"Westvale Abbey: Not the Place to be"

"Westvale Abbey: Not the Place to be"

by:

Virgilio F. De leon Jr.

When I look at old supposedly religious places it sometimes gives me a creepy vibe. My mind goes to all the unspeakable things that must have happened there and if some of those things would ever be brought to light.

And if I were able to visit Innistrad just looking at Westvale Abbey will instantly give me that creepy vibe. Like something wasn't right and you just can't place your finger on it. That is after it transforms into the Demon Ornedahl , Profane Prince and you start saying to yourself. "So that's what it was." 

So why would you want to play with this Flip Land...Er...Transform Land.Well , at the early turns it can give you colorless mana. Sounds blah right? but wait there is more. This land has the built in ability to spew out white and black Human Cleric creature tokens for the price of 5 colorless mana. Something that you could do at any time. So you could have a creature as a blocker when you need it. You could create a creature to sacrifice to other creatures like Dark Supplicant to possibly get a Scion of Darkness , or maybe use it to ping someone with a Starlit Sanctum. But by far the best reason is that you could use this creature to sacrifice to the land itself.

So one moment it's a harmless looking Abbey and after spilling the blood of 5 creatures it goes "poof" and out comes a 9/7 demon that doesn't look like as friendly. I mean flying , Lifelink , Indestructible and Haste. As if having a 7 toughness is not enough it has to have haste and flying so you could punch through with a killing blow to your opponent. Believe me. Even in EDH if your opponents could not respond to a bomb such as this they are dead in at least 5 turns with Ornedahl attacking all by his lonesome.

The lifelink is no joke either as it swings the odds in your favor if your EDH opponents have been ganging up on you and your deck all night long/all day long.

Ornedahl , Profane Prince. Let that name sink in for a moment. This guy is perfect in a Shadowborne Apostle's deck that has Shirei , Shizo's caretaker as commander.I mean after sacrificing 5 Shadowborn Apostle's you get those guys back at the end of your turn and if you have a 6th Shadowborn Apostle and one available black mana you could tutor out another demon from your deck.

Since Westvale Abbey is a land it could also be included in a Tiny Leaders deck that features a lot of tokens. The cool thing is that it doesn't care what kind of creature it gobbles up for as long as you have 5 of them and 5 mana. Ornedahl isn't such a picky eater. It would eat your Saprolings or Goblins or Elves if you feed them to it.

That's it for today. Enjoy transforming Westvale Abbey. And if you are ever in Innistrad make sure you are not there for when they feed Ornedahl cultist snacks because chances are that might include you,