Exclusive Final Fantasy Preview: Restoration Magic
Final Fantasy is looking awesome, and thanks to Wizards hooking us up with a free preview, we've got an exclusive preview card to show off for you all today: check out Restoration Magic!
Restoration Magic is one of the new tiered cards from Final Fantasy, giving us three options to choose from, each costing an increasing amount of mana. For one mana, Restoration Magic offers a Blacksmith's Skill or Loran's Escape, protecting any permanent by giving it hexproof and indestructible until end of turn. If we're willing to pay two mana, we get the same thing but also gain three life. Then, for five mana, we can make all of our permanents hexproof and indestructible until end of turn while also gaining a massive six life!
We've seen similar protection spells see play in the past, and I imagine the same is true of Restoration Magic. While these effects are not exactly staples in 60-card Magic, if you have one permanent you really need to protect like Venerated Rotpriest, for example, Restoration Magic is an efficient way to get the job done. It's notable that while we have a couple of green versions of this effect in current Standard, like Defend the Rider, with Loran's Escape rotating this summer, white is lacking a card like Restoration Magic, which means it could see some Standard play if the right deck comes along. While I imagine people would play the card as a one-mana protection spell, the five mana mode, potentially saving your entire team from a sweeper and gaining a chunk of life, is a meaningful upside, especially after Sunfall rotates this summer and even more so if the format ever slows down a bit.
Restoration Magic becomes even more powerful in Commander. Voltron-style decks like Feather, the Redeemed, Light-Paws, Emperor's Voice, and Sergeant John Benton will love the card. In the early game, it offers a way to protect your must-kill commander from removal. Then later, when you have more mana, it can do its best Heroic Intervention impression by protecting all of your permanents while also giving you six life as a bonus!
While there are better ways to protect your entire board in Commander (like Teferi's Protection or Clever Concealment), the flexibility of Restoration Magic is its selling point. It reminds me a bit of Galadriel's Dismissal. While paying four mana to phase out all of your creatures is a bit expensive compared to other options, the fact that you can cast it for just a single mana to protect one thing is huge, making the card relevant at most points in the game. Plus, in Commander, cards that incidentally gain life are very powerful. There's no worse feeling than being the player who's down to 10 life while the rest of the table is still above 30. While gaining three or six life isn't going to swing the game all by itself, it might buy you another turn to find a sweeper or a removal spell to stabilize.
The other use I see for Restoration Magic in Commander is as a budget replacement for cards like Teferi's Protection and Clever Concealment. While it's not quite as efficient, as an uncommon it should be pretty cheap and easy to pick up, while Teferi's Protection is around $50 and even with a Final Fantasy Commander reprint Clever Concealment is still over $10. Especially if you are in a relitively low-powered playgroup where playing the most efficient version of an effect isn't really necessary, Restoration Magic seems like a solid option that shouldn't break the bank.
Conclusion
While I don't think Restoration Magic is a staple, the combination of low cost and flexibility makes it an appealing option for decks that really care heavily about keeping a specific permanent in play. As such, it should find its way into Voltron-style Commander decks and could even have some Standard potential if the right synergy comes along!
What do you think of Restoration Magic? Let me know in the comments! Thanks again to Wizards for hooking us up with the preview card, and as always, leave your thoughts, ideas, opinions, and suggestions in the comments, and you can reach me on Twitter @SaffronOlive or at SaffronOlive@MTGGoldfish.com.
