Citadel Siege

Enchantment

As Citadel Siege enters the battlefield, choose Khans or Dragons.

• Khans — At the beginning of combat on your turn, put two +1/+1 counters on target creature you control.
• Dragons — At the beginning of combat on each opponent's turn, tap target creature that player controls.

Discussion (51)

TCK_Green on TempesT's Smash face dinos

3 weeks ago

"Gishath Strong! Gishath Quick! Gishath gonna stomp your face!" :D

Of course WTTempesT, happy to offer what little wisdom I have :) had I known you were all part of the same playgroup I would have told you to scrap your plans, all build creature-based Mathas, Fiend Seeker decks, and watch the carnage unfold! :D (that actually sounds quite fun now that I think of it...)

Be warned, I've never built a Dinosour tribal deck so my advice might not be amazing, but I'll advise the best I can :) the first thing that strikes me about Gishath is that his ability triggers on combat damage dealt to players. That means you're incentivised to make Gishath (A) super-stronk and (B) 'quick' (i.e. unblockable) so that you flip more cards and get the biggest dinosaurs. It's also important the Gishath is (C) evasive so that he doesn't just disappear to removal when you try to attack.

Quick caveat before you start the essay below - don't see the huge wall of text as meaning there's lots to fix with your deck! It's more the case that I think as I write, and seeing as you're asking me about a deck type I've never thought about before, I've got lots more to think through than I've had for either of your friends! :) and with that...

Gishath Strong!

There's a few options here - you could buff Gishath specifically, put out some anthems to make all your dinosaurs stronger, or make his attacks do more damage. Personally, since he's already got Trample I'd go in a double-strike direction, and add cards like Duelist's Heritage, Blood Mist or Berserkers' Onslaught to go alongside your Goring Ceratops. Alternatively, since you've already got Odric, Lunarch Marshal you could just go 'keyword soup' and chuck in cards like Momentum Rumbler and Ridgetop Raptor, but that's quite clunky and doesn't really fit the theme. (Oh, Silverblade Paladin is another decent way of giving double-strike, but again, it doesn't really fit your theme.)

If we're looking at giving Gishath double strike, then it might be worth thinking of ways to buff his power by 4. 11 power is the sweet spot for a One-Hit KO by a double strike commander. For example, if you've already got Citadel Siege and Sight of the Scalelords then you could cast Gishath and kill someone on the same turn. Alternatively, Xenagos, God of Revels does this 'better', but is a little more expensive. (Theoretically this is already possible with how your deck is set up with Bellowing Aegisaur and some of your 'deal 1 damage' creatures, but it's convoluted!)

You'll note that I didn't mention Overwhelming Stampede above. In my mind this is more of a 'win-more' card - great if you've already got a board established and untap with Gishath already out - but if you're in that position then chances are you're already won :) it's worth thinking how you're going to catch up if others are ahead, but I'll leave you to think about that.

The other way to get the damage through (and a way of getting super-synergy value if you have a way of giving your creatures haste) is to have ways of giving extra combat steps. Can't kill someone with combat damage in one swing? That's fine, just swing twice! I'd say the best combat-'doubler' with haste is Breath of Fury since you can move the enchantment onto some of the new dinosaurs that you're hitting, and the best without haste would be Aggravated Assault. Alternatively, if you have creatures with vigilance (e.g. Gishath), then you could go funky and use something like Godo, Bandit Warlord as your combat doubler :)

Gishath Quick!

Unblockable Gishath is good. I like the Rogue's Passage in the deck - I'd also be tempted to chuck a Key to the City in there as well :) some other great cards to consider are Glaring Spotlight which can make your whole board unblockable for 3 mana and Whispersilk Cloak, especially since it gives the bonus of 'thick skin' shroud protection. (It would mean that you couldn't target him with your own abilities and spells, so that might be something to think about.) Other things to consider are ways of giving Gishath evasion - Sky Terror works well with the keyword soup route, though it's a jump through a hoop which the Majestic Heliopterus you already have in the deck doesn't require. Another alternative I'd suggest is Skyshaper - I quite like this as a one-time way to give your board flying, not to mention that it's free to sacrifice and can therefore be used the turn Gishath is played!

