Cursed Totem

Artifact

Activated abilities of creatures can't be played.

Discussion (51)

jakeyuki12 on Winota Cedh

1 week ago

I think (important clarification there, haha) that the card advantage you get by running out Winota earlier can make up for the card disadvantage the zero-mana moxen give you.

I do agree that you should have a few hard stax pieces. I think you want to select pieces that don't hurt you as much as opponents. For example, in this deck I don't know if you want Winter Orb since I think that hurts you just as much as everyone else. Stuff like Cursed Totem seems perfect since your deck doesn't rely on activated abilities, so it's less symmetrical.

Mishraharad on Alesha, Who Smiles At Death and (s)Taxes [Primer]

1 week ago

ImperatorFurioso

Sorry for a late reply, but to tackle your questions!

Wayfarer I'd rather not play, because of the Cursed Totem but if you don't run it, or have it in your meta, it's a deece card to run, you can easily keep up with your opponents ramp.

Land Tax on the other hand wouldn't be too bad, I don't run it because I have no copies.

If you run it, please do give me your input how it fares

Brogan54 on Oloro, Ageless Ascetic

1 week ago

My recommendations :

I think most people will tell you that Oloro offers little competitive advantage to you compared to other esper commander like Zur (who can fetch Necropotence into play) or even Aminatou (who is a combo piece in the command zone). I think upsides for Oloro would be that he can do larger ad nauseam and possibly can even run Humility which few decks can win while it is on the board.

LOW IMPACT:

Teferi's Protection

Rhox Faithmender

Debt to the Deathless

Despark

MANA COST TOO HIGH

Merciless Eviction

Anguished Unmaking

Disallow

Thran Dynamo

TOO SLOW

Mox Tantalite

Phyrexian Arena

Twilight Prophet

Crypt Ghast

Winds of Abandon

Vindicate

Search for Azcanta  ^Flip

I would first add better ramp, better draw, potential Stax, tutors and then other win cons.

RAMP

Dark Ritual

Fellwar Stone

Mox Diamond

Talisman of Hierarchy

Talisman of Progress

Copy Artifact

Mox Opal

Cabal Ritual

Grim Monolith

Lotus Petal

Dramatic Reversal

DRAW

Ad Nauseam

Night's Whisper

Windfall

Timetwister

Whispering Madness

Brainstorm

Ponder

Preordain

Verity Circle (good against dorks)

Plunge into Darkness (a good Impulse)

Mindblade Render

Sygg, River Cutthroat

STAX

Drannith Magistrate

Aven Mindcensor

Cursed Totem

Notion Thief

Humility

Blind Obedience

Rest in Peace

Torpor Orb

BETTER COUNTERSPELLS

Mental Misstep

Dispel

Flusterstorm

Delay

Spell Pierce

Spell Snare

Negate

Tale's End

BETTER REMOVAL

Chain of Vapor

Gilded Drake

Yahenni's Expertise

Into the Roil

Blink of an Eye

TUTORS

Vampiric Tutor

Imperial Seal

Transmute Artifact

Intuition

Whir of Invention

Praetor's Grasp

Spellseeker

Academy Rector

OTHER COMBOS

CONSULT COMBO Demonic Consultation

Tainted Pact

Jace, Wielder of Mysteries

Laboratory Maniac

AD NAUSEAM COMBO Angel's Grace

Ad Nauseam (draw whole deck, can Windfall and make everyone die while AG means you can't lose

Helm of Obedience

Rest in Peace / Leyline of the Void

Heliod Walking Ballista

Approach of the Second Sun

Dramatic Scepter

Isochron Scepter

Rocks that produce at least three mana total (outlet is extort with blind obedience or crypt ghast) If have pristine Talisman gain infinite life, which is infinite draw with commander

Didn't look at landbase

Sanguinolency on Kinnan, combo prodigy

2 weeks ago

Pretty solid list so far, I have a few suggestions though. First and foremost, if you haven't checked out the cEDH decklist database, I recommend it. If you're truly wanting to get in to cEDH, then that is a good outlet for deck brewing. There are a bunch of cards in your list that are solid picks for a Kinnan deck, but there are also some that aren't up to snuff with the meta, but that's not a necessarily bad thing. Competitive EDH is about play the most powerful cards in the your color pie to achieve your overall win condition and to do it as efficient and consistent as possible. Kinnan is quite new and people are still trying to find the best way to brew the deck, but his strategy is undoubtedly proactive, so we have to try to overwhelm our opponents as fast as possible.

