Braids, Conjurer Adept

Legendary Creature — Human Wizard

At the beginning of each player's upkeep, that player may put an artifact, creature, or land card from their hand onto the battlefield.

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
Highlander	Legal
Legacy	Legal
Leviathan	Legal
Limited	Legal
Modern	Legal
Oathbreaker	Legal
Planechase	Legal
Quest Magic	Legal
Vanguard	Legal
Vintage	Legal

Discussion (50)

TheOfficialCreator on Sneak and Show in EDH

7 months ago

Braids, Conjurer Adept is Show and Tell on a stick, but as far as Izzet and Izzet-including identities, Esika, God of the Tree  ^Flip, Illuna, Apex of Wishes, Intet, the Dreamer, Jhoira of the Ghitu, Neera, Wild Mage, Sedris, the Traitor King, and The Ur-Dragon seem like the best options.

Mannlicher on Psycho Bunny Wonderland

9 months ago

Preface:

This deck was an idea to use some of my old cards, and also see just how nuts I could go with Kwain, Itinerant Meddler. This deck is a spider-web of synergy and combos, multiple infinite combos, and complete bonkers level shenanigans lurking behind a friendly-looking magic rabbit. This is not a budget deck, but in a gracious nod to Lewis Carroll, it is incredibly fun to go "down the rabbit-hole".

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At it's core, the deck is group hug with card-draw, card based mana-ramp, and multiple options for life-gain. I use a few card-draw creatures as well, such as Shabraz, the Skyshark for their synergy with Kwain. Alternate win conditions include Approach of the Second Sun, Jace's Archivist, Windfall, Jace, Wielder of Mysteries, Triskaidekaphile, and Test of Endurance; but the deck is also perfectly capable of beating someone to death with a giant fish - or a giant anything thanks to numerous life-gain options paired with an Archangel of Thune.

The deck has several prison elements with Moat, Silent Arbiter, and Archon of Emeria, as well as Propaganda, Ghostly Prison, and Sphere of Safety. Silent Arbiter and Crawlspace help directly reduce the deck's exposure to attack, along with Gwafa Hazid, Profiteer for any specific threats or "when attacks" triggers. Finally, since this deck does not rely on creatures or doing damage to win, and generates lots of cards in hand, Meishin, the Mind Cage is an easy way to reduce all opponents' creatures to 0 power. For direct damage and targeted attacks outside of combat, the deck includes The Wanderer and Greater Auramancy.

Card draw, treasure tokens, and unlimited hand-size combine with four different Tutors, an Urza's Saga, and a Teferi's Puzzle Box help you keep multiple options in hand, and hopefully keep Kwain hopping one or two steps ahead of your opponents (Remember to use the tutors before your Teferi's Puzzle Box hits the board). Tidal Barracuda, and Vedalken Orrery let you cast anything on anyone's turn. Walking Atlas helps get rid of lands anytime it's not tapped (another combo with Mind Over Matter), and Drumbellower and Teferi, Who Slows the Sunset make sure you're able to untap on every turn, so you can play cards anytime - including win-cons like Laboratory Maniac or Jace's Archivist on an opponent's end-step, then draw for the win.

Circling back to Sphere of Safety - the deck runs 18 enchantments natively, but also features Enchanted Evening to turn everyone's permanents into enchantments. (The deck also conveniently includes Cleansing Nova to destroy all enchantments, which is an absolutely devastating total board wipe when paired with Enchanted Evening, especially if you have Avacyn, Angel of Hope in play on your side). With Enchanted Evening on the board and Sphere of Safety, every permanent you control also counts toward your opponents' cost to attack you for each creature they target you with. Comboing Enchanted Evening, Avacyn, Angel of Hope, and Greater Auramancy means every permanent has both indestructible and shroud, and prevents your planeswalkers from being targeted (or targeted for attacks) directly.

