Sideboard


Maybeboard


With new dinos incoming from a return to Ixalan, it's time to review the deck. I tested Pantlaza, Sun-Favored over Gishath, Sun's Avatar and I hate to say it, but Pantlaza is stronger. While Pantlaza may be the normal commander for now, I can always swap Gishath to the command zone if I'm feeling nostalgic. Enough good dinosaurs were printed without Enrage, so that has changed the direction of this deck slightly. Considerations below for options to move away from Engrage focus.

After Lost of Caverns of Ixalan spoilers, we have some possible changes. Maybe not leaning into enrage so hard.
1. Needletooth Raptor --> Bronzebeak Foragers (single target --> three target removal)
2. Domri Rade --> Curious Altisaur (Card Draw swap for another dinosaur body to hit off the top of the deck with Gishath at the cost of potential removal) This one has been very useful.
3. Marauding Raptor --> Hunting Velociraptor (swap 1cmc reduction to greatly affect our larger dinosaurs costing only 3cmc, and lean away from enrage)
4. Herald's Horn --> From the Rubble (swap 1cmc reduction and a possible card draw for recursion)
5. Carnage Tyrant --> Earthshaker Dreadmaw (Swap a body with protection for a nearly equal body with card draw)
6. Cacophodon --> Wrathful Raptors (Swap out our potential to do infinite mana for being scarier in combat both offensively and defensively). This card has done great in testing so far.
7. Aura Shards --> Scion of Calamity (Swap out etb removal dependent on getting more creatures for another body for Gishath to find off the top of the deck that can do the same but might not draw the immediate hate. I find aura shards gets blown up in less than a round more often than not in my play group)
8. Pyrohemia --> Growing Rites of Itlimoc  
9. Forerunner of the Empire --> Roaming Throne (Tutoring is nice, but leaning away from enrage makes the optional pinging effect less desirable. Roaming throne can count as a dinosaur and double effects is hard to ignore)
10. Wakening Sun's Avatar --> board wipe or more single target removal? (The restriction from being cast from the hand often makes this just a 7/7 body. It may be time to consider swapping it out to help lower average cmc).
11. Thundering Spineback --> Dinosaurs on a Spaceship (If we remove enrage, we remove infinite mana. I find I very rarely use Thundering Spineback as a mana sink. Dinosaurs on a Spaceship is a better lord affect with upside). While it's nice to be able to get flyers, I find the suspend is generally too slow or you're already ahead and it doesn't matter at that point. The lord effect is much more impactful sooner.
12. Path of Discovery --> Pantlaza, Sun-Favored (For one more mana, we can get another body versus getting a +1/+1 counter or a card draw. Pantlaza speeds up this effect by putting the card onto the battlefield for free.) Damn near broken as a commander. Was very fast in comparison to Gishath.

This deck is not a cEDH viable deck. It is intended to be a fun combat oriented deck with around a 6-9 power level. If you like big creatures and causing a ruckus with combat, this is the deck for you. If you like control, there are some additional options you could slot in instead of what I put in mine. I'll get to some options for the control player later. Right now we're aligning the backbone of the deck from the new cards.

The main things this deck attempts to do are:

  1. Ramp! - We need a lot of lands or mana reduction to get big ol' dinos out.
  2. Combat - We want to trample over our opponents and bite everything in our path.
  3. Quick aggressive damage - Sink our teeth into someone vulnerable and we don't let go until they're gone, then move on to the next victim.

Lost Caverns of Ixalan

Since Rivals of Ixalan, we've had some interesting new dinosaurs to play with. Granted, not all of them follow the same strategies. Ixalan dinosaurs originally started out wanting to get hurt as they bit others for some extra advantages. Some of the newer dinosaurs still follow this effect but there are some additional options from recent sets. But between Lost Caverns of Ixalan and Jurassic Park, we have some notable inclusions. It has been difficult and remains difficult to pick what makes the cut and what doesn't.

