Sigarda, Heron's Grace

Sigarda has been a bit maligned. The fact that she's a 5 mana commander that doesn't protect herself is a bit awkward. Her abilities also seem a bit odd. Ostensibly she's protecting her tokens, but 1/1s generally aren't the target of spells or abilities beyond Goblin Sharpshooter. There's an underlying strength to her though that I think people are looking past. She combines an effective hate ability, hexproofing yourself, with a solid token generation ability. She doesn't ask much for either, and if you go big on mana doesn't have to be in play long to get you an army.

One of the reasons I held off on Sigarda is that I think she only functions if she's backed up by legacy level cards, specifically Gaea's Cradle. However, with the recent release of Eternal Masters, I thought I'd celebrate with a couple of lists that are a bit more expensive. Sigarda was a prime candidate since she scales really well into the amount of money you spend on her. The two lists presented are a more normal ramp and tokens list that leans more heavily on tokens and lands. The second is a hate list that takes advantage of Sigarda's ability to protect human lock pieces and giving you protection. There was a third list that I had originally planned on, which took advantage of the fact that most Enchantresses are humans. However, that list felt weaker than the version built around Sigarda, Host of Herons.

Sigarda Tokens: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/19-05-16-sigarda/

This list has many different axis. With 40 lands, Crucible/LftL/Restore/KotR/etc, the deck can play a solid Land's game of incremental advantage. With Sigarda and the token support, the deck plays a solid Token's game. It combines several different parts to form a deck resistant to disruption that gets ahead on mana and ends the game with huge plays.

Token Support:

Anthems and ways to eat tokens for value.

Lands:

Some of the lands that the deck is built around and other lands based ramp. Knight is a great engine.

Ramp:

The deck is built around lands and eschews artifact ramp. I didn't put Null Rod/Stony Silence in this shell, but its set up in such a way that you could slot it in without a hitch.

Value:

Card advantage engines and value creatures to smooth out some of the deck's rough patches.

Tutors:

A suite of tutors to find what you need. 

Sigarda Hate: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/sigarda-hate/
Hate decks tend to include white since cards like stony silence and rest in peace and quite strong. Pairing with green means that you can still ramp efficiently with creatures. Sigarda has a relevant hate ability, giving you Leyline of Sanctity. It so happens that several hate bears are humans, like Containment Priest and Ethersworn Cannonist. Extending the hexproof to a few high impact creatures. The tokens don't get a lot of support in this list, but they're mostly to suppliment Sigarda's aggression and help close out games. There's some anti-synergy, as there is in most hate decks. For the most part you just play efficient creatures and try to beat people to death.

Humans:


Hate:


Mana:


Tutor:


Misc:

Archangel Avacyn

            

    This week, the headline crazy of Shadows Over Innistrad is on display. There's a lot to unpack with this card. A card's color identity is predicated on both of its faces, so this is a W/R legend. At 5 mana, she's on the more expensive side for a non-green Commander. However, Flash mitigates that by a large amount. The ability to play her at any time means that you don't have to pass with her in play, so she's usually going to be safe. Flying and Vigilance are great keywords for voltron. Not having to tap to attack and having built in evasion makes her excellent to put Swords or Loxodon Warhammer on. Her enter the battlefield trigger is quite impactful. She can stop opposing Wraths, win combat, and lets you land Wraths of your own without losing anything. The transform trigger doesn't go off until the next upkeep, which gives players time to see it coming, but the big interaction is that her enter the battlefield trigger makes it hard to flip her immediately. Unless you build in sacrifice effects, she can take 2-3 turns to transform. The trigger is only for non-angel creatures. You could theoretically have a deck that can't flip her and still have a decent number of creatures. There's some logic to not flipping her as well if you are doing voltron. Losing vigilance hurts if you are committed to the voltron plan. Flipping her once isn't a huge game, but if you can get multiple flips she can do some serious work, especially if you include blink effects to get indestructible triggers with the transform trigger on the stack.

    Given this, what are the ways we can build around her? There's the fairly obvious voltron plan. There's plenty of W/R voltron decks though. For this week, I'm focusing on the two triggers, the etb and flip aspects of Avacyn.

Avacyn Blinks: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/avacyn-blinks/

    Blink based decks have included Blue in their color identity for as long as I can remember. Blue gives access to Deadeye Navigator, Ghostly Flicker, and Momentary Blink. However, there is now a critical mass of mono-white cards for blink. Eldrazi Displacer fills in for Deadeye, and Avacyn's trigger is a powerful way to protect a full board of creatures. (Note: Running Displacer means running a solid amount of colorless producing lands.) Restoration Angel hilariously can't blink Avacyn, but she's strong enough in the strategy that she warrants an inclusion. To get mileage out the etb creatures, Avacyn adds the following:

 
    White and Red also have access to a number of Pseudo-blink mechanics. White with reanimation mechanics and red with clones. A number of these cards are protected by Avacyn or each other. Many of these ineract with the graveyard. Some sacrifice outlets are provided later on, but the deck might want to have more in practice. To get more milage out of the etb creatures, Avacyn adds the following:


    Of course all this blinking doesn't matter if we don't have some good targets. Several of the psuedo-blinks are themselves targets, like Reveillark and Karmic Guide. These targets all have strong card advantage abilities to overcome R/W's inherent lack of card flow. This section is the most customizable. I tried to cover a spread of effects. Removal, card draw, mana, life gain, graveyard hate, etc, while still staying on non-angels with power 2 or less. To get on the board, Avacyn adds the following:


