Elsha of the Infinite

Legendary Creature — Djinn Monk

Prowess (Whenever you cast a noncreature spell, this creature gets +1/+1 until end of turn.)

You may look at the top card of your library at any time.

You may cast the top card of your library if it’s a noncreature, nonland card, and you may cast it as though it had flash.

Discussion (50)

9-lives on LIfelink and prevention

1 day ago

I have a beginner's question to ask. Why is Elsha of the Infinite 's ability better than casting from hand? And what are the benefits of having her as commander?

griffstick on LIfelink and prevention

2 days ago

I mean if you want my advise, use Kykar, Wind's Fury or Elsha of the Infinite as your cmdr. These would give you a good platform to build from.

DemonDragonJ on Strixhaven spoiler season

1 week ago

I do like some of the new cards in Commander 2021, but I am very displeased that nearly every reprinted card in that set has already been reprinted, before, and that no cards in the older border are being updated to the new border, thus far.

Excavation technique will be a great replacement for Bramblecrush in my Kynaios and Tiro of Meletis deck.

Monologue tax is less powerful than is Smothering Tithe , but it shall be great to have that redundancy.

Archaeomancer's map is an example of how card advantage works in white, and I am glad that WotC printed that card.

Veryan, voice of duality will be awesome for the Elsha of the Infinite deck that I am building, but, with so many awesome cards in this set, I worry that I will not be able to put every one of them in that deck.

Coward_Token on Strixhaven spoiler season

1 week ago

Move over 60-format nerds, it's C21 time!

(Collapsible due to obnoxious wall of text) Show

Starting with the Prismari deck, because an actual reason:

Elementalist's Palette: Yeah this is pretty great. It's a Manalith by default, which is OK, but after a single X-spell it morphs into a Worn Powerstone and keeps going. Zaxara, the Exemplary will enjoy this, among others.

Reinterpret: Fair Mana Drain . Not spectacular but neat none the less.

Surge to Victory: Wow okay. I had to double-check to see that it didn't have the killjoy templating of "one or more"; it's like you're giving everyone a Spellbinder to share, only you're free to go to town with sorceries as well! Token spellslinging anyone? The pumping can be quite game ending in its own right if you got a source of trample. Otherwise, exiling an extra combat spell is probably a reliable thing to do

Rionya, Fire Dancer: Obviously fancy, but she seems a bit torn between spell cards and creature cards, although that could be mended by e.g. using big token spells.

Radiant Performer: Radiate is explosive and all, but would it have killed them to skip the hand casting templating? It seems to me that cheating it out in a timely matter is pretty hard anyway. Oh well, at least it cost the same and you're free to bounce it back to hand for another go

Creative Technique: Meh. Seems inefficient to me if you're just going to cast one random card, while going for two via Demonstrate seems hella risky. I'm guessing the mechanic was made for Archenemy situations in mind.

Sly Instigator: Seems kinda dependent on your playgroup including stompy things, although you might be able to make a themed deck in blue+ where you empower even your opponent's small creatures against each other

Octavia, Living Thesis: I though Quandrix was the college about counting things! Anyway, gogo mono-blue wide spellslinger!

Dazzling Sphinx: It's Chaos Wand on legs; feels kinda more red to me

Veyran, Voice of Duality: this kinda feels like the Elsha of the Infinite to Zaffai, Thunder Conductor 's Sevinne, the Chronoclasm . Bonus Round gets pretty funny here. Also, note that it doesn't double just triggers that explicitly mentions instants and sorceries, so don't forget your Birgi, God of Storytelling  ^Flips and Saheeli, Sublime Artificer s

Moving on to the Lorehold precon, which I must say I found quite disappointing seeing as R&D at that point had caught on to the struggles of boros in EDH and where seeking to address them, and the Prismari cards only amplifies that disappointment for me. Oh well, moving on to the actual cards:

Wake the Past: Starting on a positive note, this is way more castable than Triumphant Reckoning , and that haste addition means you can spring a Blightsteel Colossus on people

Angel of Ruins & Ruin Grinder: Oh come one Wizards, Landcycling is there to mitigate getting mana screwed, an anti-frustration mechanic. It doesn't warrant increasing the MV of the card they're on to a point where they should be bombs (and the ETB/death triggers don't really justify it either). Yes, I know the face commander can double them from the graveyard for prenium, I don't care.

