While I'd give her intro-pack version a rating of 0.9 Tibalts, this one clocks in on at least 1.8 Tibalts, which is, let's face it, still not a whole lot.
I'm inclined to say more, but that would just end in another one of my long rants. Let's just say that I'm a bit aggravated and disappointed by getting another forgettable, weak, non-gatewatch walker and be done with this one.
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- RiverWolf13
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I know from the Command Zone episode where Josh joins the CAG he states he is in favor of no changes. He is taking a don’t rock the boat, don’t fix what ain’t broke mentality. He also extends that to the idea of planeswalkers as commanders in that episode. I disagree with his arguments againist them, but for now it seems to be the way it will go for awhile.
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But what if we could build a deck that was designed to make an ally. We could walk into a free-for-all game and turn it into a 2v1v1. So the important question is: What cards would we include to best support our ally that we could then use later to win the 1v1?
It is not "Group Hug." This deck doesn't want to make friends with everyone, just one. Think of it more of a "Fist Bump" instead.
It is not about "Tabletalk." While good multiplayer strategy involves working the table, I will be focusing solely on card choices and deck design.
It is not Rattlesnake or Judo. These are great strategies and you would certainly consider using cards that fit these styles it just isn't the focus of this article.
*Information taken from Wikipedia.
Mutualism is a relationship between individuals of different species where both individuals benefit. It plays a key part in ecology; more than 48% of land plants rely on relationships with fungi to provide them with inorganic compounds and trace elements. Mutualism is thought to have driven the evolution of much of the biological diversity we see, such as the flower forms important for pollination and co-evolution between groups of species.
Commensalism is a relationship between two organisms where one organism benefits from the other without affecting it.
Mutual Benefit
At the core of every Fist Bump deck Should be the concept of mutual benefit. The benefit you provide your opponent offsets their instinct to eliminate you. These cards are designed to help both you and your ally succeed. We begin with the cycles introduced in the Commander decks.
Vow Cycle WUBRG
Introduced in the original Commander set, these enchantments embody the Fist Bump style. Most of the cards give +2/+2 an ability and prevent the creature from attacking you or a planeswalker you control. Great on your creatures and on an opponents. All 5 cards earn an A rating.
Duty gives vigilance, a major boost for your voltron style general
Flight, with flying being prevalent in Commannder the ability will often feel redundant. That said a R/G player will appreciate the bump up in evasion/defense.
Lightning provides first strike. This is a good ability for voltron style generals coupled with trample/deathtouch/infect etc.
Malice gives intimidate, it's a great incentive for a player to swing knowing they could go unblocked.
Wildness goes all in on damage, it gives trample and +3/+3.
Tempting Offer CycleWUBRG
Debuting in the Commander 2013 set, the cycle offers each opponent a chance to benefit, and then multiplies that effect for you. These cards can turn into full on Group Hug, but it is usually heavily dependent on the playstyle of your opponents.
Tempt with Vengeance makes a large number of tokens, this can pay off big if multiple opponents take the offer: A-
Tempt with Discovery runs the risk of being an overpriced Sylvan Scrying or underpoweredSkyshroud Claim. That said, players like ramping and most will likely take the offer. It is also possible for opponents to get a really powerful land. You should definitely consider fetching a Wasteland or Strip Mine: B-
Tempt with Reflections draws an immediate comparison with Rite of Replication. This card is further restricted in targeting a creature you control: C
Tempt with Immortality: is a bit overpriced for it's effect and has serious potential to backfire: D
Tempt with Glory is the highest costing Glorious Anthem ever. The only players willing to take this offer will have a bigger army than you: D-
Offering CycleWUBRG
Released with the Commander 2014 Decks, this cycle gives an equal benefit to you and up to two other opponents of your choice.
