Hand Control with Gwendlyn di Corci [Primer]

Commander / EDH Discard Primer UBR (Grixis)

jadedflames

Land (35)

• 1x Blood Crypt
• 1x Bloodstained Mire
• 1x Cabal Coffers
• 1x Cabal Stronghold
• 1x Command Tower
• 1x Creeping Tar Pit
• 1x Crosis's Catacombs
• 1x Crumbling Necropolis
• 1x Desolate Lighthouse
• 1x Dragonskull Summit
• 1x Evolving Wilds
• 1x Ghost Quarter
• 1x Graven Cairns
• 1x Grixis Panorama
• 2x Island
• 1x Luxury Suite
• 1x Maze of Ith
• 1x Morphic Pool
• 2x Mountain
• 1x Polluted Delta
• 1x Reliquary Tower
• 1x River of Tears
• 1x Shadowblood Ridge
• 1x Smoldering Marsh
• 1x Steam Vents
• 1x Sunken Hollow
• 3x Swamp
• 1x Tainted Peak
• 1x Temple of Deceit
• 1x Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
• 1x Watery Grave

Creature (9)

• 1x Cao Cao, Lord of Wei
• 1x Fell Specter
• 1x Hellfire Mongrel
• 1x Jace's Archivist
• 1x Lavaborn Muse
• 1x Nicol Bolas
• 1x Notion Thief
• 1x Rackling
• 1x Sangromancer

Artifact (19)

• 1x Anvil of Bogardan
• 1x Chromatic Lantern
• 1x Cloak and Dagger
• 1x Crystal Chimes
• 1x Dimir Signet
• 1x Geth's Grimoire
• 1x Gilded Lotus
• 1x Illusionist's Bracers
• 1x Izzet Signet
• 1x Lightning Greaves
• 1x Paupers' Cage
• 1x Perilous Vault
• 1x Rings of Brighthearth
• 1x Sensei's Divining Top
• 1x Sol Ring
• 1x Swiftfoot Boots
• 1x Sword of Feast and Famine
• 1x Thousand-Year Elixir
• 1x Wheel of Torture

Sorcery (12)

• 1x Blasphemous Act
• 1x Damnation
• 1x Decree of Pain
• 1x Delirium Skeins
• 1x Demonic Tutor
• 1x Fabricate
• 1x Ill-Gotten Gains
• 1x Rise of the Dark Realms
• 1x Torment of Hailfire
• 1x Toxic Deluge
• 1x Vandalblast
• 1x Wheel of Fate

Planeswalker (1)

• 1x Tezzeret the Seeker

Commander (1)

Enchantment (14)

• 1x Bloodchief Ascension
• 1x Dissipation Field
• 1x Estrid's Invocation
• 1x Honden of Night's Reach
• 1x Liliana's Caress
• 1x Megrim
• 1x Painful Quandary
• 1x Quest for the Nihil Stone
• 1x Raiders' Wake
• 1x Rhystic Study
• 1x Shrieking Affliction
• 1x Underworld Dreams
• 1x Waste Not
• 1x Words of Waste

Instant (9)

• 1x Arcane Denial
• 1x Counterflux
• 1x Counterspell
• 1x Evacuation
• 1x Force of Will
• 1x Mystical Tutor
• 1x Negate
• 1x Terminate
• 1x Wheel and Deal

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Maybeboard

Enchantment (13)

• 1x Bottomless Pit
• 1x Collective Restraint
• 1x Copy Artifact
• 1x Copy Enchantment
• 1x Court of Ambition
• 1x Dream Halls
• 1x Land's Edge
• 1x Leyline of the Void
• 1x Mind Over Matter
• 1x Necrogen Mists
• 1x Oath of Scholars
• 1x Oppression
• 1x Propaganda

Artifact (4)

• 1x Howling Mine
• 1x Oblivion Stone
• 1x Skullcage
• 1x The Rack

Instant (3)

• 1x Kolaghan's Command
• 1x Spell Crumple
• 1x Visions of Beyond

Sorcery (2)

• 1x Saheeli's Artistry
• 1x Syphon Mind

Land (4)

• 1x Bojuka Bog
• 1x Geier Reach Sanitarium
• 1x Mikokoro, Center of the Sea
• 1x Strip Mine

Creature (3)

• 1x Clever Impersonator
• 1x Cunning Lethemancer
• 1x Mindslicer

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A discard themed EDH deck that I have been toying with. I have had a copy of Gwendlyn in my binder since before the price spike and thought I should finally do something with her.

First, let's take a look at what Gwen does.

So. Why consider using Gwendlyn di Corci? Her colors and her ability. Gwen taps on your turn to have an opponent discard a card at random, which is quite a bit better than it sounds. One of the biggest drawbacks of discard is that your opponent generally gets to decide what to toss: almost always the worst card in their hand. Gwen takes away that choice.

Alternatives

• Nath of the Gilt-Leaf - Shares the random discard ability with Gwen, but in . The lack of red and blue really hamstring what this deck is trying to do, though green ramp is definitely a plus if you want to ramp into a big Torment of Hailfire or Exsanguinate.
• Nekusar, the Mindrazer - He is popular for a reason, and could easily pilot this deck as well. Many of the cards in this deck don't do much without the ability to force a discard, however, and Nekusar's Howling Mine ability is actually a non-bo with rack effects.
• Neheb, the Worthy - Loses blue, and requires you hit in order to force a discard. With tweaks, he could pilot this deck competently enough.
• Nicol Bolas or Crosis, the Purger: both excellent grixis discard generals, but at 8 and 6 cmc respectively, you won't be able to play your general more than once or twice.

