The Masamune

Legendary Artifact — Equipment

As long as equipped creature is attacking, it has first strike and must be blocked if able.

Equipped creature has "If a creature dying causes a triggered ability of this creature or an emblem you own to trigger, that ability triggers an additional time."

Equip {2} ({2}: Attach this to target creature you control. Equip only as a sorcery. This enters unattached and stays on the battlefield if the creature this card is attached to leaves the battlefield.)

Legality

Format	Legality
1v1 Commander	Legal
Alchemy	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
Freeform	Legal
Gladiator	Legal
Highlander	Legal
Historic	Legal
Historic Brawl	Legal
Legacy	Legal
Leviathan	Legal
Limited	Legal
Modern	Legal
Oathbreaker	Legal
Pioneer	Legal
Planar Constructed	Legal
Planechase	Legal
Pre-release	Legal
Quest Magic	Legal
Standard	Legal
Standard Brawl	Legal
Tiny Leaders	Legal
Vanguard	Legal
Vintage	Legal

Discussion (1)

clayperce on Sephiroth, Fabled Soldier

2 weeks ago

Ryski3 -
Ok, I'll throw some thoughts at ya. PLEASE take all this as "brainstorming" though, not as "recommendations", as I'm still very new to Sephiroth, my deck is definitely not "there" yet, and we're almost certainly building for different playstyles and metas.

Looking at my deck (sorry I haven't transferred it over to TappedOut yet) and comparing it to yours, a few general things stand out:

MANA CURVE: My mana curve is quite a bit lower (total mana value 152 and average mana value 2.38, with the peak of the curve at 27x 2-drops) than yours (total mana value 180 and average mana value 2.77, with the peak of the curve at 21x 3-drops). I built it this way partly to make the deck faster, but mostly because I generally want to cast Sephiroth as soon as I have three mana … and every other 3-drop kind of “competes” with him. Depending on how fast you want to go and when you want to play Sephiroth, shifting your mana curve lower might be worthwhile.

MANA BASES: Our manabases are VERY different (I have more lands despite my lower curve, and you have a bunch more mana rocks and utility lands), but the end result is very similar. If we plug our deck lists into Salubrius Snail’s manabase tool, we can see they’re both “Very strong” and we both have a ~60% chance of casting our 6-drops on curve. That may be something you want to keep an eye on though, as you make adjustments to the deck.

“PILLARS” OF AN ARISTOCRATS DECK (SAC FODDER, SAC OUTLETS, DRAIN EFFECTS):

• I have my sac fodder spread across a few areas: 3x like Fleshbag Marauder in “mass disruption”, 2x like Greedy Freebooter in “ramp”, 5x like Gravecrawler in “recursion”, and of course 12x like Bitterblossom in “tokens”, for 22 total. As for the other pillars, I have 5x free sac outlets and 7x drain effects (3x like Marionette Apprentice in “direct damage” and 4x like Blood Artist in “drain”).
  
• In your deck, I think it’s 15 total pieces of fodder (3x in “mass disruption”, 1x in “ramp”, 1x in “recursion”, and 10x in “tokens”), 3x free sac outlets, and 6x drain effects (1x in “direct damage” and 5x in “drain”). You mentioned your deck feels like it could use some more token generation, but we’re actually pretty close there (12 vs 10). But raising your sac fodder in some of the other areas could perhaps make a big difference … maybe start with the “recursion” area (both in my main deck and in the “considering” tab)?
  

STAPLES (CARD ADVANTAGE, CARD SELECTION, MASS DISRUPTION, PROTECTION, TARGETED DISRUPTION, ETC): We’ve got different priorities here (I think mostly because of our different metas), and that’s cool.

THOUGHTS ON BRACKET 3 VS BRACKET 4:

• My deck is honestly in a REALLY awkward position … it’s too fast for Bracket 3 but it's generally way too grindy/not consistent enough to compete at Bracket 4. So I need to either tune it down (by removing some infinite combos) or tune it up (by adding either more combos or more tutors to make the current ones more consistent, plus maybe adding some more fast mana sources).
  
• As for your deck, adding some infinite combos would definitely be a way to increase the power level. The challenge is it’s very easy to build an Aristocrats deck that can go infinite on Turn 3 (or even earlier with fast mana or a Dark Ritual), and even if it doesn’t happen often, once it does, folks will think we’re playing a Bracket 4 deck at a Bracket 3 table.
  
• You may already be using it, but if not: The Find my Combo page, over at Commander Spellbook is a GREAT tool, whether we want to add combos to a deck or keep them out.

A FEW ACTUAL RECOMMENDATIONS:

• My MVPs in the 99 are probably Ayara, First of Locthwain, Forsaken Miner, and Skullclamp; I recommend giving them a hard look.
  
• You might consider adding Feed the Swarm and Withering Torment, as they’re the only tools we have to deal with enchantments, in mono-B.
• The Masamune is very flavorful OC, but playing five mana for a drain effect is IMO pretty bad.
  
• Some cards that don’t seem to really fit in with what the rest of the deck is doing: Reliquary Tower, Contamination, Blackblade Reforged, Qarsi Revenant, and Whispersilk Cloak.
  
• If you decide to keep the deck in Bracket 3, you’ll definitely want to pull the Contamination, as Mass Land Denial isn’t allowed. Obviously if your meta is cool with it, nvm :-)

Thank you for coming to my TEDtalk. Hopefully something in there ^^ was useful, and if not I’m very sorry for the spam. Good luck (and good skill!) with Sephiroth!

Cheers!