Calamity Beasts are a new cycle of creature cards in Magic: The Gathering that possess unique and powerful abilities, making them valuable additions to many decks. On top of possessing game-warping abilities, these mono-colored legendary elementals also have a central role in Bloomburrow‘s lore.
In this context, a cycle of cards in MTG refers to a group of cards, typically one for each color, that share a thematic or mechanical similarity. One of the most popular cycles of creatures, for example, has been the Titan cycle, originally printed in M11. Now, Bloomburrow brings its very own flavor to the cycle of mono-colored creatures with the Calamity Beasts.
All MTG Bloomburrow Calamity Beasts
5. Beza, The Bounding Spring
- Mana Cost: 2WW
- Type: Legendary Creature – Elemental Elk
- Rarity: Mythic
- Ability: When Beza, the Bounding Spring enters, create a Treasure token if an opponent controls more lands than you. You gain four life if an opponent has more life than you. Create two 1/1 blue Fish creature tokens if an opponent controls more creatures than you. Draw a card if an opponent has more cards in hand than you.
A 4/5 elk elemental for four mana is not bad, but with zero keyword abilities, Beza mostly just sits lazily on the battlefield. Her strength solely comes from her enter-the-battlefield effect. White is known for blink strategies in which creatures enter and re-enter the battlefield multiple times to maximize the benefit of their strong ETB abilities. Beza would fit perfectly into one of these decks.
By blinking her again and again, a player could benefit from her abilities multiple times. Unfortunately, Beza’s ETB effects heavily depend on the board state. It is rather unlikely that a player will be able to take full advantage of her abilities, even in a game of Commander with multiple opponents.
4. Lumra, Bellow of the Woods
- Mana Cost: 4GG
- Type: Legendary Creature – Elemental Bear
- Rarity: Mythic
- Ability: Vigilance, Reach. Lumra, Bellow of the Wood’s power and toughness are each equal to the number of lands you control. When Lumra enters, mill four cards. Then return all land cards from your graveyard to the battlefield tapped.
Although bears are currently popular among Commander players with the recent release of several legendary bear creatures, Lumra does not take a spot in the top three in this list. Not because she isn’t an incredible, giant monster of a card but because of how high the bar is in this cycle. For Lumra to shine and be as impactful on the game as one wishes, she requires a filled graveyard and an entire land-matters strategy wrapped around her.
Without trample or evasion of any sort, a mere 1/1 token could block all of her damage, no matter how oversized she grows. However, her enter-the-battlefield effect is remarkably powerful, even game-ending with the right lands. As with most green strategies, Lumra is slower than her counterparts but makes up for it with an incredibly powerful ability.
3. Eluge, the Shoreless Sea
- Mana Cost: 1UUU
- Type: Legendary Creature – Elemental Fish
- Rarity: Mythic
- Ability: Eluge’s power and toughness are each equal to the number of Islands you control. Whenever Eluge enters or attacks, put a flood counter on target land. It’s an Island in addition to its other types for as long as it has a flood counter on it. The first instant or sorcery spell you cast each turn costs U (or one) less to cast for each land you control with a flood counter on it.
Traditionally, players would place flood counters on their opponent’s lands to mess with their mana base. Instead, Eluge encourages players to place flood counters on their own lands to reduce the cost of instants and sorceries. Her ability can become game-changing as it would eventually allow players to cast powerful spells like Cryptic Command for free or significantly reduce the cost of casting big splashy spells like Expropriate.
Unfortunately, this giant sea monster takes many turns, attack phases, and enter-the-battlefield instances to become the powerhouse card it was designed to be. As I mentioned above, this makes her perfect for commander play, but simply too slow for Standard, Modern, or other fast-paced formats.
2. Dragonhawk, Fate’s Tempest
- Mana Cost: 3RR
- Type: Legendary Creature – Bird Dragon
- Rarity: Mythic
- Ability: Flying. Whenever Dragonhawk enters or attacks, exile the top X cards of your library, where X is the number of creatures you control with power 4 or greater. You may play those cards until your next end step. At the beginning of your next end step, Dragonhawk deals 2 damage to each opponent for each of those cards that are still exiled.
As a 5/5 flyer for five mana with a powerful ETB and on-attack trigger, Dragonhawk means business. This half-bird half-dragon would at least exile one card on entering the battlefield. Since the wording says “play” and not “cast”, players can play lands from exile if they can’t cast anything else.
Dragonhawk is a fantastic inclusion in many formats such as Standard and Limited thanks to the fact that he is mana-cost-efficient. His real strength relies on his ability to give a pseudo card draw to a color that traditionally struggled with card draw. Additionally, he dishes out direct damage to opponents if those exiled cards remain in exile. Dragonhawk may be a new auto-include in Dragon-themed commander decks.
1. Maha, Its Feathers Night
- Mana Cost: 3BB
- Type: Legendary Creature – Elemental Bird
- Rarity: Mythic
- Ability: Flying. Trample. Ward – Discard a card. Creatures your opponents control have base toughness one.
Maha, Its Feathers Night is the real deal among the Calamity Beasts cycle. A 6/5 flyer with trample and ward is a terrifying threat to look at from across the table. This gigantic night owl can take down most flyers and still dish out trample damage to the opponent. But Maha’s passive ability is much more frightening and far-reaching than her brute force.
Maha basically turns your opponent’s formidable army into an army of mice. Even though they keep their strength, turning them into X/1s is incredibly powerful. Paired with black enchantments such as Night of Soul’s Betrayal, Curse of Death’s Hold, or creatures like Kaervek, The Spiteful, you can easily lock your opponents out of playing creatures for the remainder of the game. They can still play their creatures if they wish to do so, but they immediately die as soon as they hit the battlefield.
