Sword of the Animist

Legendary Artifact — Equipment

Equipped creature gets +1/+1.

Whenever equipped creature attacks, you may search your library for a basic land card, put it onto the battlefield tapped, then shuffle your library.

Equip

Discussion (51)

Jerakin on Norin, Tries to Win

2 days ago

Thank you so much for your comment Profet93! Super helpful :)

Your first point about lowering land counts and dropping Molten Vortex for a few draw engine sounds like a superb idea!

A lot of cool sugestions will give you my thoughts about them!

Draw Ideas

1. Endless Atlas A great one, that I even have a copy of, I see no reason not to add it :)
2. Hedron Archive Not sure sure about this one, it seems a bit expensive at 4 mana. It looks like it would be more used as ramp than draw no?
3. Humble Defector This sounds like a fun one! Can even steal it back with Confusion in the Ranks even without Homeward Path (which have some anti-synergy with Confusion). Will definitely pick it up.
4. Ignite the Future/Light Up the Stage are very interesting cards, but I would be afraid not to be able to cast what ever I exile or for it to be lands, would need access to at least 8 mana to be able to cast it, feels a bit too slow. Not super sold on these two :)
5. Mind's Eye Expensive as you say but will be worth it if the game will drag on, will be looking to picking this one up together with the Honor-Worn Shaku
6. Solemn Simulacrum have a few of these laying around, not sure why I never put one it. Will do it until I find something to replace it with. :)
7. Wheel of Fortune/Wheel of Fate/Reforge the Soul/Magus of the Wheel, of Fortune is not within my price range, it is almost as much as the rest of the deck combined. I might pick the Magus of the Wheel however as a cheap alternative.

Ramp

1. Curse of Opulence Such a evil card! A lot of my group either play decks that benefit a lot from ramp or who need a lot of mana. So I fear this would help them more than me, I will definitely put it on my list to pick it up if I see one cheap though. Cause I do want to try it.
2. Dockside Extortionist Strong card! But unfortunately a bit to expensive, will put it on my "buy on a bargain" list though!
3. Mind Stone will put in this one, like it more than the Hedron Archive as you can drop it a lot faster.
4. Ruby Medallion Neat, will be looking to picking one up
5. Sword of the Animist That's true! It basically reads "Pay 2, Put a land from your library into the battlefield tapped", will be looking to adding this one too for sure!

Utility

1. Tough one, $15 is about what I am prepared to put down on a single card, if it isn't a win con or simply a "must have", I wouldn't say this is either but it is strong and versatile so will probably pick it up if I can.
2. Etali, Primal Storm Aww, I just bought this guy for my Xenagos' Dudes goes Face deck where he can get instant value, maybe I should have picked up two of them. My fear here is that it's can be a bit too slow to have to wait another turn to be able to attack with it.
3. Sunbird's Invocation Insane card. At the point I can put this down the game is either over or would be over in a few turns. Most of the cards in the deck needs a few turns to actually do something so even though this card is insane it might be too late?
4. Sensei's Divining Top Love this card so much, but unfortunately a bit too expensive. It's on the "Get it on a bargain" list :)
5. Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle It's also a bit too much to put on a card that is only going to ping for 3. If I had a few more ways to put out lands each turn it could be worth the 20$

Removal

1. Chain Reaction Good idea, will replace it when I find one
2. Nevinyrral's Disk Will be looking to pick one up!
3. Blast Zone Looks to be a bit slow? Will pick one up anyhow and test run it
4. Terror of the Peaks Yeah, wanted this in Norin as soon as I saw it. It have been dropping in price in my local market so will be looking to picking a couple up for my decks soon.

Again thank you so much for your comment, it have been super helpful.

I am super interested in hearing your thoughts about cuts to the deck. Like what you think is too weak or doesn't fit. :)

Profet93 on Norin, Tries to Win

3 days ago

Why isn't Norin listed as your commander? In any case, I have a couple ideas...

Molten Vortex - I get the concept behind this card with your high land count, but rather hope to draw this card as you are flooding your deck with a high land count and less draw, why not increase your draw and lower your land count a bit? This way, you are less reliant upon top decking and card find an easier time to maintain gas in the mid-late game. Draw ideas are as follows...

