Ixalan Limited Dive Down: Instants

Here is a quick reference list of every instant-speed card in Ixalan. (After I wrote mine up, I saw MTGGoldfish's and validated my pass with it. Theirs is much prettier to bookmark. I always keep this list in front of me for the first several drafts of any new set.)

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White

• Demystify - W - C
• Slash of Talons - W - C (2 to combat)
• Vampire’s Zeal - W - C (+2+2, 1st strike to vamp)
• Sheltering Light - W - U (indestructible scry)
• Rallying Roar - 2W - U (+1+1 untap)
• Ritual of Rejuvenation - 2W - C (gain 4 draw)
• Settle the Wreckage - 2WW - R (Path all attackers)
• Bright Reprisal - 4W - U (Second Thoughts)
• Sanguine Sacrament - XWW - R (gain 2X)

Blue

• Dive Down - U - C (+0/+3 hexproof)
• Opt - U - C
• Spell Pierce - U - C
• Siren’s Ruse - 1U - C (cloudshift)
• Perilous Voyage - 1U - U (Disperse, scry 2 if <=2)
• Depths of Desire - 2U - C (unsummon/treasure)
• Lookout’s Dispersal - 2U - U (Convolute, 2drop if pirate)
• Cancel - 1UU - C
• Dreamcaller Siren - 2UU - R ( 3/3 flash high flying, taps 2 nonland if 2 pirates)
• Run Aground - 3U - C (Repel, hits artifacts)
• Spell Swindle - 3UU - R (mana drain with treasure)
• Wind Strider - 4U - C (3/3 flying flash)

Black

• Skulduggery - B - C (+1+1 & -1-1)
• Bloodcrazed Paladin - 1B - R (1/1 with counter for each death ETB)
• Costly Plunder - 1B - C (sac creature/artifact draw 2)
• Vanquish the Weak - 2B - C (instant, destroy power <=3)
• Vraska’s Contempt - 2BB - R (exile creature/planeswalker, gain 2)
• Dark Nourishment - 4B - U (lightning helix)

Red

• Dual Shot - R - C
• Sure Strike - 1R - C (+3/+0 first strike)
• Lightning Strike - 1R - U
• Dinosaur Stampede - 2R - U (trumpet blast & trample to dinos)
• Fiery Cannonade - 2R - U (Pirateclasm, instant)
• Unfriendly Fire - 4R - C (Lightning Blast)

Green

• Pounce - 1G - C (instant fight)
• River Herald’s Boon - 1G - C (+1+1 counter on creature, another one on merfolk)
• Verdant Rebirth - 1G - U (when creature dies, return to hand + draw)
• Blinding Fog - 2G - C (prev all dmg to all creatures, hexproof to yours)
• Crash the Ramparts - 2G - C (Awaken the Bear)
• Crushing Canopy - 2G - C (instant plummet or demystify)
• Slice in Twain - 2GG - U (naturalize cantrip)
• Snapping Sailback - 4G - U (flash 4/4 fungusaur)

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Let's dive down deeper on their implications for the format.

White

• Demystify - W - C
• Slash of Talons - W - C (2 to combat)
• Vampire’s Zeal - W - C (+2+2, 1st strike to vamp)
• Sheltering Light - W - U (indestructible scry)
• Rallying Roar - 2W - U (+1+1 untap)
• Ritual of Rejuvenation - 2W - C (gain 4 draw)
• Settle the Wreckage - 2WW - R (Path all attackers)
• Bright Reprisal - 4W - U (Second Thoughts)
• Sanguine Sacrament - XWW - R (gain 2X)

There's a loose overlap between Slash of Talons and Vampire's Zeal, so be aware of two common ways to deal 2 extra damage to a creature in combat.

Some of these instants REALLY influence combat decisions. Settle the Wreckage's impact is high enough where I expect there may be spots to attack differently into 2WW even when it's not a known card in the opponent's deck. Rallying Roar is somewhat tough to avoid since it untaps blockers, but playing around it might look like attacking with ~half of one's creatures while leaving ~half back to defend, adjusted for the current board state, of course. The idea is to avoid exposure to situations where Roar can win multiple creature matchups.

There are a fair amount of Demystify targets. At common and uncommon, the white removal (Pious Interdiction, Ixalan's Binding) look like the best ones, and a few of those should often warrant sideboarding it in. Be aware of this from both sides of white mirrors. Other than that, Sunbird's Invocation looks pretty good and would be a worthy target, and then a few of the rare flip enchantments are possibly worth killing, but the big reasons to side this in look to be the white creature removal spells.

Blue

• Dive Down - U - C (+0/+3 hexproof)
• Opt - U - C
• Spell Pierce - U - C
• Siren’s Ruse - 1U - C (cloudshift)
• Perilous Voyage - 1U - U (Disperse, scry 2 if <=2)
• Depths of Desire - 2U - C (unsummon/treasure)
• Lookout’s Dispersal - 2U - U (Convolute, 2drop if pirate)
• Cancel - 1UU - C
• Dreamcaller Siren - 2UU - R ( 3/3 flash high flying, taps 2 nonland if 2 pirates)
• Run Aground - 3U - C (Repel, hits artifacts)
• Spell Swindle - 3UU - R (mana drain with treasure)
• Wind Strider - 4U - C (3/3 flying flash)

With the unusually aggressive bent of the blue cards in this set, the mediocre 1-mana trick in Dive Down may have much bigger of a role to play than usual. Both modes are below the bar in a vacuum, but both serve to press a curve-out advantage.