    White and Red are traditionally the worst edh pairing since they have so much trouble staying even on cards and mana with the rest of the table. This deck has already addressed this to an extent with powerful and reusable enters the battlefield triggers. To further compensate, Avacyn has included a number of engines. Of course, the most important engines are the creatures. Avacyn makes investing in those creatures safe since she provides protection for them. That said, cards like Skullclamp are still too strong to ignore. Especially important are the Altars. They give an outlet for infinite shenanigans with Reveillark and Karmic Guide, but also give you an out to get cards in your graveyard for reanimation or flipping Avacyn. To get incremental advantage, Avacyn adds the following:


    Mana:


    Rounding out the list involves some removal, board wipes, and equipment. Board wipes are particularly strong with Avacyn. Boros Charm is included as a back up to Avacyn and also protects your other permanents. There's only a little removal overall since several of the creatures are removal, but sometimes you just need a Swords to Plowshares. There isn't a focus on voltron-able creatures in the list, but Avacyn herself is a solid equip target. To cover her ass, Avacyn adds the following:


Avacyn Burns: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/avacyn-burns/

    The second list is going to share a significant amount of the same card pool, however the focus is on the flip trigger. In a Gisela like shell with multiple damage amplifications. In Gisela there are two challenges: getting enough mana to play her and have her stick around, and getting the earthquake effect. For Avacyn Burns, its much simpler. Avacyn has a less intense cost, has flash, and she provides the earthquake effect. So the construction can focus more on the Furnace of Rath type effects and less on mana acceleration and AoE damage.

    Damage amps and aoe pain:


   While the damage effect is tied to the general, it still requires there to be quite a few creatures in the deck in order to flip Avacyn. While not as heavy as the last deck, they still take up a significant amount of space. I also tried to maintain the spread of effects and used the creatures mostly as spells. I figure Avacyn herself will kill most people. To have triggers, Avacyn adds the following:


   Since the general is going to be a larger compomnent of this deck's combat plan, going for a stronger voltron theme was warranted. Focusing on her trigger makes cards like Basilisk Collar very attractive. It was also important to keep some ways to sacrifice/bounce/reset Avacyn for future triggers. Utility and buffs:



    Mana:


    Some tricks carry over, and board wipe + indestructible is definitely one of them. Removal:

Olivia, Mobilized for War

                                                                             
    Shadows Over Innistrad has arrived and its brought with it a bevy of interesting generals. While the Frog is a huge hit, I think that Olivia is as big a hit. She provides you several build paths. Her ability has multiple parts to it which can all be built around.  The ability triggers when creatures enter the battlefield. Importantly, the trigger doesn't care about where they enter from or if the creatures are played. Black and red are excellent at cheating big things into play via Sneak Attack effects or Reanimation effects. That the cheated creatures get haste and set-up the next reanimation effect via discard is a huge bonus. However, the creatures don't have to be cheated. Simply casting large dudes that get +1/+1 and haste that don't die at end of turn is a huge effect. While not as good at it as Drana, Olivia does enable +1/+1 counter synergies. Specifically, she is great with Persist. Cauldron of Souls is a solid card on its own that can repeatedly save your creatures with Olivia out. Finally, she turns the creatures you boost into vampires and enables madness. Unfortunately, in EDH madness falls flat. Most of the cards aren't strong enough, but some, like Big Game Hunter, are worthwhile. The tribal component essentially builds itself, so, I will be focusing on the first two aspects of her ability, reanimation and hasty beats.

Olivia, Reanimation Machine: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/olivia-reanimation-machine/

    Getting the mixture of low cost dudes and discard outlets to large targets is going to be fiddly. The other hurdle for this Olivia is the amount of card draw that you need to function. You need a ton of draw power with all the discard. Since the deck wants you to be discarding consistently, taking turns 'off' to cast draw spells like Promise of Power isn't as good as landing a Phyrexian Arena. Olivia wants to spend her mana on making large dudes, not drawing cards. That isn't to say Olivia won't play draw spells, just that they should be cheap on mana. Some, like Wheel of Fortune or Tormenting Voice, line up perfectly for Olivia's game plan. However, consistently getting extra cards for free is what you really want to be setting up. Unfortunately, the deck can't support Necropotence due to the discard-to-exile clause. While I'm not normally a fan of planeswalkers in EDH, Ob Nixilis functions as another Phyrexian Arena and makes the cut this time. To counteract the card disadvantage and give the deck sufficient velocity Olivia adds the following:

    Life total isn't a huge concern for most Commander decks. Starting at 40 ensures that things like fetchlands and the odd Sylvan Library hit are incidental. This deck is spending a significant amount of life to buoy its card advantage and the starting 40 is still going to run out quickly unless some serious life gain is included. Whip of Erebos is a no-brainer. Its back up reanimation and can gain an absurd amount of life. A single Gray Merchant can gain a significant amount of life, but repeatedly reanimating him can easily clock a whole table. Polluted Bonds and Exquisite Blood will make you a target for the whole table, so just be careful that you aren't in a horrendous board position before you play them. To ensure she doesn't kill herself, Olivia adds the following:


    I want to include Skullclamp. I don't think this deck is supporting it as best as it can, but there are some cards that it works exceedingly well with that Olivia also wants to play. Cards like Bloodghast, Kher Keep, and Squee. Squee fulfills many functions in this deck. It prompts discard when played, it can be discarded for value, and it can be eaten by clamp and other effects repeatedly. There are plenty of other low cost discard enablers to clamp as well. Clamp will do work, just not be the super star it is in something like Ghave. Low cost creatures are the go to discard outlets since they can have excellent additional purpose, like Magus of the Wheel and Grave Scrabbler. The best utility dude is Disciple of Bolas. The life gain and the card draw are useful and the body is clamp-able. To ensure a flow of discard and utility effects, Olivia adds the following:


