Dennick's Cockroach Mill

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ISBPathfinder
Bebopin
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Post by ISBPathfinder » 2 years ago

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Dennick, Pious Apprentice

WARNING - this deck uses mill as its primary wincon. In general, mill is considered to be a poor win condition and can easily be meta countered by a number of cards that will make this tactic harder. Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre and Kozilek, Butcher of Truth and Nexus of Fate make this strategy significantly harder if and when opponents play them.


One day in the Random Card of the Day thread, Dennick popped up and suddenly I was looking for some way that the card was redeeming. I thought that the back side of his card was interesting but concerned with how hard it would be to kill him off to get at the backside as well as how annoying it would be if he gets killed. Eventually I just kept picking at it to the point that I started brewing to see what a decklist looked like but I surprised myself when I found myself eager to test what I had brewed at the end.






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Table of Contents



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Deck Overview


Lets talk about Dennick, Pious Apprentice specifically and what makes him an interesting commander choice.

Pros:
  • Dennick has a very low threat profile on both sides of his card. By this I mean that its very rare that someone wants to use spot removal on him because well, usually there is something way more pressing to use spot removal on.
  • Dennick (front) is cheap and it leads to playing him early at a stage I rarely have other plays to make.
  • Dennick (front) has lifelink and can do some early game pokes to give a life buffer. Even after everyone has superior creatures in play attacking with him is fine as you want him to die and even if he doesn't get killed in combat he can give you life or serve as a blocker. Either way he can buy you time and stall while on his front side.
  • Dennick (back) has interaction with mill which allows him to make clue tokens. Several of the sources of mill also trigger every time that we draw cards allowing you to spend mana drawing cards and milling on demand which lets you hold up answers and attempt to trigger additional clues to be generated on opponents turns.
  • Dennick (back) creating chaff artifact tokens is a bit of a unique effect. There are other commanders who also do it but not in UW. These chaff artifact tokens can be utilized by effects such as Urza, Lord High Artificer, Shimmer Dragon, and Inspiring Statuary outside of their function as card draw.
  • Clues can be cracked at instant speed allowing for mana to be saved and answers to be used as needed with a backup plan of drawing cards. When you keep mana up for interaction having a backup mana dump for draw is extremely useful.
Cons:
  • Dennick generally needs to be killed so that his backside can be played. I did load up on sacrifice lands to try to help this but in general I still find it hard to kill him sometimes. He can still die in combat but this can be situational.
  • Given the above con, when Dennick dies (back side) recasting him, sacrificing him, and then disturbing him again is a huge pain in the ass. I generally find this happens more due to sweepers but that process is still not fast or fun.
  • Sweepers can be very detrimental. Lots of the permanents this deck cares about tend to be non-creatures so things that sweep or repeatedly affect artifact and enchantments such as Cleansing Nova and Aura Shards can be very tough to encounter.
  • Dennick has two toughness (backside). This can on occasion be very noticeable against cards like Sword of Fire and Ice, Umezawa's Jitte, or Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle to name a few cards that would likely be more painful.
Alternative Commanders - It is worth talking about other commanders who could sever as alternate options. I am going to focus more on what my commander does than the colors as I think as of right now Dennick is unique in his colors for what he does.
  • Bruvac the Grandiloquent - The challenge with going more proactive with mill with a commander like this is you are going to be racing rather than having more of a control strategy. It might work but I think mill takes time to function which still puts me at preferring a controlling concept that plans to go long rather than see how fast I can attempt to mill opponents out.
  • Phenax, God of Deception - My issue with Phenax has always been that it seems like it involves a weird mix of strategies that don't work too well together. Milling and playing a bunch of toughness creatures together have always seemed a bit at odds to me. I do think that it has times where it works out I just think that it takes a lot of time to assemble and the deck often has some weird bad cards if someone answers or steals the commander.
  • Geth, Lord of the Vault - I think Geth is actually quite a capable commander leaning into black's mono black strength of Cabal Coffers. He can still have issues though if someone cleans up graveyards with something like Relic of Progenitus he can be cut off of reanimating. I think he is incredibly powerful with my only real gripe being that mono black has a lot of things they have trouble interacting with.
  • Sai, Master Thopterist - Sai is a great proactive artificer concept. Its a different take on chaff artifacts in that it shifts to being the aggressor but Sai is an incredible commander.
  • Urza, Lord High Artificer - Generally Urza is sort of an artificer combo concept. Its not my cup of tea but its another take on artificer that is high powered.
Why Dennick?
It is true that there are higher powered commanders out there in the same colors or in similar concepts. What I liked about Dennick was his somewhat unique approach to both mill and artificer. Dennick's low threat perception also allows for a lot of pillowfort tactics that can be harder to pull off with higher powered commanders due to higher profile plays.

General Concept:
The general plan is to mill my opponents out while not dying. I have a lot of artificer concepts as well as some cards enabling clues and token generation as well. Cracking clues to draw cards can also generate value and trigger several of the mill effects while allowing me to keep up interaction as needed.

I went a lot more survival oriented on my interaction than traditional Azorious decks tend to be focusing more on not dying than having value sweepers. By this I mean that I often don't stop my opponents from doing things trying instead to at the last second stop their win conditions from killing me or winning them the game. It can be beneficial for my opponent to ramp a bunch of lands or draw a bunch of cards in that it puts them closer to being milled out. The downside is obviously the extra resources it lends them but a lot of draw and ramp heavy decks often run light on win conditions.

Power Level:
I often have a hard time defining power level because its something a bit ambiguous. This deck does not win quickly often taking games into later turns of the game that would normally be identified as a lower power level of deck. That said it is very good at not dying which is part of why it takes games to the later stages. All of this said, I don't think this would ever hold a candle to cEDH decks. I would probably put the power level of a deck like this in the realm of a 7/10 from the standpoint that it isn't cEDH, it isn't fast, and it can be countered if opponents care to change some of their deck composition.

This deck also takes a skilled pilot with good threat assessment for interaction purposes. If you are newer to the game this could be a difficult deck to pilot and your experience may be less. You want a very good grasp of what your opponents are doing and their capabilities as well as a good grasp of how to play control in general to play a deck like this.




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Current Decklist

Decklist

COMMANDER (1)

PLANESWALKER (1)

Approximate Total Cost:





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Budget Considerations


Lets start with saying that at the point of me writing the budget section of this page the deck using the tool books at $2500.00. My experience has been that these tools go off of super cheap and busted up copies as well so I would say its probably safe to say that ordering the deck outright would run something like $3K+. The very easy place to start in saving money is going to be looking at the landbase.
  • Diamond Valley - I don't expect many players to have access to this card. Given that its also a land that doesn't produce mana its almost like a nonland card which you could replace with other sacrifice outlets. Ashnod's Altar, Altar of Dementia, Martyr's Cause, or Fanatical Devotion would likely be my considerations if you specifically want to keep your sac outlet count up.
  • Fetchlands - Fetches aren't a must have for this deck by any means. I include them because I have them and they are great. There are plenty of fixing lands try to get whatever lands you can that provide either color and enter untapped. If you have to go more budget than that you can you will just feel it if you have a bunch of ETB tapped lands. If you cut the fetches I would also probably cut Emeria, the Sky Ruin as when you cut the fetches your consistency on having enough lands to activate Emeria probably goes away. There are some other cards like Trove Warden and Sevinne's Reclamation that also suffer if you cut fetches which might be worth cutting as well if you don't run fetchlands.
  • Tundra - Another card I run because I have one and can afford to have it. If you don't have one its fine. You should look at your count and watch Emeria, the Sky Ruin if you don't have a Tundra but there are four other fetchable duals at the time of me writing this without Tundra so I think its probably fine if you still have the fetches to run Emeria without this one.
In short the landbase makes up for probably 70% of the price tag of the deck. If you are on a budget start with just basics and work your way up slowly using whatever you have on hand or can achieve for cheap. Of the landbase I would probably still try to spring for a High Market as the deck really does need at least one sac land to open up some of the tutors to access sac effects.

Don't try to find a replacement for Urza, Lord High Artificer because the answer to that is Inspiring Statuary which I also run. My best suggestion is to look through the thread for cards I cut or have been considering and run them or run something generic like say another Counterspell or something of that sort rather than Fierce Guardianship. Its usually better to include a generally good card or some other card the deck wants than to try to look for a direct budget substitution. Look for other cards we would consider running generically and run them. You might find something like Erdwal Illuminator or Tamiyo's Journal to be fine cards and they are budget cards to pick up even though they didn't quite work out for me.




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Deck Strategy

- - - Mill Elements - - -
The core concept behind the milling that I included in this deck is that Dennick creates clues when creatures go to the graveyard. I can only trigger that once a turn though but I can trigger it on each players turn. So in an ideal situation on each player's turns I can crack a clue to draw a card which can trigger milling from one of my several effects such as Psychic Corrosion. That said milling can then potentially mill a creature on my opponents which will create a new clue from Dennick and essentially create a redundant loop just requiring mana to be input to propagate this mill loop. You won't always hit creatures when you mill opponents but you are accumulating additional resources. The best part is that some decks might use combat or sacrifice triggers themselves at which point you can accumulate clues without even doing anything on their turn.

I often am asked why I don't play larger one shot mill effects like Maddening Cacophony, Traumatize, or Cut Your Losses. The reason is mostly that I use the mill as an engine for my commander to generate clue tokens rather than trying to sprint for a mill kill. It is more important for me to set up multiple triggers that will continue to work for me than it is for a large one shot milling effect. The card advantage I get from generating clues is very good and part of the puzzle.

- - - Artificer Elements - - -
There are a number of cards in the deck that play off of additional artifacts. Urza, Lord High Artificer, Shimmer Dragon, Inspiring Statuary, and Grinding Station are the backbone of the artificer elements of this deck. They leverage my commander's ability to create suplus artifacts and allow me to use them as a resource outside of the pay two mana and sacrifice function of clues.

Its possible to expand this package and look into things like Kuldotha Forgemaster, Blinkmoth Urn, Clock of Omens, and Krark-Clan Ironworks as some potential other cards that "could" work as well. I have considered several of these cards that I listed but ultimately felt that many of these cards felt slow and could be situational and winmore. I opted for the cards I chose based on their speed of use as well as my deck consistency. Clock of Omens untapping Chromatic Orrery with clues sounds fantastic but the problem I had was that my consistency of artifacts that tap for productive things felt too low for me to run that. I just wanted to highlight some additional potential that work on the artificer theme.

- - - Cockroach Mentality / Pillowfort - - -
When running a pillowfort concept there are a few things that are important to consider. You have to create a problem somewhere else and let that problem build up while having the means of not dying to that very same problem. Ideally this pushes the other players to need to shift their removal and interaction at that problem to not die as you don't intend to save them from it only refrain from being removed by it yourself.

Pillowfort tactics are dangerous and can backfire horribly when someone has the right interaction for you at the right time. The hope is mostly to let the other players in the game go back and forth at each other while you just passively survive by being inconvenient to kill. Rather than destroying all the creatures via a Wrath of God you build up a wall named Propaganda and nicely ask them to hit each other instead of you. If you are the scariest person in play they might want to use their Naturalize on your defense but if and when done correctly pillowfort can be viewed as not the most dangerous current threat in the game often allowing you leeway from the other players in the game who aren't viewed as in the dominant position as the other two players are likely trying to figure out how they don't die to some horrible token swarm.

I like to think that a proper pillowfort concept has both proactive and reactive means to not die. Things like Angel's Grace, Teferi's Protection, counterspells, or even spot interaction can all be reactive means to stop yourself from dying but you also want active defenses such as blockers and Ghostly Prison effects. If you enjoy table talk you can even get into some social elements and deals while playing pillowfort tactics such as hyping other player's threat.

Not dying is really underrated in commander. Lots of people want to win harder and focus more on their haymaker / combo plays. Those sort of decks are the ones I want to prey on with a deck like this. Just keep not dying and the long run game is often in favor of a mechanic like mill.

- - - Opening Hands - - -
If I had to break down what I would consider to be a really ideal opening hand it would probably have the following:
  • 3+ lands with both colors covered.
  • A sacrifice outlet
  • A proactive value play (card draw or milling)
I know a lot of decks generally want to ramp into proactive plays but lots of the ramp I play in this deck is more built for the mid game or later. I won't turn down a Sol Ring opener but in a lot of cases it doesn't make my hand magically amazing to have a Sol Ring start.

Dennick also needs something to enable him to make clues. Sometimes opponents will trigger his clause on their own but it tends to be very dependent on what sort of strategy they are playing. In most cases I want something to enable him to make some clues. Getting him into play and flipped to his backside is great but it generally takes some additional setup to get the clue generation start and if I can get all of that set up by turn four or five thats generally speaking where I want to spend my early game. Keep in mind that we can sacrifice some of our own other creatures to create clue tokens as well which is part of why I have some death friendly creatures like Academy Rector in the deck.

Sample Example Hands
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Example Hand 1: Smothering Tithe, Marsh Flats, Generous Gift, Tectonic Edge, Polluted Delta, Fierce Guardianship, Nimble Obstructionist

Personally I would probably throw this one back unless I was already down on how many cards I get to keep. Its only proactive play is Smothering Tithe which it still needs to draw a land to play and even if it curves to that it can't flip the commander easily and it has no means of really triggering the commander to generate clues. You will generally want a slightly more proactive hand than this with the cavoite being if you are going up against very fast decks where you plan to need to respond very quickly. I don't think this is a very good hand though and it likely will struggle.

Example Hand 2: Unexpectedly Absent, Fleeting Memories, Thran Dynamo, Weathered Wayfarer, Command Tower, Relic of Progenitus, Cyclonic Rift

This one is a high risk / high reward. Assuming you are not playing first I would keep this hand banking on Weathered Wayfarer to get me at least one more land. It likely will disrupt the early turns to play for this but I would probably gamble with it and roll the dice. I think if wayfarer gets to activate at least once or twice the hand is fine. It also has the Relic which can be used in a pinch if wayfarer gets hit. If you are going first throw it back. I would likely get another mana fixing land as the first wayfarer trigger if you don't draw lands that provide colored mana in the first two turns. If you draw colored mana lands to play though I would get a High Market early and from there just keep lands going.

Example Hand 3: Island, Academy Rector, Sphinx of the Second Sun, Disorder in the Court, Misty Rainforest, Glacial Fortress, Fractured Sanity

This hand is fine but not amazing. I would probably keep it even though a lot of the plays don't line up great. The sphinx and Disorder are both a bit slow but I would likely play Disorder as soon as I could for 1-2 clues. Fractured cycles here as soon as possible so this hand has lands and turns itself over a bit. The reason I would keep is just that it keeps drawing cards and it has lands to play. The commander and Academy Rector can both play defense while we just keep pushing towards hitting land drops and finding something else.

Example Hand 4: Island, Anointed Procession, Glacial Floodplain, Dovin's Veto, Sevinne's Reclamation, Cryptic Command, Solemn Simulacrum

This hand doesn't have enough land and given the lack of a fetch in hand Sevinne's doesn't ramp us. I think too much of this is reactive and we don't have enough lands in general. I would probably mulligan this.

Example Hand 5: Shadow Kin, Diamond Valley, Kefnet the Mindful, Tectonic Edge, Sol Ring, Island, Flooded Strand

Ohhhh thats a spicy hand. We have lands, a sac outlet, and proactive plays. This one is an easy keep. Its kind of odd in that the Sol Ring isn't even that amazing here but the hand as a whole looks like it curves well. The Shadow Kin can start some clue gen and milling and Kefnet can offer defense and draw.
- - - Early Game Strategy - - -
I often try to play out Dennick on turn two just because he can offer some defense and offense. I really want him to die so I can get to casting his Disturb cost as soon as I can so I often push him offensively even into bad attacks where possible to try to get him to die. In a pinch if nobody is letting him die if the board gets built up you can shift him to defense as well I just prefer to be offensive with him to trigger the lifelink gains.

Most of the early game search tools look for lands or artifacts. My goal with these is primarily to get a sacrifice outlet if I don't have one yet to get Dennick to his backside. If you already have that established go for card advantage or ramp based on what you have. Keep in mind that Dennick does very little on his own so a support card (generally mill effect) to make him start making clues is usually required.

- - - Mid-Game Strategy - - -
Shifting into the mid game I generally want to have Dennick generating clues from his backside. Beyond this be defending myself and hitting my land drops. I am not opposed to killing everyone at the table myself but I am more than happy to let someone else build up and blow everyone else out of the game. In general I like to have a lower threat perception than at least one other player if I can help it. I generally am not interested in pushing hard on the mill plan going to the mid game as it shifts attention to me. If I can help it I would rather survive someone else attempting to win while letting everyone else die and just 1v1 the last person.

Getting some propaganda effects out and just hitting land drops and letting things happen is where I like to be at this point. If Dennick dies try to get him back out and sort of slow roll him to his backside. Doing both sides in one turn is intensive so I usually try to spread it out over two turns especially given that his front side works well as a road bump if attacked. Given this deck's laid back speed its not too big of a deal to slow play him to get to the backside again.
- - - Late-Game - - -
Ideally my opponents have been hitting their decks somewhat hard churning through their deck drawing cards and such. The mill starts to add up here. Depending on my opponent's deck composition the milling can also limit a number of their wincons especially if they tutor for a few specific things. I have on rare occasion had opponents run out of ways to win the game due to milling but generally speaking in most cases you will have to make them run out of cards or zero their life total to kill them.

Pairing Dennick's clues with several other cards such as Grinding Station, Fleeting Memories, Psychic Corrosion, Sphinx's Tutelage and Teferi's Tutelage can result in very fast milling. Its not unheard of once you get enough resources to hit someone for 30+ mill in a turn and you likely do this at the end of turn. I have seen in more than one situation where I can mill half of a library between my opponents end of turn and my own following turn. It usually comes down to how many synergy cards I have, how much mana, and how many clues I have built up. Lots of my turns end up with just one or two of these milling cards paired with clues but even in this situation its possible to mill for 10 or more cards in a turn.

Disruption - I generally don't bother defending most of my board with some of the exception possibly being defending a defense mechanic that I can see would be a problem without (like seeing an army of goblins as a naturalize targets my propaganda). I often save my interaction for opponents wincons rather than backing my own up. It will likely take a lot of judgment on when you need to defend your own board rather than saving interaction for opponents win conditions. Experience with your meta and the deck in general will help you make this sort of decision though.




