I'm not one to stray into tribal waters. I prefer my commanders kooky and my builds weird, whereas dabbling with a tribe explicitly supported in the last block, after a good few releases full of tribal-minded stuff no less, is the equivalent of the EDH top 40 hits list. Nevertheless, I saw a friend sling a hilarious Brago, King Eternal golem tribal deck, I got the itch to do something along those lines. I knew I had to run Kindred Discovery as that card is bonkers, and I would have liked to include my goodswords plus Jitte. My long time MTG overseer Ebline once again shed wisdom - merfolk. Goddammit. As such, the first spin on Kumena was borderline ironic, tapping into all the cliches of a tribal list. It somehow played super fun. I eventually shed most of the swords after a vehemently negative reception in playtesting with my meta, and started explicitly tapping into the strengths of the list.
The plan is simple, really - get value from all the fish, clock people a bunch, hopefully land an untapper and start going ham in everybody else's turns. There's a smidgen of combo potential, but it requires multiple pieces, so it's not gonna come around that often. The deck is easily the most casual thing I've slung and liked. That's what you call something with ridiculous amounts of variance that can either shoot for the stars or fall on its face, right?
Some observations from the deck's early days of play:
Untaps are good. It literally just takes Kumena and two fish sticks to get a bonus card, which is a pretty tasty pay-off. It's quite nice that a lot of the pay-off effects trigger at different times - Curse of Bounty in your combat, Merrow Commerce in your end step, Seedborn Muse in other people's turns. Let's ram more of those in.
Alternate payoffs to having fish sticks around are good. Earthcraft is absolutely ridiculous in the shell, granting bonkers levels of play flexibility. This one time, I got it online with Deeproot Waters, Zendikar Resurgent, Kindred Discovery and Stonybrook Banneret. Drawing three off each merfolk and being mana positive once it resolved was a pretty ridiculous thing.
Oracle of Mul Daya is solid here. You can often help the topdeck along a little with a bit of draw, or you may just be sitting on a backlog of land from the cards you already acquired. Goodstuff, getting the job done!
If enough fish sticks come home to roost, along with an untap effect, Lullmage Mentor is gg.
So, capitalising on that, let's streamline the deck a little:
A number of weaker utility pieces get taken out to focus on the main game play. Coralhelm Commander may be a lord, but he also costs a total of 6 mana to get his lord abilities online. Herald's Horn is subtle acceleration and the occasional bonus card, but its effect is too minor. Similarly, no matter how much of a soft spot I may have for Lifecrafter's Bestiary, the payoff is not quite up to the standards set by slightly more expensive options. Path of Discovery similarly suffers a bit, and is quite awkward to sequence for whatever reason. Those get replaced with Awakening, another untap effect with a handy timing clause that stacks with everything else. True, it's symmetric, but you'll probably get the most bang for your buck. Intruder Alarm should keep triggering left right and centre, and the increased draw cost in comparison to Azami should hopefully keep it reasonably in check. Mystical Tutor is a missing piece of utility, as I started building the deck from fish sticks and didn't have room to include all the sensible everyday functionality cardboard. Opposition is a new piece of payoff, allowing for the fish to potentially control the board a bit. Disallow for Forbid is a pretty straight swap, granting some more recurring permission. Also, I realistically admitted in front of myself I'm not getting a Tropical Island any time soon, and some play testing with Crucible of Worlds left it sitting in hand or discarded quite often as the deck had a good thing going land drop wise without it around, so I swapped out the dual + fetches mana base combo for some basics and a Terrain Generator.
Hello I run a very similar deck but have gone into bant, but here are a few suggestions for your consideration!
Cryptolith rite is earthcraft v2
Throne of the god-pharaoh is an alternative wincon
Tradewind rider is surgespanner v2
Nullmage shepherd I think has better potential in this deck than reclamation sage
You can go bonkers with cryptic gateway esp with intruder alarm in the deck!
Dear god PARADOX ENGINE nuff said!!
Hey man, thanks for the suggestions! The stuff that requires an actual tap to come online seems a bit on the risky side, Kumena's ruthless whipping into functionality has allowed for some dumb as hell stuff. For example, Cryptolith Rite wouldn't have allowed the chain I described in the post above to happen. Also, removal is a dish best served absolutely unconditional, so if I do end up running the Shepherd (thanks for reminding me the Shepherd exists!) it will quite possibly be on top of RecSage. I'm consciously straying away from Paradox Engine for the time being, it's a card that I feel has the potential to turn the deck into something I'm not comfortable with it being right now. As you said though, all this is great food for thought. Thanks again!
Haha I take on board your comments! I know it can be nerve wracking in a removal heavy meta waiting your next untap step re tradewind.
As I said my list went bant and I’ve gone a stax route in order to fully capitalise upon my multi untap abilities, thus no awaken for me!
I also get what your saying re Shepard but I also have the luxury of aura shards in my deck!
Have you considered using minamo School at waters edge? GREAT with Empress G and the new legendary change for planewalkers!!!
Hm, Minamo, School at Water's Edge actually seems pretty good, yes. Not just with Empress Galina, but the fact that it essentially reads " : get an extra tick of Kumena in activated ability land or an extra shot of Nykthos mana" (I'm adding Nykthos in the next update). That's pretty dece. Also, I've started warming to the idea of Nullmage Shepherd instead of Reclamation Sage, as all it takes is enough fish sticks to draw a card to get this online. That's not hard at all!
If your considering Nykthos then I feel that Growing Rites Of Itlimoc is also a must for big mana, esp with so many fish sticks (floating?!!?) around, hell if you can afford Mana Drain then go “all in” with Gaeas Cradle!!!