    For the remaining reanimation targets, Olivia wants to be getting immediate effects. The goal is to have the reanimation chain to the next reanimation spell. Barring drawing cards or tutoring, the next best thing is to have some other enter the battlefield effect to get immediate value out of the reanimation. Haste gives Olivia some leeway over traditional reanimator strategies since the creature will be able to attack immediately. To punch her opponents to death, Olivia adds the following:


    The question is, then, what reanimation spells should go into the deck? Its easy to say ALL OF THEM! and knock off for lunch, but there's probably some that are better for us than others. For instance, Zombify and it's 5 mana ilk are out. We either want to be cheaper or build in additional function. The additional function in this case is being a creature. Since Olivia's creatures gain haste and prompt a discard, being a creature that reanimates is awesome. Consider Doomed Necromancer. On turn 4 you can play the doomed dude, discard a fatty to give him haste, then pay B to sacrifice him for the reanimation immediately. Coffin Queen isn't quite as low mana but gains the value of repetition. Phyrexian Delver unfortunately needs a target in the graveyard already since you have to announce the target for the enters the battlefield ability as it triggers, but its also a 3/2 that can do real things in combat. Another 3/2 worth discussing is Puppeteer Clique. The fairy can't get creatures from your graveyard, but persist is a great ability with Olivia. You can just discard a card to clear the -1/-1 counter for as many cards as you have in hand. To bring out the dead, Olivia adds the following:



    The remainder of the list are just good all-rounders. Mana acceleration, some extra damage, removal, and tutoring.


    That concludes the Reanimation Machine. I've done some test hands and I'd put this at medium casual. It could certainly be tuned to get into low competitive territory, but as is could be played in most any play group.

Olivia, Hasty Beats - http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/olivia-hasty-beats/

    While the last deck was attempting to set up an engine for continuous reanimation, this Olivia list looks to just bring some hasty dudes. It is more focused on actually casting the creatures so it doesn't have as many moving parts. This is a simpler construction overall.

High Impact dudes:


Setup Dudes:


Card Draw/advantage:


Tricks:


Mana:


    This version builds on the principles of the first version. However, instead of cheating the dudes, Olivia just wants to attack. The Haste aspect of her ability is on display here, ensuring you can pummel unsuspecting opponents into the ground.

    I didn't figure the list out myself, but I believe there's an Olivia list that works similar to this Drana list: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/12-10-15-EGK-drana/. The primary challenge is the mana. That deck could generate tons of mana from Cabal Coffers, and I don't think there's anything comparable in B/R. However, if counters are your thing, then that's probably a good place to start.

    This is week one of Shadow Over Innistrad. Next week I'll choose another legend from the new set and do the same process. Till next time, Cheers!

Build of the Week: Mizzix

Thanksgiving was fun, and I hope everyone enjoyed themselves. This week I'm tackling a Goblin Engineer. There are two schools of thought when it comes to Mizzix. On the one hand, people look at her ability and think of Storm, using her like a legendary Goblin Electromancer to be able to play multiple spells in a turn. The other school of thought is to use her like a mana battery. Enabling the use of huge spells in what is commonly called Battlecruiser Magic. Battlecruiser Magic goes to the heart of what EDH is all about, so I'll be focusing on the second school of thought. Here is an approximation of a storm list if that is more up your ally.

When thinking of U/R big mana decks, my first thought was the UR Tron lists of original Ravnica that were later ported into Modern. Defined by its enormous plays, the deck leaned on a few monolithic threats to close out a game while drawing absurd amounts of cards with X spells. Mizzix acts like a Thran Dynamo or better most of the time, letting your X spells be larger and larger, while also making playing Clone Legion and Time Stretch in the same turn a possibility.

The last article on Daxos was about determining the overlap between his abilities. This week, the construction is about figuring out how to go from zero to 60 in as little time as possible. Daxos' abilities didn't care about escalation. Every enchantment you played had the same value. Mizzix only rewards you for playing a spell with a greater mana cost than the counters you already have. While this means that the higher cost cards will always trigger her, they won't be getting cheaper very fast. Thus, I broke the spells down into Stages of development.

Decklist: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/23-11-15-KKG-mizzix/
Bullshit Scale: 3

Stage 1

Stage 1 is from 0 - 3 counters. When Mizzix first resolves, we have to build our experience counters. Cantrips are beautiful here. Not only do they increase the number of experience counters we have, they also find higher converted mana cost spells from Stage 2 to continue our development. Unfortunately, they stop adding to our experience counters the fastest, so we can't run as many as would be ideal. This is one of the big divergences between  this version and Storm. Storm doesn't need to continually add to the experience, so it plays many more spells in stage one for smoothing.

Stage 2

Stage 2 is from 4 - 6 counters. For the most part, they are draw spells. It's generally at about this point that we are going to start to run out of resources. A strong draw spell will give us more gas, keep adding on counters from Mizzix, and give us more land to more naturally hit our top end if our goblin engineer is incapacitated for some reason. Its important to hold off on casting these until you are at a higher number of experience counters if possible. If you cast these before you have 4 counters, its likely that you are cutting off other spells from being able to add to your experience. There are some tricks here. Gush's alternate cost, Delve, Rebound, Flashback. The point here is to get the maximum amount of value out of the experience trigger as possible, not necessarily out of the cost reduction.

Stage 3

Stage 3 is where the big payoff is for the deck. Mizzix lets us do these things either much earlier or much larger than they were intended to be done. X in an X spell does get reduced by her ability, so she acts like free mana for Stroke of Genius and similar spells. However, X spells clash with Mizzix's Mastery, oddly enough, and Epic Experiment so I tried to keep the X spells to the absolute cream of the crop. They don't clash with Past In Flames. Having two Yawgmoth's Will analogs in a deck with Delve spells is going to cause some complications occasionally, but the effects are so tremendously powerful that its worth the anti-synergy. These spells are how we're most often going to win the game.  That, and Blazes to the dome for 20 or more.

