Eternal Witness
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Legality

Format Legality
1v1 Commander Legal
Archenemy Legal
Arena Legal
Block Constructed Legal
Canadian Highlander Legal
Casual Legal
Commander / EDH Legal
Commander: Rule 0 Legal
Custom Legal
Duel Commander Legal
Freeform Legal
Gladiator Legal
Highlander Legal
Historic Legal
Historic Brawl Legal
Legacy Legal
Leviathan Legal
Limited Legal
Modern Legal
Modern Beyond Horizons Legal
Oathbreaker Legal
Planar Constructed Legal
Planechase Legal
PreDH Legal
Quest Magic Legal
Tiny Leaders Legal
Vanguard Legal
Vintage Legal

Eternal Witness

Creature — Human Shaman

When Eternal Witness enters the battlefield, you may return target card from your graveyard to your hand.

DreadKhan on Thinking about how we evaluate …

1 week ago

If you get sweaty and run Noxious Revival you can pay no mana to have even more versatility (you can give someone ELSE back something instead, which can be huge). If you've built a really strong deck the idea of paying 3 mana to get a single card back (at sorcery speed!) is laughable, that's pretty much giving up your whole turn without committing something important to the board (like Rhystic Study) or attempting a win (Thassa's Oracle + Demonic Consultation is also 3 mana). That's why Noxious Revival is the best option in the eyes of many very competitive players, so I think it applies to most Bracket 4 and 5 decks, where pure card quality is so important. If you're playing in Bracket 3 and under what you want are card synergies, you need bad cards that become powerful when used together IMHO. Personally I try to avoid running recursion effects that are one dimensional at this point, power creep has given us better options in a lot of cases, if you're in Black something like Lively Dirge can get back creatures, but it can also tutor one up if you don't have anything to get back.

All that said there is a plurality of creature decks out there, and in those lists Eternal Witness can make a lot more sense.

I'm also a tad curious why Skullwinder isn't one of the options, it's bad if you usually have worse cards than your opponents (if you get back a Grizzly Bears and they get Questing Beast you'd have been better off with E-Wit), but the ceiling is very high on it if you can make a deal with an opponent (this is also a great example of recursion with added upside that makes it more versatile). I think in a lower power game Skullwinder plays pretty well, it's even easier to cast if your mana base is janky. I've heard some people really hate Skullwinder, has anyone ever tried using it and can give some salient reasons why they didn't like it?

plakjekaas on Thinking about how we evaluate …

1 week ago

You can't Chord of Calling or Green Sun's Zenith for a Regrowth. Most green decks are built to leverage The Great Henge more than, say, Whirlwind of Thought. That's why Eternal Witness has become massively more popular in EDH than Regrowth ever could. You can Ephemerate, Reanimate, Heat Shimmer or Clone your Eternal Witness, while Regrowth has a lot less ubiquitous synergy pieces.

Weirdly enough, Snapcaster Magefoil never became as popular, even though the utility is very similar; a 2/1 human creature that grabs something from your graveyard to reuse. I think if Snapcaster were more popular, Regrowth would be as well.

legendofa on Thinking about how we evaluate …

1 week ago

Different card types, different uses. As you say, for more you get a ton of utility. Even without other synergistic effects, you're effectively getting a 2/1 creature for with no extra card opportunity cost, which is far from a bad deal. I would call Eternal Witness a side-grade of Regrowth, and let the context of the deck determine which to use. It's not like green has problems producing extra mana or using creatures.

theNeroTurtle on Thinking about how we evaluate …

1 week ago

Eternal Witness is more effect in that it has more synergy with other "types" of cards. That is my vote. I am pretty sure I only run it in one deck, though. I am not a big fan of repeat with particular card types.

hyalopterouslemur on Thinking about how we evaluate …

1 week ago

So, I've been thinking a lot about how cards are evaluated. Specifically it comes down to two cards: Regrowth and Eternal Witness.

I've also been watching a lot of Magic YouTUbe, and there's a hipster movement to hate on Eternal Witness, among other EDH mainstays. Supposedly Regrowth is better, and I want to talk about that, and the two ways to evaluate cards.

First, Regrowth. In a vacuum, Regrowth is better. It costs , in contrast to Eternal Witness's . That's one mana less. The 2/1 body is unimpressive in combat. This is all true.