I am only running two counterspells, Mana Drain and Force of Negation, so the deck uses Dovescape to lock down any stray non-creature spells, as well as Tidal Barracuda and ultimately Forced Fruition to further reduce any errant spellcasting. And in this deck, Dovescape not only helps creates magnitudes of tokens, but each of those tokens is potentially an enchantment when it hits the board. With Enchanted Evening in play, those tokens, or ... literally ... any ... other card you play, combos off Archon of Sun's Grace to instantly create infinite (enchantment) pegasus tokens, and become effectively a 1 card infinite combo of 2/2 flying (avoiding Moat) lifelink pegasus. Every. Single. Time. any permanent hits the board under your control after you have both in play.

The Deck includes a The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale to help keep down on the riff-raff, (plus kill off a few billion pegasus every turn), and helps tie up opponent's mana; meshing with the prison cards we already use. For its own mana, there are some basic mana-rocks and a Smothering Tithe to help offset some of the higher casting cost spells if Braids, Conjurer Adept is not on the board.

The Smothering Tithe pairs well with sheer card-draw provided through Forced Fruition, Temple Bell, Kami of the Crescent Moon, and Kwain, Itinerant Meddler to almost guarantee several dozen treasure tokens each turn and help the deck rapidly ramp to maintain both card and board advantage towards casting an Omniscience.

More combo madness, Teferi's Puzzle Box helps spin through the deck looking for lands and combo solutions. Teferi's Puzzle Box also combos really well with Shabraz, the Skyshark and Alhammarret's Archive, effectively doubling the card-draw effect of Teferi's Puzzle Box each draw phase - and Sphinx of the Second Sun provides double the draw-phases per turn, so you're geometrically quadrupling your cards in hand each turn (and possibly playing them for free). And, for every card you draw, the shark is growing, your life is growing, and if you have the Archangel of Thune, everything else is growing too.

If you want to discard cards from your hand, to hit Triskaidekaphile for instance, or just go infinite with your commander, you can use Mind Over Matter, Omniscience, or Peace of Mind to manipulate your hand-size and either play or discard. The deck includes an Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre, Timetwister and Elixir of Immortality to shuffle your graveyard back into your hand, as well as Displacer Kitten and Angel of Finality to exile your opponents' graveyards with a quick bounce.

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Summary Combos:

Forced Fruition + Smothering Tithe == Treasure Tokens

Teferi's Puzzle Box + Shabraz, the Skyshark == Giant Shark and TONS of life-gain every turn

Teferi's Puzzle Box + Shabraz, the Skyshark + Alhammarret's Archive == Sheer madness

Teferi's Puzzle Box + Shabraz, the Skyshark + Alhammarret's Archive + Archangel of Thune == Same as above, but now ALL of your creatures grow exponentially, every turn

Kwain, Itinerant Meddler + (any of the above) == even more nuts

Kwain, Itinerant Meddler + Mind Over Matter == Infinite combo, draw your deck

Kwain, Itinerant Meddler + Mind Over Matter + (any "if you cannot draw you win") = instant win

Enchanted Evening + Sphere of Safety == every card you have counts towards attack cost

Enchanted Evening + Cleansing Nova == total board wipe (lands, creatures, artifacts, all permanents)

Enchanted Evening + Aura Fracture + (any land) == targeted removal of any permanent

Enchanted Evening + Archon of Sun's Grace == infinite flying pegasus whenever ANY card hits the board under your control, even treasure tokens from Forced Fruition.

Enchanted Evening + Greater Auramancy == every card you play has shroud when it comes into play, but will interfere with Mind Over Matter combo with Kwain.

Sheer Card Draw and hand-size + Mind Over Matter == you can tap or untap whatever you want, whenever you want, and you can reshuffle your graveyard with Elixir of Immortality or Timetwister.

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There's more I could write about with additional combos and card interactions, but those are the highlights. The deck is just all-out madness to play and can quietly build and recycle cards until it comes out of nowhere with an 600/600 flying shark. I enjoy it. I hope you will as well.

Thank you.

