Selhoff Occultist MTG Card

Card Pros

Card Advantage: Selhoff Occultist enables you to potentially filter through your deck by putting cards into the graveyard, then letting you draw if a creature was milled this way. Each creature’s death turns into a chance to gain card advantage, keeping your hand replenished for strategic plays.

Resource Acceleration: While not directly creating mana or treasure, the Selhoff Occultist helps fill the graveyard, which can be leveraged with other cards to accelerate resources. This synergy makes her a valuable piece in decks that capitalize on graveyard mechanics and threshold.

Instant Speed: The Occultist doesn’t have instant speed itself, but its triggered ability can occur at instant speed when creatures die. This turns each creature’s demise into an opportunity for resource manipulation and strategic planning, even on your opponent’s turn, ensuring you’re always prepared to make your next move.

Card Cons

Discard Requirement: Engaging in its game play, Selhoff Occultist necessitates the presence of creature cards on the battlefield or in the graveyard to trigger its ability. This condition can create a bottleneck for players who are unable to maintain a sufficient number of creatures in play, leading to missed opportunities for strategic plays.

Specific Mana Cost: As a card steeped in blue mana, Selhoff Occultist’s cost may be restrictive for decks that are not predominantly blue. This specificity can create challenges in mana flexibility and hinder players from maximizing the diversity of their deck composition.

Comparatively High Mana Cost: While its abilities are certainly interesting, the mana investment to bring Selhoff Occultist onto the field could be considered steep. Players often weigh the cost-benefit ratio of each card, and in the case of Selhoff Occultist, some may conclude that the three mana required for a card with modest stats and a situational ability might not always justify its inclusion, particularly when more cost-efficient alternatives are available.

Reasons to Include Selhoff Occultist in Your Collection

Versatility: Selhoff Occultist offers you the ability to fit seamlessly into various deck archetypes. Its milling ability can serve as a strategy cornerstone in self-mill decks or as a disruption tool in any blue-based deck.

Combo Potential: This card interacts wonderfully in combos, particularly in synergies that involve the graveyard. Whether you’re triggering morbid abilities, fueling delve costs, or working with reanimation tactics, Selhoff Occultist can be a key piece in executing complex strategies.

Meta-Relevance: In game environments where graveyard manipulation is critical, Selhoff Occultist proves to be extremely relevant. Its ability to consistently mill cards can be invaluable in long, drawn-out matches, making it a strategic asset against decks that rely on specific combos or cards.

How to beat Selhoff Occultist

Selhoff Occultist is a versatile card in the world of Magic: The Gathering that thrives in decks aiming to leverage graveyard strategies. Notoriously, this card can be an annoyance by incrementally milling an opponent’s library or strategically sending your own cards to the graveyard for later use. To dismantle the advantage that Selhoff Occultist provides, efficient creature removal is key. Spells such as Murder or Doom Blade are effective at removing the Occultist before its abilities can be fully utilized.

Targeted exile effects like Path to Exile or Unmake are also potent since they prevent the card’s ability from triggering when it leaves the battlefield. Another tactic is to limit the Occultist’s utility with graveyard hate cards like Relic of Progenitus or Rest in Peace, which can neutralize its mill strategy by keeping both players’ graveyards empty. When facing a deck utilizing Selhoff Occultist, quick, tactical suppression of the creature and its graveyard synergies ensures the occultist’s presence won’t be a lingering threat.