Orvar, the All-Form - Copying Permanents with Card Draw

[Ardeyn]

It's a pity a deck such as this can be too good even if there's plenty of fun stuff still in there...
Do you still plan on playing it despite your earlier sentiment that you might only be able to shuffle up for cEDH?

What do you think of Coveted Jewel? It draws your entire deck with just Whim of Volrath.
In the same vein Chromatic Orrery will produce infinite mana and draw the entire deck with any of the three buyback spells.

Ardeyn

[OCPunisher]

I've been playing Orvar since he was spoiled, and the simple honest truth is that the three buyback spells (Mind Games, Whim of Volrath, and Clockspinning) are the difference between a solid blue clone-and-steal deck and a super-consistent cEDH-level combo deck.

Last week, I cut all of the buyback spells from my deck, and I couldn't be happier. Now I can play all the Sapphire Medallions and Caged Suns I want and not have to worry about just ending the game on a "Whim". If you aren't at the top-level tables and just want to have some honest 75% fun, I'd highly recommend doing the same.

Never mind the fact that Whim of Volrath is like $40 as of this writing, which is just stupid.

[darrenhabib]

It's a pity a deck such as this can be too good even if there's plenty of fun stuff still in there...
Do you still plan on playing it despite your earlier sentiment that you might only be able to shuffle up for cEDH?

What do you think of Coveted Jewel? It draws your entire deck with just Whim of Volrath.
In the same vein Chromatic Orrery will produce infinite mana and draw the entire deck with any of the three buyback spells.

Ardeyn

I'm happy to play it in cEDH and I've posted the changes I've made in order to better fit in with the meta below. You'll see that I've cut a bunch of creatures for counterspells.
It is a fun deck to play when the whole table is trying to do busted stuff, so you don't feel guilty about infinite's.

You could easily swap in Coveted Jewel and Chromatic Orrery for some of the creatures and even cut some of the creature only target cards for a strong build for sure.

Add

• Pact of Negation
• Mental Misstep
• Flusterstorm
• Spell Pierce
• Negate
• Counterspell
• Treachery
• Island
• Island

Remove

• Snapcaster Mage
• Kaho, Minamo Historian
• Solemn Simulacrum
• Glen Elendra Archmage
• Shipwreck Dowser
• Torrential Gearhulk
• Scholar of the Lost Trove
• Riptide Laboratory
• Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx

[darrenhabib]

I've been playing Orvar since he was spoiled, and the simple honest truth is that the three buyback spells (Mind Games, Whim of Volrath, and Clockspinning) are the difference between a solid blue clone-and-steal deck and a super-consistent cEDH-level combo deck.

Last week, I cut all of the buyback spells from my deck, and I couldn't be happier. Now I can play all the Sapphire Medallions and Caged Suns I want and not have to worry about just ending the game on a "Whim". If you aren't at the top-level tables and just want to have some honest 75% fun, I'd highly recommend doing the same.

Never mind the fact that Whim of Volrath is like $40 as of this writing, which is just stupid.

This is exactly right. The buyback are the key to infinite's so purposefully cutting them means that you can play more casual games and get far less salt.
The other way is to cut cost reduction and mana doublers instead.

Hmm, I'm finding it hard not to re-title this thread "Ending the game on a Whim" - lol good pun my friend.

[ISBPathfinder]

I've been playing Orvar since he was spoiled, and the simple honest truth is that the three buyback spells (Mind Games, Whim of Volrath, and Clockspinning) are the difference between a solid blue clone-and-steal deck and a super-consistent cEDH-level combo deck.

Last week, I cut all of the buyback spells from my deck, and I couldn't be happier. Now I can play all the Sapphire Medallions and Caged Suns I want and not have to worry about just ending the game on a "Whim". If you aren't at the top-level tables and just want to have some honest 75% fun, I'd highly recommend doing the same.

Never mind the fact that Whim of Volrath is like $40 as of this writing, which is just stupid.

