"Celestial Archon: The gods have bestowed"

"Celestial Archon: The gods have bestowed"

by:

Virgilio F. De leon Jr.

During my earlier days of Magic I was enamored by the simple fact that you could pile on several Aura's or enchantments on one creature and that creature could make such an impact that it would consistently pummel opponents to a pulp. Of course , this was when casual games were being played and the concept of creature control was held in the minimum. After joining my first tournament it became quite apparent that though Aura's have a place in Standard play it is still something that can be be easily taken cared of by a simple Doom blade or the deck can suffer from a lack of creatures to enchant when you cannot draw them. So lack of creatures spells doom for a deck that relies heavily on Aura's for the win hence the lack of appeal for some. With Theros arriving in a few short weeks this is set to change. Theros is set to do what Mirrodin did to Artifacts , create an environment that will favor those playing Enchantments.

M14 came out with a very Aura-centric card in Ajani's Chosen. A 2/2 cat that is to be enchanted with an Angelic Destiny or Rancor is nothing to sniff at. 

However the card that I would like to talk about talk about Bestows so much more. No literally it introduces the Bestow Mechanic to the world.Enter the Celestial Archon , A creature that normally costs 5 mana to cast that has the Bestow Mechanic. The bestow mechanic works like this you can pay the Bestow cost of this card and it enters the battlefield as an Aura(enchant creature) card. If it not attached to a creature it then becomes a 4/4 Flying . First strike Creature! This creature also has the distinct feature of being an Enchantment and a creature at the same time! More on that later but check this out first.

So let us say that you already have an Ajani's Chosen in play and you decide to Bestow it with the Archon's awesome stat pump of +4/+4 Flying First Strike.A 2/2 Cat will be created and the Aura will attach to the cat. Netting you a 6/6 Monstrosity that Flies and Defends like a boss! You have a possible finisher on the board already. 

Of course in the upper levels of the game creature removal can be found at every turn. What you will have here is a what people call a 2 for 1. If in any event the 2/2 cat or any creature being enchanted disappears the Celestial Archon will drop and become another creature! And a very big creature at that! It might be the final push to finish an opponent in the end game. It might be a bit pricey but there might be possible creatures with Bestow that cost a lot lower.We would just have to see as Theros comes out.I wonder what else the gods would bestow upon us.