30+ Creature Type Changeling Tribal

[Sefir]

Orb of Dragonkind is the card with the Dragon text mentioned above. Seems like okay ramp, but with no way to recur it the second ability seems weak?

I will take whatever low CMC tribal ramp I can find! There are very few (most of them elves) and this one seems decent!

[offspring]

I personally don't believe Orb of Dragonkind is good in my build. Most changelings have a low-cmc value and there's too little actual dragons (like, two, including the commander) to make it worthwhile. The second ability is kinda okay lategame when you have enough mana, but I don't recall having had that too many times. I don't think it'll make the cut for me.

[materpillar]

Orb of Dragonkind is ok... I'm pretty sure Dragon's Hoard is just way better. Only using the mana to cast Dragons/Changelings is a huge downside. I don't run Myr Reservoir any more because it didn't help cast so many of my spells.

I haven't really seen any cards I'm interested in at the moment... which is A-OK with me because we've been getting flooded with good cards for this deck recently. I want some time to chill and get some more games in with my current list. I haven't even drawn a ton of the cards I'm testing (like Spawning Kraken) yet.

Random side note: I saw Liliana, Untouched by Death in another thread. My gut instinct is that she's good enough, especially for sacc Haakon, Stromgald Scourge lists. She's removal, card advantage and an infinite combo enabler. Seems good to me. Just glancing at my list Liliana, Untouched by Death + Universal Automaton/free changeling + Reaper King/Dragon Tempest is infinite Changeling ETBs. I kinda want to slot her and Unholy Grotto back in.

[materpillar]

Double posting on this one because new stuff

The Book of Exalted Deeds... Are you losing constantly to Thassa's Oracle? Well, now we have a pretty bad on-theme answer. Not completely troll, Tolsimir, Friend to Wolves triggers it very easily. Changeling Hero does too.

Might actually be worth a slot in some random Morophon, the Boundless builds that stack up on protection (Sliver Hivelord and friends). WWW is too scary for me to seriously consider it.

I'm going to try Liliana, Untouched by Death over Gilt-Leaf Archdruid. I've found the tap 7: to be both winmore and a pretty big feels bad moment when I actually have the chance to use it. The draw a card of cast is nice but not being on ETB is actually a pretty decent downside. It's nice to be able to search off of Skyshroud Poacher, but searching for Wirewood Savage basically does the same thing. Feels bad to lose my only Druid card though. Liliana, Untouched by Death will provide more removal (which I'm always a fan of), some ability to recover from wraths (which is always needed), and is an awkward infinite outlet (which I really love). I'm just worried she'll be too easy for my opponents to deal with. Her +1 is also pretty lackluster. Only really synergizing with Spit Flame and Glimpse the Cosmos.

I'm also slotting in Unholy Grotto over Tyrite Sanctum. I've found sacrificing lands just always feels bad. The only card I really ever want to make indestructible is Morophon, the Boundless or maybe Mirror Entity. I cut Unholy Grotto a while back, but I think Realmwalker and Graveshifter give it enough flexibility to get another shot.

[Tribbles]

Liliana is a nice card that does synergise well with Haakon. Do let us know how it tests! I always thought adding Planeswalkers to this brew might not be the best synergistically speaking, but I could be wrong. Grist, the Hunger Tide is definitely an exception as it's a creature as well, which is bonkers.

On the topic of the undead, Skeletal Swarming! Skeleton tribal support that buffs each Skeleton, cares about the number of Skeletons, and creates Skeleton tokens on end step, and cares if a creature died (Haakon builds love this!) This has to be a slam dunk?

[offspring]

Liliana is a nice card that does synergise well with Haakon. Do let us know how it tests! I always thought adding Planeswalkers to this brew might not be the best synergistically speaking, but I could be wrong. Grist, the Hunger Tide is definitely an exception as it's a creature as well, which is bonkers.

On the topic of the undead, Skeletal Swarming! Skeleton tribal support that buffs each Skeleton, cares about the number of Skeletons, and creates Skeleton tokens on end step, and cares if a creature died (Haakon builds love this!) This has to be a slam dunk?

I personally don't like any of these options. I run too little recursion to make filling my graveyard worth it, Grist is cute but not good enough in this build in my opinion, and I'm not so stoked about Skeletal Swarming since it forces us to attack - I'd rather keep my changelings back for tapping abilities.


In my opinion, there are two cards that qualify for this list: Temple of the Dragon Queen is decent, on theme mana fix for the low low cost of a simple uncommon. I don't see any reason not to run it, unless you already run the maximum number of dragons allowd - sorry @materpillar... food for thought, I guess - good fix is hard to come by.
The second one is The Book of Exalted Deeds... just hear me out here and follow me to Magical Christmasland. Because boy does it sound like a lifegoal to turn your Moritte of the Frost (that, let's say, copied something with hexproof) into an indestructible God with Tyrite Sanctum and giving it an enlightened counter with The Book of Exalted Deeds. Gonna be hard to lose from there, and it's absolutely what I want this deck to be doing. Lot of hoops though and I must agree that triple white is scary as hell.