Sylvan Offering makes one big treefolk, and many small elf tokens. The nice thing about this card is the cost, elf decks benefit, as is anything that counts creatures entering the battlefield like Soul Warden: B
Benevolent Offering gives three flying spirit tokens, and then life gain based on the number of creatures you control. This card is nice because you can gain life of off the tokens you make with this. You can also choose to get stingy and give the life gain away to someone who doesn't have any creatures. Instant speed , but not a fan of the cost though: C+
Infernal Offering reads for you: sacrifice a creature, draw 2 cards, and then return any creature in your graveyard to play for 4B. I think this effect is good enough to see play in a number of BG decks by itself. Having the option to kill a lone creature, or help an opponent bring back a key creature is just icing on the cake: A
Intellectual Offering gives three cards, then untaps all nonland permanents at instant speed. Instant speed card draw, combat trick, and potentially free with mana dorks/rocks: A-
Volcanic Offering will destroy two nonbasic lands and kill two creatures and can never backfire. This can cause a big swing in the game and still works perfectly in a 1v1 situation: A
Hijack Cycle WUR
Sometimes making a friend takes a little coercion. Sometimes deterring a threat requires some strong arm tactics. Cards in this group don't outright steal creatures but they give a strong incentive to go pick a fight elsewhere.
Flowstone Blade benefits your ally by buffing their attack. However, if you overpower the creature you can kill even indestructible creatures. Due to the R cost you have to be all in on red or heavily red to use effectively. Three color decks just can't make full use: C
Pemmin's Aura is an aura version of Morphling. It gives the ability to untap, flying, shroud, and comes with a reversible colorless Flowstone Blade ability: A
Vanishing is a classic general protection choice. It also doubles as removal againist opposing creatures. Use it on your opponent's awesome creature and let them wreck your enemies worry free from removal: A
Flickerform is the white version of Vanishing that does almost the same thing. Honestly they should have just used phasing for this card. The expensive ability cost keeps this card from a higher rating: C
Phantom Wings is as good as a Seal of Removal but adds flying to the creature as well. Stellar card to have with Bruna, Light of Alabaster: B
Ghostly Wings is the under powered version of Phantom Wings. Still a good choice for Bruna as she can recover a discarded aura: C
Sun Clasp is a white version of Phantom Wings. Note you can activate the return ability multiple times if necessary. If you run Bruna, consider these enchantments: B
Freed from the Real should be used cautiously. Use it only on a creature you need to lockdown or one that has a tap ability and can benefit. Using it indiscriminately can cause your ally to resent this strong lockdown potential. That said, this card is great on commanders with tap abilities like Merieke Ri Berit, Vorel of the Hull Clade, Phenax, God of Deception, etc: B+
Second Wind same rules as Freed from the Real, no mana to activate, but you can only use it once: B-
Laccolith Rig is a pet favorite of mine. When the creature becomes blocked, it gains Super Strike. You get to redirect the creatures damage to any other creature and it happens before First/Double Strike damage. You can even ask your ally to attack you, as long as you can block, and you can assassinate any other creature with a simple chump block.
Advocate Cycle WG
Introduced in Judgement, the advocate cycle is a series of Green or White creatures that give you a repeatable benefit in exchange for returning cards from an opponent's graveyard to their hand. In free for all this can be a great way to make an ally or help stop an out of control threat by returning counter spells, removal, etc. This can also deny key cards from a dredge/reanimator deck or can take advantage of a mill deck.
Spurnmage two cards for destroying an attacking creature. Great rattlesnake card: A-
Forcemage one card for a +1/+1 counter. Pathetic, stay away from this trash: D
Nullmage two cards for destroying an artifact or enchantment. Solid control card, you will always have plenty or targets: B+
Pulsemage three cards for reanimation to battlefield only has value as good as the creature you bring back. Pair it with Yosei, the Morning Star and a sac outlet for complete lockdown. A or B, depends heavily on your build.
Shieldmage one card for damage prevention from a source. Cheapest cost, but a weaker ability. Good for a cleric or pillow fort deck and plays nicely with other players: C
Life Gain WBG
An old version of lifelink, the Spirit Link ability causes the controller of the enchantment to gain life, not the creature's controller. This can give a pseudo protection againist attacks as the life you lose is replaced. (Disclaimer: If you get dealt lethal damage, you will die before recovering. Also it win't stop losing from having 21 points of commander damage dealt to you, or infect, or annihilator.)These cards will not benefit your ally directly but give you a nice boost when they attack. Generally, you could count these as extra Vows.
