Magic the Gathering – Commander Night Playback – Commanders Die!

Commanders die!

If you aren’t an EDH player, that phrase means absolutely nothing to you. But for the rest of us, this is a huge difference. Previously, whenever a commander returned to the commander zone, it never hit the graveyard so any death triggers would not activate.

Thanks to a recent statement by the Rules Committee, we are in a new era of Commander. We are finally freed from the tyranny of technicality.

And I could not think of a better way to celebrate than to build around a creature that I’ve wanted to for a long time, but was dissuaded from doing so by the old rules. The card that was forever trapped in the 99 until now: Elenda, the Dusk Rose.

My hybrid Vampire-tribal/Aristocrats build went up against Urza, Lord High Artificer, the Ur-Dragon, and the partners Pako/Haldan.

Urza attempted to run a Stax build, and since the rest of us were running much more aggressive decks they got quickly frozen out of the game.

As for my deck, though I didn’t win I did have a brief moment where I was able to live the dream with Elenda. My board consisted of her, Cruel Celebrant, Corpse Knight, Cordial Vampire, and Yawgmoth, Thran Physician.

The Ur-Dragon had a Steel Hellkite out, and not much else. In order to start to claw their way out of their disadvantageous position, they played Crux of Fate to clear out the rest of our boards. Since there was a 100% chance that Steel Hellkite would take of any Elenda tokens out with it’s ability, I figured it was pretty much time to go for it.

Using Yawgmoth, I sacrificed my creatures, and Elenda, to generate tokens and draw cards, while also using the -1/-1 counters generated to kill the Hellkite and draw a ton of cards while still caching in on my death triggers, accidentally killing Urza in the process. (I didn’t want him to die because he was drawing heat off of me.)

Unfortunately, none of those cards I drew were lands, so after a few rounds I found myself quickly falling so far behind in terms of mana that I was no longer able to compete with the remaining two decks. I still managed to get my licks in, but after that it was a struggle simply to remain in the game.

Even though the Ur-Dragon had an army of fliers, Paco was able to consistently deter their attacks thanks to the tokens generated by Vivien, Monsters’ Advocate. Up until the end game, when the dragon army was too strong to completely block, those Beasts with reach counters diverted attention away them and onto me. Additionally, Nissa, Steward of Elements in conjunction with Vivien’s ability to always look at the top card of their library to cheat out quite a few creatures. And again, with that small army of blockers, neither one of them was getting attacked.

Aside from the Commander, the other card that helped the Ur-Dragon stay in contention was Kindred Discovery. Thanks to those two pieces, the pilot was able to keep a full grip of cards in hand at almost all times, which allowed them to amass an army that quickly established a dominating presence. With Ramos, Dragon Engine on board, and cards in hand, they were able to consistently answer threats that appeared before them. Even despite Pako and Haldan’s Shark Typhoon, they were able to push through and finish the rest of us off.

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After we wrapped up the first round, one of us had to head out, but the rest of us were surprisingly down for one more match. Tempting as it was to stick with Elenda for another match, I chose to give another one of my brews a try: A Kelsien, the Plague voltron build heavily inspired by Seth Cross at Praetor Magic’s deck tech on the same commander.

The Ur-Dragon stayed on point, but the third switched to the Gay Kings of Meletis.

I managed to keep a firm grip on the flow of the game for most of it with many of the minor synergies I had set up, especially in the early game. One easy example was Kelsien’s ping ability in combination with Forbidden Orchard. What would normally be a nominal downside to a card that taps for all colors of mana is immediately transformed into fodder generator to generate experience counters. And by throwing in the bounty counters from Mathas, Fiend Seeker, we’re able to generate extra card draw and life that benefits us more than the rest of the table, especially when a Smothering Tithe is thrown in.

Unlike the last time where the Ur-Dragon took control of the game, this time they didn’t really get an opportunity to do the same. Thanks to General’s Enforcer, I was able to keep swinging in with Kelsien even in situations where doing so would normally be utterly foolish. This was a major factor in how the they fell before it had a moment to establish a board presence. While their Ryusei, the Fallen Star set me back briefly, it was not enough to keep me completely off balance, and I was able to get it that last bit of damage and clear the board one more time thanks to Chandra’s Ignition.

