Category: Commander 2015 - Life... Successfully

Silent Sentinel - A Magic the Gathering (MTG) Card Review

12/1/2016

by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

One of the pre-release promo cards for Born of the Gods, Silent Sentinel has proven itself over the years to be a useful way to get back Enchantments in Commander. The Silent Sentinel is a 4/6 flying Archon that costs 5 colorless and 2 White to cast. Whenever it attacks, you may return a target Enchantment card from your graveyard to the battlefield.

While a 7-drop like this never saw 60-card Constructed play, it was clearly a pretty powerful effect for Commander right from the beginning. Being able to recycle Enchantments is quite powerful. You can discard something like Omniscience (which makes all of your cards have no mana cost to play) and bring it into play with one swing from the Sentinel. Being a trigger ability upon declaring an attack is particularly awesome, as the attack doesn't even need to deal damage to work.

There's another cool caveat to Silent Sentinel's ability. If you choose an Aura from the graveyard, you get to choose any legal target that it could attach to. However, since you aren't casting the Enchantment, the Aura technically doesn't target. This means that you can actually attach Auras to creatures with shroud (can't be targeted by spells or abilities) or opposing creatures with hexproof (can't be targeted by other player's spells or abilities).

The Sentinel's effect can also bring back the Theros Gods, as they are Enchantments, if they somehow end up in the graveyard. This gave it great synergy with the rest of the Theros block of sets that this card is from. However, the Bestow creatures that could also be alternately cast as Auras can only come back as creatures, since Bestow is an alternate casting cost.

The Commander who most often plays Silent Sentinel in their 99 is Daxos the Returned. This is primarily because the Sentinel was reprinted in the same Commander 2015 preconstructed deck as Daxos. But the Sentinel makes sense in that deck, since Daxos is all about the Enchantments! Other Commanders who have conscripted the Sentinel's services are Bruna, Light of Alabaster, Krond the Dawn-Clad, Uril, the Miststalker, Sigarda, Host of Herons, and Zur the Enchanter.

Silent Sentinel has proven to be a useful toolbox card for any Commander deck that uses a lot of Auras and/or Enchantments. Being able to dump a pricey Enchantment and get it back with a simple declaration of attack is a very powerful effect. While 7 mana is quite an investment, all you have to do is give your Sentinel shroud or hexproof and you should be able to get several activations of its ability, making it a fairly efficient way to recur your favorite Enchantments.

Will Shattergang Brothers and Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest Be Best Buddies? - Magic the Gathering Commander 2015 Q&A

12/1/2015

by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

Shattergang Brothers is a powerful Commander from the Commander 2013. Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest is a Legendary Creature from Commander 2015 who can also be a fairly powerful Commander. As the Shattergang Brothers are concerned with forcing everybody to sacrifice a bunch of things, why not take advantage of all those sacrifices by also playing Mazirek alongside? That does seem like a pretty good plan, doesn't it?

This synergy has been pointed out more than a few times recently, but so far, Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest has been understudy to Commander 2015 mate Meren of Clan Nel Toth and Shattergang Brothers' good friend, Prossh, Skyraider of Kher. The synergy with Prossh is fairly obvious, as Prossh loves to sacrifice creatures and Mazirek gives him quite an extra boost, effectively doubling his own ability while also benefitting any other creatures you may still have out. But the synergy with Shattergang Brothers appears to be even more obvious, as you're getting 2-4 sacrifices at a time in a typical multi-player Commander game. That's a lot of +1/+1 counters you're racking up all of a sudden.

Shattergang Brothers' decks have plenty of creatures and plenty of ways to make more on a consistent basis. It's just a matter of working Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest into the deck. I'm sure plenty of Shattergang Brothers lists will find a way to incorporate this very abuse-able pump ability in the near future. He's not one of the more popular Commanders in the game, but this combination could make the Goblin Brothers much more of a threat than ever before.

Does Daxos the Returned Work With Zur the Enchanter? - Magic the Gathering Commander Q&A

12/1/2015

by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

Daxos the Returned is a Legendary Creature from Commander 2015 that I've briefly reviewed before. While Daxos appears to be more of a "build around me" card in that you need to be running a particularly Enchantment-heavy deck, that doesn't stop players from trying to fit him in their existing Commander decks.

In the 99, Daxos the Returned seems like he could be a good ally for Enchantment-abuser heavy-weight Zur the Enchanter. In fact, it's a question I see asked quite a bit. Can they really join forces and benefit one another?