Utility/Protection

While the other instants and sorceries are on a ramping curve, these spells should be cast whenever you need to cast them. A big upside is that they still do add counters. Protecting Mizzix with her trigger condition is just common sense. For the most part, these are ways to protect Mizzix from those who would do her harm, but Reiterate is a solid way of extracting maximum value out of all of our spells. While I didn't include many Earthquakes, you could easily swamp a couple in and have strong board clearing capabilities if you need to protect yourself from swarms of creatures frequently.

Permanents

While the deck is largely spells, having some powerful permanents does help. Crucible is to help ensure we can keep hitting land drops forever, and it interacts well with Command Beacon to keep Mizzix to a reasonable cost in long games. Orrery and Leyline are specifically good since the deck has a lot of powerful sorceries and wants to be able to play Mizzix without fear of sorcery speed removal. Mizzix is generally winning outside of combat damage, and thus Meishin is an excellent card to keep us from getting run over. That we can have 10+ cards in hand from draw spells and Reliquary Tower ensure it can be extremely potent. The original UR Tron lists had monolithic creatures to win the game for them. While we are mostly spells to take advantage of Mizzix, I included Kozilek and Ulamog to supplement our win conditions. They don't need much support, they can win the game on their own, and they also serve as Feldon's Canes. With multiple X draw spells, its possible for the deck to run out of library. Having them as deck cyclers is useful going long without having to include cards specifically for that purpose. You could include Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger if you wanted, but I decided against him or more large threats since they don't have the ancillary function of preventing decking.

Mana

It is imperative that we have Mizzix on the table as fast as possible. The first turn or two should consist of playing some piece of artifact mana, then playing Mizzix, then going through the stages of development. Artifact mana also helps us recast her if she dies, and enable us to cast the top end spells even if she is currently incapacitated.

There are 18 basics in the list, and several U/R dual lands. I tried to keep the selection of colorless lands to a minimum. Mizzix puts more emphasis on colored lands since she reduces generic costs. Its more likely that we'll be short a colored mana to cast a second spell. Command Beacon/Petrified Field/Crucible of Worlds is a trio that should help us keep Mizzix on the table even through heavy resistance. Myriad Landscape transforms into two colored sources and Thawing Glaciers ensures we'll hit lands drops essentially forever. Winding Canyons acts as another Orrery effect for Mizzix, letting us play her with flash gets past a lot of the potential counter play. I'm not sure Academy Ruins is going to earn its spot. Without self-sacrificing artifacts to recur it loses some of its bite. If I were to cut one of these for another colored source, Ruins would be top of the list. The bottom of that list is Reliquary Tower. You draw so many cards from the X spells that stacking this with Thought Vessel is worth the redundancy. Mage-Ring Network also seems like a solid backup plan. Getting bursts of mana lets us at least cast one of the big spells in the absence of Mizzix.

The roads not traveled.
Storm was discussed as a possible alternative, but another potential alternative is to go with an almost mono-color version and include Gauntlet of Power/High Tide effects. That gives you a huge boost to mana, enough to power out the high cost stuff in the deck without Mizzix in play. I chose to avoid that route since it doesn't feel Izzet-y. Having to lean on one land type more than the other also restricts deck building to an extent and I wanted to include things like Insurrection and Molten Disaster.  The plodding pace of 1 land per turn will still get us there, and comes with added benefit of being able to recast Mizzix post Planar Cleansing style sweeper. Lands are the most stable source of mana in EDH, which is why green is so strong.

Without changing anything about the deck's overall construction, there are still many obvious improvements that could be made. Cut for budget reasons were Snapcaster Mage and Jace, Vryn's Prodigy. They are both excellent. Also, given how mana hungry the deck is, Mana Crypt would be an excellent addition. Also, more free counter spells would help, such as Force of Will and Pact of Negation.

Firemind's Foresight/Reset/Turnabout/Mystic Tutor - This package is pretty standard in UR decks as a compact way to generate infinite mana. While the deck would certainly win more with the inclusion of these cards, I don't think it would be better for it. As it stands, the deck is powerful and explosive, but its not consistent enough to be a terror. Including this package or more tutors would push it over the edge into a 4 on the Bullshit Scale.

Mizzix really pushed a different style of deck. With 46 nonpermanents, its going to have challenging draws. It certainly seems like a blast to play though when its firing on all cylinders. I'll be back next week with Meren. Till then, Cheers!

Daxos the Returned.

Daxos has interesting components. The interplay between his experience counters and his active ability is not immediately obvious. He gives you creature token threats, but is asking you to cast enchantments. The cost of the token doesn't change, so you have to cast three or more enchantments for the tokens to become cost effective. Even then, its still a three mana ability, putting it out of range of a use whenever mentality. Its going to take serious commitments to use that ability multiple times in a turn. Thinking about enchantments and creatures, the overlap is in Anthem effects. Enchantments that make your creatures better have been part of the game since Alpha with Crusade. Here, they not only make all of your creatures larger while in play, they also make all of Daxos' tokens larger permanently on cast. To support this direction, B/W tokens is an archetype that pops up now and again, and it similarly crosses heavy token production with strong Anthem effects. Tokens increase the value of the anthems by increasing the number of 'creatures' in the deck without taking up additional slots. The also give you multiple bodies per card, increasing the potency of the Anthems. Its worth noting that in this instance, I'm sticking to permanents instead of playing the traditional Lingering Souls/Raise the Alarm token producers. B/W is much better at permanents, a la Emeria Shepherd, than it is at instants and sorceries. Those one shot token producers are also a bit too low impact in a format like Commander.

