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Legality
| Format | Legality |
| 1v1 Commander | Legal |
| Archenemy | Legal |
| Canadian Highlander | Legal |
| Casual | Legal |
| Commander / EDH | Legal |
| Commander: Rule 0 | Legal |
| Custom | Legal |
| Duel Commander | Legal |
| Highlander | Legal |
| Legacy | Legal |
| Leviathan | Legal |
| Limited | Legal |
| Oathbreaker | Legal |
| Planechase | Legal |
| Quest Magic | Legal |
| Vanguard | Legal |
| Vintage | Legal |
Rules Q&A
Kros, Defense Contractor
Legendary Creature — Cat Advisor
At the beginning of your upkeep, put a shield counter on target creature an opponent controls. (If it would be dealt damage or destroyed, remove a shield counter from it instead.)
Whenever you put one or more counters on a creature you don't control, tap that creature and goad it. It gains trample until your next turn. (Until your next turn, that creature attacks each combat if able and attack a player other than you if able.)
legendofa on BBEG Deck Ideas
6 months ago
For my breakdown here, I'm focusing on characters who are villains in their story arc and characters who don't have much specific backstory. Pretty much any legendary creature can be flavored as a villain in front of the right deck. I'm also not focusing on the Forgotten Realms sets, I'm broadening the net.
What's available:
: Eldrazi or artifacts. Most of the artifacts are either hero-aligned or not an independent threat, like Graaz, Unstoppable Juggernaut. If you want a challenge, Omarthis, Ghostfire Initiate, but I wouldn't, just for lack of depth.
: Villains are oddly centered on Old Kamigawa. Konda, Lord of Eiganjo is a near-immortal emperor and master duelist. Hokori, Dust Drinker is destroying resources and the land. And, of course, there's the apocalyptic, unrelenting evil that is Hazduhr the Abbot.
: Heidar, Rimewind Master is an elementalist fanatic. The manipulations of Orvar, the All-Form or Kami of the Crescent Moon could cause problems, as could a big sea creature like Tromokratis or Charix, the Raging Isle.
: Pretty much everyone. It's easier to count the people who aren't outright villains.
: Relatively few actual villains, but a bunch of manipulators, dragons, and angry people that could fill the role.
: A bunch of wild animals and nature types. No scheming villains, but a good selection of rampaging monsters. Meng Huo, Barbarian King would be a unique choice (if you're willing to.proxy or drop $150+).
: Polukranos Reborn  Flip is the most (only?) villainous character in these colors.
: Lots of options, from the behind-the-scenes manipulation of Lazav, Dimir Mastermind to the illithid Captain N'ghathrod, Gisa and Geralf's necromancer army, whatever Umbris, Fear Manifest is, and a lot more.
: A few options, but lots of depth in them. Insane biologist Momir Vig, Simic Visionary and his magnum opus Experiment Kraj, nature's avenger Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath, or maybe Aesi, Tyrant of Gyre Strait is flooding the area.
: A very deep and wide pool for villains. Vampires, demons, dragons, demon dragons, warlords, torturers...
: Grakmaw, Skyclave Ravager joins the ranks of the big scary monsters. A more calculating BBEG would probably be one of the death lords like Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord. Vhati il-Dal or Old Rutstein or probably more storyline villains than BBEG material.
: A very shallow pool. Storvald, Frost Giant Jarl, Rubinia Soulsinger, and maybe Falco Spara, Pactweaver or Katilda and Lier (mostly because of Lier) are the best options for an Archenemy villain. I'd throw Kros, Defense Contractor in, but goading is kind of limited when you're the Archenemy.
: This color set will probably be either a cold, distant, merciless villain or a manipulative puppet master. Raffine, Scheming Seer and Oloro, Ageless Ascetic fall into the first category, and Sen Triplets and The Ever-Changing 'Dane in the second. Varina, Lich Queen is another option for a zombie army.
: Big, angry, and violent, with some good dragons. Xira, the Golden Sting and Vazi, Keen Negotiator break out of this mold, but they strike me as more lieutenant-types, not arc villains by themselves.
: Not much; these tend to be either heroic or big smashy monsters. Uril, the Miststalker could work.
: Queen Marchesa is a classic, as you mentioned, and Edgar Markov is right there, too. Actually, this color set has some good depth and variety for an Archenemy. Some are more overtly villainous, and some are just very martial. My top picks would be Edgar, Licia, Sanguine Tribune, or Tariel, Reckoner of Souls.
: Mostly either weird esotericism or "nature's avenger" types. I don't think any of these are outright villainous in-story, but most of them have loose or vague stories. With the right deck, this could be a unique and interesting villain. Riku of Two Reflections is my top pick.
Four-color sets in general: Any of them would work, except for a couple of the .
: Use this color set if you want a truly apocalyptic feel. saluma mentioned Tiamat, which is a very good choice, and finding a way to get through Progenitus or O-Kagachi, Vengeful Kami is a story of epic scale.
Fish_Plissken on Gluntch counters interaction
8 months ago
If I am running Kros, Defense Contractor or Generous Patron, do the counters bestowed by Gluntch, the Bestower count for their triggered abilities?
SirHipHopHippo on
Ewwww Kros, infect
1 year ago
Hi Nova! Thanks for the comment!
Yes, we all had a budget restriction of $45. You can see the budget version of the deck here. The deck plays really well. In my experience the fogs are imperative for this deck, especially when you get into the 1v1. With Kros you spend all game buffing your opponents creatures and when it gets down to just two players you need to be able to buy time to proliferate the infect counters with something like Contagion Clasp.