More bounce than usual (and little other permanent blue removal) with 2 common and 1 uncommon. Some first-order implications: Creature auras and combat tricks are much weaker against blue, there's good coverage for the other instants (i.e. easier to leave up countermagic & the flash creatures). These effects, in conjunction with the raw effect of bounce spells, all support blue aggressive decks gaining tempo advantage in the early and midgame.

Spell Swindle in particular is well-covered by Run Aground and Wind Strider. It'll be hard to play around. When it's not a known card in the opponent's deck, I suspect that one will usually have to ignore the possibility, but once known, it certainly impacts the ordering of spells.

Black

• Skulduggery - B - C (+1+1 & -1-1)
• Bloodcrazed Paladin - 1B - R (1/1 with counter for each death ETB)
• Costly Plunder - 1B - C (sac creature/artifact draw 2)
• Vanquish the Weak - 2B - C (instant, destroy power <=3)
• Vraska’s Contempt - 2BB - R (exile creature/planeswalker, gain 2)
• Dark Nourishment - 4B - U (lightning helix)

Skulduggery is a high-impact trick that will likely need to be on one's mind nearly constantly. It also has impacts for sideboarding for creature size; finding additional X/(X+1) creatures against a black deck with lots of X/X creatures gets a little worse, early high-toughness blockers will be much better when they cover typical power by 2 (or 3) instead of 1, and naturally one-toughness creatures become a liability. Skulduggery plus Dual Shot may prove to be enough push to skew the format away from maindeck one-toughness creatures, and should have a big influence on creature swaps during sideboarding.

Bloodcrazed Paladin included for completeness, but it is unlikely to serve as creature removal.

Both Vanquish the Weak & Dark Nourishment are at high risk for being retricked at a big tempo gain by small pump spells. E.g. Vampire's Zeal goes up in value against these cards.

Red

• Dual Shot - R - C
• Sure Strike - 1R - C (+3/+0 first strike)
• Lightning Strike - 1R - U
• Dinosaur Stampede - 2R - U (trumpet blast & trample to dinos)
• Fiery Cannonade - 2R - U (Pirateclasm, instant)
• Unfriendly Fire - 4R - C (Lightning Blast)

Red is missing a small/medium instant burn spell for removal and retrick purposes. Dual Shot looks maindeckable and will have an impact on combat decisions somewhat similar to Skulduggery, but not as extreme an effect.

The only red trick being Sure Strike has a few significant implications. It supports attacking small creatures into big blockers for enabling Raid. Menace creatures get a bit better; Sure Strike + Headstrong Brute is strong synergy, and Fire Shrine Keeper lends itself towards eventually being double-blocked and we may want to be wary about making that block with two X/2s. It's also worth noting that Sheltering Light is a clean 1-mana retrick against Sure Strike.

Green

• Pounce - 1G - C (instant fight)
• River Herald’s Boon - 1G - C (+1+1 counter on creature, another one on merfolk)
• Verdant Rebirth - 1G - U (when creature dies, return to hand + draw)
• Blinding Fog - 2G - C (prev all dmg to all creatures, hexproof to yours)
• Crash the Ramparts - 2G - C (Awaken the Bear)
• Crushing Canopy - 2G - C (instant plummet or demystify)
• Slice in Twain - 2GG - U (naturalize cantrip)
• Snapping Sailback - 4G - U (flash 4/4 fungusaur)

River Herald's Boon looks to be format-defining similarly to Skulduggery, but tougher to play around. It should always be front-of-mind against any deck with Merfolk.

Crash the Ramparts as the other green trick will be tough to play around once it gets into Lava Axe mode, but rewards good retricks quite a bit if you can save them and set the game up for them. Its presence skews green towards attacking. This plus the uncommon Dinosaur Stampede equals two ways to provide instant-speed trample to the larger Dinosaurs.

The green creatures look to have a consistent size advantage against most other colors' creatures (unsurprisingly for dinosaurs), so Pounce should be at the higher end of the spectrum of how good the common fight cards are, as compared to some older formats where the green fight spell ended up being mediocre due to a low creature size differential.

Crushing Canopy has the same targets as Demystify plus a solid density of playable fliers across white and blue. There are almost no good targets on either side in red or green, and basically black too, so I do not envision this being a maindeckable card, but it should be a strong sideboard card against white in particular. Do not ever cast this targeting One With the Wind.

Not a ton of artifacts for Slice in Twain, but the same enchantments as above plus one equipment (Pirate's Cutlass), a few good vehicles, and a few rares worth targeting, mostly Vanquisher's Banner.

Don't get surprised by Snapping Sailback.

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Conclusions

• Most important tricks to constantly keep in mind: Skulduggery, River Herald's Boon, and maybe Dual Shot.
• Every color has one 5-drop instant at common or uncommon. Most of them greatly influence attacking decisions. Learn these quickly.
• In addition to Bright Reprisal, white has two other uncommon/rare instants that greatly influence attacking decisions: Rallying Roar & Settle the Wreckage.
• Blue has good coverage for its counterspells and flash creatures by its three instant bounce spells, making it tough to play around these.
• Green tricks skew it towards attacking.