Blazing Hope MTG Card

Mana cost
Converted mana cost	1
Rarity	Uncommon
Type	Instant
Released	2018-01-19
Set symbol
Set name	Rivals of Ixalan
Set code	RIX
Number	3
Frame	2015
Layout	Normal
Border	Black
Illustred by	Clint Cearley

Key Takeaways

Instant-speed removal offers tactical advantage during pivotal moments, disrupting opponents’ plays effectively.
Strict activation condition at one life creates situational usage, but impactful when conditions are met.
Despite limitations, niche uses in life-manipulating decks grant Blazing Hope competitive sideboard potential.

Text of card

Exile target creature with power greater than or equal to your life total.

"No shadow remains for you to hide in." —Caparocti Sunborn

Card Pros

Card Advantage: Blazing Hope offers a tactical upper hand by removing a high-power creature from the battlefield, potentially disrupting your opponent’s strategy without sacrificing your own card resources.

Resource Acceleration: While Blazing Hope does not directly produce mana or tokens, the life you save by eliminating a formidable threat can extend the game, giving you more turns to draw into your powerful spells and resources.

Instant Speed: The card’s instant speed is a key asset, allowing you to react swiftly to significant creatures your opponent plays. This can be especially critical during combat or in response to an opponent attempting to secure a game-winning board state.

Card Cons

Discard Requirement: Using Blazing Hope requires that you have exactly one life, making this card situational and potentially unusable if you do not meet this strict condition.

Specific Mana Cost: The mana needed to cast Blazing Hope is strictly white. This requirement constrains deck building, as it can’t be easily slotted into multicolor decks that don’t prioritize white mana.

Comparatively High Mana Cost: Though costing only a single white mana, the card’s restriction to being useful only when at one life means that its cost-to-effect ratio is unfavorable in many game states. Other removal options are available without such a limiting prerequisite, providing more flexibility throughout the game.

Reasons to Include Blazing Hope in Your Collection

Versatility: Blazing Hope offers an unexpected lifeline in your deck. It can be a strategic defense against formidable creatures, especially when you are at a low life total and facing a lethal threat.

Combo Potential: This card carves out a niche in scenarios where life-gain decks need to remove a big threat, enabling clever plays and synergies with cards that reward you for gaining life or manipulating life totals.

Meta-Relevance: Given its potential to upset aggressive strategies by removing their biggest creature without a mana cost under certain conditions, Blazing Hope finds its place in a meta where fast, high-power creatures dominate.

How to beat

Blazing Hope presents a unique challenge as a removal card in Magic: The Gathering. It stands out for its ability to exile a creature, but only if your life total is lower than your opponent’s life total. This condition is a double-edged sword – rendering it incredibly effective in dire situations or almost useless when you’re leading the game. Unlike cards like Swords to Plowshares that allow for unconditional removal, Blazing Hope’s utility is situation-dependent.

Therefore, to counter Blazing Hope, maintaining a higher life total is a straightforward strategy. It demobilizes the threat posed by the card, as it cannot be activated. Another tactic is to limit single creature dependency, diversifying threats to dilute the impact of a single removal. Additionally, keeping instant-speed protection spells or abilities to counteract Blazing Hope further ensures your creatures’ safety, making it a less daunting card to play against.

Effectively, while Blazing Hope can turn the tides of a match when timed right, it is a situational tool that can be strategically mitigated. Playing around its activation condition is key to minimizing its potential impact on the battlefield.

Cards like Blazing Hope

Blazing Hope is a unique white instant spell in MTG that challenges the norms of removals, with its key stipulation hinging on the player’s life total being lower than their opponent’s. A high watermark in this realm is Swords to Plowshares, an iconic removal spell known for its low-cost efficiency. Though Blazing Hope doesn’t offer the same immediacy in all situations, it presents no life gain for the opponent, which is an upside compared to Swords to Plowshares.

Another close relative in effect is Path to Exile, which exiles a creature but provides the opposing player with a land advantage. This can be a critical downside in the early game, a dilemma Blazing Hope cleverly sidesteps. Meanwhile, Condemn is an often overlooked cousin, trading on the condition of targeting only attacking creatures, while Blazing Hope offers broader application albeit with its own limiting clause.

Scrutinizing these removals, Blazing Hope may not be the first pick in every deck archetype. Nonetheless, its strategic advantage in life-threatening situations makes it a powerful sideboard card or a surprise inclusion for niche strategies in the vast world of MTG.

Swords to Plowshares - MTG Card versions

Where to buy

If you're looking to purchase Blazing Hope MTG card by a specific set like Rivals of Ixalan, there are several reliable options to consider. One of the primary sources is your local game store, where you can often find booster packs, individual cards, and preconstructed decks from current and some past sets. They often offer the added benefit of a community where you can trade with other players.

For a broader inventory, particularly of older sets, online marketplaces like TCGPlayer, Card Kingdom and Card Market offer extensive selections and allow you to search for cards from specific sets. Larger e-commerce platforms like eBay and Amazon also have listings from various sellers, which can be a good place to look for sealed product and rare finds.

Additionally, Magic’s official site often has a store locator and retailer lists for finding Wizards of the Coast licensed products. Remember to check for authenticity and the condition of the cards when purchasing, especially from individual sellers on larger marketplaces.

Below is a list of some store websites where you can buy the Blazing Hope and other MTG cards:

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Legalities

Magic the Gathering formats where Blazing Hope has restrictions

Format	Legality
Historicbrawl	Legal
Historic	Legal
Legacy	Legal
Oathbreaker	Legal
Gladiator	Legal
Pioneer	Legal
Commander	Legal
Modern	Legal
Vintage	Legal
Duel	Legal
Explorer	Legal
Penny	Legal
Timeless	Legal