I have been struggling with that myself but honestly, my deck is super low mana and a lot of my spells are one and two drop spells so cost reduction and double mana wasn't really doing much for me. Without those its really just things like Gilded Lotus / Nykthos that can go infinite.

I have only played one game though and didn't see a buyback spell in said game though so I guess more testing will kind of give me more thoughts on the matter.

[ISBPathfinder]

@darrenhabib What are your thoughts on including and building your lands for Field of the Dead? I disregarded it at first until I started thinking about making copies of it with the commander. It doesn't take up much room it just requires a slightly different landbase and I see you already have the fetchlands in your list. I suppose it might depend on if you see much for Blood Moon / Ruination / Back to Basics setups in your meta but otherwise a few random lands like Tolaria / Minamo, School at Water's Edge still mostly function as islands. Splitting the basics with snow basics also helps but I have mostly found that Field is still doable in mono color if being slightly delayed in average activation time. People do look at me a little funny when I play Command Tower in mono color though lol.

Its an ETB tapped land, its expensive to support, and there are reasons to not include it like if ruination stuffs is in your meta. I think that a single ETB tapped land though is fairly reasonable though especially given how much power it can give. I suppose though that if your meta is super fast though it might also be too slow. It seems worth consideration at least.

EDIT: I also think that there is possibly room for debate between Gilded Drake and Sower of Temptation for a spot. Obviously you save two mana with the drake but you are also forced to use all of your spells upfront immediately before it trades if you want copies. You can't use sorceries in this and you can't abuse it later. Sower on the other hand lets you use those same instants not as immediate upfront but lets you keep mana up and make copies of it at a later time if you want. Once you have 2+ sowers its likely that you will force opponents to use a wrath to answer them as they represent a continuous threat. I guess the big question is how much you value it being two cheaper as well as a question of how much of a problem it would be for someone to spot remove a Sower. Given how easily we make more of them though I felt that it was better to use sowers in this spot. Obviously there is the why not both argument but I think when just running one I prefer sower a little in this particular commander.

[darrenhabib]

@darrenhabib What are your thoughts on including and building your lands for Field of the Dead? I disregarded it at first until I started thinking about making copies of it with the commander. It doesn't take up much room it just requires a slightly different landbase and I see you already have the fetchlands in your list. I suppose it might depend on if you see much for Blood Moon / Ruination / Back to Basics setups in your meta but otherwise a few random lands like Tolaria / Minamo, School at Water's Edge still mostly function as islands. Splitting the basics with snow basics also helps but I have mostly found that Field is still doable in mono color if being slightly delayed in average activation time. People do look at me a little funny when I play Command Tower in mono color though lol.

Its an ETB tapped land, its expensive to support, and there are reasons to not include it like if ruination stuffs is in your meta. I think that a single ETB tapped land though is fairly reasonable though especially given how much power it can give. I suppose though that if your meta is super fast though it might also be too slow. It seems worth consideration at least.

I've found that I always want an untapped blue source as it tends to be the difference between being able to cast another copy spell each turn. This has a cascading effect.
I've seen some people play Cloudpost but colorless mana isn't the best. Specifically for the deck I've made High Tide a key component, so Islands are super important. Plus I do always try and set up Mystic Sanctuary as the land I copy

However I think there could be a cool build that is more like a lands deck and has far less creatures in the 99.
And yes Field of the Dead would be a trump card for the deck.
You'd cut down on creature targeting specifically spells and focus on ones that can target lands in some manner.
You could make copies of Inkmoth Nexus for infect damage.
If you say played other "man lands" like Mutavault then any board wipes will effect you less. You could supplement it with cards like Thing in the Ice and Whelming Wave as tech for keeping Ovar on the board.
I actually really like the sound of this type of build for playing in more casual games as it gives the opponents time to react while still being an exponential problem for them.
I could even see playing Amulet of Vigor for getting untapped lands.

