Totally see him being great for Mazirek - I run her in Glissa too, so it's a possibility. He's a zombie too, so sacrificing a zombie token or several to draw into gas and get some aristocrat action going isn't the worst thing you can do for 3BB.
Thinking further on it, he's not bad at all. I just think the Boar God is nuts. I, for one, welcome all of our new overlords, but the porcine variety just looks better at first glance.
I'm thinking of new Bontu less in a deck that sacrifices every turn and more in a deck that plays Hellcarver Demon. Sacrifice everything and roll the dice that you flip into a winning position from nothing.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Zedruu: "This deck is not only able to go crazy - it also needs to do so."
I'm thinking of new Bontu less in a deck that sacrifices every turn and more in a deck that plays Hellcarver Demon. Sacrifice everything and roll the dice that you flip into a winning position from nothing.
Ha, of course you are! I can't think of anything more tstorm.
I'm thinking of new Bontu less in a deck that sacrifices every turn and more in a deck that plays Hellcarver Demon. Sacrifice everything and roll the dice that you flip into a winning position from nothing.
Ha, of course you are! I can't think of anything more tstorm.
I'm just saying, I've stopped playing things like Insidious Dreams because I already have like a 60% win rate in games where I make contact with Hellcarver Demon. It's definitely been better to me than a coin flip.
If you can put yourself in the situation where you float mana, sacrifice everything, draw 20 cards, ritual off, and play a couple bombs, you can put people deep enough in a hole that not even their precious lands can save them.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Zedruu: "This deck is not only able to go crazy - it also needs to do so."
I do tend to get overexcited with spoilers. Looking again, in a vacuum, it's ok, but has the potential to be thoroughly average. Body is fine, ETB could swing wildly from stunning to lame depending on boardstate and accompanying buffs/evasion.
I do tend to get overexcited with spoilers. Looking again, in a vacuum, it's ok, but has the potential to be thoroughly average. Body is fine, ETB could swing wildly from stunning to lame depending on boardstate and accompanying buffs/evasion.
I'm pretty let down by the God-Eternals so far. This late into spoiler season, Wizards has done a great job keeping their spoilers interesting despite having spoiled almost none of the mythics. Now that spoilers are coming to an end though, I guess I have higher expectations for these mythics since Wizards must be saving the best for last, right? Anyway, I'm going to pick on God-Eternal Bontu for a moment.
Now, I love drawing cards. I especially love drawing lots of cards particularly if I can draw them all at once and for as little mana as possible. Resource accrual is just something I deeply care about. For that reason, God-Eternal Bontu should be the kind of card that excites me. It's a relatively inexpensive way to draw lots of cards all at once, and it leaves a 5/6 menace to boot. What's not to love here? Well, if there's one thing I hate doing, it's losing my board state, and sacrificing my board to draw lots of cards feels like the definition of counterproductive. I mean, why would I want to throw away cards I've already drawn and then found worthwhile enough to cast only to draw different cards in their place? Like, it's one thing to loot cards away while they're still in my hand. In those instances, I'm making an equivalent exchange in an effort to find cards more valuable than the ones I already have. But once I've made an effort to put my cards in play, I can only imagine wanting to keep those cards. If not, I wouldn't have bothered casting them in the first place. In that sense, sacrificing my board to draw cards feels a lot like targeting my face with my own Lightning Bolt. Sure, the worth of any individual card I have in play can decrease in value over time to the point where it's actually worth less than one random card, but generally speaking I don't fill my decks full of permanent cards to have those cards not be valuable once I've played them. That just sounds ridiculous.
So, I was thinking, what's the least valuable thing I can sacrifice to God-Eternal Bontu? Because if there's a way to make a lot of that thing, then maybe I could also make Bontu worthwhile. A few things come to mind. First, obviously, 1/1 creature tokens. They're fairly ubiquitous, and it's difficult to find non-card permanents that are less useful than 1/1s. In the token department, we do also have clues though. That, and things like treasure tokens made off the back of Smothering Tithe. In addition to tokens though, there are also cards that I actively want to kill off because they do something useful when they die but simultaneously aren't very useful to keep on the battlefield. I'm thinking of cards like Academy Rector, Reveillark, and False Prophet (although maybe not that last one in tandem with Bontu). With these sorts of cards, the battlefield is more of a stepping stone to the graveyard than it is for actually developing any kind of meaningful board state. I guess that makes them kind of like weird, delayed sorceries. In any case, it's going to be difficult to have many of those kinds of cards in play to sacrifice to Bontu, so I'm going to focus on tokens instead, specifically 1/1s.