Bi9_Do9 on Responding to Braids Conjurer Adept

11 months ago

At the beginning of my opponents upkeep and they have a Braids, Conjurer Adept in play. They decided to put a Grizzly Bears into play using Braids ability. I have a Gather Specimens card in hand, can I play the Gather Specimens after they choose a creature or would I have to play it before they made their choice known?

Guerric on Fish are friends

1 year ago

Hi Anabasis! Since you asked for some feedback on the list prior to committing, I'll comment here since I can link cards easily. Let's begin with the archetype you are going for here, how it plays out with Braids, Conjurer Adept, how to make it run a bit smoothly. The archetype for this deck is "group hug," which is a bit of a misunderstood archetype that has gotten unnecessary bad rep in the past. Basically, a group hug deck built properly is one that has effects which benefit everyone, but benefit the player the most. The idea is that there is little incentive to target the group hug player because they are giving free stuff, and the free stuff nonetheless keeps every player more competitive, which takes more pressure off of the group hug player, who is then ahead in the value race. The most iconic group hug commander, for example, is Kynaios and Tiro of Meletis. This commander lets every player either draw an extra card or play an extra land each end step, whereas the Kynaios and Tiro of Meletis player gets to do both. Oftentimes what makes game uneven are some players encountering ramp or draw problems, and this evens things out and keeps them competitive. Usually players won't target Kynaios and Tiro because it is benefitting them, and because it is not inherently threatening. Nonetheless, the Kynaios player is ahead in the value race, and usually plans to win with some sort of alternate win condition like Approach of the Second Sun. Braids, Conjurer Adept plays out similarly, in that every player benefits from Braids, but unlike your opponents your deck is built to exploit it, and you will have scarier things to cheat out than they will. The difference with this deck, however, and this is the critical part, is that your deck will be inherently threatenting. People will soon figure out that you are dropping scary things and have plenty of incentive to kill braids. What's worse is that the way Braids works inherently gives them added incentive to do so. The scariest words on the card are "at the beginning of each player's upkeep" are ones you will come to loathe if you don't build this right. These words mean that if you play Braids normally, each of your opponents will get to use Braids before you do. This is bad, because after three opponents have used it, the third could kill Braids before you ever get to use her. This is the nightmare that should ever be in your mind when planning or playing this deck, but if you are mindful of it, it can be overcome. So let's think first about Braids' abilities and how to best protect and exploit her to your benefit over your opponents.'

The first is to do lots and lots of what blue does best, namely, countering spells. Whereas Kynaios and Tiro of Meletis are a pillowfort group hug deck, you should think of your deck as a control group hug deck. Forget the crappy boardwipes like AEtherize and Aetherspouts. You probably included them because you've sensed they won't hit your board, but you'll find that smart players never attack with their most important pieces, and that they won't generally do what you want them to. Spectral Deluge and Whelming Wave are probably fine, but leave the rest out- you're better off just stopping things from happening to begin with than wiping a board that will probably be in your favor. Counterspells are good here for two reasons. First and foremost, they protect Braids from removal, which will be their most important duty. Beyond that, since you're getting a free permanent every turn, you have the luxury of holding your mana open, so you might as well have stuff to do with it! I'd think about playing up to ten different counterspells along with premium blue targeted removal like Reality Shift, Ravenform, etc.

Since the weakness of Braids is that our opponents' get to use her first if we cast her at sorcery speed, we might as well rewrite the script and try to play her at instant speed where feasible. Leyline of Anticipation and Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir can help with this. You'll enjoy much more playing Braids on your opponent's end step and getting to use her first than the reverse. This will also aid and abet your counterspell game, in that if you don't need to counter anything you can cast other spells on your opponent's end step rather than wasting your mana. I see that you included these spells, but I wanted to make sure that you realize how critical they are to your game, and that if you can find more of this effect it will be worthwhile to include it.

A third implication is that, in the true spirit of group hug, you should get to use Braids more than your opponents. It's only fair after all! Therefore cards that copy triggered abilities like Strionic Resonator are at a premium here. Braids is far better if you get to use her twice and your opponents only get to use her once.

