Ascend in MTG: Rules, History, and Best Cards

David Royale August 18, 2023 Collecting, MTG Cards, MTG Rules

Expel from Orazca | Illustration by Steven Belledin

Magic is full of mechanics. Some are evergreen due to their popularity, and some are cool but aren’t supported thoroughly, like ascend.

Let’s review this practical mechanic, exploring its intricacies, strategies, and the unique experience it brings to deckbuilding, along with a bonus deck featuring some signature cards.

Let’s get to it!

Table of Contents show

How Does Ascend Work in MTG?

Deadeye Brawler | Illustration by Jesper Ejsing

Magic is all about building resources: life points, board presence in the form of permanents, or simply having more cards than your opponents.

Ascend is an ability that rewards you if you control ten or more permanents. Once this threshold is met, you’re given an emblem called “City’s Blessing” for the rest of the game.

The History of Ascend in MTG

The first card that got ascend based on its collector number was Pride of Conquerors, a 2-mana instant spell that gives +1+1 to creatures you control and an additional +1+1 if you have the city’s blessing.

The mechanic itself was first introduced in Rivals of Ixalan, released on January 19th, 2018, and it’s dominant in Esper colors, with most of the cards being blue.

This signature mechanic exclusive to Rivals of Ixalan was reintroduced in 2021 in the Aventures in the Forgotten Realms Commander set on the card Orazca Relic. This was the only time the mechanic was put onto a card after its original set release in Rivals of Ixalan, and so ascend isn’t considered evergreen.

Is The City’s Blessing Permanent?

Yes! This is the most common question regarding ascend. You keep the City’s Blessing emblem even if your permanent count is reduced to 0. If the criteria were met at some point in the game and a card with ascend gave you the City’s Blessing emblem, you can’t lose it.

On the other hand, if you control ten permanents but don’t control a permanent or resolving spell with ascend, you don’t get the city’s blessing.

Do I Need to Maintain 10 Permanents to Keep The City’s Blessing?

No, you keep the City’s Blessing even if you lose permanents or your count is below the ten threshold. You can sacrifice or lose permanents after you get your emblem and still keep it for the rest of the game.

Gallery and List of Ascend Cards

These are all the cards that have ascend in MTG.

Best Ascend Cards

Since the pool isn’t wide enough, it’s easy to pinpoint which ascend cards are the best.

Skymarcher Aspirant is one of the cheapest cards that have ascend. Its stats are already solid for creatures that find their home in aggressive decks, and with the ascend ability, it turns into a cheap evasive creature in the later portions of the game.

Expel from Orazca is a cheap bounce spell that upgrades into a pseudo removal when you get the City’s Blessing. In some cases, it can even act as a time walk by unmaking your opponent’s plays.

Cheap board wipes are always welcomed, especially in Limited games. In the case of Golden Demise, the ascend ability plays beautifully as it turns into a one-sided board wipe.

Aggressive decks love Tilonalli's Summoner as you create your personal army once the game advances, and you even get to keep your tokens depending on how much mana you spend on the ability.

One of the most hated card types has to be time walk effects, and Timestream Navigator is one of those hidden gems that are somewhat difficult to set up. When you pair it with Imperial Recruit and bounce effects, this niche strategy suddenly becomes the most hated on the table.

Meanwhile, Wayward Swordtooth may not add much to the board once it enters the battlefield, but some ramp decks can abuse its ability by putting multiple lands in a single turn.

Tendershoot Dryad is the terror of Limited environments as you get to create an insect army in a manner of seconds.

Last but not least, Arch of Orazca is very good in the Constructed environment, especially in Commander.

Ascend Deck in Historic

Servo Exhibition | Illustration by Sara Winters

There aren’t many good decks that support this mechanic as a theme because it’s very narrow to the set where it was printed. Still, you can theoretically build an aggressive ascend deck in Historic.

The idea is to use cards like Servo Exhibition and Thraben Inspector to put multiple permanents on the battlefield at once and then benefit from the payoff given by cards like Skymarcher Aspirant and Snubhorn Sentry to push tons of damage to your opponents faces.

Convoke cards like Venerated Loxodon give this deck another attack angle, and it can have devastating starts against the slower decks from the meta.

Wrap Up

Pride of Conquerors | Illustration by Tomasz Jedruszek

While simple, ascend is without a doubt a very excellent mechanic to build around because you’ll value your resources a bit higher, more often than not leading to taking more damage by not trading or putting cards into your deck that reward you for adding multiple permanents to the battlefield like tokens.

What do you think? Would you like to have more cards with Ascend in the near future? Do you think it’s a mechanic worth being evergreen? Let us know in the comments or over on Discord!

Thank you so much for reading up until here, and if you want to ensure you get all MTG-related news, remember to follow us on Twitter!

Take care, and see you next time!

Follow Draftsim for awesome articles and set updates:

Ascend FAQ Ascend history Ascend rules Best ascend cards MTG MTG abilities MTG ascend MTG best cards MTG cards MTG collection MTG FAQ MTG history MTG keyword abilities MTG mechanics MTG rules MTG top cards Top ascend cards

David Royale

David is a YouTube Gaming content creator and the 2011 Central American MTG Champion. He's been playing Magic since 2010 and -- in real life -- is a database analyst.