Mastermind's Acquisition
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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
Gladiator Legal
Highlander Legal
Historic Legal
Legacy Legal
Leviathan Legal
Limited Legal
Modern Legal
Oathbreaker Legal
Pioneer Legal
Planechase Legal
Quest Magic Legal
Vanguard Legal
Vintage Legal

Mastermind's Acquisition

Sorcery

Choose one -

*Search your library for a card, put it into your hand, then shuffle your library.

*Choose a card you own from outside the game and put it into your hand.

keizerbuns on The Suspense is Killing You!

3 months ago

Thanks Imaginary_Friend777!

You make a good point with Clear the Mind, it’s not really vital to the game plan. I just had it there for the sake of having an infinite loop but it’s kind of a waste of main board slots, especially since I have two in the sideboard that I could grab with Mastermind's Acquisition if I really need the loop.

I like your suggestion of Aetherflux Reservoir over Grapeshot and I think you’re also right about needing more counter spells to protect my Omniscience once I cast it.

I think I’ll try taking out both main board copies of Clear the Mind, but I’ll leave the sideboard copies in because I’ll still need them since I’m probably gonna need the option of an infinite combo if I go with Aetherflux. Then I’ll take Grapeshot out completely and just replace the sideboard copy with Aetherflux, and then I’ll add one more copy of Mastermind’s Acquisition and two more copies of Test of Talents to the main board.

Thanks for the suggestions!!

Profet93 on Wilhelt and Sheoldred unite!

8 months ago

Mastermind's Acquisition/Diabolic Tutor, Demonic Tutor/Vampiric Tutor are solid options.

As far as puzzlebox, you don't want to add one card in your deck hoping you can draw into another (typically). If Sheoldred was your commander who you could reliably use then sure, otherwise not so much.

You have a very good starter deck, great average converted mana cost (cmc) and a good amount of draw which most new players usually forget. Unsure if you know but EDH REC is a good resource. Keep up the good work

Azoth2099 on Green/Black toxic/proliferate need recommendations

10 months ago

Balvron Thanks, man! Happy to help, really.

So the core of the / presence in the deck should be devoted to Dorks, Ramp and Tutors so that you can quickly get the deck engine up and running. Getting your commander on the field and geared up as quickly as possible is everything in this new context. Some cheaper options for Tutors are Diabolic Tutor, Profane Tutor, Mastermind's Acquisition and Increasing Ambition. I'd really recommend just biting the bullet and slotting in the more efficient ones like Demonic Tutor, Vampiric Tutor, Diabolic Intent & Wishclaw Talisman though. Cheaper card draw options like Phyrexian Arena & Dark Tutelage are also pretty solid. Necropotence, Black Market Connections & Dark Confidant are up there, but worth it.

The only thing you need for is for card draw and interaction, with a few key Proliferate pieces that you'll be able to Tutor for when the time is right. Spells like Brainstorm, Ponder, Tolarian Winds, Impulse, Preordain & Serum Visions provide decent gas for cheap. Classics like Counterspell, Delay, Negate, & Dispel protect your game plan. Flux Channeler & Tekuthal, Inquiry Dominus are probably the only Proliferate pieces you'll need, but I'd Throw a Serum Snare in there too. Mystical Tutor, Rhystic Study & Mystic Remora are always nice to have as well.

The few things you'll need for here is to Tutor up gear for your Commander with cards like Enlightened Tutor, Idyllic Tutor, Steelshaper's Gift & Open the Armory, and occasionally control the board with Swords to Plowshares or Path to Exile. I'd also recommend some Stax pieces like Silence, Grand Abolisher, Smothering Tithe, Esper Sentinel, Archivist of Oghma & Drannith Magistrate for good measure, & some more Commander protection with Mother of Runes & Giver of Runes.

Some good pieces of gear to retrieve slap on could be Swiftfoot Boots, Mask of Memory, Conqueror's Flail, Bone Sabres & Mask of the Schemer, for example.

debuf on infinite rats

11 months ago

also, here are some more cards I found that might be helpful for the deck: Volrath's Laboratory, Vanquisher's Banner, Blood for Bones, Mastermind's Acquisition, Epic Downfall, Professor Onyx, Conspiracy, Doom Blade, Ghastly Demise, Nezumi Graverobber  Flip, and Crippling Fear

CrystalQuarry on Liesa, Forgotten Archangel (Budget EDH, Combo)

1 year ago

Hey, thank you so much for commenting and taking the time to read through the deck description!

While this is intended to be a budget deck, I personally just really like foils and original printings of cards. The versions of each card listed in the deck here are what I actually have for it in paper.

Activated Sleeper is a card I have been looking at and considering adding to the deck, but it seems highly conditional given that it can only copy a creature that left the battlefield the same turn. I agree it can go infinite with Karmic Guide and Karmic Guide even helps set it up given that Echo would often force you to sacrifice it on your upkeep anyway. That said, I'm a bit worried about how effective the card is when you DON'T have access to Karmic Guide. I guess depending on the pod it could still be quite good at stealing an opponent's creature. I will have to test it a bit and see how it performs in practice.

Kaya's Ghostform is a card I've considered as well but what concerns me with it is the Sorcery speed nature of it and that it is a bit more telegraphed what the intention is. That said, the ability to bring back the creature even if it gets targeted with something like Swords to Plowshares is very cool! In the pods I've played this deck and where people have gotten to learn more or less how it works, they tend to try and remove Liesa, Forgotten Archangel very quickly, so I've found cards like Undying Evil to be essential for keeping Liesa in play. I've found the instant speed to be extremely relevant in many situations as well. That said, Legion's Landing  Flip is a particularly weak card in the deck and I could definitely see cutting that for testing Kaya's Ghostform.