Imagine I have five 1/1 tokens. Let's call them saprolings. Now, they don't have to be saprolings specifically. Maybe they were Wood Elves at some point in time. For now though, they're effectively 1/1 creatures with no other useful text. With Bontu, I can sacrifice all of these 1/1s to draw five cards, and that would almost certainly be more useful than keeping five 1/1s around. Having said that, this is still a non-starter for me since paying five mana to draw five cards at the cost of five 1/1s still isn't good enough despite the fact that it also develops a 5/6 menace. The opportunity cost is simply too great. For roughly the same amount of mana, I could have played something like the incredibly unsexy Collective Blessing instead. Now, all of these 1/1s are suddenly much more relevant, and I didn't need to throw them away to make them so. In this way, I can use cards like Collective Blessing to advance my existing board state even further without losing any board in the process. To make losing board worthwhile, God-Eternal Bontu would have to do something even more powerful in comparison, and that just seems like a tall order. Unintuitively, I suppose God-Eternal Bontu actually gets better the fewer things you sac to it since the opportunity cost decreases as you draw fewer cards. But then, why would I want to play this card if I weren't using it to draw lots of cards?
Private Mod Note
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WUBRGMr. Bones' Wild RideGRBUW Trap your friends in an endless game with this 23-card combo!
Is it just me or is it really easy to break the new Kefnet? Sylvan Library and Jace, the Mind Sculptor are the first cards that come to mind.
Easily stronger than the other 2 zombie gods. I wouldn't call it broken, though. It's strong, no doubt. If I played miracle Varina, I'd windmill slam a copy in that pile.
Kefnet does look pretty good. Not "broken" in a world of partners, food chain and flash-hulk, but probably getting close to competitive. A repeatable way of putting cards on top of your library (JTMS, Scroll Rack, Brainstorm on a Stick) plus an extra turn spell (even the self exiling ones) is infinite, and all of those things will still generate a lot of value without the other pieces.
The boar god is pretty sweet, but the others are a bit underwhelming. To be fair, they've got a few strikes against them from the beginning - being monocolored is always going to be both more restrictive in terms of deck construction, and also restrict the sorts of abilities they're able to have. Also, their semi-invincibility is kind of a waste in the command zone since commanders are already functionally immortal. One thing for the indestructible gods, since it's just an added layer of protection, but for these guys you've got to pick whether you'd rather just recast for 2 more, or wait some turns (or spin a top) to get them back without tax. Being able to alternate is obviously nice, but still, it's a lot less useful than the other god abilities in the CZ.
Kefnet definitely has the neatest ability of the non-boar-gods, but whenever I see a new commander, and my mind fills with excited possibilities, and I try to imagine what sorts of thrilling new adventures we could have together...and then I realize it works best with time magic...I immediately stop giving a *****.
The boar god is pretty sweet, but the others are a bit underwhelming. To be fair, they've got a few strikes against them from the beginning - being monocolored is always going to be both more restrictive in terms of deck construction, and also restrict the sorts of abilities they're able to have. Also, their semi-invincibility is kind of a waste in the command zone since commanders are already functionally immortal. One thing for the indestructible gods, since it's just an added layer of protection, but for these guys you've got to pick whether you'd rather just recast for 2 more, or wait some turns (or spin a top) to get them back without tax. Being able to alternate is obviously nice, but still, it's a lot less useful than the other god abilities in the CZ.
Kefnet definitely has the neatest ability of the non-boar-gods, but whenever I see a new commander, and my mind fills with excited possibilities, and I try to imagine what sorts of thrilling new adventures we could have together...and then I realize it works best with time magic...I immediately stop giving a *****.
Having seen what the set looks like, i imagine its going to be ultra slow and grindy and control-heavy in standard. i mean even the new dovin guy seems to be like old thaalia but with upside. and new karn being a one-sided null rod. I suspect that it's going to make EDH games also a bit slower and grindier too.
Also, this finale of promise seems fun. Its probably going straight into my rakdos deck, though i suspect it'll never be cast for anything greater than x=3. exhume and shallow grave seems a nice combination.
Though i would wanna see triple wheel of fortune coupled with triple cerebral vortex in a nekusar deck. what else can we do with this... skull storm with searing wind? I'm not liking the look of that deck!
So, I was thinking, what's the least valuable thing I can sacrifice to God-Eternal Bontu?
Lands! The answer you're looking for is you're supposed to sac your lands. You float all your mana and than windmill slam Bontu like there's no tomorrow! Or I guess more like there's no next turn. Cards that let you sacrifice lands are not made for incremental value, they're made for maniacs like me and people who like Balance.