Previously in my brief initial review of Daxos, I noted that Zur’s ability to put an Enchantment directly into play doesn’t synergize well with Daxos’ experience counter ability. That being said, Zur has a great deal of cheap enchantments (converted mana cost 3 or less) in his deck, many of which you will probably find yourself casting at one point or another.

On paper, it does seem like Daxos the Returned could find a little niche to carve out in this deck. Even if Daxos only nets you a small handful of experience counters while he's on the board, creating a bunch of 3 mana Enchantment creature tokens can't hurt. But the issue is that Daxos's ability makes him far better as a Commander, as once he's removed from the board, Zur doesn't really have an easy way to get him back. So while there is some loose synergy as far as how many Enchantments you would end up casting in a Zur deck, the token plan doesn't really mesh with what Zur is trying to do. That is, lock other players out of the game with a bevy of cheap but effective Enchantments and slowly but surely whittle away your opponents with a protected Zur himself.

Are there other Commanders that could use him effectively as an Ally within the 99? Teysa, Orzhov Scion seems like a good fit, as she's often looking for white creatures to sacrifice in order to exile opposing creatures. Also, because the tokens re both white and black, these tokens benefit from her second ability, as well. In sacrificing those tokens, they become replaced with 1/1 white Spirit tokens with flying. So there is some loose synergy there.. But it's unlikely that you'll amass many experience counters as Teysa only runs a modest amount of Enchantments in her decks.

Daxos's mate from Commander 2015, Karlov of the Ghost Council, does like a bunch of Enchantments in his decks, although the synergy outside of the pure amount of Enchantments you'd be casting isn't obvious. There aren't any other decks in either White/Black or White/Black/Blue that are obvious homes, either.

In White/Black/Green (Abzan), however, there are the popular token-happy Commanders Daghatar the Adamant and Ghave, Guru of Spores. Both decks play a fair amount of Enchantments, and Daxos the Returned could prove to be a useful token generator. Still, it's sort of an awkward combination.

Like a good many Legendary Creatures created specifically for the Commander format through the pre-constructed decks, Daxos the Returned is best utilized when built around as a commander.

MTG Commander 2015 - Counterflux Rare Reprint Review

11/3/2015

by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

Counterflux was a pretty good counterspell when it was first released in Return to Ravnica. It’s a counterspell that can’t be countered. Plus, it has the nice Overload option to be able to counter all spells that aren’t yours on the stack. The former was a big deal in Standard and the latter is a pretty sweet deal in Commander - helping you to win a bunch of counterspell wars.

In the Commander decks that want to have this available, it’s very strong. It’s no wonder then that many Red/Blue decks play it. According to EDHREC, about one-sixth of all possible decks in its database run Counterflux. With Mizzix of the Izmagus entering the fray as a strong Red/Blue Commander option, Counterflux has seen considerably increased play.

Wizards of the Coast made a good decision to print Counterflux in the Mizzix deck, Seize Control. While this takes what was a $1 rare and make it pretty much bulk, foils are around $5 and they have not been negatively affected. This is a fine choice to give more players access. As it is, Counterflux sees heavy play in the decks of Tibor and Lumia, Keranos, God of Storms, Niv-Mizzet the Firemind, Melek, Izzet Paragon, and Shu Yun, the Silent Tempest, plus many more. Red/Blue/White decks that utilize the Equipment Sunforger to seek out Red or White sorceries have Counterflux as one of their top choices. This includes the afforementioned Shu Yun, plus Numot, the Devestator, Ruhan of the Fomori, Narset, Enlightened Master, and Zedruu the Greathearted. Having copies be even more plentiful for a card from a set that is best known for Abrupt Decay, Deathrite Shaman, and shock lands is a good call.

MTG Commander 2015 - Gisela, Blade of Goldnight Mythic Rare Reprint Review

11/3/2015

by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

Gisela, Blade of Goldnight is a very popular angel originally printed in Avacyn Restored that was conspicuously absent from From the Vault: Angels. Now we know why. Gisela is one of the three “Powerpuff Girls” from Avacyn Restored. The others are Bruna, Light of Alabaster and Sigarda, Host of Herons, Gisela has the very powerful abilities to double damage to your opponents and halve damage done to you. She is very popular as a commander, with over 200 decks in the EDHREC database. In the 99, she’s been included in nearly 1200 out of over 5800 decks. Clearly, if you’re playing red and white, you’re usually going to find room for her.