Here are the cards in your deck that you just don't see in the cEDH meta. Not a bad thing, just something to consider.

Your mana dorks are higher in CMC that the meta heavy mana dorks. This puts them being cast usually around turn two, which is when you want to be casting Kinnan.

Elvish Mystic, Fyndhorn Elves, Llanowar Elves are more reliable turn one creatures. Maybe try cutting Silver Myr, Maraleaf Pixie, and Quirion Elves for these.

Arcum's Astrolabe - It's just way too circumstantial, especially when you only have 6 snow lands in the deck. This card would be dead in your hand most of the time. There are also better mana rocks.

Mind Stone has been sub-par for a while. In cEDH, you want to get plenty of mana as soon as possible so you can start setting up for win quickly. This is why Grim Monolith and Mana Vault are very prevalent in the meta. They are net positive mana rocks that come in quickly.

Whir of Invention and Blue Sun's Zenith are on the cusp of being played in the meta and not, mostly Blue Sun's Zenith as it's used to help draw the deck after getting infinite mana. Usually you see these more in mono blue decks because they have plenty of blue to pay the non-generic mana and can go big with the X cost, however, once you leave mono blue it's very difficult to keep up mana for interaction after casting these and usually when X is greater than 2, it's worth someone countering it. If they're countered, the feel bads set in as you're now 5-6 mana behind. I would suggest cutting at least Whir of Inventions for a cantrip like Brainstorm, Ponder, Preordain that nets you cards for cheap.

Chord of Calling - Most of the creatures in your deck are very low cmc, so I don't think the redundancy of a Green Sun's Zenith is needed, especially when it costs 2 additional green mana.

Force of Vigor - It's not bad, I've seen a few decks run it that are more on the control side, but Kinnan is trying to be more proactive than reactive. Blue has some of the best removal in the game for cheap. Maybe consider a Chain of Vapor. That way if there is a problematic card for you on the board such as Cursed Totem or Linvala, Keeper of Silence, you can hit it regardless of what it is for one mana regardless of whose turn it is.

Ghost Quarter - if you need to get rid of a problematic land, I suggest Strip Mine over this, as it doesn't have the downside of letting the opponent replace the land.

With Tree of Tales and Seat of the Synod it's better off to just run basic lands, in case you encounter Back to Basics or Blood Moon.

There are a few suggestions I'd like to make for you to add that are practically staples for most of the cEDH Kinnan decks:

Seedborn Muse to help you use your commander more and acquire an overwhelming board state.

Training Grounds and Biomancer's Familiar to reduce the cost of Kinnan's activation.

Grim Monolith, Mana Vault, and Fellwar Stone as they're some of the best mana rocks in the format.

Right now, if you were to play a game with this list, I wouldn't be afraid of you activating Kinnan because there's nothing that will severely impact the game. Jin-Gitaxias, Core Augur is in a lot of the other cEDH decks because getting this guy on the field is detrimental to every opponent's strategy. I suggest you get a higher creature count and put more scary things in the deck. You'll whiff a lot with on activations with a creature count that low.