One question to ask is 'how many sources of unblockable or other evasion do I need in my deck'. Let's say that you're preparing to play Gishath on T8 and want to have your unblockable ready to go by T7. Assuming that you've not drawn any extra cards, then during T7 you'll have seen 15/99 of the cards in your deck - more if you have any card draw. At that rate you only need 7 sources of something for it to be fairly likely to have on in hand by then. If you're optimising this then you might put more in, if you're not hugely bothered then you might have less. Personally I think Rogue's Passage, Key to the City, Glaring Spotlight and Whispersilk Cloak are enough ways to reliably get Gishath unblockable on T8-9 without needing flying/etc, but that depends on how much you want to rely on Gishath. Remember that the more non-dinosaurs you put in the deck, the less likely you are to not hit useful things with Gishath's triggers!

Gishath is king over aaaall land!

Speaking of 'how many sources to have in a deck', let's talk about your lands and ramp. The best way to be 'quicker' than your opponents is to make sure that you've got enough lands down and have ramped to your key point before they have. The standard method for number of lands in an EDH deck is to start ~40 lands and cut 1 land for every 3 other sources of mana. You have ~10 pieces of accelleration, so I'd estimate ~37 lands, especially since you're trying to get up to 8 mana to cast your commander. 34 lands is definitely too low when your average CMC is ~4!

Further, 15 of your lands enter tapped. I said this to one of your friends, but as much as you want to ensure having the right coloured mana available at the right time you should be careful of adding too many tap-lands. Think of it this way - if all of your lands were tap-lands, then every turn you'd have one less mana than everyone else and would be 1 turn behind with every spell. The stats show that thep layer who goes first is most likely to win since they get to certain amounts of mana before the others - playing all tap-lands is like willingly cutting off a foot. 15/34 lands isn't quite the same, but it's like cutting off a couple of toes; how would you feel finally drawing a land on T10 when you've been waiting to play Gishath, only for that to be a tap-land and for someone else to win on T11 before you get a chance to untap? Yeah - don't run too many tap-lands :P

One of the great things Gishath has going for him is that his identity includes green, meaning that you have access to the best land ramp spells in the game! Well done for putting some ramp in the deck. I'd be tempted to swap out one of them for Skyshroud Claim (since it can fetch your Shock lands), and I'd also be 'tempted' to add Tempt with Discovery (always fun in multiplayer games). Also, the Ikoria Migration Path is a direct upgrade to some of the ramp spells. Either way, I'd really add some more basic lands into the deck; you barely have enough of them to ramp with, let alone play, and you could easily get blown out by an overloaded Winds of Abandon and not have any lands to actually fetch.

As for land choices themselves - as above, fewer tap-lands and more basics. You'd be surprised In most decks I'm not a huge fan of Temple of the False God, but in your deck I can see it working. I don't really like Rupture Spire either, would much prefer Path of Ancestry. You could quite easily add Spinerock Knoll in for the free hideaway spell. Oh, and Krosan Verge is a pretty good card for multicoloured decks that include white and green - it allows you to fetch the shocklands/bicycle lands to have all of your colours in one go :)

Gishath Thick-Skinned!

If we're going to make Gishath big, then we need to make sure that he doesn't just get removed straightaway. Cards like Swiftfoot Boots and Lightning Greaves are really useful here - as well as Whispersilk Cloak above - but my top pick for this category is Favor of the Mighty. It's a fairly innocuous enchantment, but it's very unlikely that anyone else will have a CMC 8+ creature when you're casting gishath, and 'protection from all colours' is a really strong ability. Another great way of protecting Gishath the turn he comes in is by casting Shielded by Faith on another creature the turn before, then moving this onto Gishath. (It doesn't protect you from targeted exile, but it would stop Gishath dieing to destructive/damaging board wipes.) A card that's a little slower but could be interesting is Shield of the Oversoul - gives indestructible, but also gives flying - which is a keyword that Gishath doesn't have naturally.

It's a little pricey (~$10?), but I highly value Asceticism as a way of protecting creatures. Not only does it stop your opponents from targeting them, it also gives you a way of getting them back if your enemies destory them with spells or in combat. Other instant options to give Gishath hexproof include Blossoming Defense and Woodcutter's Grit (which both have the benefit of buffing Gishath at the same time), or the pricier Heroic Intervention which gives hexproof and indestructible at the same time.

Gishath have many Friends!