Also, I just had the realization that the "god mechanic" in this set is that if a god dies, it comes back in 3 turns. Not sure if that was purposeful or accidental Jesus.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Zedruu: "This deck is not only able to go crazy - it also needs to do so."
Doesn't work. Medomai can't attack on extra turns.
Doesn't need to be able to, he gets cheated in already attacking. Same way this effect ignores other attack restrictions because the cheated creature is never declared.
Problem is he's not good enough to be a definite add to either place - he's competing with Seedborn Muse and Sidisi, Undead Vizier in my Glissa list, and Grimgrin, Corpse-Born and Noxious Ghoul in Varina. Choices.
Thinking further on it, he's not bad at all. I just think the Boar God is nuts. I, for one, welcome all of our new overlords, but the porcine variety just looks better at first glance.
Ha, of course you are! I can't think of anything more tstorm.
I'm just saying, I've stopped playing things like Insidious Dreams because I already have like a 60% win rate in games where I make contact with Hellcarver Demon. It's definitely been better to me than a coin flip.
If you can put yourself in the situation where you float mana, sacrifice everything, draw 20 cards, ritual off, and play a couple bombs, you can put people deep enough in a hole that not even their precious lands can save them.
So far boar >>> bontu >>> Rhonas imo.
EDH Primers
Phelddagrif - Zirilan
EDH
Thrasios+Bruse - Pang - Sasaya - Wydwen - Feather - Rona - Toshiro - Sylvia+Khorvath - Geth - QMarchesa - Firesong - Athreos - Arixmethes - Isperia - Etali - Silas+Sidar - Saskia - Virtus+Gorm - Kynaios - Naban - Aryel - Mizzix - Kazuul - Tymna+Kraum - Sidar+Tymna - Ayli - Gwendlyn - Phelddagrif 4 - Liliana - Kaervek - Phelddagrif 3 - Mairsil - Scarab - Child - Phenax - Shirei - Thada - Depala - Circu - Kytheon - GrenzoHR - Phelddagrif - Reyhan+Kraum - Toshiro - Varolz - Nin - Ojutai - Tasigur - Zedruu - Uril - Edric - Wort - Zurgo - Nahiri - Grenzo - Kozilek - Yisan - Ink-Treader - Yisan - Brago - Sidisi - Toshiro - Alexi - Sygg - Brimaz - Sek'Kuar - Marchesa - Vish Kal - Iroas - Phelddagrif - Ephara - Derevi - Glissa - Wanderer - Saffi - Melek - Xiahou Dun - Lazav - Lin Sivvi - Zirilan - Glissa
PDH - Drake - Graverobber - Izzet GM - Tallowisp - Symbiote Brawl - Feather - Ugin - Jace - Scarab - Angrath - Vraska - Kumena Oathbreaker - Wrenn&6
Just say you want to kick Rite of Replication. That covers most creatures.
Well this is a strange miracle adjacent effect that goes really well with Time Magic unsurprisingly.
Now, I love drawing cards. I especially love drawing lots of cards particularly if I can draw them all at once and for as little mana as possible. Resource accrual is just something I deeply care about. For that reason, God-Eternal Bontu should be the kind of card that excites me. It's a relatively inexpensive way to draw lots of cards all at once, and it leaves a 5/6 menace to boot. What's not to love here? Well, if there's one thing I hate doing, it's losing my board state, and sacrificing my board to draw lots of cards feels like the definition of counterproductive. I mean, why would I want to throw away cards I've already drawn and then found worthwhile enough to cast only to draw different cards in their place? Like, it's one thing to loot cards away while they're still in my hand. In those instances, I'm making an equivalent exchange in an effort to find cards more valuable than the ones I already have. But once I've made an effort to put my cards in play, I can only imagine wanting to keep those cards. If not, I wouldn't have bothered casting them in the first place. In that sense, sacrificing my board to draw cards feels a lot like targeting my face with my own Lightning Bolt. Sure, the worth of any individual card I have in play can decrease in value over time to the point where it's actually worth less than one random card, but generally speaking I don't fill my decks full of permanent cards to have those cards not be valuable once I've played them. That just sounds ridiculous.
