The trouble with rampage is that the defender’s choice isn’t a very good or interesting one. Wolverine Pack | Illustration by Steve White The few that allowed player agency once the attack step began, like Firebreathing effects, were up to the player with the creature in question to decide. A lot of the combat mechanics before then were pretty static.įlyers evaded and deathtouch (pre-keyworded at that point) had a storyline that went into motion once you declared an attack with your Thicket Basilisk. Rampage was the first mechanic that buffed your creature in combat based on choices made by your opponent with their blockers. Mark Rosewater has written that having to look to blockers beyond the first feels “clunky with a modern design eye,” so the mechanic was left behind to be replaced with other things that trigger based on whether a creature is blocked in combat and by how many.įor most players the memory of rampage lives primarily in Chromium, one of the original Elder Dragons, which served as one of the legal “generals” in Commander before it morphed into the format as we know it. Some of these have since been reprinted in Masters sets, and three Un-cards have used the mechanic.īut the mechanic has been officially mothballed for decades. Fifth Edition in 1997 reprinted two, and that was it. Three more showed up in Alliances and two in Mirage in 1996. Rampage started with Legends in 1994 on nine cards, quite a few of which were reprinted in the reprint only set, Chronicles, in 1996. Old Fogey | Illustration by Douglas ShulerĬreatures with rampage have “rampage X.” That X is a bonus to both power and toughness that the creature gets for each creature beyond the first that blocks it in combat.