Speaking of lands I run Holdout Settlement (there is also Survivors Encampment) just to provide another tap ability for creatures.
I to am starting to warm to your thoughts of removing Coralhelm Commander. Might replace it with Cloudstone Curio, as combined with Cryptic Gateway and Intruder alarm things can go bonkers...
Ps sorry for not making the links for each card I suggest on your forum simply put I’ve forgotten how too! Doh
Tokens would be a great idea, except most of the token options are garbage. Aquatic Incursion is already kind of eh, but you need to take a step back and realise you're running freaking Benthicore, man The cheap islandwalk lords are pretty dece even when there are no islands around - a team-wide anthem coupled with an extra fish stick to turn sideways for utility is pretty welcome. The swoler your fish, the less likely people are to punch into them. You hold them up threateningly, and then you turn them sideways for further swole'ification or cards or whatever. Good times. However, I'm totally nicking Mutavault from your list, that's a bit of a silly oversight on my end, thanks for making me realise that.
Technical note - the deck can pull off an infinite combo now. However, both the pieces for it are enchantments, and as such cannot be tutored at all, making it a very rare occurrence. The game was quite interesting, actually - three wipes happened, and I had huge trouble getting enough fish online to do anything relevant. I failed to draw any of my non-Kumena draw options, my hand was depleted, things were pretty grim. I popped the world's saddest Tishana for three cards. I had to Beast Within my own Mana Crypt as I was veering dangerously close to single digits and I had to keep the dude with True Conviction off his flying beefslab via Opposition. I eventually clawed my way to a Zendikar Resurgent, and I suddenly gummed up the board with some tiny irrelevant bodies that let me cantrip through about as many cards in one turn as I'd previously seen all game. Claw my way to ten power on board after yet another piece of self-removal (Pongify on my Birds of Paradise), flip the Ewit sitting under Mosswort Bridge, Tishana 2.0, this time everything is swole. Acquire healthy dollop of cardboard to hand. Realise there's potential for Earthcraft + Intruder Alarm. So, essentially, like a turbocharged version of the interaction from earlier, with a stupid amount of mana on tap for each creature that hits, and a repeatable drawstick in the command zone. Go to town, draw a bunch, locate Surgespanner, locate Jungleborn Pioneer, get two untaps per cast of that, start 'spanning everyone's boards to hand. Boom. Thankfully this is not going to happen regularly, but it's fun to know it's possible. It's also quite funny how originally I was all leery towards Paradox Engine for potentially allowing something like this to happen, and now I've got Intruder Alarm interactions which are actually cheaper and stronger.
Okay, this is probably the deck that I have committed to papering out the quickest in my EDH career. What can I say - I'm apparently a sucker for activated abilities, and have only truly realised this now. All three non-fish decks that I have active at the moment reveal around activated abilities in one capacity or another, and this list taps into that play style to the fullest. It's kind of like Worker Management: the Gathering, as you get a fixed amount of fish derps and you can utilise them to do various tasks, both from Kumena and other sources. And then you build your untapper upgrades and the value just keeps skyrocketing.
Here's a bunch of largely mana-base-centric tweaks in preparation for the papering:
Why yes, Nykthos gives many manas, is gud idea. It's not uncommon for its payoff to be bigger than what Gaea's Cradle would have fetched as I also park a sizeable amount of enchantment real estate on the board. It gets funky with Merrow Reejery. It also gets funky with Minamo, School at Water's Edge, which can also be used to untap Empress Galina or some other legendary fish stick in a pinch for whatever reason. I somehow missed Reflecting Pool so I'm fixing the oversight. Alchemist's Refuge has been pretty grand, so I'm doubling up on the effect with Winding Canyons. Mutavault can become a fish stick in a dire hour of need and help draw a card or whatever. Needed to make room, so swallowed up some basics and Strip Mine + Terrain Generator. The deck can only support so many colourless lands, and these are the least good.
Since it's Worker Management o'clock, I'm gonna risk it and ram Nullmage Shepherd over Reclamation Sage. True, Recsage is unconditional, but this is yet another fishstick tap sink! And all it takes is as many other bodies as you'd need to draw a card, and stuff like Oracle of Mul Daya can help too if needed! It's going to be okay. Ran the list by Ebline for last-second feedback before paperification, he pointed out the ETB-to-draw dorks aren't that good. I asked him for playable recommendations, he offered a potpourri of choices from which I picked out Sigil Tracer and Whirlpool Rider. Finding a wizard friend for the former shouldn't be too hard given the numerous tutor options, and the fact that some of the deck's best fish sticks (like Surgespanner) qualify. I'm slightly weary of the latter, but I can imagine it's going to change the moment I ship a largely exploited hand of debris and get a bit more gas.
I was considering adding Cryptolith Rite and Tradewind Rider for the longest time, but decided against it for the time being. They're both tamer versions of effects in the deck, and the explosiveness/element of surprise the superior versions offer can make really silly things happen.
What’s people thoughts on chord of calling and the convoke mechanic with regards to being an extra tap ability for the fish sticks?? The 3 green mana required might be a bit steep? But the tutor ability I feel out weighs this cost...?
Yeah, Chord would be great. However, given the fact I've got two merfolk tutors, a Worldly Tutor and a Survival of the Fittest already, I feel like I'm already quite heavy on the search. And yeah, GGG certainly wasn't helping matters when it was decision time.
