Some stuff is harder to quantify though. ie global ruin is garbage in mono-white. in my 5-color decks, though, it's crazy good because I'm running all duals and fetches so I always keep 5 lands. But for most decks, it won't be that good.
starstorm probably belongs on the list. Imo it's far superior to BSZ. BSZ is meh at best, it's a crazy expensive way to deal with ulamog or any indestructible you're likely to care about. That's what targeted removal is for - make 'em sac it after the rest of his board got wiped, or tragic slip it or whatever. definitely prefer starstorm to chain reaction too. magmaquake is pretty decent too, as is fault line. instant speed uber alles.
also, supreme verdict at #2? what? yet obliterate is way down the list?
and steel hellkite is a fine creature, but when you need a wrath you don't want to topdeck a steel hellkite.
ok, let's see, my top 10:
oblivion stone
austere command
hallowed burial
terminus
armageddon/ravages
jokulhaups
pernicious deed
decree of pain
cataclysm
catastrophe
EDH Primers
Phelddagrif - Zirilan
EDH
Thrasios+Bruse - Pang - Sasaya - Wydwen - Feather - Rona - Toshiro - Sylvia+Khorvath - Geth - QMarchesa - Firesong - Athreos - Arixmethes - Isperia - Etali - Silas+Sidar - Saskia - Virtus+Gorm - Kynaios - Naban - Aryel - Mizzix - Kazuul - Tymna+Kraum - Sidar+Tymna - Ayli - Gwendlyn - Phelddagrif 4 - Liliana - Kaervek - Phelddagrif 3 - Mairsil - Scarab - Child - Phenax - Shirei - Thada - Depala - Circu - Kytheon - GrenzoHR - Phelddagrif - Reyhan+Kraum - Toshiro - Varolz - Nin - Ojutai - Tasigur - Zedruu - Uril - Edric - Wort - Zurgo - Nahiri - Grenzo - Kozilek - Yisan - Ink-Treader - Yisan - Brago - Sidisi - Toshiro - Alexi - Sygg - Brimaz - Sek'Kuar - Marchesa - Vish Kal - Iroas - Phelddagrif - Ephara - Derevi - Glissa - Wanderer - Saffi - Melek - Xiahou Dun - Lazav - Lin Sivvi - Zirilan - Glissa
PDH - Drake - Graverobber - Izzet GM - Tallowisp - Symbiote Brawl - Feather - Ugin - Jace - Scarab - Angrath - Vraska - Kumena Oathbreaker - Wrenn&6
I, for one, don't typically associate "wrath" with creatures exclusively. I know it comes from Wrath of God, but I still tend to just think of "wrath" as short hand for "mass removal".
I would generally consider it to be for mass removal of non-land permanents. Because as I said, when you want to wipe lands, it's usually not because someone else has better lands, it's because you have better creatures/artifacts/enchantments/planeswalkers and you want to lock them down. When you're playing a "wrath", imo, it's because you're behind in board position and you want to make the field even again.
EDH Primers
Phelddagrif - Zirilan
EDH
Thrasios+Bruse - Pang - Sasaya - Wydwen - Feather - Rona - Toshiro - Sylvia+Khorvath - Geth - QMarchesa - Firesong - Athreos - Arixmethes - Isperia - Etali - Silas+Sidar - Saskia - Virtus+Gorm - Kynaios - Naban - Aryel - Mizzix - Kazuul - Tymna+Kraum - Sidar+Tymna - Ayli - Gwendlyn - Phelddagrif 4 - Liliana - Kaervek - Phelddagrif 3 - Mairsil - Scarab - Child - Phenax - Shirei - Thada - Depala - Circu - Kytheon - GrenzoHR - Phelddagrif - Reyhan+Kraum - Toshiro - Varolz - Nin - Ojutai - Tasigur - Zedruu - Uril - Edric - Wort - Zurgo - Nahiri - Grenzo - Kozilek - Yisan - Ink-Treader - Yisan - Brago - Sidisi - Toshiro - Alexi - Sygg - Brimaz - Sek'Kuar - Marchesa - Vish Kal - Iroas - Phelddagrif - Ephara - Derevi - Glissa - Wanderer - Saffi - Melek - Xiahou Dun - Lazav - Lin Sivvi - Zirilan - Glissa
PDH - Drake - Graverobber - Izzet GM - Tallowisp - Symbiote Brawl - Feather - Ugin - Jace - Scarab - Angrath - Vraska - Kumena Oathbreaker - Wrenn&6
In that regard, cards like Cataclysm and Razia's Purification should not be considered wraths. They are cards that are meant to secure your victory once you're ahead, but not to be played when you're behind. In fact, playing these cards when your board state is bad will generally be your own death sentence. I would argue that effects like Armageddon fall under it as well. You do not play Armageddon when your opponent is ahead. I mean, Desolation Angel is a victory condition all by itself when played on an empty board, but once again, you don't drop it when your opponent has better critters.
