One of the first cards spoiled for the Kaldheim set in Magic the Gathering was the powerful Saga Enchantment, Showdown of the Skalds. Sagas have proven their power in Standard competitive play time and again, beginning with the advent of Saga Enchantments in the Dominaria set. Several Sagas from the Theros: Beyond Death set have found plenty of competitive homes, as well. Indeed, Showdown of the Skalds would continue a trend of playable Sagas?

Impulse drawing, which allows you to exile cards from the top of your library and gives you the ability to play them until the end of your next turn, is a powerful ability. We’ve seen impulse draw cards even prove to be so powerful they end up banned in competitive Standard play (see Escape to the Wilds). Four mana to essentially draw you four cards is powerful enough, which is exactly what Showdown of the Skalds does. But, as with all Sagas, there are more Chapters to be had.

While the 4 cards for 4 mana already makes this Saga playable, Showdown of the Skalds gives you another ability for each of the next two turns. Whenever you cast a spell, you get to put a +1/+1 counter on any creature you control. If you’re playing a deck where you can cast multiple spells in a turn, you are going to be able to pump up your creatures a lot with this Saga. In the decks this would see play, you’re already going to be very aggressive in attacking anyway, so this is a huge boost.

The most obvious use for Showdown of the Skalds is in Commander, where many of the Red & White decks rely on “Voltron” strategies. These decks rely on the Legendary Creatures they choose as Commanders to deal the majority of damage in the game. Being able to draw 4 cards is extremely powerful in that color combination, and play enough cheap spells to make this Saga a strong inclusion. Two Commanders who make are Hofri Ghostforge and General Ferrous Rokiric. Hofri plays a bunch of cheap artifacts and creatures that can easily be cast off of a Showdown of the Skalds trigger. The General loves multicolored spells, creating a 4/4 Golem anytime you cast a multicolored spell, so Showdown gives you a faster way to do just that with its rapid fire impulse draws.

Of course, plenty of other aggressive Commander decks would be thrilled to play Showdown of the Skalds. Many Red/White/X decks also have ways to get this card back from the graveyard, meaning even a single copy could return to play multiple times in a game. With the massive popularity of the Commander format – as well as the 60-card Brawl variant that uses cards only legal in Standard – Showdown of the Skalds is already being penciled into a lot of potential deck lists. But, it’s very likely to see Standard play, as well, and potentially other non-rotating formats like Modern and perhaps even Legacy. 

Before the release of Kaldheim there wasn’t an obvious deck that would play Showdown of the Skalds. There were a few semi-competitive decks that would easily benefit, including Boros Warriors, a Red/White aggro deck, which could certainly find a way to play one or two copies of this Saga. It could create explosive “draws” that also power up the deck’s already aggressive strategy. The +1/+1 counters help the 1 toughness creatures in the deck even more powerful and get some of the larger creatures out of range for some burn-based removal spells.

It seemed possible that some Red/Green decks would even splash White mana just for the Showdown of the Skalds. Another possibility was that the best of Mono-Red Aggro and Mono-White Aggro come together with the Showdown of the Skalds to create an even more powerful deck. Both of these things actually happened. Naya Adventures was a strong deck before Throne of Eldraine rotated from Standard, and Boros Aggro combined the best of Red and White aggro decks.

After the October 2021 rotation that cycled out Eldraine and welcoming Innistrad: Midnight Hunt, Showdown of the Skalds has rarely appeared outside of some Naya Midrange decks. But, even after fading in relevance in Standard, this Saga has proven its worth in Modern. Thanks to the power of Yorion, Sky Nomad, Showdown of the Skalds is a perfect blink target for the broken Companion Creature. The already potent Boros Aggro, with its Legendary Monkey Pirate Ragavan and Evoke creatures in Fury and Solitude, finds Showdown of the Skalds to be a key card draw engine. That’s not to mention the Historic format unique to Magic the Gathering: Arena, where many decks have also played the Saga with some success. 

Overall, Showdown of the Skalds delivered on its promise of being an explosive card, and should be a force to be reckoned with for years to come in both Modern and Commander.

How would you play Showdown of the Skalds?