As for Paradox Haze I have a very nice hand painted alter of the card, I haven't had a home for it in a while since I took apart another deck so I just have to put it in here. Here's a link to the alternate art if you wanna check it out. There are a lot of cards in the build though that trigger on upkeep Orzhov Advokist, Aven Mimeomancer, Evolutionary Escalation, Sheltering Ancient, Sporogenesis, Crescendo of War, Kumena's Awakening, Phyrexian Swarmlord, and of course the commander Kros, Defense Contractor so I think it will be really strong.
I'm excited to see how Kros can be improved with upcoming sets and more community research.
enpc on Feedback Requested! Tsukimi Moon's Mirror
1 year ago
On the whole the card is actually pretty well designed. A few thoughts though:
Having it create a token of any creature on the battlefield seems both a bit strong, given the 3 mana populate. Sure, commanders like Sakashima the Impostor only cost 4, but you don't get a token in addition to the commander. And with the amount of token support out there, it seems too easy to just piggyback someone else's hard work. Here, I would change the wording to "another target creature you control" which I think balances it up a bit.
Moonfolk Druid is an odd creature type. Druid seems fine (we see this as one of the common creature types that has the populate mechanic) however typically you would expect Dryad, Human or even Merfolk (there's already two merfolk druids). Moonfolk on the other hand are typically wizards. Thematically as well, Moonfolk mechanics are based around bouncing lands. New moonfolk lean more heavily into artifact effects, but this is due to the direction of Neon Dynasty. I'm not saying that it can't be a moonfolk, it's just a bit odd. And I'm presuming there won't be many, if not any other moonfolk in the deck, which means you're potentially losing an opportunity to have a bit of extra tribal synergy (potentially).
Mana symbols on the card should be in the order of: . Kros, Defense Contractor is a brand new card and uses that mana colour order.
You probably have enough space on the card to add the reminder text for populate and I think it might make the text area feel a bit more balanced. Not to mention it helps for others less familiar with the mechanic.
Most of these are pretty minor comments - as I said, I think you've done well with a balanced card.
Coward_Token on
Kros, Defense Contractor
2 years ago
antattack tagging your quote with Kros, Defense Contractor so that it's globally visible
This is a rough list of all cards I've found that work with Kros. I do understand that Orzhov Advokist doesn't necessarily trigger our commander but it does work with the goal of the deck, make things big and don't let them attack us.
One card in particular thats great is Magnetic web. You start nabbing creatures with magnet counters and also goading them, forcing the goaded creature to drag the others with magnet counters on them along and run into your opponents.
//play-1 1 Kros, Defense Contractor
//deck-1 1 Ajani, Adversary of Tyrants 1 Alharu, Solemn Ritualist 1 Basri Ket 1 Basri's Lieutenant 1 Bloodthirsty Blade 1 Brokers Ascendancy 1 Collective Effort 1 Combat Calligrapher 1 Contagion Clasp 1 Contagion Engine 1 Curse of Predation 1 Cytoplast Manipulator 1 Dismiss into Dream 1 Dragon Blood 1 Duelist's Heritage 1 Evolution Sage 1 Evolution Vat 1 Evolutionary Escalation 1 Experiment Kraj 1 Fertilid 1 Forcemage Advocate 1 Forgotten Ancient 1 Forgotten Ancient 1 Gladehart Cavalry 1 Grateful Apparition 1 Inexorable Tide 1 Iridescent Hornbeetle 1 Leech Bonder 1 Ley Line 1 Magnetic Web 1 Nils, Discipline Enforcer 1 Oblivion Stone 1 Obsessive Skinner 1 Pendant of Prosperity 1 Pollenbright Druid 1 Power Conduit 1 Regna's Sanction 1 Salt Road Quartermasters 1 Scholarship Sponsor 1 Secret Rendezvous 1 Serrated Biskelion 1 Sludge Monster 1 Sly Instigator 1 Soulblade Renewer 1 Spike Breeder 1 Spike Hatcher 1 Spike Tiller 1 Spike Worker 1 Summoning Trap 1 Tempt with Glory 1 Thrummingbird 1 Together Forever 1 Twilight Shepherd 1 Verity Circle 1 Willbreaker 1 Yannik, Scavenging Sentinel
Coward_Token on Streets of New Capenna
2 years ago
Luxior: Hah, I was thinking how funny it was that the story made out Elspeth to be this great fighter who's handed fancy weapons, yet her actual Planewalker cards don't really reflect that. Anyway, e.g. Huatli, Radiant Champion is quite interesting here; make note of PWs that can make lots of loyalty for themselves and/or buff creatures. Also, it's not to be overlooked for actual creature cards either; the curve is quite perfect for Skullbriar, the Walking Grave
Black Market Tycoon: Would it have been overpowered without the downside? It's basically standard-legal Coalition Relic on legs. That aside, feels more appropriate for or even
Metropolitan Angel: Flavor here is confusing seeing as the angels being absent, even towards the end arguably, is a plot point.
Public Enemy: I don't get it, isn't this pretty useless for 1v1 formats? Anyway, funny with Kros, Defense Contractor (and probably intentionally so)
Queza, Augur of Agonies: Life loss doesn't work with Curiosity, sorry! Kind of wish it said "each" and "that much".
Obscura Ascendancy: Feels like quite a bit more work than the Maestro and Broker one without a lot more gain. Got any 0-cost spells?
Illuminator Virtuoso: Looting isn't extremly strong but I'm not a fan of this pattern of color bleed with reference to learn (e.g. Professor of Symbology).
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