Spirit Link is the original life gain enchantment. If you can target a crazy damage creature like say Ashling the Pilgrim or Heartless Hidetsugu it combos nicely: B
Vampiric Link is the color-shifted version of Spirit Link from the Time Spiral Block: B
Soul Link adds the extra clause of gaining life when they take damage as well. In EDH, most creatures go unblocked anyway and the higher mana cost doesn't justify the marginal gain in life: C
Luminous Wake is an overcosted, undereffective version listed here only for the sake of completeness:D
Armadillo Cloak is simply amazing: lifegain, trample, +2/+2 all in one. This card acts like a Vow in that the lifegain discourages attacks, but it also provides a substantial boost and very useful ability for your ally: A
A Friend in Need
These cards provide you and an opponent a benefit, but usually requires a formal alliance to maximize benefit for both of you.
Rainbow Vale is a great land for the politically minded player piloting 3+ color decks. It fixes mana for you and a potential ally: A
Forbidden Orchard fixes your mana and gives your opponent creatures to attack or block with: B+
Goblin Cadets can act as an extra blocker or attacker, plus its amusing (a bonus for making friends): C
Humble Defector is insane card draw. Two extra cards per turn starting on turn three plus a powerful incentive for your opponent to keep you around. You will make the other players jealous and they will suddenly try to befriend you or your ally: A+
Asking for Favors
Curiosity Cycle UBG
These cards draw you a card when a creature deals damage to a player. Really more useful as a combo card. You can get some mileage out of these in the right build. These cards provide no real benefit to your ally and don't protect you from their attacks so use them sparingly.
Betrayal is great since it doesn't require damage only tapping. This pairs well with ability creatures or creatures that untap like Merrow Levitator: B+
Curiosity is a signature combo card with Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind: B
Keen Sense is the color-shifted version of Curiosity: B
Ophidan Eye is the overcosted version with flash : C
Sleeper's Robe requires combat damage but gives fear as a tradeoff: B
Thassa's Emissary also requires combat damage and has the highest cost to enchant, but it gives a +3/+3 bonus and triggers off of a player taking damage. Use it if you think you can trist your ally not to turn around and kill you instead: C
One with Nature doesn't draw a card, but it does give you mana ramp, which is pretty cool: B
Parasitism
So you sit down at a table, you know the commanders, you may even know the other players. Before turn one, you have made up your mind as to who is going to be the biggest threat. You may be able to convince your would be allies of the necessity of taking out that player first. But it would be even better to give them an incentive. This is where Curse and Oath style cards come in handy. The trick is to evaluate which ones are going to benefit you the most, without auto-winning for your opponents.
C17 Curse Cycle UBR, but not WG
This is a neat cycle of curses released in Commander 17. The gist is whenever the cursed player is attacked, you get a benefit and the attacking player gets the same benefit.
Curse of Opulence is hands down the best curse of this cycle and contender for best curse ever. First, at 1 cmc, it pays for itself with just one attack! Second, it features a very desirable reward for other players, a mana boost. Allowing other people to play their decks is the core of the Fist Bump style. Lastly, the card gives Treasure and has gold coins in the art, people love gold treasure: S
Curse of Verbosity takes a close second. People love drawing cards, and most likely the player you hit this with played a Rhystic Study or some such nonsense, so its only fair. The fact that it has the same cmc as Rhystic Study makes it an easy, low-cost replacement: A-
Curse of Disturbance is fun, not broken way to generate some warm(undead) bodies on the board. The great part to this card is it is self-sustaining. As soon as a player gets a 2/2 Zombie, they can safely attack with it because, heck they'll just get another one: B-
Curse of Bounty and Curse of Vitality should not be used. Vitality is weak unless you are a lifegain deck like Ayli or Karlov. Bounty has way too much potential for UG mana-dork/rock decks to abuse. Don't get me wrong, Curse of Bounty is a fantastic card, with tons of potential for abuse, I just think most Fist Bump decks will regret it: C-
ReCycle UB
So creatures are going to die, its expected that someone is going to Wraththe board or maindeck spot removal. These types of cards are well represented in the format, so I'll just list some of the better ones.
- Reanimate
- Animate Dead
- Dance of the Dead
- Necromancy
Here is a fun cycle of cards that "save" a creature. These cards wait for the creature to die, then return them to play under your control. They are budget friendly and can act as a Seal style card, buying a little deterrence against a trigger happy Wrath player.Commander Options
While there are commanders for just about any color combination, certain generals lend themselves to the Fist Bump strategy better than others.