You also need to rework your ramp section entirely. The general rule of commanders and ramp applies here, namely, that you mostly want to play ramp that can get your commander out a turn early. This means one and two mana rocks primarily, unless it can get extra lands out. Dreamstone Hedron and Hedron Archive are traps and will make you cry. I know the theory is that you can play them for free with Braids, but keep in mind that they will never help you cast Braids. Also, they tend to be removal targets, and you'd probably be putting out something threatening over a mana rock anyway. Caged Sun is definitely worth it though because of the overall value, and because it will be worth it even to double your mana for one turn in order to cast a massive x-spell. Armillary Sphere is just bad here. Importantly, it is not a ramp spell since it doesn't put anything onto the battlefield. When people do play it, it is just for color fixing in multi-colored decks, and you don't need that. It'd be better to just play more card draw so that you can draw into your land drops normally. Sol Ring, Mind Stone, and Thought Vessel are fine, but you want to add Wayfarer's Bauble, Sky Diamond, and Coldsteel Heart at least. Sword of the Animist and Dowsing Dagger  ^Flip are also fabulously repeatable ramp that always makes me smile. Dreamscape Artist is also a sleeper blue card that can repeatedly ramp lands onto the battlefield which is often overlooked. You'll be far happy with these efficient options that can either get Braids out early or get her out on time with mana to spare for counterspells than with the big splashy cards.

Also, as far as card draw goes, I wouldn't take group hug to far here. You are already giving your opponents free permanents, and you are in the best card draw color and don't need their help in that. Personally I'd recommend skipping Kami of the Crescent Moon and the like entirely, and play more personal draw spells like Gadwick, the Wizened and Blue Sun's Zenith. Seriously. One advantage of Braids is that they will play spells for free and run out of stuff to cast, whereas you can keep drawing into it. If you help them out too much, you're just hurting yourself in the long run. I'd honestly replace all the reciprocal draw spells with spells which draw you cards. The only one that might be ok is Well of Ideas, but that one is benefiting you more and you first, so it fits the bill.

Some more cautions. While casting free haymakers is the reason for this deck, don't overdo it. You want to be able to afford to hard cast stuff sometimes, both in case Braids dies or just to amass more of a board presence. The power curve in magic has been getting lower in recent years, and there are many devastating spells that cost four and five mana, so don't sleep on those. Your average cmc here is 4.5, and while some high cmc haymakers are what you want, you also want lots of castable creatures.

I'm also not sure why we are playing the "creatures become every creature type" cards. Is this for better board wiping with Whelming Wave or synergy with Spawning Kraken? In my experience these synergies won't work out enough to justify the card slots, which might be better filled with counterspells or other creatures. Honestly, if I were to pick another theme to support this archetype I'd pick blink, since you doubling ETB counters can be great, but that's just me. Blinking is the sort of thing where you don't need to do a lot of it for it to be good.

A few other card choice matters. Reflections of Littjara only works on cast, so it won't copy creatures played with Braids. Definitely consider this before including a five mana enchantment that doesn't affect the board right away. Also, yes, absolutely play High Tide. It is so worth it in a mono-blue deck. Yes, Frozen Aether is amazing here. this is absolutely how to play group hug. Your opponents get free stuff, but it is only fair that you get to use your stuff first. Personally, I feel like Ominous Seas is one of the most overrated commander cards in recent years. It seems like you get a great rate on a vanilla 8/8, but often the enchantment will get blown up first, and it takes forever to come out. That's just my opinion thought.

One final thought, don't prejudice yourself too much in favor of sea monsters over against, say, eldrazi. I know the chase eldrazi are expensive, but Artisan of Kozilek is under one dollar in real world money and a wonderful thing to play with Braids, and to make copies of with your copy spells, and to give haste to with Crashing Drawbridge. You will have so much fun.