Roaming Throne Synergies

First we will mention is an unusual but exciting card. Roaming Throne was an unexpected surprise for kindred decks, and for Gishath, this still holds true. Roaming Throne allows all sorts of advantage for this deck. Notably, Roaming Throne can be especially synergistic with Enrage as well.
1. Roaming Throne + Topiary Stomper, Ranging Raptors, Hulking Raptor for extra ramp or Zacama, Primal Calamity or Regal Behemoth if we really want extra mana. Plenty of ways to get extra mana for our high costing dinosaurs.
2. Roaming Throne + Regisaur Alpha, Polyraptor, Quartzwood Crasher, or Ghalta and Mavren to get twice as many tokens.
3. Roaming Throne + Itzquinth, Firstborn of Gishath, Trapjaw Tyrant or Silverclad Ferocidons for extra removal.
4. Roaming Throne + Ripjaw Raptor, Runic Armasaur, or Earthshaker Dreadmaw to get extra cards.
5. Roaming Throne + Bonehoard Dracosaur for both extra card draw and or ramp.
6. Roaming Throne + Harnessed Snubhorn to get recursion for an artifact and or enchantment twice.
7. Roaming Throne + Etali, Primal Conqueror   for a ton of free stuff. Absolutely ridiculous.
8. Roaming Throne + Rampaging Brontodon for an absolutely ridiculously large dinosaur.

There are so many options, plus more not listed, it would be a mistake not to include Roaming Throne in the deck.

Hunting Velociraptor

This wasn't a surprise that they made a card depicting the 'Clever Girl' scene in Jurassic Park, but the Prowl cost of was definitely a surprise. If we have mana reduction out combined with Hunting Velociraptor, then we can surprise the table with some huge threats seemingly out of nowhere. Expect Hunting Velociraptor to be killed on sight whenever you cast it. Or at least have some protection for it as a second surprise.

  1. Hunting Velociraptor + Urza's Incubator or Knight of the Stampede essentially allows you to cast a dinosaur for . That's right. Just a . This includes our commander, Gishath, Sun's Avatar, Zacama, Primal Calamity, or even Ghalta, Stampede Tyrant to cheat out the rest of the dinosaurs in your hand. All for a single .

I've found that if you hang on to Hunting Velociraptor and try to get out Urza's Incubator or Knight of the Stampede first, you can attempt to stack your hand with some creatures and try to find a way to get through on combat damage. Cast Hunting Velociraptor for from the mana reduction, then keep casting dinosaurs for a .

Possible Control with Dinosaurs?

Pyrohemia Combos

  1. Pyrohemia + Rite of Passage or Bellowing Aegisaur + any other creatures to buff up our creatures. (Note: Bellowing Aegisaur does not buff himself)
  2. Pyrohemia + Polyraptor to create more dinosaurs.
  3. Pyrohemia + Trapjaw Tyrant to exile opponents creatures
  4. Pyrohemia + Silverclad Ferocidons to mini-board wipe opponents
  5. Pyrohemia + Needletooth Raptor to mini-board wipe opponents
  6. Pyrohemia + Cacophodon + Gruul Turf or Boros Garrison to make infinite green or white mana (if Cacophodon is indestructable)
  7. Pyrohemia + Cacophodon + Bow of Nylea to ping Cacophodon and untap the bow to return cards from the graveyard to the bottom of the library. Great way to recycle dinos and other tools. Can also be used to give +1/+1 counters to my creatures to buff stuff quick.

Forerunner of the Empire Combos

  1. Forerunner of the Empire + Boros Charm or Heroic Intervention + Polyraptor for infinite dinosaurs and board wipe opponents. With Silverclad Ferocidons or Trapjaw Tyrant on the board, you can make sure indestructable creatures are removed as well due to sacrifice or exile.
  2. Forerunner of the Empire + any enrage Dino on the field + any other dino that enters the field to trigger enrage.

Aggravated Gishath

  1. Gishath, Sun's Avatar + Selvala, Heart of the Wilds + Aggravated Assault to generate infinite mana together with infinite attack phases. (While Gishath is on the field, tap Selvala to generate at least 7 mana from Gishath to pay for Aggravated Assault. Aggravated Assault untaps Selvala. Rinse and Repeat. Can work with any creature with power 6 or more, but Gishath is king due to putting all our dinos on the field. Since most of our dinos do not have vigilance, we will need to activate Aggravated Assault on our second main phase to untap everything for better efficiency.)