Hand Control

So the whole point of the deck is to control how many cards are in everyone else's hands (ideally zero). Gwendlyn is not absolutely necessary to the strategy, but she does kick off a bunch of the interaction.

Now, of course, there is the issue of "what happens when everyone is out of cards?" That would actually be fine for us, because there are a lot of ways to punish people having no cards in hand. But there are two reasons we would rather have cards in people's hands:

1. People who are hellbent get really mad at the person making them stay that way.
2. When everyone is hellbent.... the game gets really boring.

Every single person will immediately aim all the hate at the person making them discard, and really there is no going back once you have made yourself the archenemy of the group. So the solution to this: wheel effects. Wheel and Deal is the best, because you can be nice and political about asking who wants a bunch of new cards, and what they'll be willing to give for that. Wheel of Fortune and Wheel of Fate are good too, which is why they show up in basically every hand manipulation deck.

Combos

1. Geth's Grimoire+Words of Waste: Tap Gwen to make an opponent discard, in response to the card draw, pay to have everyone discard a card. In response to this, pay to have everyone discard another card and draw 2 yourself. Continue this until you run out of mana or everyone is empty-handed.
2. Notion Thief+Anvil of Bogardan: During each opponent's upkeep, they draw one card, you draw one card, and then they discard one. If someone is empty-handed, you draw one, they mill the top card of their deck. It's a hard lock.
3. Wheel and Deal + Ill-Gotten Gains + Geth's Grimoire/Waste Not: Magic Christmas Land. With the Grimoire on the table, Wheel and Deal to fill up everyone's hand, then Ill-Gotten Gains to make them discard everything, getting back Wheel and Deal, then wheeling again. With three players, all opponents will discard their hand, draw 7, discard those, get 3 back, then discard those and draw 7. They will get 7 cards, but you will draw at minimum 30 cards, plus damaging your opponent's with any Megrim effects. I once drew my entire deck and knocked two players out with only 8 mana invested.
4. Notion Thief + Any wheel effect: Everyone discards their hand, your opponents draw one card, and you draw 25.

Punishment

Really what we want is for our opponents to get hurt every time they so much as touch a card. To that end, we have multiple megrim effects and multiple rack effects.

Megrim Effects

These are effects that punish the opponent for discarding.

• Liliana's Caress: The best example of this effect. For only , you get an enchantment that deals 2 damage every time an opponent discards a card.
• Megrim: The namesake of this effect. Similar to Caress, but it costs
• Raiders' Wake: The newest Megrim effect. It costs .
• Fell Specter: A 1/3 flier for with Megrim stapled onto it.
• bloodchief acension: After it is turned on, it drains 2 every time any card goes to an opponent's graveyard.

Rack Effects

These are effects that punish the opponent for having too few cards in their hand.

• Wheel of Torture
• Paupers' Cage
• Shrieking Affliction

More Punishment

There are a few more cards which punish your opponent for making the mistake of playing magic.
• Painful Quandary
• Dissipation Field

Profit

Card Draw

This deck really can't function at anywhere near it's full value without one of two cards. When in doubt, always tutor for one of these first.

• Geth's Grimoire: This is the first, and is good enough that Fabricate is included for the sole purpose of being another copy. It combos with Words of Waste to make all your opponents discard their entire hand and draw most of your deck.
• Waste Not: Not quite as good as the Grimoire, but a cheaper value card. The mana can come in handy at the end of the game for a massive Exsanguinate or Torment of Hailfire, and the zombies are great chump blockers.
• Tezzeret the Seeker - Copy 2 of Geth's Grimoire.
• Fabricate - Copy 3 of Geth's Grimoire.

More Profit

• Sangromancer: the incidental life gain can add up surprisingly quickly, especially with something like Anvil of Bogardan and Words of Waste on the battlefield.
• Notion Thief: Let's you be the sole beneficiary of the wheel effects, and combos with Anvil of Bogardan for an effect similar to Chains of Mephistopheles.

Win Conditions

At some point, there will come a time that the game needs to end. By this point, you will likely have an absurd amount of mana, possibly spurred on by a mass discard effect and the mana produced by Waste Not, the go to mana sink in this deck, if you have an option, should be the ever great Torment of Hailfire. If you can cast it for 12-15, it is likely to be the end, because discarding will hurt them more than the life loss, and few people will be able to come back from losing all their permanents. Other standouts:

• Exsanguinate: Another commander all star.
• Rise of the Dark Realms: All game people have been discarding the super high cost cards that they can't cast yet, so that they can hold on to the few things they can. What this means is there will usually be a bunch of great targets for mass reanimation.

Top Ranked	Achieved #27 position overall 5 years ago
Date added	7 years
Last updated	2 years
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	6 - 0 Mythic Rares 51 - 0 Rares 25 - 0 Uncommons 11 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	3.30
Tokens	Zombie 2/2 B
Folders	Gwendlyn, Gwendlyn, Other Decks, Favs
Based on	[PRIMER] Gwendlyn DI Corci EDH o0xx 7V 3 iZ ID EDH