But then you look at Eternal Witness. She's a creature, meaning Cryptolith Rite or Earthcraft turns her into a mana dork. Meaning you get two cards back with Panharmonicon. Meaning you get to trigger Cathars' Crusade or Aura Shards. Meaning her death triggers Dictate of Erebos. Meaning she can be blinked or bounced. Meaning cards that count creatures (e.g., Shamanic Revelation, Pennon Blade, Gaea's Cradle) count her. Meaning she can attack, triggering Hellrider, even if she's likely to just be blocked and killed. Meaning her entering triggers Purphoros, God of the Forge and Warleader's Call and related cards. Meaning Yeva, Nature's Herald gives her flash, which opens up other forms of abuse. (Seedborn Muse, anyone?) Meaning you can bring her 2/1 self back with Smile at Death. And no one's playing either card on turn 2 anyway.

Which one you pick says a lot about your personality, though neither choice takes away your Spike card, and there is no wrong answer. I tend to favor instants over creatures where applicable, for instance. And this doesn't make, e.g., Silverglade Elemental, good in most decks; mana cost still matters.

In reality, both are good cards, and you should probably play both if you can. but it depends on what you're trying to do. But which card you choose if you must choose one is far more complicated than simple rox/sux arguments.

FadingReality on building

2 weeks ago

CREATURES:

I like every single creature with the sole exception of the Ancient Adamantoise. Glacial Chasm does the same thing but way better and is more on theme for the deck. Also, swapping an 8 drop for a 0 drop MASSIVELY reduces the deck's average cmc. I'd simply cut this. You need to cut two cards regardless AND you'll probably want to make more cuts so that you can add in some of my other upcoming suggestions. These suggestions will be different than my "swap" recommendations in my previous comment.

LANDS:

You are running two of the three karoo lands (Golgari RotFarm, Selesnya Sanctuary) in your colors. I'd reduce this to one. Normally I'd never run any of these cards except in VERY specific decks. That said, necrobloom is one such deck that I would run these in, but I would only run one. These are even slower than a normal tap land and are brutal to have destroyed by a strip mine or something. But in a deck that can recur lands and play more than one per turn, they are worth including one of. Pick one of these and cut the other. You are running 11 basics in a 3 color deck which is pretty high. In order to justify running things like Cultivate and Kodama's Reach you'll only need about 6-7 basics. I speak from experience. Even if you wanna run more than 7, 11 is really high. And again, I will be suggesting a bunch of lands to include, so you'll wanna cut some basics and a karoo anyway.

Last thing regarding lands: your land count of 40 is actually a good number. Normally 40 is way to high, but this is a "lands matter" deck so 40 is a good call here. You could probably get away with 38 or 39 too, but don't worry about that unless you are desperate for cuts.

SORCERIES:

These are all very good except for two. I'd cut Regrowth. If you still want this effect (you already have Eternal Witness) then run Bala Ged Recovery  Flip. It's an MDFC land so it's awesome and synergies further with your deck. I'd also cut Dread Return. This card is actually VERY good and even saw some cEDH play when Flash/Hulk was still around. The flashback cost is also really good fro your deck. However, the initial cost of 4 is too slow. Consider Reanimate. This is the best reanimation spell in the game and this card is the reason reanimator decks are called reanimator. Also, with reanimate, you lower your deck's CMC more AND you can grab opponents' creatures with it.

INSTANTS:

I already recommended swapping Overkill for Swords to Plowshares. Other than that, I'd cut Reprieve. It's not terribly great (I know you want a pseudo counterspell, but this is meh). Cut it for Necropotence and that way you still preserve and actually upgrade the card draw in the deck.

ARTIFACTS:

As mentioned before, you should still try to keep world map if you can. Endstone should be cut. It's VERY powerful, but it's both expensive and risky. Necropotence is much better for drawing cards.

ENCHANTMENTS:

I like every single one of these with the sole exception of Spelunking. Sure it ramps you once (can wiff although VERY unlikely in your deck) but its 3 mana and theres a ton of two mana ramp you can run that's land based. Also you run 0 caves. The entering untapped IS nice, but swapping this card entirely for another card that let's you play more than one land per turn is going to be much stronger and also kinda negates the tapped lands as you're gonna be able to get more out which negates the slowness to an extent.

Idoneity on A Flourishing Benignity

5 months ago

Thank you, iischris! It's a long-lived baby of mine.

I used to run the Witness, but realized that the only thing I really care to get back is Serra's Sanctum. The recursion package consists entirely of Petrified Field and Hall of Heliod's Generosity.

iischris on A Flourishing Benignity

5 months ago

Love the deck! Have you considered some recursion stuff such as Cosmic Rebirth or Eternal Witness?

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