[darrenhabib]

EDIT: I also think that there is possibly room for debate between Gilded Drake and Sower of Temptation for a spot. Obviously you save two mana with the drake but you are also forced to use all of your spells upfront immediately before it trades if you want copies. You can't use sorceries in this and you can't abuse it later. Sower on the other hand lets you use those same instants not as immediate upfront but lets you keep mana up and make copies of it at a later time if you want. Once you have 2+ sowers its likely that you will force opponents to use a wrath to answer them as they represent a continuous threat. I guess the big question is how much you value it being two cheaper as well as a question of how much of a problem it would be for someone to spot remove a Sower. Given how easily we make more of them though I felt that it was better to use sowers in this spot. Obviously there is the why not both argument but I think when just running one I prefer sower a little in this particular commander.

If you can afford Gilded Drake then 100% should be played. Sower of Temptation is a fine substitute as you say at least it gives options further into the game. I could see playing both. Certainly a steal themed decked with Steal Enchantment and even maybe Steal Artifact could be fun. Oh imagine playing an Alpha Steal Artifact..

[ISBPathfinder]

I've found that I always want an untapped blue source as it tends to be the difference between being able to cast another copy spell each turn. This has a cascading effect.
I've seen some people play Cloudpost but colorless mana isn't the best. Specifically for the deck I've made High Tide a key component, so Islands are super important. Plus I do always try and set up Mystic Sanctuary as the land I copy

However I think there could be a cool build that is more like a lands deck and has far less creatures in the 99.
And yes Field of the Dead would be a trump card for the deck.
You'd cut down on creature targeting specifically spells and focus on ones that can target lands in some manner.
You could make copies of Inkmoth Nexus for infect damage.
If you say played other "man lands" like Mutavault then any board wipes will effect you less. You could supplement it with cards like Thing in the Ice and Whelming Wave as tech for keeping Ovar on the board.
I actually really like the sound of this type of build for playing in more casual games as it gives the opponents time to react while still being an exponential problem for them.
I could even see playing Amulet of Vigor for getting untapped lands.

I guess that's fair. I don't plan to ever execute any infinite combos which makes it better for me. I have never been very fond of High Tide in part because its a one turn tempo that tends to be played best into combo tactics.

If you can afford Gilded Drake then 100% should be played. Sower of Temptation is a fine substitute as you say at least it gives options further into the game. I could see playing both. Certainly a steal themed decked with Steal Enchantment and even maybe Steal Artifact could be fun. Oh imagine playing an Alpha Steal Artifact..

I am not sure that I can get onboard here without more information. I get that Gilded Drake is a far superior standalone card but would you like to elaborate further on your thoughts here? In my mind you have a one shot cheap effect vs something that continues to dominate the board until someone can wrath at which point the theft answer was still an answer.

I haven't gotten to play this deck much but the one game I have I literally took over the game with 5x Sower of Temptation that would have not been the same if it had been a drake. I curved the commander into Sower + clone the turn after and the next three turns I continued to steal everything that was played. It easily won me the game where as I doubt I could have managed the same with the drake given the one shot nature of it. Part of what makes it so effective in my mind is that as soon as you have two sowers, spot removal to get their creatures back becomes incredibly difficult as you can just splice off more sowers.

[OCPunisher]

My two cents:
- Gilded Drake is the far superior card in a vacuum, but this deck definitely wants Sower of Temptation because the Drake doesn't stay under your control, so you can't copy it later (as previously mentioned). Along those same lines, Master Thief is pretty solid here as well. I built this deck while on a quest to find a home for my masterpiece Vedalken Shackles and it fits very well here too.
- Cloudpost and Glimmerpost are nice lands to copy, but you need quite a few copies in order to really make them worthwhile, and the colorless mana isn't very useful in a deck full of Hydroblasts and Thoughtlaces (imagine casting THAT in Alpha). This makes me think I should cut them from my own list. Field of the Dead is probably similar to the Posts, but requires even more effort to get paid off (splitting half Snow basics, plus more utility lands and a Wastes isn't really where you wanna be).

