Mox Diamond

Artifact

If Mox Diamond would enter the battlefield, you may discard a land card instead. If you do, put Mox Diamond onto the battlefield. If you don't, put it into its owner's graveyard.

: Add one mana of any color to your mana pool.

Discussion (51)

mariowen on [cEDH] Krenko Combo [[Primer]]

3 days ago

MasterGabe this deck started over three years ago as a budget build and I slowly acquired pieces for it. If you are looking to spend around $200 and keep the combo, start by removing all the fast mana (Mox Diamond, Grim Monolith, Mana Crypt, etc) and put in the normal ramp like Fire Diamond, Arcane Signet etc. Also remove Wheel of Fortune and replace with Wheel of Fate. You also don’t need any of the fancy lands, just stick with regular mountains and as we will be removing ramp increase land count to 39.

The deck will be quite a lot slower and more susceptible to interaction but you can keep the combo shell and all it’s shenanigans. If you want to make a copy of this deck, remove the foils and make the suggested changes I would happily make more suggestions for you to meet the budget.

ShaDoWz_6677 on ELSHA OF THE STORM

4 days ago

crewchief88 Alela wants the Hall of Heliod's Generosity in there. not in Elsha. Alela is the artifact/enchantment chick in esper. So she really could use it more than Elsha can. I play tested your deck 6 times to turn 7 and only 1 time was i able to go off and win before then. That was turn 4 on a really good hand.

I would do some testing and working with the deck a little more, tweaking and ironing out the issues that you may have. (I noticed a HUGE problem with mana. You arent running signets, or all the talismans, so your fixing isnt there. That may be why you have some problems in the deck)

Azorius Signet Izzet Signet Talisman of Creativity Talisman of Progress Mox Opal Mox Diamond all should be future investments into this deck.

After further evaluation Library of Leng should not be in this deck. It's a cute card that does nothing for you right away in game. And discard decks are only if you are going against decks like Nath or Nekusar. (My baby Nath sadly can't keep up to my Elsha list.)

I think you rely too much on the effects of wheeling your way to a victory when you need to be letting Elsha do all the work man. She's a house. Throw in Rogue's Passage to sneak a few beats in there. Swiftfoot Boots is another card that she should be running to protect her. You don't want to give your opponents any opportunities to kill your commander when you are tapped out. Elsha, much like other storm decks, relies on the commander. For example: If Kess was not in play, the Grixis Kess Storm deck wouldn't function 100% of the time. I've done some testing on that.

Jeleva is the only one that wants to not be on the field 99% of the time unless shes attacking. Yidris storm REQUIRES Yidris to be on the field 100% of the time to win the game. Elsha is the same way. We need to be able to protect her at all costs.

Also, while I'm on the topic. SAY NO TO CODEX SHREDDER. It HAS TO GO. Its a cute card that if you want to win, you play around what people tutor. You know what they are tutoring well ahead of time so you can stop them with what counter magic you have.

You also don't care if they use Tabernacle because you only use 1 creature. Everythign else does value on ETB.

dingusdingo on You Are Now a Member ...

5 days ago

Alright, in hypothetical Larryland where I am now in charge of making decisions, here is what I would do

First, establish criteria for the format

Shouldn't be too complicated, as there has already been lots of time spent discussing the format

• Bans should serve to stop certain combos or deckbuilding approaches from swallowing the meta.
• Bans should be justified off of power level for winning, not how fun or unfun the combo or style of deck is to play or play against
• General rules changes about the format should serve to open deckbuilding and allow for more interesting approaches to the meta and winning.

Rules Changes

I think a couple rules changes should take place to open deckbuilding and allow more options, and allow cards to work as intended with the commander specific ruleset

• Commanders should hit the graveyard before returning to the command zone. This allows commanders like Child of Alara or other death triggers to actually function as intended while maintaining the command zone. Commanders should have the option of returning to the CZ at will from exile, the graveyard, the library, or a player's hand as an ability that doesn't use the stack, similar to mana abilities.
• Hybrid mana symbols should be perfectly legal as long as the hybrid symbols fulfill a color identity of your commander. For example, Boros Recruit should be legal in a mono-red deck. If a hybrid mana card has a mana symbol in the text box that it outside the color identity, it should still be excluded. For example, if Boros Recruit had a firebreathing ability for in the text box, it would no longer be legal in a mono-white deck.
• Restriction of the command zone to a single card. Partner commanders are still legal, but not legal to run them as partners in the command zone. Having a mix and match color identity and having guaranteed access to two cards at all times over one card is too strong. Bigger color identity means wider pool of cards to pull from, and the partner players are effectively starting with a 9 card hand as opposed to non-partner commanders starting with an 8 card hand.

