Are you a Quiet Speculation member?
If not, now is a perfect time to join up! Our powerful tools, breaking-news analysis, and exclusive Discord channel will make sure you stay up to date and ahead of the curve.
Hedonist's Trove
Enchantment
When Hedonist's Trove enteres the battlefield, exile all cards in target opponent's graveyard.
One per turn, you may cast a nonland card exiled by Hedonist's Trove.
You may play land cards exiled by Hedonist's Trove.
Likely too slow for Standard despite its utility as a Graveyard hoser, this is perfect for EDH. It keeps them from getting up to graveyard shenanigans and gives you a slow, crushing advantage over the turns. I like this card a lot in EDH, which mean it will be a bulk rare forever and the foils will take over a year to crack $5. Oh, and it's only fringe-playable in EDH. I am not sure if it;s some nuance lost in translation, but even if you play their lands, you can't tap them for mana that isn't in your general's color identity, so this severely limits what of their spells you can play. EDH is a bulk rare format, and lots of good EDH cards are still bulk. Welcome to one of them. I am targeting foils, but only because they will be cheap and no one is going to think to ask for the customary 5x multiplier for EDH staples, something this isn't. Cool card, that's all.
Haven of the Spirit Dragon
Why WotC decided to make a terrible Dragon land in the last set and a good one in this one, I will never know. I expect this to experience a price trajectory very, very similar to that of Sliver Hive so if you want to know when to buy and when to sell, look at a graph of that card's price. This is very, very good and may even compel some people to play Ugin in dragon tribal in EDH, further buoying Ugin's price. This land is so good, but so narrow.
Ire Shaman
I like this card a lot. Aggressive red decks can make use of every part of the buffalo here. You have a 3/2 that is hard to block and all but draws you a card on turn 4 when you should have 3 mana on top of its megamorph cost to play whatever you flip up if your curve is low. I am excited about the prospect of serving with this dude. Is a $2 preorder too cheap? Maybe not. I think this card is good but I also don't know if it has a deck. There certainly isn't hype around this card so if it starts to tick up, I imagine it will be after its price goes down initially allowing you to re-evaluate it if it hits bulk but gets a modicum of adoption. I think we hold off for now in any case.
Pitiless Horde
Creature - Orc Berserker
At the beginning of your upkeep, lose 2 life.
Dash 2BB (You may cast this spell for its dash cost. If you do, it gains haste, and it's returned from the battlefield to its owner's hand at the beginning of the next end step.)
This is a very good rate for a 5/3, which swing through Courser of Kruphix with ease and can even be repeatedly dashed to avoid the steep upkeep life loss. They should call Dash "MegaEcho". I don't know if Standard wants a clunky beater like this, but this will be super useful in Limited, I guess. Unfortunately, this was spoiled in another language so SCG doesn't have a price for it, yet, but I have to imagine this ends up bulk.
Assault Formation
Finally, Abzan has the Doran aura (Dora?) they have always wanted to have. This is a very Abzan card, but it feels like it has no shot of being played outside of Limited and Doran EDH decks. Narrow, clunky and cool. The whole set feels that way. This may be the most powerful card that no one is going to give a crap about.
Avatar of the Resolute
This is a very good rate for a 3 power trampler. Still, the two toughness and 3 power means it can't deal with Courser and that is a real liability. You won't be able to play this guy on curve, and you have to play him in decks where you have a lot of creatures with counters on them. Still, a 4/3 trample, reach is very good for 2 mana and finding one other creature with a counter should be doable. Clearly the public agrees - he was listed at $2 but quickly sold out. Does he have a deck? If he does, he will likely be a 4/3 or even 5/4 for 2 mana early in the game. That's even better than Tarmogoyf. Two green pips if that matters to you, and reach in case they beset you with dragons. All in all, this card has a ton of potential and the sell-out on SCG makes him worth watching. Maybe start with a list of playable creatures that get +1/+1 counters on them for a start...