[darrenhabib]

I am not sure that I can get onboard here without more information. I get that Gilded Drake is a far superior standalone card but would you like to elaborate further on your thoughts here? In my mind you have a one shot cheap effect vs something that continues to dominate the board until someone can wrath at which point the theft answer was still an answer.

I haven't gotten to play this deck much but the one game I have I literally took over the game with 5x Sower of Temptation that would have not been the same if it had been a drake. I curved the commander into Sower + clone the turn after and the next three turns I continued to steal everything that was played. It easily won me the game where as I doubt I could have managed the same with the drake given the one shot nature of it. Part of what makes it so effective in my mind is that as soon as you have two sowers, spot removal to get their creatures back becomes incredibly difficult as you can just splice off more sowers.

Yeah that is fair. I'm just not a Sower of Temptation player so don't really have experience with it. I'll give it try,

[pokken]

umm, if you have 3 copies of Cloudpost that's 9 mana. that's bonkers. I'd definitely play that.

[ISBPathfinder]

Yea, Cloudpost sounds kinda sick the more I think of it. If you get a few of those then commander tax could quickly become irrelevant. I am not sure about Glimmerpost but I was sort of considering running Wurmcoil Engine as a means of not dying but given some of my land tutors it might be better served to just throw in a land that could function in a pinch for some lifegain....

Well, I guess I will probably throw them in and see what I can do to increase my land targeting stuffs lol. The nice thing about Cloudpost is that its colorless mana so it can't go infinite with buyback spells (yay). Dang combos are hard to avoid lol.

---

Random question for those who might have played this deck more than me. I am curious as to the take on the clones that can copy Orvar like Sakashima of a Thousand Faces. I get the appeal but I guess I am curious to hear more about it in action. My fear is that this deck is already sort of centric to Orvar and my concern is more so on how commander centric they feel. If you cast one and eat spot removal in response to casting it or get wrathed after casting them it seems like not a great outcome. Obviously if you get away with it and don't get swept or spot removed its gravy but with a deck so focused on the commander and their value already I guess I question these cards given that they REALLY suck if you don't copy Orvar with them and or if you don't get time to make use of them.

I guess what I am asking is are they too greedy. We are already very commander centric and it feels like somewhat of a greed on top of where we are already sort of weak (aka someone hating on our commander). I sort of opted to not go down this path myself but I see some have and am just curious about it. I still sort of fear someone stealing / transforming Orvar early as we are sort of weak to such a tactic.

[pokken]

I would imagine you would rather just draw a spell that protects Orvar over a clone 100% of the time? So I see no reason to ever play those. His ability is so insanely powerful that copying it seems like a winmore thing. if he's on the board you'll be so far ahead almost all the time.

I could like super maybe see the argument for playing Body Double as a way to recur him if the commander tax ever got super rude, you could let him go to the bin and then body double it, but that feels like a stretch to me.

[darrenhabib]

Random question for those who might have played this deck more than me. I am curious as to the take on the clones that can copy Orvar like Sakashima of a Thousand Faces. I get the appeal but I guess I am curious to hear more about it in action. My fear is that this deck is already sort of centric to Orvar and my concern is more so on how commander centric they feel. If you cast one and eat spot removal in response to casting it or get wrathed after casting them it seems like not a great outcome. Obviously if you get away with it and don't get swept or spot removed its gravy but with a deck so focused on the commander and their value already I guess I question these cards given that they REALLY suck if you don't copy Orvar with them and or if you don't get time to make use of them.

I guess what I am asking is are they too greedy. We are already very commander centric and it feels like somewhat of a greed on top of where we are already sort of weak (aka someone hating on our commander). I sort of opted to not go down this path myself but I see some have and am just curious about it. I still sort of fear someone stealing / transforming Orvar early as we are sort of weak to such a tactic.