Despite my presence and powerful commander, I was not able to close the match with the Gay Kings of Meletis. Not only did they have massive quantities of life thanks to Venser’s Journal, but they had defenses in the form of both Kefnet the Mindful and Nezahal, Primal Tide. Though my deck does have tools that can either rob creatures like Kefnet of their indestructibility, I was sadly unable to draw those crucial pieces. For that reason, I wasn’t able to obtain the necessary commander damage to tip the scales in my favor and finish them off. Thanks to a combination of vast amounts of card draw, Jace, Wielder of Mysteries, and Thassa’s Oracle, they were snatch away victory.

And yet, I find myself unable to complain about my performance. I may not have won, but the Kelsien deck did what it set out to to by powering up it’s commander to absurd levels so that he can quickly take command of the table. Sometimes, we just don’t draw into the pieces we need to tip the scales in our favor, and that’s okay. The match was still an extremely close one. I performed to the best of my ability and simply was outplayed. It certainly beats being mana screwed out of a match.

Magic: The Gathering – Commander Night Playback – Choices, Both Good and Bad

Some EDH games don’t take too long, only about an hour or so. Others can be marathons where the tides ebb and flow, each player taking their turn in the hot seat until someone is eventually able to establish that final lock to close out the match once and for all.

This week, my table played both of types of games last night. The first of which was the one that wrapped up quickly. I piloted a combo deck using Gyruda, Doom of Depths, and my opponents were Vial Smasher/Ikra Shidiqi (with Obosh as the companion), Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord, Mairsil the Pretender, and Mayael the Anima.

I had the good fortune of having Panharmonicon in my opening hand, and with it my combo was made significantly more consistent. To explain, when Gyruda enters the battlefield, they mill each player (even their controller) for 4 cards. Their player may then choose an even-numbered CMC creature from those milled cards and summon it.

The hope is that we hit a card like Clone or Spark Double, that can enter the battlefield as a copy of Gyruda. Even if we have to sacrifice it to the legend rule, we’ll still get the ETB trigger and activate Gyruda’s effect once more. Ideally, we can keep this chain going forever, until all players are out of cards.

There are two ways to protect ourselves from falling into that same fate, either through a way to win the game if our deck is empty like Thassa’s Oracle or Jace, Wielder of Mysteries. This deck used Kozilek, Butcher of Truth, whose ability allows us to shuffle our grave back into the library when it goes in.

And while the combo went off without a hitch, the resulting bad feels reminded the table too much of why we banned Mindcrank from going into the same deck as Syr Konrad, the Grim. It was technically a win, but I lost the moral victory. Needless to say, this will likely be a deck I never pilot again, just because it’s irritating to play against.

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After profusely apologizing to my playgroup, I promised to change decks to something less miserable for my next match. It is for that reason that I picked up my Monty Python and the Holy Grail deck. (Don’t tell me he doesn’t remind you of that movie.)

I hear you, the reader, groaning that Kenrith is an overpowered cEDH-level commander. And you’re right, if he’s built that way. I opted to go in a politics direction, generating tons of mana and using it to strike deals with other players.

Everyone else played the same commander except Jarad, who switched to Gavi, Nest Tender. That said since this game took an entire three hours, I won’t be detailing every move that happened. Instead, I’ll go over some of the best board states that occurred during that match and what happened to stop them.

The first big problem for the group came from Mayael. Like me, she also had a Seedborn Muse out with her commander. Except where I was helping other players (and giving myself a few extra draws) in exchange of favors down the line, Mayael was summoning a board that grew increasingly more difficult to deal with. Since two of them were Archetype of Endurance and Sigarda, Host of Herons, dealing with these threats wasn’t beyond my capability. (I wasn’t drawing any board clears.)

Fortunately, Gavi managed to hit the board with an overloaded Cyclonic Rift. No one else had made any major commitments to the board, so we could all rebuilt easily enough, but without a Reliquary Tower, Mayael was forced to discard over 20 cards at the end of the turn. Once I countered Seedborn Muse on recast with my own Pact of Negation, that was enough to seal her fate.

Gavi was managing to set up her own army thanks to the tokens she generated with her ability, but since she wasn’t doing much swinging in with them the real threat became Mairsil who dangerously close to establishing a combo win, constantly blinking their commander with Thassa, Deep-Dwelling to exile more and more cards for Mairsil to steal abilities from.

As for me, I was close to entering my endgame. Because I had been getting many excess draws using Kenrith’s ability and my still living (despite eating several removal spells) Seedborn Muse, I had managed to discard Meteor Golem and play Altar of Dementia. Resurrecting the Golem with Kenrith, then sacrificing it to my Altar to mill myself and set up for a Thassa’s Oracle win, I was set to start controlling the board and setting up my win.

