Worldwake Magic: The Gathering Spoilers - Anowon, the Ruin Sage and Urge to Feed

Magic: the Gathering's upcoming set Worldwake is introducing many powerful cards into Standard. Right on the heels of Raging Ravine and Chain Reaction we receive Anowon, the Ruin Sage, Urge to Feed, Abyssal Persecutor, Novablast Wurm, and Hada Freeblade.

Anowon, the Ruin Sage - 3BB
Legendary Creature - Vampire Shaman
At the beginning of your upkeep, each player sacrifices a non-Vampire creature
4/4

Anowon, the Ruin Sage provides the best Abyss-like effect that black players have seen in years. Call to the Grave was an over hyped (and priced) card when Scourge came out, never seeing much play due to the prominence of Goblin decks packing Patriarch's Bidding and Astral Slide decks running Exalted Angel. This time around, Anowon, the Ruin Sage is a beefier Braids, Cabal Minion with an ability that has no real drawback for one of the most popular tribe based decks. Anowon, the Ruin Sage isn't the only new friend to vampire based strategies.

Urge to Feed
Instant
Target creature gets -3/-3 until end of turn. You may tap any number of untapped Vampire creatures you control. If you do, put a +1/+1 counter on each of those Vampires.

Urge to Feed is a very cute removal spell / combat trick. Idealistically one would cast Urge to Feed when they are blocking, however the end of an opponent's turn is the best time outside of the combat step.

With the introduction of both Anowon, the Ruin Sage and Urge to Feed into Standard, Vampires are sure to become an even more popular deck than it is now. Expect to run into at least one vampire themed deck at Friday Night Magic events around Boston.

Abyssal Persecutor, Novablast Wurm, and Hada Freeblade are three more recent Worldwake spoilers. Abyssal Persecutor is an efficient costed flyer whose drawback isn't realized unless you've already won the game. It fits in quite well with a later played Anowon, the Ruin Sage (provided an opponent lets you keep Abyssal Persecutor on the board). Novablast Wurm will definitely make a showing in casual decks, and some will try to make a competitive deck with it. Hada Freeblade is an auto-include to Ally themed decks.

Did you enjoy this Magic: the Gathering Article? Check out these others:
Worldwake's Raging Ravine, and Omnath, Locus of Mana
Worldwake's Chain Reaction can blow up casual games
Worldwake's Dragonmaster Outcast
Worldwake Magic: the Gathering preview - Kitesail Apprentice
Announcing Archenemy, a new Magic: the Gathering multiplayer variant

Sources:
Jacob Van Lunen "The Urge to Feed", Wizards.com 1/20/2010. Retrieved January 20th, 2010 from http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/boab/74

Jenna Helland "Consortium Report: "The Incident at the Eye", Wizards.com 1/20/2010. Retrieved January 20th, 2010 from http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/stf/74

"Worldwake Visual Spoiler", Wizards.com 1/20/2010. Retrieved January 20th, 2010 from http://www.wizards.com/magic/tcg/article.aspx?x=mtg/tcg/worldwake/spoiler