Here is a link to my current Kinnan build that has been assembling win (in a vaccum) very consistently between turns 3 and 4: Kinnan Activations cEDH

dingusdingo on Alesha: A Slug is Faster Than A Corpse

3 weeks ago

StopShot The choice of having only a single combo is intentional. This deck is similar to Blood Pod in that staxing the board is more important than gassing into a combo, and you can get kills in cEDH by turning creatures sideways. This deck is very concerned about hitting the board hard early, and I don't want to be drawing cards that are dead outside of comboing. If I was going to expand into a second combo, I'd most likely extend into Splinter Twin and Felidar Guardian due to how Twin interacts with the Titans. In place of redundant combos, I've chosen to slot more hate pieces and more beater pieces. I've tried to add only the most efficient beater pieces that have utility or are just hyper efficient in terms of effectiveness. For example, Luminarch Ascension will singlehandedly win games on stalled out boards by turning creatures right. Inferno Titan swinging removes all kinds of dorks and opposing hatebears that are common in the format, as well as draw pieces and combo creatures. It also swings for a minimum of 9 when there aren't targets on the board. Loyal Apprentice is free tokens for doing nothing every round, speeding up the beatdown clock but it also has great synergy with Goblin Welder Smokestack Rankle, Master of Pranks Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite and Daretti, Ingenious Iconoclast. The beatdown pieces have been chosen because they are a fast clock even in when staring down 120 life instead of the regular 20, or they offer strong synergy towards other parts of the deck. Extending into beatdown as the secondary option also lets me run harder "no" pieces, which is why I have Cursed Totem even though I'm running Kiki, and why I'm running Stony Silence even though I have 10 cards turned off by it. Having these pieces that turn each other off in our deck raises the mulligan % and requires higher pilot skill to play, but this is the trade off for how strong they are.

Banewhip Punisher is an interesting card and certainly better than Chupacabra, but also pretty inefficient. Especially after the banning of Flash, the format has slowed and become grindier. I've been looking for group sacrifice effects or repeat removal to achieve greater board control. Necroplasm would practically be an auto-include if it was only 2 CMC. Removing Alesha on its final tick is a turn off for me. If I was really interested in this effect, I'd slot Blast Zone, to tutor it with Wayfarer and recur with Crucible. Similarly, I'd be looking to slot Wrath of God or Toxic Deluge before another single target option, even if it is reusable.

I am aware of how recurring Kiki with Alesha requires another rotation to get a combat step. Once again, I'm not very worried about it. I'm not running many discard effects here, and I'm also not running Entomb to try and get Kiki that way. Kiki won't likely end up in the yard unless an opponent forces you to discard it, or you managed to stick Sire Of Insanity (with the Buried Alive line probably). I have considered more reanimation spells, but I'd probably start with good old Reanimate just for speed purposes. As the budget has raised, I've moved away from the Thrill of Possibility + friends that play extremely well with reanimator strategies.

Thanks for taking a peek. I have a 100% no budget list brewed up as well, which is the eventual goal for this deck.

StopShot on Alesha: A Slug is Faster Than A Corpse

3 weeks ago

You might want to mess around with Banewhip Punisher as you can destroy a creature every turn with it. It’s better than Ravenous Chupacabra as you don’t need a sac-outlet to keep re-using it from the grave and you can get some pretty good value abusing it with Sun Titan. Another positive to reanimating spot removal through Alesha is counter spells can’t interact against it. If you have problems against tokens/mana-dorks I greatly recommend Necroplasm instead. Most Alesha decks don’t run the Necroplasm because a lot of them often produce a lot of creature tokens themselves, but your deck is pretty light on that theme.

It seems you are running only one infinite combo. If either Kiki-Jiki or Village Bell-Ringer gets exiled you’ll have to win through sheer combat strength. If you want to increase the consistency and durability of this combo I recommend using Felidar Guardian as your Village Bell-Ringer back-up because it too can go infinite with Kiki-Jiki. Felidar Guardian also goes infinite with Molten Echoes naming “cat” as you can always have the haste cat token blink the original Felidar Guardian which then will re-trigger the Molten Echoes. Molten Echoes in this case being your Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker back-up. If you find Molten Echoes too narrow you can run Flameshadow Conjuring instead as the process is practically the same except every time the original Felidar Guardian enters the battlefield you must use its ETB to blink a red mana producing land to effectively untap it so you can keep paying Flameshadow Conjuring’s cost. This second combo can also bypasses your Cursed Totem which turns off your Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker’s ability.

