Simian Spirit Guide

Creature — Ape Spirit

Exile this card from your hand: Add {R}.

Combos

• Boom / Bust + Darksteel Citadel + Simian Spirit Guide

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
Oathbreaker	Legal
Pauper	Legal
Pauper Duel Commander	Legal
Pauper EDH	Legal
Planar Constructed	Legal
Planechase	Legal
Quest Magic	Legal
Tiny Leaders	Legal
Vanguard	Legal
Vintage	Legal

Discussion (48)

greyninja on Animar & friends!

1 week ago

@SaberTech interesting, Lilysplash Mentor is now in the tcgplayer cart! Cool idea

Other upcoming additions:
- Dour Port-Mage
- Elvish Spirit Guide
- Simian Spirit Guide

Anything in the deck you think should come out?

SaberTech on Mad World Rising

3 weeks ago

Thanks for the questions greyninja!

Grazilaxx is a remnant from an older, pre-banning of Dockside cEDH build for the deck. At that time in cEDH people were running Animar as more of a midrange deck because it wasn't fast enough for a turbo build to work well in the meta. I've kept it now that I run the deck as more of a Bracket 4 build and have to face off against more board wipes in the casual meta. It's mostly in the deck as another way of drawing cards to help recover but if an opponent would rather have me bounce back my creatures so that I can put more counters on Animar and get more ETB effects instead of drawing a card, then who am I to argue?

I've generally been pretty happy with Elvish Spirit Guide and Simian Spirit Guide. Like you pointed out, they help to increase the chances of a turn 2 Animar. There have also been times where I was digging through my deck with the help of something like Glimpse of Nature but have completely tapped out to do it. In those cases, having cards like the Guides, Lotus Petal, and Chrome MoxGC help to give free coloured mana that I might need to help close out the game. In cEDH the guides are a little more useful because they can pay for cards like Red Elemental Blast and Veil of Summer on their own but even in this build they can help to pay for a Wild Cantor or a Talisman so that I have blue mana up for counters to protect Walking Ballista. At 3 mana, the Guides can also be Neoformed into Ancestral Statue.

The 27 lands may not seem like a lot but some of the cEDH builds have even less. Animar doesn't really need many lands to go off considering the various cheap mana dorks and other ramp the deck provides. It is a bit tricky to go that low in lands and can require some aggressive mulligans to get a decent starting hand. While playing though, I've sometimes found that even just 27 lands can result in some mana flooding when I would really rather be drawing spells. The land count is something that you just have to experiment with for your own build to see where that sweet spot is for your own play style.

As for Utopia Sprawl, there are times where it has been a dead draw but it's not that often. Between the Dual Lands, Shock Lands, and Fetch lands in the deck it's not normally that difficult to get access to a land that counts as a forest on turn 1. Using Utopia Sprawl and Wild Growth as ramp synergizes well with Arbor Elf and can also net extra mana with the help of cards like Snap, Deceiver Exarch, and Peregrine Drake.

greyninja on Mad World Rising

3 weeks ago

Looks fun! Love to see differences and similarities of the various Animar decks. Pretty sure I +1 years ago

Curious on your inclusion of Grazilaxx, Illithid Scholar. Is it more for the first, or second ability?

How do you like Elvish Spirit Guide and Simian Spirit Guide? These are two I have considered myself, to try and get a turn 1-2 Animar. Worried I might just be hard-casting late-game for that +1/+1 on Animar though

27 lands - super aggressive! Do you ever find Utopia Sprawl to be a dead draw with no Forests?

If you have a chance, please take a look at my deck as well! I can see you commented back in 2015, but we've had updates since then ;)

Icbrgr on What makes a card or …

6 months ago

Gemstone Caverns/Simian Spirit Guide/Desperate Ritual/Chancellor of the Tangle/Mox Opal there have been a lot of free win via Blood Moon decks over the years in various ban lists and formats and mulligan rules to pull off putting out the moon on turn 1.

Truthfully even fairly casting Blood Moon on turn 3 and the opponent just not having an answer or able to play afterwards just feels bad in general when I go to my local game store and it's just a non game I feel bad playing moon.... but its certainly a necessary evil to police the game in the same way Chalice of the Void does.

Icbrgr on We Are Going to the Zoo

7 months ago

Oh I absolutely love the Anger idea... but Simian Spirit Guide isn't legal anymore, do you know a different option?

jonjonhholt on Thunderous Burn (Pauper)

7 months ago

This is a really fun list, Thunderous Wrath holds a special place in my heart as pauper’s only miracle card! One change you might consider is swapping Simian Spirit Guide out for something like Rite of Flame or Seething Song. While they require initial mana to cast, they synergize really well with all your creatures that care about non-creature spells or instant/sorcery spells.

capwner on Clockwork Black

8 months ago

Squee_Spirit_Guide Man I haven't thought about that Heartless combo in forever, I tried building that in modern aaaages ago with Infernal Tutor and Spoils of the Vault to dig for the combo cards. Also Grim Haruspex or Fecundity with Simian Spirit Guide and Grapeshot to kill since the Heartless Summoning will remove pretty much all the Blood Artist type pingers. The deck was pretty bad lol but it was fun when it worked.

nuperokaso on Brian Stacks' Anvil (E)

10 months ago

• Fill in the format. I suspect Vintage, since you are playing Demonic Tutor.
• What is the budget? If there is none, go with Badlands, Mox Ruby instead of 1 Simian Spirit Guide
• You are playing just 1 blue card, and it's not that much relevant - Windfall. Throw it away and you can then go two-color with much more stable and less painful mana-base. Remove 4 Aether Hub and 4 City of Brass. Play instead 1 Blood Crypt, 1 Raucous Theater, 1 Graven Cairns, 1 Sulfurous Springs, 4 Blackcleave Cliffs
• Memory Jar is an insane card in this strategy, since it causes your opponent to discard 7 cards while it gives you more cards to play. I would replace it for 1 Howling Mine. Jar may well be a reason to still play blue - for Tinker. In that case also replace a few swamps for Vault of Whispers.