Unfortunately, I underestimated the general fatigue that was starting to set in. After a exhausting almost three hours, Gavi was growing (rightfully) tired and seeking to wrap up the match, even if she wasn’t the winner. I don’t think she saw that I was in the middle of setting up my own victory, because if she had it’s unlikely she would have stopped my attempt to lock Mairsil out of the game by using Meteor Golem to kill it until perform it could be blinked to exile its winning combo. As I went to do so, they blinked it themselves with Astral Drift.

This allowed Mairsil to generate their win-condition and exile Tree of Perdition, with Spikeshot Elder already caged. Having had to use my resources to mass exile the token army beforehand, I was not able to establish my board quickly enough to avoid the lethal kill shot. The rest of the table was taken out in short order.

Still, I can’t be mad at my performance. With Kenrith, I was able to do what I sought to do and keep the heat off myself with everyone else used me to take care of the bigger threats. It’s easy to say that “If X didn’t happen, I could have won”, but that’s the danger of focusing on politics. Failing to manage the mood of the table just means you’ll get taken out.

And maybe I misplayed by using by mass exile spell. Though I had to sacrifice Kenrith earlier when Mairsil copied Empress Galina‘s ability, I had more than enough mana to recast him and could’ve just used my mana to gain life and dodge the Spikeshot Elder damage. Part of why I enjoy writing these posts is that they give me a space to evaluate not just my performance in the game, but also how I can help keep our meta healthy.

If you learn have any takeaways from this post, make it these two:

1. Gyruda is one of those abilities where it’s not game breaking, but it may be just annoying enough to resolve, either in Cockatrice or in paper, than it’s not worth running. In an automated UI, the feels bad would not have hit my playgroup so strongly
2. At some point, the game has to end. Even the most ardent MTG player would be hard pressed to last 3 hours in Cockatrice. And with more than 4 players, the odds of that happening just go up.

Magic: The Gathering – Commander Night Playback – Xyris Draws Me to Victory

What is this? Are we actually back? After spending… *checks notes*… almost half a year on indefinite hiatus, I think it’s finally time to bring Commander Night Playback back to the masses.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with this series, our objective is to recap and do a postmortem analysis of the Commander games my playgroup run on Cockatrice every Saturday. This session had me equipped with one the newest commanders from Commander 2020: Xyris, the Writhing Storm.

I had run this deck in the previous session. Thanks to some bad luck with my draws, I wasn’t able to secure the land drops required to even garner a board presence, let alone win the game. It was worth running again just to see if it would perform better with a more fortunate hand. My opponents this time were running Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord and The First Sliver respectively.

And as far as performance goes, the deck vastly exceeded my expectations in the first game we played. Thanks to an Arcane Signet, I had managed to ramp out Xyris one turn early. Unfortunately, The First Sliver had managed to cast a Smothering Tithe before I was able start attacking. This meant that for every attack that landed, not only was I giving at least one opponent a few extra cards, but I was giving away mana on top of that.

Since The First Sliver was about to receive a glut of mana, but was otherwise running out of cards in their hand from land drops and the few slivers they managed to put on the board, I opted to swing in at Jarad to split the mana/card draw benefits across multiple players. Having missed my land drop that turn, I was more than happy to draw into a Gaea’s Cradle, and the extra mana allowed me to cast a Dockside Extortionist and Doubling Season, to create some treasure for each one of the treasures my sliver friend generated off of me.

Even after a few turns, the group wasn’t able to do anything to keep my board in check, and after dropping a Beastmaster Ascension with 11 creatures on board, I swing at The First Sliver with everything I had. When they went down, Jarad folded under the pressure. From start to finish, the match took about 25 minutes.

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Naturally, we all reshuffled and began a second match with the same decks. I had another fortunate hand. Additionally, The First Sliver had started missing land drops after the third round.

There’s a joke among our table that whenever the sliver deck summons a Manaweft Sliver or a Gemhide Sliver, I will always remove it before they are unable to untap. In my defense, the ability to turn all of one’s creatures into mana dorks is too powerful to let live, which is why the streak continued. I had no choice but to Pongify that Manaweft Sliver when it hit the board, missing land drops be damned.

Of course, since I wasn’t casting any creatures in the meantime, waiting to play Xyris on turn five without any mana ramp, they naturally turned that 3/3 ape onto me. This only continued when I played an Impact Tremors in preparation for Xyris’s summoning.

That said, the other problem I was running up to was the fact that I also wasn’t sure I would be able to hit my 5th land drop in time. With the mana I had left, I countered the Syphon Sliver my tribal opponent was trying to play with Mana Drain just to ensure I had enough to cast my commander even if I missed my fifth land.