Edit: If we had a little more reliable lifegain, I'd definitely give this a shot.

[materpillar]

On the topic of the undead, Skeletal Swarming! Skeleton tribal support that buffs each Skeleton, cares about the number of Skeletons, and creates Skeleton tokens on end step, and cares if a creature died (Haakon builds love this!) This has to be a slam dunk?

Skeletal Swarming is worth a test for those decks trying to go wide. 5 mana to make a 2/1 or two 3/1s isn't really where my list is at though.

In my opinion, there are two cards that qualify for this list: Temple of the Dragon Queen is decent, on theme mana fix for the low low cost of a simple uncommon. I don't see any reason not to run it, unless you already run the maximum number of dragons allowed - sorry @materpillar... food for thought, I guess - good fix is hard to come by.

I'm definitely going to slot it into my deck and be annoyed about how many dragon cards I have. My rule is for non-land cards. I could also cut Haven of the Spirit Dragon. I've only actually used that card's ability once. Someone Traumatized me, I got Graveshifter to get The Scarab God and won because of it though. Hrmm. Probably just replace City of Brass to decrease the amount of non-tribal lands I'm running.

The second one is The Book of Exalted Deeds... just hear me out here and follow me to Magical Christmasland. Because boy does it sound like a lifegoal to turn your Moritte of the Frost (that, let's say, copied something with hexproof) into an indestructible God with Tyrite Sanctum and giving it an enlightened counter with The Book of Exalted Deeds. Gonna be hard to lose from there, and it's absolutely what I want this deck to be doing. Lot of hoops though and I must agree that triple white is scary as hell.

Edit: If we had a little more reliable lifegain, I'd definitely give this a shot.

That's pretty hilarious. I just axed Tyrite Sanctum for Unholy Grotto though. D:

[offspring]

The second one is The Book of Exalted Deeds... just hear me out here and follow me to Magical Christmasland. Because boy does it sound like a lifegoal to turn your Moritte of the Frost (that, let's say, copied something with hexproof) into an indestructible God with Tyrite Sanctum and giving it an enlightened counter with The Book of Exalted Deeds. Gonna be hard to lose from there, and it's absolutely what I want this deck to be doing. Lot of hoops though and I must agree that triple white is scary as hell.

Edit: If we had a little more reliable lifegain, I'd definitely give this a shot.

That's pretty hilarious. I just axed Tyrite Sanctum for Unholy Grotto though. D:

Yeah I know. I'd be hard to make it work, too. My guess is you should run at least Regal Caracal and Lyra Dawnbringer as lords to make this work just a little, and as much other lifelink as possible via stuff like Righteous Valkyrie. It does open doors to another viable strategy, I think.

[ISBPathfinder]

The second one is The Book of Exalted Deeds... just hear me out here and follow me to Magical Christmasland. Because boy does it sound like a lifegoal to turn your Moritte of the Frost (that, let's say, copied something with hexproof) into an indestructible God with Tyrite Sanctum and giving it an enlightened counter with The Book of Exalted Deeds. Gonna be hard to lose from there, and it's absolutely what I want this deck to be doing. Lot of hoops though and I must agree that triple white is scary as hell.

Edit: If we had a little more reliable lifegain, I'd definitely give this a shot.

Just yesterday I was watching someone play the post rotation arena que animating his Faceless Haven and activating the book on that. The fun part of this is that after the turn ends your opponents then need to have a Strip Mine effect to get at it lol.

It would also be sort of fun in a Sliver Hivelord deck but its also very dedicated to just that one trick unless you push harder on lifegain in a shell. I keep seeing more and more cards that make me want to build a dedicated lifegain deck though so I am sure I will kick something like that around.

[Tribbles]

The Forgotten Realms commander decks just introduced us to this card:

Minn, Wily Illusionist

It's Illusion support that buffs the power of tokens it creates by the number of Illusions you control. As it's a wizard the effect of the second draw can be triggered by Azami easily.

It's second effect is amazing for sac/recursion as we can get permanents with amazing mana values into the board for free! Even if you're not pivoting to sacrifice themes, this card could generate nice advantage with the tokens it generates, and also our changelings. It's also for permanents, not just creatures. Wow. I'm imagining stealing opponents creatures with a type changing card like Maskwood Nexus out, sac them to a Skirk Prospector or similar, get value and then get to cheat out a card of our own from our hand!

[offspring]

Just yesterday I was watching someone play the post rotation arena que animating his Faceless Haven and activating the book on that. The fun part of this is that after the turn ends your opponents then need to have a Strip Mine effect to get at it lol.

