Top Trades: February 24-March 3

Happy Thursday, folks! Another week's wrapping up, and that means it's time for Top Trades, the weekly series here at Cardsphere where we check in with the most exciting trades from the week prior. So, what Magic cards do players want their hands on the most this week? Let's take a look!

Honorable Mention - Marauding Mako

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

Kicking things off as our honorable mention for the week is Marauding Mako, an aggressive threat that is playing a whole lot of roles in Standard right now thanks to its synergy with the cycling mechanic.

For , Marauding Mako is a 1/1 Shark Pirate with cycling . A flexible creature for just one mana is already decent, but this creature really shines thanks to its triggered ability, which gives it a +1/+1 counter whenever you discard a card. Either play it in the early game and watch Marauding Mako grow, or cycle it in the mid-to-late game to change it out for something else while also growing any Marauding Makos you may have already resolved.

A card that synergizes with itself is always something to keep an eye on in 60-card formats, especially when that card is as cheap as one mana.

#5 - Sevinne's Reclamation

Number of Trades: 5 --- Number of Cards Traded: 5

Coming in at number five for the week is a Commander powerhouse - the kind of Eternal-legal design that's good enough to see play in Commander's highest power decks, but not neccessarily break its way into Legacy or Vintage. Let's check in with Sevinne's Reclamation.

For , this sorcery lets you return any permanent with mana value three or less from your graveyard to the battlefield. It may not be Reanimate-levels of value, but the ability to target any permanent type is exactly the flexibility that white wants.

So, you've cast Sevinne's Reclamation once, now what? Well, I'm glad you asked, because not only does this card have flashback, but it also has a special effect when you cast it that way! For , you can cast Sevinne's Reclamation from your graveyard thanks to flashback, and when you do, you'll get to copy it - that's right, double the effect for less than double the cost.

#4 - Manifold Mouse

Number of Trades: 5 --- Number of Cards Traded: 8

Next up on our list is another aggressive red threat that's pulling its weight in Standard, and that card is Manifold Mouse.

For , Manifold Mouse is a 1/2 Mouse Soldier that, like Sevinne's Reclamation before it, often comes in pairs, and that's thanks to the offspring mechanic - an ability which lets you pay a card's offspring cost in order to create a token copy of that creature, with base power and toughness 1/1, when the original creature enters. For Manifold Mouse, that cost is .

Beyond arriving in doubles, Manifold Mouse also doubles up your combat damage, thanks to its triggered ability which triggers at the beginning of combat on your turn, granting target Mouse creature you control double strike or trample until end of turn.

At base rate, this often means that Manifold Mouse is a 1/2 for which has double strike, since one point of power isn't usually enough to make trample desirable. That being said, the decks which Manifold Mouse calls home are often awash with pump spells, such as Monstrous Rage, which make either ability all the more valuable.

#3 - Hashaton, Scarab's Fist

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

Alrighty, back to Commander. Staking its claim on Top Trades this week at the halfway point is Hashaton, Scarab's Fist, a card which has had many in the cEDH community absolutely ecstatic since it was first previewed. So, what does it do, and how easily can we break it?

For , Hashaton is a 1/3 legendary Zombie Wizard with "Whenever you discard a creature card, you may pay . If you do, create a tapped token that's a copy of that card, except its a 4/4 black Zombie." So, what does this mean in practice? Well, as long as Hashaton is out, your best creatures cost just to play, and you don't even have to cast them.

Hashaton is the reason that cards like Tortured Existence have popped up on Top Trades in recent months: cards which allow their controller to (often repeatedly) discard creature cards with little to no other cost.

In casual and high-power Commander, Hashaton is an excellent way to cheat powerful creatures into play. Avacyn, Angel of Hope, Consecrated Sphinx, Void Winnower, while in cEDH Hashaton provides you access to some of the most important colors in the format while also providing you with ways to circumvent interaction thanks to many of the deck's combos being facilitated through activated abilities. All in all, if you're playing Commander, odds are you'll see Hashaton someday, and when you do, it'll be doing some pretty strong things.

#2 - Twisted Landscape

Number of Trades: 6 --- Number of Cards Traded: 11

Next up is our penultimate pick for the week, a Pauper standout for many Jund manabases: Twisted Landscape.

Twisted Landscape is a land with three abilities: ": Add ;" ", Sacrifice Twisted Landscape: Search your library for a basic Swamp, Mountain, or Forest card, put it onto the battlefield tapped, then shuffle;" and last but certainly not least, cycling .

Starting from the top and moving down, Twisted Landscape does what many of Magic's most important lands do; it enters the battlefield untapped and as a result can provide you with mana (albeit colorless) the turn it comes down. Colorless is certainly a downside, especially in the aggressive decks which Twisted Landscape calls home, but it's far better than not being able to add mana at all.

As for Twisted Landscape's "fetch" ability, mana fixing comes at a high premium across all formats, and is especially limited in the Pauper environment, where the premier multicolor lands enter tapped. As such, a fetch effect limited to basic lands is still a valuable one.

Finally, as the cherry on top: don't discount Twisted Landscape's cycling ability. Card selection in the mid to late game is always valuable, even in Pauper.

#1 - Stock Up

Number of Trades: 12 --- Number of Cards Traded: 26

Speaking of card selection, here we are, folks - our most traded card of the week. Let's learn all about Stock Up, a multi-format sleeper hit from Aetherdrift that absolutely blows the rest of this week's list out of the water by traded count.

For , this absurdly power crept version of Divination is a sorcery which allows you to look at the top five cards of your library, pick two to put into your hand, then put the rest on the bottom of your library in any order.

At first glance, Stock Up reads like an impactful card, but not necessarily the break-out effect that would reach older formats. Standard and Pioneer? Definitely. Modern and beyond? Probably not - three mana for a sorcery is just too slow, right? Well, judging by recent tournament results, that initial opinion is solidly incorrect. Between its mana cost only requiring a single colored pip and its selection looking at a massive five cards, Stock Up does more than enough to make up for being a sorcery.

Wrap Up

That does it, folks! This week's selection covered just about everything - from casual to competitive, Pauper to Vintage, the range of cards this week was all over the place. Check back in next week for another Top Trades, and thanks for reading!