Since Gishath basically gives you free dinosaurs, you definitely want to be putting in the biggest and best dinosaurs you can to swing for the win the turn after. However, if you're sat there with a giant board then it's quite likely that some sort of Star of Extinction will wipe out your dinosaurs before your next turn. Choosing the right dinos for your super-squad who are going to stick around is key.

Some thoughts on dinosaurs you could add:

• Apex Altisaur - repetive great creature removal. Would highly recommend!
• Quartzwood Crasher - new from Ikoria, this guy is really good in any decks that do lots of trampling. Add it!
• Titanoth Rex - big tramply dinosaur, can cycle to give trample to something else
• Rampaging Brontodon - gets big if you get to swing with it
• Verdant Sun's Avatar - a great way of stacking a huge amount of life. Great to have if you decide to cut all of your small stuff and just go late-game instead.
• Regal Behemoth - errata'd in 2018 to be a dinosaur instead of a lizard. A very good way of setting up the turn before casting Gishath to have extra mana left over.
• Sun-Crowned Hunters - it's not got quite the value I'd like, but if you're going heavy into the 'damage to my own creatures' theme then this might be a good card to add
• Snapping Sailback - as above, if you're leaning heavy into the 'damage my own creatures' theme then this could be decent to add
• Ranging Raptors - as above, great in the 'damage my own creatures' deck
• Atla Palani, Nest Tender - alternatively, if you decide to go heavy in the 'big dinos' direction, then Atla from C19 could be fun to have in the 99 as another way of getting big dinos out

Some thoughts on dinosaurs you could remove:

• Cacophodon - what's it doing in the deck, other than occasionally untapping a land?
• Draconic Disciple - I think a mana rock or ramp would be better here, the other ability is expensive enough that you have many other options to use first
• Imperial Ceratops - depending on how agressive your playgroup is, you might find that the life gain from this doesn't really help your gameplan
• Kinjalli's Sunwing - a great card if you're going aggro-heavy, but EDH games tend to go long and one round of creatures being tapped won't change much. How would you feel if this was the only dinosaur you find in one of Gishath's attack triggers?
• Kinjalli's Caller - unless you're regularly playing multiple dinosaurs per turn, this is effectively a mana-rock on a creature which is easily killed (including by some of your own creatures). It also means you have to have extra white lands in your deck to try and get it out. I'd just cut this and put some land ramp or a mana rock in instead.
• Zetalpa, Primal Dawn - if it wasn't for the keyword-soup then I'd remove Zetalpa. Most of the other elder dinosaurs are just better, but if you can reliably get Odric out then Zetalpa could work in this deck.
• Ulvenwald Tracker - whilst I like the ability to fight your dinos against others, the fact it's a 1/1 means it dies too easily to everything (including your own stuff!). I'd much prefer something like Domri, Anarch of Bolas instead, especially since it also 'pumps' your creatures and can act as a mana rock. (Okay, it can't fight multiple creatures in a turn, but it's rare that you'll be needing to do lots of fighting at once.)

Other thoughts

As I looked through your deck I noticed lots of 'do damage when enters the battlefield' synergy and combos. I really like the look of it, and it almost feels like that's your main win-con with giant dinosaurs led by Gishath as your backup. Either way, it's a fun theme and game plan, and I'd be interested in how it turns out. A few things to think about:

• Marauding Raptor and Polyraptor is infinite in a bad way. Since it's not a 'may', triggering this goes uncontrollably infinite unless someone has a way of breaking the chain, and according to MtG rules uncontrollable infinites results in a draw - which is a bit of a naff way to end the game if you've all been playing for an hour!
• You don't have much white in your early game. I'd be tempted to take out some of your white lands and most of your white 1-3 CMC cards - if you can cut your early game down to 2 colours and mostly fetch to get your white, then you can also remove your need for so many tap lands. This will make your games much more consistent and faster.
• On a related note, pay attention to the colour wheels in the corner. You currently have ~equal sources of white/red/green, even though over half of the coloured mana requirements in your deck are for green. At the moment you could quite easily end up with green spells in hand but not enough green mana to play them. Further, because green is the colour of fixing, you want more green mana so you can more easily guarantee fetching the other lands that you need when you need them later. Balance your lands for (A) when you need specific colours and (B) how much you need in total to cast the spells that are important to you (e.g. Gishath).