This would be quite doable with Mutavault, didn't even think of that. There might be some more LD in commander (especially permanent removal) than in standard, but it would be really hard to deal with. Still, though, I think you should run quite some lifegain to make it worthwile.

The Forgotten Realms commander decks just introduced us to this card:

Minn, Wily Illusionist

It's Illusion support that buffs the power of tokens it creates by the number of Illusions you control. As it's a wizard the effect of the second draw can be triggered by Azami easily.

It's second effect is amazing for sac/recursion as we can get permanents with amazing mana values into the board for free! Even if you're not pivoting to sacrifice themes, this card could generate nice advantage with the tokens it generates, and also our changelings. It's also for permanents, not just creatures. Wow. I'm imagining stealing opponents creatures with a type changing card like Maskwood Nexus out, sac them to a Skirk Prospector or similar, get value and then get to cheat out a card of our own from our hand!

Not convinced about Minn. It's cute, but I don't really like to be the aggressive-looking player on the table. Plus, to make the second effect tick, your card advantage engine should be up and running first. And by that time, I plan to take over the board anyway - don't need the illusians or the free spells for that. I dunno, it just doesn't do much for me I guess.

[Tribbles]

I know Demons aren't a terribly well-supported archetype, but when I was researching other cards that fit well in a reanimation/sacc version of this list (with regards to the recent addition of Liliana), I stumbled upon Blood Speaker and wondered if anyone had thought about it before?

It seems like if you were to cheat it out on the last opponent's end-step, you could tutor up any Changeling or Demon. When you play any Changeling or Demon, it comes back to your hand (flashing out a Changeling could prevent opponents exiling from the graveyard, too). Seems like a novel piece of synergy. It could do with something else on it. Taps for 2G with Sachi though, haha.

What Demons might be good? Any?

EDIT: It's also great with Hofri Ghostforge as you can sac the original, tutor and get a token copy, sac the token copy and tutor, then play one of the Changelings/Demons you tutored for to get Blood Speaker back to hand (or, if you have Haakon/Liliana + Maskwood Nexus, resummon him).

[offspring]

I know Demons aren't a terribly well-supported archetype, but when I was researching other cards that fit well in a reanimation/sacc version of this list (with regards to the recent addition of Liliana), I stumbled upon Blood Speaker and wondered if anyone had thought about it before?

It seems like if you were to cheat it out on the last opponent's end-step, you could tutor up any Changeling or Demon. When you play any Changeling or Demon, it comes back to your hand (flashing out a Changeling could prevent opponents exiling from the graveyard, too). Seems like a novel piece of synergy. It could do with something else on it. Taps for 2G with Sachi though, haha.

What Demons might be good? Any?

EDIT: It's also great with Hofri Ghostforge as you can sac the original, tutor and get a token copy, sac the token copy and tutor, then play one of the Changelings/Demons you tutored for to get Blood Speaker back to hand (or, if you have Haakon/Liliana + Maskwood Nexus, resummon him).

The only demon-tribal card I ever played in my list was Liliana's Contract. Come to think of it, it's probably better than the Airborne Aid I currently run in that slot. Blood Speaker is a little too slow for me, and the 4MV is a bit steep for what is does n my book. I like Moggcatcher et al. better, since they have the same timing and tutor to the battlefield. I kind of like Hofri Ghostforge as a lord, but haven't tried it yet.

Wanted to share a nice play from last week as well. The game was utterly boring up to the final few turns. Ended up 1v1, with opponent having a Nyxbloom Ancient out, after which I played a Shapesharer. Turning three changelings into the Ancient made all my lands tap for 3*3*3=27 mana. Unfortunately, I was killed before I could put it to use. The top card of my library when I died was Crib Swap and I had Haakon, Stromgald Scourge out - that could have been so much fun.

[materpillar]

I know Demons aren't a terribly well-supported archetype, but when I was researching other cards that fit well in a reanimation/sacc version of this list (with regards to the recent addition of Liliana), I stumbled upon Blood Speaker and wondered if anyone had thought about it before?

I have. He just seems like he'd be way too slow. Paying 4 and then having to wait until upkeep to search is a huge upfront cost. There's no cards demon tribal creatures that I'm aware of outside of Liliana's Contract. Quick scryfall search... Mark of the Oni is pretty cute. I wonder if I should give that or New Blood a test again.

Take my opinion with a grain of salt because I don't dive too deeply into the sacrifice theme though. Walker of Secret Ways all the way for me.

The only demon-tribal card I ever played in my list was Liliana's Contract. Come to think of it, it's probably better than the Airborne Aid I currently run in that slot. Blood Speaker is a little too slow for me, and the 4MV is a bit steep for what is does n my book. I like Moggcatcher et al. better, since they have the same timing and tutor to the battlefield. I kind of like Hofri Ghostforge as a lord, but haven't tried it yet.