And from there, the game was almost wrapped up. Once Xyris was ready to attack, I played the Purphoros, God of the Forge I had kept up my sleeve, swinging my commander at Jarad and dealing an additional 9 damage to each opponent with the combined effects of Impact Tremors and Purphoros.

With Jarad spinning his wheels, and The First Sliver going what they could with their limited mana supply, I was pretty much free to close the game, especially since I drew into Gaea’s Cradle again. Using the mana I now had ready access to, I played Psychosis Crawler to accelerate my victory. Swinging in with Xyris once more, I hit a Wheel of Fortune. With everyone tapped out, and mana to spare, I used it to wrap things up nicely.

There’s no denying that this run with Xyris was successful. In less than an hour, I had managed to take home two decisive victories. That said, it is difficult to access how much of that is due to my performance or the deck itself and how much of that was due to sheer luck. Since my playgroup does not use tutors, I was not able to search for any of my pieces: I had to draw into them. I’ll probably play this deck more, and if it becomes too strong I’ll just table it like I’ve done with other decks in my group (*cough* Yuriko *cough*).

But before I wrap up, I just want to set some expectations. Last time I wrote this series, I grew exhausted from the need to create a new deck each week, and then recap every game in my playgroup. So to make this easier on myself, I will only write up one of these playbacks when my group runs a match I really want to talk about, and only to discuss that match/those matches.

Until then, take care and stay safe out there.

Magic: The Gathering – Commander Night Playback – Elsha Plays Tops and Marisi Flops

It’s another weekend, and another exciting session of commander with my table. Going with neither tutors nor budget has been working wonders for the table, with everyone having a noticeably better time than they were previously. Without the added consistency of tutors, the threat level has evened out.

This week, we managed to get a solid 4 rounds at the table, with a healthy mix of colors in each matchup.

Our first match was a 3-player setup, while we waited for the other 2 players to arrive. I piloted an Elsha of the Infinite build, and my opponents were Endrek Sahr, Master Breeder and Uril, the Miststalker.

The match was pretty quick, with each of us taking our first few turns to accelerate our mana since our commanders were all five-drops. Fortunately for me, I also managed to eek out a turn three Rhystic Study to get a lot of early game card draw. Unfortunately for both myself and Uril, Endrek Sahr managed a turn four Grave Pact, which hurt since both of us were creature-light decks that focused on our commanders.

I managed to turn this unfortunate circumstance to my favor by playing a Time Wipe to save Elsha and kill the other creatures… which ultimately didn’t work since Endrek Sahr sacrificed a creature in response, but their Grave Pact did kill Uril, who was indestructible thanks to their enchantments. They tried to save them with Remove Enchantment, but I managed to Mana Drain it with the excess mana I had from my mana rocks.

In the next few turns, I had managed to recast Elsha and get a few planeswalkers on board in the form of Narset, Parter of Veils and Jace, Wielder of Mysteries. Uril also managed to reestablish their side by recasting Uril and Retethering all of their destroyed Aura to them. Thanks to the ever present threat of Grave Pact, which was still on the board, I managed to convince Uril to direct their aggression to Endrek Sahr to buy some myself some extra time. Poor Endrek Sahr didn’t survive, but that wasn’t my problem.

The next turned was all I needed to change my fortune. I had Foundry Inspector in hand, but I was still waiting for the remaining piece of my combo. Thankfully, I had just managed to obtain a Cyclonic Rift, which would be able to save me and set Uril back significantly. Using Narset, I was able to get the last piece of my combo: Sensei’s Divining Top. However, Uril had enough mana open that if they had a removal spell, my combo would be stopped in it’s tracks. With that in mind, I waited one more turn to see if I could guarantee my victory.

This ended up going exactly as planned. Uril was hurting for cards, and tried to cast Rishkar’s Expertise until I reminded them that Narset politely locks them out of extra card draw. Once they swung in, I played my Cyclonic Rift and they tapped out to replay Uril. Without enough mana to do anything, I told them the game was over.

With Jace already on board, Sensei’s Diving Top, Elsha, and Foundry Inspector go infinite, allowing me to draw through my whole deck. With Foundry Inspector on board, I can cast Sensei’s Divining Top for free, and use it’s tap effect to draw the top card of my deck and put it back on top instead. Since Elsha lets me cast it from top, this results in drawing through my whole deck and using Jace’s effect to win instead of lose. Tapped out, and hurting for cards, Uril could do nothing but surrender.

