Today, for our Hump Day tip, we’re going to be looking at a Magic 2014 card with some potential: Elite Arcanist. The ability to repeatedly cast an instant is a powerful effect, and it has some synergy with some standard-legal cards, which brings us to today’s question.

When you activate the Arcanist’s ability, you make a copy of the exiled instant card, and then you can cast it without paying its mana cost. You’re not putting the spell on the stack (like you do with Wild Ricochet and most other “copy a spell” effects), you’re casting the copy. This means the Arcanist plays well with cards like Young Pyromancer and Guttersnipe. Since you’re casting the copy, the abilities of the Pyromancer and Guttersnipe will still trigger, so you’ll get the token and/or get to deal damage to the opponent.

So that sounds like the makings of nice little standard deck. Go red/blue, add in Young Pyromancer and Guttersnipe, add in some cheap instants and sorceries, and run the Arcanist to make sure you can play an instant every turn and keep the triggers coming. Feel free to try out that combo at your next Friday Night Magic event.*

*Author takes no responsibility for your tournament results as a consequence of following this suggestion. 😉

Today’s Rules Tip written by Nathan Long