The other aspect of the tokens that Daxos produces is that they are enchantments themselves, providing a huge number of triggers for Constellation cards like Doomwake Giant. Unfortunately, Constellation payoffs that are important for EDH largely landed in green with Eidolon of Blossoms and Strength from the Fallen. However, the ones that are relevant are still stronger here than anywhere else. Curiously the card Skybind both exists and received little fanfare. Its a strong card that combines well with the deck's themes, and helps contribute to a sub-theme of creatures that like to be journeyed. The creatures in question tend to make tokens, which ties into the Anthem theme of the deck.

Decklist: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/02-11-15-nRh-daxos/
Bullshit Scale: 3

These enchantments are double anthems for Daxos' tokens as long as Daxos is on the battlefield when you cast them. I included True Conviction, even though it isn't technically an Anthem. It gives the creatures enough of a punch to win the game and dominate combat. Marshal's Anthem is fine to cast without kicker, but its main objective is to be kicked 2-4 times. As you'll see later, we can go big with our mana. That's mostly used for Daxos' activated ability, but it comes with some side benefits too, such as including Marshal's Anthem. While Eldrazi Monument isn't an enchantment, +1/+1, flying, and indestructible is an incredibly strong effect. Its worth the inclusion, though you do need to continually be producing bodies for it to be functional. It helps protect against the large number of board wipes you'll see at some EDH tables. The evasion is also important. Not a lot of the tokens naturally fly, and you can still be stymied on the group by an opposing Rhys or Ghave player.

I stuck mostly to white token producers because of Crusade and Honor of the Pure. Bitterblossom isn't worth the trouble since it produces black tokens by the above Anthems. Several of the token producers make soldiers, so I included Captain of the Watch as another card to pump my army. I don't have enough unity to go for something like Shared Triumph, but since Captain makes it's own army, its worth the inclusion. One of the reasons the deck can get away with so few protection effects is that it runs many such 'Army in a Can' variants. Making tokens so quickly is a way to get back on the board in the face of a heavy control deck.

These cards trigger off casting enchantments, or in the case of the Constellation cards, enchantments coming into play. This lines up with our commander's experience condition and thus work along a primary axis of the deck's design. Skybind is great, it gives us repeatable uses of enter the battlefield effects and can reset some of our mana when making tokens with Daxos. If we have permanents that tap for multiple mana, its possible to reset them and make even more tokens the next turn.

Since the deck invests heavily in anthems, it makes sense to eschew instants and sorceries in favor of enter the battlefield effects. These creatures add value to the deck while still operating on the play creatures and attack plan. They give a good range of effects, and can combine with Skybind to make an excellent value train. Many of them help with recovering from removal. As the deck wants to over commit to the board, having ways to pull stuff back from the graveyard will help go long against other decks with substantial removal.

As much as I enjoy niche appeal in cards, sometimes you need to have some good old fashioned wheel greasers. These cards are just tutors, card draw, protection, etc. As an aside, I don't mind tutors in non-combo shells nearly as much. If you aren't using tutors to just win the game, they lose a lot of their bite. I think Dark Prophecy and Necropotence are a little ambitious on the mana, but not too much. Their upside is definitely worth the risk of not casting them immediately. The deck is definitively light on removal. It leans on making a scary board and interlocking effects from enchantments to push the game towards completion and overcome the positions of it's opponents. Below, I describe a different sort of Daxos deck that takes this idea to the extreme. For this deck, I think this section is the most customize-able. Its also an excellent place to put various hate cards like Stony Silence or Painful Quandary if there's some combos or strategies that are prevalent in your play group that you consider to be a problem.

I alluded above to the importance of mana in the deck. Daxos' ability is the late game power of the deck. Being able to make 3 mana 5/5s or better is quite strong. However, that means the deck needs to get Daxos out before casting too many enchantments. A solid ramp amount of ramp ensures keeping Daxos on the table even if we're going to have to recast him 3-4 times. That's a tall order, but not out of reach. It also means that we have a plan for what we're doing with all this extra mana once he's on the table. The deck won't simply waste it. This is similar in approach to Ghave, where any additional mana can be used to fuel an important activated ability. This selection of artifact mana makes a good dent, but they can still destroyed. The real mana power comes from the lands which tend to evade removal even better than enchantments.

These lands give the deck phenomenal late game mana for Daxos. Serra Sanctum in particular is excellent since the tokens themselves are enchantments, constantly building your mana pool by making creatures. Urborg + Coffers is a tried and true approach to generating copious amounts of mana. Of course, its riskier in a deck that only runs 5 or so swamps naturally, but honestly you only need this to come only late in the game, which gives you time to find it once the rest of the game plan is online.

Daxos was fun to build because it went in such an odd direction. This is a deck that I think doesn't have a better potential leader. I don't know what I would do to power this up beyond including some of the more expensive enchantments to lock my opponents out, Nether Void and Chains of Mephistopheles chief among them. Its worth noting that there is a completely different Daxos variant that I believe to be quite strong, though it is terribly unfun. Daxos Punisher is going to terrorize some shop, with all the strong B/W hate cards and the ability to have Daxos be your sole win condition. This is my first draft of it and it is mean.

I'm going to go through all 10 new legends in WUBRG order, marquee cards first, then secondary generals. Next week its Mizzix. Till then, cheers!

Commander 2015 Review

Anya, Merciless Angel

Anya fits well into a R/W aggressive shell. I had a Jor Kadeen deck built in the past which I believe would cover the vast majority of the same space as Anya. However, one of the primary problems with him was that if you went vertical and stacked a bunch of equipment onto Jor, he could be removed. Anya having Indestructible prevents a significant amount of the shenanigans that could stop Jor without specific equipment in play. I do wish she came baked in with a Sulfuric Vortex clause, but she's totally fine as is. You can build a voltron deck around her, and it'll be a decent deck. My chief complaint is that we don't need more voltron generals in W/R. I know their standard isn't card advantage, but it would be cool the have a boros deck that isn't just about attacking. Like, Whenever you gain life, impulse draw. This is a fine legend, but is more of the same.