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Our fourth member joined in as we were finished up the first match, and we reshuffled for another round at the table. This time, I deployed a new tutorless brew of Marisi, Breaker of the Coil. Endrek Sahr and Uril reprised their roles while our friend brought in a deck based on a new commander: Sedris, the Traitor King.

This game was a difficult one for me. I don’t remember a lot of it, but the finale sticks out because it dramatically tilted the game in Sedris’s favor. When the rest of us had established a decent board, and after throwing a ton of creatures into the graveyard with Windfall, Faithless Looting, and similar effects, Sedris played a Living Death that set the rest of us so far back that it was impossible to recover.

That didn’t stop us from trying, but our efforts seemed to only make the situation worse. I had to write down the exact chain of events because otherwise I would have forgotten. After Sedris was replayed from the Living Death, Uril tried to set them back by casting Beast Within. Once Sedris said that their commander would stay in the grave, we all knew we were in trouble. On their turn, they used Animate Dead to bring them back, then used Victimize on the Beast to resurrect Chainer, Nightmare Adept and Sepulchral Primordial.

Using their Primordial, they resurrected my Gisela, Blade of Goldnight, in the grave due to the previous Windfall. Since everyone else was already hurting for resources we were all in a bad spot. After they played Feldon of the Third Path to start tokenizing their It That Betrays in the grave, the remaining players quickly surrendered.

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At this point, the Endrek player wasn’t able to continue due to time constraints, so while they bowed out, our other player who just arrived took their place. I held onto Marisi for one more game, while our new playing brought in Saskia the Unyielding. Sedris switched over to their Neheb, Dreadhorde Champion deck, and Uril was traded in for Korvold, Fae-Cursed King.

And once again, I was barely in the running for most of this match as was Saskia. Arguably, Saskia was in a worse position than I was because they had managed to draw aggro from Korvold by targeting them when the Neheb player was ahead on board with their commander equipped with Sword of the Animist and Hammer of Nazahn, with Combat Celebrant and Tyrant’s Familiar alongside it.

With Neheb with such a strong position, and all of us taking on a ton of commander damage to them, it looked like they were going to take the lead. That changed once Korvold, after deploying their commander, played Wave of Vitriol. The resulting sacrifices increased their power up to 21, and with the extra cards that came with this boost, Korvold swung straight into Neheb and killed them instantly. Unfortunately, that same play absolutely crippled the rest of us to the point where we couldn’t mount a defense, and the table fell shortly thereafter.

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As the night drew late, the Korvold player had to withdraw since they needed to get ready for work. Since the remaining three players were in the mood for one more round, we just had a three player game where I went back to Elsha after being resoundingly crushed as Marisi twice. Saskia moved onto Chulane, Teller of Tales and Neheb moved onto a deck based on the Gitrog Monster.

What actually ended up happening for most of the game was Chulane and I double teaming the Gitrog Monster. On the very first turn, the played Field of the Dead, which set the tone for the rest of the match. Using the Gitrog Monster and Oracle of Mul Daya, they managed to play a massive number of lands. The resulting army of tokens was creating a massive threat for the both of us. That’s when  I managed to arrive at an Austere Command on top of my deck to clear board. Sadly, it also destroyed their World Shaper, which brought a ton of lands out of their graveyard.

This was especially bad because we knew Gitrog had a Torment of Hailfire in hand thanks to Oracle of Mul Daya showing it to us before they drew it. Our only fortune was that we had counterspells in hand and Gitrog knew it, so they couldn’t commit to it. In order to properly set up for this eventuality, they played Boseiju, Who Shelters All.

Knowing we were basically in it together, Chulane and I got to work. At the end of turn, I had a Mana Drain at the top of my deck, which I could play with Elsha, but I had nothing that could take care of Boseiju. That’s when Chulane, after cycling through their deck with their commander’s ability and an army of little creatures, finally arrived at a Beast Within. After confirming I had a counterspell, which was true at the time, they destroyed Boseiju and once again stopped Torment of Hailfire from taking effect. However, at the end of their turn, Gitrog Putrefied my Elsha.

Now, at this moment, I had a choice. I could play the Mana Drain to save Elsha, but that was the counterspell I told Chulane I had open and it Gitrog would logically conclude that I could no longer stop their Torment of Hailfire.  Since I otherwise had a full hand, and I never said the counterspell was on top of my deck, the only real answer was to bluff my way out of this and let Elsha die knowing that it would open up Gitrog to a win if they called me on it.