So, I was thinking, what's the least valuable thing I can sacrifice to God-Eternal Bontu? Because if there's a way to make a lot of that thing, then maybe I could also make Bontu worthwhile. A few things come to mind. First, obviously, 1/1 creature tokens. They're fairly ubiquitous, and it's difficult to find non-card permanents that are less useful than 1/1s. In the token department, we do also have clues though. That, and things like treasure tokens made off the back of Smothering Tithe. In addition to tokens though, there are also cards that I actively want to kill off because they do something useful when they die but simultaneously aren't very useful to keep on the battlefield. I'm thinking of cards like Academy Rector, Reveillark, and False Prophet (although maybe not that last one in tandem with Bontu). With these sorts of cards, the battlefield is more of a stepping stone to the graveyard than it is for actually developing any kind of meaningful board state. I guess that makes them kind of like weird, delayed sorceries. In any case, it's going to be difficult to have many of those kinds of cards in play to sacrifice to Bontu, so I'm going to focus on tokens instead, specifically 1/1s.
Imagine I have five 1/1 tokens. Let's call them saprolings. Now, they don't have to be saprolings specifically. Maybe they were Wood Elves at some point in time. For now though, they're effectively 1/1 creatures with no other useful text. With Bontu, I can sacrifice all of these 1/1s to draw five cards, and that would almost certainly be more useful than keeping five 1/1s around. Having said that, this is still a non-starter for me since paying five mana to draw five cards at the cost of five 1/1s still isn't good enough despite the fact that it also develops a 5/6 menace. The opportunity cost is simply too great. For roughly the same amount of mana, I could have played something like the incredibly unsexy Collective Blessing instead. Now, all of these 1/1s are suddenly much more relevant, and I didn't need to throw them away to make them so. In this way, I can use cards like Collective Blessing to advance my existing board state even further without losing any board in the process. To make losing board worthwhile, God-Eternal Bontu would have to do something even more powerful in comparison, and that just seems like a tall order. Unintuitively, I suppose God-Eternal Bontu actually gets better the fewer things you sac to it since the opportunity cost decreases as you draw fewer cards. But then, why would I want to play this card if I weren't using it to draw lots of cards?
Trap your friends in an endless game with this 23-card combo!
UWU/W BlinkUW
BMono-Black ControlB
Commander:
GWUJenaraGWU
BGeth MBCB
RGXenagosRG
WUBSharuumWUB (retired)
Modern:
xAffinityx (starting)
Standard:
Ha! That's a good one.
Easily stronger than the other 2 zombie gods. I wouldn't call it broken, though. It's strong, no doubt. If I played miracle Varina, I'd windmill slam a copy in that pile.
So this is 12 Mana for 6 spells which depending on those 2 spells is pretty okay.
It can be cheesed in some very interesting way with 0 mana spells, and averages out pretty well for two spells.
I like it
For me it is the Boar > Kefnet > Bontu > Rhonas
Finale of promise looks promising. Kess will be happy.
Kefnet definitely has the neatest ability of the non-boar-gods, but whenever I see a new commander, and my mind fills with excited possibilities, and I try to imagine what sorts of thrilling new adventures we could have together...and then I realize it works best with time magic...I immediately stop giving a *****.
EDH Primers
Phelddagrif - Zirilan
EDH
Thrasios+Bruse - Pang - Sasaya - Wydwen - Feather - Rona - Toshiro - Sylvia+Khorvath - Geth - QMarchesa - Firesong - Athreos - Arixmethes - Isperia - Etali - Silas+Sidar - Saskia - Virtus+Gorm - Kynaios - Naban - Aryel - Mizzix - Kazuul - Tymna+Kraum - Sidar+Tymna - Ayli - Gwendlyn - Phelddagrif 4 - Liliana - Kaervek - Phelddagrif 3 - Mairsil - Scarab - Child - Phenax - Shirei - Thada - Depala - Circu - Kytheon - GrenzoHR - Phelddagrif - Reyhan+Kraum - Toshiro - Varolz - Nin - Ojutai - Tasigur - Zedruu - Uril - Edric - Wort - Zurgo - Nahiri - Grenzo - Kozilek - Yisan - Ink-Treader - Yisan - Brago - Sidisi - Toshiro - Alexi - Sygg - Brimaz - Sek'Kuar - Marchesa - Vish Kal - Iroas - Phelddagrif - Ephara - Derevi - Glissa - Wanderer - Saffi - Melek - Xiahou Dun - Lazav - Lin Sivvi - Zirilan - Glissa
PDH - Drake - Graverobber - Izzet GM - Tallowisp - Symbiote Brawl - Feather - Ugin - Jace - Scarab - Angrath - Vraska - Kumena Oathbreaker - Wrenn&6
regarding the new blue god, i was trying to mull over how to make high tide work, maybe float a time spiral, tonnes of untap effects like cloud of faries and turnabout and reset. And then i thought wait but we can do better than that - how about floating a artificial evolution to screw with my opponent's ib halfheart, goblin tactician! Or float a blue elemental blast?
and then i realised that temporal manipulation is just better. it kinda spoils the whole funkiness of trying to do fun things.