Wanted to share a nice play from last week as well. The game was utterly boring up to the final few turns. Ended up 1v1, with opponent having a Nyxbloom Ancient out, after which I played a Shapesharer. Turning three changelings into the Ancient made all my lands tap for 3*3*3=27 mana. Unfortunately, I was killed before I could put it to use. The top card of my library when I died was Crib Swap and I had Haakon, Stromgald Scourge out - that could have been so much fun.

Shapesharer is really amusing. Usually it does nothing. But sometimes you copy Magda, Brazen Outlaw or Nyxbloom Ancient and just win off of it.

I played a game yesterday, first game with this deck in a while. I got to go T2 Priest of Titania
T3 Wirewood Savage → Harabaz Druid
T4 Vedalken Aethermage to find Masked Vandal to deal with a Nevinyrral's Disk
T5 Risen Reef → A large chunk of my deck
T6 Magda, Brazen Outlaw, The Ur-Dragon, Gaea's Cradle and a huge pile of cards. Could have probably won but I was trying not to monopolize game time
T7 Sliver Hivelord, Knowledge Exploitation to find Wrath of God + Mirror Entity to swing out with a huge pile of 15/15s.

Things of note.

• Priest of Titania is all elves in play. There was an elf tribal deck at the table so she tapped for a huge pile.
• Vedalken Aethermage puts itself into the graveyard for Masked Vandal, which might be enough of a reason to run it over Step Through
• I cast my first Spellstutter Sprite. It countered Finale of Devastation for x is 10. That almost certainly saved my life.

[ISBPathfinder]

I know Demons aren't a terribly well-supported archetype, but when I was researching other cards that fit well in a reanimation/sacc version of this list (with regards to the recent addition of Liliana), I stumbled upon Blood Speaker and wondered if anyone had thought about it before?

I have. He just seems like he'd be way too slow. Paying 4 and then having to wait until upkeep to search is a huge upfront cost. There's no cards demon tribal creatures that I'm aware of outside of Liliana's Contract. Quick scryfall search... Mark of the Oni is pretty cute. I wonder if I should give that or New Blood a test again.

Take my opinion with a grain of salt because I don't dive too deeply into the sacrifice theme though. Walker of Secret Ways all the way for me.

The only demon-tribal card I ever played in my list was Liliana's Contract. Come to think of it, it's probably better than the Airborne Aid I currently run in that slot. Blood Speaker is a little too slow for me, and the 4MV is a bit steep for what is does n my book. I like Moggcatcher et al. better, since they have the same timing and tutor to the battlefield. I kind of like Hofri Ghostforge as a lord, but haven't tried it yet.

Wanted to share a nice play from last week as well. The game was utterly boring up to the final few turns. Ended up 1v1, with opponent having a Nyxbloom Ancient out, after which I played a Shapesharer. Turning three changelings into the Ancient made all my lands tap for 3*3*3=27 mana. Unfortunately, I was killed before I could put it to use. The top card of my library when I died was Crib Swap and I had Haakon, Stromgald Scourge out - that could have been so much fun.

Shapesharer is really amusing. Usually it does nothing. But sometimes you copy Magda, Brazen Outlaw or Nyxbloom Ancient and just win off of it.

I played a game yesterday, first game with this deck in a while. I got to go T2 Priest of Titania
T3 Wirewood Savage → Harabaz Druid
T4 Vedalken Aethermage to find Masked Vandal to deal with a Nevinyrral's Disk
T5 Risen Reef → A large chunk of my deck
T6 Magda, Brazen Outlaw, The Ur-Dragon, Gaea's Cradle and a huge pile of cards. Could have probably won but I was trying not to monopolize game time
T7 Sliver Hivelord, Knowledge Exploitation to find Wrath of God + Mirror Entity to swing out with a huge pile of 15/15s.

Things of note.

• Priest of Titania is all elves in play. There was an elf tribal deck at the table so she tapped for a huge pile.
• Vedalken Aethermage puts itself into the graveyard for Masked Vandal, which might be enough of a reason to run it over Step Through
• I cast my first Spellstutter Sprite. It countered Finale of Devastation for x is 10. That almost certainly saved my life.

Magda, Brazen Outlaw is legendary . Sounds like a solid goldfishing.

On the discussion of Mark of the Oni / New Blood. On a budget or slave to the theme I think they are fine but I still think that they don't really compete with Gilded Drake or Treachery. It depends on how much of a hard line you want on theme but I have a problem intentionally giving up superior cards for being on theme. In a perfect world you get to get cool tech that in niche situations are better than goodstuff cards but have requirements. I don't really think they are better than the goodstuff cards is my issue.

[materpillar]

Magda, Brazen Outlaw is legendary . Sounds like a solid goldfishing.