There is a catch however. If Felidar Guardian ends up in your graveyard and you want to win using it and either four-cost red enchantment, reanimating the Felidar Guardian through Alesha will instead waste up your combat step which means you can still create infinite haste tokens, but they won’t stick around for the next time you get another combat step to attack on. If you find yourself needing to salvage this combo you’ll need to cast a reanimation spell like Karmic Guide before your combat step. In this case I recommend adding Animate Dead and/or Necromancy to your deck as these will work as well and are much cheaper to hard-cast. Even without the Felidar-version of the combo either of the black reanimation spells are still beneficial as you can get back your larger stuff like Sun Titan or Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite and you can always use your Hall of Heliod's Generosity to recur the black enchantments for further re-use which can make them valuable if your Karmic Guide ever gets exiled. You can also use them to pull stuff out of your opponent’s graveyards unlike Karmic Guide as well. They even make recurring your Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker combo better as recurring him with your commander means having him sit on the battlefield for a whole turn cycle before you can go off while hoping none of your opponents draw any removal or worse, winning the game before you do. Having more flexible ways to reanimate creatures before the combat step can mean a huge difference when your goal is to win on your combat step.

Olde_English on Dragon's Eye Sanctuary | Dragonlord Ojutai EDH

1 month ago

StefanKaminski: Please excuse the essay XD

My main gripe with equipment is that they tend to be a lot more mana intensive than auras and you have to run extra pieces, like Sigarda's Aid or Stoneforge Mystic, to cheat those high costs, which takes away valuable spots that could be dedicated to better cards. I chose auras over equipment after extensive play-testing and although auras are more brittle than equipment, being able to attach them early and generate huge advantage is very powerful.

I do really like Umezawa's Jitte seeing as it pumps up Ojutai and can effectively eliminate opposing mana dorks and hate-bears, I'll test it out and see how it plays. This deck is shooting for optimization, while equipment like Sword of Feast and Famine are very solid pieces in high or mid-powered metas, in competitive games they take too long to set up or are disrupted before you can generate any value from them. Voltron is just one way to win with this deck, mostly Ojutai serves as a massive distraction piece who also generates card advantage.

Muddle the Mixture is very spicy, thanks for the suggestion! As far as specific stax pieces go, I really like Deafening Silence style effects their only downside is that they are a non-bo with combos I play like Dramatic Reversal + Isochron Scepter + Blind Obedience. I can run Disenchant effects to break parity with my own stax pieces, I just worry that I'll lock myself out of potential wins. You are right though, one spell per turn effects really hose quick combo decks and I should include one, it's just tough to identify exactly what I could swap for it.

Winter Orb and Back to Basics have been great "no untapping allowed" pieces so I haven't felt the need to have another. I'd like to play-test Static Orb and see if I prefer it over any of my other pieces.

I have play-tested both Sphere of Resistance and Thalia, Guardian of Thraben and didn't like how either performed. Usually they slowed me down as much as my opponents and didn't cause enough disruption to warrant including in the main board.

In this particular list, Cursed Totem functions as a better version of Linvala, Keeper of Silence and is easier to tutor up in Azorius colors. The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale is similar to Timetwister, great cards and I'd run them if I had several thousand dollars to spend on them, unfortunately I don't have that kind of cash lying around.

I love Approach of the Second Sun and if I was ever powering down this list it would go right back in right alongside a ton of crazy equipment. Trying to optimize things though makes keeping a seven mana spell that doesn't win the game on the spot tough.