Having seen what the set looks like, i imagine its going to be ultra slow and grindy and control-heavy in standard. i mean even the new dovin guy seems to be like old thaalia but with upside. and new karn being a one-sided null rod. I suspect that it's going to make EDH games also a bit slower and grindier too.
Also, this finale of promise seems fun. Its probably going straight into my rakdos deck, though i suspect it'll never be cast for anything greater than x=3. exhume and shallow grave seems a nice combination.
Though i would wanna see triple wheel of fortune coupled with triple cerebral vortex in a nekusar deck. what else can we do with this... skull storm with searing wind? I'm not liking the look of that deck!
Legacy - Solidarity - mono U aggro - burn - Imperial Painter - Strawberry Shortcake - Bluuzards - bom
EDH Primers
Phelddagrif - Zirilan
EDH
Thrasios+Bruse - Pang - Sasaya - Wydwen - Feather - Rona - Toshiro - Sylvia+Khorvath - Geth - QMarchesa - Firesong - Athreos - Arixmethes - Isperia - Etali - Silas+Sidar - Saskia - Virtus+Gorm - Kynaios - Naban - Aryel - Mizzix - Kazuul - Tymna+Kraum - Sidar+Tymna - Ayli - Gwendlyn - Phelddagrif 4 - Liliana - Kaervek - Phelddagrif 3 - Mairsil - Scarab - Child - Phenax - Shirei - Thada - Depala - Circu - Kytheon - GrenzoHR - Phelddagrif - Reyhan+Kraum - Toshiro - Varolz - Nin - Ojutai - Tasigur - Zedruu - Uril - Edric - Wort - Zurgo - Nahiri - Grenzo - Kozilek - Yisan - Ink-Treader - Yisan - Brago - Sidisi - Toshiro - Alexi - Sygg - Brimaz - Sek'Kuar - Marchesa - Vish Kal - Iroas - Phelddagrif - Ephara - Derevi - Glissa - Wanderer - Saffi - Melek - Xiahou Dun - Lazav - Lin Sivvi - Zirilan - Glissa
PDH - Drake - Graverobber - Izzet GM - Tallowisp - Symbiote Brawl - Feather - Ugin - Jace - Scarab - Angrath - Vraska - Kumena Oathbreaker - Wrenn&6
Lands! The answer you're looking for is you're supposed to sac your lands. You float all your mana and than windmill slam Bontu like there's no tomorrow! Or I guess more like there's no next turn. Cards that let you sacrifice lands are not made for incremental value, they're made for maniacs like me and people who like Balance.
Also, I just had the realization that the "god mechanic" in this set is that if a god dies, it comes back in 3 turns. Not sure if that was purposeful or accidental Jesus.
Kefnet seems interesting. With Scroll Rack/Jace, the mind sculptor it is super easy to take infinite turns.
Bontu is scary in the land of Mindslaver effects. Especially as a commander.
8.RG Green Devotion Ramp/Combo 9.UR Draw Triggers 10.WUR Group stalling 11.WUR Voltron Spellslinger 12.WB Sacrificial Shenanigans
13.BR Creatureless Panharmonicon 14.BR Pingers and Eldrazi 15.URG Untapped Cascading
16.Reyhan, last of the Abzan's WUBG +1/+1 Counter Craziness 17.WUBRG Dragons aka Why did I make this?
Building: The Gitrog Monster lands, Glissa the Traitor stax, Muldrotha, the Gravetide Planeswalker Combo, Kydele, Chosen of Kruphix + Sidar Kondo of Jamuraa Clues, and Tribal Scarecrow Planeswalkers
Doesn't work. Medomai can't attack on extra turns.
Building: Varina
Doesn't need to be able to, he gets cheated in already attacking. Same way this effect ignores other attack restrictions because the cheated creature is never declared.
Most Used (of many dozens) EDH Decks:
Brago, King Eternal - Stax
Grenzo, Dungeon Warden - Aggro Combo
Wort, the Raidmother - Spellslinger Swarm Control
Animar, Soul of Elements - Tempo Combo
Yidris, Maelstrom Wielder - Spellslinger
Exodia the Forbidden One:
Oona, Queen of the Fae - Combowins.dec
Building: Varina
https://helix-gaming.com/blogs/news/war-of-the-spark-commander-review-week-2
Ugin, the Ineffable
Colorless/artifact deck players rejoice