I killed Nevinyrral's Disk. Someone Nature's Claimed my Maskwood Nexus and I countered a lethal Finale of Devastation so stuff happened. No one was throwing around Doom Blades or anything though. So it wasn't a complete goldfishing but it kind of felt like it. One thing about this deck that is frustrating for me is that if no one is playing any interaction at all, it can just blow the table completely out of the water with games like that one. However, if everyone is casting rampant growth into rampant growth and then someone wraths away all my mana dorks the game feels unplayable. I'm not sure how to reduce this swingy feel. It can't keep up with truly degenerate stuff or a really good control deck but it smashes beer and chip decks. It's in a really weird power level of too strong for low and not quite capable of dealing with medium/high stuff.

On the discussion of Mark of the Oni / New Blood. On a budget or slave to the theme I think they are fine but I still think that they don't really compete with Gilded Drake or Treachery. It depends on how much of a hard line you want on theme but I have a problem intentionally giving up superior cards for being on theme. In a perfect world you get to get cool tech that in niche situations are better than goodstuff cards but have requirements. I don't really think they are better than the goodstuff cards is my issue.

I just don't have any issue giving up goodstuff cards in the slightest. Honestly, if my opponents don't have to read at least one of my cards every game is it even worth sleeving up? Anyone can cast goodstuff and win. Very few people have the courage to sleeve up Mark of the Oni. Over a decade ago I caused a concession with a Rishadan Pawnshop trigger. I still get an emotional high thinking about it.

Honestly, winning was the least interesting part of the game I mentioned. The best part of the game was when I said "I'll attack and draw a card with The Ur-Dragon. I'll put Didgeridoo into play with his trigger and pass." My opponent said "Woh, woh, woh! You can't just say you put Didgeridoo into play and then immediately pass like we've ever heard of that card before. What the heck does that do?" Short card read later and a fair amount of laughing broke out. This was on the boardstate where they're all very very clearly dead in a very short period of time and they're still laughing about what I'm doing.

[ISBPathfinder]

Yea sweepers seem like a problem for this archetype especially when pushing harder on the lords. Changelings are bad value on their own and usually take a good helping hand to not be a completely terrible draw. Its been a big focus of mine to not get blown out by them but to be honest its a lot more common for me to encounter spot removal than it is sweepers but I still see plenty of sweepers. The hard part is that every deck and player has a different priority on control not to mention whatever the deck concept is so while I see plenty of decks with 2-3 sweepers when you find that deck that has 10 you really feel it.

I get you on the sweet tech, I just have a hard time not running superior cards. I guess it is a bit telling about my playstyle but I prefer it when the sweet tech in a niche situation is superior when you find that cool and specific place and requirement for it to run than to intentionally take a loss in power. I get what you are saying, I just play a lot more 3v1 magic than I care to admit and while it isn't always that way if everyone is open I generally get hit lol. I had a game not so long ago with my changeling deck where the mardu player was legit wanting to strip mine my cavern of souls while my commander was in play so that an esper player could later possibly counterspell my commander. I had to strongly convince him that the mono green overrun deck's Field of the Dead was more threatening.

Cmon ppl who doesn't know what Didgeridoo does lol.

[offspring]

However, if everyone is casting rampant growth into rampant growth and then someone wraths away all my mana dorks the game feels unplayable. I'm not sure how to reduce this swingy feel. It can't keep up with truly degenerate stuff or a really good control deck but it smashes beer and chip decks. It's in a really weird power level of too strong for low and not quite capable of dealing with medium/high stuff.

I honestly have quite some decks that do exacly this. Off the top of my head, my Karametra, God of Harvests deck, my Kadena, Slinking Sorcerer, and my K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth will do exactly the samen if they go unchecked. It's a matter of 'boardwipe or no', and if no, you just have to draw into or find your wincondition. This is kinda what my playgroup as a whole does, and that combined with staying away from going infinite, leads to a lot of games go stalemate. Breaking the deadlock is a serious issue for us, hahah.

[Tribbles]

I played my tweaked version of this list for the first time(s) IRL the other day (yay for vaccines). Sadly, I struggled with a few things which I'm unsure how to remedy, sort of along the lines of what was just described above:

1. Card draw: I found a had an empty hand more often than not. This deck seems to be inconsistent, either flatlining or going off. This is after mulliganing once or twice to get some mana dorks, lands, and some early plays. Maybe there are some ways to improve this?
2. Some cards are dead in hand a lot: Azami, Lady of Scrolls (ironically, given point 1) was a notorious card, but others I just didn't have the mana or correct fixing to get out. Triple for Azami, for Moggcatcher, etc.
3. Mana fixing: Sometimes the colours needed to get stuff on board were not there. I feel like adding some things like Treefolk Harbinger would be beneficial - ensuring we maybe use more Forests (triomes, shocklands, etc) so we can blink and land fix or get the Changelings we need.

