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Top 11 6-Drop Magic: The Gathering Creatures From The Last 10 Years


Credit: WotC

 

The latest Magic: the Gathering set Ikoria: Lair of Behemoths has been out for a couple of weeks now. In that time, players have been treated to a whole array of giant monsters both in Constructed and Limited formats 

The Companion mechanic is certainly hogging the spotlight by being completely broken, for better or for worse. But I’m more a fan of the Mutate mechanic and the wacky behemoth-stacks it lets players assemble using multiple creatures that have the alternate cost.

Unfortunately for all the Timmies out there, Mutate hasn’t made much of an impact in Standard, Pioneer, and Modern. That’s probably because Constructed Magic is most often about cheap threats and interaction. In fact, formats won’t often feature many cards more expensive than five mana. And if they do, they likely win the game on the spot or are part of an unstoppable value engine.

Of course, there are a bunch of six-drop creatures that have made their mark on Constructed in the past decade. And yes, most of them can shut the door on the opponent or help you claw back from a losing position.

So, in honor of Ikoria, let’s look at the 11 best 6-mana creatures released in the past 10 years. True to their steep costs, each and every one of them is an absolute blast to play!

  1. Gyruda, Doom of Depths

    "Gyruda, Doom of Depths" and their reanimating tentacles have been part of Constructed for less than a month, but the 6-mana Companion has already made waves in three different formats. In terms of Constructed popularity, I would say that it has only been eclipsed so far by "Lurrus of the Dream-Den" and maybe "Yorion, Sky Nomad".

    This creature boasts the distinction of being the only 6 drop on the list that will always be available to cast when you hit the necessary mana. On top of that, the first copy of the card doesn’t clog up your hand in the early game like other sixes do. 

    Oh, and Gyruda also lets you win the game the same turn you cast it, as we’ve seen from the bizarre but powerful builds that have popped up. In Standard, the Simic Gyruda deck consistently puts almost 20 power into play on turn 4 by chaining "Spark Doubles" and "Thassa, Deep-Dwellers". In Pioneer and Modern, the critical mass of Clone effects lets you mill your opponent out before they even get to untap. 

    Gyruda is undoubtedly one of the most powerful 6 drops ever printed, thanks to the Companion mechanic. The reason why it’s so low on this list—for now—is that we’ve seen so many game-winning heavy hitters in the past ten years. I’m excited to see how quickly Gyruda gets even with the rest of the list.

  2. Dragonlord Silumgar

    "Dragonlord Silumgar" is my personal favorite card on this list, because it’s one of the cards I’ve won the most with in Standard. The Dimir Dragonlord got me my first Regional Pro Tour Qualifier appearance back when I was new to competitive Magic.

    It flew right into the finisher slot in Esper control decks alongside Dragonlord Ojutai when Dragons of Tarkir released in 2015. That deck relied heavily on the latest set’s many Dragon synergies like "Dragonlord’s Prerogative", "Foul-Tongue Invocation", "Silumgar’s Scorn", and "Haven of the Spirit Dragon". Esper Dragons put multiple players into the Top 16 of Pro Tour DTK.

    But even without the synergies that made that deck such a powerful option in that Standard format, Silumgar could win games single-handedly. The most backbreaking way to use him was to steal a Planeswalker that was ready to activate its ultimate on the following turn, and then cash it in yourself. 

    That was flashy, but just stealing a dorky creature from your opponent was often enough to catch the control deck up from a losing position. It’s 5 toughness also made it very difficult for Red decks to kill. 

    My favorite thing about the card, however, is that the art has Silumgar wearing the corpse of Tasigur, the Golden Fang, as an amulet.

     

  3. Carnage Tyrant

    If you’ve done me the honor of reading a few of my list articles, you’ll know that I fancy myself a control mage. I love making smart one-for-one trades and drawing cards until I can cast an unbeatable 6 drop and ride it to victory. 

    Imagine my dismay, then, when this Mythic Dinosaur was released with Ixalan. During that Standard season, the shoe was on the other foot. I lost so many times to this Hexproof, Trampling win condition! 

