Magic The Gathering Phyrexia: All Will Be One Review: Tokens, My Precious

Magic The Gathering has recently launched the new Phyrexia: All Will Be One set. If you care about lore, prepare to buckle yourself in for some angst, because none of these heroes are having a good time. There’s stuff about politics, someone’s going to riot, there’s a lot of poison going on. It seems like a fantasy version of working in a factory for a major tech company based in the developing world, but less constructing phones and more raising armies to do your bidding. But a similar vibe.

However, if you, like me, do not care about lore and instead just want to make hundreds, upon hundreds of tokens, then you are in for such a good time, my friend.

Magic The Gathering Phyrexia: All For One Mechanics

There are five main mechanics in Phyrexia: All For One:

Toxic

If you get dealt damage by a creature with toxic, you have to take some poison counters, equal to that creature’s toxic value. Poison counters are, well, poison, because if you end up with ten or more, you lose the game.

Corrupted

Corrupted then builds on those poison counters to do more damahge to your opponent. For example, Skrelv’s Hive has a corrupted ability that says “Corrupted – As long as an opponent has three or more poison counters, creatures you control with toxic have lifelink.” Basically, Corrupted is a way to make poison counters mean more, even when your opponent doesn’t have ten of them yet.

For Mirrodin!

For Mirroden! Is a new triggered ability on Artifact Equipment that basically means they come into play with their own wielder in token form. Handy if you don’t have any creatures, or if your equipment has other abilities, like the ability to copy another creature in play.

Oil Counters

Basically just another counter effect that cards check to do other things. For example “place X oil counters when Y, then create X tokens” and things along those lines. Some cards move oil counters around, though, which can spice things up.

Proliferate

Proliferate, my beloved, “choose any number of players or permanents that already have counters on them. For each one, and for each kind of counter it has, add another one.” Chaos. True chaos. Glorious.

But is Phyrexia: All Will Be One any good?

Yes, yes it is. Aggressively good. I’ve mostly played it in Commander form, because Commander is my jam, and the Rebellion Rising pre-fab Commander deck could have been custom made for me.

I normally play white/green decks, because I want to gain a lot of life, make a lot of creatures and not really pay attention to the other players at all until I have an unstoppable army. Rebellion Rising is exactly like that, but with the instant speeds of red.

I made dozens, upon dozens of tokens. I played this against my wife, who tried three different decks (I didn’t get the other Phyrexia: All Will Be One commander deck, which is likely better balanced) and I destroyed her every time. Decks that I normally find nigh unbeatable crumpled like tissue paper. This deck repeatedly and effortlessly beat all her decks so badly she might not want to play Magic anymore. That last point is bad, because Commander is a friendly format and everyone should have a good time, and also I want to play more Magic at home. But still, it’s a testament to the strength of the deck.

OK, the Rebellion Rising Commander deck is good, but what about the rest of the set?

While the mechanics of the set aren’t going to set the world ablaze with excitement, it’s actually a pretty great draft set. There’s a lot of cards in here that can change the game on a dime, and you’ll be home after draft night with enough time to unwind before bed, because this set is fast.

I can certainly understand why the Magic community has been so upset about how fast Phyrexia: All For One plays. MTG Arena Zone broke down the numbers, and while the set isn’t as fast as originally feared, it’s still going to change the meta a bit.

The sheer speed of the set will be a major problem for casual play because, as we saw from my commander games, a deck this fast against slower decks will just destroy them before the other player has had a chance to have their fun, which is bad for a casual format.

Magic The Gathering Phyrexia: All Will Be One Verdict

I love this set. It seems to have been made with exactly my interests in mind. Playing Phyrexia: All Will Be One decks against each other promises that everyone is in for a great (if fast) time. But players should be careful playing it against older, slower decks if they want to make sure everyone at the table is having a good time. Bring spare decks to share or pivot to, lest you accidentally cause a loved one to rage quit long-term.