it's hard to compete with prossh on raw power level/shenanigans, but I would recommend omnath, locus of rage. even one instance of his landfall ability will leave you with two 5/5's which are much more threatening than most tokens. of course if you're doing it right you have something like fetchlands or explosive vegetation to put 20 power on the board not counting omnath. oh and when you have millions of tokens and 'overextend' you get to dome the person who boardwipes for a ton of damage.
Prossh, Skyraider of Kher get's my vote as he is super strong, doesn't care about being countered and is awful lots of fun to play. As he's extremely explosive and linear my second vote would be Riku of Two Reflections as he's totally different and versatile.
Doubling season affects 3 things: Tokens, +1/+1 counters, and planeswalkers.
You're locked in green, but that's fine because green has solid additions to all 3 categories.
After that, +1 counters is solidly in white, with some blue (graft, novigen, etc), and some black (corpsejack, mazirek, etc).
Tokens are pretty good from white, while token copies from blue are powerful to double.
Planeswalkers run the spectrum, but blue walkers tend to be very powerful at controlling the board and giving CA.
Overall, a WGU deck would likely make the most use of every aspect of doubling season, no matter what aspect you choose to focus on.
If you simply want to make a lot of tokens with your Commander, then the colors matter less, but your focus of synergy will be tied more to a single interaction.
The problem with Prosh, Ghave, Hazezon, and Marath is that with each of them, Doubling Season is almost simply a "win-more" card. Each of those cards already combo with so much, that while DS is a great add to the deck, it's still just another piece.
I have personally run Doubling Season in Nemata, Marath, Riku, and Trostani.
===
Of those you listed:
Prossh, Skyraider of Kher - Often goes for big combo with the mass of tokens, and as such the deck is more often defined by Food Chain than by doubling Season. DS can add an aspect for a large token army, but you're more likely to end up with a large Voltron strike of some sort instead. Dropping DS and Prossh on the same turn can be hard, so you will need to protect DS somehow. The deck often runs limited other methods of token production, but I am a fan of Night Soil, among others.
Ghave, Guru of Spores - Known mostly for infinite combos with Ashnod's Altar, and hard conrtol with Gravepact effects, among others, Ghave is a one-stop combo shop. DS will 'compete' with Hardened Scales, Blade of the Bloodchief, and Cathars' Crusade (among others), as a way to fuel the machine. Ghave doesn't really go big or wide, but rather just kills people indirectly, perhaps via Blood Artist, but once you're infinite, you can do whatever you want.
Marath, Will of the Wild - Marath's removal ability is so strong, it too easy to just keep her load with counters. Hardened Scales, illusionist's bracers, and similar effects allow Marath to target herself with the +1 counter ability to keep growing in size, and thus be able to make more tokens or shoot more things. This means that it's often better to just go big on her, and Voltron up (slightly, just for trample), and then just use her to burn the ground clear of obstacles. While it might be tempting to make big tokens, the truth is that her X might as well be locked in at 1. It's better to just make lots of 1/1 tokens, and then shift counters onto those that need it at a later time.
Rhys, the Redeemed - The first commander that prefers to go wide over big, DS and Parallel Lives will allow your army to grow at an insanely rapid pace. He takes some number of turns to start getting going, and is pretty mana intensive, but can do big things.
===
Some you haven't listed:
Trostani, Selesnya's Voice. Trostani like to go big AND wide. You want to get good value out of your populate, so you have big things. And you want more big things. It works.
Riku of two Reflections. Token copies of creatures are great things to double up. Increased ETB, LTB and other triggers is great. Just wait till you drop a Hellrider in a riku deck, copy it, get an extra token, cast a Clone, copy it, and get an extra token. You'll be a believer. Don't get me started on the math with Doubling Season and Chancellor of the Forge.
Hazezon Tamar - Expensive, but one of the first major token producers. He makes an army in a shot, often times this means haste, or Blasting Station shenanigans to just instakill people. Doubling Season helps that be a little smoother.
