Ardenn, Intrepid Archaeologist
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Legality

Format Legality
1v1 Commander Legal
Archenemy Legal
Block Constructed Legal
Canadian Highlander Legal
Casual Legal
Commander / EDH Legal
Commander: Rule 0 Legal
Custom Legal
Duel Commander Legal
Freeform Legal
Highlander Legal
Legacy Legal
Leviathan Legal
Limited Legal
Oathbreaker Legal
Planar Constructed Legal
Planechase Legal
Quest Magic Legal
Tiny Leaders Legal
Vanguard Legal
Vintage Legal

Ardenn, Intrepid Archaeologist

Legendary Creature — Kor Scout

At the beginning of combat on your turn, you may attach any number of Auras and Equipment you control to target permanent or player.

Partner (You can have two commanders if both have partner.)

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Optimator on How many equipment until free-equip …

4 months ago

I'm throwing together a Shinra-themed deck with Elena, Turk Recruit and Reno and Rude as rule-0 partners. Here's the prototype decklist (I doubt the details are particularly important for this discussion per se): Shinra Conflict Resolution

As a way to help the commanders do anything, and to trigger Elena's historic-matters ability, I'm thinking of adding a good amount of equipment. Not enough to make it like a full-on equipment deck, nor to make the deck a Voltron deck.

That said, I wanna check everyone's gut:

How many equipment would you run before cards that free-equip, like Sigarda's Aid, Ardenn, Intrepid Archaeologist, Forge Anew, Bruenor Battlehammer, etc seem like good inclusions?

Conventional wisdom for Equipment decks seems like 18-25 equipments makes it a true Equipment deck.

Would running, say... twelve Equipments warrant free equipers? Ten? Fourteen? Sixteen? Nine?

I know it depends on the equip-cost of all the equipment and the curve and all that. I'm just testing the waters as to where y'all would draw the line if you had to throw out a number.

Thanks!

CrimsonWings3689 on Halvar, Divine Voltron

6 months ago

Spyrechild Unfortunately, I think that for as sweet as the lore/art for Ultima Weapon is, it's too inefficient. WotC committing to the bit to have the buff, cmc and equip cost all be 7's is cute, but it's just a worse Argentum Armor :(

Similarly, Beatrix, Loyal General is a really expensive Ardenn, Intrepid Archaeologist. Which is a shame, considering how vanilla she is otherwise for the cost

Neotrup on If I give control of …

11 months ago

Changing control of a curse with something like Donate will not change who it's attached to, only who controls it. With most curses, control doesn't really matter (some like Curse of Misfortunes or Curse of Leeches  Flip do care who controls them). In order to change what an aura is attached to, the spell would need to state that like Aura Graft does, however the only thing I can find to do that would be Ardenn, Intrepid Archaeologist which requires you to still control the curse, and is not available within Lynde, Cheerful Tormentor's color identity.

Apoptosis on Gear Up!

11 months ago

Specific changes. All of these changes optimize card draw, tutoring, protection to board state, create synergies and infinite combos, and optimization to allow instant speed responses.

OUT: Ardenn, Intrepid Archaeologist (thought this would be awesome, disappointed in performance) Assemble the Players (sub-optimal card draw) Aurelia's Fury Bitterthorn, Nissa's Animus (land drops have not been a problem and by the time I draw it, I needed something else) Brimaz, King of Oreskos (love this guy, but had to cut) Chained to the Rocks Elbrus, the Binding Blade  Flip (obtained better equipment) Fellwar Stone Hixus, Prison Warden (never happy when I had this in hand because you need to let the damage land, plus you fail to build board state when waiting to draw a punch) Illusionist's Bracers (I realized there was little in this deck that this could help) Kemba, Kha Enduring (I want the option of where the equipment goes) Kjeldoran Outpost (did help create a chump blocker and spend unused mana, but I didn't like losing the land) Lapse of Certainty (replaced with better options, but I love this card) Lightning Helix Path of Mettle  Flip (never had good results) Prophetic Flamespeaker (under-performed) Puresteel Paladin (tough cut) Purphoros, God of the Forge (under-performed) Rogue's Passage Sea Gate Wreckage Silverblade Paladin (love this guy, tough cut) Sram, Senior Edificer (very tough and recent cut for Leonin Shikari and Merry, who are just better but I may put back in) Sword of the Animist (land drops have not been a problem and by the time I draw it, I needed something else) Wingmate Roc (love it but under-performed)