I didn't play Sakashima of a Thousand Faces and Spark Double at first but thought I'd give them a try with a posters suggestion. Busted.
The thing is that if you have one of these then that is all you need to win. Each target spell creates another Ovar and of course you get to copy the spells for each of them. So it just a snowball effect.
The thing with Sakashima of a Thousand Faces/Spark Double is that once they are down you can save Orvar with targeting spells by making new copies so they offer protection as well of sorts.
Sure you are always prone to getting shut down with well timed removal, but if opponents have removal then they are going to use it immediately rather than waiting for you to untap and be able to cast something like Sakashima of a Thousand Faces to then blow you out more.

[ISBPathfinder]

I see the potential of the clones, I guess my concern is more along the lines that it kind of doesn't do much of anything immediately. You spin together a bunch of things and down the road multiple turns later you hopefully do something meaningful that is going to threaten the board.

Example:
Four Mana Turn: Cast Orvar, the All-Form
Five Mana Turn: Sakashima of a Thousand Faces + Target clone

My questioning of the clones is mostly from the standpoint that Orvar is already by far our biggest weakness. Removing him, stealing him, or transforming him are things that are going to be some of our biggest disruption. I think that cloning him is somewhat of a greedy tactic that does in fact make everything better but its what I would consider a winmore effect in that if we get to untap with him in play I already think we are doing outrageous things. Its somewhat of a slow thing to try to do and even after you accomplish it and set up multiple copies I think its still sort of a weak and greedy play to make that is still left weak to sweepers.

We just spent an entire second turn after casting Orvar in a way that isn't threatening the board. What if we had just cast Master of Waves and cloned it instead? Obviously a three devotion Master of Waves is like extremely underwhelming but we would have gained 22 power of creatures from that play that could then threaten our opponents. I guess what I am saying here is that I don't see clones as an asset to what this deck is doing. Their setup time seems unnecessary, they play into our primary weakness in a bad way, and they spend time and resources in a way that just opens us up to wraths. Wrathing a Master of Waves setup is still weak to that but if we untap with it, its likely that we can threaten lethal like immediately from there instead of having generated +6 power of Orvar copies hoping that some future swarm of creatures might do something.

[oldmangrieves]

I play in a pod of mostly high power, non cEDH decks and I don't think the clones are worth it. The way I have mine built, If Orvar sticks for a turn or two and I haven't won than I have screwed up in a way that cloning Orvar will not fix.

That said since you are eschewing combos for a more incremental game plan, the the clones may work for you. After a few games in our group Orvar became a kill on site so I doubt they would live long enough to be cloned anyway.

It is kind of a bummer that they combo so easily. I built mine to be a 75%(whatever that means these days) deck based on John Carpenter's version of The Thing, and even with all the flavor concessions Orvar can go infinite off a sneeze. Since the second I play Orvar the group focuses on removing them, I don't play Orvar on turn 4, or even 5. I wait until I can play, protect and gain value off them during the same turn cycle.

[pokken]

That said since you are eschewing combos for a more incremental game plan, the the clones may work for you.

The Spark Double clones are basically a combo. It becomes borderline infinite really fast if you stick it. And incredibly tedious.

After 10 spells you have I wanna say..wait it's not straight up N ^ (Casts). My brain doesn't want to do the math but basically once you have 3 Orvars, it's 2^N where N is the number of spells you have.

So..513 maybe?

[BeneTleilax]

Someone make a wolfram alpha doohick to tell how many Orvars you have

[pokken]

For some reason I could write code to do it in a second but I couldn't get a math formula to save my life.

