Week 4: Scavenging Ghouls

Scavenging Ghoul is not a good card. I may have convinced someone (maybe even convinced myself) last week that Frozen Shade was an exciting inclusion. I do profess that, in the Alpha/Beta format where rarity truly implies rarity, Frozen Shade, at common, is a force to be reckoned with. The play value garnered from the Shade for a mere five-dollars is certainly defensible.

Not so with the Ghoul. At pennies more to supplement its printing at uncommon, Scavenging Ghoul is simply a body, filler for a deck that has little chance of fielding much more than a lone Hypnotic Specter amid its army. Its wall of text amounts to a marginal benefit, at best, and definitely not one that closes the gap between its power/toughness and mana cost. For 3B, I could have a Bog Wraith.

Another card whose frailty is masked under the ominous glow of a Bad Moon 

The last few posts have felt like a slog, though I'm anticipating an upswing. Bog Wraiths, Frozen Shades, and Scavenging Ghouls were necessary steps to keeping the early stages of my project on track. In fact, looking a few weeks ahead, I expect to close the month of February more than halfway to a forty-card pile, nearly halfway to sixty. This is a good sign; it should allow me to ease my foot a little off the gas, focus on additional higher end includes, and some take time to assess my direction.

Despite its flaws, Scavenging Ghoul was omnipresent at the table where I learned to play, and its illustration harbors an intrinsic nostalgia that embodies the reason for constructing this deck.