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Card Choice Discussion

In the spoilers you can see a writeup of most of the cards in the list. I didn't delve into mana production lands but did most everything else.

Notable Includes
Includes
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Creatures
  • Weathered Wayfarer - It serves as a means to get a sac outlet and ramp as its primary roles. I primarily wanted it as increased consistency of the sac outlets but it also serves as some card advantage and helps making land drops.
  • Fog Bank - Its a relatively safe defensive measure. I like that it can push off a lot of the medium and larger threats that propagandas do less work against. This card could be a number of other cards as well I just like mixing active defense with tricks and I like where this guy stands on cost and effect.
  • Academy Manufactor - He spins up more artifact tokens for the artificer things but its also relevant that he makes treasure which can be stockpiled as an emergency spellcast or used to cover half of cracking the clue token. This deck also doesn't have a lot of lifegain to offset decks that do direct damage and or life loss so having some food tokens can be useful against those decks.
  • Kefnet the Mindful - He offers a strong defense, card draw mana dump, and planeswalker poke options. I like that he offers the punishment of potentially killing attackers which I find to give a stronger defense that pairs really well with the propaganda tactics that I also run.
  • Nimble Obstructionist - Its a stifle with a cantrip but beyond that it also triggers Dennick's clue generation as its a creature going to grave. Stifle effects can be very strong against some haymaker and can stall or stop some combos (very situationally). It can also stop an eldrazi from shuffling a graveyard which is kind of a cool use if you ever find yourself in that situation.
  • Trinket Mage - Early in the game he can get a sac outlet through Witch's Oven or Expedition Map for a sac land. Later on getting graveyard hate or using Expedition Map to get some ramp land.
  • Academy Rector - Sacrificing it can generate a clue token and get me one of numerous enchantments. There are defense options, removal, mill, card advantage options. I don't really have a hard and fast always get card X with this so its just up to your situation on what to get with him. I also don't hate just keeping him alive and waiting as if someone wraths he gets you a headstart on rebuilding and keeping him in play to fetch Cast Out on demand is great interaction.
  • Ethereal Investigator - Getting three clues on average and giving some chump block tokens is really useful. As a spirit token generator I would consider him somewhat weak but giving three clues on entering as well is useful. When just curving him he isn't that amazing but later in the game you might have ways to generate more clues or make the clues do additional work.
  • Shadow Kin - It is a flash based milling option so it plays well towards keeping mana up and responding. Beyond that a good portion of the high cmc creatures we run they can mimic very well. Milling creatures on our turn tends to be one of the easier triggers since we draw on our turn but even with this its a card I am experimenting with due to its fast start on milling. Ultimately I wish there were more Psychic Corrosion like cards but this is something I am testing for now as I wanted more mill cards in deck.
  • Solemn Simulacrum - Its ramp that draws on death and triggers Dennick's clue generation as well when thrown away.
  • Trove Warden - It can be a weird sort of ramp off fetches that can recover tools that got removed. It also is something that cares about dying so it helps Dennick's clue generation and can recover a lot of useful tools back to play. Personally I want to slow play killing it as it makes it harder to sweep him but I also think that at some point you have to keep sac outlets up at all times to make sure he doesn't get bounced or exiled.
  • Urza, Lord High Artificer - The token he makes on entering often gets very large due to all of the clues and he makes it so that the chaff artifacts tap for colored mana. He is one of the best cards in the deck and I can't blame anyone who tries to use spot removal on him as he totally deserves it. Expect him to get targeted but if he doesn't he is going to run away with things from his mana generation.
  • Shimmer Dragon - This dragon turns all of the clues into tap draw effects. Its crazy that he also gains hexproof from his own abilities for having a number of artifacts. He can be very hard to dig out when played often requiring a sweeper. He is a very strong support card for having the chaff artifact tokens.
  • Sun Titan - He can be ramp off of fetchlands or he can recover a number of very useful trinkets to play. I usually expect him to die before he can attack but if he is still alive enjoy the value recursion he offers.
  • Sphinx of the Second Sun - If this sphinx is not countered or immediately spot removed he triggers another beginning phase which allows an untap and draw. In this sense I find that he pays for himself in the first turn of being played as he draws another card and refunds all of the mana in casting him. If he continues to live from there he is generating card advantage and giving a huge net mana every turn he lives. Excess mana can be dumped in cracking clues in a lot of cases which draws more gas which takes more mana to play. He is very powerful and needs to be dealt with immediately and when he is not he runs away with things in a way that is in my opinion a bit similar but slightly different to Seedborn Muse (he costs more mana, generates less mana, but also triggers upkeep triggers and draws a bit).
Artifact
  • Expedition Map - It gives access to land based sac outlets early and if I don't need those because I have one it allows for some ramp options.
  • Relic of Progenitus - When playing mill, you should have plans for graveyard abuse as well as Eldrazi shufflers. In most cases the best solution is to run adequate graveyard hate. I think that graveyard hate options that also have a sacrifice to draw are the best. Relic has the downside of hitting your own graveyard but when you need to clear the grave sometimes it just has to happen. I like relic a lot due to sweeping graveyards and drawing a card in the same trigger.
  • Sol Ring - It is hard to say a lot about sol ring other than its cost is low and its mana generation high. Its completely broken in half and its hard to not run in any deck that needs mana. This deck is a bit odd in that it can have a hard time making use of lots of mana early as it tends to be more important to set specific card combinations to generate clue tokens before excess mana is really useful but Sol Ring mana is still very powerful.
  • Soul-Guide Lantern - When playing mill, you should have plans for graveyard abuse as well as Eldrazi shufflers. In most cases the best solution is to run adequate graveyard hate.
    Soul-Guide has the downside that it either draws or it grave hates but its graveyard hate is like having a Tormod's Crypt for each opponent so I think that is well worth the sacrifice and it still can draw a card in a pinch. Its ETB graveyard hate poke can also be quite effective in some cases but I tend to prefer it being in play than trying to time its ETB to be more effective.
  • Witch's Oven - Its a cheap sac outlet that makes chaff artifact tokens that can be abused by other effects. Its also cheap to cast which makes it a target for Trinket Mage. The small life gain from food can also be relevant against some decks that run noncombat damage as win conditions.
  • Dowsing Dagger - Dennick comes in early and in a lot of cases someone might still not have a creature in play on turn four allowing him to sneak in some ramp. If someone removes him in response its still kind of useful. Once Dennick flips he has flying and can better deliver the dagger for ramp that mostly pays for itself.
  • Grinding Station - This card seems primarily useful later in the game where I might have a good stockpile of tokens already in play. The fact that it untaps when you generate artifact tokens can make it potentially do a lot of work at the cost of some tokens. I think it will be somewhat of a weak earlygame card but in the mid or late game it could potentially pop off.
  • Thaumatic Compass - Its cheap and is a ramp option that also helps as defensive measure against some large creature tactics. In a sense it serves a similar role as Fog Bank but can only turn back one creature a turn but it also punches through huge trampley and unblockable things which is useful. Its a defensive measure though that also taps for mana which means I can use it to crack clues and cast spells. This deck is mostly looking to ramp in the mid or late game anyways so the fact that it isn't a land until then isn't actually that big of a concern.
  • Inspiring Statuary - It turn's the clue generation of the deck into things that can support spellcasting. It makes it a lot easier to make proactive plays while keeping lands up to respond or crack clues. It is weaker than Urza, Lord High Artificer who can make actual mana which can be used to crack clues but I think its still a great effect that while lesser it is also something that can be tutored by a number of blue's artifact tutors. It is possible that I could run more Transmute Artifact / Tezzeret the Seeker / Fabricate effects depending on how important I find this particular card to be but I think its one of my stronger cards even while being weaker than Urza, Lord High Artificer.
  • Thran Dynamo - It almost pays for itself the turn it enters play and if it lives from there it boosts how much mana we can bring from turn to turn. Mana throughput matters quite a bit in the mid and late game stages for this deck as cracking clues is expensive.
  • Gilded Lotus - Its similar to Thran Dynamo but costs a little more but makes colored mana. All of the same reasons that we run Thran Dynamo transfer for this one as well. While it does lose a little more mana the turn it is played it also provides colored mana making it easier to cast this for the turn and still have mana for responses which can be harder with Thran.
  • Chromatic Orrery - Another card similar to Thran Dynamo. It costs more mana but also makes more mana. It makes colorless mana but it also fixes all mana which is kind of cool. I don't think I have ever activated its draw ability but I suppose you could do it. Drawing two cards for ten mana (it taps for five mana normally so five mana and tap is essentially ten mana tap) isn't that impressive especially while in Azorious colors.
Enchantment
  • Fleeting Memories - It makes a clue on entering and fires up a mill effect on clue cracking. This is really everything I want to be doing and I wish there were like seven more functional reprints of this card so I could run them all. When looking at the actual power of milling this one is a little weaker because its only on clue cracking rather than on any draw and its only one opponent for three rather than each opponent. This all said, I am more than happy with this card given the clue it generates on entering.
  • Ghostly Prison - Strong passive defense vs swarm decks. Tokens are extremely popular wincons in commander and I see a lot of them. Effects like this make it harder for opponents to play big haymaker pump effects and still swing at you with numbers. It can often blunt swarm decks' ability to attack you effectively and deflect random poke attacks.
  • Memory Erosion - Its a good punish against decks that chain together a lot of small cantrips and or chaining draw excessively. It can be a bit hit or miss against more casual decks but lots of the more dangerous decks do heavier amounts of ramp and draw which this will affect more.
  • Propaganda - Strong passive defense vs swarm decks. Tokens are extremely popular wincons in commander and I see a lot of them. Effects like this make it harder for opponents to play big haymaker pump effects and still swing at you with numbers. It can often blunt swarm decks' ability to attack you effectively and deflect random poke attacks.
  • Psychic Corrosion - This might be the most powerful mill play we have but it also spread it out over each opponent rather than focusing in on one opponent. Dennick paired with this card hitting each opponent for two cards each draw results in six milling per clue cracked which if you activate a clue on each player's turn is likely to add up a lot and its also the most likely to trigger a new clue to be generated due to the amount of cards milled per trigger. It can be a real work horse on a board with few other cards setup but again it is hitting everyone for a little rather than one player for a lot so it isn't great at eliminating players but does overall work towards a win.
  • Sphinx's Tutelage - This card can do a lot of damage to one player especially if they are playing a one to two color deck. That said, don't overestimate how often you will see its trigger to copy to pop up as even a lot of one color decks have a good number of lands and often artifacts. I would say on average in a one color deck its often normal for 60% of their deck at most to be the same color which makes for a lot of triggers that wont duplicate.
  • Teferi's Tutelage - This card adds up a lot with the clues plan but it is a bit weaker on the mill plan. It makes up for it a little in that it triggers a filter on entering play which does add a mill trigger upfront so you have the option to discard a creature or mill into a creature for a clue gen on entering play which is nice. It isn't the strongest of the mill we have but it triggers how we want and it will add up to help what this deck wants to do.
  • Thorough Investigation - Oddly enough, both sides of Dennick trigger this card to generate clues through attack rather well. When on his front we want him to die so attacking to hope he dies or pick up lifelink damage is decent anyways. Once he is flipped he has flying and often will have somewhere he can go as well. The value added of delving into the dungeon on clue cracking is fine and it does add up but I actually think its clue generation is more of the reason I run it. Early in the game getting that extra clue generation is great and if it is drawn later its delving is still somewhat relevant.
  • Anointed Procession - Twice the clue and treasure token generation. I do have a few other random cards like Urza, Lord High Artificer, Ethereal Investigator, and Witch's Oven that make tokens as well but its mostly in the deck for doubling the clue and treasure token generation.
  • Cast Out - It has flash, can answer any permeant, and can be found by Academy Rector. I wouldn't call it crazy powerful but it is instant speed exile interaction that can be cantripped off if you get stuck. Its unfortunate that its a temporary solution given that answering it brings back the card but I think its passable as far as interaction goes.
  • Collective Restraint - Strong passive defense vs swarm decks. Tokens are extremely popular wincons in commander and I see a lot of them. Effects like this make it harder for opponents to play big haymaker pump effects and still swing at you with numbers. It can often blunt swarm decks' ability to attack you effectively and deflect random poke attacks. This card is mostly a more expensive Propaganda but if someone has an Urborg or Yavimaya it will tax harder. I have actually considered running Urborg and or Yavimaya in this deck for this card as well as allowing Diamond Valley to tap for mana but I think its probably not worth doing.
  • Smothering Tithe - it creates chaff artifact tokens that can be used by Shimmer Dragon, Urza, Lord High Artificer, and Inspiring Statuary but also can just be used on their own as extra mana. I also have Academy Manufactor and Anointed Procession in the deck which can further generate value off of this card. Smothering Tithe is a card that on its own can usually justify its inclusion in decks that have sufficient mana dumps / draw options but when you can make additional value out of the tokens its kind of crazy.
  • Teferi's Ageless Insight - It powers up the clue based draw. Its a bit winmore in that I need to already be drawing additional cards which can be a bit hit or miss but even being sort of winmore I haven't had much of an issue with the card. Its something I will have to think about in the future but it does need to be played when somewhat setup already to do much. It does pair incredibly well with Teferi, Master of Time though as both a flavor win as well as an impressive card advantage engine.
  • Sphere of Safety - Strong passive defense vs swarm decks. Tokens are extremely popular wincons in commander and I see a lot of them. Effects like this make it harder for opponents to play big haymaker pump effects and still swing at you with numbers. It can often blunt swarm decks' ability to attack you effectively and deflect random poke attacks. Sphere of Safety starts at a lower tax than Propaganda but it can also add up to be a much higher tax to attack. I don't think I am so deep on enchantments that I value it more than Propaganda especially given its higher cmc but I do value having more copies of its effect to the point that I run Sphere of Safety.
Instant
  • Angel's Grace - I love this card because it denies a LOT of haymaker and combo plays. Cutting off a player who attempts to win via Laboratory Maniac by telling them nope is really fun. It doesn't always solve the problem but some things it just cold shuts down and the things it does well against it does very well against.
  • Visions of Beyond - Its just efficient for its mana. We could crack clues for this effect but it does a lot for the mana given we are playing mill. Don't be afraid to cast it early if you get stuck just for the draw one as its not worth missing land drops because you are being stubborn.
  • Arcane Denial - Its a cheap counterspell with some added value. Giving a single opponent two cards while shutting down the problem card and drawing a card yourself is a good exchange. You could also run something like Counterspell if you don't care for Arcane Denial but I find that the small added value and easier mana cost of 1U is something I prefer.
  • Cyclonic Rift - Cyclonic is a great emergency interaction that can also be used to disrupt entire boardstates. This deck already keeps up mana so the emergency 1U mode of casting cyclonic is entirely reasonable even though you probably do have to plan for the overload in a lot of cases still.
  • Disorder in the Court - You can shift someone's commander out over their entire turn by casting this at the end step before their turn and have it return summoning sick.
    It can also blank tokens as needed or protect utility creatures. You can even sort of cheat Dennick through a wrath with the downside that he returns face up. I like this card due to its ability to do a little bit of different things in its interaction and it also spawns a bunch of artifact tokens that this deck cares about. It does it all at instant speed to boot.
  • Dovin's Veto - Its a big old no and don't come back. Uncounterable counters are kind of rude but the things I am probably going to use them on are probably violently unacceptable cards.
  • Mana Drain - It counters and gives mana back. That mana can be used for proactive plays or cracking clues the following turn.
  • Unexpectedly Absent - This is somewhat of funny interaction given that this deck is built on milling. Its not that uncommon that I can take any permeant and put it on top of their deck and then force it to be milled. I like the range of targeting with this spell and even without paying any extra mana beyond WW it deals with a problem temporarily. Pay a bit more mana and you can put the problem off if you don't have a means of immediately milling it.
  • Fierce Guardianship - Emergency free counterspells are great. It is a non-creature counterspell but being free can be a big deal.
  • Generous Gift - It has a wide range of interaction. Costing three mana is a bit high for spot removal but I run it for its ability to interact with any permanent.
  • Leadership Vacuum - Lots of faster decks often utilize a commander to move fast. I like that this answers a commander and draws a card. I can think of a lot of commanders I would like to slow down a bit.
  • Teferi's Protection - It can be used as someone tries to combo off or do some big haymaker but it can also be used against a sweeper to jump through and keep your board. Its very versatile and powerful.
  • Whir of Invention - It can be very similar to Trinket Mage in getting a sac outlet early on but I also think there are a number of useful artifacts later on. Tutors allow some consistency without loading too heavily on any one effect.
  • Wipe Away - It can interact with a lot of big problems and doesn't take interaction back. Its a temporary answer but a lot of how I play this deck is geared towards interacting at the right time rather than hard removal.
  • Cryptic Command - The tap all function can be very useful against combat wincons and the counter, draw, and bounce functions feel good against most decks where tapping isn't.
  • Spell Swindle - I haven't had much of a chance to test this but chaff artifact tokens and a counter seem worth testing.
Sorcery
  • Fractured Sanity - I mostly expect to cycle this card and in that situation it will cantrip and do some minor milling which might trigger Dennick's clue generation. Later in the game though casting it for a 14 card mill might be appealing. I like that it seems like a very playable card at essentially all stages of the game rather than hoping to find it at a specific time like how I feel Maddening Cacophony to be.
  • Savor the Moment - I have always considered this card to be a 3 mana Explore. I love Explore and I often want to just push for another land drop for cheap. Splitting my turn also triggers upkeep triggers again and allows me to make another clue off of Dennick potentially.
  • Sevinne's Reclamation - It can ramp off of Fetchlands early or recover important resources later. I also like how I can accidentally mill it and still get value from it.
Planeswalker
  • Teferi, Master of Time - In general I like this planeswalker a lot due to how much loyalty he puts on and his ability to interact with problems on opponents turns. More specifically in this deck he has some cool interaction with a number of mill that triggers on me drawing cards like Sphinx's Tutelage which can then push into Dennick clue generation. His ult is very reasonable too but the downside of planeswalkers in this list is that they are not protected from most Propaganda effects.
Land
  • Diamond Valley / High Market / Miren, the Moaning Well - Dennick needs to die so he can be cast with Disturb. Having some lands to help facilitate this helps.
  • Tolaria West - Get a sac outlet land or a land that taps for more than one mana.
  • Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx / Serra's Sanctum - Hopefully ramp me some mana. This deck does play a number of things to the board so hopefully both of these can tap for positive mana.
  • Kor Haven - Its mostly for big trampling / unblockable threats but we also in general don't have a lot of defenses from big single monsters other than spot removing them.
  • Strip Mine - Mostly if a land is being tapped for four or more mana it probably needs one of these.


