Needle Specter

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Legality

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

Needle Specter

Creature — Specter

Flying

Wither (This deals damage to creatures in the form of -1/-1 counters.)

Whenever Needle Specter deals combat damage to a player, that player discards that many cards.

Gleeock on Edh options

5 months ago

Breena, the Demagogue is certainly aggro & capable of winning with more players at the table. The precon was poorly constructed (IMO) to make you think it needs to be a political deck... Or you just pluck those cards & replace them with proactive aggro... and you don't need to add massive card-draw filler/fluff because the commander nets you easy early game card-draw. Mistmeadow Skulk & Needle Specter become easy powerhouses.. Really any low cmc lifelinker suddenly finds new life in this deck. Believe me, if you are pumping a lifelinker with +4/+4 on your turn, then possibly another +2/+2 on their own turns, your opponents often do think twice about taking advantage of that card draw clause.

Players commonly misinterpret this commander, it is: "EACH time a player attacks an opponent with more life" -- so it is quite easy to suddenly place +4/+4 on one of your creatures & draw 2 cards because your opponents had different life totals. You just need a few low-cmc creatures around, a very easy prerequisite & the commander functions just for being on the field instead of requiring haste. On top of that it is 3 CMC. I usually pump my field (instead of going Voltron) & that lends itself to control, my opponents HATE having to spend removal on Needle Specter but they find they pretty much have to unless they feel they can just afford to discard 3-5 cards on turn 4 or so. My version is probably less aggro than what you would go with, but it is more based on proliferate & walkers + aggro.

Isshin, Two Heavens as One also accomplishes what you want nicely. I would say that is less "build out of the box", less budget-friendly, & probably needs a little more card-draw fluff since the commander does not do that on his own.

Crow_Umbra on Felix Five-Boots - Reach for the Sky (v0.5)

7 months ago

Glad to see your Five-Boots list up like you mentioned! I'll definitely be keeping tabs on this as you make your changes and upgrades.

I checked out your Maybe List, and I'm glad to see that you have Spawnwrithe and Mist-Syndicate Naga; they were both some of my favorite "host bodies" for when I used to play Brokkos, Apex of Forever Mutate Voltron.

These are some cards I also used to run in Brokkos as host bodies, but I think they could do some work in Five-Boots, especially if you add in some of the Swords of X & Y, but check out Cephalid Constable and Needle Specter. Constable & Specter are much more immediately mean as hosts for Brokkos, but they could still be fairly disruptive with Five-Boots.

Crow_Umbra on Gix, Yawgmoth Praetor

7 months ago

As an additional example, Cold-Eyed Selkie is worded in a way so that you draw cards for the total amount of combat damage it deals.

Let's say Cold-Eyed Selkie is enchanted with a Rancor, and it connects for combat damage. If it connects with its full 3 damage, you will draw 3 cards.

Although their wordings have some similarities, their are some slight differences between "one or more" (Professional Face-Breaker, Grim Hireling, and Olivia, Opulent Outlaw), and "Whenever ~ deals combat damage to a player, X happens that many times" (Cephalid Constable, Cold-Eyed Selkie, and Needle Specter)

Gleeock on Haha Trust Me Dude, I'll Help You

1 year ago

Archon_Bel I threw Dreamstealer & Needle Specter in because Breena reliably pumps them up &, even in a vacuum, those 2 cards are such nutkickers when you can reliably pump. I've double triggered Breena onto one of them & had an opponent discarding 5 cards easily, I don't necessarily need any discard synergy to make them worthwhile. Also some of my reanimation pulls cards from my opponents' graveyards as well.

I do the same thing with lifelink, I don't neccessarily rely on lifegain, but lifelinking creatures are one of the better ones to be pumped when you have a reliable engine, so I throw in a bunch of lifelink aggro. Nullpriest of Oblivion is another one I like. One that probably meets halfway between our different strategies is Speaker of the Heavens.

A bunch of the new phyrexian things synergize well, that is the direction I saw the toxic/proliferate Breena deck going.

For me, Felisa, Fang of Silverquill was cut for Ratadrabik of Urborg. I do think guardian scalelord will playtest really well though.

If you end up leaning into the phyrexian build & run with "mites" you probably wouldn't miss Cathars' Crusade anyway :)

My deck is Birdlock, it may have some things that you like for the creature category anyway. Breena decks fascinate me because for whatever reason she is one of the Strixhaven precon commanders that I don't see explored as much. Alot of the decks don't deviate much from the precon build, yet she is so much stronger & more fun as a more aggressive build.

Gleeock on Haha Trust Me Dude, I'll Help You

1 year ago

Haha, yeah, I tend pump the agro-helpers more than the voltron to force that decision. Mistmeadow Skulk is a serious badass & since Breena's ability doesn't target, the protection isn't a non-bo. Likewise, Dreamstealer has built in recursion if you need it. Needle Specter becomes an instant threat with one combat instance. Voice of the Blessed becomes jacked easily.

I'm a fan of proliferate since Breena doesn't particularly lend herself to finishing wide as much as going midrange-tall, so usually I only have like maybe 4 creatures that I've truly pumped, then I can proliferate those +1/+1 counters at the very worst... but, the best-case scenario I am quickly ulting planeswalkers with it & pumping some low-cost critter. For a superfriends deck it is unusually agro & creature-dense (31 creatures). I've seen someone on here using proliferate with breena but with the infect/poison angle as a subtheme as well.

The new guardian scalelord will be one to look out for if you want recursion for non-land permanents.. It will be a shoe-in for me since I need ways to bring noncreatures back & you know how easy it is to meet power requirements with Breena

Coward_Token on Irenicus' Experimental "Donations"

2 years ago

Oh speaking of which, if you end up (partially) reconsidering, Needle Specter & Dreamstealer synergizes well with the counters without irritating the controller. Haven't found a lot of other good scaling creatures in UB, mostly milling related and that's risky with all the GY strategies around

Cosmoesis on Curse me love

3 years ago

Not curses but curse adjacent flavor in goading: (12 suggestions) 1)Shiny Impetus 2)Psychic Impetus 3)Parasitic Impetus 4)Disrupt Decorum 5)Vengeful Ancestor 6)Bloodthirsty Blade 7)Karazikar, the Eye Tyrant 8)Jeering Homunculus 9)Goblin Racketeer 10)Grenzo, Havoc Raiser 11)Coveted Peacock 12)Kardur, Doomscourge

Other Curse like things with wither: (12 suggestions - some of these aren't very good and can be left out) 1)Stigma Lasher 2)Fang Skulkin 3+4)Nest of Scarabs + Corrosive Mentor 5)Everlasting Torment 6)Needle Specter 7)Midnight Banshee 8)Kulrath Knight 9)Necroskitter 10)Fists of the Demigod 11)Cinderbones 12)Oona's Gatewarden

Add 12 more lands (36 cards suggested total) + 56 cards currently on the list = 92 cards

Remaining 8 slots should be card draw, removal and Board-wipes (15 suggestions here) 1)Rhystic Study 2)Erebos, God of the Dead 3)Wheel of Misfortune 4)Shadowmage Infiltrator 5)Phyrexian Arena 6)Eye of Vecna 7)Blue Sun's Zenith 8)Tragic Slip 9)Go for the Throat 10)Doom Blade 11)Feed the Swarm 12)Ravenform 13)Chaos Warp 14)Damnation 15)Ritual of Soot

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