MTG Salvation

My Mark 1 take on Mairsil, the Pretender, wherein I just jam 42 cards that Mairsil can durdle super hard with, is a failure. One game was a nonstarter, but the other two have had Mairsil being unfun, crushing folks with Avatar of Woe, Illusionist's Bracers and Spikeshot Elder as a one man army. The deck is also insanely reliant on hitting ways to reuse Mairsil's trigger, like Aetherling, or to double up on activations, like the bracers - so games feel unlosable if I do these things, and unwinnable without them. Overall it hasn't been super satisfying to play and I know it's been miserable to play against.

So, on to Mark 2. I am toying with converting Mairsil into a reanimator deck with a "hidden" commander of Chainer, Dementia Master (or Havengul Lich or Doomed Necromancer, but clearly Chainer is superior). Mairsil has all of Chainer's power and none of his drawbacks, which is quite spicy. Here's my mock-up of a list:


This deck can still do some sick Mairsil stuff; Mairsil with Avatar of Woe or Nevinyraal's Desk is a walking nuke, and I can cage like mad with Pack Rat if I wish, but this is mostly a reanimator deck that's looking to land Necromancer, Lich, or Chainer and then use Mairsil to steal their powers to go long.
I know The Scarab God would be sick here but he's out of my budget currently. Any other suggestions or thoughts though?

I think the "you may activate those abilities only once each turn" clause is independent of the instance or Mairsil, meaning that even if you blink him with Aetherling's ability, the ability from the exiled creature was already used that turn and can no longer be used again, similar to Patron of the Orochi's ability; blinking it will not allow you to use the ability again in the same turn.

Quote from DementedKirby »

I think the "you may activate those abilities only once each turn" clause is independent of the instance or Mairsil, meaning that even if you blink him with Aetherling's ability, the ability from the exiled creature was already used that turn and can no longer be used again, similar to Patron of the Orochi's ability; blinking it will not allow you to use the ability again in the same turn.

The goal of this deck is not to get repeated activations, but simply to be able to activate "Chainer" every turn (or several times around the table) without fear of a single removal or bounce spell killing all my nightmares. HOWEVER, this is incorrect; if Mairsil blinks he is a new copy and can use those abilities again; the "may activate" is tied to Mairsil and not the caged cards, and each time Mairsil leaves and reenters the battlefield in a turn you can get a fresh shot at all his caged abilities. In the case of a caged Aetherling and Argent Sphinx this isn't actually super helpful as he comes back on the end step, making it very hard to start an infinite chain, but it is a powerful wombo combo with a not-caged Deadeye Navigator (plus a caged Gilded Lotus and some sort of haste enabler as a for instance). You can also evade or skirt the restriction with Quicksilver Elemental.

But again, I've played the deck that cheats and tries to set up, if not infinite combos, certainly oppressive ones and it just ain't that fun. Hence the reanimator take

Ah, I see. How has it been playing now that you made it less degenerate?

www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/commander-edh/multiplayer-commander-decklists/783193-mairsil-grixis-overlord-chainer
Havnt updated it, still rockin it but dont get to play much at all.
Maybe some ideas for you.