Notable Excludes
Excludes
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Some of these cards are things I have tried myself at one point or have yet to test. I will do my best to outline my thoughts and why I either don't run or haven't run these cards.
  • Erdwal Illuminator - I ran it previously but being a creature that I needed to live long term put it on a list of being a bit fragile. It did work well with Dennick but as I added some other token generation especially ones that created non clue tokens and or multiple clue tokens it made more sense to move to Anointed Procession. Its possible that I might want to run both but I saw Annointed as an effect that worked with more cards beyond my commander in a positive way. Its possible at some point I may want to run both or if someone is on a budget you can easily bring this card in as something on theme.
  • Bruvac the Grandiloquent - I do think he can do a lot of work but I think he needs to live a long time for that to happen. He is a bit winmore in that I need to set up milling and then play him which is a large part of why I don't run him. If the deck is drawing cards, making clues, and milling already then I am already happy. He can have a lot of time where all of the checkmarks aren't checked for him to do his thing.
  • Dreamborn Muse - I ran it for a bit but I felt like it didn't live that long and I had a few situations where I started turbo milling myself via Sphinx of the Second Sun with this. I ended up cutting it to try out Shadow Kin but I think both are a bit so so as far as on synergy milling goes. Dreamborn Muse is a totally reasonable card pickup I just found myself wanting to do some testing and opted to cut it to try out other things.
  • Kuldotha Forgemaster - I think there are two glaring issues I have with this card. The first is the lack of flash or haste to get to activate him quickly after playing it. The other issue is I don't have a lot of artifacts in my deck that I would want to jump through all of this for.
  • Altar of the Brood - Its a lot of light milling and it probably would add up given time I just think it needs to be played somewhat early and left alone which might or might not happen. Its trigger is unfortunately difficult to trigger clues on opponents turns as I would need permentns entering on opponents turns to trigger its mill to try to get clues out of Dennick. Given this I felt like it wasn't going to help Dennick much and that was enough that I didn't run it.
  • Crook of Condemnation - Another reasonable graveyard hate effect. Its nice that it can extract specific cards while alive and its sacrifice is a strong mass graveyard exile. I don't run this card in part because it can't draw a card and its effect also hits my graveyard. It is powerful graveyard hate but its also very dedicated to grave hate and it hits our graveyard as well making it a bit of a harder sell.
  • Mesmeric Orb - Its strong mill but its more some milling on everyone. It often gets removed quickly but it also does a lot of work quickly. I ended up cutting it from my list but I suspect it likely needs to come back in. My mild complaint about it is that it doesn't do a lot of milling on one player unless you catch them in the right situation. It is Dennick friendly as far as making clues though I just don't like that its performance sometimes runs counter to how my deck is playing. For instance, if my deck is doing well I might have a bunch of clues and be using them for mana and then suddenly if I untap I mill like 25 cards. This deck taps out hard and draws cards. So, in a sense the milling hits me kind of hard as well which isn't not concerning. If you have a Sphinx of the Second Sun it also burns through extra milling. I cut it in part because when it lives it can become a liability to my own deck.
  • Clock of Omens I think this card could do some absolute work in here. The big reason I don't include it though is that I have like... four mana stone artifacts in the deck. I think its really strong with all of them but the issue is I lack a sufficient quantity of artifacts that I would feel comfortable having both mana stones and this in play at the same time. I think what it does works really well with this deck I just don't have enough mana stone numbers to get away with including it. Its possible if I resorted to adding more artifacts like Everflowing Chalice and Dreamstone Hedron it might get there but as of right now I am concerned that I don't have the numbers I want to get away with running the clock.
  • Krark-Clan Ironworks Ironworks could do some good work in the right situation. My fear is how many resources it uses up for the tempo it offers. I can think of some late game situations where it might help but I can think of a lot of situations early and mid game where its going to be more of a hindrance than a help. I have a lot of ways to use artifacts repeatedly as well so burning them all for some mana tempo seems somewhat dangerous given how long it can take me to build up my artifact count.
  • Blinkmoth Urn - My fear with Blinkmoth is that it helps my opponents first and doesn't do anything for me immediately. Paying five mana for something that does nothing isn't a small thing and helping your opponents is usually a bad idea.
  • Tamiyo's Journal - I ran the Journal for a while and the issue is primarily that its just too slow. I think that the sac for tutor is actually somewhat acceptable but being that it is three tokens needed hurts and its very slow token generation is abysmal. For the record I don't think that Diabolic Tutor is really a playable card in this format and the journal felt a little like playing Diabolic with a slow value added onto it later. It wasn't as fast or cheap as I wanted it to be but I could see it being a potential budget include.
  • Rest in Peace - Depending on how hostile graveyard tactics in your meta are as well as how many death trigger based concepts you see you could step up your graveyard hate and run Rest in Peace. I think its important that you probably scale back your own graveyard reliance if you run a heavier graveyard hate setup like this.
  • Time Stop - It interacts with most things exiling spells on the stack as well as interrupting a lot of haymaker plays. Its a bit weaker to combo in that its a six mana play so its vulnerable to being countered itself but in a lot of ways it can function similarly to a Teferi's Protection except that it protects everyone from what was happening. Its high mana cost is my only hesitation in adding it to my list.
  • Wrath of God - I will talk about Wraths globally rather than cherry pick individual ones but you could run wraths. They would help flip Dennick to his backside and if on his backside trigger for a clue. I opted though to focus more on not dying though rather than playing a board control strategy as I felt that there was a lot of power in passive defenses combined with some tricks to deny death. Having more sweeping based defenses leaves opponents knowing a bit better if they have you dead outright and it also denies you the opportunity for them to kill someone else. Sweepers do help keep some commanders in check though and do stall the game so I think they could be played but I think you might want to consider your defenses very differently than how I set mine up if you do run wraths.
  • Tezzeret the Seeker - I previously was running Altar of Dementia as a sac outlet and I ran Tezzeret because he could fetch it. I later moved the alter to be Witch's Oven because I have reasons to create artifact tokens and the lower cost let me change Tezzeret back into Trinket Mage which is cheaper to cast. Tezzeret could still be a strong consideration depending on how much you value Inspiring Statuary or some other artifacts like Grinding Station or Mesmeric Orb.





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Credit & Thanks

Special thanks to anyone who drops into my thread to have a discussion on the thread. I didn't even know that this card existed until I stumbled over him in the Random Card of the Day thread and stole some ideas that were mentioned there as well.

Also thanks to the primer committee. I stole the formatting for this thread from them and they put in a lot of time and effort to make sure that primers live up to their name.




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Change Log

Lastly, it's fun to keep track of how your deck has changed and evolved as you have as a player. It also gives readers an idea of what cards you've already tried out.
Changelog Date
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11/23/21
  • Trinket MageSearch for Azcanta The more I thought about the Trinket Mage it felt like it might not be worth the inclusion. Its still probably fine, I just like it a lot more with some semblence of creature abuse to a deck via things like Skullclamp / Birthing Pod / Swords of X and Y to make use of creatures like this. Search gives me some ramp and a mana dump to card advantage option that I kind of dig. I also can use a few of my mill effects on myself to flip it faster potentially.
  • Arena RectorSphere of Safety I was looking to cut one of my three planeswalkers and I decided that the Rector while still probably fine, it wasn't something I felt like I needed to push. I was looking at my defenses from random pokes and it felt like while I have some decent cards I felt like I was leaning hard on roughly six cards as my passive defense (me not casting spell defense) and I felt like I could perhaps use a little more.
  • Sun TitanSphinx of the Second Sun Sun Titan is fine, its just a lot of mana for some small recovery in a deck that I want to be keeping mana up and responding. So, I am cutting him for some ramp / draw effect instead. Its more expensive but assuming it isn't immediately nuked it pays for itself. Sun Titan is better on the guarenteed value front but I kind of expect both of them to die somewhat quickly. I guess the difference is I like the sphinx more if they aren't literally holding up spot removal as I go to cast them. I don't really mind if the Sphinx dies before it comes back around but I am hoping that I can get that first untap out of it and I am fairly happy with anything else it does beyond that.
  • Altar of the BroodGrinding Station I will be honest, I don't really know that I stand behind either of these cards but I think that the Altar is a lot less focused than the station. Milling everyone a few cards with the caviot that my deck needs to sort of be functioning is harder. It makes me feel like Altar of the Brood needs another mill outlet to work. Both feel a little dependent on my commander but I feel like my commander plus grinding station accomplishes more especially in that it gets to target mill a player rather than do a little to everyone. I think when everything is set up Altar does more but its also something that needs more setup to function. We will see how it goes and if I don't like it I can always change again.
  • Worn PowerstoneVictory Chimes Worn Powerstone gives acceptable mana for its cost but coming in tapped really hurts it some. I like that the Chimes untap each turn which seems like a good way to slowly nibble at clues on opponents turns as well as keep up mana for interaction.
  • Force of NegationSmothering Tithe I did some looking at my counterspells and I think while Force of Negation is good, it is a bit narrower being noncreature counter. I had three counterspells with this designation and I felt like I liked my other two counters with the same designation more. I feel like Force of Negation tends to be more of a card for tap out decks. Its still fine, I just don't know that I have to be as deep on counter magic as I am. Smothering Tithe is a lot of mana production and a number of my enablers for clues also work on treasure so lets give this a shot.
  • Dig Through TimeSavor the Moment I think dig is fine, I just want to push a bit harder on ramp and I like that savor is cheap to play and cantrips. I really just haven't seen much for situations I don't like the option of casting Savor to be honest.
  • Elspeth, Sun's ChampionTamiyo's Journal Elspeth is fine, she did a number of things like being sort of board control. It just isn't really what I need this deck to do. Tokens isn't really what I am doing and the sweeper is a bit situational still. The Journal seems kind of crazy so I want to see it in action and see how it does. I don't love it without my commander but it does things on its own and might pull some heat off him while also giving me access to a repeat D Tutor that must be answered which is cool.
12/3/21
  • Grinding StationErdwal Illuminator with the super minimal testing I have done so far, I think while Griding Station could be good I think it is going to take a lot more token generation than I have going right now. Its ironic as I am cutting it to try to increase my clue token generation with its replacement.
  • Heliod's InterventionThorough Investigation Cutting some more traditional control effects and pushing up my clue generation / value generation. I didn't actually account for this originally when talking about this enchantment but my commander flies on the backside and is a completely worthless blocker so he can actually sort of give me the attacker trigger in a lot of cases and the extra value generation of the clues seems ok still. I will bring it in and see how it goes but I didn't actually anticipate really having something to attack with to trigger the clue generation of this card which I think I sort of failed on.
  • Aura of SilenceTeferi's Ageless Insight I felt like aura of silence is more of a traditional control card. I actually don't care to tax my opponents plays with this deck and while the Naturalize on demand is fine, I think I am ok just being down a control card and pushing a little harder on my draw potential.
  • Academy RuinsScavenger Grounds I looked at my artifact selection a bit more and I realized I just didn't really care much to use the utility of Academy Ruins all that much. I felt like my enchantments were more likely to be reloaded so I like adding this extra bit of graveyard hate as I felt like I was still a bit light being I am a mill deck.
  • Hostile HostelBlast Zone oops Hostile Hostel has black color identity. I thought it was colorless or blue for some reason but I had it wrong. I think that Blast Zone plays to the keep answers up kind of concept I was going for here.
12/19/21
  • Hedron CrabDisorder in the Court so, in hindsight I sort of expected more from the crabs than they actually delivered. They mill three to six (fetchland) in a turn and that is about all they do. It isn't enough and I need to cut both crabs even the one that can mill each opponent for 3-6 in a turn its just not enough. Lots of my enchantment mill can spin up and start doing significantly more work than that in a turn when I combine them with additional cards. I want to explore a little more token creation and after looking at it for a bit I think I do like Disorder. Disorder gives me a little bit of interaction that might be able to throw a combo off, strip tokens, or disrupt a commander briefly. It seems like a card that could be used in a handful of ways.
  • Ruin CrabEthereal Investigator similar to above I found the crabs to underperform for me. I am not quite sure on this creature but I figure I should push for a little more draw / clue token stuff and I think that the blockers it could create could possibly be useful.
  • Altar of DementiaWitch's Oven sac outlet for sac outlet. I did actually get to use Altar once in my testing but it wasn't actually very impressive to me as a mill outlet. I did end the game by milling for roughly 40 at the end with it but I think its like, barely passable sac outlet until the very end of the game. What I like about the oven is that it makes artifact tokens which can be used by numerous things that care about my artifacts in this deck and the small increment of lifegain is something I find somewhat lacking in the deck currently. Moving from a two mana sac to a one mana sac also is a big deal for several of the artifact tutors as well which before now would have had to get Expedition Map into a sac outlet land so its a much faster option that I find more appealing.
  • Search for AzcantaLeadership Vacuum I just wasn't impressed with search. I was forgetting its triggers among all my things and even if I wasn't it just isn't the kind of card I need. I think that a little bit of disruption from leadership seems appealing especially given that it comes with a cantrip. I think a fast proactive or temp plan could really be a problem for this deck and I think Leadership is the type of interaction that I want to hit an opponents commander with rather than something like Swords to Plowshares which has more versatile targeting but a little less desirable effect on a commander. So, I trade off cheap and broad interaction for something a bit more narrow but still powerful that comes with a little bit of draw.
  • ComeuppanceCast Out in my games tonight I realized how awkward Comeuppance is paired with the propaganda effects that I went heavy on. It makes it hard to en mass counterstrike a big attack. I had been eyeballing Cast Out for my enchantment package already and its something I like in this sort of a deck anyways so lets just bring it in.
  • Tezzeret the SeekerTrinket Mage I think this is just a touch faster. I don't know what my hope with Tezzeret is I don't run that many artifacts and outside of getting my sac outlets I don't really feel like I need an artifact tutor. With adding the oven to my one drops I think it makes sense to drop this down as its faster and fits the curve a little better.
  • Enlightened TutorDowsing Dagger // Lost Vale I have a lot of redundancy in my artifact / enchantments package and I also struggle a little to maintain my card advantage in the early parts of the game. I just felt like I didn't really need this tutor so lets throw a little more ramp in and call it good. I am not really sold on the dagger by any means but I just figured when in doubt hit up some more draw / ramp and call it good lol.
12/28/21
  • Heliod's InterventionAcademy Manufactor I love heliod's Intervention but the card is more of a traditional control effect. I realized that with this deck I am mostly looking to ignore what my opponents are doing only intervening right before they can lethal me. This means I want my interaction to be as broad as possible in nature and so while Heliod's Intervention is good.... I was looking for more things that can interact with sort of anything. I also felt like my interaction might be a little heavy handed right now given the nature of how I am trying to interact I wanted to just go a little more linear and add some more ramp. I am not really sure about this add but I think it hits on things I want to be doing which is drawing, ramping, and gaining life. Its another creature and he is cheap so it adds to my recursion options.
  • Erdwal IlluminatorAnointed Procession I realized I was adding a bit more that makes tokens and the creature was just too limited. Some of my new additions create multiple clue tokens in one go and I also have some treasure / food token production so Procession helps all of those things as well.
  • Echoing TruthUnexpectedly Absent Truth can be a big deal vs tokens but I think against non tokens its a lot narrower of an answer. I like that I can absent to topdeck and then mill through whatever I threw up there. With all of the Propaganda and last ditch defense options like Cryptic Command I felt like I wanted a slightly better outside of tokens answer.
  • RewindSpell Swindle I was contemplating cutting Rewind for something other than a counterspell but I think the treasure production from swindle is tempting. The hard part is using it on things I need countered rather than just trying to cash in for value token production. I will give it a shot and just see how I feel about it.
  • Victory ChimesSun Titan Chimes seemed good on paper. It wasn't as helpful as I had hoped though given a lot of the time I want to keep my options open until the last second and then have mana throughput then. Sun Titan can help recur a lot of important pieces of the deck as well as ramping me on lands if drawn early not to mention the option to potentially rez him with Emeria or rezing Emeria.
1/11/22
  • Mesmeric OrbGrinding Station I am REALLY not confident in cutting Mesmeric Orb but it has been a little awkward in how much it mills me as well as how I can't really control how well its doing and who its milling hard. All of that comes down to how opponents decks work and how they are tapped the turn I play it which while it is powerful its kind of all over the place on how it performs. Grinding Station is something I didn't really get around to testing but I had some upfront issues with my artifact token creation ability which I feel fairly good about now after a number of changes. I think its ability to untap a bunch is also interesting and it could work with a few artifact enablers with that effect. I need to bring it in for testing to see how it runs and now seems like a good time as I am feeling I need to add some mill for some I wanted to cut and test some different things out. Its possible I bring back Mesmeric Orb as it is powerful I just found that it wasn't the mill I wanted in most cases.
  • Wall of DenialThaumatic Compass I love Wall of Denial but there are a lot of situations it doesn't quite work against (like big attackers). The compass can't repeatedly deter attackers but it can stop bigger / trampley attackers and when not needed it is mana which is great. I considered just going straight to Maze of Ith but right now I don't think I need the jump in speed of active.
  • Dreamborn MuseShadow Kin trying out some different mill stuff. I think the Shadow Kin is worse at milling but having flash is interesting and hitting each player on my turn with flash is also cool. The clone function seems interesting too and the fact that it exiles a creature means it could eat an eldrazi if it mills one which would be convenient if unlikely. Dreamborn was really not cutting it for me given how vulnerable to removal it is and how little it did if it didn't live a while (which it just wasn't for me).
  • Tamiyo's JournalFractured Sanity the Journal is just a little too clunky for me. It costs a little too much and its token production is a little too slow. It is cool as a tutor but its still really expensive as a tutor so I think I will just go away from it. I considered if I wanted Maddening Cacophony for the power of milling but as I looked at that card I kept feeling like it needed to be drawn somewhat early to be of much use. Players draw cards and I have other mill effects and when you look at drawing it later it probably won't be very impressive. I like how Fractured Sanity can give me a small mill on cycling and if drawn later a mill 14 effect for cheap still seems quite useful. In this sense, I felt like it had a lot better function both early and late which is what sold me on giving it a shot.
  • Blast ZoneSerra's Sanctum I constantly wasn't using Blast Zone. Some of this might have been due to my objectives of this deck, the lack of token kill options with it, or just having good card draw. Either way I just didn't feel like I actually wanted Blast Zone for this deck and I want to try out some additional ways to generate more mana which Serra's seems interesting for.
2/11/22 - Kamigawa Set Changes
  • Fog BankLion Sash I really do love Fog Bank but I think to some degree the spot removal of the deck can also step in for the cases that I want and need Fog Bank. Its a cheap defense which is great but I just see SOOOOOOOO much swarm style overrun type tactics that the situations that Fog Bank shines are somewhat few and far between. It is good at turning random titans and such back but honestly I can take some hits here and there from that sort of thing. I think that Propaganda effects also do a good job against just making it annoying to come my way though too. I have some high hopes for the lion and I also think that in a lot of cases where Fog Bank can hold things at bay the Lion can also serve the same function. The lion does lack flying but it can still equip Dennick and sit on defense in a pinch and its ability to brickwall non flyers seems probably better than Fog Bank.
  • Cast OutTamiyo's Compleation there are pros and cons to both. Tamiyo's can target all but enchantments which could be targeted by Cast Out but I think its removal effect is more desirable for me. Its ability to make cards do nothing and be locked up in play and still making them die to sweepers is mostly a positive change for me. I added Cast Out in part to expand Academy Rector's package while also just being a fairly reasonable tool for decks that keep mana up. I have high hopes for this new enchantment and I think its ability to lock up commanders is something I like over the slight bump in targeting options as well as cycling that Cast Out offers.
  • 1 IslandOtawara, Soaring City for most purposes this new land is identical to an Island when played as a land. It has more options most of the time. The downside will be if someone is playing Blood Moon / Back to Basics / Ruination sort of things but its generally something that socially is frowned on enough that I don't have to worry about it.
  • 1 IslandPrismatic Vista this is a small change but in short I am prioritizing my plains count slightly due to Emeria, the Sky Ruin. More fetchlands also help with some of my recursion and I even have a small bit of landfall triggers in the deck.
  • Hall of Heliod's GenerosityNykthos, Shrine to Nyx I just haven't ever really felt that I needed Hall of Heliod so I am going to cut it for now. I had done this in my paper previously and forgot to mention this swap. Nykthos is really nice in any situation that it makes additional mana. Its downside is that it taps for colorless otherwise but I think its a small enough thing that I like how much of an upside it has when it does its thing.
  • Mystic SanctuaryTemple of the False God I don't really feel like this is the sort of deck that needs to loop back specific spells. I think I like Mystic more in decks that have more proactive rather than reactive spells. Also, I want more mana.
3/29/22
  • Trove WardenAngel of the Ruins Trove Warden wasn't really working out for me after having seen it a few times. I just wasn't impressed by what it did and the setup it needed. Adding in Angel of the Ruins here for an early game cycler that still has a very relevant later game cast option answer that could also be stumbled into with a rez.
  • Serra's SanctumTimeless Dragon Sanctum was.... ok but I was mostly finding it to tap for 1-2 mana potentially. I don't think its quite good enough with my current enchantment count. It is a bit odd to cut a land for a nonland but I plan to cycle the dragon essentially every time making him sort of like a land still. I like that the eternalize gives me an option to get a blocker / attacker still out of him after already discarding him. We will see if the commander trigger for a clue is relevant enough but its something I wanted to test.
4/25/22 - New Capenna Changes
  • Anointed ProcessionSmuggler's Share I did a little reflecting on some of my effects that require token production to be happening and while they can be really good, if I am not set up they don't really do anything. Even though I have been pushing a little more other token generation into my list I still think I should probably cut back on this given how inconsistent it can be. I like how Smuggler's Share seems powerful and it should function on its own.
  • Thran DynamoA Little Chat the extra mana generation stuff is good but not really until I am set up and I have on more than one occasion had issues getting my commander to the backside. I think that this new draw / sac option seems ok in that if I don't need to sac my commander its probably a tad weak but if I don't need to do that then I am probably in a better position. If I do need to sac him the draw seems very reasonable and I set up to play him from his backside.
  • Dowsing DaggerConfounding Conundrum I have been meaning to hate on lands a bit more for a bit. Landfall.deck has been invading the hell out of my meta of late and Conundrum feels like it has very little downside to the card even when its not amazing it still cheaply cantrips.
6/7/22 - Commander Legends: Baldur's Gate Changes
  • Angel of the RuinsDeep Gnome Terramancer the potential return of the Terramancer is much higher and my total land in play count does matter. I don't know what to expect back from it but I think the potential of this little guy as far as total ramp is really good. The better my opponents decks the more likely he will trigger a few times for me.
  • Thorough InvestigationLoyal Drake I don't mind investigation making me clues but it can be sort of time consuming to get to more draw and I didn't find myself enjoying micro manage the dungeon stuff. I just want something a little more compact that will give me some card advantage.
  • Timeless DragonArchivist of Oghma I have no clue how easy it is going to be to draw cards off of this new dork but I guess its time to test it out. I feel like there is going to be a lot of variance from meta to meta but I guess we will see.
  • Wipe AwayBanishment Wipe Away has been borderline on getting cut for me for a bit now. I do like its ability to break through interaction but bounce is often not enough for me in a single target situation. Banishment being able to interact with a whole token army is appealing so lets give it a shot and see how the flexible effect works out.
10/12/22 - Warhammer 4000 Release
  • Archivist of OghmaTrickbind I wanted a little more for interaction against combo decks and right now a lot of the ones I am seeing seem like they can be shut down by Trickbind. Archivist has not been impressive in my testing.
  • Sun TitanSpace Marine Devastator I am not really sure on the Devastator but its a creature based answer that can scale sidways and create some creatures that can block / be saced to make clues. I just haven't been feeling Sun Titan in this deck lately as it makes assumptions that my opponents interact with me rather than trying to race.
  • Tamiyo's CompleationFog Bank with the addition of Banishment I think I am ok with just having one of the two of these answers in and while Tamiyo's is far more powerful I think I prefer the broad answer over the more powerful commander answer given that I try to play pillow fort with this. My shift back to using Fog Bank in my 99 is in part due to shifting what metas I play in again and seeing more powerful single card threats than I did in my previous meta. Fog Bank can still suffer from opponents using large size + trample but I think something to keep large attackers at bay is still useful for this concept and its something I want just a touch more of I think for now. Its also worth mentioning that I feel like I see a little less of the overwhelming commander focused decks right now where as in the past there were a few more commander centric decks that could really run
  • Collective RestraintThe Golden Throne the propaganda effects haven't been doing as much for me lately and I have wanted more sac outlets and means to stall off death via combos. I don't know that its great but I want to test it out.
  • Whir of InventionRead the Runes Whir has been more awkward than I had thought it would be. Early on it can function as a sac outlet by tutoring up Witch's Oven but the problem there is that its a 4 mana play which is ideally when I would want to flip Dennick. Beyond that it also can be really rough having UUU by turn 4 and I think that has been the larger issue I have had with Whir. As games go late I don't really have anything super juicy that I find myself wanting to have Whir to go and get for me but I guess its funny that I could have instant speed grave hate it just hasn't been as impressive as I have wanted it to be. Read the Runes gives me the early game sac option still and I like how it can work with the mill whenever I draw effects too. The option to sac tokens as an option to bloat my hand up is good too and its something I get to decide after I see the cards I have drawn. I think its an interesting early and late concept that I want to give a shot.
  • Emeria, the Sky RuinPlaza of Heroes I have had a very hard time setting Emeria up to function in this deck. I think that Plaza as a means to protect Dennick is probably safer and I think it still fixes well for what I need to accomplish in the early game while being a land that enteres untapped at every stage and producing mana which is enough for me to be happy including one. Its possible that I might want to still cut one of the always tapped fetchable dual lands I was trying to run to support this.