Fortunately for Chulane, they didn’t. Unfortunately for me, they instead dumped the rest of their mana into building up an army and swinging at me for lethal. Once my deception no longer mattered, I revealed the truth and gracefully bowed out. This left Chulane to fend for himself against Gitrog’s army of zombies. Since he had a Frilled Mystic, he had to keep enough mana open to use it against Torment of Hailfire, but luckily for him Chulane and Lotus Cobra were keeping him rich in mana, and Panharmonicon and Guardian Project were filling his hand with cards.

Surprising enough, despite having an army against them, they managed to keep just enough mana open to stop themselves from dying, and won by casting Approach of the Second Sun twice, winning the game and snatching victory from the jaw of defeat.

I’m happy with Elsha’s overall performance, but I’m disappointed that Marisi got overwhelmed both matches. I want to keep giving my kitty a shot, but I’m not sure what I can do to the deck to make it more effective. Of course, it could also just be a function of the meta.

Magic: the Gathering – Commander Night Playback – Marisi and Syr Konrad Suffer For My Sins

As we do most weeks, my pod got together for our regularly scheduled doses of EDH. Although we saw a few new cards from Eldraine make appearances last session with Rankle and Chulane, this week was where the new set started to make inroads and impacts on the game, with strategies that were enabled by some of the legendary creatures added to the set.

The first match was my Marisi deck up against The Locust God, Neheb, Dreadhorde Champion, and a Torbran deck I had loaned to the 4th player since they hadn’t the time to think up a new deck.

It was a slow start for me, as I wasn’t really able to play many cards early on. Torbran took a somewhat early lead with a turn 1 Sol Ring into a Ruby Medallion. Using the combined ramp and discount effects, they were able to play Syr Carah, the Bold on turn 2, and Torbran on turn 3.

While they realized how powerful it was that Syr Carah can tap to inflict a combined 3 damage to anything with Torbran’s effect, the skimmed over the first paragraph, which was the actual reason she’s in the deck. After 2 rounds had gone by without it going off once, I politely asked them to read through the paragraph one more time. Realizing their mistake, they begun directing their pings away from creatures and towards players, but it was too little too late. As The Locust God built up an army of insects, the board clear intended to clean them up also destroyed most of Torbran’s born and more or less kept knocked them out of the game since they weren’t drawing into any of the deck’s card advantage pieces.

This was when The Locust God began to get scary. In the same turn, they played Consecrated Sphinx and Jace’s Archivist. Fortunately, the cooperation of the table managed to take care of both of them before the next turn came up, but they had still managed to amass an army of insects in the intervening time.

In my card, I had Swords to Plowshares and Insurrection. Thinking I had one more turn, and seeing that the Torbran player placed their commander on the board. I decided to wait. Since the army wasn’t large enough to kill all players at once, I figured that with one more round of the table The Locust God would have enough insects for me to take control of all of them and end the game. Unfortunately for me, The Locust God was ready to win, and swung all out, killing everyone almost at once with Throne of the God-Pharaoh. I realize now that if I had acted sooner, I could have at least kill Locust God and possibly crippled the Neheb player enough that I could sweep up the game quickly, but alas.

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In the next round, all of us but Neheb player kept player the same decks. They swamped from WAR Neheb to Neheb, the Worthy instead.

They also had an early start, with their own turn 1 Sol Ring which they used to summon Neheb on turn 2. Thanks to my Varchild, Betrayer of Kjeldor, I was safe from their aggression, as was Torbran with a early Goblin Chainwhirler. Defenseless, The Locust God suffered from the brunt of Neheb’s early game aggression. The rest of us also had to discard cards to his triggered ability, but it was better than taking that hit.

Swinging in at Neheb with Varchild, I moved to force a more aggressive game from my table by deploying Fumiko the Lowblood. With the Survivor tokens Varchild created also swinging in, Fumiko proved by a adequate deterrent from Neheb’s aggressive swings. When Torbran played Manabarbs to try to slow down the game, all it accomplished was getting The Locust God to surrender because they had 18 life and nothing left and had just gotten to the 6 mana they needed to play their commander.

Of course, with The Locust God out of commission, and quickly surrendering under the pressure, Neheb just directed their aggression to Torbran, since my Fumiko was forcing them to attack still. With only 5 life left, Torbran’s own Manabarbs was what ultimately killed them.

Sadly, because Fell Specter had been forcing me (and everyone else) to discard so many cards, by the time it came to the 1v1 my only hope was drawing into a removal spell of a board clear. Neither or them materialized and I was quickly executed.