To some extend, comparing Shatterstorm with Wrath of God has a bit of an apples/oranges feel to it, but at least they both serve the purpose of clearing the board of threats. I think it can be generally agreed that in terms of threat, the order is generally Creatures >> Artifacts > Enchantments > Lands (if you kill lands, you usually do so as resource denial, not because you're afraid that the lands will kill you if left unchecked). Vandalblast would be the best card ever if it dealt with creatures instead of artifacts. As it is, dealing with a less threatening permanent type, it's perfectly balanced. The list can be adjusted with this ranking in mind, but I do think that things like Cataclysm should be removed as they cannot be compared, since they serve an entirely different purpose.
Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
(Image by totallynotabrony)
-Damnation and Wrath of God should be higher because of their low mana costs.
-Cyclonic Rift is one of the best wipes in EDH, if only because it is one-sided... oh, and hits everything. Not sure where I would rank it, but definitely somewhere in the top 6.
-Jokuulhaaps should not be that highly rated. It's pretty situational and not seen in casual play at all.
Username: Cabz
This is definitely true, though it does cost 8 for the wrath instead of six, and people will be able to anticipate and play around it while it's on the field. Still though, you've convinced me to move it up.
In a lot of scenarios you're correct. Marelt brought this up too. But others (having a Crucible of Worlds or Life from the Loam or in a Jhoira of the Ghitu deck) will take you from a place of potentially being behind to essentially winning the game. You also give a great top 10 and I'll take those highly into consideration for my next update.
In any scenario where one card an opponent controls is causing you to lose, this is true. But let's say you have a powerful creature like an Ulamog, while your opponents have several creatures that can kill you with pure damage. You're going to lose the game when your opponent attacks you, but a Cataclysm would bring you from dead on board to ahead.
I completely agree, and I haven't really done that as well as I should have. I try to take into account speed, versatility, and cost. There may be more criteria I could be missing, let me know if you come up with more. Having clear cut definitions like this would definitely help me establish a less arbitrary ranking.
Sharuum | Damia | Hermit Druid
Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
(Image by totallynotabrony)
Well you can just set o-stone off immediately if necessary.
But the thing I love about o-stone isn't playing it on a field where I'm losing badly where it's just an 8 mana planar cleansing (which is still way better than planar cleansing, if only for the color restriction and recurrability), it's playing it on a field where I'm evenly matched or even a little ahead. Because then you can force your opponents to overextend MORE to force you to set it off, otherwise you just beat them on board, and in the meantime you can protect your own stuff from o-stone so that your advantage is insurmountable when you do set it off.
Personally I think it's pretty much required in any mono-black deck, and nearly so in any non-white deck. For white decks it isn't required but I'd still usually run it. It's not quite as ubiquitous as soul ring, but nearly so among my decks. It has a crazy number of advantages over almost any other wipe.
Btw, why is DoJ so many spots below ***? I have a hard time believing regeneration is really that important, very few playable creatures have it. Plus you can actually take advantage of regeneration yourself with DoJ, so ***'s prevention is a double-edged sword.
EDH Primers
Phelddagrif - Zirilan
EDH
Thrasios+Bruse - Pang - Sasaya - Wydwen - Feather - Rona - Toshiro - Sylvia+Khorvath - Geth - QMarchesa - Firesong - Athreos - Arixmethes - Isperia - Etali - Silas+Sidar - Saskia - Virtus+Gorm - Kynaios - Naban - Aryel - Mizzix - Kazuul - Tymna+Kraum - Sidar+Tymna - Ayli - Gwendlyn - Phelddagrif 4 - Liliana - Kaervek - Phelddagrif 3 - Mairsil - Scarab - Child - Phenax - Shirei - Thada - Depala - Circu - Kytheon - GrenzoHR - Phelddagrif - Reyhan+Kraum - Toshiro - Varolz - Nin - Ojutai - Tasigur - Zedruu - Uril - Edric - Wort - Zurgo - Nahiri - Grenzo - Kozilek - Yisan - Ink-Treader - Yisan - Brago - Sidisi - Toshiro - Alexi - Sygg - Brimaz - Sek'Kuar - Marchesa - Vish Kal - Iroas - Phelddagrif - Ephara - Derevi - Glissa - Wanderer - Saffi - Melek - Xiahou Dun - Lazav - Lin Sivvi - Zirilan - Glissa
PDH - Drake - Graverobber - Izzet GM - Tallowisp - Symbiote Brawl - Feather - Ugin - Jace - Scarab - Angrath - Vraska - Kumena Oathbreaker - Wrenn&6
Sure you need a draw engine and a tutor to set it up for instant speed, but damn is it nice to pre combat tuck everyone's team.
But I agree the tuck and exile wraths are superior to your standard blow up stuff cards. Avacyn is abused in my meta and damnation just doesn't cut it some times.
The EDH stax primer
When you absolutely, positively got to kill every permanent in the room, accept no substitutes.