A common card gets a new look for Magic's The Brothers' War

No, it's not about plastic surgery gone wrong.

In Magic: The Gathering's latest set, The Brothers' War, we get a reprint of a commonly seen card — Disfigure. Except, it comes with fancy new art inspired by the lore behind the set.

The art now features a Phyrexian dragon engine bursting through the ground and if you ask us, it's way cooler than the old art of a man with a palm print on his face screaming in terror.

For The Brothers' War, which refers to the cataclysmic battle between brothers Mishra and Urza, players get to dive deeper into this key event in Magic's history.

It was previously only portrayed in Antiquities (Magic's second expansion in 1994) and various works of fiction such as the 1998 novel (of the same title as the set) by Jeff Grubb.

As an instant card that costs one black mana, Disfigure is the "You've activated my trap card" play — something Yu-Gi-Oh! players would be familiar with.

While it only reduces a creature's power and toughness by two each, and it's not nearly enough to take down stronger creatures, it can get rid of some pretty annoying creatures, especially those which are "indestructible".

In Magic, a creature is put into the graveyard if its toughness reaches zero. Since it's not considered as "destroyed", this card is able to remove creatures that have the "indestructible" static ability if you get their toughness down to zero.

Alternatively, this card is good in spellslinger decks due to its low cost and instant speed, and can combo off recent Commanders such as Propser, Tome-Bound, or Tor Wauki the Younger.

Before you scoff at such strategies, you might want to check out Dominaria United-themed Game Knights episode from The Command Zone to check out the latter in action.

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X__qapQRP50&ab_channel=TheCommandZone[/embed]

bryanlim@asiaone.com

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