It is kind of slow though, since aggravated assault happens at sorcery speed, but eventually you should find Regisaur Alpha from Gishath's trigger. We do need to give all our other dinosaurs haste in order to become scary. Other potential haste options include Ogre Battledriver, Samut, Voice of Dissent, Xenagos, God of Revels and Fires of Yavimaya. In terms of ability wise, Ogre Battledriver is one of the best as it pumps up all creatures with a +2/+0 and haste. Xenagos, God of Revels will be much better though as he is tutorable "creature" with the tutors available to our deck and makes Gishath much more dangerous. The God also makes extra attack steps more attractive too since it triggers at the beginning of each combat step.

Additional Upgrade Options:

Gishath's Bite

With Dual Nature + Gishath, Sun's Avatar + Congregation at Dawn + Burning Sun's Avatar and Changeling Titan, we can surprise our opponents by infinite comboing off with the addition of Congregation at Dawn to kill all opponents. Otherwise, with Dual Nature + Burning Sun's Avatar on the field, play Changeling Titan to do the same thing - just skip to step 5.

How to use the combo:

Have Gishath bite an opponent for at least 2 damage. With the reveal top cards trigger on the stack, cast Congregation at Dawn and search for Burning Sun's Avatar and Changeling Titan.

  1. Both Burning Sun's Avatar and Changeling Titan ETB
  2. Dual Nature triggers along with both dinosaur triggers, stack it in a way that Burning Sun's Avatar trigger trigger first
  3. Deal 3 damage to target opponent
  4. Dual Nature trigger for Burning Sun's Avatar then resolve, create a token which deals 3 damage to target opponent
  5. Changeling Titan original ETB then resolves, champion Burning Sun's Avatar (exiling it)
  6. With the original Burning Sun's Avatar exiled, the avatar token also exiles
  7. Dual Nature's trigger for Changeling Champion then resolves last, creating a token of Changeling Titan
  8. Changeling Titan token ETBs, champion its own original Titan
  9. Since the original Titan is exiled, Burning Sun's Avatar is returned back to the battlefield
  10. Since the token lost the original, it also leaves the battlefield, which brings back the original Changeling Titan
  11. Restart from 1 and loop until every other player dies.

There are a few potential combos for this deck that will help you stomp your way to victory with this method:

  1. Warstorm Surge synergizes great with Gishath, Sun's Avatar because it will bring the pain when Gishath's rolls out more dinos. You can double it up with Gratuitous Violence, because it's not combat specific.

  2. Living Plane will turn all lands into 1/1 creatures. You can then use Savage Alliance to blow up all of one opponent's lands, or kill the board with Seismic Shudder and trigger all of your dinosaurs' enrage.

  3. Liquimetal Coating + Splinter will seek out and exile all of one type of your opponent's basic lands. As an added benefit, you can then leave Liquimetal Coating to work with Aura Shards for targeted removal. Myr Landshaper will do the same.

Suggestions

Updates Add

Comments

Attention! Complete Comment Tutorial! This annoying message will go away once you do!

Hi! Please consider becoming a supporter of TappedOut for $3/mo. Thanks!


Important! Formatting tipsComment Tutorialmarkdown syntax

Please login to comment

99% Casual

Competitive

Date added 6 years
Last updated 2 months
Exclude colors UB
Legality

This deck is Commander / EDH legal.

Rarity (main - side)

10 - 3 Mythic Rares

55 - 14 Rares

14 - 2 Uncommons

8 - 0 Commons

Cards 100
Avg. CMC 4.27
Tokens City's Blessing, Copy Clone, Dinosaur 2/2 RW, Dinosaur 3/1 R, Dinosaur 3/3 G, Dinosaur 3/3 G, Dinosaur Beast */* G, Dinosaur Egg 0/1 G, Dinosaur X/X G, Egg 0/1 G, Fungus Dinosaur, The Monarch, Treasure, Vampire 1/1 W
Folders DECKS, commander, Gishath, Favorites, Decks, Cool Decks, Commander, liked commander decks, decks, Dinosaur
Votes
Ignored suggestions
Shared with
Views