Lastly, some cards to consider adding:

• Furious Rise - it's an extra Colossal Majesty, and extra card draw is always good
• Helm of the Host - why have one Gishath when you could have two?!? You'd want to make sure to play and equip this when Gishath is already on the board otherwise it would be too big a threat for people to leave on the table. (Also, this combos as an insta-win with Godo, Bandit Warlord - though I don't know if that's a negative or a positive for you!)
• The Great Henge - this is especially good with Gishath since all the dinos Gishath puts into play trigger the 'add a +1/+1 and draw a card', meaning that Gishath ends up drawing you a couple of cards as well as cheating out some dinos. Extra gas is always good!
• Finale of Devastation - slightly pricey, but this could be a decent upgrade to Overwhelming Stampede down the line, allowing you to both fetch a creature and pump your board at the same time.

And some cards to perhaps remove:

• Herald's Horn - you've only got 29/100 cards which are dinosaurs. Okay, this gets your commander out one turn earlier, but so does every mana rock. Okay, this card gives you ~0.3 extra card draw each turn, but in the turns between getting this out (~T3) and when you think the game might end (~T10) this would only 'draw' you ~2.1 extra cards. I'd take a simple mana-rock over this since it gives you the flexibility to cast any of your 30 non-creature spells, which Herald's Horn wouldn't help you with at all.
• Lurking Predators is fun, but as with Herald's Horn - you won't hit things often, so this is mostly a 6-mana 'do nothing' or 6-mana 'get a ~4CMC creature'. The biggest benefit is that it deters people from swinging at you - especially with multiple creatures - but it doesn't feel like it helps your strategy in the same way.
• Gaea's Blessing - what does this do for you?
• Primal Rage - I don't think you need this in the deck. Enough of your creatures already have trample, and the rest will anyway if you had Odric out.

Final thought - this would be the ultimate flex, but if you somehow find some way to get Colossification onto Gishath during the combat step... Currently the only methods I can think of are (1) playing it on another creature then using Flicker of Fate during combat to move it to Gishath, (2) sacrificing Academy Rector during combat, (3) having it on another creature that you kill then casting Second Sunrise during combat... That's about all of the ways I can think of, let me know if you think of any more! (I guess an easier way would be to just cast it in main phase 1 and find a way to untap him. Hey ho!)

I should have gone to bed a few hours ago, but I thought I'd finish writing this before I went to bed... Little did I know how deep the rabbit hole went!

Stay safe! ^_^

Swilliam on Anafenza KIN Do It All! (+1/+1's/Tribal)

1 month ago

@RamenNoodles: The Ozolith seems good against removal heavy decks. It could go in for something like Citadel Siege that I have left in from playing in Standard. However, I am inclined not to play Hardened Scales as I would have to invest in the lands to do that and I would probably shift towards something more midrange-y. That is not bad, it just sort of takes away from the novelty of it being mono-white aggro. There are enough +1/+1 counters to sustain the board and keep offensive pressure without sacrificing space for one of my one drops.

carpecanum on The Punk Rocker And Her Goodest Boy

1 month ago

Shalai, Voice of Plenty, Mercy Killing maybe?

Palace Siege and Citadel Siege.

I have a deck that specializes in creatures with Modular. If you went full on artifact you could mess around with stuff like that and Skeleton Shard et al.

Kiran_M on Card creation challenge

3 months ago

Next challenge: make something representing conflict between two guilds. Let make it a cycle. I'll start:

Conflict Over Nature-

Enchantment

Cast this spell with only two colors of mana.

If was paid, creatures you control get +1/+1 and gain vigilance.

If was paid, creatures you control gain haste and trample.

Gruul v. Selesnya

I was unsure wether to do something like Citadel Siege, but settled on this. Follow this template. For non-color-sharing guilds, make the cost 4 hybrids of 2 types (e.g. for Dimir v. Selesnya).

DespairFaction on If you see evil, crush it!

3 months ago

Greetings Aurelia,

Thank you for entrusting me to look over your deck. So i'll start by saying we have reached a point where there are more powerful options than there are available deck slots. Therefore, many times choices come down to prioritizing a specific strategy like voltorn vs go wide, how cards interact with other cards in your deck, or if you want to better your chances against a particular opponent. So the most important information I can give you is the cards that I think will underperform. From there that allows you the freedom to try out some of the things I suggest or test out some of your own choices.

