Pointed Discussion

A repeatable Hurricane and a huge butt can make flying creatures very miserable indeed.

Best spider ever printed. (well okay I guess you could make a case for deadly recluse)

best flier-hoser. this thing eats faeries for breakfast.

I think this card has great potential, being able to easily take down tournament staple cards like Delver of Secrets and Lingering Souls as well as newer cards like Thundermaw Hellkite, Sublime Archangel, etc. And besides that it is quite hard to kill, surviving most removal spells in standard, and unlike many other powerful creatures, Silklash Spider could survive a Mutilate sometimes.

You're back just in time! I've got this Insect problem...

Really nice to have a black border for EDH.

I do kinda miss the old flavor text, but in the face of having this badass spider back (and with black borders and updated rules text!) I am not complaining.

Great reprint.

Boy oh boy am I glad to see this reprinted. Not only is it very relevant in Standard, but it's also just a really fun, well-designed card.

4.5/5

Hello, Silklash, so glad to see you my friend. It's been a while.

One of the best spiders there is in mtg. Especially in slow multiplayer formats, such as Commander.

Yeah, awesome anti-flier spider.

In another time with fewer flying creatures, this would only be ok, but currently, with flying creatures so popular, this card is desperately needed. If you are playing one of the few decks now without many flyers, being able to get rid of your opponents evasive creatures and get a terrific blocker in a single card with a reasonable price is incredible. A sideboard stable for green decks and may even see maindeck play depending on how popular flyers become.

An armadillo cloak away from being your best friend among fliers.

Suck it Nocturnus. Suck it good.

This card is the definition of "brick house."
Especially in limited.

Also known as The Punisher's Spider.

Forever dubbed "Hate-a-flyer"

Does his ablity destroy flying that has equipped artefacts with hexproof? Does it destroy creatures with equipped artefacts with flying?

Unquestionably the best spider ever printed and the only one that ever saw serious constructed play. The best creatures in magic are in the air.

@ Ekkaja
Yes, it will work against shroud and hexproof since it's not specifically targeting anything as well as equipped creatures since equipment is usually worded "equipped creature has flying."

@ Barjin
You're an evil, evil man. I like the way you think.

I can't say how much I love this guy. When we play EDH, he's my #1 guy to keep my brother's Sigarda, Host of Herons in the Commander Zone.

This guy is so powerful. A boon to almost any flying creature. And only 5 mana? What a deal!

Ok, I'll be the one to say it. Basilisk Collar

This is the only non-elf I have in my Door to Nothingness Deck-stalled the game for me numerous times.

My Doran EDH is so going to love this guy.

If you want to do a reasonable standard combo without having to use a modern card like Basilisk Collar, you can bloodrush a Wasteland Viper while popping its ability.

You have to attack with it to execute the combo, but it becomes a 3/9 in the attack phase, so it can avoid lethal while plinking potentially 3 different blocking critters. In result you only have to pay a total of 4 to wipe big fliers instead of their level of toughness.

A little less mana spent always helps for an added giant growth during that attack phase.

In a Doran commander deck, this guy is a perfect fit, clearing the skies and essentially being a 7/7 for 5cc.

I would say I'd be happy to pay up to X = 4.

For 4 mana, you can take down any flying tokens ever, including the Angels and Dragons (ok so there's 5/5 Demon tokens....ALMOST every kind of bird, spirit, elemental, thopter, or tokens that like to be in 'Token Theme' decks will be power/toughness 4 or less).

4 kills a lot of the aggressive creatures like Sublime Archangel that you might want to play this in response to, and it's good against some Sphinxes too. (Sphinxes tend to be clunky flying Leviathans though-- over costed mana for the power, but way out of the range of damage based removal).

4 will wreck anything like Faeries or Vampires, where you have a lot of similar-sized Flying creatures. Basically it can kill Tribal Flying, and the things it doesn't kill, don't have much Tribal support.

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Some things to NOT use this for, even though it's 'possible' in Magical Christmas Land where you have oodles of mana to pour into 'X':

15-20: Emrakul, the Aeons Torn or Marit Lage.

9-12: The number of creatures that are this big at all is small. A lot of them fly, but you'd still be better off using spot removal.

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Creatures that you would have to set X = to 5-8 in order to kill, are not creatures you want to see across the table, BUT in an emergency, X CAN go up that high. If it is "Pay boatloads of mana to kill my attacker, or die", then you have to suck it up and do it.

The Baneslayer Angels and Titans-that-got-granted-Flying-somehow of the world are what you most want to be worried about when considering Anti-Flying. Those stats tend to come at competitive mana costs with good value and abilities to match. Silklash Spider IS probably one of your absolute best hopes against the Big Winged Bogeymen, but Flying is still better than Reach for now, and the BEST Flyers have EVEN more value on them than the BEST Reacher.

However, if you are considering Silklash Spider for your deck at all, chances are you are looking for other tech options for your deck, and you will find plenty of spot removals in Black, or go White for Wrath of God/Day of Judgment, or even better, try BLUE for mass Bounce that hits Fliers and Non-Fliers alike!

I will say that I insist a mono-green approach to Answering the Air is just not viable, since even if you build the deck to have enough things to kill other things, the decks that you beat will not find it hard to exploit your mono-Trees. {G}

G/x, and especially G/x/y, however, always wants Silklash Spider in its army, and can put up a great fight against even Kaalia of the Vast if it wants to try to do that. :)

I stopped buying any more Magic 2013 after I got 3 of these in a single fat pack.