Except it isn't. Herald of Secret Streams and Sun Quan, Lord of Wu are the evasion options, not giving the slightest bit of a damn about anything on the board. As already mentioned upthread, the islandwalk lords work pretty darn well just for pump purposes even if the evasion doesn't work. Smoke and mirrors, look at my swole-ass fish, go somewhere else.
In other news, the two new fish sticks add welcome options to the arsenal. Sigil Tracer can double removal or nick some cool utility from other people, while Whirlpool Rider can restock options. It's not uncommon to have a large hand of land and other assorted debris which this attempts to reset to gas. The deck's quite temperamental in execution, I think I'm seeing the other side of RNG after a prolonged streak of fortunate draws. At least given the arrangement of the 99 I can toss all sorts of utility/interaction around if I can't get a good tool of fish sticks going, so that's something.
You know, taking an extra turn could technically count as untapping That aside, the only reason I'm not running the Prophets is that I'd need to guarantee a way to connect. Evasion exists in the 99, but is not super common, and by the time six drops come out to play a 4/4 walker, especially one with a hilarious ability like this one, doesn't seem super likely to punch through to glory unassisted. Do you have any experience with it?
Was already mentioned, but Growing Rites of Itlimoc? Cantrips to replace itself in your hand, and still easy to flip.
I feel like you could run Eldrazi Monument to protect your board, seeing as you have a ton of token production. Plus solid evasion is always good.
You know, taking an extra turn could technically count as untapping That aside, the only reason I'm not running the Prophets is that I'd need to guarantee a way to connect. Evasion exists in the 99, but is not super common, and by the time six drops come out to play a 4/4 walker, especially one with a hilarious ability like this one, doesn't seem super likely to punch through to glory unassisted. Do you have any experience with it?
Well, I've run it on occasion, and generally, the extra turn thing worked about 50% of the time. But when it worked, I was often able to chain together multiple hits and get multiple turns for the low price of a dead fish.
Now, to be fair, I was often running them in a wizard shell, where Archetype of Imagination already had a home. But even without that, Rogue's Passage was often in there (especially in a two-color deck), and you are already running some evasion for your fish. If you don't mind upping the curve just a tad, Deepchannel Mentor is a card that did lots of work in decks where I wanted to swing over and be sure of connecting (and is a fish, too).
Thoughts noted and appreciated certainly a valid line of play. I've been largely shunning Growing Rites of Itlimoc as it's a Cradle knockoff, so if I'd be running that I may as well run Cradle itself, but that costs money, but then why am I straying into suboptimal card selection realms, *insert needless feedback loop*. There's a nonzero chance I'll end up running it in the end, got to get there one step at a time.
Yeah, this thing plays pretty damn well. Quite often it descends into a non-infinite combo, wherein you keep untapping loads of stuff, making tons of mana and chewing through the deck, but you have the potential to fizzle out at any second. Surprisingly exciting times! This typically ends in assembling the machinery for a full-blown infinite and winning, but it isn't guaranteed to. Also, the pieces that make this come online are not tutorable, so it doesn't happen with too frightening a regularity.
The deck seems to be quite high variance - the opposite end of these comboriffic interactions are scenarios when you have no fish, no untappers, and bits of utility in your hand. This is an inherent trait of the list and nothing can be done about it, really. The only way to make it really go away would be to invest heavier into combo and add some Isochron Scepter and Azami interactions, which would transform the deck into a full-blown combo engine that I'm not fully comfortable it becoming. However, I can smooth out some of the nooks and crannies in the list by swapping out some underperformers for preferable options.
Curse of Bounty is the most situational of the untappers. You essentially have to commit Kumena and a fish stick to rip an untap, and if your board is swole enough people sure as heck won't go out of their way to offer you extra untaps in their turns. Merfolk Sovereign is pretty average as far as three drops go, and that spot is a bit sensitive on the curve as the commander lives there too. Sun Quan, Lord of Wu is very nice, I have nothing but the best to say about horsemanship, but he does also happen to cost six mana and only respond to half the creature tutors while Herald of Secret Streams does the same job cheaper (you should probably load up on at least one round of fish swole'ification before you get punching). In turn, Paradox Engine is a slower, crappier Intruder Alarm in the deck, but it's still pretty damn good and since the thing didn't become unplayable after Alarm went in then Engine should have a place too. Drawing cards en masse outside of tapping is pretty darn good, so Bident of Thassa is here to draw cards en masse. True, it doesn't explicitly tap to make Kumena unblockable, but that's a fault I'm willing to overlook Fact or Fiction needs no introduction, if anything it should be noted I'm apparently notorious for missing it out more less accidentally from lists I build.
In terms of stuff that could go in and help smooth matters out, Chord of Calling would be pretty sweet, as would Sylvan Scrying (fetching Nykthos and Reliquary Tower already makes this worth it). Those are sitting around on the outskirts, waiting for stuff to underperform. For now I"m quite happy with where the list is. It's got the potential to do stupid stuff, but is high-variance enough to get away with it when it does happen.
I papered the list out, minus two cards that I made the mistake of ordering from Italy. It's been over two weeks and not a trace of them. The swaps are just last-minut efficiency tweaks before I debut the deck in paper on Saturday, following up on musings I made in the last post. Sylvan Scrying gets Nykthos, fixing or can also act as a Thought Vessel proxy by going for Reliquary Tower, so that made sense to include. Chord is Chord. Nothing really bad is in the 99, so I took out the most eh card in Tidal Courier. I'm a bit worried this brings me down to 20 fish sticks, but I should hopefully be okay as long as I don't go pillaging for more utility slots.