    The Golgari Midrange list that played this at the top of the curve was so ubiquitous that decks started playing Detection Tower to help them target the Tyrant. That deck could also grind out midrange mirrors by combining Carnage Tyrant’s 6 toughness with the -4/-4 sweeper side of Find//Finality. 

    As bonkers as this card looks, at least two factors limited the amount of success Carny-T had on the Pro Tour. First, White Weenie was an excellent strategy when Guild of Ravnica came out. It proved too quick for Golgari and put six copies into the Top 8 of that set’s Pro Tour. Second, control players had access to powerful answers to the card like "Settle the Wreckage".

  4. Sun Titan

    Newer Magic players may not recall all five members of the Titan cycle, first released in Magic Core Set 2011, but each of them topped the curve of tier 1 decks at the start of the decade. They jostled for position at the top of the 6 drop heap, battling each other for supremacy. They were like the Cavaliers from Magic 2020, but way better.

    "Sun Titan" is Mono-White’s lone representative on this list, and for good reason. I wrote above that competitive decks tend to feature low curves and cheap creatures, and that is most true for White decks. 

    The White Titan is notable, though, for its role in the powerful Esper Solar Flare deck that tore Standard up after "Liliana of the Veil" and "Phantasmal Image" were released. 

    That deck spent early turns filling the Graveyard and killing creatures, before reanimating a Sun Titan and putting into play as many "Phantasmal Images" copying the Titans as it could. The deck was a blast to play and actually functioned similarly to the Gyruda decks of today. 

    "Sun Titan" was an uncharacteristically powerful late game card for White, and it will likely be a long time before a better 6 drop in the Weenie color is printed.

     

  5. Dinrova Horror

    This 4/4 Horror wouldn’t be slithering anywhere near this list if this Uncommon from Gatecrash hadn’t been reprinted as a Common in Modern Masters 2017 Edition

    Since being unleashed into the Pauper format, "Dinrova Horror" has been one of the premier finishers in Tron and multicolor value decks. It’s particularly devastating when combined with flicker effects, of which Pauper has many.

    It’s not a bad legacy for a 6 drop that was barely good enough for the blisteringly fast Gatecrash Draft format!

  6. Aetherling

    Just as a list of Magic’s best one-drops would include a lot of aggressive creatures, this list is packed with Blue or Dimir finishers. That’s because Blue decks in Constructed formats usually play control effectively, so the color’s best creatures are often resilient finishers that end the game soon after the pilot takes control.

    One of the exemplars of the impossible-to-kill Blue 6 drop is "Aetherling". This Rare featured heavily in Standard once Dragon’s Maze was released. If you managed to get to the late game and had a ton of lands in play, "Aetherling" would come down, get in for ridiculous amounts of unblockable damage, and blink itself out of harm’s way or into a block.

    The card was so hard to deal with that pros started packing Debtor’s Pulpit in their sideboards, an otherwise abysmal and expensive Enchant Land that actually dealt with Aetherling effectively.

    A card warping the format around it so much that you need a garbage Limited Uncommon to handle it is a textbook example of why 6 drops can be so powerful.

     

  7. Inferno Titan

    I’ll take a short break from raving about Blue 6 drops to talk about Inferno Titan, Red’s deserving sole inclusion on this list. The color Red is all about dealing a lot of damage, and that is exactly what this flaming Giant does. 

    Now spending its retirement as a Red Cube finisher and part-time Modern sidekick to "Primeval Titan", Inferno Titan was once a force to reckon with in Standard ramp decks like RG Valakut and Wolf-Run Ramp. 

    The card was extremely effective at clearing the board of small creatures with its enter-the-battlefield ability as early as turn 4. And if it ever got to attack, the game was likely over, as the Titan could get in for as much as 12 or more damage at once.

    Red mages in Standard didn’t often care about getting to 6 mana, but when they did, Inferno Titan was without a doubt one of the best options to end the game quickly. 