Group Hug
Fist Bump differs from Group Hug in that it doesn't want to help everyone. Group Hug is happy to play cards like Collective Voyage. That said, these generals are well recognized as being friendly and they do open up the option for a hybrid Group Hug/ Fist Bump.
Phelddagrif is the original everybody's friend card. Fun to play and telegraphs your deckstyle. Players will line up to get on your good side.
Zedruu the Greathearted is a great win-win card. You can play wide giving help to multiple players or focus on just one ally.
Political
Diaochan, Artful Beauty is a bit restrictive being mono-red; however her ability is quite powerful if you can team up with someone. It allows you to murder at least two creatures a turn. Later in the 1v1 you can give her shroud or pro red to protect her from herself.
Tasigur, the Golden Fang can be abused by manipulating your graveyard or by making a friend. If you play friendly cards with your ally, they will more likely choose good cards to return to you. In this way, Tasigur i plays a support role to Fist Bump.
Athreos, God of Passage can be used best with a cooperative opponent, as long as it’s not a Relentless Rats style deck.
Voltron
Considering the heavy presence of auras in Fist Bump, Voltron style generals would do very well. Cards like Vow of Duty work for your creatures too; so it's ok to invest in them. A voltron general shows your opponents and ally how you plan to win the game though. Just about any voltron general will do well, here are some standouts for Fist Bump.
Bruna, Light of Alabaster negates the two-for-one downside of auras.
Ruhan of the Fomori is a great cheap choice for the colors. He is a 7/7 making him a natural 3 hit kill. My personal choice for Fist Bump.
This article is meant to be a starting point for conversation. Post cards, decks and discussion below.
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Creature - Wall
Defender
If a card would enter or leave the graveyard, exile it instead.
With the cemetary full, Purgatory remained the only escape for the living and the dead.
0/3
Request: Meld Mini Game
The first player creates a wall with the Meld mechanic.
The second player creates another wall that melds with the first.
The third player makes the combined melded wall.
Each player should still provide a request for the next.
All walls should be non-legendary.
Look at Graf Rats, Midnight Scavengers and Chittering Host for guidance.
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Whenever possible, justify your attacks based on the following strategy:
Aggro Playbook
1) Kill the combo player(s)
2) Kill the control player(s)
Alternative) Kill the player who has been playing Magic the longest.
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Can we please make the Tibalt a proper unit of measure for evaluating cards?
How many tibalts is a Jace, the Mindsculptor?
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These cards all strongly follow the style guide for cat humanoids and highlight what I am referring to about the shoulder/head/neck profile.
Also I was imagining him either for Duel or a two color deck, as a general his cmc is fine but he is only ok as a general.
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I figure that everyone gets embalmed. But only special people get elaboate masks over their face. The flavor text could be read to emphasize that a blank face covered in only linen is mediocre.
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So some players will be buying boxes and some will draft and others will do both. Among the players who draft, most are really excited to play with the awesome archetypes or 4C+ decks possible. However there are a few players(3-4) who will go through the draft round and then drop out without playing. We understand they are money drafting and heck we are all heading in hoping to get good trade value or a sweet modern card we need for our decks, so no judgement.
But when you draft and dash, you leave the rest of the players in a bind. Either there is an odd number of players and someone has to get a bye (with no prize payout) and stand around bored OR you leave the group with a smaller even number of players to match up with. The dedicated drafters get a little upset with this cause it leaves us with awkward matchups.
So my question is this: How can we discourage draft and dash or encourage them to stay. Again for this event we won't be doing a prize payout, and I'm sure the owner will not want to do anything extreme like banning players. I hope there is something simple and positive out there that other LGS do.
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The problem came when I used my Lazav clone mill deck. She felt that she wasnt interacting with me. The problem was my other decks were similar. Either I tried to sweep the game or I was a noninteractive combo deck. Also playing 1v1 didnt help. We had better games when my buddy would come over.
I will say it is nice when you can build a deck that isnt degenerate and sit down with others and have a good time. I like pulling out my political Ruhan deck then.