You can find the card by card choices here. I just find it easier to work on a spreadsheet to see what I am changing. Helps me keep track of changes to CMC/mana curve, number of removal spells etc.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1MoPea_IljSgl9dzV_wYW6_iNto4BWqlkqyowMQvKOgA/edit?usp=sharing

Ill use this to talk about general philosophy and other optional choices that I didnt include above.

First things first, many people have mentioned some issues with the mana base. So yes we'll want to get you up around 37 lands. I got you to 36 with 2 cards that find lands. So just be dilligent about your mulligans since were still slightly greedy. Mana production is super important with this deck because all you really need to win after a board wipe is enough mana to recast aurelia and put some swords on her. Because of this early game i tutor for sword of the animist about 70% of the time. I also made some changes to your utility lands so you can get some added benefits there. Becareful with colorless lands, aurelias colors are pretty strict so manage colorless lands closely, if you start having issues either cut colorless lands or add a chromatic lantern. Fetches and Dual lands do make life easier but thats a high cost low impact change. Its nice but not necessary.

As I talk about in the document, Sword of Feast and Famine is the single most impactful change you can make. It sucks because they are super expensive, but it allows you to do ridiculous things and get way ahead of your opponents. It makes the rest of your swords look like rusty forks by comparison. Mid game I am probably tutoring for feast and famine, the only equipment that really comes close is a Sunforger with a full sunforger package though it is slower.

The second most impactful change you can make is adding teferi's protection. Its useful in 100% of games, but it too commends a super high price tag. Fortunately you can substitute this one with a combination of Boros Charm / Comeuppance / Eerie Interlude or other protection effects.

Mana ramp wise, i made a few changes. Nothing crazy, but in a slower setting I do prefer multi ramp as opposed to mind stone type cards. You want a little of both. The options i added are all colorless. If you find that colors are a problem you can look at gilded lotus or kor cartographer. Another thing to mention is that because of the increased mana production, you may find a need to add 1 or 2 cards at 6 or 7CMC. Just pay attention to how it performs. If you have a lot of mana late with nothing to do having something big to go to is nice.

Removal wise I really like my removal to hit everything possible. So thats where I really like Austere Command and things that blow up multiple permanents types. I didnt mention them in the doucment partly due to cost, partly due to CMC, but they are both incredibly effective and thats Ugin, the Spirit Dragon and All Is Dust. Again all you needs is swords and mana to finish a game. Magmaquake is also a nice option since it doesnt kill aurelia and hits planeswalkers. I really like Hour of Revelation but its pretty dangerous for your equipments.... I would want more protection and recursion effects if I were going that Hour of Rev direction, but its great in decks that are slightly less artifact heavy. Cleansing Nova is also pretty real. Deck slots get really tight and it usually means cutting creatures but I also like having both generous gift and chaos warp, you've only got 1 for now and thats ok. Just pay attention to see if you are really needing that second all target piece of removal...they are useful for people that hide behind sporefrog and glacial chasm. Another card I forgot to mention is Volcanic Offering It never hits your stuff, blows up problematic lands without sacrificing your own lands, and is just fun cause everyone gets to be involved. Many options for removal, will depend on what your meta calls for.

Card draw there are a few additional options for things. Wheel of Fortune and Reforge the Soul will both be the best, and combo with smothering tithe. Plus they are pretty disruptive too opponents especially around turn 4 or 5. Aside from those, Tome of Legends and Rogue's Gloves are both reasonable. I like that tome doesnt require successful hits, but overall draws less cards. Manifold Key looks a little better if you decide to go with Tome because aurelia puts more counters on it than you can untap, plus unblockable is needed sometimes. Prophetic Flamespeaker and Tectonic Giant are also ways that you can look at additional cards. They arent as good as just drawing cards, but if your goal is just to look at more cards they will fill the role, plus Prophetic wears equipments very well, but they do sometimes exile cards you wanted.

Another thing that I ran out of room for is more double strike. I usually run 3-4 sources when possible. Duelist's Heritage is my favorite but Silverblade Paladin and True Conviction are also great. Embercleave will also be possible, but I would wait for the price to come down a little.

Other fun cards that warrant some amount of consideration but are not must includes: Neheb, Dreadhorde Champion, Citadel Siege, Hate Mirage Argentum Armor its fun but it gets stuck in hand a lot. If you attack with it you probably just won the game.