Digsite Engineer: Not bad, a repeatable Karn, Scion of Urza -2 that could get out of hand in a reasonable and fair matter. Decent direction for white.

Audacious Reshapers: Repeatable Madcap Experiment s on legs. Give them lifelink to skip the downside. Probably abuseable

Bronze Guardian: Ey, Guardian Beast throwback! Meh on the whole tho.

Archaeomancer's Map: reasonable white Burgeoning , not bad; punishes landfall decks a bit. Still, while I'm probably in a bit of a minority on this, I don't think white has that big of a problem with ramp in EDH; the generic rocks work fine IMo

Monologue Tax: See above, even if this isn't bad; while its performance can vary, I don't think you can expect it to be much more than a Worn Powerstone most of the time

Battlemage's Bracers: slightly modified Illusionist's Bracers , I like this

Excavation Technique: With that drawback it could have gone all the way and included lands too. Anyway, again, anti-Archenemy tech right here, more so than the Prismari one, but giving the Archenemy six colored mana to play with seems risky in its own right

Laelia, the Blade Refored: red Phyrexian Arena on legs , kinda. The haste seems like kind of a trap since I think you're often out of mana/already played a land on the turn you get her out. I don't think there's a way to circumvent the "one or more" templating in mono-red; I couldn't find a card that cheaply exiles individual cards alá Alms .

Losheel, Clockwork Scholar: Speaking of color shifted Phyrexian Arena s on legs that can't be readily abused, here's an underwhelming attempt at giving white card advantage. Best I could find for drawing more than one card per turn rotation is Spawning Pit . Don't really expect this to be the mono white messiah we've all been holding out for

Alibou, Ancient Witness: Meh, Golem/rocks tribal I guess? And scry 8 or something seems kinda tedious.

Welcoming voiced disagreements here, I wouldn't mind being proven wrong

DemonDragonJ on Strixhaven spoiler season

2 weeks ago

Solve the equation is exactly the spell that I was seeking, and WotC printed it only shortly after I asked if such a card would ever exist; what an amazing coincidence! I wish that it was an instant, but it will still be perfect for the Elsha of the Infinite deck that I am currently building.

Revel in silence is very nasty, and this is a rare instance in which I am very glad that a spell exiles itself upon resolution, because it would be far too powerful, otherwise.

Codie, vociferous codex is a very fascinating card, so I will be very interested to see how players use it, in the future.

Magma opus and creative outburst are both very awesome, but they are too expensive for me to seriously consider using them.

Wandering archaic looks exactly like an eldrazi, so I wonder if it has any connection to those beings? It would be awesome for some of my decks, but there is no guarantee that my opponents will have instants and sorceries (although it is usually safe to presume that they shall).

Galazeth Prismari is actually rather subdued compared to many of the card in his school, but he (the name sounds masculine) still provides excellent support for certain strategies.

Tanazir Quandix is likewise rather modest, but still excellent as a support card for decks of the appropriate colors.

Coward_Token, I agree that it is ridiculous that blue continues to have such powerful creature removal when it is supposed to be the color that is worst at removing permanents (due to its ability to counter spells), so I hope that WotC soon realizes that and stops printing such cards.

I see that all of the campuses have the same activated ability, but I still say that 4 mana is too much to scry only a single card, especially when Crystal Ball can scry 2 cards for 1 mana.

DemonDragonJ on Strixhaven spoiler season

2 weeks ago

Reconstruct history is very nice, although I personally feel that it should not have been able to return a planeswalker, as that makes it too powerful.

Potion of empowerment should have been a green/white hybrid card, because I feel that green alone should not have an effect such as that.

Why does blade historian grant double strike only to attacking creatures? Why is WotC making card that force players to attack, rather than both attack and defend?

Rip apart is not too bad, but the fact that it is merely a sorcery prevents it from being useful, so I shall keep Wear / Tear in my red/white decks, instead.

It seems that there shall be a cycle of campuses and pledgemages for each school, and, thus far, I am not impressed; Lorehold pledgemage could have been good if its ability increased its toughness in addition to its power. It is not yet known if all of the campuses shall have scry, but, if they do, 4 mana to scry one card is terrible, so I shall not be using them, in any of my decks.

Elite spellbinder is very nice, as it explores new design space for white while still feeling appropriate for that color, so I am very pleased by with it.