Bans and Unbans

First, I would unban cards that the RC has banned because they are "unfun" or don't fit the spirit of the format

• Coalition Victory - If you can pull this off and cast the cost, go ahead and win
• Emrakul, the Aeons Torn - This costs 15 mana and channel is banned, this isn't going to break decks at all and most likely will only see play as an Ulamog alternate in Gitrog decks
• Erayo, Soratami Ascendant - This can be countered or removed or smart opponents can avoid triggering it. Once it has flipped, it is still removable although somewhat toxic. It definitely gets good mileage in EDH but people can play around this if they have even half a brain, which is what I would expect from competitive.
• Iona, Shield of Emeria - This is only banned now because Painter's Servant was unbanned. Certainly reanimator Iona strategies can cause problems, but hitting a 2 card combo for a soft lock isn't game shattering unless you are on a mono-colored deck, at which point it just becomes one of the things you must worry about. If Back to Basics and Blood Moon are totally fine for shitting on 3-5 color mana bases, I'm 100% fine with Iona for shitting on mono color decks.
• Library of Alexandria - I have no idea why this is banned in the first place. Most competitive decks are so tight on their land base and won't have a slot for this. Also most competitive decks wish to play spells on turn 1 and 2, which makes it harder to get the 7 in hand for the Library draw.
• Panoptic Mirror - If someone can assemble the ultra fragile Mirror + Free turn spell, and then gets an ENTIRE ROTATION of no one destroying it, I'm 100% fine with them taking infinite turns. Also consider that this combo basically costs to start, 5 for cast and 5 for the free turn. This card is banned because casuals absolutely loathe combos. Its unbanning could make Pox decks somewhat viable in competitive, and would be a boon to stax decks as well
• Primeval Titan - This card is a double tutor on ETB or attack, but its a double tutor for lands. If someone really wants to set up Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth + Cabal Coffers + Deserted Temple + Inventors' Fair (which fetches Rings of Brighthearth) then more power to them, as it requires either a blink effect or an entire rotation to THEN get the second set of tutors from attacking. Its big value, but honestly no reason for this card to be banned. It costs to cast
• Paradox Engine - the banning of this card made the format worse, as it knocked out tons of viable decks simply because "Too many casuals put down rocks and PE and oops into an infinite". The unbanning of this card opens up the format significantly, and allows weird decks like Hannah, Ship's Navigator or Dralnu, Lich Lord to be viable commanders, although definitely not tier 0 picks.
• Recurring Nightmare - Banned because of griefing almost 100%. Nobody likes being hit by some ETB creature that involves saccing or losing permanents, but it isn't fast enough to warrant a ban. It requires mana, AND a creature on the field, AND a creature in the GY.
• Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary - Selvala is basically a more powerful version of this because of the cantrips and you can play non-basic lands. This would probably become a tier 1 deck by basically copying the Selvala list, but I think the meta would be enriched from adding this as an alternate, similar to how Marwen has added instead of detracted from the meta.
• Sundering Titan - Banned because attacking a player's resources is seen as an unfun way to win. Its expensive to cast and not exactly game shattering when it enters.
• Sway of the Stars - This costs to cast for a weird Timetwister that sets life totals to 7. Sure there is potential for abuse with Suspend cards, but this costs 10 mana. Nobody is going to play this if it gets unbanned.
• Sylvan Primordial - Another board state changer that isn't really going to do as much as it looks when it lands. Sure, -3 permanents on board for opponents and +3 lands is neat, but it costs . Decks would rather win than assemble some blink or recursion loop for this card.
• Upheaval - This is banned almost entirely from a casual and time perspective. It makes games take longer. In competitive though, this card would be used with excess floating mana to THEN rip your combo. Almost definitely wouldn't see competitive play though, and the banning seems silly to me.
• Worldfire - If you can run a wacky suspend deck that abuses this to win, you have my blessing. It also costs to cast so someone will probably just win before you
• Yawgmoth's Bargain - This is a Necropotence that costs with the benefit of no-delay on the draws. If necro is legal, this should be legal.

Bans

My biggest reasoning for bans is that some combos are so strong and so hard to interact with that they become the go-to builds for certain color identities. When the optimal way to build 30 different commanders in the same color pairing is Flash Hulk, you have run into a problem.

