Caltrops

Artifact

Whenever a creature attacks, Caltrops deals 1 damage to it.

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
Oathbreaker	Legal
Planar Constructed	Legal
Planechase	Legal
Premodern	Legal
Quest Magic	Legal
Tiny Leaders	Legal
Vanguard	Legal
Vintage	Legal

Discussion (47)

Crow_Umbra on Best color for this type …

3 months ago

My main play group runs various flavors of Goad, or combat manipulation (we love swinging at each other). Why swing at other people, when you can force them to hit each other? A few suggestions off the top of my head:

• Karazikar, the Eye Tyrant/Kardur, Doomscourge - Either of these could be the commander of the deck. Karazikar simultaneously incentivizes and punishes your opponents for smacking each other. Playing in Red/Black also opens up access to all the direct burn stuff in Red, as well as attack trigger group slug like Hellrider, Vicious Conquistador, or Far Fortune, End Boss.

• Breena, the Demagogue - Help your opponents draw cards from hitting each other. The access to white also gives you plenty of options for the Ghostly Prison effects in white, plus its suite of removal.

• Gonti, Night Minister is a new option that could also slot into the 99 of some of the other commanders mentioned above. The theft aspects will likely draw the ire of the table, but if everyone is stealing from everyone...

• Alexios, Deimos of Kosmos or Slicer, Hired Muscle  ^Flip- You could donate a big Voltron threat around the table and make the table kill each other for you. One of my friends runs Alexios, and it feels like a game of hot potato with Voltron damage. Technically, you're not the one hitting people.

• Nelly Borca, Impulsive Accuser can Goad your opponents creatures, but also rewards your opponents for hitting each other. You can Goad everyone while hiding behind the Ghostly Prison/Propaganda effects.

• Isshin, Two Heavens as One can be built as a combat control deck, since he checks the attack triggers on most stuff I previously mentioned, and house those all in his 99. Additionally you can run stuff like Lightmine Field and Caltrops.

• The Lord of Pain is a lot of fun to play as a commander, and to play against. Maybe my friends and I are just masochists. A couple of my friends run the Lord of Pain as a commander, and typically play it very politically, where they "donate" the option to target the damage. You don't have to swing, and can run all the burn and damage multipliers to your heart's content.

Crow_Umbra on Combat Superiority

3 months ago

Glad to chat about the suggestions and get a better understanding of your deck building goals. I wouldn't consider it sparring, as I don't see myself in any kind of opposition to you lol.

Your approach to this deck as combat support is interesting and unique. The Isshin decks that are most adjacent to this tend to run Goad and some of the symmetrical combat benefits you currently do, and maybe a few other control pieces like Caltrops or Lightmine Field. I think one of the inherent obstacles for playing "support" or Group Hug-adjacent strategies is that the rest of the table might be suspicious and expect you to pivot to benefiting the most at some point.

That last bit about "support" suspicions comes from my own experiences, and how my main play group tends to treat those types of strats when we play against them. The play pattern tends to be that everyone else races to benefit most, then turns off the symmetrical benefit to the rest of the table. Do you tend to play with a consistent group of friends or LGSs with randos? I think the consistency of your play group can be another big factor to how much you can politic and have your support be accepted. Offer the carrot first, then beat them with the stick if they don't want to eat.

I won't go through your card feedback line by line, but they all make sense as to why you do or don't like them. Slicer and the other Transformers are cards that I want to like more, but aesthetically also get bugged by. Hoping for some kind of Universes Within reprints at some point.

• Xantcha, I get it, but she can also be gifted to whoever is the current table Arch Enemy. She can be a means for everyone else to take that player down a few notches while evening out the game a bit. How you use her doesn't have to villainous in that sense. "See everyone, I'm giving you all card draw and a means of hitting the actual table villain".

• Emberwilde Captain is one of those pieces that I initially had in my Isshin deck, but quickly cut it. It deterred attacks for a bit. In the end, I think I wanted something more proactive in that slot.

• Since you're already running Karazikar and Breena, I'd recommend giving Nelly Borca, Impulsive Accuser a look to round out that suite of "support". I run her as a commander, and she's a lot of fun in the command zone, often the first deck I'll play each session to get the juices flowing. Donated card draw tends to be a popular incentive in my more aggro-leaning play group. Possible swap with Sophina, since Clues can get mana intensive to draw from?

• I'd recommend checking out Kambal, Profiteering Mayor, also to kind fit in the flavor you're going for as a "broker"/"mafioso". He is an awesome way to passively benefit from whatever token shenanigans are happening around the table.

• Totally understandable with Hellrider and Hordechief. I wouldn't include them unless you pivot to having more token generation as your "Plan B" in case the combat support isn't working out.

• In line with the Hellrider and Hordechief lines of reasoning for current exclusion, I'd think that all your Battalion creatures might be worth a reexamination if you aren't really planning on going wide with your current build.

• Although Boros Battleshaper is likely on its way out, have you seen Master Warcraft? It's not a creature with a repeatable effect, but kinda has a similar effect for what you were going for.

