Dress (Down) for Success

Dress Down looked like a bulk rare at first. But time proved that this flashy enchantment has a ton of potential, revitalizing Death's Shadow in Modern while stopping all kinds of interactions from opposing creatures even in Legacy and Vintage. Keep reading for the full lowdown on Dress Down!

dress down price development

Did you see it coming?


Greetings, everyone! While we wait for the next set returning to Innistrad and some announcement regarding reorganized play in 2022, there is still some room for innovation and metagame developments. Today I want to report on one such case, taking my hat off to .

In case you haven't seen it in action yet, it's a card from Modern Horizons 2 that first started as a bulk rare with dubious potential. However, during the past month it has slowly picked up both in price and popularity until now, while I am writing this, it stands as the number one bestseller here on Cardmarket.

The reasons are many. Let's look at the applications of this blue enchantment in the formats where it's legal (Modern, Legacy, and Vintage) alongside its main interaction with numerous creatures.

A Comprehensive Dress Down Tutorial

Starting with the basics, Dress Down stands as a two-mana cantrip enchantment with flash and the permanent effect of making creatures lose all abilities until end of turn, at which point it needs to be sacrificed. So at first glance someone might say the card doesn't seem too exciting, right?


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Absolutely no. For starters, going to the graveyard at the end of the turn enables recursion and also adds a card type for . Finally, flash plus the "at the beginning of the end step" clause allows you to play it during the end step of your opponents' turn therefore sticking around on the battlefield during yours. It will never be a dead card either, as it either interacts with your own creatures or opposing creatures or at the very least replaces itself against creatureless decks—which aren't common these days anyway.

Next, without mentioning every creature currently being played in Magic, here is a short list of interactions Dress Down offers:

Creatures Profitably Combined with Dress Down

  • becomes a 13/13 until end of turn, forgetting about the life total, which forces opponents to play around a Dress Down during the combat phase similar to . (And Dress Down plus Battle Rage results in a 13-powered, double-striking trampler!)

  • enters the battlefield without triggers, both without the discard one and the sacrificing clause as well. Hence a common play pattern is Dress Down before your turn, then play Kroxa, sticking in play for only two mana. Same thing applies to in Legacy, although you would rather get its triggers for obvious reasons.

  • , the old favorite, has regained some playability thanks to the new card. The way both cards interact is, with Dress Down on the battlefield, the Horror defender will enter with no ice counters on it and once the enchantment leaves play, it will flip with the first sorcery or instant cast. Not a bad deal!

  • —talking about old cards, there are still some Legacy decks combining this massive creature with to put a 12/12 into play for only to mana. Now you can achieve it with Dress Down as well without losing a card in the process.

Creatures with ETB Effects to Shut Off

  • White: , ,
  • Blue: ,
  • Black:
  • Red: ,
  • Green: ,
  • Colorless: , , ,
  • Multicolor: ,
  • Incarnations (, , , ): probably the most played cycle of creatures ever printed. Whether they're evoked or cast regularly, Dress Down blanks all their abilities, which is crucial when facing the Elemental matchup in Modern. (Though the opponent won't have to sacrifice them and may yet get the trigger via on the following turn.)

The list could go on and on, but the general idea is Dress Down disrupting creature ETBs leaves you in an advantaged position. This is especially true for cheap creatures where what matters more is the effect, like Stoneforge, Snapcaster, or Thassa's Oracle, while bigger ones like Primeval Titan, Omnath, or Archon of Cruelty still require an answer on the next turn.

Creatures with Static Abilities to Shut Off

  • White: ,
  • Blue: ,
  • Black: ,
  • Red:
  • Green:
  • Multicolor: ,
  • Colorless: ,

Some additional uses Dress Down provides are blanking troublesome creatures for a turn, enough time to deal with them. For example, once it's in play, can get rid of Santifier-en Vec, and you can even cast the card named for Meddling Mage, among many other interactions. (Note that Dress Down doesn't stop the type-changing effects of or because … that's how the layer system works.)

Extra Applications

  • / and 0/0 token creatures: Our spotlight card indeed can outright kill creatures with toughness dependent on a clause, such as or . The same applies to the common Construct tokens. They will die immediately once the enchantment hits the table, as they then have no text, something to take advantage of when paired against strategies.

  • Equipped creatures: , , , and recently are the most played Equipment cards in Modern. Well, Dress Down also gets rid of the abilities granted to creatures by Equipment, for example protection or indestructible, lifelink or trample. This can make for one hell of a combat trick, but note: if your opponent moves the Eqipment around among their creatures, these will gain the associated abilities after all. Also, power/toughness bonuses remain intact regardless.

Bringing Back Death's Shadow

Starting with Modern, Shadow decks had been on the downswing for a long time, ever since ceased to be a playable card. However, Dress Down has pushed the strategy in the last few weeks, mainly popularized by famous Modern streamer Aspiringspike, who posted strong results with a similar list.


Grixis Death's Shadow by Niko41, 8th at Modern Challenge #12328706
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As mentioned early, both Shadow and Kroxa benefit from Dress Down. In combination with Shadow, the enchantment basically becomes an improved version of . Sure you cannot trample through blockers as you could with the red instant, but at the same time you don't get two-for-one'd by a spot removal on your creature. Moreover it also enables a turn three Kroxa when you resolve Dress Down at the end of your opponent's turn.

Be aware that Channeler and Ragavan lose all their abilities too, so don't attack with them unless the coast is clear. Finally, our beloved companion Lurrus can bring Dress Down back from the graveyard again and again. On top, Dress Down improves the matchups against Elementals, one of the most played decks at the moment, and against decks.

Compared to other Rakdos-based shells, the blue splash grants access to the powerful as well as to main-deck countermagic in the shape of , which can also work as spot removal. It unlocks further cheap interaction such as or for the sideboard to fight / and control as well.

Legacy Players Found It First

Moving on to the next format, Legacy keeps feasting on Modern Horizons 2. In fact, Legacy players were the ones to welcome Dress Down into their ranks first. The most common deck with the card has no Kroxa or Shadow. Instead, it's a controlling strategy, most of whose creatures have positive ETB triggers.


Snow Miracles by INF, 23rd at Legacy Challenge #12328708
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Slamming Uro on turn three with the same trick previously mentioned is nice. But most of the time Dress Down will work against opposing threats, like an Endurance exiling our graveyard, a flashy Hullbreacher that messes with our , or even blanking an for a turn, so we don't get annihilated. This seems to be the best version to fight every shell while also taking advantage of numerous MH2 additions, especially and , which have already become Legacy staples at this point.

Vintage Is Properly Dressed Too

I'm not that familiar with Vintage myself. However, while looking for spicy Dress Down lists, I found this brew played by IamActuallyLvL1. (You can also watch him play a League with the deck.)


Blue-Black Dress Down by IamActuallyLvL1, Vintage League Testing
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This is showing off the powerful interaction between Thing in the Ice and Dress Down. Bouncing all the creatures in play is especially useful against fast combo decks relying on shenanigans or . Adding Baleful Strix into the mix to stop early threats while also redrawing a card once it gets bounced by the Awoken Horror is another great synergy.

Back to Modern

This same idea is also being supported in Modern, where popular streamers like Kanister or Aspiringspike again have recently created a Dimir shell featuring the interaction with Thing in the Ice. It won't take long until you start to see it at tabletop events.


A Dimir Thing by aspiringspike, 5-0 at Modern League
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As usual, thank you so much for reading. Enjoy the summer while it lasts!

Opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and not necessarily Cardmarket.