• Flash - Arguably the worse part of Flash Hulk. Potential for abuse in a post-Hulk world with Academy Rector. This card has the potential for abuse with every single new creature printed. I don't think this card makes the meta more interesting, and I think it pigeonholes deckbuilding into "well why don't you run Flash Hulk, or Flash _". Flash combos are also difficult for other decks to interact with outside of Counterspell, which means when you're building for playing in a competitive meta, you are almost expected to play Blue due to how strong and warping this card is.
• Protean Hulk - Even with a flash banning I still wand this turd of a card gone. Finding hulk, reanimating hulk, and sacrificing hulk isn't interesting. There isn't very much skill there. The decks aren't interesting. There is a combo in practically every color combination for winning immediately after you get a Hulk trigger. It can be viewed as a 6-card into-play tutor, or a 5-card into-play tutor, etc. etc. I don't think the meta is more interesting or better for having this card be legal.
• Demonic Consultation and Tainted Pact - More boring and tired combo archetypes. Once again, tutoring for 2 cards and ripping the Consultation + Oracle combo doesn't really require much pilot skill, and it doesn't make decks more interesting to build. These cards are simply too efficient at what they do, and they are hard for non-blue decks to interact with meaningfully. The presence of this combo and Flash Hulk has basically relegated all stax decks to being tier 2 builds, as they have such an impossible time locking down these combos. The banning of these two cards and Flash Hulk would bust the competitive meta wide open. Also, between these cards or the Laboratory Maniac + variants in the combo, these are the cards that are way way way more degenerate than the other part of the combo.
• Rhystic Study and Mystic Remora - These are annoying and burdensome mono-blue staples that slow gameplay, and are auto-includes in practically any deck that includes blue. They function much better than intended due to the multiplayer nature of the format, and deckbuilding is less interesting and diverse because these cards are legal. They can singlehandedly run away with games when you have a single player in the pod who ignores them, and having your combo shut down because someone draw a Force of Will after getting 6 free draws is frustrating and extremely obnoxious. They also prop up extremely mediocre mono blue decks like Urza, Lord High Artificer and Baral, Chief of Compliance. Once again, I don't really think there is any skill in playing or building around this card, and the power level of "auto-include for any deck with blue" stifles deck building. Blue really doesn't need any help being good in EDH, let alone cEDH.
• Nature's Will and Druids' Repository - Targeted bans for Najeela, the other obnoxious tier 0 commander deck in the current meta. I'm not a huge fan of 1 card combos with commanders, because you always have one of the cards available at all stages of the game, and tutoring + playing a single card once again doesn't really speak to high skill or interesting deck building. The banning of these cards will peripherally splash and hit other decks, such as Edric, Spymaster of Trest, but I'm fine with that. Najeela and Edric will still have other options for executing these combos, such as Sword of Feast and Famine or Bear Umbra, but these are more mana intensive or more fragile combos with lower utility outside the combo.
• Tymna the Weaver - I have already advocated for removing partners from the command zone, but this card is so dummy strong as to be included in the 99 of other decks with some frequency. You can get the draws even if Tymna didn't attack (i.e. it just came in). You can get 3 draws a turn for the same mana cost as Phyrexian Arena, except that if done correctly you'll get the draws before you would get the Arena draws. This card is meta warping, this and Najeela are a big part of the reason the meta is so creature heavy right now. Decks either run this card, or they run ways to handle this card because a Tymna sitting on the board for 1-3 rotations gives such a fat advantage the pilot runs away with the game.
• Timetwister - A card that sees play because you save slot efficiency by spamming TT to create a loop of infinitely recasting spells, plus its a wheel effect for 3 mana that shits on decks assembling combos through the GY with cards. I'm totally hunky dory with high efficiency combos, but losing to a timetwister loop is boring, cumbersome, and takes the pilot 30 years to demonstrate and explain the loop to those who haven't seen it. Combined with the ridiculous price of the card, and the ridiculous powerlevel even outside the combo, this card should go. This is also another card that makes fast mana extremely degenerate, as someone going first and sticking Mana Crypt into Sol Ring into Chrome Mox into Timetwister feels extremely bad, and opponents don't even have the benefit of recurring their starting hand from the GY later on.
• Sylvan Library - The green Rhystic Study. Doesn't make decks more interesting. Doesn't make games more interesting. Its just cheap ways to get cards that becomes more ridiculous in the context of a format where you have double the starting life of the format this was printed for. The auto-include nature of this card means decks open up more when this card is removed.
• Lion's Eye Diamond - No, Razakats is not an interesting combo. No, bomberman is not an interesting combo. These are both degenerate and more shoe-horn "oh I need a combo to win" style combos. Bomberman is extremely degenerate as LED can be recovered in the face of targeted GY removal by simply stacking the Salvager trigger on top of the removal if you have extra floating mana, and pretty much the only way to really stop it is a replacement effect like Rest in Peace. Seeing someone play a bomberman combo then dump mana into their outlet from the CZ (whether it be Thrasios, Triton Hero or Breya, Etherium Shaper) isn't interesting, although I will admit it is fast. This card is much lower on my list of requested bans, but it is still there for how annoying Bomberman and razakats are, plus how easy this makes Doomsday piles.
• Hermit Druid - I want this gone for the same reason Consultation and Pact should go. Boring deckbuilding that becomes "UGx deck can run Hermit and Oracle to win", and thus you end up with twenty different UGx decks that look the same. Once you have seen this combo once, there isn't much merit to seeing it again. This card isn't as bad as Consult or Pact in my opinion, and once again it is a much lower priority for banning than those cards, as it requires a haste enabler to make it truly degenerate, or a way to flash it in at EOT before your untap step.