I'm also fond of Ulasht, the Hate Seed. Can combo pretty well with Earthcraft (But then, what doesn't) and it's the kind of commander not many folks run, so you have some surprise factor going for you as well.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
My Commander decks:
Chandra, Torch of Defiance - Oops! All Chandras.
Prime Speaker Zegana - Draw for Power.
Pir & Toothy - Counterpalooza.
Arcades, the Strategist - Another Brick in the Wall.
Zacama, Primal Calamity - Calamity of Double Mana.
Edgar Markov - Vampires Don't Die.
Child of Alara - Dreamcrusher.
No seriously Ghave is great with Doubling season. Get ashnod's altar and congrats you just went inifnite. If you have a haste enabler (Tough without red but still possible) you may have just won.
Alos with all the thallids, they get 2 spore counters a turn instead of 1, meaning that you will be getting a lot of saprolings. Creatures like Mycoloth, it is insane. If you had access to blue you could even make more doubling seasons with Clever Impersonator and Copy Enchantment.
I still vote for Ghave though as the others do not give you blue either.
And with white you hav access to Enlightened Tutor and Idyllic Tutor.
My favorite commander to double up with is Ezuri of the Claw. It doesn't double experience counters, but it sure does some shenanigans in this deck. I sometimes adjust my Maelstrom Wanderer deck to a +1/+1 counter build, and it is decent in there.
My two commander decks are built around this concept.
Rith the Awakener (tokens, obviously)
Kresh the Bloodbraided (built around creature sacrifice and killing both opponents' creatures as well as your own to pump Kresh higher...drop a Phyrexian Dreadnought and immediately get +12/+12, or +24/+24 with Doubling Season....not to mention Meren bringing things back from grave to resacrifice them, etc.)
I run a Ghave deck that isn't combo, but focuses on counters, sacrifice and to a lesser extent tokens. Doubling Season makes for some amazing plays, especially with a Corpsejack Menace or Cathar's Crusade out. It usually wins by locking down the board with Grave Pact/Dictate of Erebos type shenanigans, and then going big and wide with Mycoloth/Avenger of Zendikar pieces.
I over emphasized what actually happened without checking the loyalty to make sure it worked (I guess you could find a Garruk Apex Predator or a Vraska or a Nico Bolas to kill the Ablaze for you which then Tamiyo would return to your hand but that is still limited).
You really shouldn't need more than 9 planeswalkers off the two Confluxes to win but you can push it farther if you really want to.
@Taleran, yeah I thought so - just being unreasonably nitpicky. Usually casting all the things off a conflux with omniscience out results in a win no matter what.
I pick Marath out of the choices, because he is the most versatile and all three of his functions utilizes Doubling Season, even just casting Marath could benefit from it.
My Doubling Season deck uses Jenara, Asura of War. Mostly because she's in the right colors, though secondarily because she can get pretty insane with a doubling season or two out.
UG is fun for a similar clone themed deck. Lots of alternate wincons like Helix Tower and that one guy who you win with if you have four of them on the field at your upkeep... which isn't too hard with all the UG flash shenanigans.
I've finally gotten my hands on a Doubling Season, and now I need to find a way to put it to good use. I'm assuredly going the token route, but I'd like your help figuring out which token route I should go. Prossh, Skyraider of Kher? Ghave, Guru of Spores? Marath, Will of the Wild? Rhys the Redeemed? Who else? The possibilities seem endless!
To narrow it down a bit, I'm looking for:
- Something with competitive potential (combo is a-ok, but I want to be able to make good use of Doubling Season.)
- Not mono-G.
- Not superfriends.
Who would you recommend at the helm?
Thanks for the help!
Blue lives don't matter in the slightest.
Ghave, Guru of Spores, Riku of Two Reflections and Sidisi, Brood Tyrant do have great potential as well. Ghave, Guru of Spores has insane synergy, as D-Season not only doubles Tokens but Counters as well. Riku of Two Reflections on the other hand doesn't synergize as well, if you don't build him very creature heavy. Sidisi, Brood Tyrant's mechanism always felt a bit akward if you ask me.
