That it grants haste and the same effect as Firebreathing are enough to make Dragon Breath a decent card. But it really gets its power from its recursion ability. In particular, Dragon Breath has incredible synergy with Sutured Ghoul. Many decks can fill up their graveyard quickly and reanimate Sutured Ghoul. Dragon Breath gives it haste and you're attacking with a huge trampling creature for the kill. It's so effective that other reanimation strategies seem completely obsolete by comparison. Dredge cards, Cephalid Inkshrouder, Mesmeric Orb, and Hermit Druid are all easy ways to dump Dragon Breath and whatever else you need into your library. Dread Return and multiple copies of Narcomoeba can automatically put Sutured Ghoul into play without any requirements for cards in your hand. It doesn't have to be Sutured Ghoul, either. Any creature with a high mana cost is likely to be big enough to get the job done. If you use Gamekeeper, it doesn't even need to be reanimation as one card is dumping a bunch of your library (including Dragon Breath) into your graveyard and putting a creature into play.#59: Divine Intervention
At eight mana, Divine Intervention is tied for most expensive on this list (Decree of Silence is also eight mana and I don't remember anything else being more than seven). Despite the high cost, Divine Intervention is pretty much guaranteed not to win you the game, barring any silly combos. In terms of power, it has no place here, but Divine Intervention ranks where it does because we value fun. And Divine Intervention is a fun enchantment. Other players want to win the game. But if you can play this thing and stall for two turns, no one wins. It's like alternate win condition enchantments, but somehow more sinister just by making the game a draw instead of letting anyone win it. Divine Intervention is a prime component for an "annoy your opponent" deck. It's also great for a multiplayer fun deck, especially if you can clear the board of threats before playing it. So it won't win, but sometimes forcing a draw is even better.#58: Goblin Bomb
The ultimate burn spell. Lightning Bolt is a pretty good deal, being three damage for just one mana. But Goblin Bomb beats everything with twenty damage for two mana. Of course, there's a catch. It could take a long time. It will eventually do the damage. But even if you win every coin flip it will take five turns. So there are more efficient cards. Don't get the idea that Goblin Bomb is totally useless, though. We mostly rank it here for the fun factor, similar to Divine Intervention. It's also not that hard to use Goblin Bomb. If you're playing a deck that keeps the game locked down, Goblin Bomb kills just as well as everything else (and is cheaper than most things too). But also, a lot of cards can add counters to permanents. We already feature Doubling Season. At the Casual Players Alliance, I built a Goblin Bomb deck as part of a contest to build a deck around Clockspinning. No matter how you use it, Goblin Bomb is great fun, especially when it actually goes off.
#57: Treachery
I was hesitant to even put Control Magic on the list because Treachery is so close to it. But they're used in different ways and this separates them enough for the purposes of this list (although if we did it all over again, there are cards I accidentally left out that deserve to be on the list, so maybe Control Magic would be cut). The difference is obvious enough: Treachery costs 1 more and is also "free" because it untaps five lands when it comes into play. Among the infamous "free" spells, Treachery isn't the most broken, but it's pretty close. What this amounts to is stealing a creature and then reloading so that your lands are available for something else. This is great for blue control decks (although Vedalken Shackles has pretty much replaced it) and great in general for any deck that has an interest in stealing creatures, since you probably either like keeping your mana open or want to play another spell in the same turn. Free creature-stealing is good.
The ultimate burn spell. Lightning Bolt is a pretty good deal, being three damage for just one mana. But Goblin Bomb beats everything with twenty damage for two mana. Of course, there's a catch. It could take a long time. It will eventually do the damage. But even if you win every coin flip it will take five turns. So there are more efficient cards. Don't get the idea that Goblin Bomb is totally useless, though. We mostly rank it here for the fun factor, similar to Divine Intervention. It's also not that hard to use Goblin Bomb. If you're playing a deck that keeps the game locked down, Goblin Bomb kills just as well as everything else (and is cheaper than most things too). But also, a lot of cards can add counters to permanents. We already feature Doubling Season. At the Casual Players Alliance, I built a Goblin Bomb deck as part of a contest to build a deck around Clockspinning. No matter how you use it, Goblin Bomb is great fun, especially when it actually goes off.#57: Treachery
I was hesitant to even put Control Magic on the list because Treachery is so close to it. But they're used in different ways and this separates them enough for the purposes of this list (although if we did it all over again, there are cards I accidentally left out that deserve to be on the list, so maybe Control Magic would be cut). The difference is obvious enough: Treachery costs 1 more and is also "free" because it untaps five lands when it comes into play. Among the infamous "free" spells, Treachery isn't the most broken, but it's pretty close. What this amounts to is stealing a creature and then reloading so that your lands are available for something else. This is great for blue control decks (although Vedalken Shackles has pretty much replaced it) and great in general for any deck that has an interest in stealing creatures, since you probably either like keeping your mana open or want to play another spell in the same turn. Free creature-stealing is good.#56: Intruder Alarm
As far as flavor goes, I suppose Intruder Alarm makes sense. One creature coming into play triggers the alarm, altering all the other creatures and therefore untapping them. It was probably intended for weird uses with creatures that have activated abilities and I have seen it used that way, sometimes very effectively. I used it in something like that myself, although I can't remember what all I was using in that deck (Tradewind Rider and some other stuff). Intruder Alarm is good enough when it's merely untapping creatures in some limited way. But it's also an easy source of infinite combos. And when I say that, I mean that Intruder Alarm is one of those cards that allows for lots and lots of different infinite combos, some of them amazingly efficient and some of them laughably clumsy. I won't list them here because there are too many and because some of the really good ones are obvious anyway. There might be a post on the subject later, though. For now, all you get is one: Intruder Alarm + Kik-Jiki, Mirror Breaker (and one other creature) = infinite creatures.
As far as flavor goes, I suppose Intruder Alarm makes sense. One creature coming into play triggers the alarm, altering all the other creatures and therefore untapping them. It was probably intended for weird uses with creatures that have activated abilities and I have seen it used that way, sometimes very effectively. I used it in something like that myself, although I can't remember what all I was using in that deck (Tradewind Rider and some other stuff). Intruder Alarm is good enough when it's merely untapping creatures in some limited way. But it's also an easy source of infinite combos. And when I say that, I mean that Intruder Alarm is one of those cards that allows for lots and lots of different infinite combos, some of them amazingly efficient and some of them laughably clumsy. I won't list them here because there are too many and because some of the really good ones are obvious anyway. There might be a post on the subject later, though. For now, all you get is one: Intruder Alarm + Kik-Jiki, Mirror Breaker (and one other creature) = infinite creatures.
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