In: Esper Sentinel (card draw) Leonin Shikari (instant speed equiping is amazing) Merry, Esquire of Rohan (card draw) Enlightened Tutor (great for combos/synergies) Sigarda's Aid (so great) Pyrohemia (this card is a beast with Iroas! Even without Iroas must people don't have easy ways to deal with enchantments and this is a wraith on a stick. I've added it to all of my red decks and it's cousin (Pestilence) to my black decks in a slot I would normally hold for a wraith) Teferi's Protection (protect the board state) Excalibur, Sword of Eden Fighter Class (tutor!) Angelic Skirmisher (lifelink to stretch game and facilitates infinite combos) Splendor Mare (put it on Reckoner or Spitemare, give them indestructable, and gain infinite life, or move it to pyrohemia with nesting grounds to get massive amounts of life as you flamethrower the whole table!!) Mask of Avacyn (better option then shroud from boots, you need to be able to dynamically react/voltron) Mob Rule (this just finishes games) Smothering Tithe (ramp) Sunforger (some say you must build around this, I say you use this as a key tutor for when you need an instant) Nesting Grounds Spitemare The One Ring (card draw, duh) Minas Tirith (card draw) Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion (value engine, mana dump) Phyrexian Vindicator (beefy flier, helps get Iroas online, and difficult to remove) War of the Last Alliance (tutor) Hall of Heliod's Generosity (bring back pyrohemia and flamethrower the world all over again!!) Mask of Memory (card draw) Boromir, Warden of the Tower (protect board state)

Gidgetimer on Pattern Recognition #337 - Not …

1 year ago

Bad news about how Ardenn, Intrepid Archaeologist interacts with Pacifism. Ardenn specifically says "auras and equipment you control"

Crow_Umbra on

2 years ago

Hi there, welcome to Tappedout and Isshin brewing. I saw your deck and thought I'd offer some suggestions. By the looks of your deck, you have an emphasis on utilizing equipment, but your creatures don't really support that too well.

I think it could be helpful to first determine if you want to have more of an emphasis on the equipment aspect, or go more creature heavy and open up more attack trigger shenangians that Isshin is capable of. A few general suggestions off the top:

  • If you do decide to go more of the equipment route, I think it could be helpful to add stuff like Puresteel Paladin, Ardenn, Intrepid Archaeologist, or Sigarda's Aid, depending on your budget. Equipments can be mana intensive to cast, then equip. These types of effects can help you get around those Equip costs.

  • I think you could drop (most) of the equipments, and instead go more creature heavy. Myriad creatures like Hammers of Moradin and Elturel Survivors are great in Isshin, since Myriad gets an additional trigger from him. Myriad creatures are all fairly budget friendly, with the exception of Battle Angels of Tyr

  • The other great thing about Myriad and other effects that create creature tokens that enter tapped and attacking, is that you can combine them with enter the battlefield group slug damage like Impact Tremors and Witty Roastmaster. Additionally, Devilish Valet can be a serious beater that can outright kill opponents depending on how many creature tokens you pump out on your attack swings.

I hope these suggestions are a helpful starting point. I'd be happy to offer some additional feedback if you would like it. Isshin is one of my favorite commanders of the past year, so you're in for a fun time.

eliakimras on Wyleth, Boros Voltron

2 years ago

Hello fellow Wyleth, Soul of Card Draw player!

I'm glad you got both Wyleth's and Aesi's precons for a good price. They are reeeeally explosive in gameplay with a few upgrades.

I play a lot of this bad boy, and I want to suggest some swaps below 3 USD for you to take it to a higher ground:

First of all, the ramp. I found out that 2 CMC, untapped ramp is the best for Wyleth. Since he draws so many cards, he can chain rocks and voltron pieces in the same turn, so his next turn is even more explosive than the last one. I almost always have more mana than the Green decks in my pod.

You should run boardwipes that hits your stuff the least:

Also, you can streamline your removal package. All of those are fetchable by Sunforger:

More/better auras and equipment

Cheating equip costs

If you really need to protect yourself against attacks, Ghostly Prison is a way better Palace Guard.

More utility lands

Delphen7 on Pattern Recognition #289 - Voltron …

2 years ago

I think speed is the most important part of Voltron. The strategy needs to rack up the damage as quickly as possible to avoid giving opponents time to respond to your threat(s). This means cheating on costs, and playing very cheap commanders that are hard to interact with.

Rograkh, Son of Rohgahh, and Ardenn, Intrepid Archaeologist, for example, are a very difficult pair to interact with, because they can cheat costs (Colossus Hammer :D ), have evasion, and are low CMC. The first turn is spent playing them, and subsequent turns are spent building up your threats. If they are removed, you can esaily recast them, or use Ardenn to make another random creature a massive threat

Commanders like Balan, Wandering Knight, or Uril, the Miststalker are slow(er), don't intrinsically have evasive abilities, and require you to wait on them to build up, so once they're gone you're severely set back.

Sometimes you're not fast enough though, and Voltron tends to turn into a very political deck at that point as you try to get opponents to let your threat stick in order to deal with other opponents. "If you don't remove my creature I can stop player C from winning next turn".

You usually still lose at this point though if everyone knows what they're doing. Speed is of the essence.

This is why I love utilizing other players combats. You could limit yourself to one combat, but cards like Assault Suit can quadruple how fast you're killing your opponents (and has the perk of preventing the pesty sacrifice that was mentioned).

This is also why Slicer, Hired Muscle  Flip has been so competitive, because it's Assault Suit built into a commander with incredibly aggressive stats -- 28 damage a turn cycle is more than most decks can do with lots of setup, and that's just the minimum. It can come down turn 1, and no one wants to remove it because everyone wants to use it. It's free damage!

Voltron, while more direct than a Giant Growth, does tend to play a lot of the same head games with people to make your creature stick as long as possible.

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