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The Locust God player had to withdraw from the last round due to some pending engagements, but that still left us with enough players to play one last match. Torbran decided to stay on his deck, while the Neheb player switching to Alesha, Who Smiles at Death. On the other hand, I had decided to run the new deck I built based on Syr Konrad, the Grim.

This time, it was my turn to start with a turn 1 Sol Ring, which I had used to play Expedition Map to ensure my 3rd land drop. With that I was able to set the stage with a Mindcrank on turn 2, and finally deploy Syr Konrad himself on turn 3.

The synergy between these two cards enabled much of my success in this match. To explain, Syr Konrad deals 1 damage to each opponent whenever a creature dies, or is put into the graveyard from anywhere other than the battlefield, but whenever my opponents take damage, Mindcrank forces them to mill the top card of their deck. Should that card be a creature, Syr Konrad deals 1 damage to each opponent, and the process repeats. The odds of a successful scale with the number of players in the game, but even with 3 players this synergy can pull a lot of weight.

In addition, Alesha, since she relies on ETBs, had Corpse Knight on the board. So whenever she played a creature, Torbran and I would take 1 damage. Since this had the potential to start other Mindcrank chain, I had deemed it an acceptable loss. However, when Alesha was deployed, I immediately Defiled her because with my mill strategy in place, it was far too risky to let her resurrect her minions.

Things were progressing smoothly. I had even managed to deploy an Altar of Dementia and a couple of other one-time mill effects like Sticher’s Supplier and Balustrade Spy.

Then, I made one crucial mistake that nearly knocked me out of the game, and gave Alesha the opportunity she needed to win. When Torbran swung at me with his forces, with only 7 life remaining, I had forgotten that Syr Konrad can force all players to mill the top card of their deck for 1B. If I had remembered that, then I would have still been at 25 life instead of 3. Fortunately, when they used the mana from Neheb, the Eternal to cast Chandra’s Ignition, I had finally wizened up. Activating Syr Konrad, I had initiated a Mindcrank chain large enough to kill Torbran before the Ignition could resolve, but the Alesha player survived, killing me with a few creature drops.

I blame myself for both that loss and the early one with Marisi. I must’ve been having an off night, because it both cases I would have been able to buy myself crucial time in I had been paying attention and not been so careless in my play. Oh well. It wouldn’t be the first time I died to player error, nor will it be the last.

Still, I’m proud of both decks I ran. Torbran is a strong commander, and the Stax strategy I build around him can work. I just think either I or its pilot this round need to tune it a bit so that it goes off the way I want it to.

This night may not have gone my way, but I can’t deny that I had a great time. Eldraine looks like it’s got some choice treats for us EDH players, and it’ll be exciting to see what else gets brewed up with them.

Magic: The Gathering – Commander Night Playback – Hapatra and Vaevictus Come Close, But No Cigar

For this weekend’s Commander night at my playgroup, we decided to lift the restriction on budget so that we could play whatever cards we wanted to in our decks.

And in doing so, I was able to play a very special deck, and another one that I had been thinking about for quite some time. As a whole, the table had a blast and we may consider going budgetless more regularly again.

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During the first game, I ran a deck that I had actually won in a raffle hosted by Dan Krause on Twitter. He participated in a Rotisserie Commander Draft at Magic Fest Vegas 2019 and held a charity raffle where the winner received the deck. I won, and promised to play at least one match with it completed unaltered, and this was that match.

My commander was Hapatra, Vizier of Poisons. My opponents were running Emrakul, the Promised End, Zedruu the Greathearted, and Azusa, Lost but Seeking.

As far as starts go, mine was fairly rough. For the longest time, I was flooded with forests but no swamps. Although I had my Golgari Signet in play for black, it was never safe to play Hapatra because I had no one that I would be able to swing into to trigger her ability. The situation only grew more dire when Emrakul’s player managed to cast Geode Golem and swing in the following turn at my empty board, since no one had the ability to kill it off, allowing her to cast Emrakul for free. Even worse, she had managed to put Akroma’s Memorial out on the table a few turns after Geode Golem.

What an adorable little *problem*!

Fortunately, my dire situation had turned to my favor because nobody saw me as a threat (and, in fairness, I wasn’t). Due to past experience, the Emrakul player took control of the Zedruu player and sought to sabotage them. It didn’t work, because Azusa’s Hall of Gemstone, which had been adversely affecting Zedruu’s playability, also interfered with that plan.