Prossh, Skyraider of Kher get's my vote as he is super strong, doesn't care about being countered and is awful lots of fun to play. As he's extremely explosive and linear my second vote would be Riku of Two Reflections as he's totally different and versatile.
Ghave, Guru of Spores + Doubling Season + Ashnod's Altar = infinite mana
Add Grave Pact = no one gets creatures
Add Fecundity = infinite draw
I buy HP and Damaged cards!
Only EDH:
Sigarda, Host of Herons: Enchantress' Enchantments
Jenara, Asura of War: ETB Value Town
Purphoros, God of the Forge: Global Punishment
Xenagos, God of Revels: Ramp, Sneak, & Heavy Hitters
Ghave, Guru of Spores: Dies_to_Doom_Blade's stax list
Edric, Spymaster of Trest: Donald's list
You're locked in green, but that's fine because green has solid additions to all 3 categories.
After that, +1 counters is solidly in white, with some blue (graft, novigen, etc), and some black (corpsejack, mazirek, etc).
Tokens are pretty good from white, while token copies from blue are powerful to double.
Planeswalkers run the spectrum, but blue walkers tend to be very powerful at controlling the board and giving CA.
Overall, a WGU deck would likely make the most use of every aspect of doubling season, no matter what aspect you choose to focus on.
If you simply want to make a lot of tokens with your Commander, then the colors matter less, but your focus of synergy will be tied more to a single interaction.
The problem with Prosh, Ghave, Hazezon, and Marath is that with each of them, Doubling Season is almost simply a "win-more" card. Each of those cards already combo with so much, that while DS is a great add to the deck, it's still just another piece.
I have personally run Doubling Season in Nemata, Marath, Riku, and Trostani.
===
Of those you listed:
Prossh, Skyraider of Kher - Often goes for big combo with the mass of tokens, and as such the deck is more often defined by Food Chain than by doubling Season. DS can add an aspect for a large token army, but you're more likely to end up with a large Voltron strike of some sort instead. Dropping DS and Prossh on the same turn can be hard, so you will need to protect DS somehow. The deck often runs limited other methods of token production, but I am a fan of Night Soil, among others.
Ghave, Guru of Spores - Known mostly for infinite combos with Ashnod's Altar, and hard conrtol with Gravepact effects, among others, Ghave is a one-stop combo shop. DS will 'compete' with Hardened Scales, Blade of the Bloodchief, and Cathars' Crusade (among others), as a way to fuel the machine. Ghave doesn't really go big or wide, but rather just kills people indirectly, perhaps via Blood Artist, but once you're infinite, you can do whatever you want.
Marath, Will of the Wild - Marath's removal ability is so strong, it too easy to just keep her load with counters. Hardened Scales, illusionist's bracers, and similar effects allow Marath to target herself with the +1 counter ability to keep growing in size, and thus be able to make more tokens or shoot more things. This means that it's often better to just go big on her, and Voltron up (slightly, just for trample), and then just use her to burn the ground clear of obstacles. While it might be tempting to make big tokens, the truth is that her X might as well be locked in at 1. It's better to just make lots of 1/1 tokens, and then shift counters onto those that need it at a later time.
Rhys, the Redeemed - The first commander that prefers to go wide over big, DS and Parallel Lives will allow your army to grow at an insanely rapid pace. He takes some number of turns to start getting going, and is pretty mana intensive, but can do big things.
===
Some you haven't listed:
Trostani, Selesnya's Voice. Trostani like to go big AND wide. You want to get good value out of your populate, so you have big things. And you want more big things. It works.
Riku of two Reflections. Token copies of creatures are great things to double up. Increased ETB, LTB and other triggers is great. Just wait till you drop a Hellrider in a riku deck, copy it, get an extra token, cast a Clone, copy it, and get an extra token. You'll be a believer. Don't get me started on the math with Doubling Season and Chancellor of the Forge.
Hazezon Tamar - Expensive, but one of the first major token producers. He makes an army in a shot, often times this means haste, or Blasting Station shenanigans to just instakill people. Doubling Season helps that be a little smoother.