    These next changes are all related. As I decided to cut Diamond Valley and Emeria, the Sky Ruin from my list I decided to add a package to the list that can conflict some with enabling Emeria to function. The below package of three lands is an opening hand Weathered Wayfarer setup that I like to do that starts with T1 Weathered Wayfarer. T2 tutor and play Flagstones of Trokair. T3 tutor and play Lotus Field ramping off of Flagstones. T4 tutor and play Thespian's Stage using it to copy Lotus Field. This is a four turn opener but it results in being -1 total lands but those lands tap for 7 mana with 3 lands in play. I have used this in other decks that don't have a strong early game strategy and while it does interfere with playing and flipping Dennick I think its a viable opener and wayfarer can still get High Market or other ramp like Temple of the False God / Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx.
  • Diamond ValleyLotus Field
  • Glacial FloodplainFlagstones of Trokair
  • Prismatic VistaThespian's Stage

***Credit for the template of this page thanks to the members of the Primer Committee. I was entirely lazy and stole their template.***
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RowanKeltizar
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Post by RowanKeltizar » 2 years ago

Seems like a neat deck idea! Have you considered Krark-Clan Ironworks or maybe stuff like Bronze Guardian? Just trying to think of ways to capitalize more on the clue tokens. Vanilla clue tokens kind of seem a bit bad... but token artifacts definitely have their uses.

Theres also Thorough Investigation for lolz

There's also Erdwal Illuminator, Anointed Procession, and Search the Premises for some extra clues.

Esper Sentinel is pretty premium draw IMO and it's also an artifact if you wanted to go heavier into artifacts.

There's Bruvac the Grandiloquent for double mill

Grinding Station seems perfect for this deck.
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ISBPathfinder
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Post by ISBPathfinder » 2 years ago

RowanKeltizar wrote:
2 years ago
Seems like a neat deck idea! Have you considered Krark-Clan Ironworks or maybe stuff like Bronze Guardian? Just trying to think of ways to capitalize more on the clue tokens. Vanilla clue tokens kind of seem a bit bad... but token artifacts definitely have their uses.

Theres also Thorough Investigation for lolz

There's also Erdwal Illuminator, Anointed Procession, and Search the Premises for some extra clues.

Esper Sentinel is pretty premium draw IMO and it's also an artifact if you wanted to go heavier into artifacts.

There's Bruvac the Grandiloquent for double mill

Grinding Station seems perfect for this deck.
Sorry I was working through some ideas in my head as well as I was going through my cards building what I had on hand for this and it gave me some more thoughts I need to work through as well. My biggest fear for this list without having played it at all currently is just the question of how awkward playing the commander and going to sac and replay him is going to be. If I get disrupted a lot via sweepers / spot removal / theft / whatever this commander is going to be a massive headache. I don't really feel like this is a panic smash kind of commander but you never really know what people will do until you see it in action. I have a bit of a target on me just given my experience at the game and some of the expensive cards that I play which seems odd to me given that a lot of my decks are fairly laid back but people see me as having relatively good deckbuilding and playstyle and they tend to target me a lot for it regardless of what I am playing. The complexity of the commander setup is something that puts a lot of concern into me with this commander and as a result I have a hard time leaning into them super hard with some winmore tactics
  • Krark-Clan Ironworks - I want to see the deck in action before I jump to conclusions on this one. I need my commander to work for this to realistically be a card and I need to be making so many clues that I can't keep up with them and don't have some other enabler instead to use them for. This could be a thing, but I want to see my commander work and not have a ton of issues before I consider this and even then I think I am more likely to go into some of the more clue production potentially first. I guess I need to see and understand the deck a bit before I feel comfortable including this given how much of a concern I have on my commander just being out and on the back side.
  • Bronze Guardian - I assume you were just thinking a big creature? I think I would be more likely to go with Karn, Scion of Urza, Urza's Saga, or Nettlecyst if that is my goal though as protecting the clues with ward doesn't seem like something I need. I opted not to run big tokens just because combat isn't really my goal with this deck and I feel like I can get better defensive measures outside of big tokens that lack flying. My concern just based on my meta is more of stopping combo, combo like things, and tokens. One of the very few situations I can come up with where giving ward to my artifacts would be useful would probably be against something like Aura Shards but they will just start on the guardian then if we get to that point.
  • Thorough Investigation - I like the whole extra value on clues thing. I am not sure that I am ready to pull the trigger on this because I think going deeper on things that require my commander might take me seeing this deck work first. I wouldn't call it winmore because its like, just my commander + this = results but
  • Erdwal Illuminator, Anointed Procession - I think these have similar concerns for me where it seems like they are dependent on my commander but beyond that I think its also worth noting that there is probably a maximum cap in my ability to consume the clues so more clue production probably falls back to the question of other enablers that can use the clues outside of just cracking them as norm. I think both are cool and could still happen but I need to get some testing in before I want to include more commander centric stuff. I did order the creature though because I think its worth having on hand given how much of a zero cost it was to include in my order. They could happen but I think I would want to increase my clue abuse as well if I add them.
  • Search the Premises - It does clue things but I don't like the nature of this card that it makes not important attacks be dissuaded but it doesn't stop that Craterhoof Behemoth pumped army from murdering the hell out of me. I would more likely go for Mystic Barrier or Sphere of Safety if I increase my defensive measures but right now without testing I am fairly happy until I see some deck testing.
  • Esper Sentinel - So, I am not sure how much of this is a personal thing but I legit don't feel that this card fits this format well. Its a decent card if you can get it early but it falls off very quickly and most decks don't pump up their creatures. Beyond that it only taxes the first spellcast of a turn and if you are only taxing that for one mana its relatively weak and if you are actually taxing them significantly its a bit of investment on your end for them to just let you draw one card as they play their 5 spells in a turn and kill you through this more or less meaningless card. My own view of this card is that its too far from Rhystic Study for me to actually think that even in mono white / boros that I want this card and I am not in mono white / boros here. I know I have seen others on these forums speak positively of this card and I would love to hear about it but I thus far am not convinced that this card is actually a good card in commander. I think the nature of this card makes it more designed for a 60 card 20 life format where you can run four copies of it and playing it on curve might play well against a controlling deck for a low to the ground aggro concept. I just think that the lack of deck consistency and how bad aggro is in this format make for a lot of bad combinations for this card to work for commander.
  • Bruvac the Grandiloquent - Honestly it feels a little winmore in that I need other mill and most of my mill is over time triggers rather than burst mill. My actual deck consistancy and the number of mill cards I have also doesn't feel that high to me. I think this card seems stronger as the commander or when you look at cheap one shot milling paired with him which isn't what I was building for. I was aiming for more of a long run mill out concept than pushing for fast kills. This guy seems like a big target and he also doesn't do anything on his own.
  • Grinding Station - Hummmmm interesting thought. I guess the concern is that if I don't have some other form of mill established I might have a hard time starting the station up. I do sort of like how much pressure it might have though. I do think I would like to give it a shot and see what it can do. I will see what I can do for making room as I think I like it more than I do Altar of the Brood but Trinket Mage targets and all. I will see what I can do to work it in it has me interested.
Other cards that I then and am now considering as well:
  • Tamiyo's Journal - Its token creation is kind of terrible but that on demand Demonic Tutor effect by sacrificing three just seems kind of crazy when having other clue creation.
  • Sphinx of the Second Sun - Its mana generation and some light draw. It does trip and fall flat to spot removal but thats also something not hitting my commander and if it does its thing even once I would say it pays for itself. I feel like I just need more mana with this type of deck and I like that this is mana / a little draw.
  • Smothering Tithe - I often am not huge on this card in mono white because I feel like I can't keep up enough draw / mana needs to utilize the tokens in a lot of cases but I think this deck actually does make REALLY good use of it given that several of the alt uses for the clues can come in on treasures just fine. Yea, in retrospect this 100% needs to be in here. I do have a strong hate for the words "are you paying for that" but I guess this is the deck where I have to stoop to playing it.
  • Savor the Moment - and in addition I guess I could say all of the other extra turns but I like this one as a weird Explore effect. Its useful in that its cheap ramp / cantrip / lets me trigger once / turn things like my commander again.
  • Victory Chimes - Not quite sure where I stand on this but given that its half the cost of cracking clues I could see something like this being useful for moving through the clues. It is still sort of 4 mana over a turn rotation of four players and it costs three and comes in untapped. This is probably the type of concept that this mana stone actually wants to be played in which is weird because I never end up in a deck that it seems to work for lol.
  • Search for Azcanta // Azcanta, the Sunken Ruin - Its sort of ramp / card draw. This deck is currently sitting at 45 non creature / nonlands so my hit ratio is probably fairly good if I activate the backside. Its possible I could mill myself with a few of my effects to flip this sooner too which is amusing.
  • Summoning Station - I don't actually think I plan to run this but I am going to give it a shout out here in that cracking clues triggers it to untap. Given what my gameplan actually is I don't think I can really get behind it but I think its cool. Side note, tokens dying also trigger the commander to make clues so you could weirdly do some sort of janky expensive looping outside of mill with it. I don't actually have much for sac outlets but Ashnod's Altar is kind of hilarious with this card. The commander only makes one token per turn so no infinite there but sacing the token from this for 2 to crack the clue to make another pincher and clue token is funny. It could be something I look into yet but I am not really sure that 2/2s on defense are that impressive.
I don't have changes figured out at all just figured I would try to respond and post some additional thoughts and things I found as I was putting cards together for this. I do need to figure out a bunch of changes which will be tricky without having played the deck at this point but we will figure something out (hopefully soon). In all honesty though I might end up needing to play some games with this just to figure out how things are working before I can make a lot of changes. We will see what I come up with given how infrequently I get to play these days.
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Post by ISBPathfinder » 2 years ago

Ok I had a bit of time to think some things through and I do think I am going to go ahead and push some changes. Several of them seemed a bit more optional but there were a few I knew I was going to want to change around so I figured I would go ahead and make the changes.

@Feyd_Ruin great changes on the dual face card popup. I really love how you can see both sides now. I will have to change my OP of this thread as I created it right before you changed that lol.