Perhaps I'm piloting it wrong. Is this everyone else's experience? Any advice on piloting it or lines of play? I know the brew isn't meant to be competitive, nor is it autopilot, but I struggled a bit.


As an aside, regardless of the above points, I thought Patron of the Moon looks like it would be a fun inclusion, if only for the ability to say "Moonfolk" when playing it.

[materpillar]

1. Card draw: I found a had an empty hand more often than not. This deck seems to be inconsistent, either flatlining or going off. This is after mulliganing once or twice to get some mana dorks, lands, and some early plays. Maybe there are some ways to improve this?

What's your list right now?

I'm only running 6 hard draw spells. Glimpse the Cosmos, Dragon's Hoard, Risen Reef, Wirewood Savage, Azami, Lady of Scrolls, Liliana's Contract. 9 if you count tutors since Vedalken Aethermage, Cateran Summons, and Skyshroud Poacher can get card draw. 10 if you count Knowledge Exploitation.

That being said I have 8 mana sinks that effectively draw at least one card every time they're activated. Those being Wirewood Symbiote, Moggcatcher, Skyshroud Poacher, Hibernation Sliver, Walker of Secret Ways, Emiel the Blessed, The Scarab God, and Kogla, the Titan Ape. That's not counting all my lands either.

I also find myself getting Morophon, the Boundless into The Ur-Dragon fairly frequently to refill my hand.

[*]Some cards are dead in hand a lot: Azami, Lady of Scrolls (ironically, given point 1) was a notorious card, but others I just didn't have the mana or correct fixing to get out. Triple for Azami, for Moggcatcher, etc.

[*]Mana fixing: Sometimes the colours needed to get stuff on board were not there. I feel like adding some things like Treefolk Harbinger would be beneficial - ensuring we maybe use more Forests (triomes, shocklands, etc) so we can blink and land fix or get the Changelings we need.[/list]

I highly recommend drawing The World Tree every game to solve your mana problems. xD

On a serious note, a lot of my card choices are based on mana-cost. I heavily lean towards UG and I've skewed my mana base in that direction. WB cards are usually later game plays for me. This means that if I can fetch out Ketria Triome early, I rarely have mana problems. Then, I can fetch Murmuring Bosk later in the game. Adding fetches helped my manabase a ton.

I actually cut Azami, Lady of Scrolls for a while because UUU was just too rough. I cut Widespread Brutality for a similar reason. I only put Azami, Lady of Scrolls back recently because I spiffed up my manabase with fetches and duals.

Perhaps I'm piloting it wrong. Is this everyone else's experience? Any advice on piloting it or lines of play? I know the brew isn't meant to be competitive, nor is it autopilot, but I struggled a bit.

I haven't played much recently, but I haven't had many of the problems you mentioned. The deck can be fairly swinging as I was just discussing recently though. It's also got some very pointed weaknesses to consistent, repeated creature hate. If you're eating a Wrath of God every other turn it's going to be hard not to run out of steam.

As an aside, regardless of the above points, I thought Patron of the Moon looks like it would be a fun inclusion, if only for the ability to say "Moonfolk" when playing it.

Moonfolk is a fantastic creature type. I was really hoping there would be some sweet food synergy card because Gingerbrute made all Changelings food. That's the creature type I really wanted to have a slot for.

[edit]: just double checked the rulings, that isn't actually the case. Food isn't a creature type even though it is on that line on Gingerbrute.

[ISBPathfinder]

I played my tweaked version of this list for the first time(s) IRL the other day (yay for vaccines). Sadly, I struggled with a few things which I'm unsure how to remedy, sort of along the lines of what was just described above:

1. Card draw: I found a had an empty hand more often than not. This deck seems to be inconsistent, either flatlining or going off. This is after mulliganing once or twice to get some mana dorks, lands, and some early plays. Maybe there are some ways to improve this?
2. Some cards are dead in hand a lot: Azami, Lady of Scrolls (ironically, given point 1) was a notorious card, but others I just didn't have the mana or correct fixing to get out. Triple for Azami, for Moggcatcher, etc.
3. Mana fixing: Sometimes the colours needed to get stuff on board were not there. I feel like adding some things like Treefolk Harbinger would be beneficial - ensuring we maybe use more Forests (triomes, shocklands, etc) so we can blink and land fix or get the Changelings we need.

Perhaps I'm piloting it wrong. Is this everyone else's experience? Any advice on piloting it or lines of play? I know the brew isn't meant to be competitive, nor is it autopilot, but I struggled a bit.


As an aside, regardless of the above points, I thought Patron of the Moon looks like it would be a fun inclusion, if only for the ability to say "Moonfolk" when playing it.