ORVAR TABLE

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Hide

+-----------------+--------+--------------+
| Starting Orvars | Spells | Total Orvars |
+-----------------+--------+--------------+
|        2        |   1    |      3       |
|        2        |   2    |      5       |
|        2        |   3    |      9       |
|        2        |   4    |      17      |
|        2        |   5    |      33      |
|        2        |   6    |      65      |
|        2        |   7    |     129      |
|        2        |   8    |     257      |
|        2        |   9    |     513      |
|        3        |   1    |      5       |
|        3        |   2    |      9       |
|        3        |   3    |      17      |
|        3        |   4    |      33      |
|        3        |   5    |      65      |
|        3        |   6    |     129      |
|        3        |   7    |     257      |
|        3        |   8    |     513      |
|        3        |   9    |     1025     |
|        4        |   1    |      7       |
|        4        |   2    |      13      |
|        4        |   3    |      25      |
|        4        |   4    |      49      |
|        4        |   5    |      97      |
|        4        |   6    |     193      |
|        4        |   7    |     385      |
|        4        |   8    |     769      |
|        4        |   9    |     1537     |
|        5        |   1    |      9       |
|        5        |   2    |      17      |
|        5        |   3    |      33      |
|        5        |   4    |      65      |
|        5        |   5    |     129      |
|        5        |   6    |     257      |
|        5        |   7    |     513      |
|        5        |   8    |     1025     |
|        5        |   9    |     2049     |
|        6        |   1    |      11      |
|        6        |   2    |      21      |
|        6        |   3    |      41      |
|        6        |   4    |      81      |
|        6        |   5    |     161      |
|        6        |   6    |     321      |
|        6        |   7    |     641      |
|        6        |   8    |     1281     |
|        6        |   9    |     2561     |
|        7        |   1    |      13      |
|        7        |   2    |      25      |
|        7        |   3    |      49      |
|        7        |   4    |      97      |
|        7        |   5    |     193      |
|        7        |   6    |     385      |
|        7        |   7    |     769      |
|        7        |   8    |     1537     |
|        7        |   9    |     3073     |
|        8        |   1    |      15      |
|        8        |   2    |      29      |
|        8        |   3    |      57      |
|        8        |   4    |     113      |
|        8        |   5    |     225      |
|        8        |   6    |     449      |
|        8        |   7    |     897      |
|        8        |   8    |     1793     |
|        8        |   9    |     3585     |
|        9        |   1    |      17      |
|        9        |   2    |      33      |
|        9        |   3    |      65      |
|        9        |   4    |     129      |
|        9        |   5    |     257      |
|        9        |   6    |     513      |
|        9        |   7    |     1025     |
|        9        |   8    |     2049     |
|        9        |   9    |     4097     |
+-----------------+--------+--------------+

Pretty sure that's right. it's some kinda function of 2^S where S is spells, but for some reason I can't conceptualize it as a math formula

and looking at the chart got me there. whee.

2^S * (n-1) + 1

[ISBPathfinder]

@pokken yea, thats sort of my issue. I get that if you chain a bunch of spells on them it gets all crazy and all but it reminds me a lot of the reasons I don't play Avenger of Zendikar. There is just so much disruption that makes it not work. It starts getting spicy at 3+ spells but even then you are only at 30 power of Orvars and again that is 4 spells past the commander and that ends up being.... ohhh yea 7 mana and a bunch of spells.

My issue with this plan is that it doesn't give you any utility or affect the board really. Its true that you could have other things in play and switch to copying those but I just see it as something very disruptable that spends a lot of time and effort not really doing much to the board. Given enough spells and time its great..... but then again our commander staying in play and just doing his thing is kinda crazy.

[pokken]

@pokken yea, thats sort of my issue. I get that if you chain a bunch of spells on them it gets all crazy and all but it reminds me a lot of the reasons I don't play Avenger of Zendikar. There is just so much disruption that makes it not work. It starts getting spicy at 3+ spells but even then you are only at 30 power of Orvars and again that is 4 spells past the commander and that ends up being.... ohhh yea 7 mana and a bunch of spells.

My issue with this plan is that it doesn't give you any utility or affect the board really. Its true that you could have other things in play and switch to copying those but I just see it as something very disruptable that spends a lot of time and effort not really doing much to the board. Given enough spells and time its great..... but then again our commander staying in play and just doing his thing is kinda crazy.