Upon first setting eyes on Tatyova, Benthic Druid I saw the uncommon rarity and brewed a PDH deck around her. Hey, a PDH deck that's also EDH legal! The perfect way to get something low-power together. However, the list was just 20+ ramp spells of varying shades of bad topped up with pretty much every single UG combo commons can muster. When playing willingly constrained lists, they often have to stoop to varying levels of filth to do something. As such, the list was pretty much dead on arrival, and I never really considered Tatyova for an inclusion here as I was stuck thinking about her in that light. So yeah, Tatyova makes sense as an include here. Seeing more cards is always nice, and this deck tends to play lands and ramp. What really makes Tatyova tick, to the point of running panoramas in the PDH version? Fetches.
So yeah. Fetches in. Also dual in, seeing how the fetches mean eight proxy copies of it in the list, and UG gets the short end of the stick on the land front a lot - where are our tango and bicycle lands? Urgh. My MTG spending has been reasonably low recently, and the only way these boys are going is up (thank you so much, reserved list and ample buyouts!), so may as well. No Crucible as the deck is quite draw happy and usually gets something going, and in fact a lot of the lands are not just fetch spam. The Tatyova cut is Beastmaster Ascension, not because the Ascension is bad or anything but it doesn't shine quite as bright here as it could. The counter option built into Kumena leads to a critical fish mass going hard overboard with P/T effortlessly, especially if untaps come around as well. Plus hey, this way I get to bump the fish count, as hoped for!
The problem with Wake Thrasher is that he's just a gigantic vanilla beefslab with no built in evasion. My interactions with a 20+ power Tishana lead me to believe that just having a ginormous body doesn't solve problems by itself (however, having that body come with a no hand size clause and a fat refill is reason enough to keep her).
The list has become a touch too combo happy for my liking. Thing is, none of the pieces that come together to result in an infinite are actually explicit combo pieces, they all work well within the deck. One notable class of interactions is Intruder Alarm/Paradox Engine + Earthcraft, the other is Merrow Reejery + Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx. Both really come together with Surgespanner. You'd think that having four-card combos, with very limited tutoring, would be fine. However, the list's draw is so heavy something usually comes together. As such, I'm depowering things a bit by taking out Earthcraft.
So why Earthcraft? Intruder Alarm gets dumb amounts of value off other people doing stuff, Merrow Reejery has the decency of being a fish (and a lord to boot), Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx ramps out the wazoo. As such, it's marginally less all-around useful. The other two cuts are just rather weak spots - Vanquisher's Banner helps other tribes a lot, but given the fact pretty much all fish does is lords and draw this is quite redundant at five. Plus, the ridiculous Kindred Discovery still lives and isn't going anywhere. Harvest Season is a bit awkward, as it feels best when cast in a turbo winmore fashion.
Sword of Feast and Famine is not quite Nature's Will, but I own one and the topic of swords keeps returning to haunt me every now and then. Original drafts of this list, before they even went up on MTGS, had some swords as they play well with Kumena. Those got taken out early in playtesting due to negative reception. Guess what the reception is like now that the list seems to piece combos together just about always? Bit of a lesser evil here, and should hopefully solve the recurring sword issue to some degree (even if Fire/Ice and Jitte remain unused). Cauldron of Souls is a better five mana artifact as it repeatedly shields against wraths (once five fish are hit, you just tap them after they return), including in a less powerhouse fashion early on before critical fishness is assembled. Mistcaller is a decent one-drop, and I could use more serviceable fish. This nominally creates the possibility of ending up with a turn three Kumena as the third fish. Hope that happens some time. I can't think of any other one-drop fish that would actually merit a slot, unfortunately.
I'd have suggested Rootwater Diver as a 1cmc pick, but you have next-to-no artifacts, so, yeah, that's not a great suggestion.
Slightly off-topic, but given your experience with this deck, I figured you'd be a good person to ask: Switching to Tuvasa seems like it would be a downgrade, right? While she adds white (wraths, enchantment tutoring, Schoolmaster), I think not having constant access to Kumena derails the plan too much. Just wondered your thoughts on tacking on the third color.
Slightly off-topic, but given your experience with this deck, I figured you'd be a good person to ask: Switching to Tuvasa seems like it would be a downgrade, right? While she adds white (wraths, enchantment tutoring, Schoolmaster), I think not having constant access to Kumena derails the plan too much. Just wondered your thoughts on tacking on the third color.
Just because Tuvasa is a fish does not make her a fish commander. She's more like Daxos the Returned - a way to make an enchantment-centric deck have more of an endgame. I guess if you were to go Bant you could go for Derevi as that's more value with the typical evasive fish plan. Does adding white offer enough benefit to offset the loss of Kumena value out of the command zone though?
I'm not one to stray into tribal waters. I prefer my commanders kooky and my builds weird, whereas dabbling with a tribe explicitly supported in the last block, after a good few releases full of tribal-minded stuff no less, is the equivalent of the EDH top 40 hits list. Nevertheless, I saw a friend sling a hilarious Brago, King Eternal golem tribal deck, I got the itch to do something along those lines. I knew I had to run Kindred Discovery as that card is bonkers, and I would have liked to include my good swords plus Jitte. My long time MTG overseer Ebline once again shed wisdom - merfolk. Goddammit. As such, the first spin on Kumena was borderline ironic, tapping into all the cliches of a tribal list. It somehow played super fun. I eventually shed most of the swords after a vehemently negative reception in playtesting with my meta, and started explicitly tapping into the strengths of the list.
