Q Tourney, 8. Snow league, Season 4

AlurenRecycle, 1 month ago

First Place. 7-2, 55pts

None

amonra0810, 1 month ago

Big redesign of the deck - Version 2 of the deck

Taida, 1 month ago

I decided to properly tackle some of the consistency problems the deck was showing, especially in terms of its manabase. I ended up with an Izzet list that feels more consistent. The main points I modified were the lands to move to only two colors, and changed the cards so that the deck would not brick as often in the middle of the storm turn. I wrote a more in-depth explanation in the description of the deck.

Bonus Update — Final (Fantasy) Revision 2

August_Cross, 1 month ago

Cleaned up the primer, and completely rewrote some sections to explain its performance in terms of our new power brackets system!

Also, I stand by referring to my previous version as the "Final Revision." I've been very happy with this deck, and I consider my quest to "fix it" complete. So, despite plenty of new Knights and Equipment coming out, I haven't felt the need to make room for any of them. Well... almost any of them. Then Final Fantasy spoiler season started.

===accordion ===panel:Card Changes Battle Angels of Tyr --> Adelbert Steiner

This might seem wild. Battle Angels is not at all a bad card, but I've gotten to play with it a lot, and I've found that you don't have as much control over triggering it as you might expect. While you can use equipment to help force it through against specific players, the play patterns still don't match up: if you're behind because you lack equipment, then it struggles to get through on its own and draw the cards you need. If you're ahead of the table due to lots of equipment and can more easily push its damage through, then you don't need its utility effects. That example even assumes that you aren't so far ahead that you fail the ability's condition outright. So, Battle Angels isn't actually achieving its intended role as a utility creature. In the past four games I've cast it, it succesfully triggered (and actually got me something) once over each game, but it only ever gained life. I originally was going to put a different Final Fantasy card, Freya Crescent, here. Freya would still fly and could still theoretically provide mana utility at a more consistent rate. BUT, I know from experience with Paradise Mantle that I don't often have an excess of creatures to be tapping some of them for mana. Then Steiner got spoiled too, and I had to think and test a little more. I decided to try Steiner here. A knight with no natural evasion or utility fails my usual criteria, but both of his abilities remain very relevant. Lifelink has already been proven to work in my particular brew of the deck by offsetting Gwyn triggers and other pings, by keeping my lifetotal high for Twinblade Paladin, and by naturally keeping me alive after my aggression exposes me to opponent's attacks. Steiner's second ability is a first for this deck for being an escalating threat like my finisher equipment, except on a creature body. Even better, it doesn't change the play patterns of the deck to use him as a finisher, because I'm still just hoarding equipment. And as a final huge bonus in his favor: when I tested the card, I realized that, because he doesn't need the equipment to be attached to him, my equipment can be attached to a different bearer and Steiner can be a secondary threat at no cost. This means he still pulls his weight while laying-low to dodge removal, until I get to the end of the game and am ready to go all-in on Steiner to try and end the game. Additionally, Steiner being a low mana cost card matters for this deck's recursion and for cards like Kayla's Reconstruction.

Eowyn, Fearless Knight --> Squall, SeeD Mercenary

Because this deck often wins more gradually through a resource grind, you can think of it as a control deck in a "Who's the Beatdown" evaluation. As the theory goes: you use your removal early to survive to the midgame and on, where your deck's superior resource efficieny and card quality will eventually take command of the game. Yet still, I'm removing this bit of interaction. Eowyn suffers from the same issue that Swords and Path did, which is being creature-only in a deck that needs to its interaction to kill noncreature stuff. The protection gave me the potential to go for big attacks with Gwyn and Eowyn, but not only have I moved away from surprise kills, I also have colored equipment that fall off when my creatures gain protection! (And even if I wanted to play closer to the "Who's the beatdown" theory, I would probably need to rely on cheaper, faster removal than a 4-mana creatuer with a restriction on targeting.) Leon will be a far better combat creature—since he matches my squad of other 4-mana, 3-power Double Strikers—but he also provides repeatable recursion, which when it matters, is one of the most powerful effects for this deck and contritbues to that long-term grind gameplan.