Arjun, the Shifting Flame

Arjun doesn't fit into many decks. His triggered ability is extremely strong, but requires a specific frame to work. As such, I'm expecting him to primarily be played as a Commander. As a Commander, he works well in a Storm/combo shell due to his unparalleled ability to find cards. Mindmoil is already played in certain situations because it actually draws cards. The same is true for Arjun. He'll be closely related to Niv-Mizzet. However, Niv is more direct, and has more combos associated with him specifically. Arjun is the stronger engine, drawing an absurd number of cards over the course of the game. While it would seem that Arjun gets weaker with every card you play, its trivial to put in cards that draw cards, eg Opportunity, to keep your hand size high. One specific use I can see for Arjun is playing him with Dream Halls to turn off mana and use your insane velocity to find combo pieces.

Daxos the Returned.

Daxos is solid. B/W enchantments is a real thing that has generally added blue through Oloro. This is mostly due to the draw of another color and there not being a sufficient reason to stay in B/W. Daxos combines several different potential archetypes. Obviously he works as a Constellation enabler, but he also functions as a way to convert mana into a supply of fairly large creatures. White has many different Anthem effects that provide a boost while in play and pump up your experience counters. Black provides all the card advantage and has a history of cards like Necropotence. Enchantments that provide cards at a cost. Daxos also works in a stax-like shell with resource denial, leaning on his ability to make tokens to stay ahead of the constrictions. Daxos opens up a significant amount of deck building space that was previously unexplored.

Ezuri, Claw of Progress

Ezuri piles up experience counters very quickly. Not having a restriction to nontoken creatures means that casting Deranged Hermit gives you 5 experience counters. Every time after the first casting, Ezuri can just act as a sorcery. He follows a similar axis to Edric without being a retread. He's strong, flexible, and interesting. He lets you build vertically as a reward to building horizontally. That kind of feedback loop makes for strong deck construction. He might even be worth including as part of the 99, given the ease he accumulates counters.

Kalemne, Disciple of Iroas

This is easily the worst of the new legends. Its more R/W voltron, but this just so clearly misses the mark. It only accumulates counters when you cast 5+ mana creatures, meaning that you're not going to get counters quickly. Then, when you jump through the hoops the card asks for, you get +1/+1 for the the general only? If it was an Anthem I'd like it more, but there are just more efficient ways to pump up a general. Sure, the experience counters are more or less permanent, but it just doesn't matter. Kalemne has a set of good abilities, double strike on a Commander is always worth paying attention to, but she isn't surprising anyone. At a base of 4 mana, people are going to be able to react to her. She doesn't protect herself and doesn't have haste. I would love to trade the vigilance or the double strike for haste since that means she could do real damage immediately. I don't think this is a deck worth building, though I do like the direction away from token swarms and toward playing R/W monsters. There are some number of synergies she can exploit with Avacyn or Gisela, but overall this style of deck isn't going to be worthwhile.

Karlov

Karlov is a space that is both new and old. BW life manipulation is not new. See Selena, see the common uses of Vish Kal. However, the theme has never been this explicit and this aggressive. Karlov costing a mere two mana is his largest draw. He also works as a way to transform counters into unconditional removal, which is a big game. It comes at a steep cost, but its not terribly difficult to see situations where giving up the damage is worth handling a threat. Karlov is odd for EDH in that he is far more Spike than traditional commander products. He doesn't reward creativity as much as he does mastering when to use his ability, and he doesn't create memorable moments as much as he is about efficiency. A properly built Karlov is going to be a monster, which is somewhat against the idea of the format.

Kaseto, Orochi Archmage

A snake Tribal commander, Kaseto is decent. He does his thing well, and can even be a legitimate threat with enough mana. I can see him as a role player in other decks, but clearly his place is at the head of the snake. As a commander, Kaseto offers to play nice with on-hit effects. Lots of snakes have an Ophidian-like nature to them so the two dovetail well. Unfortunately, like most of the Commander legends, he was built with a specific need and is somewhat lacking outside of it. I'm certain that once research starts in earnest, there'll be an agreed upon 90 cards that you basically have to play. I like the card, I like that its doing something weird, I just wish it was a bit more open ended.

Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest

What a beating. Maz has a ton of interactions and plays well as a part of the 99 in virtually every g/b deck, while having significant options to build around himself. Imagine him as part of Ghave, now think of him as the Commander for a stax deck. Both are easy to do. Mazirek is best friends with Kothophed, Savra, Smothering Abomination, and that whole continuum of cards. His strength is his flexability and value, his weakness is that for all he does, he is fairly ineffiecient. 6 mana for a 2/2 is abysmal. He gets larger quickly, if he's in a deck that can take advantage of his trigger. Without a specifically capable shell Maz is nothing special, so don't include him without ensuring you can make use out of his ability.

Meren of Clan Nel Toth

Meren, like the other head liners, doesn't have a way to fulfill her own exp condition. However, the others, Daxos, Kalemne, Mizzix, and to a lesser extent Ezuri, all need you to hold onto cards in your hand in order to start to get experience counters. Meren wants you to play stuff out before her so that you can have creatures die once she's in play. Consider turn 2 Elvish Visionary, turn 3 Nantuko Husk, turn 4 Meren, eat them, reanimate Visionary. That's not even trying and lines up well. She also doesn't need exp to generate value. Kolaghan's Command has in recent times shown just how powerful Raise Dead can be, and Meren definitively gives value whenever she's cast. She's also a 3/4, which is of no particular relevance expect that its my favorite power/toughness combination.

