Pretty Savage
Commander / EDH*
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Pretty Savage? —Aug. 31, 2021
So, maybe we should consider Jin-Gitaxias, Core Augur as a stax piece/draw engine? It's 'better' than Consecrated, which is already considered fairly salty, at least Jin makes it harder for people to function when they all turn against me because I've gotten set up. The deck would then win off of Proteus Staff (after I've gotten out all my creatures with it, and I might shave the number down, more below!) setting up an Shimmer Myr combo of Isochron Scepter and Dramatic Reversal draw of 7 cards, which are drawn by Jin after I've gotten set up, I then flash in a Drake army, as well as opponent's losing their hands. I should have infinite mana, so I can also have drawn a few counters to protect my combo until I win, or I could just use some artifact to win on the spot, which is a definite possibility.
So, creatures that aren't Jin... do we want any? I'm not sure, but I feel like Second Sun is still good, as is Stormtide (to prevent me from dying a horrible death, but if I run Jin, I'm not playing against aggro very often), but I could see myself cutting the Mage. TBH, I could see myself cutting the other two as well, but Second Sun gives me two uses next turn, which can speed up the process of digging creatures out, but it also sets up the combo nicely by giving me a free untap of Proteus Staff even if it's the only other creature. Actually, the more I think of it, the more I want to run just Jin and Second Sun as creatures, and hope I can survive until I combo off.
Ultimately, this would make the deck much more competitive, but it's already in an awkward space where it's too pushed for casual usually, yet not pushed enough to actually win at a higher level table. There are a few artifacts that can use infinite Drakes to win, and if I'll have the mana to flash the combo in, it seems straight forward enough.to just win on the spot. I'd love a non-targeted win con, but I don't know if such a card exists, or in a relevant enough form. It merely has to be an non-creature artifact (or have Flash I guess), so that keeps a pretty wide field to search. I guess I look for 'each opponent' effects, My biggest issue might be the general lack of card draw, but I think I can make the complete combo fit in 6 cards, and the other card could be a spare counter because why not. The issue I think would be that I might have very few counters up to protect this while it's setting up. I'll have to see. I feel like ramping and setting up my combo usually means any other spell I cast is a cantrip (possibly to make drakes) or tutors (to make drakes). If I take out Trophy Mage, I'll want another non-creature tutor for the Staff, there is the 'sac an artifact' option, but I really hate that with Dramatic Scepter needing mana rocks, so it might be a dead card if I only have a Sol Ring out to sac. I might try to get creative, like adding Solve the Equation to tutor for a tutor, which will feel super-bad at 3 mana, but it'll come with a 2/2 flyer, which cleans the salt and vinegar out of the wound at least, especially since I might need the drake. It can also find Dramatic Reversal if I need to set up without Staff out, since I can reasonably do that if the game goes longer. Some stuff to think out loud about anyways!
Edit: It occurs to me that it might be fine to just set up a draw of 7 cheap interaction spells to prevent anyone from winning, and a Sunder if I'll have the mana to just rub salty iodine into the wound that Core Augur is inflicting. I'm also thinking this will want some more fast mana, especially no CIPT rocks, and no more clunky stuff like Archive unfortunately. I suspect if I can set up enough protection for Sunder, it's pretty close to a win con already, since everyone will have to discard all of their lands, alongside whatever else they had in most cases, since they'll have limited mana to work with. It's clunky, but an upgrade to the fast mana (I'm honestly considering proxies for this for once, to see how they feel at least) will take out a substantial amount of clunk, speeding up getting Talrand out. Some free counters would also be good to proxy in, because UU to re-target something is not going to cut it in this meta.