Cards I would avoid banning

As the title reads, things I think aren't a problem but usually draw comments for bans.

• Cheap tutors like Vampiric Tutor and Imperial Seal - Every single 1 CMC tutor goes to top of deck (besides Gamble and Steelshaper's Gift), which means you're -1 card advantage for casting them. Having the ability to assemble combos or seek a problem solving card doesn't blow the format out of proportion. Having players be able to assemble threats in a timely manner makes the format faster and more interactive. If you see an opponent tutoring, you know to hold up interaction or try to race them. I'm more interested in removing hyper degenerate combos that are hard to interact with or are resilient enough to win through interaction.
• Fast mana like Mana Crypt or Mox Diamond - If fast mana is banned, all decks will require Green for speed purposes from the high amount of turn 1 dorks (read: accelerators) available. Stax would become 100% dead as an archetype with these bans outside of Hatebear builds that include Green.
• Free counterspells like FoW or Pact of Negation - Keeps combo decks in check. Similar to how Force of Will keeps Legacy from being overrun by super speed combos, these cards also keep Commander in check.

NiftyCheshireCat on Mr. Steal Your Girl

1 week ago

Hey NV_1980! Thanks for the ideas! Ugin, the Spirit Dragon would definitely be a perfect fit for this deck. I just picked up the Grim Monolith and Power Artifact today so I'm going to wait and let my wallet recover before going after him, Mox Diamond, Extraplanar Lens, and 24 snow covered basics which are probably the next upgrades in line for this deck.

I do like the Training Grounds idea, my only copy is in my Sliver Queen deck though so I might have to think about what I could cut to make room for it in this deck and if I find a spot I'll consider picking up another copy.

PhyrexianGameplay on Habanero Hulk

1 week ago

if you are going to play this deck, you probably should be playing Biomancer's Familiar, Mox Diamond, Dack Fayden, as well as removing kiki, pod, felidar, and other bad wincons that don't allow you to win at instant speed. adding another land would also be good, as well as playing pyroblast.

Goretast on Derevi, Queen of the Hated

1 week ago

Obvious power upgrades would be Mana Crypt, Gaea's Cradle, or Mox Diamond with a big emphases on Cradle with this commander. I think you might like Deafening Silence because you are so creature heavy. I would also consider adding the Yisan line with Wirewood Symbiote, Bloom Tender, and Mirror Entity to generate infinite mana with only 3 Yisan verses. Aluren and Cloudstone Curio are also essential if you're wanting to take this to the next level because it opens up so many combos. If you decide to go this route to open up more infinite mana combos, Walking Ballista would be a strong finisher that you can tutor with a strong stax/tutor like Ranger-Captain of Eos.

Boza on How Does Harmless Offering Not ...

2 weeks ago

The only example of blatantly violating the RL is Mox Diamond, which was reprinted in shiny form for From the Vault: relics. After a backlash of Wizards violating their own policy with that (see above for the policy), shiny editions of RL cards are not done anymore.

Opinion on the RL Show

The Reserved List is the glue which actually keeps Magic finance and the game in one piece. Having a base of older cards that are expensive are essential for a long-living TCG - it gives a sort of insurance that the investment is safe. The RL is the Magic analog of government bonds - safe investments backed by strict rules. Any form of tradable goods needs a base of stable investments in order to function. It reduces risk in the whole system. From a financial standpoint, if the reserved list did not exist, every Magic card would be more expensive, because the risk of buying a card has increased.