Mizzix of the Izmagnus

Another RU general that favors a Storm-esque style. Mizzix can also be used as a powerful Helm of Awakening type card. I can see her being used in the capacity where she is played with tons of cantrips to chain lots of spells together, or to make crazy powerful sorceries much cheaper. Things like an overloaded Mizzix's Mastery or Enter the Infinite.


White

Bastion Protector

An adequate way to protect your Commander. Except someone to attack for 4 with their Siege-Gang Commander.

Dawnbreak Reclaimer

In addition to having absolutely gorgeous art, Dawnbreak Reclaimer is a pretty decent card. Sure, its always reanimating the worst creatures in both graveyards, but that's not the worst thing. It can even be used as a political tool. Regardless, if you have a deck packed full of value creatures, its not going to be exceptionally difficult to always be getting ahead with the Reclaimer.

Grasp of Fate

Grasp if excellent removal. It also has a built in political protection. One person getting something of theirs back might be put on the fence about that decision if they knew that it meant giving back a Sylvan Library to an opponent. This will likely wind up in most White decks that don't have a reason to exclude it.

Kalemne's Captain

This card makes no sense to me. The stats are fine and Vigilance is a huge plus in EDH, but the ability actively works against you. White more than any color relies on artifacts and enchantments. It needs them to either modify the game state or generate card advantage. Wiping out all of your own things is not something that you want to pay 12 mana to do. If mass removal is something you want, there are other cards for that, and the body is not enough to want to make allowances for.

Blue

AEthersnatch

An excellent new trick, that it only costs one less than Commandeer means that you only play this if you are looking for redundancy.

Gigantoplasm

In many ways, this mimics the Mimeoplasm. Its a copy of a creature that is also way larger than it normally would be. You have to spend actual mana to make it large though, so its not as powerful, but being monoblue opens up a significant amount of space where it could be inserted.

Illusory Ambusher

Yahowsa. This is expensive, but when it works you draw 5-10 cards easily. Cashing it in for 3-4 cards and killing an attacker is also totally fine. It works absurdly well in Nin for obvious reasons.

Mirror Match

A fog of the most hilarious variety, Mirror Match also lets you get all the value. You copy all the enter the battlefield effects, you generate lots of bodies for sacrifice outlets, and you kill any creature with power equal to or greater than its toughness. It does cost 6 so its easier to see coming than most tricks, but someone's eventually going to walk into it.

Mystic Confluence

Cryptic Command's cousin, Mystic Confluence functions in several different capacities. Its great at stopping permanents, spells, and digging into your deck. Except this to show up in any deck with blue mana.

Synthetic Destiny

Another way to get maximum value out of creatures, Synthetic Destiny is intended to be played in response to Wraths. I ditch all these things that were going to die anyway, here is my new army. The delay until end of turn makes it difficult to respond to what's going on for your opponents. If you just don't care about the dudes you have in play, its pretty easy to wait till the second main right before your turn to give everyone essentially a hasty surprise.

Black

Corpse Augur

Augur is a solid inclusion. He's risky, but the ability to choose which graveyard helps mitigate the risk of his mandatory trigger. Of course, there's a lot of competition for creatures that draw cards. Having 4 power puts him outside of Reveillark range, but recursion shouldn't be a problem in black. He's also solid anti-wrath technology. Ensure you get a refill as soon as your creatures die.

Daxos's Torment

This card is awful. A four mana 5/5 flying haste enchantment creature demon would have been bordering on ok. This is a couple steps removed from that. Its true that it doesn't die to wrath of god, but that's still relatively not useful. I was hoping there'd be a Constellation card in the deck to make that style worthwhile, but this is not that card. Avoid at all costs.

Deadly Tempest

A Wrath that punishes grow wide strategies, expect this in creature light decks like Oloro, or in metagames with high concentrations of Rhys, Darien, or Kemba.

Deadly Summons

A mill card that gives a strong payoff, this finds an immediate home in Geth and Sidisi. Geth loves the X in the mana cost, since Geth is one of the most powerful big mana decks. Sidisi loves it for the self-mill and extra zombies. It will find other homes as well, Lazav springs to mind.

Scourge of Nel Toth

Oh baby. Scourge is a big threat for little investment. A sacrifice outlet that's active from the graveyard, and a potent creature in play, Scourge does virtually everything that you want for a deck like Jarad, Mimeoplasm, etc. He'll mostly be found in B/G decks that love to have sacrificial food and large dudes, but he also can be found in the more specialized B/X decks such as Grimgrin and Vish Kal.

Thief of Blood

An interesting card, Thief instantly crushes planeswalkers and Ghave. It niche and expensive, but also incredibly powerful at what it does. I wouldn't include this willy nilly, since it does have some significant anti-synergy potential, but if you are in an area with lots of offending cards and need a broad answer to multiple different permanent types, Thief can fulfill that role. Its especially useful if you are running various tutors for creatures, eg Chord of Calling or Birthing Pod.

Wretched Confluence

While not as good as the Blue Confluence, Wretched Confluence is still plenty powerful. At worst its draw three at instant speed, and its also quite adept at saving your creatures from graveyard removal. It can be used to pick off multiple small creatures or go big on killing a large one. It notable that this removes indestructible creatures as well. I do think that this will see less play that the blue version since this has less overall utility, but its an option if you expect to have 5 mana you can leave up on other people's turns.

Red

Awaken the Sky Tyrant

The worst card in the set, Awaken is utterly miserable. Let me rewrite it for you:

Sky Tyrant 3R
Creature - Dragon
Defender, Shroud
When you are dealt damage by a source an opponent controls, Sky Tyrant loses Defender and Shroud.
5/5

That card is awful, and so is Awaken. It doesn't get hit by Wraths, but it also doesn't do anything unless your opponent does something first. Its trying to be a rattlesnake card, but it just doesn't do enough. No Mercy is a rattlesnake card. This is just a poor attempt at an undercosted creature. It also doesn't trigger when attacked, so you can't even block with the 5/5 token.

