Flame of Anor
The modal-with-a-clause structure is the whole argument here: three respectable-but-not-remarkable instant-speed effects (a Divination, a Shatter, a five-damage bolt to a creature), any one of which you get for the asking, with a second one unlocked whenever you control a Wizard as you cast it. What makes the design worth studying is where the reward sits. Most "choose two" cards either bake the upside into the mana cost or gate it behind a heavy build-around; this one hangs the second mode on a static board condition checked at cast, which means the payoff is deck-construction work you have already done rather than a tax you pay on the spell. Control a Wizard and you are firing a two-for-one flexible enough to draw cards when you are safe, blow up an artifact when you need to, and kill most things when you are under pressure, all decided at instant speed with information in hand. Without a Wizard, it is still perfectly castable, just single-mode: the floor is a playable spell, the ceiling is a genuine tempo swing. That gap between floor and ceiling is the entire point. It rewards a tribe that has historically been long on flavor and short on payoff, giving Wizard-matters decks a reason to care about the type line beyond a single splashy commander, and it does so without ever becoming dead in a hand that draws it early against the wrong board.