1 Kumena, Tyrant of Orazca
Ramp City
1 Birds of Paradise
1 Cultivate
1 Dowsing Dagger
1 Explore
1 Harvest Season
1 Kodama's Reach
1 Mana Crypt
1 Nature's Will
1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
1 Sol Ring
1 Sword of Feast and Famine
1 Sylvan Scrying
Assorted Fish Sticks
1 Benthic Biomancer
1 Darting Merfolk
1 Fallowsage
1 Herald of Secret Streams
1 Jungleborn Pioneer
1 Kiora's Follower
1 Lord of Atlantis
1 Lullmage Mentor
1 Master of the Pearl Trident
1 Merfolk Mistbinder
1 Merfolk Skydiver
1 Merrow Reejerey
1 Mistcaller
1 Overtaker
1 Reef Shaman
1 Sea Scryer
1 Seafloor Oracle
1 Stonybrook Banneret
1 Surgespanner
1 Tatyova, Benthic Druid
1 Thrasios, Triton Hero
1 Tishana, Voice of Thunder
1 Waterfront Bouncer
1 Whirlpool Rider
1 Deeproot Waters
1 Kindred Discovery
1 Seahunter
Magical Fish Sticks - Untap!
1 Awakening
1 Intruder Alarm
1 Merrow Commerce
1 Murkfiend Liege
1 Quest for Renewal
1 Paradox Engine
1 Seedborn Muse
Draw/Tutors/Recursion Corner
1 Bident of Thassa
1 Chord of Calling
1 Defense of the Heart
1 Eternal Witness
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Worldly Tutor
Permission/Protection/Removal
1 Beast Within
1 Cauldron of Souls
1 Cyclonic Rift
1 Counterspell
1 Forbid
1 Heroic Intervention
1 Inspiring Call
1 Mystic Snake
1 Nullmage Shepherd
1 Pongify
1 Rapid Hybridization
Lands.dec
1 Alchemist's Refuge
1 Breeding Pool
1 Command Tower
1 Flooded Grove
1 Flooded Strand
5 Forest
1 Hinterland Harbor
7 Island
1 Minamo, School at Water's Edge
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Mosswort Bridge
1 Mutavault
1 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
1 Path of Ancestry
1 Polluted Delta
1 Reflecting Pool
1 Reliquary Tower
1 Scalding Tarn
1 Tropical Island
1 Unclaimed Territory
1 Winding Canyons
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Windswept Heath
1 Wooded Foothills
1 Yavimaya Coast
The plan is simple, really - get value from all the fish, clock people a bunch, hopefully land an untapper and start going ham in everybody else's turns. There's a smidgen of combo potential, but it requires multiple pieces, so it's not gonna come around that often. The deck is easily the most casual thing I've slung and liked. That's what you call something with ridiculous amounts of variance that can either shoot for the stars or fall on its face, right?
1 Kumena, Tyrant of Orazca
Ramp City
1 Birds of Paradise
1 Cultivate
1 Earthcraft
1 Harvest Season
1 Kodama's Reach
1 Mana Crypt
1 Nature's Will
1 Oracle of Mul Daya
1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
1 Sol Ring
1 Thought Vessel
Assorted Fish Sticks
1 Cold-Eyed Selkie
1 Coralhelm Commander
1 Empress Galina
1 Fallowsage
1 Forerunner of the Heralds
1 Herald of Secret Streams
1 Jungleborn Pioneer
1 Kiora's Follower
1 Lord of Atlantis
1 Lullmage Mentor
1 Master of the Pearl Trident
1 Merfolk Mistbinder
1 Merfolk Sovereign
1 Merrow Harbinger
1 Merrow Reejerey
1 Seafloor Oracle
1 Silvergill Adept
1 Stonybrook Banneret
1 Surgespanner
1 Thada Adel, Acquisitor
1 Tidal Courier
1 Tishana, Voice of Thunder
1 Wistful Selkie
1 Deeproot Waters
1 Herald's Horn
1 Kindred Discovery
1 Seahunter
1 Vanquisher's Banner
Bonus Fish Power!
1 Curse of Bounty
1 Merrow Commerce
1 Murkfiend Liege
1 Quest for Renewal
1 Seedborn Muse
Draw/Tutors/Recursion/GG NO RE Corner
1 Beastmaster Ascension
1 Eternal Witness
1 Lifecrafter's Bestiary
1 Path of Discovery
1 Sun Quan, Lord of Wu
1 Survival of the Fittest
1 Sylvan Library
1 Worldly Tutor
1 Zendikar Resurgent
Permission/Protection/Removal
1 Beast Within
1 Cyclonic Rift
1 Counterspell
1 Disallow
1 Heroic Intervention
1 Inspiring Call
1 Mana Drain
1 Mystic Snake
1 Pongify
1 Rapid Hybridization
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Alchemist's Refuge
1 Breeding Pool
1 Command Tower
1 Flooded Grove
1 Flooded Strand
6 Forest
1 Halimar Depths
1 Hinterland Harbor
8 Island
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Mosswort Bridge
1 Path of Ancestry
1 Polluted Delta
1 Reliquary Tower
1 Scalding Tarn
1 Strip Mine
1 Temple of Mystery
1 Tropical Island
1 Unclaimed Territory
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Windswept Heath
1 Wooded Foothills
1 Yavimaya Coast
14.02.2018 Changes
1 Coralhelm Commander
1 Disallow
1 Flooded Strand
1 Herald's Horn
1 Lifecrafter's Bestiary
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Path of Discovery
1 Polluted Delta
1 Scalding Tarn
1 Tropical Island
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Windswept Heath
1 Wooded Foothills
1 Awakening
1 Forbid
3 Forest
1 Intruder Alarm
4 Island
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Opposition
1 Terrain Generator
18.02.2018 Changes
1 Forest
2 Island
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Silvergill Adept
1 Strip Mine
1 Terrain Generator
1 Wistful Selkie
1 Minamo, School at Water's Edge
1 Mutavault
1 Nullmage Shepherd
1 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
1 Reflecting Pool
1 Sigil Tracer
1 Winding Canyons
1 Whirlpool Rider
02.03.2018 Changes
1 Curse of Bounty
1 Merfolk Sovereign
1 Sun Quan, Lord of Wu
1 Bident of Thassa
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Paradox Engine
07.03.2018 Changes
1 Thought Vessel
1 Tidal Courier
1 Chord of Calling
1 Sylvan Scrying
09.05.2018 Changes
1 Beastmaster Ascension
3 Forest
1 Halimar Depths
3 Island
1 Temple of Mystery
1 Flooded Strand
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Polluted Delta
1 Scalding Tarn
1 Tatyova, Benthic Druid
1 Tropical Island
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Windswept Heath
