Spoiler Highlight: Clarion Conqueror in Standard, Pioneer & Modern

Magic: The Gathering has a very broad set of rules, but it's structured in such a way that the basic messages are easy to understand: players can only play one land per turn, tapping a land generates mana, paying mana for a card is used to cast it, tapping this card activates an ability, and maybe another creature has an ability triggering because its controller or opponent took an action in the game.

In addition to these, there is a phrase commonly used when explaining the basic rules of Magic to someone else: “Unless a card says otherwise.” This maxim applies all the time: cards like Oracle of Mul Daya allow you to play more lands, Panharmonicon makes abilities trigger more than once - and in other cases, there are cards that prevent actions in the game, like Thalia, Guardian of Thraben and Phyrexian Censor.

The new card from Tarkir: Dragonstorm, Clarion Conqueror, fits this second mold, and with some peculiarities that make it our highlight today.

Clarion Conqueror fits an already known mold of a creature with a decent body and a disruptive ability which hinders some action in the game. Unlike many of its distant cousins, this one has a wide range of targets and the notorious lack of restrictions on them: once in play, Planeswalker cards and artifacts with activated abilities become essentially useless on the board, while creatures with activated abilities lose their greatest benefit of being played in most lists.

The new creature also has the notable absence of an essential line of text: unlike other similar effects, Clarion Conqueror also locks mana abilities. Therefore, situations in which the opponent has some interaction to generate infinite mana cannot be taken advantage of if this card is in play, and artifacts such as mana rocks cannot be used either - which will probably quickly put it on the list of most hated cards in Commander.

As a bonus, its controller gains a 3/3 with Flying for three mana, meaning that it can establish good pressure on the board while locking possible interactions, but without being a game-winning machine or hard-to-kill threat, since Lightning Strike, Lightning Bolt or Nowhere to Run would already be enough to deal with it.

Despite this, Clarion Conqueror already has all the elements to be a potential staple for several formats, as pointed out by our author Elton Fior in his analysis for Legacy and Vintage.

Clarion Conqueror’s main target in Standard is to lock down Zur, Eternal Schemer, thus preventing a Domain opponent from turning Leyline Binding or Overlords into creatures and starting adding tons of value too early.

Other common targets could include Jace, the Perfected Mind and Collector’s Cage. The new creature is actually one of the biggest possible hates against Selesnya Cage, since it locks Llanowar Elves, Collector’s Cage and also other cards like Sandstorm Salvager and Haywire Mite.

Consequently, it doesn’t fit well in any of the archetypes that are heavily affected by its “lock”, but it has the advantage of not blocking activated abilities from enchantments like Stormchaser’s Talent, although Bounce decks probably won’t want it in their lists if the Metagame doesn’t demand this type of specific hate in the Sideboards, since it interacts very poorly with Kaito, Bane of Nightmares.

In the end, it still doesn’t seem to have a home in Standard today, at least not in the maindeck. Tarkir: Dragonstorm could bring this space to it as new three-color archetypes emerge. However, it requires a specific Metagame to work, and Standard's doesn't seem to be the case at the moment.

The larger the card pool, the more important Clarion Conqueror becomes, but perhaps its greatest highlight among the formats listed in this article is in Pioneer, as it has an almost certain home in Selesnya Company. Although it blocks the mana-generating abilities of Llanowar Elves and Elvish Mystic, it delays the game plan of several archetypes in the current Metagame.

Against Rakdos Demons, Conqueror blocks Bloodtithe Harvester's ability to interact with the board and also Reflections of Kiki-Jiki's ability to copy creatures. At the same time, it blocks a dozen important Planeswalkers in the format today, such as Kiora, Behemoth Beckoner, The Wandering Emperor, Teferi, Hero of Dominaria and Kaito, Bane of Nightmares.

At slightly lower tiers, Witch’s Oven and the combo of Ygra, Eater of All with Cauldron Familiar are no longer possible as long as we can keep Conqueror on the board, Parhelion II becomes a useless card in the graveyard - the same cannot be said for Skysovereign, Consul Flagship - and Quintorius Kand cannot finish its combo.

The amount of cards that Clarion Conqueror locks in Modern is considerably high, and we can highlight Karn, the Great Creator, Mox Opal and Grinding Station as the most important among them today, but other pieces like Goblin Charbelcher and Yawgmoth, Thran Physician are the core of combos that the new card can stop, not to mention the interaction between Samwise Gamgee and Cauldron Familiar with Carrion Feeder.

As a bonus, it also stops some current value engines like Relic of Progenitus and Teferi, Time Raveler or less played combos in the Metagame, like Splinter Twin, and has some incidental value against other archetypes like Thopter Foundry and Urza, Lord High Artificer or Hammer Time, where it stops almost all combo lines and makes Urza’s Saga the only viable win condition.

It is unlikely that Clarion Conqueror will find slots on the maindeck. Many archetypes that could run it in Game 1 also have their permanents with activated abilities, and for the most part, it will be counterintuitive with them. The sideboard will be its main home, and there, it will find space in some of the main archetypes of the format today, such as Orzhov Blink, but also in other archetypes that can take advantage of it in other ways.

A good example are Cascade decks like Crashing Footfalls or Living End. The new dragon has the right mana value to pass the cost test in these strategies and is one of the main tools to respond to cards like Karn, the Great Creator or, in the case of Living End, Relic of Progenitus and Ghost Vacuum, while being a hoser for a dozen troublesome cards in the most varied matchups.

Clarion Conqueror is the kind of card that shows a lot of potential when it is revealed, especially in non-rotating or eternal formats, where the card pool it locks in expands.

While its greatest potential may be in Legacy, and it has a good variety of cards in Modern to hold, Pioneer seems like its ideal home, where there is a specific archetype that it fits in while holding on to some of the main combos and interactions in the Metagame.

Thanks for reading!