Card Draw - I have noticed this being an issue as well more so with the changeling concept as a whole. Most of the changelings are in the category I would call sort of draft chaff normally speaking. We do have a number of payoffs but generally speaking these concepts are very weak to sweepers. I have played a few different commanders myself but right now I am playing with The First Sliver as my commander and it has helped me some but also put a lot more of a central focus on my commander which has resulted in me being a little stronger vs sweepers but weaker to heavy counter spell / spot removal disruption for my commander.
Stuck in Hand - It sounds like this ties into the mana fixing in your third point as well. I don't know what your landbase looks like but I have been running 4 triomes with 10 fechlands lately and it has felt like an improvement on my overall fixing. Most turns where I don't need all of my mana I try to set up a fetch into a triome.
Mana Fixing - Five color decks tend to be very expensive as far as landbases. I think I am fielding something like a $5,000.00 landbase myself as my solution. I have played a few five color decks with cheaper landbases but generally speaking they tend to be a little slower getting started. If you can afford to jam it full of basics and green ramp it can also be cheaper but with this concept I am sort of stuck trying to be fast and fixing really well. I don't technically "NEED" to have a bunch of ABU duals but well.... I have them so why not. I don't actually run a single basic in my list as of right now.

I can't really comment about anyone else but I don't think that there is a hard line on what 5c commander needing to be run as the commander for this concept. I had previously done some testing with Sliver Hivelord on top of my current selection of The First Sliver as the commander. I think there are some other viable commander selection options as well that I haven't really seen much of anyone explore. Tiamat for instance just came out and I could see him being an interesting commander choice that would give a hand restock as well as selection choices. Reaper King could also be an option as a lord but doesn't particularly answer the card advantage issue. I am not trying to talk anyone out of playing The Ur-Dragon so much as just pointing out that there are some other commander options and I haven't really heard much from anyone about other commander choices.

I think that the landbase thing is tricky. If you have the money to blow on a good 5c landbase its going to be the solution but in general if on a budget its easier to stick to a slower 5c deck that doesn't need to play on curve as much or focus on a more ramp based concept. I had a Kenrith, the Returned King deck at one point that was almost entirely basics that focused on primarily beeing a green ramp deck and fixing through that. That sort of concept is a little slower though and has a setup time to it. I ended up playing my changeling deck a few weeks ago and ended up dying by turn 5-7 like.... repeatedly in one night lol. I don't have the option to go slow in a lot of cases.

[Tribbles]

My decklist is basically the same, but I wanted to lean a bit more into the sacrifice/recursion theme (and I don't have some of the more expensive cards), so I made the following trades:

Out:

• Elder Pine of Jukai
• Knowledge Exploitation
• Sachi, Daughter of Seshiro
• Tolsimir, Friend to Wolves
• Patron of the Vein
• Guardian Gladewalker
• Seraph Sanctuary
• Gaea's Cradle
• Elephant Graveyard
• Forbidden Orchard
• Overgrown Tomb
• Misty Rainforest

In:

• Grist, the Hunger Tide
• Haakon, Stromgald Scourge
• Nameless Inversion
• Kindred Discovery
• Pyre of Heroes
• Hofri Ghostforge
• Dwarven Recruiter
• Starlit Sanctum
• Stomping Ground
• Blood Crypt
• Bloodstained Mire
• Flooded Strand

The lands are fairly straight trades, but the others shouldn't affect the curve too much, and be fairly related. So I have fetches, shocklands etc. Maybe adding in more triomes? I've had plays where I get Risen Reef early and get mana acceleration, but situations like that is uncommon.

I also find myself getting Morophon, the Boundless into The Ur-Dragon fairly frequently to refill my hand.

That's a nice trick that might need to be a staple move from now on. Your list of sources and sinks is useful too, but I guess running into them and/or getting them to hit the battlefield aren't as easy for me. That or I'm heinously unlucky!

The principle of blinking/ETB is the same, but I wanted to utilise reanimation a bit to gain further ETBs. I've considered going deeper into the sac-theme and using Scion of the Ur-Dragon as my commander, or bringing in things like Mana Echoes so I could spend colours in a wiser fashion.

[materpillar]

The lands are fairly straight trades, but the others shouldn't affect the curve too much, and be fairly related. So I have fetches, shocklands etc. Maybe adding in more triomes? I've had plays where I get Risen Reef early and get mana acceleration, but situations like that is uncommon.

I ran a ton of vivid lands in my original build. You can make a pretty serviceable 5c manabase with tap lands if you're playing in a lower power setting. I'm running a lot of really cute lands like Unholy Grotto and Mutavault. If you're struggling to get the proper colors, I'd recommend axing all those cards. I run them all because I'd rather lose to a color-screw every now and again if it makes my deck funnier and more on theme. That's a trade I'm happy to make.

Do you have your decklist online on a website like tappedout or aetherhub? It'd be a good idea to upload it to one of those website because they tell you exactly how many cards of each color you have. Then, you can count up each land that produces each color. Compare and make sure you have the right lands/colors for the right turns. Not particularly thrilling but it makes your deck run much smoother. I check up on my deck/lands every so often to make sure things line up.

