Desolation Giant MTG Card

Card Pros

Card Advantage: The kaboom of Desolation Giant’s ability can obliterate multiple creatures on the battlefield, potentially leaving you with the biggest threat in play. This effectively provides card advantage as it diminishes your opponent’s assets while maintaining your own, setting you up for a stronger position.

Resource Acceleration: While Desolation Giant itself doesn’t directly provide resource acceleration, its impact can accelerate your game plan. By clearing the board, it paves the way for your attacks, potentially shifting the game’s pace in your favor as you capitalize on a now defenseless opponent.

Instant Speed: Although Desolation Giant is a creature that operates at sorcery speed, the strategy around it involves playing it at just the right moment. This can be during your main phase right before an attack or after your opponent has overextended, allowing you to use your mana effectively and maintain the tempo of the match.

Card Cons

Specific Mana Cost: Desolation Giant requires a strict mana combination to cast, needing both red and white. This can be a limitation for decks that don’t run these colors or those that have a less stable mana base, making it harder to play on curve.

Comparatively High Mana Cost: With a casting cost of two generic, two red, and two white mana for its kicker ability, Desolation Giant is a sizable investment. This high cost means it can’t always be played when needed, and may not always provide the board wipe effect at the most opportune time.

Discard Requirement: While Desolation Giant does not have a discard requirement itself, the resources invested in playing it could lead to a smaller hand size. This is due to the need to potentially use additional cards, like mana acceleration or protection, to ensure its successful casting and effectiveness.

Reasons to Include Desolation Giant in Your Collection

Versatility: Desolation Giant offers a flexible role in your arsenal, serving as a large creature for aggressive strategies or a board wipe in more controlling decks. Its ability to clear the battlefield while giving you a sizable creature makes it a unique choice for various deck architectures.

Combo Potential: This giant shines brighter when combined with ways to protect your own board or recur it from the graveyard, turning its board-clearing effect into a repeatable advantage. Its kick ability, when used with care, can be a game-changer in the right build.

Meta-Relevance: As meta shifts towards creature-heavy strategies, Desolation Giant can be an efficient response, deterring opponents from overcommitting to the board. Additionally, it serves as a deterrent, influencing opponents’ play patterns to work to your advantage.

How to Beat Desolation Giant

Desolation Giant presents a unique challenge in the world of Magic: The Gathering, emerging as a formidable creature card with a kicker ability that can reset the battlefield. When facing this giant, successful strategies often revolve around countering its devastating entrance ability or mitigating its impact.

One effective tactic is to prioritize instant-speed removal or counterspells. Cards such as Negate or Disallow can directly target the giant’s kicker ability, neutralizing the threat before it clears the board. Alternatively, spells that grant your creatures indestructible for a turn, like Heroic Intervention, can be invaluable in preserving your battlefield against the giant’s wrath.

Baiting your opponent to play Desolation Giant when you have minimal presence on the board is another strategy, allowing you to leverage the situation by casting your more valuable creatures post-wipe. Additionally, cards that can quickly rebuild your board state, like Raise the Alarm or Spectral Procession, can restore your defenses promptly, minimizing the tempo loss from Desolation Giant’s kicker effect.

In essence, when countering Desolation Giant, consider these key approaches: counterplay through spells, board state manipulation, and rapid recovery. Each strategy can enhance your resilience against this massive threat, ensuring you maintain control of the game.