I imagine you already know but just in case, Helm of Obedience is meant to pair with Rest in Peace to kill off one person at a time, it isn't the most streamlined combo but Azorius in general suffers from a lack of ultra-efficient game winning combos. The best way to navigate it is to play Rest in Peace early on, then use something like Whir of Invention to put Helm of Obedience into play on the end-step before my turn begins, kill a player, start my next turn, untap and kill another player. I go back and forth a lot on whether or not to remove Helm and add effects like Luminarch Ascension (which can also win with Dramatic Scepter combo), extra mana rocks or hate pieces. It's a never ending tinkering process.

Scroll Rack pairs incredibly well with Land Tax and is a solid way to get out of dead hands. I can also use it to put two or three dead cards on top of my library, deal damage with Ojutai, filter the top three and set myself up for fresh draws. It might not be an optimal card choice but it always performs well when I need it too and is a versatile tool to have at my disposal.

And yes Blind Obedience does need a white or black producing mana rock in order to stack infinite extort triggers. Six out of my ten mana rocks can produce white mana, seven if you count Copy Artifact. It's not perfect but sometimes when you're trying to make a fringe strategy work you've got to bank on a bit of luck.

Thank you for all your feedback, I appreciate it!

SideBae on Angels, Demons, and Dragons, oh my.

1 month ago

I agree with multimedia: Two-mana mana-rocks are really important in EDH, as long as you're not in green. My first instinct here is to add more of them, and upgrade the three-drop rocks to two-drops. Three-drops like Commander's Sphere and Chromatic Lantern aren't as good, since they don't allow you to cast your general turn three. Consider some adding some of the following: Talisman of Conviction, Talisman of Hierarchy, Fellwar Stone, Talisman of Indulgence, Arcane Signet, Everflowing Chalice, Mind Stone...

I like Crackling Doom, since to be good 2+-for-ones are necessary in EDH (since you have 3 opponents). Fire Covenant and Kolaghan's Command are also fairly powerful, the former more than the latter. Wear / Tear is also a RW staple.

There're some lands I think you missed. Savai Triome is almost strictly better than Nomad Outpost and could probably replace one of your basics. Mana Confluence, City of Brass, Reflecting Pool, Forbidden Orchard and Exotic Orchard are also funny, though the first few are kinda expensive. If you have $10 and want to get spicy, Shizo, Death's Storehouse can replace a basic Swamp and will give your general more evasion. I also think you can cut one to three lands if you put in more artifact-based ramp, since this'll make your deck faster. Slow-fetches like Rocky Tar Pit, Mountain Valley and friends are also on the table, since they can get Smoldering Marsh and Savai Triome (if you run it).

Alternatively, you could consider the "moon" plan. Blood Moon and Magus of the Moon can be back-breaking against a lot of decks, and if you design your deck right you can still run them in a three-color deck. Running snow-covered lands and Arcum's Astrolabe can help, and your signets/potential talismans are all good ways to smooth out your colors. Ruination is similar. If you want to go hard (I like pushing my decks to be as good as possible), consider Armageddon and Ravages of War: those can end a game if your general is out, since you can prevent a response.

Depending on your meta, you may want to consider cards like Cursed Totem. If you're playing against a green player (who is playing dorks, which they 2,000% should), this will shut down Elvish Mystic etc. and slow them down like crazy. It also shuts down Jace, Vryn's Prodigy  ^Flip shenanigans and other abilities.

Maze of Ith is similar to Reconnaissance; you can use it on your own dudes, too.

Depending on your deck budget, you may want to consider Demonic Tutor, Vampiric Tutor and/or Gamble. They're all better than Diabolic Tutor.

Depending on your meta, consider running Boil, Red Elemental Blast and Pyroblast. My meta is very blue-heavy and I suspect most are, so at least Red Elemental Blast is generally a safe bet.

Some other demons/dragons/angels to consider: Sire Of Insanity, Archfiend of Despair, Razaketh, the Foulblooded...

Deflecting Swat seems like a good way to protect your general from spot-removal.

Last card I can suggest is Cataclysm. It's good for wiping the board once you've landed your general, and making people lose their lands serves as protection for her. Also note that it totally wipes planeswalkers.

Good luck!