1 Wooded Foothills
01.08.2018 Changes
1 Earthcraft
1 Harvest Season
1 Vanquisher's Banner
1 Cauldron of Souls
1 Mistcaller
1 Sword of Feast and Famine
02.09.2018 Changes
1 Cold-Eyed Selkie
1 Empress Galina
1 Sylvan Library
1 Rootwater Diver
1 Sea Scryer
1 Waterfront Bouncer
11.09.2018 Changes
1 Forerunner of the Heralds
1 Mana Drain
1 Merrow Harbinger
1 Opposition
1 Zendikar Resurgent
1 Darting Merfolk
1 Dowsing Dagger
1 Exploration
1 Harvest Season
1 Thrasios, Triton Hero
RNA Change
1 Rootwater Diver
1 Benthic Biomancer
So, capitalising on that, let's streamline the deck a little:
1 Coralhelm Commander
1 Disallow
1 Flooded Strand
1 Herald's Horn
1 Lifecrafter's Bestiary
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Path of Discovery
1 Polluted Delta
1 Scalding Tarn
1 Tropical Island
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Windswept Heath
1 Wooded Foothills
1 Awakening
1 Forbid
3 Forest
1 Intruder Alarm
4 Island
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Opposition
1 Terrain Generator
A number of weaker utility pieces get taken out to focus on the main game play. Coralhelm Commander may be a lord, but he also costs a total of 6 mana to get his lord abilities online. Herald's Horn is subtle acceleration and the occasional bonus card, but its effect is too minor. Similarly, no matter how much of a soft spot I may have for Lifecrafter's Bestiary, the payoff is not quite up to the standards set by slightly more expensive options. Path of Discovery similarly suffers a bit, and is quite awkward to sequence for whatever reason. Those get replaced with Awakening, another untap effect with a handy timing clause that stacks with everything else. True, it's symmetric, but you'll probably get the most bang for your buck. Intruder Alarm should keep triggering left right and centre, and the increased draw cost in comparison to Azami should hopefully keep it reasonably in check. Mystical Tutor is a missing piece of utility, as I started building the deck from fish sticks and didn't have room to include all the sensible everyday functionality cardboard. Opposition is a new piece of payoff, allowing for the fish to potentially control the board a bit. Disallow for Forbid is a pretty straight swap, granting some more recurring permission. Also, I realistically admitted in front of myself I'm not getting a Tropical Island any time soon, and some play testing with Crucible of Worlds left it sitting in hand or discarded quite often as the deck had a good thing going land drop wise without it around, so I swapped out the dual + fetches mana base combo for some basics and a Terrain Generator.
Cryptolith rite is earthcraft v2
Throne of the god-pharaoh is an alternative wincon
Tradewind rider is surgespanner v2
Nullmage shepherd I think has better potential in this deck than reclamation sage
You can go bonkers with cryptic gateway esp with intruder alarm in the deck!
Dear god PARADOX ENGINE nuff said!!
Food for thought!!!
As I said my list went bant and I’ve gone a stax route in order to fully capitalise upon my multi untap abilities, thus no awaken for me!
I also get what your saying re Shepard but I also have the luxury of aura shards in my deck!
Have you considered using minamo School at waters edge? GREAT with Empress G and the new legendary change for planewalkers!!!
Speaking of lands I run Holdout Settlement (there is also Survivors Encampment) just to provide another tap ability for creatures.
I to am starting to warm to your thoughts of removing Coralhelm Commander. Might replace it with Cloudstone Curio, as combined with Cryptic Gateway and Intruder alarm things can go bonkers...
Ps sorry for not making the links for each card I suggest on your forum simply put I’ve forgotten how too! Doh
Technical note - the deck can pull off an infinite combo now. However, both the pieces for it are enchantments, and as such cannot be tutored at all, making it a very rare occurrence. The game was quite interesting, actually - three wipes happened, and I had huge trouble getting enough fish online to do anything relevant. I failed to draw any of my non-Kumena draw options, my hand was depleted, things were pretty grim. I popped the world's saddest Tishana for three cards. I had to Beast Within my own Mana Crypt as I was veering dangerously close to single digits and I had to keep the dude with True Conviction off his flying beefslab via Opposition. I eventually clawed my way to a Zendikar Resurgent, and I suddenly gummed up the board with some tiny irrelevant bodies that let me cantrip through about as many cards in one turn as I'd previously seen all game. Claw my way to ten power on board after yet another piece of self-removal (Pongify on my Birds of Paradise), flip the Ewit sitting under Mosswort Bridge, Tishana 2.0, this time everything is swole. Acquire healthy dollop of cardboard to hand. Realise there's potential for Earthcraft + Intruder Alarm. So, essentially, like a turbocharged version of the interaction from earlier, with a stupid amount of mana on tap for each creature that hits, and a repeatable drawstick in the command zone. Go to town, draw a bunch, locate Surgespanner, locate Jungleborn Pioneer, get two untaps per cast of that, start 'spanning everyone's boards to hand. Boom. Thankfully this is not going to happen regularly, but it's fun to know it's possible. It's also quite funny how originally I was all leery towards Paradox Engine for potentially allowing something like this to happen, and now I've got Intruder Alarm interactions which are actually cheaper and stronger.
