Removal for Animar edh?
Commander Deck Help forum
Posted on March 3, 2016, 9:05 p.m. by MTGJustice
I'm building a bounceAnimar, Soul of Elements edh deck. It's entirely creature centric. The problem I keep running in to is that I have no real removal, i've considered cards like Flametongue Kavu or Inferno Titan but they are pretty situational. Do I have any better options that I'm missing? I would prefer a creature if possible, my budget is no more than $5 on a card and Cyclonic Rift is banned in my play group. Thanks for your help.
FAMOUSWATERMELON says... #3
Both Ulamogs are fantastic (Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger, Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre).
March 3, 2016 9:11 p.m.
I've been playing around with Animar for a little while, if you want to post a decklist here or on my profile I'll take a look and see what I can suggest.
Some generic suggestions that fit your Budget: Voidwielder, Man-o'-War, and//or Riftwing Cloudskate. These work as both Bounce repeaters for Animar, and can bounce a troublesome creature in a pinch.
Giant Trap Door Spider and Hunting Kavu are Random R/G cards that exile a creature that's attacking you.
Gruul Ragebeast and Ulvenwald Tracker let you use your huge creatures for fight styled Removal.
Unfortunately, lacking White and Black really limits the amount of really good removal, and going for all creatures also hinders this. However, I ran a deck that had very few non-Creatures in Animar for a little over a year, and it was very fun to pilot. Best of luck with your Animar build.
My current list: Animar, the Angry Uncle
March 3, 2016 9:57 p.m. Edited.
Steelspike says... #5
Rampaging Baloths + Warstorm Surge Balefire Dragon Lord of Shatterskull Pass are all very good creature based removal.
March 3, 2016 10:17 p.m.
I t depends on what you are looking to remove. For artifacts and enchantments you usually see Caustic Caterpillar, Sylvok Replica, Reclamation Sage, Ainok Survivalist, and Nantuko Vigilante.
For creature removal people tend to run Flametongue Kavu (which I have personally not had the best success rate with; 4 damage often isn't enough), Man-o'-War (which I find really useful), Gilded Drake, and Sower of Temptation. And of course, you usually see the Ulamogs in Animar lists.
I run Inferno Titan in my deck, but that is because it mostly serves as my win condition with the Palinchron + Deadeye Navigator combo.
I don't know if you are running a combo focused Animar build, but I find that the more competative Animar decks don't often run much removal. They usually stick to just a few options that they can tutor for in a pinch. The competative decks want to focus on comboing out as fast as they can.
March 4, 2016 12:49 a.m.
Animar, Soul of Elements don't need creature removal so desperately, Domri Rade, Equilibrium and Tidespout Tyrant do the 105% of the work, my Man-o'-War is doing mold. take a look at mine if you want Animar, Soul of Victorious
March 4, 2016 2:27 a.m.
A lot of these recommendations seem to be completely ignoring OP's request for card costs to be no more than $5.
What are you looking to remove? Artifact, enchantment, creature, other? Here are several creature options I didn't see listed above that are both cheap and can remove something in Animar's colors: Brutalizer Exarch, Ulvenwald Tracker, Ingot Chewer, and Mold Shambler.
March 4, 2016 5:50 p.m.
@ Omeros It's hard to find good creature removal spells for an Animar deck that are also creatures, which is why a lot of the suggestions being offered are on the expensive side. At the budget level, most of what Animar has available to it are creatures that bounce other creatures. Bouncing isn't a great answer in a multiplayer game. To keep in budget, MTGJustice may need to look into non-creature spells like Pongify or Control Magic.
Animar is one of those decks that can utilize a lot of monetarily cheap cards to good effect, but there are a handful of expensive cards that it really benefits from including.
March 4, 2016 6:55 p.m.
@ greyninja You're right, I forgot about Phyrexian Ingester. For a budget Animar list it is probably the best creature option available for permanently getting rid of other creatures.
March 4, 2016 9:19 p.m.
Nobody mentioned Steel Hellkite? It's like the go to, "X colored deck needs to remove anything on a budget," card.
For creature removal I would really suggest investing in a Balefire Dragon, as it's great repeatable boardwipe, but some budget optons that haven't been mentioned yet are Tyrant's Familiar, Scourge of Kher Ridges, Disaster Radius (capitalize on all the high cost creatures you're running),Warstorm Surge, and Curse of the Swine.
For artifact/enchantments you have Viashino Heretic, Trygon Predator, Nullmage Shepherd, Terastodon, Reclamation Sage, Acidic Slime, Decimate, Krosan Grip, Hull Breach, Chaos Warp, Beast Within, Glissa Sunseeker, Woodfall Primus (not budget), and World Breaker (not budget at the moment).
I'm also a fan of just stealing things: Hellkite Tyrant, Aura Thief, Beguiler of Wills, Empress Galina, Memnarch (not budget).
March 4, 2016 9:24 p.m.
SaberTech the fact is that realy few cards do damage to Animar, Soul of Elements like Torpor Orb, Umezawa's Jitte and Sword of Fire and Ice. Creatures that give proplems are too big and have to stay in play for long to work so you have the time to counter or bounce these. Animar isn't for multiplayer, i'm a player of animar and thats terrible to say to my beloved, the only solution that I found is combo after loooooooooong time, and that isn't the way of Animar, an optimal manipulation of the deck like Thassa, God of the Sea, Descendant of Soramaro this one is more good than its look trust me.... A great boost comes from Sneak Attack but is way too above the 5$. Now i don't remember, but you can play Seedborn Muse+Winding Canyons or Alchemist's Refuge and the way is buoncer and counter but you have to buonce back your creatures with Cloudstone Curio and Equilibrium.
March 5, 2016 3:18 a.m.
@ DVLuca When I leave comments on decks I just default to the assumption that people are going to be playing them in multiplayer games, although I am well aware that Animar is a powerful 1v1 commander.
In regards to the rest of your comment, I think that it's just easier to link you to the deck I run and let you make your own conclusion about the type of Animar player I am. If you feel like having a discussion regarding Animar decks, feel free to drop me a message there. I'm interested in hearing other people's views on how they run Animar now that the mulligan rules have changed to the Vancouver rules and how the change may have affected their card choices.
Deck ---> Mad World Rising
greyninja says... #2
Duplicant and Phyrexian Ingester for bouncing...
Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger and Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre for Cloudstone Curio/Temur Sabertooth
March 3, 2016 9:10 p.m.