• Last recommendation I can think of is Batwing Brume. This is an old favorite of mine, and can be a fun interaction piece to hold up if someone turns their token horde at you.

I appreciate your detailed response. Happy to continue chatting about this if you're ever up for it.

Bookrook on How Can I Put Circle …

4 months ago

I would play Caltrops over circle.

SufferFromEDHD on Pistols Only Baby

5 months ago

Balduvian Trading Post niche

Charisma tech

Frostwielder utility

Thumbscrews pew

Caltrops pew pew

Modkip on The Embodiment of Fear

6 months ago

Caltrops can replace Circle of Flame, Frostwielder I will find a place for because that exile is too good to forget. Thank you SufferFromEDHD!

SufferFromEDHD on The Embodiment of Fear

6 months ago

Caltrops pew pew

Frostwielder that exile clause

Mortlocke on Indoraptor Combo

1 year ago

Apologies for taking so long to make a reply, life is busy and all. Before going into your deck, i'll speak on what I think are the ideal cards for your commander, Indoraptor, the Perfect Hybrid. This deck's primary wincons appear to be death by Commander Damage, as your Commander grows exponentially when it's Cast under the right conditions. The Enrage trigger is meant to deal with the opponents left after the initial shock of blowing up one opponent after the combat step.

In my opinion, your deck seems close - but misses the mark when supporting your commander's themes. Some of your cards seem a little too divergent from a nice central theme which I believe is or should be a form of group slug. However, you will break pairity through your commander's enrage ability. Obviously this won't earn you many friends but when you throw around enough damage friends may not even be necessary.

The Good

Objectively, your deck has all the usual suspects when it comes to solid reliable options that help with consistency. Demonic Tutor, Grim Tutor, etc are always the best options when you have {B} available to you. Same for the other colors. Good job on making sure you have your options available to you when you need them. Great manabase as well - you've picked essentially all the best options. I would however advise a word of caution regarding the inclusions of Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth and Yavimaya, Cradle of Growth - fixing your opponents manabase can push them multiple turns ahead as well and cost you the game. I'd typically recommend cutting these unless you can break pairty and find a use for them that far outstrips the benefit to your opponents (e.g. include Cabal Coffers for urborg).

The Bad

As painful as it is to cut or change themes, here are the cards I think would better suit your commander:

• Caltrops: A reliable method to trigger your commander when Pyrohemia or Pestilence isn't on the field. it also punishes opponents as well. However, a word of caution here - if you can't deal damage to opponents before you cast your commander, then this will result in a nonbo or anti-synergy. Take or leave this one.

• Rite of Passage: Enrage naturally wants to kill creatures off, so why not make that an advantage for you and break pairty?

• Roaming Throne: Double up on triggers.

• Wrathful Raptors: Double up on triggers.

• Raging Regisaur: Did I say Double up on triggers? I feel like I haven't.

• Fiery Confluence: When you simply need to get another trigger from your commander.

• Forerunner of the Empire: The tutor effect is neat for when you need to get another Dinosaur - but what's really great is his second ability which you guessed it - gets you another trigger from your commander when said other Dino hits the battlefield.

• Assassin's Trophy/Beast Within: Your deck doesn't have very much interaction, which will lead to situations where you will find yourself wanting to do something about a problematic card - but unable to do so.

• Deflecting Swat/Deadly Rollick: The free cast spells are great in any deck - and thanks to the "recently" released commander masters these cards are cheaper than they've ever been.

• Compy Swarm: This creature will get your consistent Dinosaur ETB triggers as your opponent's creatures die off from Pyrohemia and the like triggers.

• Plague Spitter: It does what Pyrohemia and Pestilence does - with caveats. With the effect being only once per turn

• but free, you don't have to worry about keeping mana open to use it. But it's on a body and can be easily removed.

• Ranging Raptors: As you are using Enrage, why not ramp while you're at it?

• Sword of Hearth and Home: Given your commander's first ability is an ETB trigger, when not have the option of potentially increasing it's power and toughness after a particularly vicious turn? The ramp also doesn't hurt to boot. The best part though, is that you don't have to target your commander - need another creature to ETB so you can trigger something else? You can do that too.

• The Ozolith: This is obviously an expensive suggestion - and I don't know your budget. But this card has some very obvious synergy with your Commander that would definitely make all those recasts worth it - and you know you'll be recasting your commander.

The Ugly

The Proliferate/Poison cards are an interesting method of dealing with opponents early - but this theme unfortunately requires much more cards to be built around it to work in my opinion. Proliferating the +1/+1 counters and the poison counters already on an opponent is great and all - but I don't think that will create consistently lasting and reliable game states that are favorable to you. It only takes a single piece of interaction to make the whole process fall, and that interaction only needs to target your single point of failure - your commander.

You have a solid deck, but I think over time as you play it in pods and ponder your themes you may make make some changes or tweaks. I hope my card suggestions are something useful to you. +1 from me, if I haven't already.

SufferFromEDHD on Pew Pew

2 years ago

Caltrops brutal value.