Powering Up the deck. If you find yourself in more high power metas facing down stronger and faster opponents, you'll want to embrace the philosophy of more interaction and dropping the curve back down a bit. A few key hatebears can really slow things down like Thalia, Heretic Cathar Hushbringer and Remorseful Cleric. The big thing I use to shutdown combo decks is to get a decent board position, usually a flying creature with a relevant sword (feast and famine if possible) and then use Goblin Engineer to slam Winter Orb and you can watch the combo decks cry salty salty tears. God-Pharaoh's Statue is also an option that isnt winter orb levels of salt inducing but keeps opponents off of big turns.

You can check out my list right here. Aurelia Weapons of War Currently ive got it setup to go very fast to compete in a more combo centric turn 6 turn 7 style meta. My build is going to be a little soft to someone just having a lot of creatures on board. Anyway I hope all this helps :)

-PJ

QuirkyQU33FER on

3 months ago

things to abuse his tap ability

Illusionist's Bracers , Magewright's Stone , Thousand-Year Elixir , Djeru's Resolve , Dauntless Aven , Puppet Strings , Beacon Hawk , Tenth District Veteran , Inspiring Roar , Collective Effort , Citadel Siege , Unbreakable Formation , Feat of Resistance

gavriel1136 on The Accountant

8 months ago

As a disclaimer, some of these are not perfect 1:1 replacements. Essentially, any card on the remove side can be swapped for any card in the replace side. Remove-Replace Blind Obedience - Kismet : Slowing down your opponent's lands is huge and will make you "faster" in comparison

Good-Fortune Unicorn - Collective Effort : GFU is just too small of an effect to take up a slot here. CE is more flexible, plus at instant speed.

Yisan, the Wanderer Bard - Bloodspore Thrinax : Yisan needs a deck built for her, which this def isn't. Thrinax replaces the Unicorn.

Tolsimir Wolfblood - Leyline of Abundance : Tolsimir is just too weak for what he does. The leyline works well with your mana dorks.

Huatli's Raptor - Mikaeus, the Lunarch : HR is low cost, which implies it will come out early, but it really works best midgame. Mikaes scales to any point in the game and can proliferate faster with all your "untap creatures" effects.

Anafenza, the Foremost - Myth Realized : Ana is simply too narrow. Myth will give you a strong creature even if someone wipes all the creatures on the field.

Hadana's Climb  ^Flip- Luminarch Ascension : Hadana is nice, but mana-hungry and a bit slow for what it does. LA can churn out angels as early as turn 4 if you can get atraxa out before it.

Temple of the False God - Gavony Township : 4 color decks don't like temple, as a rule, but Gavony is a great mana sink late game

Eternity Vessel - Cauldron of Souls : Since +1/+1 counters negative counters, you'll always be able to save your creatures from a wipe with Persist.

Contentious Plan - Solidarity of Heroes : Even if you never use the strive cost, instant speed doubling can win you the game with an unblocked creature and 1 G mana.

Inexorable Tide - Unbreakable Formation : IT is flashy, but slow to build up. UF is cheap, can save your creatures from a wipe, and if cast during your main phase, basically gives you a free combat round with no consequences.

Jiang Yanggu, Wildcrafter - Oona's Blackguard : Yanguu is too slow and vulnerable. OB can really slow down your opponents when they're losing cards each turn.

Caustic Caterpillar - Black Sun's Zenith : You have tons of artifact/enchantment removal and without graveyard recursion, CC is just too small. BSZ can be cast for X=1 and then can be proliferated. Plus it recurs itself.

Lighthouse Chronologist - Inspiring Call : Don't kid yourself with extra turns. Saving all of your creatures while drawing cards is where it's at.

A few cards I found that would work great in this deck, but had no easy replacements: Gleam of Authority , Together Forever , Orochi Hatchery , Citadel Siege , and (I know you used to have it here) Vorel of the Hull Clade

Zerraphon on UNDER NEW MANAGEMENT | Victoria Angelica!

8 months ago

I would 100% either add True Conviction or Citadel Siege instead of Bow of Nylea in my play testing, the death touch never mattered, cause you already have fliers, and angels are inherently big power/toughness and have abilities alongside them! The utility is nice, but a +1/+1 for a green and a colorless seems silly. The other 3 modes are useless as 2 damage to a flier never matters, what’s three life when your commander does a better job? And the cards shuffled into your library? Run Eternal Witness , Praetor's Counsel , Seasons Past and the like will provide way better effectiveness and utility than the bow!