Thran Vigil is a cool new card that I must have missed in the BRO spoilers. However, this deck isn't really all in on persist type effects. Twilight Shepherd is pretty much the only card it would strongly interact with. I would say it's pretty rare for this deck to win through combat and as such the value of the +1/+1 counters in it (even an arbitrarily large number of them) is a bit questionable. If the deck has assembled one of the infinite death engines, then it should be winning outright without the need to even go to combat. I like the interaction with Tortured Existence but it's such a shame that it only works on your turn! If you could suddenly pump up Liesa on an opponent's turn after they've already declared attackers at you, then that would make it a lot better.

Profane Tutor is a great budget tutor, but having to wait two entire turns is a major detriment to how useful of a card it is, especially as a mid to late game draw. The decks I've seen take the biggest advantage of Profane Tutor are the ones that somehow exile and cast a copy from exile or copy it from graveyard and cast the copy immediately, rather than having to wait the two turns. Mid to late game I would much rather pay a little extra mana to guarantee getting a card immediately rather than having to wait. If you get Profane Tutor in the early game, then yes it's definitely better than Diabolic Tutor or Mastermind's Acquisition for the lower mana cost. If I had a means of cheating on the suspend part of the card in Orzhov then it would warrant an inclusion over one of the other tutors in my opinion.

Vile Entomber is another card I considered and even in an earlier iteration of the deck I ran for a while. The issue I often found with it was that it only grabbed ONE card to put to the graveyard. Burning-Rune Demon and Final Parting are in the deck because they find TWO cards. With Vile Entomber I could find Karmic Guide but not another card to combo with it. With Burning-Rune Demon I can find Karmic Guide and another card to combo with it and often times whichever piece the opponent gives me is irrelevant. Blinking or reanimating Burning-Rune Demon is also significantly more value and helps assemble combos much faster than Vile Entomber can.

Bolas's Citadel is extremely powerful, but it is at least right now (12/17/2022) more than $5 which is where the line in the sand has been drawn for whether or not a card can be added to the deck. That said, even if it was a bit cheaper Bolas's Citadel would require leaning much harder into a life gain theme. While life gain is another very popular and powerful strategy, I feel it is a bit orthogonal to the direction of this deck which is more heavily focused on creature ETB/LTB triggers and the graveyard.

I've been working on a Liesa, Shroud of Dusk deck which leans very heavily into life gain/life loss shenanigans and in that deck I do run stuff like Children of Korlis. That's not to say that Children of Korlis isn't a good card in Liesa, Forgotten Archangel, but I feel like you have to already be on the life gain game plan to get the most out of it.

Plumb the Forbidden is a great card, but you need sufficiently many throw away bodies and a sufficiently high life total to manage it. Without sufficient life gain or creature token generators it runs the risk of being a dead draw. Body Count can also be a completely dead draw at times, but it has a much higher ceiling in this deck specifically than Plumb the Forbidden does. Body Count can literally draw the entire deck for 1 black mana with a death engine assembled. Plumb the Forbidden could never draw more than the greatest number of creatures in play at one moment and I must have the life available to pay for it plus 2 mana. If the deck was more of an aristocrats style build spewing creature tokens left and right and running things like Soul Warden then Plumb the Forbidden would be a much more natural inclusion I feel.

Fanatical Devotion is a really cool sacrifice outlet that can do relevant things like protect Liesa which is very important. That said, thanks to BRO another arguably much better sacrifice outlet just became budget (<$5). And that's Ashnod's Altar. I will be adding this to the deck shortly as a third sacrifice outlet.

Thanks again for reading the long description and commenting!

MthrFknHuman on

1 year ago

I accidentally put those in the wrong box. The Guildless Commons are for the sideboard, assuming a game grinds long enough to cycle the Mastermind's Acquisition a few times and build a combo from the sideboard. The Bottomless Vault and Sand Silos are for the main deck to build up over time for various expenses. I fixed it. Thanks for pointing that out man.

immakinganezehaldeck on Anje Reanimator (Casual CEDH)

1 year ago

11/23/22 - Madness update

I'm really low on madness cards. Needs to be far higher for an anje deck.

IN

OUT

NOTES

Removed most end game threats + interaction that didn't have madness, since madness tech needs to be there in high density and the deck can win through that stuff mainly.

Gidgetimer on Abzan Graveyard Recursion Help

1 year ago

In the current deck the problem with running Crop Rotation to sac a basic for a dual/tri land is that you don't run many untapped ones. This makes that move incredibly slow. You are tapping a mana to get a tapped land and not going up on land count. Even if you had more untapped duals it would be pretty slow just fixing off of it. Something like Utopia Sprawl would be way better until you get the Coffers.

The more I think about it the more I am convinced that this deck in it's current state is not a deck that wants to dredge. There are not nearly enough additional draws to stay relevant while filling the yard. I think this might be a deck that wants Mesmeric Orb. The good cards that let you tutor it are monetarily expensive, but it might be worth checking out a build with some number of Diabolic Tutor, Mastermind's Acquisition, a Fortnight Grim Tutor (actually a good card, but eww Fortnight), or Varragoth, Bloodsky Sire and the Orb. Then you could focus on ramping into the commander and passively mill while still being able to draw. The downside is that if your friends also run graveyard strategies you are feeding them.

On the subject of ramp, I think you could easily cut 3 lands to slot in 1 MV dorks. You are limited to 1 land a turn, but could play any number of ramp that you can pay for. The ones mentioned above are good and if you are wanting a source to fix black Elves of Deep Shadow is also available.

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