====
+1 counters:
You can also look at Jenara, Asura of War, and Mazirek, Kraul Death priest.
Retired EDH - Tibor and Lumia | [PR]Nemata |Ramirez dePietro | [C]Edric | Riku | Jenara | Lazav | Heliod | Daxos | Roon | Kozilek
Chandra, Torch of Defiance - Oops! All Chandras.
Prime Speaker Zegana - Draw for Power.
Pir & Toothy - Counterpalooza.
Arcades, the Strategist - Another Brick in the Wall.
Zacama, Primal Calamity - Calamity of Double Mana.
Edgar Markov - Vampires Don't Die.
Child of Alara - Dreamcrusher.
No seriously Ghave is great with Doubling season. Get ashnod's altar and congrats you just went inifnite. If you have a haste enabler (Tough without red but still possible) you may have just won.
Alos with all the thallids, they get 2 spore counters a turn instead of 1, meaning that you will be getting a lot of saprolings. Creatures like Mycoloth, it is insane. If you had access to blue you could even make more doubling seasons with Clever Impersonator and Copy Enchantment.
I still vote for Ghave though as the others do not give you blue either.
And with white you hav access to Enlightened Tutor and Idyllic Tutor.
UB Vela the Night-Clad BUDecklist
WBG Ghave, Guru of Spores GBW
WUBRGThe Ur-DragonWUBRGDecklist
Blue lives don't matter in the slightest.
Ghave and Marath are the obvious choices. Doubling isn't even that good in Prossh, Skyraider of Kher, as often times Parallel Lives is the better card.
My favorite commander to double up with is Ezuri of the Claw. It doesn't double experience counters, but it sure does some shenanigans in this deck. I sometimes adjust my Maelstrom Wanderer deck to a +1/+1 counter build, and it is decent in there.
Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest could be pretty sweet, especially with clue tokens.
Rith the Awakener (tokens, obviously)
Kresh the Bloodbraided (built around creature sacrifice and killing both opponents' creatures as well as your own to pump Kresh higher...drop a Phyrexian Dreadnought and immediately get +12/+12, or +24/+24 with Doubling Season....not to mention Meren bringing things back from grave to resacrifice them, etc.)
It's also a good idea to hit up the various planeswalkers who can ult off season. Elspeth et al...
The best sequence of this I have seen is
Omniscience
to
Conflux
Grabbing Doubling Season Chandra Ablaze Tamiyo, the Moon Sage Ajani Steadfast {insert black walker here}
to
Doubling Season
to
Tamiyo, the Moon Sage
to
Emblem
To
Chandra Ablaze
To
Cast Conflux and Chandra Ablaze FOREVER
Club Flamingo Wins: 1!
How did they cast Chandra Ablaze the second time?
You really shouldn't need more than 9 planeswalkers off the two Confluxes to win but you can push it farther if you really want to.
Blue also gets you access to Rite of Replication, Dance of Many, and Progenitor Mimic which all make powerful tokens (assuming you clone something good). Throw in a Master Biomancer and your tokens are gigantic and horrifying.
U/G hand-vomit isn't the most competitive deck, but it's up there before you get into AN/HD and hard stax.
Shu Yun, the Silent Tempest WUR Voltron Control
Temmet, Vizier of Naktamun WU Unblockable Mirror Trickery
Ra's al Ghul (Sidar Kondo) and Face-Down Ninjas
Brudiclad, Token Engineer
Vaevictis (VV2) the Dire Lantern
Rona, Disciple of Gix
Tiana the Auror
Hallar
Ulrich the Politician
Zur the Rebel
Scorpion, Locust, Scarab, Egyptian Gods
O-Kagachi, Mathas, Mairsil
"Non-Tribal" Tribal Generals, Eggs
If you're in blue, make sure you don't forget Copy Enchantment
Custom Set
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1hu9uNBSUt92PwGhvexYlwFvsh6_SJBlEEIUV3H9_XyU/edit?usp=sharing
Club Flamingo Wins: 1!
Blue lives don't matter in the slightest.