DECK CHANGES:
  • Trinket MageSearch for Azcanta The more I thought about the Trinket Mage it felt like it might not be worth the inclusion. Its still probably fine, I just like it a lot more with some semblence of creature abuse to a deck via things like Skullclamp / Birthing Pod / Swords of X and Y to make use of creatures like this. Search gives me some ramp and a mana dump to card advantage option that I kind of dig. I also can use a few of my mill effects on myself to flip it faster potentially.
  • Arena RectorSphere of Safety I was looking to cut one of my three planeswalkers and I decided that the Rector while still probably fine, it wasn't something I felt like I needed to push. I was looking at my defenses from random pokes and it felt like while I have some decent cards I felt like I was leaning hard on roughly six cards as my passive defense (me not casting spell defense) and I felt like I could perhaps use a little more.
  • Sun TitanSphinx of the Second Sun Sun Titan is fine, its just a lot of mana for some small recovery in a deck that I want to be keeping mana up and responding. So, I am cutting him for some ramp / draw effect instead. Its more expensive but assuming it isn't immediately nuked it pays for itself. Sun Titan is better on the guarenteed value front but I kind of expect both of them to die somewhat quickly. I guess the difference is I like the sphinx more if they aren't literally holding up spot removal as I go to cast them. I don't really mind if the Sphinx dies before it comes back around but I am hoping that I can get that first untap out of it and I am fairly happy with anything else it does beyond that.
  • Altar of the BroodGrinding Station I will be honest, I don't really know that I stand behind either of these cards but I think that the Altar is a lot less focused than the station. Milling everyone a few cards with the caviot that my deck needs to sort of be functioning is harder. It makes me feel like Altar of the Brood needs another mill outlet to work. Both feel a little dependent on my commander but I feel like my commander plus grinding station accomplishes more especially in that it gets to target mill a player rather than do a little to everyone. I think when everything is set up Altar does more but its also something that needs more setup to function. We will see how it goes and if I don't like it I can always change again.
  • Worn PowerstoneVictory Chimes Worn Powerstone gives acceptable mana for its cost but coming in tapped really hurts it some. I like that the Chimes untap each turn which seems like a good way to slowly nibble at clues on opponents turns as well as keep up mana for interaction.
  • Force of NegationSmothering Tithe I did some looking at my counterspells and I think while Force of Negation is good, it is a bit narrower being noncreature counter. I had three counterspells with this designation and I felt like I liked my other two counters with the same designation more. I feel like Force of Negation tends to be more of a card for tap out decks. Its still fine, I just don't know that I have to be as deep on counter magic as I am. Smothering Tithe is a lot of mana production and a number of my enablers for clues also work on treasure so lets give this a shot.
  • Dig Through TimeSavor the Moment I think dig is fine, I just want to push a bit harder on ramp and I like that savor is cheap to play and cantrips. I really just haven't seen much for situations I don't like the option of casting Savor to be honest.
  • Elspeth, Sun's ChampionTamiyo's Journal Elspeth is fine, she did a number of things like being sort of board control. It just isn't really what I need this deck to do. Tokens isn't really what I am doing and the sweeper is a bit situational still. The Journal seems kind of crazy so I want to see it in action and see how it does. I don't love it without my commander but it does things on its own and might pull some heat off him while also giving me access to a repeat D Tutor that must be answered which is cool.
Hopefully I can get some testing in before I make a bunch more changes but I put in my order for cards and hopefully can play the deck soonish.

EDIT: oh also I need to cut Hostile Hostel. For whatever reason I assumed the card was colorless but I see with the poup that the black is identified as black. I don't know what the change will be offhand but its on my to do list.
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Post by ISBPathfinder » 2 years ago

Ok, I managed to sort of goldfish a buddy of mine in 1v1. He isn't great at the game so I figured a slow deck like this might be good to give him a chance to play given how a few of my other decks just ran him down in the first few turns. It was a fun and sort of laid back experience. I noticed that I felt like I wasn't drawing enough cards even with the clues but given I was 1v1 against a creature light deck it made it a lot harder to make clues against him. I am not chalking much up in the experience but it was a fun game.

It made me think about Teferi's Ageless Insight and or Alhammarret's Archive (mostly only if I want to pay more for a second copy of the effect). I think there is merit in making the clues do more work its just concerning as it paints more of a target on the commander. I still think getting more value per clue might be worth doing though as might means of creating more than one clue per trigger of the commander. I just need to get some more testing in really but I figured I would mention these two cards as it occurred to me that they are also on theme for making the commander better.
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Post by bashrag » 2 years ago

I'm surprised you aren't leaning into board wipes. You are in the correct colors, and Dennick needs to die for your strategy to move forward.

It seems to me like a turn 3 Dennick and a turn 4 or 5 Wrath works pretty well.

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Post by ISBPathfinder » 2 years ago

bashrag wrote:
2 years ago
I'm surprised you aren't leaning into board wipes. You are in the correct colors, and Dennick needs to die for your strategy to move forward.

It seems to me like a turn 3 Dennick and a turn 4 or 5 Wrath works pretty well.
Welcome to nexus!

Sweepers - I did consider the sweep answer to killing my commander but a lot of the issue I encountered was that a lot of what I really wanted to be doing with this deck was mostly diverting attention to others while holding up paper thin defenses and interacting as mildly as possible to keep me from losing the game. Lots of my defenses just encourage opponents to go elsewhere while using a bit of a lower threat perception commander I am hoping to play a bit of a pillowfort concept with this. Lots of why I am trying to play like this is because a lot of my opponents have shifted to haymaker and combo win conditions rather than just repeatedly attacking with creatures.

In a lot of cases I want my opponents to spin their wheels hard and draw through a good portion of their decks. Rather than tearing down my opponents things I am hoping that I can just ignore their resources and make them lose the game instead of killing me so a lot of this comes down to me expecting horrible boardstates to emerge and see if I can duck dying to them while pushing said opponents to do themselves in.

This all said I do need to make a few adjustments to the deck. Some of my inclusions I felt were more of attrition based control cards rather than being the cheap and efficient cards to keep me afloat. It might be odd for me to try to describe what I am talking about but rather than having value control cards I need things that interact with a wider range of card types at instant speed.

DECK CHANGES:
  • Grinding StationErdwal Illuminator with the super minimal testing I have done so far, I think while Griding Station could be good I think it is going to take a lot more token generation than I have going right now. Its ironic as I am cutting it to try to increase my clue token generation with its replacement.
  • Heliod's InterventionThorough Investigation Cutting some more traditional control effects and pushing up my clue generation / value generation. I didn't actually account for this originally when talking about this enchantment but my commander flies on the backside and is a completely worthless blocker so he can actually sort of give me the attacker trigger in a lot of cases and the extra value generation of the clues seems ok still. I will bring it in and see how it goes but I didn't actually anticipate really having something to attack with to trigger the clue generation of this card which I think I sort of failed on.
  • Aura of SilenceTeferi's Ageless Insight I felt like aura of silence is more of a traditional control card. I actually don't care to tax my opponents plays with this deck and while the Naturalize on demand is fine, I think I am ok just being down a control card and pushing a little harder on my draw potential.
  • Academy RuinsScavenger Grounds I looked at my artifact selection a bit more and I realized I just didn't really care much to use the utility of Academy Ruins all that much. I felt like my enchantments were more likely to be reloaded so I like adding this extra bit of graveyard hate as I felt like I was still a bit light being I am a mill deck.
  • Hostile HostelBlast Zone oops Hostile Hostel has black color identity. I thought it was colorless or blue for some reason but I had it wrong. I think that Blast Zone plays to the keep answers up kind of concept I was going for here.
There is still room that I could potentially add more value generation to the clue creation / cracking yet. I need to get this one in for some testing but unfortunately I have been sick the last few weeks which has put a damper on that.
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Post by ISBPathfinder » 2 years ago

I managed to play three games with this deck. It was actually quite surprising how well the deck was working. The commander continues to be one of the more awkward parts of the deck and I don't really have a solution to that right now but the deck itself was working well and I just found the concept really refreshing and something I don't see much of. My games were just a bit of 1v1 and I managed to win 2/3 of the games with the loss being to a theft commander + means of doing so each turn which cut me off on the creature front hard which was essentially what I was heavily on. I considered if I should have a Homeward Path in the deck with that game but I will probably just be lazy for now and let that slide for now and see if its actually a problem. I just feel like I am a bit heavy on utility lands for now to squeeze it in.

Deck Changes:
  • Hedron CrabDisorder in the Court so, in hindsight I sort of expected more from the crabs than they actually delivered. They mill three to six (fetchland) in a turn and that is about all they do. It isn't enough and I need to cut both crabs even the one that can mill each opponent for 3-6 in a turn its just not enough. Lots of my enchantment mill can spin up and start doing significantly more work than that in a turn when I combine them with additional cards. I want to explore a little more token creation and after looking at it for a bit I think I do like Disorder. Disorder gives me a little bit of interaction that might be able to throw a combo off, strip tokens, or disrupt a commander briefly. It seems like a card that could be used in a handful of ways.
  • Ruin CrabEthereal Investigator similar to above I found the crabs to underperform for me. I am not quite sure on this creature but I figure I should push for a little more draw / clue token stuff and I think that the blockers it could create could possibly be useful.
  • Altar of DementiaWitch's Oven sac outlet for sac outlet. I did actually get to use Altar once in my testing but it wasn't actually very impressive to me as a mill outlet. I did end the game by milling for roughly 40 at the end with it but I think its like, barely passable sac outlet until the very end of the game. What I like about the oven is that it makes artifact tokens which can be used by numerous things that care about my artifacts in this deck and the small increment of lifegain is something I find somewhat lacking in the deck currently. Moving from a two mana sac to a one mana sac also is a big deal for several of the artifact tutors as well which before now would have had to get Expedition Map into a sac outlet land so its a much faster option that I find more appealing.
  • Search for AzcantaLeadership Vacuum I just wasn't impressed with search. I was forgetting its triggers among all my things and even if I wasn't it just isn't the kind of card I need. I think that a little bit of disruption from leadership seems appealing especially given that it comes with a cantrip. I think a fast proactive or temp plan could really be a problem for this deck and I think Leadership is the type of interaction that I want to hit an opponents commander with rather than something like Swords to Plowshares which has more versatile targeting but a little less desirable effect on a commander. So, I trade off cheap and broad interaction for something a bit more narrow but still powerful that comes with a little bit of draw.
  • ComeuppanceCast Out in my games tonight I realized how awkward Comeuppance is paired with the propaganda effects that I went heavy on. It makes it hard to en mass counterstrike a big attack. I had been eyeballing Cast Out for my enchantment package already and its something I like in this sort of a deck anyways so lets just bring it in.
  • Tezzeret the SeekerTrinket Mage I think this is just a touch faster. I don't know what my hope with Tezzeret is I don't run that many artifacts and outside of getting my sac outlets I don't really feel like I need an artifact tutor. With adding the oven to my one drops I think it makes sense to drop this down as its faster and fits the curve a little better.
  • Enlightened TutorDowsing Dagger // Lost Vale I have a lot of redundancy in my artifact / enchantments package and I also struggle a little to maintain my card advantage in the early parts of the game. I just felt like I didn't really need this tutor so lets throw a little more ramp in and call it good. I am not really sold on the dagger by any means but I just figured when in doubt hit up some more draw / ramp and call it good lol.
Going to keep my eye on Dreamborn Muse for now. I think the total milling in a turn is probably still good for this card so I am going to let it slide for now but I am a bit leery from the perspective that I can't really control if it does anything or not but I assume the problem players won't be the ones with 0-3 cards in their hands.

I also got cheaky in my paper list and added Urborg / Yavamaya to the lands. Not sure if I keep them in or not but I found the interaction with Collective Restraint as well as letting my Diamond Valley tap for mana to be sort of fun. I will probably play with my landbase a bit more later when I feel I have a better grasp of what I need and where I need to be for it.
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Post by ISBPathfinder » 2 years ago

Ok, this deck is SUPER complicated and hard to breakdown my game information for. I did play a five player game last week which was a bit of a slog. In short though there was a Laboratory Maniac self mill deck and a pillowfort draw deck at the table. It was a little terrifying to see that combination of opponents while playing mill but whatever the hell. I always hate playing against weird hug decks just because it feels like it throws a lot of what would be good testing data off in that you don't know how your deck and opponents decks drawing like four cards every turn throws everything off for a normal game.

The self mill deck quickly got through its library and ended up with like 20-30 zombies in play and a few cards left in deck. There was a mono green deck that got an early Sacavenging Ooze though and was poaching a lot of his valuable cards and on essentially the last turn before the self mill deck would get to having zero cards left the mono green player played a Terastodon hitting one of my mill enchantments and all of the self mill player's blue lands.

The self mill player struggled due to the loss of his blue mana and he tried attacking the hug player with his swarm of zombies given that forcing him to draw more cards was a problem and my milling was off the table as of right then. The hug player played Bloodline Culling and killed the zombies off though as the self mill player played out a Mesmeric Orb of his own and passed turn. I had played a Mesmeric Orb of my own earlier in the game and sort of stumbled into milling myself for 20 at that point and getting hit again for quite a bit off the new orb on top of all the card drawing so my library was actually getting a little slim. When we got back to the self mill player's turn before he could draw and die he attempted to Memory's Journey which I threw an Arcane Denial into for him to die.

The hug player scooped on his next turn when he realized he just didn't have wincons left as they had all been milled.

The last two players lasted a bit as they kept removing my things but I had the defenses to keep their creatures at bay given Kefnet + Fog Bank + Kor Haven. They did remove my two Propaganda effects though but weren't quite through my defenses when I used a Drown in Dreams to strip the last roughly 20 cards each had. Even though it worked here I don't think that I am all that keen on Drown in Dreams just given how much of a mana hog finisher the card is. I don't like how bad of an effect it sort of feels like it is until late game.



So, I don't know how much to take away from this game. I was sort of enabling a deck and there was a hug deck that made it so that I really didn't pop any of my clue tokens. I did end up using Inspiring Statuary for mana with the clues for most of the game until it got ended just after the lab man deck died. Largely my opponents just had no idea what I was doing this game and didn't even know I was holding responses up because I wasn't stopping like anything they were doing lol. Its possible that my experience with this deck will be different after I play it a few times as I mostly just flew under the radar while doing a bit of milling. As soon as the lab man deck was gone I started getting a lot more pressure on my permeants so I will have to see if that trend continues or not.

DECK CHANGES:
  • Heliod's InterventionAcademy Manufactor I love heliod's Intervention but the card is more of a traditional control effect. I realized that with this deck I am mostly looking to ignore what my opponents are doing only intervening right before they can lethal me. This means I want my interaction to be as broad as possible in nature and so while Heliod's Intervention is good.... I was looking for more things that can interact with sort of anything. I also felt like my interaction might be a little heavy handed right now given the nature of how I am trying to interact I wanted to just go a little more linear and add some more ramp. I am not really sure about this add but I think it hits on things I want to be doing which is drawing, ramping, and gaining life. Its another creature and he is cheap so it adds to my recursion options.
  • Erdwal IlluminatorAnointed Procession I realized I was adding a bit more that makes tokens and the creature was just too limited. Some of my new additions create multiple clue tokens in one go and I also have some treasure / food token production so Procession helps all of those things as well.
  • Echoing TruthUnexpectedly Absent Truth can be a big deal vs tokens but I think against non tokens its a lot narrower of an answer. I like that I can absent to topdeck and then mill through whatever I threw up there. With all of the Propaganda and last ditch defense options like Cryptic Command I felt like I wanted a slightly better outside of tokens answer.
  • RewindSpell Swindle I was contemplating cutting Rewind for something other than a counterspell but I think the treasure production from swindle is tempting. The hard part is using it on things I need countered rather than just trying to cash in for value token production. I will give it a shot and just see how I feel about it.
  • Victory ChimesSun Titan Chimes seemed good on paper. It wasn't as helpful as I had hoped though given a lot of the time I want to keep my options open until the last second and then have mana throughput then. Sun Titan can help recur a lot of important pieces of the deck as well as ramping me on lands if drawn early not to mention the option to potentially rez him with Emeria or rezing Emeria.
So........ I haven't run into any shuffle eldrazi or opponents rocking Nexus of Fate yet. It is something I worry about a bit as I think defeating Nexus would be hard but its possible I can force them into a situation where they just can't kill me with their remaining hand (at which point I have no clue what happens).

I do think that if my meta shifts to running more eldrazi I can shift to more grave hate I just don't plan to do that until I see a problem with it (which I haven't yet). Nexus of Fate is a card that concerns me a lot more as I don't actually see much solution outside of Extract, exile counterspells, or some sort of forced draw effect. Most of this is moot other than to voice some level of concern as I start seeing some success with mill.
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Post by ISBPathfinder » 2 years ago

I had a really sweet five player FFA game last night.

Early game I got stuck on two lands for a turn but managed to crawl out of it ok. I did miss a few land drops in the early turns which was a bit rough but I managed to play Urza, Lord High Artificer on four mana and Ethereal Investigator the turn after to help fix some of my issues. I used the ramp off of the clues to play a Sphinx of the Second Sun and an early Sun Titan to recur some fetchlands and managed to attack with it twice so that helped me overcome some of the land shortage issues. This is mostly what I did going up until things went sideways as follows.

The goblin deck played Krenko, Mob Boss that went unanswered and the landfall deck ran away with Scute Swarm. The vampire deck which didn't do much in this game did a pyroclasm effect that also made a blood token slowing the two down. The Scute Swarm deck ended up spot removing my Dennick, Pious Apprentice so that he could Regrowth the Swarm and get it going again. Two turns later he got over 100 of them after hitting five lands in a turn the turn after playing it.

Right before all the horrible things went to people dying I managed to draw and play Collective Restraint keeping a bunch of mana up with a few response options for removing the Boggart Shenanigans the goblin deck player had in a pinch as it looked like both the huge armies were ready to smash.

Before the 100+ Scute Swarms could lethal the heck out of people the goblin player played a Parallel Lives and exploded his token count. He had a bunch of extra mana from treasures thanks to a Dockside Extortionist and followed it up with his commander to give haste and Craterhoof Behemoth. He only had enough mana left to send two of them at me but they were like 130+ powered with trample but I spun my wheels before he moved to combat and managed to draw into more interaction and slapped together Wipe Away + Cryptic Command to bounce out the two that attacked me rather than tapping him down and keeping the other three opponents in the game.