Here's a bunch of largely mana-base-centric tweaks in preparation for the papering:
1 Forest
2 Island
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Silvergill Adept
1 Strip Mine
1 Terrain Generator
1 Wistful Selkie
1 Minamo, School at Water's Edge
1 Mutavault
1 Nullmage Shepherd
1 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
1 Reflecting Pool
1 Sigil Tracer
1 Winding Canyons
1 Whirlpool Rider
Why yes, Nykthos gives many manas, is gud idea. It's not uncommon for its payoff to be bigger than what Gaea's Cradle would have fetched as I also park a sizeable amount of enchantment real estate on the board. It gets funky with Merrow Reejery. It also gets funky with Minamo, School at Water's Edge, which can also be used to untap Empress Galina or some other legendary fish stick in a pinch for whatever reason. I somehow missed Reflecting Pool so I'm fixing the oversight. Alchemist's Refuge has been pretty grand, so I'm doubling up on the effect with Winding Canyons. Mutavault can become a fish stick in a dire hour of need and help draw a card or whatever. Needed to make room, so swallowed up some basics and Strip Mine + Terrain Generator. The deck can only support so many colourless lands, and these are the least good.
Since it's Worker Management o'clock, I'm gonna risk it and ram Nullmage Shepherd over Reclamation Sage. True, Recsage is unconditional, but this is yet another fishstick tap sink! And all it takes is as many other bodies as you'd need to draw a card, and stuff like Oracle of Mul Daya can help too if needed! It's going to be okay. Ran the list by Ebline for last-second feedback before paperification, he pointed out the ETB-to-draw dorks aren't that good. I asked him for playable recommendations, he offered a potpourri of choices from which I picked out Sigil Tracer and Whirlpool Rider. Finding a wizard friend for the former shouldn't be too hard given the numerous tutor options, and the fact that some of the deck's best fish sticks (like Surgespanner) qualify. I'm slightly weary of the latter, but I can imagine it's going to change the moment I ship a largely exploited hand of debris and get a bit more gas.
I was considering adding Cryptolith Rite and Tradewind Rider for the longest time, but decided against it for the time being. They're both tamer versions of effects in the deck, and the explosiveness/element of surprise the superior versions offer can make really silly things happen.
In other news, the two new fish sticks add welcome options to the arsenal. Sigil Tracer can double removal or nick some cool utility from other people, while Whirlpool Rider can restock options. It's not uncommon to have a large hand of land and other assorted debris which this attempts to reset to gas. The deck's quite temperamental in execution, I think I'm seeing the other side of RNG after a prolonged streak of fortunate draws. At least given the arrangement of the 99 I can toss all sorts of utility/interaction around if I can't get a good tool of fish sticks going, so that's something.
Also, I know it's not untapping, but ... Wanderwine Prophets?
You know, taking an extra turn could technically count as untapping
I feel like you could run Eldrazi Monument to protect your board, seeing as you have a ton of token production. Plus solid evasion is always good.
Well, I've run it on occasion, and generally, the extra turn thing worked about 50% of the time. But when it worked, I was often able to chain together multiple hits and get multiple turns for the low price of a dead fish.
Now, to be fair, I was often running them in a wizard shell, where Archetype of Imagination already had a home. But even without that, Rogue's Passage was often in there (especially in a two-color deck), and you are already running some evasion for your fish. If you don't mind upping the curve just a tad, Deepchannel Mentor is a card that did lots of work in decks where I wanted to swing over and be sure of connecting (and is a fish, too).
Anyway, just some thoughts!
The deck seems to be quite high variance - the opposite end of these comboriffic interactions are scenarios when you have no fish, no untappers, and bits of utility in your hand. This is an inherent trait of the list and nothing can be done about it, really. The only way to make it really go away would be to invest heavier into combo and add some Isochron Scepter and Azami interactions, which would transform the deck into a full-blown combo engine that I'm not fully comfortable it becoming. However, I can smooth out some of the nooks and crannies in the list by swapping out some underperformers for preferable options.
1 Curse of Bounty
1 Merfolk Sovereign
1 Sun Quan, Lord of Wu
1 Bident of Thassa
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Paradox Engine
Curse of Bounty is the most situational of the untappers. You essentially have to commit Kumena and a fish stick to rip an untap, and if your board is swole enough people sure as heck won't go out of their way to offer you extra untaps in their turns. Merfolk Sovereign is pretty average as far as three drops go, and that spot is a bit sensitive on the curve as the commander lives there too. Sun Quan, Lord of Wu is very nice, I have nothing but the best to say about horsemanship, but he does also happen to cost six mana and only respond to half the creature tutors while Herald of Secret Streams does the same job cheaper (you should probably load up on at least one round of fish swole'ification before you get punching). In turn, Paradox Engine is a slower, crappier Intruder Alarm in the deck, but it's still pretty damn good and since the thing didn't become unplayable after Alarm went in then Engine should have a place too. Drawing cards en masse outside of tapping is pretty darn good, so Bident of Thassa is here to draw cards en masse. True, it doesn't explicitly tap to make Kumena unblockable, but that's a fault I'm willing to overlook
In terms of stuff that could go in and help smooth matters out, Chord of Calling would be pretty sweet, as would Sylvan Scrying (fetching Nykthos and Reliquary Tower already makes this worth it). Those are sitting around on the outskirts, waiting for stuff to underperform. For now I"m quite happy with where the list is. It's got the potential to do stupid stuff, but is high-variance enough to get away with it when it does happen.
