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Overall Strategy

TL;DR -- Build a Token army and sac everything to drain the table.

These strategies are not mutually exclusive; you will often use all three elements in a single game.

Three primary paths to victory:

  • Aristocrats Drain: The main goal. You create a massive army of disposable Squirrel and other creature tokens. You then sacrifice these tokens to outlets like Ashnod's Altar or Viscera Seer to trigger damage-dealing effects from cards like Zulaport Cutthroat, Blood Artist, and especially Mirkwood Bats. This allows you to drain the entire table's life totals without ever entering combat.

  • Go-Wide Combat: The classic Green strategy. Amass an enormous board of Squirrels, then cast a game-ending finisher like Craterhoof Behemoth to give your entire team trample and a massive power boost, swinging for lethal damage.

  • Commander Control: Use Chatterfang's second ability ({B}, Sacrifice X Squirrels: Target creature gets +X/-X until end of turn.) as a repeatable, instant-speed removal spell. This can control the board by picking off key threats from your opponents while you assemble your primary win condition.

Best Practices & Key Tips

Chatterfang is More Than a Token Doubler: Never forget his activated ability. It's one of the best parts of the card. It kills indestructible creatures, gets around targeting restrictions like Hexproof (by targeting your own creature and giving it -X/-X, then targeting the opponent's creature for the +X/+X part which does nothing), and can even be used to pump one of your own creatures for a surprise lethal hit.

Any Token Will Do: Chatterfang's ability triggers off any token creation. This includes non-creature tokens like Treasure from Deadly Dispute and Pitiless Plunderer, Food from Gilded Goose and Tireless Provisioner, and Clues or Blood tokens if you were to add them. A single Deadly Dispute with Chatterfang on the field gives you a Treasure token, a Squirrel token, and two drawn cards for two mana at instant speed. That's incredible value.

Understand the "Replacement Effect" Stack: This is crucial when you have Chatterfang and a card like Doubling Season or Parallel Lives on the battlefield. You, as the controller of the permanents, choose the order in which to apply the replacement effects.

Example: You cast Acorn Harvest. It creates one 1/1 green Squirrel token.

Optimal Order:

  1. Apply Chatterfang's effect first: "Create one Squirrel" becomes "Create one Squirrel + one black Squirrel."
  2. Now apply Doubling Season's effect to this new event: "Create one green Squirrel + one black Squirrel" becomes "Create two green Squirrels + two black Squirrels."

By applying Chatterfang first, you effectively double the number of extra squirrels you get from your other doublers.

Protect Your Engine: Your deck relies heavily on having key pieces on the board (Chatterfang, a sac outlet, a payoff). Cards like Lightning Greaves and Heroic Intervention are your absolute best friends. Always be aware of how much mana you need to hold up to protect your board from a wipe.

Skullclamp is Your Best Friend: With Chatterfang out, any 1/1 creature you control is perfect Skullclamp fodder. Sacrificing a 1/1 Squirrel to Skullclamp will kill it, draw you two cards, and Chatterfang's ability will create a new Squirrel to replace it. This is a repeatable, one-mana "draw two" engine.

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98% Casual

Competitive