From here I managed to draw some cards, start actually milling but unfortunately I just had a bunch of flyers and beat him to death in the skies while playing a second Propaganda effect making it more or less impossible for his swarm to come at me. I also was holding a few interaction options in case he drew a sac outlet for the Boggart Shenanigans. So.... I guess combat damage works lol.



So.... lets talk about the take always:

Concerns:
  • Mesmeric Orb / Dreamborn Muse - I am still a bit disappointed in these cards to some degree. Some large part is that it feels like they both get targeted and removed a good bit. The other part is that the Orb is kind of concerning for me as well given how much stuff I tap and untap in a turn lol. I also ended up with Sphinx of the Second Sun and these effects more than once and.... well its a bit spooky. I guess my concern is how much they mill me vs how little they sometimes mill my opponents. They are both heavily targeted and short lived in a number of situations and in others they seem to threaten me more than my opponents. I might experiment with some other mill options possibly.
  • Wall of Denial - I feel like my defenses have been fairly good and I also think that this wall is sort of my worst of these blocker type creatures I run. I think I might be able to play with less of these just because I don't like that if someone has a huge creature I can't use this one to block it and I haven't had much for issues with my opponents killing off my Fog Bank.
  • Tamiyo's Journal - Its fine... but I don't know its where I want to be. Its slow and I think its also a bit of a target. I think I might want something else offhand.
Considerations:
  • Grinding Station - I didn't really give it a shot and I have pushed up my token generation options. I should probably circle back and test it.
  • Maddening Cacophony - Its one shot..... but it packs a punch.
  • Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger - Answers and milling. Plus its exile mill so it rips right through self shuffle effects. My biggest concern is mostly that its slow and I don't really pack haste / flash. I could possibly counterspell protect it though I guess.
  • Shadow Kin - Interesting card I didn't actually know existed. The mill isn't super powerful but its got flash and hits my opponents quickly after. The clone function could be interesting I guess. I actually have a number of creatures in the list that would be good clone targets too if I mill them.
  • Serra's Sanctum - I didn't think much about this but even the idea of getting like two mana back from this is probably appealing. I don't know if my enchantment count is quite right but its probably close enough to jam it in for some testing. If I do run this it might reiterate the idea of running Urbog / Yavamaya
You can see I listed a lot of additional mill considerations given that I was thinking of changing out a few of my mill cards. I should probably pick up some copies of these and just swap some things through and see what sticks. I am fairly happy with the deck as a whole right now I just need more overall testing to see where I need to be. It feels like my rate of milling is a little bit poo but I still keep squeaking out a good number of wins with it.
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Post by ISBPathfinder » 2 years ago

I have been sitting on some thoughts and ideas for a few days and I think I am going to make some changes. I am not really confident in my changes but they are things I want to test at the least. Creating these posts gives me insight in the future on why I was changing stuff like this and how I felt about the cards as I cut them.

DECK CHANGES:
  • Mesmeric OrbGrinding Station I am REALLY not confident in cutting Mesmeric Orb but it has been a little awkward in how much it mills me as well as how I can't really control how well its doing and who its milling hard. All of that comes down to how opponents decks work and how they are tapped the turn I play it which while it is powerful its kind of all over the place on how it performs. Grinding Station is something I didn't really get around to testing but I had some upfront issues with my artifact token creation ability which I feel fairly good about now after a number of changes. I think its ability to untap a bunch is also interesting and it could work with a few artifact enablers with that effect. I need to bring it in for testing to see how it runs and now seems like a good time as I am feeling I need to add some mill for some I wanted to cut and test some different things out. Its possible I bring back Mesmeric Orb as it is powerful I just found that it wasn't the mill I wanted in most cases.
  • Wall of DenialThaumatic Compass I love Wall of Denial but there are a lot of situations it doesn't quite work against (like big attackers). The compass can't repeatedly deter attackers but it can stop bigger / trampley attackers and when not needed it is mana which is great. I considered just going straight to Maze of Ith but right now I don't think I need the jump in speed of active.
  • Dreamborn MuseShadow Kin trying out some different mill stuff. I think the Shadow Kin is worse at milling but having flash is interesting and hitting each player on my turn with flash is also cool. The clone function seems interesting too and the fact that it exiles a creature means it could eat an eldrazi if it mills one which would be convenient if unlikely. Dreamborn was really not cutting it for me given how vulnerable to removal it is and how little it did if it didn't live a while (which it just wasn't for me).
  • Tamiyo's JournalFractured Sanity the Journal is just a little too clunky for me. It costs a little too much and its token production is a little too slow. It is cool as a tutor but its still really expensive as a tutor so I think I will just go away from it. I considered if I wanted Maddening Cacophony for the power of milling but as I looked at that card I kept feeling like it needed to be drawn somewhat early to be of much use. Players draw cards and I have other mill effects and when you look at drawing it later it probably won't be very impressive. I like how Fractured Sanity can give me a small mill on cycling and if drawn later a mill 14 effect for cheap still seems quite useful. In this sense, I felt like it had a lot better function both early and late which is what sold me on giving it a shot.
  • Blast ZoneSerra's Sanctum I constantly wasn't using Blast Zone. Some of this might have been due to my objectives of this deck, the lack of token kill options with it, or just having good card draw. Either way I just didn't feel like I actually wanted Blast Zone for this deck and I want to try out some additional ways to generate more mana which Serra's seems interesting for.
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Post by ISBPathfinder » 2 years ago

Just bumping to say that I am working on updating this list to being a primer. It still has a good ways to go but I spent enough time on the OP I felt like bumping it saying as much. It still needs a lot of work but this list has been interesting and different enough I felt that I wanted to put in the effort for it.

I haven't gotten to play this deck the last few weeks due to travel then being sick but hopefully I can this week. Some random cards I have been eyeballing lately are:

Cathar Commando - I like that its cheap interaction but its also a creature which would trigger a clue token on death. Its also cheap so it can be recurred. It seems like it has a few reasons I may consider running it and since it got spoiled its constantly been a card I have been trying to test somewhere.
Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger - He is removal on cast but I think more relevant is that he exile mills for 20 on attack. My biggest concern is mostly just that he lacks haste so he feels slow as hell.
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Post by ISBPathfinder » 2 years ago

Side note I got done with my first draft of the OP primer. I think I still have a good ways to go in rereading and rewriting a bit of it but the OP got flushed out and it just comes down to my own standards before I am willing to submit it. I suspect it will still be a ways before I get the process under way but its a nice accomplishment to have gotten this far. I love this deck and its super fun and interesting to play so hopefully it helps someone looking for a mill / control style of deck.

Kamigawa Set Review: - (Best tidbits are bolded)
  • Ao, the Dawn Sky - I did a bit of math and I have around 35 targets for him to put into play. I think having a creature that can attack / defend and then die and put some value into play is fine but I think my hit rate is just ok. I think where he really would shine is a deck more focused on rez abusing and getting extra value out of creature deaths. Decks he would shine in are decks using things like Birthing Pod, Skullclamp, and Gift of Immortality. I still think his death is probably fine but he will put something likely of less mana cost into play and I just don't think its really the card I am looking for for this deck right now.
  • Brilliant Restoration - Its a very reasonable effect. I always have issues adding more responsive late game 6+ mana spells like this though. What if you get it in an opening hand it can be a very slow card to get your value back from. I also think that it tends to play more to a specific type of meta that might be heavier on sweepers than I find myself in personally. My own personal meta is very big on proactive gameplay and ending games with some spot removal interaction rather than sweepers as means to interact.
  • Farewell - I think this is a very interesting card due to how much it can be sculpted. I think it best fits a deck that is light on several of these categories. I don't really play to sweepers in this deck and I also spread myself out over most of the categories of what it can interact with so while I think its cool, it doesn't really fit here.
  • Invoke Justice - It can rez any permanent and it also can make Dennick into a 3 turn clock. I thought about this a bit more though and my concerns are first that it can't reanimate my commander (in the way I would want) and second that it makes him more of a target. Its enough of a pain in the ass to get Dennick in on the side that makes clues that I don't want to really bring more attention to him where I can help it. The counters don't seem like they would be very useful on most other things either so while I could run this, I think it has some challenges and something more focused on rez would probably be superior to making a weird backup kill condition. My thoughts might be different if my primary plan wasn't milling and I think this new card is really cool but I don't think it fits this deck.
  • Lion Sash - Its great graveyard hate. I had been thinking if I wanted to expand my grave hate any further but my issue was that a lot of what I could consider didn't draw cards. I think its ability to multi interact for cheap, be a cheap card that is hard to steal / copy (they would need white as well), and it can always go voltron if I have it for long enough. I think its very important to run enough graveyard hate when playing a mill strategy and I think it plays off of the mill factor fairly well while also offering a backup voltron equipment plan. I don't currently have any equipment tutors but if I add this guy I might have to consider it. I had also been thinking about things like Sword of Feast and Famine with really the thing holding me back being that more equipment will likely force me to push them onto Dennick making him more of a target. I really like this lion though in that it does its thing without being equipped but it has the option to go voltron in a pinch.
  • Organic Extinction - It has Improvise so I am interested but unfortunately I am not that interested in wraths in my build.
  • Release to Memory - I like that its instant speed graveyard hate that hits an entire graveyard but I don't really care about the token generation or how much it costs. It might fit a few niche decks that care about the token part but I think I am going to pass.
  • The Restoration of Eiganjo - It can be ramp or recursion but I think its a bit limited as a recursion outlet. Its probably going to be a bit more limited to seeing play in token tactics given the value of the creature portion of it.
  • Discover the Impossible - I do enjoy a good deep digging card. I think that this card is fairly interesting from the standpoint that if you pick an instant it can cast it right then and there which could be good if you need spot removal or a counterspell but I don't think it quite plays to how my list wants to play offhand.
  • Kairi, the Swirling Sky - The bounce side of this card is cool because it can make tokens go away but its a lot of mana investment and needing a sac outlet to pull that off. I think that I don't value it enough given its mana cost without more means to abuse creatures who die more.
  • March of Swirling Mist - Flipping and keeping Dennick flipped seems important to me so far. I like that phasing keeps him the way I want him but phasing can also screw with some combo / haymaker type of effects too. Its an interesting effect that I am not dismissing I guess is where I am at. It covers some of what I hope to be able to do and its cool that it can affect multiple targets as far as some big buff / fatties coming my way.
  • Reality Heist - I was REEAAALLY excited as I was reading this card until I got to the part where it has to find artifacts as well. Ohhh well it was close.
  • Skyswimmer Koi - Its looting is interesting. Unfortunately we can't trigger Dennick off of this in most cases as we probably need to trigger him to trigger this. Its a little too clunky and not quite but it was close enough that I felt I should include it in here. I think it needed to be a little cheaper or have a little more value than what it has but its interesting.
  • Tamiyo's Compleation - This card is a really brutal effect that takes away all abilities and stops you from killing the creature via combat. It seems like it shines primarily as a means of locking up someone's commander but it also invalidates artifacts in most cases too. I think that having flash and its somewhat broad targeting capabilities all might be enough for it to be worthwhile. Its a little bit worse as non commander removal but its also a big step up when used on commanders. I could see this making the cut in place of something like Cast Out as it still fulfils having at least one broad interaction enchant in the package for Academy Rector in a pinch.
  • Tezzeret, Betrayer of Flesh - WOW that passive. It lets us crack a clue for free each turn if we want which is not nothing. His ult is also really spooky with the clues given some of the artificer tap effects that I run. I think his other two abilities are..... fine but the real question is if free clue cracking once a turn ends up being enough and also the question of how much hate he will bring down on himself as defending walkers can be tricky here. Walkers bring a lot of attention and I don't defend them especially well.
  • Universal Surveillance - I like what this card "could" pull off. Improvise is a great effect but in general I avoid big X spells. Given that I could tap a few clues to power a draw spell though.... I probably do need to pick up a copy for testing. I will have to put a little more thought into where I bring it in but I think its potential is really good.
  • Shorikai, Genesis Engine - I don't think it really fits in the 99 of this deck at all but I felt like it could compete for a similar strategy of being a UW artificer dealing with cheap tokens. Several of the effects to untap artifacts work really well with this commander. I will have to add it to the OP as another viable alternative commander. I think its probably the most direct competition I have seen being same colors and relatively similar playstyle.
  • Eiganjo, Seat of the Empire - Man, white really got the shaft again on this cycle. I guess this effect is probably fairly decent still in 60 card magic where random creatures put in work but in this format it might as well be an upshifted rarity plains. There are actually reasons to play this card which is generally going to be Field of the Dead where you get to run less cards that have the same name. I am playing with Emeria, the Sky Ruin so its bad to lower my plains count.
  • Otawara, Soaring City - As long as I have at least one island still this appears to be an upgrade over having basic islands with the only downside being something that cares about my island count or if I run out of them in list due to cutting them. I think the interaction here is along the lines of what this deck wants access to and I like that I can just play out a land early. It seems to check all the boxes I want for me to say its definitely going in.
Of the cards I bolded, I am going to try to fit most of them into my list. I do think that Tezzeret, Betrayer of Flesh has a lot of potential but planeswalkers are always higher priced than they are worth when they release. Some of my issues with Tezzeret is that I think the largest reason to include him is his passive and for it to do anything I need to be in a situation where I have a bunch of clues and want to sac through them. I am not saying that doesn't happen but it means I need to sort of be setup to support him and I have a hard time defending planeswalkers given how much emphasis I put on Propaganda effects which don't defend them. I have Teferi, Master of Time in my list but he also has much higher loyalty gains and all of his abilities are strong regardless of what my boardstate is. Tezeret is going to need to be played at specific times and I expect him to die violently somewhat quickly after playing him. I might still pick him up but my intent right now is to let the set settle before I do in part because I am a lot less certain and I have reason to doubt that he would actually work out for me.

Deck Changes:
  • Fog BankLion Sash I really do love Fog Bank but I think to some degree the spot removal of the deck can also step in for the cases that I want and need Fog Bank. Its a cheap defense which is great but I just see SOOOOOOOO much swarm style overrun type tactics that the situations that Fog Bank shines are somewhat few and far between. It is good at turning random titans and such back but honestly I can take some hits here and there from that sort of thing. I think that Propaganda effects also do a good job against just making it annoying to come my way though too. I have some high hopes for the lion and I also think that in a lot of cases where Fog Bank can hold things at bay the Lion can also serve the same function. The lion does lack flying but it can still equip Dennick and sit on defense in a pinch and its ability to brickwall non flyers seems probably better than Fog Bank.
  • Cast OutTamiyo's Compleation there are pros and cons to both. Tamiyo's can target all but enchantments which could be targeted by Cast Out but I think its removal effect is more desirable for me. Its ability to make cards do nothing and be locked up in play and still making them die to sweepers is mostly a positive change for me. I added Cast Out in part to expand Academy Rector's package while also just being a fairly reasonable tool for decks that keep mana up. I have high hopes for this new enchantment and I think its ability to lock up commanders is something I like over the slight bump in targeting options as well as cycling that Cast Out offers.
  • 1 IslandOtawara, Soaring City for most purposes this new land is identical to an Island when played as a land. It has more options most of the time. The downside will be if someone is playing Blood Moon / Back to Basics / Ruination sort of things but its generally something that socially is frowned on enough that I don't have to worry about it.
  • 1 IslandPrismatic Vista this is a small change but in short I am prioritizing my plains count slightly due to Emeria, the Sky Ruin. More fetchlands also help with some of my recursion and I even have a small bit of landfall triggers in the deck.
  • Hall of Heliod's GenerosityNykthos, Shrine to Nyx I just haven't ever really felt that I needed Hall of Heliod so I am going to cut it for now. I had done this in my paper previously and forgot to mention this swap. Nykthos is really nice in any situation that it makes additional mana. Its downside is that it taps for colorless otherwise but I think its a small enough thing that I like how much of an upside it has when it does its thing.
  • Mystic SanctuaryTemple of the False God I don't really feel like this is the sort of deck that needs to loop back specific spells. I think I like Mystic more in decks that have more proactive rather than reactive spells. Also, I want more mana.
I guess I will end with some random thoughts / watch list stuff.

Strip Mine - I currently am running two of these effect and I am not really sure where my thoughts are on this effect. I think I want at least one so I can tutor it if need be but I get the feeling that this isn't really the type of deck that cares too much about opponents lands. Big mana producing lands are probably the biggest offender just globally speaking but I feel like I could go either way on how much of a concern it is to me. I might end up cutting one of them and going down to just a single of this effect. I just don't have a lot of utility lands I have been trying to use in this deck as I often find most of my mana being used by the deck itself so utility lands have to be situationally really strong.

Teferi's Ageless Insight - It occurred to me the other day that the board complexity needed for this card to shine is a bit high. Don't get me wrong it has been a great card in a lot of situations for me its just that it tends to be a situation where my deck has been doing its thing fairly well and has a wide board of a bunch of things when this comes in and shines. My point being that it is.... kind of a bit winmore and it takes time to set up as well as the board for it to be worth playing it into to be set up. I am going to keep an eye on this card due to this.

