Elderfang Disciple

Creature — Elf Cleric

When this enters the battlefield, each opponent discards a card.

Legality

Format	Legality
1v1 Commander	Legal
Alchemy	Legal
Archenemy	Legal
Arena	Legal
Block Constructed	Legal
Brawl	Legal
Canadian Highlander	Legal
Casual	Legal
Commander / EDH	Legal
Commander: Rule 0	Legal
Custom	Legal
Duel Commander	Legal
Gladiator	Legal
Highlander	Legal
Historic	Legal
Legacy	Legal
Leviathan	Legal
Limited	Legal
Modern	Legal
Oathbreaker	Legal
Pauper	Legal
Pauper Duel Commander	Legal
Pauper EDH	Legal
Pioneer	Legal
Planechase	Legal
Pre-release	Legal
Quest Magic	Legal
Standard	Legal
Tiny Leaders	Legal
Vanguard	Legal
Vintage	Legal

Discussion (18)

legendofa on Sheoldred Reanimate

11 months ago

Tempo is basically the pace of the game. Slower, more attrition-y decks want to extend the game and gain value over time, which is where I think this deck is trying to be. Compare that to a high speed, high damage deck that tries to do as much damage as possible as quickly as possible. What I mean by saying those cards keep your tempo up and your opponents down is that they represent threats, while also disrupting your opponents' strategy by forcing discards and damage.

The mana curve is a measure of how efficiently you use your available mana each turn. A low-curve deck will be more aggressive and try to win in the first few turns. A higher curve will try to extend the game to get to its best effects. The idea of playing "on curve" is basically that you play a land and use all available mana that turn. Turn 1, play a land and spend 1 mana, T2 land + spend 2 mana, T3 land + spend 3 mana, etc. It's important to balance the amount of mana you have with what you can do with it--if you're consistently leaving mana unused, or if you regularly don't have enough to cast your key spells, you need to rebalance.

EDH games tend to run longer, so there's more opportunity to get to higher mana values, and I see a lot of single-use 2-mana cards in this deck. Once your Elderfang Disciple or Virus Beetle or whatever does its thing, it's basically relegated to the role of chump blocker. My suggestions, especially the enchantments, aim to give this deck a way to use and reuse them, so you can get more value out of them. Self-destructive cards like Crypt Rats and Fleshbag Marauder also are worth using more than once.

As another thought, there's a lot of counter manipulation, but only Liliana of the Veil, Undying Evil, Undying Malice, Blightbelly Rat, Oriq Loremage, Bloodchief Ascension and Contagion Engine actually use or create counters, unless I'm overlooking something. There's as many or more ways to move or add counters as ways to actually get counters. I'm not sure what role Power Conduit plays in here.

At this point, I should probably mention that I'm not a high-end EDH builder; I have a lot of gimmicky decklists and just design around whatever catches my interest at the moment. Still, I hope my suggestions and advice keep your wheels going!

zapyourtumor on How Not To MTG

1 year ago

Dead_Blue_ I actually tried making a BW scam rack-type deck with Ephemerate and Grief and Elderfang Disciple here: BW Blink Rack

The main problems I ran into were that you cannot run the Undying Malice type cards because the only card they work with is Grief, and if you only have 4 targets, both Grief and Undying Malice are pretty terrible on their own and you won't hit the combo very often. So basically you are forced to run at least 4 more creatures and switch to flicker spells, but then you run into the problem of flicker spells being mono white and not pitchable to Grief, plus they are useless on their own. And even then I ended up trying to fit too many cards into one deck. So yeah if you want to run this type of deck you would need to cut herald and a lot of the artifacts, and sometimes the saga package too if you go BW.

However you did give me an interesting idea, which is if you included Fury as well and then went for a BR midrange scam rack type of deck. Rakdos gives you access to Kroxa, Fury, Bolt, K-Command, Terminate, etc.