My thought is that mainly like if you've got 5 spells and orvar you probly winnin so 4 spells, spark double and orvar is just a way to maybe get blown out? You've got to play super cautiously to stick it and make sure you have interaction, and then if they sweep the board you lose 5+ mana of tempo you coulda spent building resources that can't die to sweepers...e.g. land tokens, cards etc.

And if you're in a meta that lets you play spark double orvar and then make 1025 orvars and win, you're kinda presuming on your meta a bit. Might not be the appropriate deck for that kinda group.

It's a high risk high reward strategy I guess but the reward is "womp womp I basically combo'd but it wasn't technically a combo." If you wanna combo just combo, there's no shortage of ways to go infinite with Orvar with more efficient cards.

[ISBPathfinder]

My thought is that mainly like if you've got 5 spells and orvar you probly winnin so 4 spells, spark double and orvar is just a way to maybe get blown out? You've got to play super cautiously to stick it and make sure you have interaction, and then if they sweep the board you lose 5+ mana of tempo you coulda spent building resources that can't die to sweepers...e.g. land tokens, cards etc.

And if you're in a meta that lets you play spark double orvar and then make 1025 orvars and win, you're kinda presuming on your meta a bit. Might not be the appropriate deck for that kinda group.

It's a high risk high reward strategy I guess but the reward is "womp womp I basically combo'd but it wasn't technically a combo." If you wanna combo just combo, there's no shortage of ways to go infinite with Orvar with more efficient cards.

I have the same thought. Lots of our other plays are still decent plays even if when you cast them Orvar gets removed. This is just something that feels all in on him. Even with making an army its heavily forecasted what you are doing and it lacks haste so its going to give opponents that wrath option unless you can somehow flash the clones in. Many of the other options to make an army of creatures have alternative uses as well to gain extra advantage like flashing back spells which leads to potentially more draw rather than spending all of our spells on an all in effect.

Even when not playing in a combo shell it just seems so much better to cast so many other things. Master of Waves feels like the closest equivalence in that its primarily going to be an offense move but I think its less reliant on Orvar and gets disrupted less by him being removed in response. I just keep feeling like a cheap draw / selection spell or even a tutor feels more relevant to me. Dizzy Spell for instance is still a relevant spell in that its a target spell but it could be transmuted to get a buyback spell too.

[darrenhabib]

My thought is that mainly like if you've got 5 spells and orvar you probly winnin so 4 spells, spark double and orvar is just a way to maybe get blown out? You've got to play super cautiously to stick it and make sure you have interaction, and then if they sweep the board you lose 5+ mana of tempo you coulda spent building resources that can't die to sweepers...e.g. land tokens, cards etc.

And if you're in a meta that lets you play spark double orvar and then make 1025 orvars and win, you're kinda presuming on your meta a bit. Might not be the appropriate deck for that kinda group.

It's a high risk high reward strategy I guess but the reward is "womp womp I basically combo'd but it wasn't technically a combo." If you wanna combo just combo, there's no shortage of ways to go infinite with Orvar with more efficient cards.

I have the same thought. Lots of our other plays are still decent plays even if when you cast them Orvar gets removed. This is just something that feels all in on him. Even with making an army its heavily forecasted what you are doing and it lacks haste so its going to give opponents that wrath option unless you can somehow flash the clones in. Many of the other options to make an army of creatures have alternative uses as well to gain extra advantage like flashing back spells which leads to potentially more draw rather than spending all of our spells on an all in effect.

Even when not playing in a combo shell it just seems so much better to cast so many other things. Master of Waves feels like the closest equivalence in that its primarily going to be an offense move but I think its less reliant on Orvar and gets disrupted less by him being removed in response. I just keep feeling like a cheap draw / selection spell or even a tutor feels more relevant to me. Dizzy Spell for instance is still a relevant spell in that its a target spell but it could be transmuted to get a buyback spell too.

