Top Trades: July 8-July 15

Kuja, Genome Sorcerer | Illustrated by Joshua Raphael

Howdy folks, and welcome to Top Trades, the weekly series where we check in with the most popular cards from the previous week here at Cardsphere. So, what are traders after? Let's take a look!

Honorable Mention - Jidoor, Aristocratic Capital

Number of Trades: 9 --- Number of Cards Traded: 9

Kicking off this week's Top Trades is our honorable mention and blue's installment from Final Fantasy's rare Adventure Town land cycle: Jidoor, Aristocratic Capital.

First off, a brief refresher on how Adventures work. Adventures are an optional alternate way of playing a card, like modal dual face cards or split cards, wherein you're presented with an opportunity to send a card "on an adventure." In doing so, you'll cast the instant/sorcery with the Adventure subtype, which will go into exile as it resolves. On a later turn, you can play the main card from exile. In this case, that means that you can either play Jidoor, Aristocratic Capital: a Town land which enters tapped and has ": Add ." Alternatively, you can cast the Adventure sorcery Overture, which costs and causes target opponent to mill half their library, rounded down.

Mill is a very all-or-nothing mechanic; for most decks, Jidoor is a pretty terrible land. If it's your only source of mill, then you certainly won't be winning any games with it. However, for all the Bruvac the Grandiloquent players out there, Jidoor's Overture spell is another mass mill effect which can be absolutely devastating.

#5 - Kuja, Genome Sorcerer

Number of Trades: 6 --- Number of Cards Traded: 6

Starting off our main list of the week is a card that is already making rounds as both a potent commander and a game-winning support piece for the main decks of plenty more decklists, Kuja, Genome Sorcerer.

For , Kuja is a 3/4 legendary Human Mutant Wizard with the triggered ability "At the beginning of your end step, create a tapped 0/1 black Wizard creature token with 'Whenever you cast a noncreature spell, this creature deals 1 damage to each opponent.' Then if you control four or more Wizards, transform Kuja." On the back side, Kuja becomes Trance Kuja, Fate Defied, a legendary black and red 4/6 Avatar Wizard creature which has the replacement effect "If a Wizard you control would deal damage to a permanent or player, it deals double that damage instead."

Breaking down Kuja, the first thing that stands out is how relatively easy it is to transform. Since Kuja itself is a Wizard, that means you only need three more to get the job done, and Kuja makes one more token Wizard each turn; by the time a single turn cycle has elapsed, you're already half way there at the very least, and that's assuming you don't play any other Wizard support.

On the back side, Kuja's replacement effect is a game-winner in and of itself. This essentially makes Trance Kuja an 8/6 for damage purposes while simultaneously turning all your little Wizard tokens into beefed-up Guttersnipes.

#4 - Sephiroth, Fabled SOLDIER

Number of Trades: 6 --- Number of Cards Traded: 6

Coming up next is another double-faced antagonist from Final Fantasy: Sephiroth, Fabled SOLDIER.

For , Sephiroth's front side is a legendary 3/3 Human Avatar Soldier with two abilities. First off, Whenever Sephiroth enters or attacks, you may sacrifice another creature. If you do, draw a card. Secondly, whenever another creature you control dies, target opponent loses 1 life and you gain 1 life. Then, if this is the fourth time this ability has resolved this turn, transform Sephiroth.

On the back side, Sephiroth becomes Sephiroth, One-Winged Angel, a legendary black 5/5 Angel Nightmare Avatar creature with flying and "Whenever Sephiroth attacks, you may sacrifice any number of creatures. If you do, draw that many cards." Additionally, as Sephiroth Fabled Soldier transforms into Sephiroth, One-Winged Angel, you get an emblem with "Whenever a creature dies, target opponent loses 1 life and you gain 1 life."

Sephiroth may not have the potent word "each" before "opponent" anywhere in its textboxes, but make no mistake: this card is the pinnacle of Blood Artist effects. In dedicated Aristocrats strategies (those which seek to build up small armies of creatures and then sacrifice them in pursuit of victories based off of death triggers), the four-creature threshold for Sephiroth's transformation isn't actually that difficult to reach. Once you have, not only do you have a sacrifice outlet that restocks your hand, but you also have an emblem that keeps the attrition war going until the game is over.

#3 - Dreams of Laguna

Number of Trades: 6 --- Number of Cards Traded: 15

Marking the halfway point on our list is Dreams of Laguna, a repeatable cantrip which is making waves in Standard, and it's making a bit of a splash in Pauper, too.

For , Dreams of Laguna is an instant which causes you to surveil 1, then draw a card. Additionally, it has flashback for , allowing you to recast it later on from your graveyard.

All in all, Dreams of Laguna is a fine, albeit unexciting, card. Cantrips that grant meaningful card selection and replacement are always on the competitive radar, especially at instant speed, but two mana is a lot. However, the surveil effect on this card is doing double duty not just as card selection, but as actual resource advantage for graveyard-based strategies, such as Reanimator or Tolarian Terror-centric control lists. Plus, when played in multiple, Dreams of Laguna can also surveil away another copy of itself from the top deck, allowing you to later flashback your milled copy in addition to the one you cast earlier.

#2 - Gift of Immortality

Number of Trades: 7 --- Number of Cards Traded: 7

Our penultimate pick of the week, Gift of Immortality is a card that hearkens back to the Voltron Commander strategies of the original Theros era. So, for those unacquainted, what does it do?

For , Gift of Immortality is an Aura enchantment with "Enchant creature" and "When enchanted creature dies, return that card to the battlefield under its owner's control. Return Gift of Immortality to the battlefield attached to that creature at the beginning of the next end step."

In short, Gift of Immortality makes creatures ridiculously hard to kill. A creature enchanted by it either had to be destroyed twice in the same turn (once before Gift of Immortality's ability reattaching the enchantment could resolve, in addition to the initial creature destruction), returned to hand, or exiled. That's certainly a fine array of options, but removing good ol' combat and destruction magic from the equation made things a lot harder in practice.

#1 - Tifa Lockhart

Number of Trades: 9 --- Number of Cards Traded: 10

Last but certainly not least, we come to our most traded pick of the week: Tifa Lockhart.

To be frank, I'm honestly surprised that Tifa hasn't popped up on Top Trades earlier in the life cycle of Final Fantasy. For , this 1/2 legendary Human Monk creature with trample packs a game-winning wallop. How? Because, whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, Tifa's power doubles until end of turn.

In the competitive scene, Tifa's best friends have been fetchlands and the Modern Horizons pump spell Scale Up. For , Scale Up is a sorcery which makes target creature you control have base power and toughness 6/4 until end of turn (Scale Up also has Overload ). So, if you target Tifa, then play and crack a fetchland in the same turn, then you've effectively spent over two turns in order to have a 24/4 with trample. Not a bad way to end the game as early as turn two, assuming you've got some ramp up your sleeves.

Wrap Up

This week was an all-star week for the game-ending legendary creatures in Final Fantasy. Kuja, Sephiroth, Tifa - all sorts of folks are popping up, from optimized Commander all-stars to Eternal sixty-card threats. Check in next week for another edition of Top Trades, and thanks for reading!