EDIT: I forgot to review the commander precons cards so I edited them in afterwards. I will have to give a bit more thought but its possible that I might want to bring in Universal Surveillance for Teferi's Ageless Insight considering I was already eyeing Insight as a bit of a problem card. I didn't want to rush it though so for now its just on my radar of something that might happen.
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Post by ISBPathfinder » 2 years ago

Alright, its been a hot minute since I did any updates. My avalability to play has been spotty at best for a while now and one of the times I showed up at the shop it was just me and one other guy so we ended up just playing some 1v1 games. I also played some 1v1 against a buddy of mine lately and last night managed to show up to the shop and play three games of five player FFA. Its hard to really give a full rundown on all of the games but I actually think I won all of the recent games with this deck so I guess my win ratio with this deck is fairly good. Its not to say I always win but I rarely feel like I am not in games with this deck and I win most of them. I am going to start by highlighting some cards that I have either rarely seen, are new adds, or just play a little bit differently in some situations recently.
  • Lion Sash - I managed to see him in the five player FFA game but I ended up discarding him to an opponents activation of Geier Reach Sanitarium. I don't have much of a take away it was like turn 2/3 when this happened and I just wasn't ready for anything this card could provide. I did opt to keep an Angel's Grace over this which could have been debated either way given how early it was but Angel's Grace ended up being super clutch that game. I plan to continue testing at this time as I don't think it was anything anywhere near conclusive. I think this is a card that I generally want to draw later rather than starting with it.
  • Academy Manufactor - I managed to play it very early in the five player game and it never died. It did some absolute work but..... again it never died. There was a point where I had to Teferi's Protection jump through a Cyclonic Rift but I think it was quite worth doing to save what he built up for me. I ended up winning the game in part because of all of the free treasure and food he made for me. I would have died without the lifegain that the food gave me to recover from my Angel's Grace play. I was happy with him but I also got to just ride this guy all game so I guess we will see how things go with more testing but it was a great effect.
  • Shadow Kin - I managed to play it early behind Dennick flipping and spent a turn hiding as a Purphoros, God of the Forge. After that I shifted to being a Archmage Emeritus and cashed in on a lot of card draw from this. Honestly Archmage Emeritus played fairly well and could possibly be an add for this deck but I guess I was happy with the performance of Shadow Kin in this. It gave me a little bit of graveyard exile, milling, and I liked that it had flash as well.
  • Trove Warden - I have seen it a few times in passing and its never been worth casting. I think I am ready to pull this card it just hasn't been living up to my expectations. Recursion can be a bit tricky with this deck though as lots of its targets aren't actually that amazing on their own and I don't eat a lot of spot removal while playing this deck. The setup of needing a sac outlet and some fetchlands is all a bit so so for me if I am being honest. I think I am ready to ship this off and try something else.
  • Grinding Station - I FINALLY got to test this card. To be fair I ended up with a mid game Whir of Invention where my only real choices seemed to be Grinding Station or Inspiring Statuary. I was in a situation where I had probably 40 or so artifact tokens but I lacked something to really sink my mana into for Statuary so given how good my token production was I opted for Grinding Station which carried a lot of my milling allowing me to mill for probably 30-40 cards in the turn rotation it came in. I need more testing but in a situation where my token production was good and I had a large stockpile it was a very impressive mill cannon. It does still sort of have to be spread over a few players turns but what it can accomplish was impressive.
  • Tamiyo's Compleation - Yup, this card was just as busted as I thought it would be. It forces opponents to kill their own commanders or find a naturalize. Its freaking amazing.
  • Angel's Grace - I know this card doesn't always work depending on circumstances and what is happening but holy hell it has saved me almost every time I have drawn it. Last night we got in a situation where Kykar, Wind's Fury went infinite with a Reiterate on a mana producing spell using Purphoros, God of the Forge to kill everyone. I pushed through with Angel's Grace and when he went to kill me on my turn I just cracked my numerous food from Academy Manufactor to survive. I ended up winning in an epic game where I milled him out but couldn't force him to draw a card but I could survive when after untapping thanks to the food.
  • Dovin's Veto - I ended up breaking through an infinite Reiterate of Abrade thanks to Veto being uncounterable lol. He was going to strip all my artifacts which would have left me defenseless to a spellcast the next turn. It came in clutch.
  • Leadership Vacuum - overall I have been fairly happy with the slow down of this effect. The fact that it draws as well just gives me a slow effect that only costs me a little mana. I like that it cantrips and is instant speed it seems to be fairly good so far.
  • Spell Swindle - Overall I have been fairly happy with this. All of the things to make more tokens and use the tokens outside of just cracking them really add up and these random things that do good things and make me tokens seem to be working well. Its sort of psudo rewind even though it probably makes me less mana on average the fact that it spits out tokens has been a big deal. The only real downside is that keeping five mana up can be a bit harder but I have been happy with the results when I cast it.
Eyeballing some things:
  • Dress Down - I don't know if this does enough but the cantrip function of it makes me want to test it.
  • Cycling - I can't find much else for cycling cards that I really love but some of the plains cycling effects are fairly decent cards. Angel of the Ruins and Timeless Dragon offer some other potential in casting the angel and making a token from the dragon that aren't entirely nothing. Cycling creatures does trigger clue production out of my commander so its been something I have been thinking about a little. If I end up adding enough cards with cycling I also think that Astral Drift is somewhat reasonable in what it does when it cycles itself, its cheap enough to recur, and it could theoretically support other cycling cards if I ran enough of them. I don't really think that Astral Drift really will make sense to cast though as the number of cycling cards would have to be somewhat high but I think its still an alright effect with its cycling effect. Vedalken Aethermage could also be a potential card to run but I would probably want to expand my wizard package as right now it seems to be Nimble Obstructionist and Trinket Mage which I don't think I really plan to tutor for.
  • Drift of Phantasms - I would say transmute but it was really just this one card I was thinking about. Similarly to cycling transmute on creatures would trigger Dennick's token generation and I do think that I have some GREAT three drop options in this list. Lots of different problems can be solved by a three mana transmute but my issue mostly comes back to the fact that Drift of Phantasms isn't really a card I would ever want to cast / recur I don't think so it leaves me stuck transmuting it at sorcery speed. Sorcery speed also limits my potential to fill turns where nothing died with something that would generate clues on my opponents turns.
  • Sword of the Animist - I have a cheap commander who is often free to attack. Opponents might interfere with him more if he is flipped and carrying this but at the same time it would also give me something to do if he isn't flipped that I would be more than happy for him to die.
I think I need to mull over more potential card adds. The plainscycling cards seem interesting to me right now but I might have to put them in for some testing to really figure out where I stand on them. I think I am sold on cutting Trove Warden I just don't know what would be coming in for it offhand. It is also possible that if I add a few plainscycling cards that I could also cut into my land count some to offset which might be a thing I consider at something like a 2 to 1 sort of ratio.

Deck Change:
  • Teferi's Ageless InsightUniversal Surveillance I kept thinking about this and I think it is a change I want. I still think that there are benefits in Teferi's Insight but I think its a bit clunky to set up. Universal Surveillance also needs some setup but I think its top end is more impressive and its cast speed doesn't leave me with much for vulnerabilities.
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Post by ISBPathfinder » 2 years ago

I haven't gotten to play any in the last few weeks since my last post but I have been constantly circling back thinking about the plainscycling cards for this deck. I think I am going to go ahead and pull the trigger and see how they pan out. I opted to run these cards primarily because I saw value outside of just cycling a creature and triggering my commander.

DECK CHANGES:
  • Trove WardenAngel of the Ruins Trove Warden wasn't really working out for me after having seen it a few times. I just wasn't impressed by what it did and the setup it needed. Adding in Angel of the Ruins here for an early game cycler that still has a very relevant later game cast option answer that could also be stumbled into with a rez.
  • Serra's SanctumTimeless Dragon Sanctum was.... ok but I was mostly finding it to tap for 1-2 mana potentially. I don't think its quite good enough with my current enchantment count. It is a bit odd to cut a land for a nonland but I plan to cycle the dragon essentially every time making him sort of like a land still. I like that the eternalize gives me an option to get a blocker / attacker still out of him after already discarding him. We will see if the commander trigger for a clue is relevant enough but its something I wanted to test.
Its unfortunately been a bit hit or miss on my ability to show up lately for games. I am planning on moving in a few months though so I will have to see what sort of schedule they keep when I show up at the new place.
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Post by duducrash » 2 years ago

How do your feel about limited all star Startled Awake // Persistent Nightmare

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Post by ISBPathfinder » 2 years ago

duducrash wrote:
2 years ago
How do your feel about limited all star Startled Awake // Persistent Nightmare
It can repeatedly do its thing but my issue is how mana hungry and slow it is. It also only hits one player which is unfortunate. I have a lot of mana sinks with the clues in this deck as is so I am not really hurting for something like this. I also tend to favor mill that hits each opponent or somehow incorporates what I already am trying to do as how it mills. Most of the one shot milling effects don't do enough in my mind given how much of an uphill battle mill is for commander so I tend to like mill that is low cost and high potential performance.

Fractured Sanity is one of the only cards I run that breaks this kind of setup and thats because its cycle option is what I plan to do in most cases only casting it if I draw it late and need to push for the mill plan. I like that I can mill at instant speed while cantriping with that one. I tend to avoid a lot of one shot milling though in general and while Startled Awake // Persistent Nightmare isn't necessarily stuck to a one shot effect I don't think its mana efficient enough for me to want to be using its recursion.

Overall though I was building for more of a control concept to my build. The milling helps enable my commander to make clues which can keep me going rather than trying to mill to the win as fast as I can I consider it to be more of an engine of the deck that also eventually can win for me.
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Post by ISBPathfinder » 2 years ago

Well, I had an interesting..... experience with this deck. I was playing against Tergrid, God of Fright and Nihiloor. Yes, it was absolutely the worst experience of commander without just losing the game immediately I have had in a long time. I ended up scooping after going to no hand and having Nihiloor cast his commander to soley steal my commander after I finally flipped it when I had zero boardstate otherwise. I ended up scooping out of said game.

In a second game with the same two opponents the Nihiloor player switched to Azor, the Lawbringer and Tergrid, God of Fright played his commander back. Tergrid got us topdecking very quickly but I managed to sneak a Lion Sash into play which I used to combat his discard / sac based theft. Tergrid ended up with some larger creatures and went on the offensive but Azor started stabilizing via his commander and clocking Tergrid back. It ended up forcing a bit of a race between the two on each other where as I managed to sit back a bit. Azor killed Tergrid while going down to like 10 life. I forced him to chump block with his commander whom he had flickered with Sword of Hearth and Home but ironically couldn't afford to re-equip as I could force my Lion Sash to one shot him from where he stood. After doing so I hid my Lion Sash by equipping it to my commander as I know a lot of his removal is sweeper based. He ended up gaining some life for the turn but I flashed in Nimble Obstructionist off my blue and colorless mana and pushed pump on my Lion Sash to lethal him.

I did win one of the two games but I guess my take away was a little bit that Tergrid is a terrible matchup for this deck as I want to time a lot of my plays and throwing away my hand is tough. I might want to push a Homeward Path into the list which while I don't think on average I will eat theft I think the opportunity cost of including it is probably somewhat low. Its always funny to see my deck resorting to combat for a win but now and then it just comes through that way. This isn't a great summary of the games but I felt I would just mention that I finally managed to play Lion Sash and not only didn he stop a lot of terrible things from being stolen from Tergrid, he also managed to push me in combat to a win.
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Post by ISBPathfinder » 1 year ago

I have had a few games I played with three player where I really shouldn't have been playing this deck recently that went poorly just due to someone playing something aggressive and better geared for less opponents while putting pressure on me. This deck as I have it configured is really a lot better for those 4+ player games.

I will say that I have been putting up some really impressive results with Shadow Kin the few times I have seen it now. Last game I played with it I managed to turn it into Sheoldred, Whispering One on their first trigger and then Utvara Hellkite on the second one. I managed to make a dragon army that ran down the player I got the Utvara from which was funny as it just wasn't getting answered. The fact that it has flash has been so useful and in general it has just been putting in work for me.

In that same game I managed to get Smothering Tithe out against a Tatyova, Benthic Druid who ended up drawing like 40 cards in the next few turns and just let me have a ton of treasure. Luckily he draw his deck and then someone used a Demonic Tutor to get Sign In Blood and kill him with it lol.

I haven't managed to see the plaincyclers I added last time yet to really have an opinion on them yet.

Streets of New Capenna Review:
  • Bennie Bracks, Zoologist - Its a bit tricky as I usually feel like if I am in a situation where I am creating tokens on everyone's turns I am probably already in a good situation. I think this new legend is really sweet and in other decks that maybe are a little more consistent on their token setup I will likely run him but I need to get my commander to the backside then I need creatures to die / get milled and thats enough setup that I don't think Bennie is quite right here. I think if you were to run him there are probably times he will work but I am hesitant to run it. In hindsight I think a lot of the same things could be said about Academy Manufactor and Anointed Procession so I will have to probably give more thought to this type of card as a whole. To be honest, I don't know where I want and need to be but I could see Bennie maybe making it later given their inclusions or I could see all of them going away or anything in between. I think Academy Manufactor is my favorite of these right now due to being cheaper (better for casting / recurring), an artifact (tutorable), and the number of tokens it spawns when it does its thing. Its something to give more thought to as I play this more.
  • Elspeth Resplendent - I generally am not really a combat oriented concept and putting counters on Dennick concerns me from the standpoint that it gives more incentive to interact with him which I don't like adding to. The -3 ability though is quite reasonable and if the + ability was better for me I think I would be all for running this. In general though this deck survives to some degree by trying to fly under the radar so I really try not to run planeswalkers as my Propaganda effects don't defend them and it attracts opponents to my board.
  • Jailbreak - Its got a little bit of a hug feel to it but I think it has some versatility too. There are a lot of decks in white where I wouldn't mind using this on a fetchland of my own and thus give something small back to someone else for the same. I don't know that I want it here or anywhere in general but I think this card isn't unplayable I guess. It seems more interesting than the usual hug card to me and it could be great for those who like politics. This deck could play with some political cards and I think this one is very reasonable.
  • Smuggler's Share - Well, this might be the best commander singleton card of the set in my opinion. It doesn't offer opponents options and all of the things it does seems great in general. If opponents want to play fetchlands and need the mana in the same turn it even makes treasures off of that which is amazing.
  • Change of Plans - It mixes a few reasonable effects together. Connive can help set up a creature going to grave for Dennick to make a clue and it can help when you draw too many lands. The problem I have is that two mana plus X feels like it costs just a little too much. It can only target your own creatures as well and we aren't a go wide deck. I think its probably fine but I think ultimately I would rather play March of Swirling Mist for the targeting and lower cost even at the loss of the connive effect.
  • Cut Your Losses - I tend to favor repetitive triggers of milling over single stronger effect of milling as it just tends to be more consistent on setting up clue generation. I do think that the option to sacrifice Dennick is useful but being a six mana sorcery makes it a lot less appealing. I thought this was an upgrade over Maddening Cacophony (which I don't run) but Cacophany hits each opponent where as this is target player. I think I am fairly off of the scene with it being more of a Traumatize with the option of duplication.
  • Extravagant Replication - This card, is powerful. That said.... I think its also a card you are going to have to defend heavily with protection / counter magic. This deck wants to fly under the radar and generally I don't bother defending my boardstate outside of situations where I am clearly running away with things. Paying six mana for something that draws everyone's attention while doing nothing until next turn is something I generally try to avoid.
  • Flawless Forgery - I find most everything about this card to be clunky but using opponents graveyards as a resource in a mill deck isn't unreasonable. The sacrifice trigger is also alright but being an expensive sorcery really puts me off the scene. This is going to be a pass for me.
  • A Little Chat - Instant speed, reasonable cost for the effect, and another option to sacrifice my commander to it while being a totally playable card when I don't need to. This seems like it checks a lot of boxes for me and I fully intend to try it out. I guess if I was being greedy I would have asked for it to put the card I don't choose in grave but well, I am really happy with this card and want to see how it runs.
  • Make Disappear - I think it has some redeeming values similar to A Little Chat but modern day standard playable counter magic tends to be a little bit lower powered for this format. I think its a little under the bar of what I can reasonably push into a commander deck.
  • An Offer You Can't Refuse - It seems like a fantastic Negate like card filling a lot of similar roles as Swan Song, Flusterstorm, and Stubborn Denial. I think it will be a great card and I can't really fault anyone for running it. I don't know that I need to get down to one mana counters in this list specifically but I suspect that I will likely consider it in some list at some point.
  • Rooftop Nuisance - I think this is a cool effect but for three mana at sorcery speed it misses the mark a little for me. If it had been less mana / instant I might go for it but its just not quite there for me. I think that tapping creatures in commander is rather weak especially at sorcery speed but the draw a card and casualty effects of this card were more what I was contemplating it for. I think its just a little shy of the mark for me where its at though.
  • Slip Out the Back - Interesting protection but I guess I would have to question why not run March of Swirling Mist instead. I don't value the counter and the option to scale up is probably something I would value for this deck over being cheaper without the optional discard.
  • In Too Deep - I just don't really value split second on this type of effect much. It stops opponents from counter magicing this but a lot of other things that actually get played wouldn't really be relevant to respond to this with. Players don't run spot protection / hexproof much in this format. I think that its mostly just another weird answer aura which in some ways it can be better or worse than other versions that are already out there.
  • Mask of the Schemer - I think this is interesting and even useful in some decks that might have more intention of voltron. I think for my own list where I would be valuing the card movement more I would likely prefer Mask of Memory over this but I think this is a really useful new equipment for blue for some sort of evasive commander who might go for a voltron concept.
  • Witness Protection - Its another version of the aura answer but the selling point is definitely on its low cost. I think that this is a very playable card even if you aren't in an enchantress / auras concept just given how cheap it is. I don't run a lot of lock up answers in this deck but the low cost of this is legit.
  • Unlicensed Hearse - I think its graveyard hate effect is very reasonable and the option to power it up and have a good attacker / defender is fine. Its rare to see something like this where you get to pick multiple cards in a graveyard to exile and it doesn't even cost mana to do it. I think its very reasonable and I am considering it as I do need to stay on top of graveyards but I also just recently added the Lion Sash and I probably need to play more games to see where I stand on my grave hate before trying to throw another in the mix or replacing one of the ones I have.
  • Brokers Hideout - Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth and Yavimaya, Cradle of Growth exising and being run make these lands interesting but with a lack of landfall triggers I don't think I have a reason to run them.
  • Obscura Storefront - Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth and Yavimaya, Cradle of Growth exising and being run make these lands interesting but with a lack of landfall triggers I don't think I have a reason to run them.
DECK CHANGES:
  • Anointed ProcessionSmuggler's Share I did a little reflecting on some of my effects that require token production to be happening and while they can be really good, if I am not set up they don't really do anything. Even though I have been pushing a little more other token generation into my list I still think I should probably cut back on this given how inconsistent it can be. I like how Smuggler's Share seems powerful and it should function on its own.
  • Thran DynamoA Little Chat the extra mana generation stuff is good but not really until I am set up and I have on more than one occasion had issues getting my commander to the backside. I think that this new draw / sac option seems ok in that if I don't need to sac my commander its probably a tad weak but if I don't need to do that then I am probably in a better position. If I do need to sac him the draw seems very reasonable and I set up to play him from his backside.
  • Dowsing DaggerConfounding Conundrum I have been meaning to hate on lands a bit more for a bit. Landfall.deck has been invading the hell out of my meta of late and Conundrum feels like it has very little downside to the card even when its not amazing it still cheaply cantrips.
The focus of this change was heavily towards cutting back on some of my "good if set up" cards and try to add more cards that help me be set up and or stall to get set up. I feel like my change to include Confounding Conundrum was heavily dictated by meta deck construction so it might not be something I would run if not for all the damn landfall decks I see constantly. I think Smuggler's Share is probably worth testing on its own merit (assuming you can afford them) but its also nice that it gives a stronger return against those running land concepts.
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Post by ISBPathfinder » 1 year ago