I can't really comment about anyone else but I don't think that there is a hard line on what 5c commander needing to be run as the commander for this concept. I had previously done some testing with Sliver Hivelord on top of my current selection of The First Sliver as the commander. I think there are some other viable commander selection options as well that I haven't really seen much of anyone explore. Tiamat for instance just came out and I could see him being an interesting commander choice that would give a hand restock as well as selection choices. Reaper King could also be an option as a lord but doesn't particularly answer the card advantage issue. I am not trying to talk anyone out of playing The Ur-Dragon so much as just pointing out that there are some other commander options and I haven't really heard much from anyone about other commander choices.

There's a ton of viable commanders. The Ur-Dragon is my personal choice because he has the most flexibility. He is ramp, card advantage and a win-con. He doesn't ramp as well as Morophon, the Boundless if Morophon, the Boundless is on the battlefield. He doesn't card advantage as hard as The First Sliver. He doesn't win-con as well as Najeela, the Blade-Blossom or The First Sliver. I just want to use Walker of Secret Ways to cast the same Changeling three times in one turn and The Ur-Dragon is the best choice for that. I also hate being completely reliant on my general and The Ur-Dragon empowers everything that I want to be doing while not making the deck take a nosedive in power if he's not on the battlefield. I prefer to make my commanders to either be low power but reliable early game smoothers or fairly extraneous late-game threats I can use to close out the game if things stall out. I really really do not like them as the lynch pin of my mid-game.

Rooftop Storm + Morophon, the Boundless, Sliver Overlord + Unnatural Selection, General Tazri for hidden commander Mirror Entity are definitely all reasons to run other commanders.

Reaper King was the first popular commander people would run for Changeling tribal way back when. I think most people I've run into online use Morophon, the Boundless with a handful using The Ur-Dragon.

My decklist is basically the same, but I wanted to lean a bit more into the sacrifice/recursion theme (and I don't have some of the more expensive cards), so I made the following trades:

Grist, the Hunger Tide + Dwarven Recruiter is hilarious by the way. If you're leaning into sacrificing Species Specialist probably deserves a slot too.

That's a nice trick that might need to be a staple move from now on. Your list of sources and sinks is useful too, but I guess running into them and/or getting them to hit the battlefield aren't as easy for me. That or I'm heinously unlucky!

The principle of blinking/ETB is the same, but I wanted to utilise reanimation a bit to gain further ETBs. I've considered going deeper into the sac-theme and using Scion of the Ur-Dragon as my commander, or bringing in things like Mana Echoes so I could spend colours in a wiser fashion.

Depends on your meta a fair bit too. If you're consistently getting wrathed two turns back to back in the early game the deck can definitely struggle. I've found playing around wraths and knowing how much to commit to the board to be extremely important piloting the deck. As long as I sandbag a card or two going into the midgame find that I don't personally find myself running out of cards.

Scion of the Ur-Dragon definitely has outs to be real busted. You'll certainly want Arcane Adaptation then too.

[lyonhaert]

I prefer to make my commanders to either be low power but reliable early game smoothers or fairly extraneous late-game threats I can use to close out the game if things stall out. I really really do not like them as the lynch pin of my mid-game.

I prefer this approach, too, though I probably have a couple decks that are still finding their shape that lean on the commander a bit much still. Also, the way I've seen it framed before was "a commander should make a good deck great" (as opposed to making a bad deck good).

[materpillar]

Couple of interesting cards from midnight hunt so far.

A handful of considerations for all the sacrifice decks out there Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver, Jerren, Corrupted Bishop // Ormendahl, the Corrupter (extra points for enabling The Book of Exalted Deeds if that's a desire), and Falkenrath Pit Fighter

Sigarda, Champion of Light - This seems pretty win-more, coven requiring a fair boardstate already. Potentially drawing a card on attack is pretty nice though.

Tovolar, Dire Overlord // Tovolar, the Midnight Scourge - I haven't found any of these effects to be great. I ended up cutting Seafloor Oracle and Yuriko, the Tiger's Shadow because I found them underwhelming. There might be enough of these effects now that there's a deck built around unblockable changelings and attacking. This gets an extra look because it's an infinite mana sink in addition to being a solid card. I love cards that double dip like that.

None of those cards are probably making my list. The final card though...
Katilda, Dawnhart Prime - Siiiiiiiiiiick. I'm always looking for more ramp. Manaweft Sliver and friends help this deck out so much. Another one is certainly an awesome addition! This deck also has a ton of random humans to turn into mana rocks and my human tribe only has Kogla, the Titan Ape right now. Peeeerfect. Now what to cut. I always want more of this effect, but I could also replace Manaweft Sliver to cut my sliver section down from 4 to 3. Hrmmm.