Why people are misevaluating Lead the Stampede

There has been a lot of negative press lately about this card from people I would consider to be good magic players.  It has been bugging me for quite some time, so I feel like I have to say something about it.


People say that when it gets two creatures (when you have 20-30 creatures in your deck), that is "Divination at best".

The reason I think this is flawed logic, is the same reason I think Foresee is better than Jace's Ingenuity.

Foresee says "draw two".  Jace's Ingenuity says "Draw 3", and is an instant.  How can Foresee be better?

Well, Foresee actually lets you see 6 cards, for one less mana, and you DON'T HAVE TO DRAW the bad ones.  If you ship two cards with Foresee, which is common lategame, shipping two lands, you effectively drew FOUR cards.

Call to Mind is NOT "draw two", it is "draw two CREATURES". (at it's worst)

Lets say you didn't have any creatures in the top 5 cards of your deck.  Would you rather put all 5 of those cards on the bottom of your deck, or draw two lands?  In the first case, you effectively drew 3 MORE cards, just by not drawing the cards at all.

Think about Fact or Fiction.

You always get a 3/2 or 4/1 split.  You can often take the two, or the one, and that is the right decision.  Would anyone argue from this data that Fact or Fiction is a more expensive (4 vs 3) Divination?

If the best cards in your deck are creatures (often true in a green deck?), Lead the Stampede seems like a poor card to underestimate.

Morbid Plunder is a card that is often considered good (in limited), but it does roughly the same thing as Lead the Stampede, except you have to have already drawn, cast, and had killed, your good creatures.  Lead the Stampede does a very similar thing, but it uses the top of your deck, instead of your graveyard.

See Beyond vs Treasure Hunt is a similar debate.

Now, Lead the Stampede can't draw you land.  It can't draw you removal (unless it is creature based, like Acidic Slime, Gatekeeper, War Priest of Thune, or the like).  It can't draw you alternative creatures, like Living Weapons, Planeswalkers, or Manlands.  It can't draw into more of itself (which I presume is some of the better FoF options).  It doesn't do everything.

But it does draw you "the business".

Like Foresee, like Fact or Fiction, make sure you don't get caught up in the pure card advantage ("I drew two cards off this").  Make sure you consider the fact that you don't need to draw those other cards, and that the cards you drew were not terrible.

Play utility creatures.  Play good creatures.  Play a moderate amount of creatures (20-30?), and Lead the Stampede isn't just "the Green Divination".  It is the Green Fact or Fiction, where YOU get to split the cards.