1. Endless Atlas - Comes down early, cheap to use, only 2nd to tome of legends but very worthwhile nevertheless

2. Hedron Archive - Acts as ramp when you need it and card draw when you don't. Pretty useful

3. Humble Defector - Underrated card, politics and card draw that comes down early. Bonus points if you add in a Homeward Path

4. Ignite the Future/Light Up the Stage - Unlike cathartic reunion which provides virtual card advantage by giving you a better choice of cards, ignite the future provides actual card advantage. Plus, flashing it back is nice when you have ran out of gas. Light up the stage is nice, especially in your build which focuses on little damage accumulating since it can be played even cheaper. Both are highly recommended.

5. Mind's Eye -While expensive to cast, helps ensure gas in mid-late game. Goes well with Honor-Worn Shaku which should also be added as a strictly better wornpowerstone in this deck, because with Norin + Eye + Shaku, you can tap Norin each upkeep to untap Shake and use it to fuel mind's eye for card draw. Not to mention tapping down purphorous and your planeswalker to ramp feels good too

6. Solemn Simulacrum - Not necessary but a good staple in most mono red/white builds given it provides you with what you need, card draw and ramp.

7. Wheel of Fortune/Wheel of Fate/Reforge the Soul/Magus of the Wheel - Wheels help bring card draw, mess with opposing tutors and are chaotic as well.

Now that we have discussed card draw, it is time to help you ramp out your goals more quickly....

1. Curse of Opulence - Politics, and ramp with Norin that can start as early as T3. Very helpful. Don't forget, you can use the treasure tokens it makes with goblin welder to bring back an artifact!

2. Dockside Extortionist - Comes down early, makes lots of mana, very powerful card especially in the right meta. Highly recommended.

3. Mind Stone - Ramp when you need it, card draw when you don't. Its a baby hedron archive

4. Ruby Medallion - Ramp, plain and simple

5. Sword of the Animist - Imagine Norin with the sword attacking and then running away to get a land. Very fun!

There is more ramp but this should be a decent help given your CMC is low enough already despite the chaos cards, especially for a Norin build! Kudos to that! Now let's discuss some utility...

1. Chandra, Torch of Defiance - Ramp, removal, draw and wincon all in 1. Don't sleep on this card

2. Etali, Primal Storm - What chaos deck doesn't love the chaos dino? It can be a wincon on its own!

3. Sunbird's Invocation - This card reads, if you don't destroy me, I win in the next few turns. The amount of value this card brings is insane

4. Sensei's Divining Top - Top deck filter and a rare draw when you need to dig a little deeper.

5. Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle - Highly recommended with all of your mountains

Lastly we should discuss removal....

1. Chain Reaction > Storm's Wrath - There are usually many creatures in EDH and this just destroys them all instead of the weaker ones.

2. Nevinyrral's Disk - I see no way for you to deal with enchantments, having one reset button is crucial in case things get out of hand.

3. Blast Zone - Another option to deal with enchantments or pesky permanents that fits its way into the land base

4. Terror of the Peaks - Newest addition to any Norin deck. Synergy and power blended together at a fair CMC.

I have other suggestions and ideas for cuts should you wish. Be sure to let me know what you think of each suggestion. Looking forward to your response.

jakeyuki12 on Iroas Good Stuff

1 week ago

Hello, long time Boros player here.

Your deck has a lot of removal, a healthy amount of ramp and card draw, and lots of threats. This is all good, but there are a few things that could use some work.

To start with the minor issue, while you've got plenty of card draw in the deck, a lot of it isn't the best. For example, Tome of Legends is great if you're attacking with your commander a lot, but Iroas isn't a general that attacks a lot seeing that he's not a creature half the time. Another one not right for the deck is Mind's Eye. This big clunky artifact is suuuuuper mana hungry and not super efficient unless you sink a lot of mana into it, not what this deck wants. This deck wants cheap, efficient card draw. Finally, equipment like Mask of Memory or Sword of the Animist really want low-cmc creatures to work best. That way you can turn 2 or 3 drop a 2 or 3 cmc creature then the next turn play, equip, and swing with that creature right away to get the value. This deck doesn't have enough creatures at 1-3 cmc, so these might not work as efficiently as you want them to.

Related to that is the more glaring problem I see- your deck is incredibly clunky. After your 2 drop slot, your next cmc slot with the most cards is 5, then 4. You said you didn't like the supposedly notorious slow start that Boros has in EDH (that I was not aware of, but that's not the point) and yet you've made your deck super slow by making it this clunky. With that many cards at 5 cmc your deck is going to be slow and your hand will get clogged by big cmc cards that you can cast one per turn. On top of that, your commander is 4 cmc, so having the other clogged slot be 4 cmc is also bad- all of those cards are competing with your commander to be cast, and Iroas is one you always want to cast on 4 since he's harder to kill.