Sigiled Sword of Valeron --> Dragoon's Lance

I can explain this change much easier. Sigiled Sword of Valeron was already such an iffy inclusion. It's not that powerful as a combat equipment, and it didn't even correctly perform its utility as a "tutorable creature" without already having one in play, such as Syr Gwyn. So, it's practical function overlapped too much with Heirloom Blade. Some of the few otther use cases, such as needing extra blockers, were still dampened by this deck's access to Lifelink for that same sense of safety and further dampened by the fact that the token comes in attacking, leaving it vulnerable to dying to blocks. I am instantly replacing it with Dragoon's Lance, which does the "tutorable creature" job correctly AND provides evasion with its keyword.

Nomad Outpost --> Shattered Landscape

Getting my land types is much more valuable for this decklist than having access to all pips simultaneously, due to the way I've set up the rest of the manabase. This makes check lands come in untapped more frequently, and it still finds me whatever individual color I'm missing or that I need a second source of. I actually made this change a while back, but I hadn't updated the decklist to reflect it just yet. ===endpanel ===endaccordion

Plane Chase Fiasco

CardTyrant, 1 month ago

Went to DS for the first time in months... Played a lot of games and had a blast. But this isn't about the other games. This is about SQUIRRELS! Played a single game of Plane Chase with two other people. One was using the new sulti dragon self mill and the other Gishath. All the plane cards favored the dragon, while weakening Gishath and myself. I managed to get six squirrels out (more if I didn't have to keep sacing them). I even drew two cards for two different infinite combos (Earthcraft and Scurry Oak) and a pinger. I tried to stay low and not a target, but the dragon player seemed to want me out. What irritated me with the deck is I was drawing lots of cards... But never the other two cards I needed. Would have if I lived two more turns but nope. Losing streak continues.

None

Lon24sok, 1 month ago

5/14/2025 revision

Zenith8438, 1 month ago

Swapped out some cards with newer options for more card advantage, better recursion options, and a door from Duskmourn that allows for cascade triggers to double.

Time to Shuffle

Hybrow, 1 month ago

With Final Fantasy coming I want to add the Prickly Pear .. But that means another shell game because i will be losing a fetchland (x2) ETB.

REMOVING: Genestealer Patriarch, Lumbering Megasloth, Rimefeather Owl, Haywire Mite, Topiary Stomper, This opens up Tyranid, Mutant, Sloth, Bird, Insect, Dino, and the all important Plant

ADDING: Venomthrope, Summon: Fenrir, Duskshell Crawler, Vaultborn Tyrant, Jumbo Cactuar This will use up Tyranid, Saga, Wolf, Insect, Dino and Plant

I have wanted to add the tyrant for a while, but havent wanted to lose my ETB fetch. Fenrir solves this problem. And changing out my Mite for the crawler gives me another way to get trample. And to top it off, it ends up being a 6 CMC discount to the deck

Back from the Dead

Vulnoth, 1 month ago

Due to varied facets of unfortunate circumstances, my playgroup fell apart and none have played MTG since. I, however, am bringing that to a close and will be developing Mort moving forward once more. It's been over a year since my last log (recorded in relatively short order after last EDH night), which means a great many cards have been made in my absence. This is going to drastically slow development as I sift through in theory and play everything that catches my eye. However, I do see promising selections for this super duper hypocritical psyker moth boi and his ugly bois. In much greater quantity I'm seeing cards to facilitate gain-and-drain, which has been my intended "secondary" wincon should the ugly bois prove too slow. Also since we now have the bracket system, such as it is, I think I will have finally the opportunity to scale Mort back a smidge to be better in line with Bracket 3. He has currently strong consistency cards which does inflate Mort's theoretical performance even though he himself is far too slow to break into Brack 4 without playing a cutthroat and unfun build. I've no idea what's next and I'm excited to see it through.

v1.4 - Dragonstorm!

KBK7101, 1 month ago

OUT - Hellrider, Grave Titan, Cavalcade of Calamity, Fervent Charge, Herald of the Host, Krenko, Tin Street Kingpin, Neyali, Suns' Vanguard, Preacher of the Schism, Skyhunter Strike Force, Raid Bombardment, Welcoming Vampire, Warchief Giant, Witty Roastmaster

IN - Warleader's Call, Enduring Innocence, Arabella, Abandoned Doll, Goldlust Triad, Ainok Strike Leader, Voice of Victory, Dalkovan Packbeasts, Redoubled Stormsinger, Zurgo Stormrender, Zurgo, Thunder's Decree, Bone-Cairn Butcher, Windcrag Siege, Within Range

HUGE update! I had been meaning to back around to updating this deck for a while now and the release of Tarkir: Dragonstorm finally pushed me over the edge! Mobilize is a fantastic mechanic that fits perfectly with what I want this deck to do. I made a lot of changes to this deck and removed some longtime mainstays, but hopefully these changes are for the better.