We all thought the Azusa player was basically out of the game once Emrakul directly her 13/13 Flampling might towards them, but they managed to set up a strong defense with an Emrakul of their own, along with a Vorinclex to hamper our ability to cast spells. In an act of petty revenge, a concept that I am strongly in favor of, they opted to control the Zedruu player instead of the Emrakul player, because Zedruu had used Vedalken Plotter to take their Gaea’s Cradle and Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx. In all likelihood, this cost him the game, because he was unable to stop Emrakul’s Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger, which destroyed his Emrakul and fulfilled the promise spoken of in their commander’s name.

Pictured: The reason people dislike Eldrazi

While all this was going on, I was mostly a passive observer, but I had finally dropped enough lands and acquired the right cards to make my move. The Zedruu player went before me though, using Gilded Drake to take control of Ulamog. She was going to take control of Emrakul, but I had chosen to forewarn her that my plan was to clear the board. Following through on that promise, I enacted my Decree of Pain.

Reciprocating my earlier forewarning, Zedruu opted to swing in at the Emrakul player with “their” Ulamog the next turn. This freed me up to finally start taking control. Using Demonic Tutor, I searched for and summoned Liliana, Dreadhorde General, using her -4 to deal with Ulamog and the other creatures that had hit the board in the time since the last turn. Although Zedruu was able to keep the aggression off of her thanks to Island Sanctuary, I was able to stay a float with a synergy between Tendershoot Dryad, Yawgmoth, and Dictate of Erebos. With the aid of Gary Asphodel, I was even able to gain back much of my lost life and kill the Zedruu player.

It was close, with Emrakul having only 3 life remaining at the end. However, the aid of Akroma’s Memorial and the ability to take control of my turns was too much for me to bounce back from. I was a single turn away from victory, but alas. Still, it was a well-played match and I have no regrets. I’m proud that I was able to make a strong impact despite being out of it for most of the game.

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The Emrakul player had to withdraw from the second match due to other obligations, but we were able to bring in a new challenger who had shown up too late to join the first match, who brought with them a Golos, Tireless Pilgrim deck. The Zedruu player decided to replay their deck, and the Azusa player swapped over to their Kambal, Consul of Allocation deck.

As for me, I played a commander that I don’t bring out often because it tends to generate a lot of hate, and rightfully so: Vaevictis Asmadi, the Dire. The deck is designed to take advantage of both the sacrifice mandate and the ability to cheat out the top card of the deck while including cards that protect Vaevictis and give him haste to swing in as much as possible.

I had a decent, if not great start by playing a Lantern of Insight on the first turn. My plan was to it use to pseudo-control what everyone else was getting out of my future Vaevictis swings, keeping them from accidentally playing their win-cons for free. However, as the turns went on I found myself again not playing much of anything. My field consisted of Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet, Vaevictis, my Lantern, and land.

Kambal and Zedruu were doing nothing more than building up their walls. Kambal had Hissing Miasma and Norn’s Annex to stop people from swinging at him directly, and Zedruu wasn’t performing anything aggressive enough to inspire ire from the table, mostly playing reactively since they lacked proactive plays and red mana.

However, with Azusa on the board, a fetch land in the grave, and Crucible of Worlds, the Golos player was very quickly accumulating large amounts of land, with incidentally card draw due to Tatyova, Benthic Druid. However, both her board and my own were destroyed by Zedruu’s Austere Command. To further complicate the matter, she also used her only her source to play Pramikon, Sky Rampart, making me the only possible target of the Golos player.

A very powerful way to control the flow of combat in a deck that needs it.

And of course, the Golos player also quickly recovered from their board wipe and played powerful creatures like Bringer of the Red Dawn. I could deal with it using my Decree of Pain… except I was stuck at 7-mana. Even if I had the 8 mana required to recast my commander, the threat would be the Golos would use Red Dawn to take control of it and swing in, further ruining the game.

The rest of us had tried to start mounting a defense, but by the time we were able to it was far too late. Using Craterhoof Behemoth, and effects like Aminatou‘s -1 that let her bounce it over and over again, Golos succeeded at knocking each one of us down one at a time, the Sky Ramparts and Kambal’s life total stopping her from doing it all at once. I was the first to fall, followed by Kambal, and Zedruu never arrived at the board clear she needed.

A popular win condition in many decks

And a good way to keep getting its benefits

I wonder how different that game would have played out if I had managed to convince Zedruu to counter Craterhoof when it first entered the board, but there’s no use crying over spilled milk. Overall, it was a solid match that I had a ton of fun with. I think Vaevictis isn’t going to draw as much ire as I was afraid it would it I play him correctly, something to keep in mind for next time.