    The card has seen a lot of Pro Tour success, albeit with the help of it’s Green colleague. Most notably, Junya Iyanaga took home the crown of 2011 World Champion with a Gruul Wolf-Run deck featuring 8 Titans. Just a few months later, Brian Kibler brought a similar list to Pro Tour Dark Ascension and won the whole thing, beating Paolo Vitor Damo da Rosa in a Finals mirror match.

  8. Dream Trawler

    Speaking of the World Championship and of Paolo Vitor Damo da Rosa, the Brazilian Hall-of-Famer and all-time great won this year’s edition with an Azorius Control deck supercharged by the printing of Dream Trawler in Theros: Beyond Death.

    His version of the deck featured only a single copy, but that was an excellent metagame decision. Before the release of Ikoria, Azorius Control decks played as many as 4 maindeck copies of this unkillable Sphinx, while Midrange decks like Bant also looked to the Trawler to end the game.

    It’s hard to imagine printing a card better than "Aetherling", but "Dream Trawler’s" insane combination of card advantage, resilience, and finishing power make older 6 drops look like draft chaff.

    I’m exaggerating, of course, but the printing of "Dream Trawler" has definitely kept the light of 6-drop finishers from going out in the face of cheaper aggro creatures and broken Planeswalkers.

  9. Wurmcoil Engine

    "Wurmcoil Engine" is unquestionably the best colorless 6-drop Artifact Creature ever printed, and I believe that its stats and staying power since being printed in Scars of Mirrodin cement its place near the top of this list.

    The card’s most recent success came at Mythic Championship IV, where Thoralf Severin played 4 in his winning Tron deck. 

    Often coming down on turn 3 in that deck, "Wurmcoil Engine" is a big reason why Tron is usually one of the best Modern decks at a given time. It has all the hallmarks of 6 drops that are good in Constructed. The 3/3 tokens it makes means it’s hard to permanently remove, Lifelink is great for stabilizing against Aggro decks, and its 6 power and Deathtouch helps it end the game quickly.

  10. Torrential Gearhulk

    I’ve always loved "Torrential Gearhulk" and knew it was successful in its time in Standard, but I was surprised at just how many winning decks it appeared in. While doing research for this article, I found this Flash Gearhulk in the Top 8 decklists from Pro Tours Amonkhet, Hour of Devastation, 25th Anniversary, and Dominaria. 

    It even featured in both finalists’ decklists at PT Kaladesh, and it helped Shota Yasooka take the title home with his finely tuned Grixis Control deck.

    "Torrential Gearhulk" is particularly good because of the spell effect it brings along. One problem with 6 drops is that they take up slots in decks that could be spent on more cheap removal or card draw. That’s why it’s uncommon to see them appear as playsets of 4 in control decks. 

    This 6-mana Artifact Creature solves that problem by acting as another copy of the best Instant in your Graveyard. It also ambushes attackers well and gets in for huge chunks of damage.

    Control decks in Pioneer and Modern now have access to cheaper and more flexible win conditions like "Teferi, Hero of Dominaria" and "Uro, Titan of Nature’s Wrath", but pilots looking for a little extra oomph will always find what they’re looking for in "Torrential Gearhulk".

  11. Primeval Titan

    It’s only fitting that we end with a Green card, as ramp is the archetype besides control that most wants 6 drops to slam down and win the game.

    "Primeval Titan" has enabled and supercharged a ton of land-based shenanigans since its first printing 10 years ago. From "Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle", to Bouncelands and "Slayers’ Stronghold", to "Field of the Dead", This Trampling Giant doubles as the best payoff and enabler for decks that win with a combination of lands.

    Apart from helping Junya Iyanaga and Brian Kibler win the World Championship and PT Dark Ascnesion, respectively, Prime Time also propelled Justin Cohen to a Modern Pro Tour Finals appearance in 2015. The Amulet Bloom deck he and many others played to great success at that tournament was so broken that Wizards of the Coast soon banned the Sorcery Summer Bloom.

    Even after getting hit by a ban, Amulet decks have been a staple of Modern, and it’s no thanks to this not-so-gentle giant.

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