I think overestimating the chances of getting blown out is a mistake. As I've pointed out if opponents do have a way to remove Ovar they are not going to wait until your turn where you get to untap with all your mana. Ovar will be dead before you cast a Clone. So in my opinion you don't open yourself up anymore.
As far as creating a board of Ovar and thus not gaining any advantages if a board wipe occurs, well as Pokken pointed out you can cast 3 spells to make 9 Ovar and then you can use a spell like Aquitect's Will to create 9 more lands and draw 9 cards allowing you to keep cascading into creating more lands and spells.
So it's not like the 27 power of Ovar is what wins you the game it is the fact that your spells turn into incredible value, or more likely just win the game and in the case of my deck I have a lot of spells that target lands, so you sculpt your spells so that you keep putting lands into play to get value to cast the next copy Ovar.

[ISBPathfinder]

I think overestimating the chances of getting blown out is a mistake. As I've pointed out if opponents do have a way to remove Ovar they are not going to wait until your turn where you get to untap with all your mana. Ovar will be dead before you cast a Clone. So in my opinion you don't open yourself up anymore.
As far as creating a board of Ovar and thus not gaining any advantages if a board wipe occurs, well as Pokken pointed out you can cast 3 spells to make 9 Ovar and then you can use a spell like Aquitect's Will to create 9 more lands and draw 9 cards allowing you to keep cascading into creating more lands and spells.
So it's not like the 27 power of Ovar is what wins you the game it is the fact that your spells turn into incredible value, or more likely just win the game and in the case of my deck I have a lot of spells that target lands, so you sculpt your spells so that you keep putting lands into play to get value to cast the next copy Ovar.

Maybe, but I think it also depends on if your opponent knows you deck construction. I think most of us are running somewhere in the 3-4 counterspell range most of which are free to cast. You really don't risk much letting Orvar untap with just the commander in play. At that point he can clone lands and I guess artifact / enchantments if you run much for them. Most of the big spicy plays end up with needing a creature in play though so they could just wait for you to cast something with your mana as a target option and in response to that kill him.

I do think that the point that the clones really don't do anything without Orvar though. Its true that you could clone something else with them but if I remember correctly both of the good ones that can be copied only clone your own creatures. If you can't stick Orvar the clones leave you with a dead card in hand.

Aquitect's Will - it would only draw a single card still not 9. Also you are reading the table wrong if you cast Aquitect's Will after getting Orvar + Clone + Two other spells cast first on one of the clones this spell would then create 5 copies of the land. He was shortcutting how many Orvars you would have not how many it would make. Since in this case you would be targeting a land instead of Orvar you would get 5 lands instead of 4 more Orvar. Keep in mind, this is again a 7 mana of play after keeping Orvar for a full turn requiring still somewhat of a specific hand of cards.

Lets say that all three of those spells you cast cantrip, at that point you spent 7 mana using midly specific cards (in that a lot of the spells have redundancy as cantrips) to end up with a mildly ok boardstate (not much pressure and still very vulnerable to wraths) and down in hand size without affecting your opponents board.

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I am just comparing this to a lot of the other things you could do in this deck.

• Shipwreck Dowser - Recovers a cantrip spell, spins off a bunch of copies while drawing up in cards and the copies all have prowess so it threatens the next turn to attack with a bunch of like 6/6+ sized creatures next turn while increasing your hand size. The limiting factor with her is primarily how much mana you can make but you could easily attack for 100+ damage the following turn and be up resources for having cast and used her.
• Torrential Gearhulk / Scholar of the Lost Trove - Lets you cast essentially all of your graveyard of target spells getting to draw up cards and make a ton of stats on board. Easily a means of generating like 30-100 power of creatures and threaten lethal while again...... drawing a bunch of cards.
• Precursor Golem - Bunch of power and draw potential here. Even if someone steps on Orvar in response its still a reasonable play in that you get to turn cantrips into draw threes.

I just keep looking at the other things we are doing and I ask myself why it wouldn't be better to have cheap selection draw like Preordain / Ponder over something like these inefficient clones. I myself am running Master of Waves in my list and I am considering cutting that for the exact same reasons I am pointing out on how inefficient the clones are in comparison.