tkjanacek on Mogis Ravel

1 year ago

You have a card draw/bearhug theme, maybe you should make this a Nekusar, the Mindrazer deck? I recommend running Memorial to Folly, Path of Ancestry, Blightstep Pathway  ^Flip, Drossforge Bridge, Talisman of Indulgence, Coldsteel Heart, Commander's Sphere, Fellwar Stone, Mind Stone, Star Compass, Fire Diamond, Charcoal Diamond, Glittering Stockpile, Prismatic Lens, Tome of the Guildpact, Exsanguinate, Read the Bones, Angrath, the Flame-Chained, Court of Ambition, Curtains' Call, Stormbreath Dragon, Fiery Confluence, Liliana's Specter, Capital Punishment, Gray Merchant of Asphodel, Soul Shatter, Tectonic Giant, Graveyard Trespasser  ^Flip, Palace Siege, Vance's Blasting Cannons  ^Flip, Cut / Ribbons, Make an Example, Oath of Liliana, Valakut Exploration, Terminate, Liliana's Triumph, The Eldest Reborn, Unnerve, Yarok's Fenlurker, Elderfang Disciple, Skull Rend, Tasigur's Cruelty, Warchief Giant, Warlock Class, Zof Consumption  ^Flip, Hagra Mauling  ^Flip, Skyclave Relic, Syphon Mind, Syphon Flesh.

legendofa on Pattern Recognition #237 - A …

1 year ago

Peanut gallery reporting in! I've been waiting for this, and I hope I'm not being obnoxious about it.

This note isn't a criticism, but just an observation. Erosion is the only common ever printed that needs three mana of the same color, and that was back in 1995. I don't know if there's some special reason why it doesn't happen, but Fisher of the Bog caught my eye for that reason. I don't know if it needs to be power-adjusted, but maybe reduce the color density? I leave this in your capable hands.

Undying Endurance feels to me more like a variant Gift of Immortality or Fool's Demise than Undying Rage. This feels like an uncommon, since it can keeps recurring itself and the creature it was attached to. I would suggest either pushing this up to uncommon as-is or adding an additional cost to the enchantment's self-recursion.

I love the design of Warning from Beyond, and it fits with Duelist very nicely.

Cruel Lessons takes the low cost of Sign in Blood and the speed of Blood Pact and puts them together. Probably not too powerful, but worth keeping an eye on, in my opinion.

I agree that Bog-Mad Warlock's spectacle cost should be {1}{B}. That would make it a decent side-grade to Elderfang Disciple, Liliana's Specter, and similar cards.

Thanks for posting these articles. It's a lot of fun watching the creative process, and I hope my thoughts are helpful in some small way.

Last_Laugh on Looking for a good card …

2 years ago

Elvish Doomsayer, Noxious Toad (oracle text is each opponent), Burglar Rat, Elderfang Disciple, and Liliana's Specter are all 2-3 drops that put in their work already or do when they die.

Last_Laugh on Marchesa, the Black Rose

2 years ago

Spark Double feels like it's a custom card made specifically for Marchesa. It allows you to abuse any etb/death trigger on everyone's turn instead of once per round thanks to that automatic +1+1 counter or it copies Marchesa for double Dethrone.

Vigean Graftmage = 2 free sacs every turn (itself + 1 other). This card is deceptively amazing here. Have Vigean enter first then as the 2nd enters, graft a counter onto it.

Goblin Bombardment is a sac outlet that only 2 colors can reliably deal with and it enables an infinite damage combo with Mikaeus and Glen Elendra.

Burglar Rat, Elderfang Disciple, Elvish Doomsayer, Liliana's Specter, and Noxious Toad (oracle text is each opponent) are all excellent additions to your discard theme.

Feel free to check out my list for ideas. Upvotes on any of my decks are appreciated. Every Masochist Needs a Marchesa to Love Them

Araignee on Nath - Budget Commander

2 years ago

As for a flavour edition, you might try to squeeze Elderfang Disciple in. It discards and it's an Elf ;)

zAzen7977 on Always Standard Discard

2 years ago

Hey legendofa, I’m right there with you regarding the lack of good discard interactions in standard. But I think it can work in Mono-Black. Check out what I’ve been working on, I recently updated it:

TERGRID’S TORTURE CHAMBER - Discard Control [VOW]

In my build I run no creature or hand exile effects, since those effects are non-bo’s with Tergrid. We want to be able to keep the stuff we force the opponent to discard and ‘sac. Plus I think you could run more 1-drops on the mainboard, like Dread Fugue and Bloodchief's Thirst.

Acquisitions Expert is strictly better than Elderfang Disciple since both hit 1 card of the opponent’s choice, but the Expert has 1 additional toughness.

Also, Professor Onyx is a good option for a finisher, since her ultimate can do up to 18 damage to the opponent, depending on how empty the opponent’s hand is. And she really synergizes well with Tergrid!