Additionally, none of the cards in the reserved list are that good and as long as your playgroup is fine with it, playing with proxies allows you easy access to those cards. Or buy the gold-bordered one and paint the border black with a sharpie.

Finally, literally no-one needs the RL cards - they are relics of Magic's past, which the current game is trying to move away from. The designs on most are bad and besides the dual lands and power 9, there are few cards on there are actually useful. If the next set announces a Drop of Honey reprint, noone will be interested, even though it is currently 500 bucks.

dingusdingo on Best Counterspells in Commander?

2 weeks ago

Blue

Your very top tier auto-include for lists is going to look like

• Force of Will "free"
• Pact of Negation "free"
• Swan Song cheap to cast and wide in restrictions
• Mana Drain color heavy but ramps the following turn
• Mental Misstep "free"
• Delay not color heavy and hits any spell, delaying for 3 turns is the same as solving it in very fast competitive EDH

Your situational includes are going to look like

• Force of Negation This can't protect your own combos, so it isn't wanted in every list. This is ran in QUITE A FEW lists though, always worth a consider.
• Counterspell Usually seen in mono or dual color decks as the cost can be hard in some 4 or 5 color shells
• Dispel Sometimes cut for a more general counter
• Negate
• Muddle the Mixture Limited in scope and color heavy but this is more often slotted as a hard-to-counter tutor with a counterspell as icing on the top
• Narset's Reversal this card is pretty nice. While it does see a lot of play, it definitely isn't an autoinclude yet by any means.
• Spell Pierce Before you mock this card, consider how well it catches ultra fast mana rocks and tutors. Noncreature is very wide, and it stops Sol Ring Mana Crypt Mox Diamond Mox Opal Chrome Mox Mox Amber Mana Vault Vampiric Tutor Imperial Seal Mystical Tutor Worldly Tutor Gamble Dark Ritual and SO MUCH MORE. Even for a tempo card, you're still going to catch weird stuff like someone's Rhystic Study because they tapped out to pay for it. Its very strong against blistering fast combo decks, which is why it sees competitive play.

Other blue stuff is usually just too expensive. Paying over 2 mana for a counterspell just doesn't cut it when there are so many threats for so cheap. Don't pay more than 2 for a counterspell unless it does something wild on top. Counterspells with fewer restrictions on what it can counter are going to be better.

Other Colors

This is where it gets saucy boys

• Red Elemental Blast Pyroblast are VERY good. In a pod, there is almost definitely blue at the table. Every single red deck can slot these for commander without fear. Do note that REB works against any spell that includes blue (multicolor), while pyro only works against spells that are ONLY blue (monocolor).
• Fork Reverberate (Twincast) these allow you to copy a counterspell to create a counterspell. More access for red to counterspells. They also conveniently work very well against tutors, ramp, big draw spells, and extra turn spells.
• Guttural Response Weird hybrid color and somewhat restricted but still a good include in most RG decks.
• Burnout a bit worse then the elemental blasts as it costs 2 mana and it is limited. The cantrip is nice though
• Mana Tithe not that good in EDH but give it a whirl I guess
• Lapse of Certainty costing 3 hurts, but this is more a tempo card than anything.
• Dash Hopes Don't play this card in EDH lol
• Withering Boon on the chunkier end at 2 CMC, but in a color that doesn't get much of this. The 3 life and the restriction hurt, but definitely EDH playable. Every deck runs a commander, 99% of which are creatures
• Imp's Mischief can counter a spell by having it target Mischief, as can Misdirection Shunt Swerve and Ricochet Trap.
• Veil of Summer 1 mana green Cryptic Command
• Autumn's Veil Counterspell + silence against UB
• Bind I bet you didn't even know this card existed. Cantrips. GOOD IN THE YISAN MIRROR MATCH?
• Avoid Fate Weird protection oriented counterspell
• Nether Void Mostly ran in stax builds, brutal lockout card
• Planar Chaos One of my new favorite cards. Brutal with recursion like Hall of Heliod's Generosity. Play when you're ahead
• Deathgrip Lifeforce These are based if you have any method of color shifting. Realistically, you could run Lifeforce in Momir Hackball. These cards can cause scoops on casual tables lol.
• Vexing Shusher can render counterspells useless. Similarly, Dosan the Falling Leaf Grand Abolisher Prowling Serpopard Gaea's Herald can all protect against counterspells. Far more marginal but still worthwhile are Hall of Gemstone and Ritual of Subdual for turning off counterspells for opponents.