I recommend heavily trimming down your mana curve so that it's not so slow and clunky. Iroas's ability that protects your creatures in combat actually lets your smaller creatures somewhat scale into the late game since they're not easily blocked and eaten by bigger creatures. Even if they are blocked, they don't die. That means you can take advantage of small creatures will useful value, aggro, or stax effects, and then have some bigger creatures to help close out the game.

Epicurus on The Thousand Pierced Knight

1 week ago

I'm not fond of comments like that from Mgalangzingme, because "scrap this deck and build something different" isn't really good for anything. However, they bring up a good point. There's really not enough artifacts in there to make Puresteel Paladin the absolute freak that it can be.

To remedy this issue, I would add Sword of the Animist and 2x Sword of Vengeance, then double up on Sword of Feast and Famine and Sword of Fire and Ice. That would bring the equipment count up to 13, and with the Darksteel Citadel, the total artifact count would be 17. A much better ratio, and maybe even still too low.

To fit in the extra swords, first I would remove 2x Faith's Shield (you already have a ton of protection in the deck). Next, I would drop Mirran Crusader completely, bring Stoneforge Mystic and Giver of Runes down to 3 each, which would make room for the adds I already mentioned, plus leave room for 2x Knight Exemplar and 1x Balan, Wandering Knight.

I know that's a lot of changes, but I hope at least it's more helpful than simply saying "this deck doesn't work, build something different."

Cheers

Profet93 on Norin the Scary

1 week ago

I have A LOT of suggestions and questions for this deck. But I'll start off with a few since it's a bit late...

1. Ancient Tomb > Temple of False

2. Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle - Value, synergy with thawing glaciers. If you wanted to, you could add a Deserted Temple for thawing glaciers and an Expedition Map to help ensure land drops and get them together (although unnecesary to add temple and expedition map, just an interesting idea)

3. Where is your card draw? I barely see any. I know thats red's weakness and you have Tome, wheel of fate, hedron, mindstone, Chandra torch, light up the stage, experimental frenzy, outpost siege, chandra fire, and torch. But that doesnt seem like enough? I know what I listed is long, but most of those don't pull too much weight. You should consider adding Endless Atlas, Humble Defector, Solemn Simulacrum and last but not least Skullclamp. Skullclamp works with norin given the new commander ruling, and makes those myrs do more work.

4. Given you run experimental frenzy, have you considered adding Ugin, the Ineffable + Sensei's Divining Top? Both of those with experimental frenzy lets you draw your entire deck, and each piece is good on it's own. Top for filter and is cheap to cast, Ugin to get rid of enchantments which is red's 2nd weakness, "card draw" and makes 1/5th of your deck cheaper to play.

5. WTH is chartooth tiger doing in here? Same with Copper Tablet. Both seem misplaced, the tablet I "kind of get" but it doesnt actually interact with the board in any meaningful way. Not looking at anything else, those 2 are RIPE for cutting.

6. I REALLY like tanglewire, thats good to note. Cool with norin and tanglewire itself, thats given me something to think about.

7. Curse of Opulence - Politics and ramp with norin. Also see Sword of the Animist, a repeatable rampant growth

8. No Dockside Extortionist?

Would love to hear your comments on each suggestion. If you want to take a look, here's my Deck

plakjekaas on Mono Red Tips (Value, Ramp) …

2 weeks ago

Sword of the Animist in every deck that runs creatures.

Gauntlet of Power, Caged Sun are very powerful too

Warp World is pretty funny to flip mid combat with Etali's trigger 0:)

BlackoutX on The Cat Returns

2 weeks ago

Greater Good is a better draw engine than Ajani, Mentor of Heroes (also cheaper with the reprint).

Grafted Exoskeleton, Sword of the Animist and Shadowspear are just good especially in this deck.

Hungry Lynx is overpriced and can really hurt you. Jareth, Leonine Titan is quite slow. Seht's Tiger doesn't do much for its cost. Edge of Autumn, why?

no Lost Leonin or Skyhunter Skirmisher?

Boza on Subira, Tulzidi Caravanner and sword …

1 month ago

No, you cannot pay to make her unblockable. Her first activated ability states "another target creature". If her ability could be used on herself, equipping Sword of the Animist would give her 3 total power and she would be an ilegal target for that ability.