Combining the colors of the cunning Blue and conniving Black offers players incredible control of a game of Commander. This can be manifested in a number of ways. Most simply, you may want to simply counter others’ spells and kill creatures on board. That’s well within Dimir’s toolkit, sometimes even printed on the same card. However, this brilliant and deadly alliance goes much further.
From eradicating your opponent’s deck and using their cards against them to rebuilding your own library and taking all the time in the world to accomplish your goals, Blue/Black cards have all the tools to strategically manipulate any game in your favor. Here are ten incredible cards to put in your Dimir-supporting deck.
Baleful Strix
When you think of Commander, a 1/1 flier isn’t necessarily the first card you’re throwing in the deck. However, Baleful Strix is an incredible value. For the absurdly low cost of two mana, not only are you getting a creature that can get in some evasive damage if needed, but it's an artifact to enable any of those synergies, and it can block just about anything profitably because it has Deathtouch. And best of all? It draws you a card on ETB. I don’t know about you, but I’m casting and making copies of this owl all game, every game.
Notion Thief
What’s the fun in letting other players draw cards? At the drop of a hat, Notion Thief can shut down anyone else at the table refilling their hand and instead gives you those precious extra cards instead. Once it’s on the battlefield, it continues to take any additional draws that may happen, and if the time ever comes to defend, it can trade with attacking creatures rather nicely.
Drown in the Loch
Somebody at the table has to be a party pooper, and Drown in the Loch gives you multiple ways to be that person. Mode one gives you that sweet, sweet counter to any spell that’s threatening the table. Mode two lets you destroy that threat that’s managed to resolve. Of course, you’ll need your opponent to have enough cards in the graveyard to make either mode possible, but a few simple cards that cause them to mill will prime the Loch to easily take whichever victim you choose.
Lim-Dûl's Vault
It’s a strange card on first read, but for two mana and a handful of life, Lim-Dul's Vault can do a powerful amount of deck reorganization while also filtering the card or cards you need most to the top of your deck. Life, of course, is a resource, and for every life you spend, you can arrange not only the top five cards of your library but also the bottom five. However, you can repeat this process as many times as you’d like as long as you have life to pay. Lim-Dul's Vault may possibly be the most complex card on the list, but for those who master its clever use cases, the wildest dreams and most diabolical machinations are at their fingertips.
Mnenomic Betrayal
During the climax of a hard-fought game of Commander, graveyards are usually stocked with all kinds of spells. For the low price of , Mnemonic Betrayal allows the caster to gain access to all of the best cards in every graveyard, and if they have enough mana, use them to swiftly close out the game. If you’re also equipped with White in your Color Identity, pairing this with Immortal Coil and Fractured Identity can conjure up a sneaky way to take out everyone at the table all at once for the ultimate betrayal.
Ashiok, Dream Render
Planeswalkers don’t typically live long in Commander, but it’s worth it to have a copy ofAshiok, Dream Render ready to slam on the table. It not only mills another library but wipes out that player’s entire graveyard in the process, giving you a repeatable Bajuka Bog for as long as Ashiok has the loyalty. Of course, if left on the board, you can make use of this card’s menacing static ability, which shuts down most library searching of your opponents. Fetchlands? Useless. Tutors? Effectively a blank card in hand. Ashiok, Dream Render plays its various roles perfectly, and for only three mana, they are a small price to pay to terrorize the playgroup.
Time Sieve
There may have been an era where Time Sieve was a cool pet card you had to work a bit to build around to take an extra turn or two. Today, however, artifact tokens rain from the sky, making the effort to get this card to do its thing a handful of times is child's play. To really get this to pop off, all you’ll need is a handful of mana rocks and an Esoteric Duplicator to take an indefinite amount of turns and steal the game out of nowhere.
The Scarab God
Not only is this deity fun to pilot as your Commander, The Scarab God is great to have in any deck that sports Dimir colors. For only , you have the power to raise the dead. Any creature in any graveyard can be exiled and Eternalized into a 4/4 Zombie token on your side of the battlefield. These tokens feed The Scarab God’s first ability, which drains every opponent's life and lets you scry for that amount on your upkeep. As an additional upside, this God is hard to kill and keep dead and will return to your hand if it's ever destroyed. Just pray this immortal being doesn’t see the business end of an exile effect itself.
Toxrill, The Corrosive
Toxrill, The Corrosive may be expensive, but it provides incredible late-game inevitably. With every single end step that passes, this gooey guy dumps slime counters onto all creatures on the battlefield you don’t control. This coating of counters isn’t just for show because each lowers the power and toughness of the affected creatures by one. If Toxrill goes unanswered for an entire turn cycle, there’s a good chance a lot of the board has been goo-goned. Thanks to more of Toxrill’s fine print, you get a shiny new slug token for everything that dies, leaving plenty of fodder for drawing cards, blocking desperate attacks, or swinging in yourself to end the game.
Hostage Taker
The name says it all. When Hostage Taker hits the battlefield, any creature or artifact is yours to make walk the plank into exile. Although, like any pirate worth its salt, it’s persuasive; anything exiled by Hostage Taker can be cast into your control. Take the baddest creature on the board or the most valuable artifact and make it yours in two easy steps. One trigger of this card’s ETB ability can be devastating, but imagine making a fleet of copies or repeatedly blinking it with Thassa, Deep-Dwelling, to build a makeshift crew of everyone else’s best permanents. Sometimes piracy pays off extremely well.
Comments