With all the untapping, I would definitely recommend Chord of Calling.
1 Thought Vessel
1 Tidal Courier
1 Chord of Calling
1 Sylvan Scrying
I papered the list out, minus two cards that I made the mistake of ordering from Italy. It's been over two weeks and not a trace of them. The swaps are just last-minut efficiency tweaks before I debut the deck in paper on Saturday, following up on musings I made in the last post. Sylvan Scrying gets Nykthos, fixing or can also act as a Thought Vessel proxy by going for Reliquary Tower, so that made sense to include. Chord is Chord. Nothing really bad is in the 99, so I took out the most eh card in Tidal Courier. I'm a bit worried this brings me down to 20 fish sticks, but I should hopefully be okay as long as I don't go pillaging for more utility slots.
1 Beastmaster Ascension
3 Forest
1 Halimar Depths
3 Island
1 Temple of Mystery
1 Flooded Strand
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Polluted Delta
1 Scalding Tarn
1 Tatyova, Benthic Druid
1 Tropical Island
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Windswept Heath
1 Wooded Foothills
So yeah. Fetches in. Also dual in, seeing how the fetches mean eight proxy copies of it in the list, and UG gets the short end of the stick on the land front a lot - where are our tango and bicycle lands? Urgh. My MTG spending has been reasonably low recently, and the only way these boys are going is up (thank you so much, reserved list and ample buyouts!), so may as well. No Crucible as the deck is quite draw happy and usually gets something going, and in fact a lot of the lands are not just fetch spam. The Tatyova cut is Beastmaster Ascension, not because the Ascension is bad or anything but it doesn't shine quite as bright here as it could. The counter option built into Kumena leads to a critical fish mass going hard overboard with P/T effortlessly, especially if untaps come around as well. Plus hey, this way I get to bump the fish count, as hoped for!
The list has become a touch too combo happy for my liking. Thing is, none of the pieces that come together to result in an infinite are actually explicit combo pieces, they all work well within the deck. One notable class of interactions is Intruder Alarm/Paradox Engine + Earthcraft, the other is Merrow Reejery + Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx. Both really come together with Surgespanner. You'd think that having four-card combos, with very limited tutoring, would be fine. However, the list's draw is so heavy something usually comes together. As such, I'm depowering things a bit by taking out Earthcraft.
1 Earthcraft
1 Harvest Season
1 Vanquisher's Banner
1 Cauldron of Souls
1 Mistcaller
1 Sword of Feast and Famine
So why Earthcraft? Intruder Alarm gets dumb amounts of value off other people doing stuff, Merrow Reejery has the decency of being a fish (and a lord to boot), Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx ramps out the wazoo. As such, it's marginally less all-around useful. The other two cuts are just rather weak spots - Vanquisher's Banner helps other tribes a lot, but given the fact pretty much all fish does is lords and draw this is quite redundant at five. Plus, the ridiculous Kindred Discovery still lives and isn't going anywhere. Harvest Season is a bit awkward, as it feels best when cast in a turbo winmore fashion.
Sword of Feast and Famine is not quite Nature's Will, but I own one and the topic of swords keeps returning to haunt me every now and then. Original drafts of this list, before they even went up on MTGS, had some swords as they play well with Kumena. Those got taken out early in playtesting due to negative reception. Guess what the reception is like now that the list seems to piece combos together just about always? Bit of a lesser evil here, and should hopefully solve the recurring sword issue to some degree (even if Fire/Ice and Jitte remain unused). Cauldron of Souls is a better five mana artifact as it repeatedly shields against wraths (once five fish are hit, you just tap them after they return), including in a less powerhouse fashion early on before critical fishness is assembled. Mistcaller is a decent one-drop, and I could use more serviceable fish. This nominally creates the possibility of ending up with a turn three Kumena as the third fish. Hope that happens some time. I can't think of any other one-drop fish that would actually merit a slot, unfortunately.
Slightly off-topic, but given your experience with this deck, I figured you'd be a good person to ask: Switching to Tuvasa seems like it would be a downgrade, right? While she adds white (wraths, enchantment tutoring, Schoolmaster), I think not having constant access to Kumena derails the plan too much. Just wondered your thoughts on tacking on the third color.
(U/B)(U/B)(U/B) JUMP IN THE LINE, ROCK YOUR BODY IN TIME
(R/W)(R/W)(R/W) RISING FROM THE NEON GLOOM, SHINING LIKE A CRAZY MOON
(U/R)(R/G)(G/U) STEALIN' WHEN I SHOULD HAVE BEEN BUYIN'
Huh, I'll actually give it some thought - being able to recur a Bident, Paradox Engine or even Sol Ring/Sword of Feast and Famine is a pretty decent thing to have. Thanks!
Just because Tuvasa is a fish does not make her a fish commander. She's more like Daxos the Returned - a way to make an enchantment-centric deck have more of an endgame. I guess if you were to go Bant you could go for Derevi as that's more value with the typical evasive fish plan. Does adding white offer enough benefit to offset the loss of Kumena value out of the command zone though?