MTG Forums Reveal Great Arashin City Sentiment

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Great Arashin City card art by Josu Solano

Image courtesy of Scryfall.com

Sentiment from the MTG Forums on Great Arashin City

Last week’s discourse on MTG forums lit up like a freshly cracked booster—thread after thread buzzing about a new Abzan-flavored landmark from Tarkir: Dragonstorm. Great Arashin City isn’t just a land; it’s a doorway to a older, murky corner of the Tarkir cosmology where capital and graveyard meet in a deliberate, black-manded handshake. In practical terms, this rare land enters tapped unless you control a Forest or a Plains, then taps for black mana and, more intriguingly, offers a two-step engine: pay {1}{B}, tap, exile a creature card from your graveyard to create a 1/1 white Spirit token. For a lot of players, that’s a flavor-filled payoff that can show up in the late game as a surprise board presence 🧙‍♂️🔥.

What fans love most is the multilayered identity of Great Arashin City. On one axis, it’s a solid mana source for any colorless or single-colored strategy leaning on black mana. On the other axis, it’s a graveyard-enabler that rewards clever sequencing. Exiling a creature card from your graveyard to spawn a white Spirit token is a textbook example of how designers thread color-pairing synergy into a single card. The token’s presence matters, too: a 1/1 Spirit can crew minus-ably for a chump-block or trigger enter-the-battlefield shenanigans, depending on what you’re running. The moment the forum chorus started to chant, “It’s not just a land—it’s a toolbox,” you could feel the enthusiasm radiating through the threads 🎨🎲.

“A quiet carol of power. Great Arashin City doesn’t overwhelm the board; it quietly accelerates graveyard strategies and token pathways.”

— forum poster, vibe-check thread

Discussions aren’t without their cautions, though. A few voices remind us that a land which enters tapped unless you have a Forest or Plains can be a tempo cost in faster formats or in builds that don’t run green or white lands. Some players worry about “dead-on-arrival” turns when that crucial fetchland or dual-shrine isn’t in your deck, and a handful of purists scoff at any card that aims to do two things (mana acceleration and token generation) with a single activation. Yet the counterpoint is compelling: in Commander and other singleton formats, the card’s flexibility can outrun those tempo concerns as you pivot into a late-game engine—especially when you’re already leaning into Abzan’s resilient, grindy vibe 🧙‍♂️⚔️.

From a lore-flavor perspective, players are vibing with the Abzan flavor encoded in the card art and the ability. Tarkir’s fractured planes and faction lore give Great Arashin City a sense of gravitas—an ancient seat of power that quietly feeds a modern toolbox. The Abzan identity—patience, endurance, and graveyard resilience—feels reinforced: you exile a creature to summon a token, bending a once-buried card into a living presence. It’s a moment where flavor and function align in a way that fans crave in a land card 🧭💎.

In terms of strategy, you’ll hear the chatter about which deck archetypes sing best with this land. In Commander, it slots well into decks that already lean into the graveyard or token themes—think a black-centered shell that wants to pivot into white Spirit hordes when the time is right. In Modern/ Pioneer, the card’s raw value might be more situational, but it’s not hard to imagine niche builds pairing this with resurrection or blink effects to maximize value over multiple turns. The community is quick to point out that with a card like Great Arashin City, you don’t just get a mana source—you get a potential engine that scales with your graveyard and token suite, turning “slow and steady” into “slow and unstoppable” when your graveyard is primed and your board is ready to flood the skies with spirits 🧙‍♂️🔥.

By the numbers, collectors and budget-minded players are noting that this card sits in a modest price range, with a current USD price around $0.17 for non-foil and about $0.30 for foil, per Scryfall data. It’s not a chase mythic, but for players chasing edge in Abzan or graveyard-themed builds, it’s a pragmatic inclusion that can pay off with thoughtful play patterns rather than pure speed. The card’s rarity is rare, which often means a nice balance between availability and value—perfect for a format where utility and flavor carry equal weight 🧩🧠.

For those who love to explore cross-format cross-pollination, there’s also a broader cultural signal here: MTG forums are increasingly treating lands as dynamic contributors to deck-building narratives. Great Arashin City is a tiny, flavorful reminder that a land can age into an anchor for a strategy, not just a basic source of mana. The chatter shows players appreciating story-rich design and a card that rewards thoughtful sequencing—two things that keep fan communities engaged for seasons to come. It’s the magic world’s version of a well-loved indie track: not the loudest song in the set, but the one you end up humming long after you’ve left the chat room 🧙‍♂️🎶.

What this means for builders

  • Leverage the discard pile as a resource: exile from graveyard to create a token—turning a potential liability into board presence.
  • Pair black mana production with white Spirit tokens to unlock token-swarm or recursion-based strategies.
  • Consider EDH synergies where a single land can fuel long-term plays and fuel a resilient board state.
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Great Arashin City

Great Arashin City

Land

This land enters tapped unless you control a Forest or a Plains.

{T}: Add {B}.

{1}{B}, {T}, Exile a creature card from your graveyard: Create a 1/1 white Spirit creature token.

ID: ecba23b6-9f3a-431e-bc22-f1fb04d27b68

Oracle ID: f40f374b-acaf-459d-9ccd-b0b22d1a3f28

Multiverse IDs: 693737

TCGPlayer ID: 624265

Cardmarket ID: 818308

Colors:

Color Identity: B

Keywords:

Rarity: Rare

Released: 2025-04-11

Artist: Josu Solano

Frame: 2015

Border: black

EDHRec Rank: 8608

Penny Rank: 2609

Set: Tarkir: Dragonstorm (tdm)

Collector #: 257

Legalities

  • Standard — legal
  • Future — legal
  • Historic — legal
  • Timeless — legal
  • Gladiator — legal
  • Pioneer — legal
  • Modern — legal
  • Legacy — legal
  • Pauper — not_legal
  • Vintage — legal
  • Penny — legal
  • Commander — legal
  • Oathbreaker — legal
  • Standardbrawl — legal
  • Brawl — legal
  • Alchemy — legal
  • Paupercommander — not_legal
  • Duel — legal
  • Oldschool — not_legal
  • Premodern — not_legal
  • Predh — not_legal

Prices

  • USD: 0.17
  • USD_FOIL: 0.30
  • EUR: 0.30
  • EUR_FOIL: 0.36
  • TIX: 0.02
Last updated: 2025-12-07