Dream Pillager

Pillager is an attempt at something new, and I applaud that. It does, I think, cost a bit too much for what it does. It also doesn't work well in conjunction with Haste. I'd like it in Kaalia, except you are just as likely to hit other 7 mana cards that you can't cast. I think there'll be homes for Pillager, I just can't think of any right now that simultaneously want a 7 mana dragon and can cast multiple cards from his trigger.

Magus of the Wheel

Magus set up an expectation of their being a cycle of Magi in the precons, which wasn't followed through. The card itself is quite good. Wheels are powerful in red and this one being recur-able through raise dead effects is certainly strong. That it costs additional mana to active is a bit awkward for me since that essentially changes the amount spent for the effect. Still, this is a good card that will see heavy play with how difficult it can be to get positive on cards in Monored.

Meteor Blast

Fixing the amount of damage and scaling targets is novel. I'm not sure how useful this will end up being. On the one hand, casting this on one target is 4 mana, thus a 4 mana 4 damage spell. Once you get above four targets, it'd probably have been better to cast Molten Disaster or Comet Storm. So its not that this is bad, it just a question of how much mana you want to pay. Obviously, in Mizzix its great since you don't want to kill your own stuff, and the cost reduction applies to X, letting you hit many more things than normal.

Mizzix's Mastery

Past in Flames for free is a powerful effect. Getting to 8 mana is difficult though. This is clearly a knockout for storm, but can also just be played in a deck that expects to get to 5RRR and have a decent number of spells in its graveyard. You can't cheat the Overload through the usual means of alternate costs since overload is itself and alternate cost. However reductions still apply to the overload, so you can get this down to RRR with Mizzix, Helm of Awakening, Ruby Medallion, etc.

Green

Arachnogenesis

Fogs are excellent in Commander, and one that lets you pick off opposing attackers while generating bodies are even better. This is like Mirror Match, but less powerful and cheaper. This fits into Rhys like a glove, and most other decks that want another fog beyond Constant Mists.

Bloodspore Thrinax

Bloodspore is like a monogreen Master Biomancer. It counts counters instead of just power, but its also only one color identity. It useful in Ghave or Marath, and also decent value in other less counter focused decks. It'd still only look to include it in a synergy heavy deck as it not the most efficient way of making your creatures larger.

Centaur Vinecrasher

On the surface Vinecrasher is what a green graveyard deck wants, especially Life From the Loam decks, but there are a number of problems. Mostly the problems are with the creature itself. Being enormous is not in itself useful, see Hammletback Goliath. The trample helps this immensely, but I'm still unsure how useful this is going to be overall. This one of the cards I'll need to play with to give a definitive answer, but I still think you should only include this if you are proactively putting lands in the graveyard for some reason instead of relying on lands to wind in the yard over the course of the game.

Ezuri's Predation

'Green-Wrath', Predation is excellent at catching you up from behind. It's very expensive, and won't solve all of your problems, but it does a good job of dealing with overloaded boards. 8 mana isn't terrible to get to in Green either. Expect this to show up quite a bit in ramp orient green decks that don't do too much while getting over seven mana.


Great Oak Guardian

Listed purely because it says 'Target player', GOG will see play as a political nightmare for the table. It does cost 6, but it can be used offensively, so that not too worrying. I don't think I'd play it often, but its nice for people looking for combat tricks on a budget.

Pathbreaker Ibex

Craterhoof's younger cousin, the goat will be breaking people's faces. It really wants to be combined with haste, so look for this in G/R shells. That's not to say it won't be played elsewhere, because it certainly will be. A lot. In format of 40 life where you have to deal 80-120 damage to win, effects like the Ibex or Crafterhoof are priceless for letting you multiply your damage so high as to win the game in a turn.

Skullwinder

An Eternal Witness that effects two players probably would have been good enough on its own. One that has Deathtouch and costs 2G over 1GG is definitely worthwhile. Skullwinder is great in virtually every deck with green mana as a literal rattlesnake that comes with value. Its worth noting that you can target someone with no cards in their graveyard and it still works, meaning that sometimes this is a true E.Witness.

Verdant Confluence

At worst this is a triple rampant growth. Nissa's Pilgrimage just came out and its seen play, so Verdant Confluence is at least even there. However, instead of gaining 7 life, the confluence gives you other options. Regrowing permanents and +1/+1 counters are useful modes. I expect this to take over the Pilgrimage slots immediately unless triple rampant growth is something a madman wants twice.


Artifacts and lands

Blade of Selves

Blade of Selves is an exciting cards. It provides excellent value with enter or leaves play effects and also enables a number of combos, like Yosei or Kokusho. Its expensive to equip, but its definitely worth it. Imagine it on a Craterhoof or even something as simple as a Man-O-War? If your deck has creatures to attack with, Blade is probably great for you.

Sandstone Oracle

Useful in Red and White decks as a way to catch-up on cards. 7 mana is quite a bit to get to normally, but is mitigated by the enters the battlefield effect not being limited to cast by hand. This means that red's Trash for Treasure effects can recur it and White's reanimate effects can get it back early. I don't think this is worth it in blue, black, or green since they can draw cards more efficiently. The exception might be Sharuum since its an artifact for her enters the battlefield effect.

Thought Vessel

Making Reliquary Tower into a 2 mana artifact is a good move given how many decks play reliquary tower. This will see widespread play and is a solid if unexciting card.

Command Beacon

This is a crazy card. When paired with Crucible/Life From the Loam, its a way to get around the tax indefinitely. You have to jump through enough hoops that its not that big a deal, but having the option to skip the tax is potentially extremely powerful for decks that rely on their commander.