I think this will be a great deck and you have a lot of good ideas going here. I'd just refocus it a bit and then wreak some havoc!

KrarkTheAngryBoi on I HAVE TWO DADS...♡ [BUDGET PRIMER][ENABLER]

1 year ago

Braids, Conjurer Adept could be good, great deck.

TotesMcGoats on Wizzardrix (Kwain, Itinerant Meddler)

1 year ago

VayraTheGatherer Hey, feel free! I posted the deck and primer for a reason! :D For Arcane Artisan, in my own personal experience playing Group Hug Decks, I'm not a huge fan of effects that let my opponents cheat things into play such as Braids, Conjurer Adept, Hypergenesis, or Tempting Wurm. When I used to play these sorts of cards in my Phelddagrif Group Hug deck, what happens is you usually just end up randomly Kingmaking whichever opponent happened to be playing the biggest scariest thing in the hand like an Eldrazi or something. Its never as symmetrical as it seems it should be, you know? That's why I like focusing on card draw for my Group Hugging, you still speed up the game by making sure people hit their land drops and ramp and have action to play, but they still have to put in the work to cast those cards, they don't just get to cheat them for free.

Dimensional Breach feels like an absolutely miserable card to play against, because this will hit every single permanent including lands. Tokens are just gone forever, and players are now forced to slowly get back 1 land or creature or whatever at a time to rebuild their boards. Its like starting the entire game over, and nobody is going to want to sit through that. A much better option I think would be Out of Time, which phases out only creatures as a sort of pseudo-board wipe for a number of turns but then safely returns them all back into play without removing tokens or retriggering any ETB, and most importantly, its ONLY creatures, so no need to replay absolutely everything. Its also why I prefer cards like AEtherize as opposed to Wrath of God because you can be a bit more precise with what to remove, and you're only temporarily bouncing it back to hand to be replayed later, rather than just removing it forever.

Having Hexproof for yourself is nice, but kind of unnecessary I think. Ideally no one should really be targeting you with very many spells since you're far from being the biggest threat at the table. Anything they DO target you with you should most likely have a counterspell for if its a big enough deal, or otherwise if its not actively about to kill you, let it slide. The great thing about Kwain is that we're playing him on Turn 2 every single game, and he should hopefully stick around the whole game, so when we're gaining a life every single turn our life total should be pretty stacked. If there's some sort of infinite damage combo or repeatable trigger that keeps threatening your life total, than that's what we have counterspells and removal for. I like to take a more reactive approach to things, rather than trying to construct an untouchable pillowfort. Its why I don't play Solitary Confinement or Island Sanctuary or Blazing Archon. And if you're worried about burn, cards like Aegis of the Gods or Teyo, the Shieldmage won't actually do much besides eat the first burn spell.

Spiritual Focus is... a weird card. I guess if you want to run it as a metagame decision if someone in your playgroup plays Nath of the Gilt-Leaf, Tinybones, Trinket Thief or some other discard focused deck or a lot of wheels like Nekusar, the Mindrazer. But honestly, with the sheer amount of card draw that this deck will provide the entire table, discard decks are going to have a much harder time keeping up, and they're just going to have a bad time. You'll have enough cards in hand that you won't really care to ditch one or two.

As for Nekusar, the Mindrazer and other similar strategies looking to punish card draw... well that's sort of a sticky situation for us since all of our extra card draw is actively hurting everyone except the Nekusar player and helping them a LOT. This is the sort of matchup you really just want to discuss and avoid in Rule 0 conversations, because someone is going to have a miserable time, and its probably the Nekusar player as every single card they play in their deck is a threat that you simply can't allow to resolve to stick around on the board for more than a turn.

I hope this helps :)

dritchie on Cheapskate Talrand (Competitive, Budget $50!!)

2 years ago

I did make a talrand deck but changed it to a Braids, Conjurer Adept for the fun of it

AjMcGamer on Group Hug EDH help

2 years ago

Braids, Conjurer Adept

Howling Mine

Temple Bell