Aminatou Staxshifter (Esper Stax Primer)

Commander / EDH SynergyBuild

SCORE: 44 | 43 COMMENTS | 10756 VIEWS | IN 14 FOLDERS


Update 1 - Deck Majorly Tuned —Dec. 18, 2018

With the deck that I, SynergyBuild, and my internet friends DangoDaikazoku&IAmTheWraith have tested and tested endlessly over the last couple weeks, I have refined the capabilities of the deck, particularly in winning in such a method that gets around our own stax and hate, while making our stax gameplan more oppressive, and adding minimal dead combo cards.

In fact, below in the combo in question:

Requirements on field: Tezzeret the Seeker, Aminatou, the Fateshifter

Requirements in deck or on field: Basalt Monolith, Rings of Brighthearth, Goblin Cannon

Use Tezzeret's -3 to fetch a Rings of Brighthearth, -1 Aminatou targeting Tezzeret, then -4 Tezzeret, copying the ability with Rings to fetch Basalt Monolith&Goblin Cannon, use Monolith&Rings to make infinite mana, stack infinite Cannon triggers killing each opponent.

It is easy to remember, really only needs one card other than the commander to go off, and gets around every stax and hate piece we run.


The rest of the deck has been updated to run a lot more tutors and otherwise versatile cards, particularly to fight the current cEDH metagame, these cards are aimed at being useful in any situation, while being incredible in a few particular ones. Take Spellseeker for example, while on occasion, we have Torpor Orb or Humility, often it acts as a tutor for removal, countermagic, or another tutor to start a chain, and can be flickered with Aminatou, the Fateshifter's -1 to get another card. This is a very powerful effect to repeat, gaining repeated value that wins games. The same is true for Trinket Mage, despite them tutoring different cards.

Muddle the Mixture instead is great as a tutor or countermagic spell, somewhere inbetween Counterspell and Grim Tutor. A lot of versatility there.

Other changes were relatively minute, such as running Chalice of the Void against many decks of stagnant CMC, and can be flickered to be set to 0 cmc if we really need to cast a spell that would otherwise be countered.

Enral says... #1

I'm really digging this version of Aminatou! +1 from me!

December 11, 2018 2:34 p.m.

SynergyBuild says... #2

Enral thank you, I believe it might be extremely competitive.

Any suggestions?

December 11, 2018 3:01 p.m.

Enral says... #3

There's a lot of good target for Trinket Mage...I don't think the single inclusion of Torpor Orb should prevent you from including him in. Muddle the Mixture is another great permission that doubles up as a tutor. Academy Ruins can return important artifacts and can be put immediately back to hand with Aminatou. Notion Thief/Timetwister/Teferi's Puzzle Box seems like they might fit in. That's all I can think of off my head for now!

December 11, 2018 4:09 p.m.

SynergyBuild says... #4

Academy Ruins is certainly good, and our 2 cmc slot is pretty stacked, so I'll see what I can do for muddle. The Puzzle Box is certainly an option I haven't considered to abuse that +1, thanks!

December 11, 2018 5:20 p.m.

Dango says... #5

Enral The thing about Trinket Mage is that we also run Humility, and my personal list currently runs Hushwing Gryff as well. The creature count is so low as of right now too, so finding slots for others is conflicting especially when our Stax pieces and hate kill other cards that feel like they get the would get the wheels turning otherwise. Cards like Academy Ruins and Buried Ruin are only really hit by Rest in Peace which doesn't feel bad considering that's one of three of our graveyard hate cards, so it's definitely worth thinking about. I can see problems with running too many colorless producing mana lands though, since we want to get Aminatou out sooner than later. A problem with draw cards like Timetwister is problematic since we also use Ensnaring Bridge as means to defend our walkers, which makes card advantage less than ideal if we don't have means to immediately dump our hand afterwards. Teferi's Puzzle Box could be manageable, however. I'm not sure yet if it can find a slot in here, but we greatly appreciate the suggestions!

December 11, 2018 7:08 p.m.

CyborgAeon says... #6

Hi

I love the deck. I play a few cEDH decks: Gitrog, Yisan & Circu. All 3 have stax pieces but they're combo decks at the end of the day. I saw you mention this and I want to ask a few q's

Bob - [dark confidant] is not in this list. Though he breaks parity with chains, allows you to dig deeper than just the 1 you already knew was there thanks to animatou and regardless of your average cmc, provided you don't need to worry about damage because you choose what goes back!

Love the deck nonetheless, will definitely have a few goes piloting.

December 13, 2018 6:59 a.m.

IAmTheWraith says... #7

CyborgAeon: I think this mainly comes back to the value we get off of Humility. While I think Dark Confidant can be good to break parity on some occasions, I don't think there is anything I would cut for it. I think spots are extremely tight in the list, and slotting in a card that sometimes breaks parity just isn't going to benefit you as much.

December 17, 2018 2:24 p.m.

SynergyBuild says... #8

CyborgAeon I'll definitely admit that Dark Confidant is really sweet, but I'll have to test it out - thanks!

IAmTheWraith - Humility is our key control card, but some creatures are so good they are worth it, I will update this list to show that!

December 17, 2018 3:07 p.m.

CyborgAeon says... #9

I suppose that if Bob really doesn't work (in the instance that humility is that key), then i suggest trying his less popular enchantment cousin: dark tutelage?

December 17, 2018 6:38 p.m.

Dango says... #10

CyborgAeon Glad you like the deck! Bob is not a bad choice at all for the reasons you mentioned. I also believe that the only thing that shuts him down is Humility too which is nice because he's not all too affected by our other hate cards.

One issue I find with the inclusion is that our creature count is low as it is, and our primary means of defending our walkers is Ensnaring Bridge which doesn't make card advantage feel very desirable if we don't have outs to empty our hand right away. We have found through testing that the deck operates well with minimal cards in hand, and through Aminatou's card filtering ability coupled with durdling through a Stasis lock, we tend to manage better than other commanders at the table. Dark Tutelage is certainly a card worth considering since it avoids our hate, but I feel like I would rather run Phyrexian Arena instead. Even then though, we still prefer cards that don't force draws, which makes our Rhystic Study and Mystic Remora highly desirable with text that says "you may draw a card".

Hope that clears some things up! We will definitely keep in mind your suggestions while we work on our revisions soon to come. Cheers!

December 17, 2018 7:14 p.m.