Commander Legends: Baldur's Gate Review
  • Ancient Gold Dragon - My general consensus of all of the mythic dragon cycle is that they need a deck that can support them with a lot of haste / flash enabling for them to seem decent. There is just such a huge window of response in playing a big 6+ cmc dragon and waiting a turn for your opponents to kill, disable, clone, steal it that I don't particularly find any of them that appealing without further synergy in the build for them. I don't think that either of them fit this deck in particular.
  • Archivist of Oghma - This card likely will draw some cards but I want to point out that it will depend on your meta as to how often this sort of thing triggers. I think that fetchlands are going to be one of the more common triggers but ramp decks and landfall based decks will definitely make you trigger this more. I think the cost basis is low enough that I would be surprised if this isn't a good card as it really only takes like two cards back on investment for this to pay off. I am sort of afraid with some of the power level of some of the new cards lately where its just been ridiculous power level goes everywhere sort of cards that have no niche levels to them. I like seeing powerful cards my fear is powerful goes everywhere cards and I fear this might be one of those.
  • Ascend from Avernus - This is a good card but its also designed to fit very low curve creature tactics ideally with a mill or draw / discard sort of basis to it. It doesn't fit this type of deck in short but it is very good.
  • Banishment - I have complained about Oblivion Ring in this format for some time due to its slow speed and often dying incidentally while rewarding another player but I also think that giving them flash plus other utility makes them more appealing. I have played Cast Out quite a bit and its an effect I really enjoy in decks where I plan to keep mana up and be responsive. This take adds better token hate to the effect at the cost of the cycling but I think its a very respectable effect with a wide variety of use to it. I haven't made up my mind yet but I likely will try to pick one up and try it out.
  • Battle Angels of Tyr - This card is alright for mono white but probably more when sticking to angel themes and or lacking other colors for card advantage. I don't think this is really that great given how slow it is and still very interactable on several fronts.
  • Deep Gnome Terramancer - This is going to be another meta dependant sort of card but it plays very well against fetchlands and green ramp in general. Generally speaking good decks with good landbases run fetchlands so having a card that gets worse if your opponents are using worse tactics isn't really that big of a concern because the rest of your deck is probably still quite solid. This isn't me saying that you can't have a good deck without fetchlands but its less common to see. What I like about this card is he can get non basic plains and he doesn't care about having less lands or anything like that. I am actually quite interested to see how this new hatebear plays.
  • Ellyn Harbreeze, Busybody - Interesting design. Unfortunately it tends to play better to making a bunch of tokens in one go rather than spreading them out like this deck does. I don't think its quite good enough as a tap to draw a card creature as I have access to blue and reasonable draw already.
  • Legion Loyalty - I actually think that Myriad is not as good as people hype it to be. Don't get me wrong if you are a token deck with a Doubling Season and mass myriad you are going to do crazy things I just think the setup for Myriad is too much and even in a four player game its just unwieldy most of the time to get it setup. Beyond that myraid starts to lose power as players die so even if you are the one removing players your effects start getting worse as you need to push for the finish until the point that it literally does nothing. This is a card that you can theorize really crazy things as a finisher for it but my experience with mryaid just with Blade of Selves has mostly been negative. This isn't the deck to try it in either I just wanted to say my $0.02 on my take of Myraid as a whole.
  • Scouting Hawk - I think this is a very reasonable addition to the Knight of the White Orchid / Loyal Warhound options largely because it flies. Having flying opens options of equipment delivery which I like seeing on cheap white creatures so I think this is reasonable. That said, I also think that your meta needs to have a lot of green ramp decks to it or you need to be playing a less lands strategy yourself to get away with a lot of these effects. You can casually throw it in a deck as ramp but it is going to be very unfortunate when you draw a 1/1 for 3 bird with no ETB effect. I like to see this on a common too as it means its price tag and availability are going to be better for those in need of reasonable cards.
  • Windshaper Planetar - I think this is a fun trick but on an overcosted body. I don't value 4/4 angels much in this format and its really just Illusionist's Gambit with a stapled on angel to it. I just think there is a lot of competition for a flash defense strategy and many of them feel better than sending attacks elsewhere to me.
  • Ancient Silver Dragon - I don't see much synergy for this deck with what this does.
  • Bane's Contigency - I don't normally find three mana counterspells to be very appealing but I do think there are some commander choices out there that you should plan on taking quite a bit of hate for picking and this could be kind of nice if you were playing one of them. The hard part is playing the commander and making it back to having mana up for something like this. I don't think I want it for this deck but its interesting.
  • Blur - Its nothing really new but its nice to see more variations of this.
  • Candlekeep Sage - Its interesting in that I do need to kill off my commander and play them to the other side but it also doesn't curve well with my commander plan.
  • Displacer Kitten - This is a really strong effect, it just doesn't fit in this deck.
  • Elminster's Simulacrum - I don't mind the effect especially at instant speed but I have had a hard time making opponents clones really work as so much of commander these days requires you to build heavily on a specific strategy. If I can clone opponents generic value creatures its fine but then you come across tokens / spellslinger / tribal and some of this falls apart. I prefer playing off of my own deck than hoping opponents play in a specific way.
  • Feywild Visitor - wow this is actually really reasonable token production for some decks. I even have a few decks it might fit in. Sadly I don't do a lot of attacking with my creatures of this deck but it could be useful for some chaff tokens potentially. Interesting card.
  • Font of Magic - my issue with this type of card is that the way in which you make this card reasonable is probably completely miserable. The thing that stands out in my mind that might make this card work is playing obscene amounts of extra turns mixed with ramp and card draw. I hate that this is even a thing because if anyone ever pulls this off its going to be unfortunate. My issue with cost reduction is generally a question of how to make your list be filled with still good cards
  • Gale's Redirection - This card is a variation on Spelljack. It costs less mana but it doesn't make it automatically free to cast but depending on what you are countering there might be a very reasonable chance of getting to cast it for free. It seems alright I just have a hard time paying this much mana on counterspells.
  • Irenicus's Vile Duplication - Another copy your commander clone. This one being on a spell is nice but I don't think I really plan on running this effect either way. Its actually a downgrade to get this effect on a spell rather than a creature from a accidental mill opportunity.
  • Wizards of Thay - I like the design I just wish it was a legend so I could play it as a commander but then I suppose myraid wouldn't work right. I don't think it really works in this deck.
  • The Council of Four - Its card draw, token creation, and a huge blocker all in one. Honestly I probably need to think about this one a bit more because I could sac those tokens potentially to get clues in a pinch beyond just having some chump blocker options. I think this card is reasonable but maybe a little expensive to cast.
  • Elminster - This deck defends planeswalkers poorly so I generally don't run many over time value walkers here.
Ok, I am not entirely sure how all of these new hatebears are going to function but the solution to that is get them in for some testing. I do like that they are a cheap two mana with flash as it really plays well to how this deck likes playing and more draw / ramp are all things I don't mind doing. The plainscycling effects have been just ok for me. I didn't hate when I saw Timeless Dragon because the option to bring it back from grave felt like a little more value but the angel didn't feel as great to me so I was sort of thinking about cutting the angel but with some nice new things to test I think I am just going to boot them to the curb a bit early. It is a bit awkward in that I cut a land for one of them but I am looking at primarily cheap draw / ramp with these changes so lets see how this goes not recovering one of my land count.

DECK CHANGES:
  • Angel of the RuinsDeep Gnome Terramancer the potential return of the Terramancer is much higher and my total land in play count does matter. I don't know what to expect back from it but I think the potential of this little guy as far as total ramp is really good. The better my opponents decks the more likely he will trigger a few times for me.
  • Thorough InvestigationLoyal Drake I don't mind investigation making me clues but it can be sort of time consuming to get to more draw and I didn't find myself enjoying micro manage the dungeon stuff. I just want something a little more compact that will give me some card advantage.
  • Timeless DragonArchivist of Oghma I have no clue how easy it is going to be to draw cards off of this new dork but I guess its time to test it out. I feel like there is going to be a lot of variance from meta to meta but I guess we will see.
  • Wipe AwayBanishment Wipe Away has been borderline on getting cut for me for a bit now. I do like its ability to break through interaction but bounce is often not enough for me in a single target situation. Banishment being able to interact with a whole token army is appealing so lets give it a shot and see how the flexible effect works out.
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Post by darrenhabib » 1 year ago

There are advantages to having both sides of Dennick, Pious Apprentice in play if doing a mill strategy.
You mentioned that actually killing Dennick to then cast for Disturb transform is a factor.
If you clone Dennick then you can leave the copy in play and then cast for disturb as well. This has the benefit of making it hard for graveyard strategies to target cards, as well as a way to kill him in the first place.
Glasspool Mimic and Phantasmal Image are the best cost effective to slot into the deck imo.

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Post by ISBPathfinder » 1 year ago

darrenhabib wrote:
1 year ago
There are advantages to having both sides of Dennick, Pious Apprentice in play if doing a mill strategy.
You mentioned that actually killing Dennick to then cast for Disturb transform is a factor.
If you clone Dennick then you can leave the copy in play and then cast for disturb as well. This has the benefit of making it hard for graveyard strategies to target cards, as well as a way to kill him in the first place.
Glasspool Mimic and Phantasmal Image are the best cost effective to slot into the deck imo.
Its not a bad thought but I also think its worth looking at a few other elements.

1) Falloff of sac over time - By this I mean that the longer the game goes the more likely I am to have found one or more sac options. I love having a means of killing him off early but at the same time most sac options aren't great in duplicate so I like my means of sac to be useful outside of just sacrificing by means of tapping for mana, drawing cards, or making tokens or something. In this I mean that I could add something like Altar of Dementia to the list which does have some synergy as well but I don't care for it outside of getting my commander to the graveyard but ultimately what it does outside of that is going to be very narrow.
2) Graveyard Hate - the front side of Dennick can hate on some graveyard effects but there are probably just as many if not more things that he fails to hate on. Self recurring creatures, mass recurring effects, or even eldrazi shuffles can be a problem when you are milling players and while he does stop some targeted grave recursion I don't think that the hate effect is sufficient for me to want to commit to him as a means of grave hate.
3) Alternative Clone Options - I counted my creatures and there are somewhere between 8 and 10 that could be cloned alright. I think that number is a bit low personally considering that cloning my commander falls off as being all that viable as time goes on.
4) Sweepers - its also worth mentioning that clones aren't great against sweepers in that you lose the commander and your sac outlet. Most of my sac outlets right now are diversified over other permeant types which gives me some insulation from losing both commander and my sac option in the same go.

So, I guess where I stand is I see what you are getting at and it could work. That said I think there are some concerns with clones with my low target count as well as diminishing returns over time but its possible that some more diverse clones could still work. Glasspool Mimic being a potential land play is probably an acceptable alternative play route for that to be worth considering and it fits the curve of playing Dennick on front and back on curve. Clever Impersonator could also be an option even though it doesn't fit the curve as well the fact that it can clone noncreatures is interesting given how many powerful options I run on those fronts. Cackling Counterpart also has some advantages in being an instant speed spell and having some cool things with its flashback potential.

I need to think about them a bit more as well as do some testing of these new cards. I am a bit worried that the new two mana flash creatures might be a bit narrow in when they trigger but with such a low cost to cast them I think even a single trigger often makes them worth having. I will give the clones idea a bit more thought but I have some concerns as of right now.
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Post by darrenhabib » 1 year ago

ISBPathfinder wrote:
1 year ago
Its not a bad thought but I also think its worth looking at a few other elements.
As the game goes longer you're bound to have a sacrifice land, so thinking about sac outlets like Witch's Oven it has less value the longer the game goes, where as clones like Phantasmal Image or Phyrexian Metamorph can copy opponents powerful creatures as well.
Only the Glasspool Mimic copies your own creatures and of course that has redundancy as a land.
Mirrorpool is another land that allows you to do this.
I do think it's the perfect curve, if you just have one clone in your starting hand then it's worth a keep, as you can go Turn 2
Dennick, Pious Apprentice, Turn 3 Clone, Turn 4 Dennick, Pious Apparition, and then start deploying your engines. Even though you say that there are mass graveyard effects, at the same time insulating from graveyard strategies that do target means that you do have a measure of safety with this curve built into your commander.

Eiganjo, Seat of the Empire could be a nice option with Weathered Wayfarer and Expedition Map, especially as your play group discovers that you have it as an option. So in games where you have these in play they know that if they attack you that the can potentially lose a creature by searching it up at instant speed.

Diamond Valley does look super weak in this deck, the fact that it doesn't provide mana. I'm just not seeing any recursive value, and if you playing it early to remove Dennick, then you are always a mana behind the entire game.

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Post by ISBPathfinder » 1 year ago

darrenhabib wrote:
1 year ago
As the game goes longer you're bound to have a sacrifice land, so thinking about sac outlets like Witch's Oven it has less value the longer the game goes, where as clones like Phantasmal Image or Phyrexian Metamorph can copy opponents powerful creatures as well.
Only the Glasspool Mimic copies your own creatures and of course that has redundancy as a land.
Mirrorpool is another land that allows you to do this.
I do think it's the perfect curve, if you just have one clone in your starting hand then it's worth a keep, as you can go Turn 2
Dennick, Pious Apprentice, Turn 3 Clone, Turn 4 Dennick, Pious Apparition, and then start deploying your engines. Even though you say that there are mass graveyard effects, at the same time insulating from graveyard strategies that do target means that you do have a measure of safety with this curve built into your commander.

Eiganjo, Seat of the Empire could be a nice option with Weathered Wayfarer and Expedition Map, especially as your play group discovers that you have it as an option. So in games where you have these in play they know that if they attack you that the can potentially lose a creature by searching it up at instant speed.

Diamond Valley does look super weak in this deck, the fact that it doesn't provide mana. I'm just not seeing any recursive value, and if you playing it early to remove Dennick, then you are always a mana behind the entire game.
Witch's Oven does look kind of suspect at a glance but it also opens up my artifact tutoring via Trinket Mage and Whir of Invention to get a sac outlet without going the long way around getting Expedition Map and cracking into High Market. It also has synergy with Academy Manufactor, Urza, Lord High Artificer, Shimmer Dragon, Grinding Station, and Inspiring Statuary. The chaff artifacts that it makes are rarely all that exciting on their own but I also don't run a ton of lifegain so cracking them vs aristocrat concepts can occasionally come up but I think its value is more in being easy to grab with a number of tutors while also propagating some of the artificer concepts. I have drawn it quite a bit so far via draw and tutor and have been overall reasonably happy with its performance. If I did entertain cutting it from my list I would probably have to add another artifact based sac outlet to the list and potentially shift Trinket Mage back to Tezzeret the Seeker but I think I like where the oven stands right now in curve potential even with using some of the tutors to get it the curve for it feels fairly good to me.

Side note I did actually win a game off of having Food Tokens to back up an Angels Grace play once. I would have died to a Purphoros, God of the Forge + Kykar, Wind's Fury in an infinite loop situation and I would have died at my upkeep except I had a lot of food and mana that he couldn't push past on my turn. That might sound somewhat niche but food can be very useful especially with Angel's Grace.

Eiganjo, Seat of the Empire - I just don't see it being relevant enough. I am not generally afraid of a single 4 or less toughness creature coming at me in combat. I do have to fear commander damage on occasion its just that this card won't remove any of the commanders that I would be afraid of commander damage with. Generally speaking in order for win conditions 1) Tokens tokens tokens 2) combo 3) aristocrat (aka non combat damage / life loss) 4) voltron. I wouldn't say I don't respect voltron but I would much much rather pack a maze effect than this effect. In my opinion, white's utility land for this cycle is by far the worst for commander.

Diamond Valley - It is on the weaker side but saying it doesn't tap for mana in this day and age where both green and black have an Urborg type card is a little heavy handed. It is true I am not running either of them myself but I have seen it tap for mana most of the time I have seen it from an enemy transforming all lands with these effects. I will keep an eye on it and its true that if I get a nonbasic land tutor I almost always go for High Market but I haven't found Diamond Valley to be a bad card to have. I unfortunately sold my The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale a while back or I might bring in Tabernacle instead of Valley but alas its gone and unlikely for me to spring the money to get another.

Cloning Opponents Targets - You aren't wrong that its an option but I also think its important to look at your meta as to what sort of tactics are played commonly. If you play against ETB decks I think clones get better but I also think there are a lot of types of decks that cloning opponents assets isn't very useful. Keep in mind I am playing as a mill deck so even something like an Avenger of Zendikar is something I can't really support half as well as the landfall deck. This is also assuming there are opponents cards worth cloning at all. I have seen a lot of decks of late that without having the full synergy and focus of their deck that cloning / stealing their cards are not easy to work with. Lots of tribal decks / spellslinger / aristocrats all can be hard to work with via clones. My own assessment of clones as far as my opponents decks go has changed a lot in the last 10+ years. Early on in commander history everyone was heavy on ETB tactics but with the change to commander tuck as well as broadening of niche strategies I feel clones have been hit in a very negative way that have made them worse in more recent years. This isn't me saying that you will never get a decent clone target out of opponents but I do think that the value of enemy clone targets has shifted to make it more of a meta call.
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Post by rexyplaysmtg » 1 year ago

Couldn't agree more! I would even consider (again possibly) Archive Trap or Psychosis Crawler for some mill and passive damage since this deck also has a good amount of control. Bruvac the Grandiloquent is my favorite card for milling tbh; the faces of your opponents when you have a Body of Knowledge out with 20 cards in your hand and 15 damage dealt to it paired with a Teferi's Tutelage, ultimately milling each opponent 60 cards brings me much joy.

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