Venerable warsinger is awesome, so I do hope that I can put it into at least one of my decks.

Dueling coach is almost entirely worse than is Mikaeus, the Lunarch , so I will not even bother with it.

On returned pastcaller, why is the hybrid symbol between the two mono-colored symbols? Would it not make more sense for it to be after the colorless mana symbol?

Strict proctor is thankfully not as annoying as Hushwing Gryff or Hushbringer , but why is WotC printing so many cards that punish permanents with enter the battlefield abilities?

Efreet flamepainter will be amazing for the Elsha of the Infinite deck that I am building, so I shall definitely get a copy of it.

I shall presume that each school shall have an uncommon legendary creature, who shall be students who are the main characters of the story, and Quintorius is acceptable, but too narrow, in my mind.

Velomachus Lorehold, the founder of the Lorehold school, is as impressive as I would expect an elder dragon to be, so, perhaps, I may put him into one of my decks, but his high mana cost is unappealing.

Given that nearly every card that was revealed today was red/white, is it now safe to presume that each day this week shall feature cards from one specific school?

DemonDragonJ on Strixhaven spoiler season

3 weeks ago

Previews for Strixhaven have finally begun!

I shall first say that I am not particularly fond of the learn mechanic, because being able to obtain cards from outside the game is very powerful and prone to abuse, so I believe that that ability should have bene abandoned.

I also severely dislike the wording on Augusta, dean of order, because players do not attack, their creatures do.

Even further, Will, scholar of frost being able to unconditionally exile permanents is yet another break in blue; it does not matter that the players are given tokens to compensate for the loss of the permanents. Blue is not supposed to be able to remove permanents, other than by returning them to their owners’ hands, so why does WotC continue to give blue such powerful removal?

Why does Uvilda not use the suspend mechanic? That would have been much easier than creating an entirely new type of counter for her ability.

Willowdusk’s ability would be so much better if it could be used at any time, as the fact that it can be used only as a sorcery severely limits its usefulness.

Lisette is mostly worse than is Archangel of Thune , but it is nice to have that effect on a legendary creature, for use in EDH. However, Valentin is far too inexpensive for such a powerful effect; how did WotC think that such a card was balanced?

Breena, the demagogue is very nice, but her ability is useless in one-versus-one games, so any deck that contains her must be used only in games with three or more players.

I do like the cards in the mystical archive, but only two of them are multicolored, thus far, so I hope that more of them shall be. Another reprint of Time Warp is always welcome, to me.

The flavor text on both Blue Sun's Zenith and Krosan Grip implies that the students of Stirxhaven are aware of the existence of other planes, which is actually a nice departure from the majority of planes being utterly unaware of each other’s existences.

Ward being a new keyword is nice, so I do hope that WotC gives it to all previous cars that had it (which were admittedly not many).

Adrix and Nev render Parallel Lives obsolete, but still cannot replace Doubling Season , due to them lacking that card's other ability. Also, why has the wording been changed from "if an effect would create one or more tokens" to "if one or more tokens would be created under your control?" I dislike that, because there is a difference between a cost and an effect.

I see that the "reveal land" cycle from Shadows Over Innsitrad is the cycle that is being completed, which is nice for fans of that cycle, but disappointing, to me, as I was hoping for the "battle land" cycle from Battle for Zendikar to be completed, but I am certain that that cycle shall eventually be completed, some day.

I cannot make any room for archmage emeritus in my Riku of Two Reflections EDH deck, but that card will be great for the Elsha of the Infinite deck that I am currently constructing.

Osbert on EDH Card-Draw Master List

1 month ago

I see you have included Future Sight but not Magus of the Future . Functionally identical albeit slightly worse.

There are some cards that let you play off the top of your library that I would count as card draw: Radha, Heart of Keld , Oracle of Mul Daya , Courser of Kruphix , Elsha of the Infinite , Realmwalker , Vizier of the Menagerie .

Some impulse draw you're missing: Bell Borca, Spectral Sergeant , Dark-Dweller Oracle , Chandra, Torch of Defiance , Showdown of the Skalds , Theater of Horrors , Apex of Power , Birgi, God of Storytelling  ^Flip, Ignite the Future , Jeska's Will , Magmatic Channeler , Soulfire Eruption , Valakut Exploration .

Others: Memory Jar , Magus of the Jar , Allure of the Unknown