Would love some feedback!

half a decade away from the game

Bitsy83, 1 month ago

Finishing school and the pandemic are what took me away from MTG and a mental pivot away from tabletop gaming in general is a helluva thing. I've tried several times to return to Commander over the past year but it seems that I suck at MTG again and have to start from where I was in about 2010. Not bad but potentially expensive because of the scrub urge to buy "better" cards as if that's a substitute for paying attention while playing and knowing what my deck actually does. I would love a Bone Miser or Bloodthirsty Champion but tbh the deck doesn't really need them. It's been so funny rediscovering the delight of the dollar bin! I do have many expensive cards in the deck but I had most of them already. Trash cards are trash until you gotta dig in there to remember ancient recipes or find your deck's plot.

Version 1.1

CardTyrant, 1 month ago

So today I gutted the deck. I am a tribal player, and this deck really lacked a tribe. So I am leaning towards warriors. I also want to embrace the Mardu, and be fast and aggressive. So by the time I'm done with the deck I want everything to be around 4 CMC or less. There will be some exceptions, but not many. Nothing higher than 6 CMC.

Got the deck; Mardu Surge

CardTyrant, 1 month ago

Found the deck, Mardu Surge, at my local Walmart for $49.99. My wife got the Abzan deck for the same price. We played them 1v1 against one another, and the wife won twice. I found that she could get a fat defense up faster than I could attack. Once she got three or four fat boys up, my attacks were over until I could knock the defense down. For our first two matchups, I found the deck lacking removal and ramp.

Proxy

Pethrax, 1 month ago

Arcane proxy is a proxy for Kuja genome sorcerer

Changes for consistency

Taida, 1 month ago

Made some small adjustments. Increased Aria of Flame to 4 copies, as it is true that being the main piece of the deck it would be recommended to have all the possible copies. For it I took out one copy of Thirsting Roots and Invoke Calamity, the latter mainly as it is quite color-intensive.

None

SilvValens, 1 month ago

Swapped out 1x Frontier Guide and 1x Vulshok Factory for 2x Warden of the Grove.

None

SilvValens, 1 month ago

Swapped 1x Ephara, God of the Polis and 1x Rule of Law for 2x Arcane Laboratory.

May Update Log

JBTomero, 1 month ago

• Added Open the Way, cutting Hunting Wilds. With my collection of nonbasic lands lying in wait, the value floor would be roughly the same as Hunting Wilds but with the potential for huge gains.

• Added Pir's Whim, cutting Embrace the Unknown. Another Field of the Dead ramp-tutor with a little artifact/enchantment removal for free. Even better in multiplayer. Embrace the Unknown probably didn't get its fair shake, but it feels like a dream scenario card since the Retrace didn't come up as often as I'd hoped.

• Added Sylvan Scrying, cutting Lair of the Hydra. My nonbasic collection has become such a toolbox that this 2cmc tutor has grown into an auto-include. I'm replacing a land since 2 mana to "cycle" into a land satisfies a land slot. Lair of the Hydra ran afoul of my "No Lightning Rods" rule and either I was too meek to activate it, was punished when I did, or if I had ridiculous amounts of mana I was casting Hazezon instead of risking it all on this. Deep in my gut it was not a card I was happy to see, so it ended up being worse than a forest.

Game changer list

Telph, 1 month ago

I removed 3 game changers: vampiric tutor, Rhystic study, and enlightened tutor. This was an attempt to make it a bracket 3 deck with only 3 game changers. With the first update to the game changer list, a lot of tools this deck needs to function are now on the game changer list, and now I have no intention of changing it further. I'm still a fan of removing the tutors though.

Changes

ERJI, 1 month ago

Add : - Will of the Jeskai - Cephalid Coliseum - Mistrise Village