Mirror Gallery
in Commander? Why?
I've had this idea to exploit Legends in Commander using Blade of Selves and other "copy" cards. The neat thing with Blade of Selves is that without the Mirror the extra tokens will die instead of being exiled (unless for some reason you choose to kill the original). The Dragons of Kamigawa all have incredibly useful Death Triggers that work very much in your favor. This is a one card set up that works with all five of these Dragons. I decided that this was enough to persuade myself to go all out Dragon Tribal. There are more than enough Legendary Dragons to work with and most of them have great abilities to exploit when in bigger numbers. The rest of the deck needed to be full of ramp and tutors in order to work consistently, and the best way to have access to everything I need (including the Dragons) was Scion of the Ur-Dragon at the helm. I also have good ways to cheat big creatures onto the field early since I have literally nothing for the early game other than build up.
I wanted to incorporate the classic Dragons from Invasion, but ultimately had to cut most of them. I made sure to keep their Lairs and Charms for color fixing and flexibility, but I just couldn't make it work with all of them in there. Crosis made the cut over the rest since it's activated ability is the most useful of the bunch. I also had room in that color slot because Dragonlord Kolaghan is unexploitable in Commander. I also toyed around with including the original Elder Dragon Legends, but the Dragonlords from Tarkir proved to be much much better. Every Dragon included has it's place in different situations, and again having access to all colors gives you a really mixed bag of tricks. There are triggers on ETB, damage to players, and leaving the battlefield so using or breaking the Legend Rule to your advantage is key to success.
I also remembered another "Legend Cheat" where you can copy Dark Depths with Thespian's Stage which has no counters on it and becomes a 20/20 Flying Indestructible monster. This monster is also Legendary which means it isn't supposed to have a twin, but those Mirror images... The fun part is that if you are Mirrored up you actually get to also keep the original copy of Dark Depths and wind it's clock down the old fashioned way. If you start the game with one but not the other then Sylvan Scrying allows you to go get it. Crucible of Worlds adds even more exploitable action that allows you to even do this every turn... Play the Stage, copy the Depths, Sacrifice the Stage and add the token, play the Stage from your Graveyard, do it again, do it again, do it again... Crucible is also nice with Evolving Wilds and Terramorphic Expanse to be able to search up as much land as you need.
Another fun interaction is Sneak Attack and
Palace Siege
. Dragons are cool, but those Khans are cooler. Sneak in any Dragon, attack, sacrifice it at end of turn, return it to your hand at the beginning of your next upkeep, do it again. Gross.
Bladewing the Risen has a nice ETB effect that not only works well with the Blade combo (with or without Mirror) and also combos well with Conjurer's Closet. Scion of the Ur-Dragon tutors for any Dragon and puts it into your graveyard. Bladewing makes you care a little less about sending them there.
Dragon Tempest can be absolutely absurd, especially considering you can drop a whole bunch of Dragons so many different ways. The Haste is nice, but the damage can really rack up quickly. A ridiculous way to cheat out a lot of Dragons quickly is getting Sarkhan Unbroken to achieve his Ultimate and empty your Library of Dragons straight onto the field. Quicksilver Amulet and
Dragon Arch
are fine options as well.
Finally, the copy cards add a whole 'nother element of danger. Clever Impersonator, Copy Artifact, Phyrexian Metamorph, and
Masterwork of Ingenuity
copying a Blade of Selves to double it's effect? Uh, yes please. You can also copy Dragon Throne of Tarkir to be able to really double up your Dragon's power, or simply copy another Legendary creature and roll with multiples thanks to the Mirror.
That pretty much sums it up. Of course there are many other directions to take this idea, but I'm very happy with Dragons. I've been thinking up some strange variations, and if this works out as well as I think it will I'll be sure to get building again :)
Thanks for reading, I'd appreciate some thoughts and ideas. Of course there are thousands of other card options out there. I stuck to a pretty tight list of restrictions when digging through card options so I'm sure there are other things that might still gel with the concept that I've overlooked. Thanks again.