This reprint makes Gisela even easier to acquire. With Kalemne, Disciple of Iroas being the cover card of the Red/White Commander 2015 deck, the Giant Soldier needs some big creatures to help rack up experience counters. Not only does Gisela fill that role, but she is a powerful alternate commander for that deck. Her ability is so useful in so many decks that all that holds her back is a somewhat high mana cost (4RWW). But it’s well worth the investment. As of the spoiling of the reprint, Gisela was about $10 a copy, a number that fell sharply as more copies of the Commander 2015 reprint version entered the secondary market. This was a great time to reprint Gisela, honestly. She’s now going to be accessible to more players than ever.

MTG Commander 2015 - Fiery Confluence Review

11/3/2015

by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

If you’re looking for a card from Commander 2015 that can impact Legacy and Vintage, Fiery Confluence may be one. While 4 mana may be a bit slow for Vintage, the three modes of this card are all useful for a Legacy sideboard card. Dealing with the 1/1 and 2/2 creatures that can swarm the board in Legacy with cards like Delver of Secrets/Insectile Aberration, Lingering Souls, Monastery Mentor, Young Pyromancer and others, is a big deal.

The best part about Fiery Confluence is the fact that it has three modes and you can choose those modes more than once. The three modes are:

Deal 1 damage to each creature
Deal 2 damage to each opponent
Destroy target artifact

That’s quite versatile, especially the third option, which can allow you to destroy up to three target artifacts. In Commander, that’s an awesome ability - seriously, a 3 for 1 is extremely powerful. You can also choose to deal up to 6 damage to your opponents, or deal 1, 2, or 3 damage to each creature (with or without flying!) with the option to hit your opponents in addition or destroy artifacts.

In Legacy, though, there are plenty of artifacts to hit, such as Chalice of the Void. In Vintage there are the Moxen and crazy artifact creatures. As I’ve already said, 4 mana may prove too much for Vintage but in Legacy, a 4 mana spell that can singlehandedly turn the course of a game is pretty darn good. Also, Burn decks are a real deal in Legacy as they are in Modern, and this could prove to be a useful finisher or answer to the aforementioned Chalice or other hate cards in artifact form.

This will definitely find a home in plenty of Commander decks, especially Mono-Red strategies than are looking to burn out opponents. Duplicating a spell like this is a particularly idea, with cards like Reverberate or Blue options like Twincast. The new Blue/Red Commander Mizzix of the Izmagus will find a home for it, as well as many other Blue/Red (Izzet) decks that could cast it for even just 2 Red mana. But the Constructed Legacy implications I think will put this card over the top in terms of value.

MTG Commander 2015 - Skullwinder Review

11/3/2015

by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

Skullwinder appears to simply be a functionally worse version of the ever-so-popular Eternal Witness. It is a 1 / 3 with Deathtouch for 2G, but having that one fewer Green mana symbol and Deathtouch compared to the Witness isn’t worth its biggest difference. Yes, you get a card back from your graveyard, but then an opponent of your choice must choose a card, as well. While you could obviously choose a player that doesn’t have any cards of value in his or her graveyard, this is obviously strictly worse.

What’s more curious is that Eternal Witness is being reprinted in Commander 2015, so it’s odd that they would print a functionally inferior version. Having the deathtouch is certainly not nothing and used early on enough in the game, it’s probably just as good as Eternal Witness. The only upside to this card is that it’s a redundancy that Commander decks typically like to have for powerful effects. Thing is, Regrowth gets you any card back from your graveyard for 1G and isn’t too expensive a card. While this is definitely playable, this would be your third option behind Witness and Regrowth.

One upside this card does have, though, is that it’s a Snake, meaning it works well with the new Commander Kaseto, Orochi Archmage. With Snake Tribal being helped considerably by Kaseto’s release, Skullwinder does have one obvious home. Is the tradeoff of potentially giving an opponent a useful card make this more fair? It certainly does. But is that trade-off worth the fact that it can block with Deathtouch? Perhaps. Skullwinder is a budget option for those that don’t want to pay $6 for Eternal Witness, although it isn’t playable in Modern like the Witness. The Witness probably won’t remain $6, either, after its new printing in the same set.

MTG Commander 2015 - Karmic Justice Reprint Review

11/3/2015

by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

Originally printed way back in Odyssey, Karmic Justice is an Enchantment that has seen a good deal of EDH / Commander play. According to EDHREC, it has seen the most play in Hokori, Dust Drinker decks, with Heliod, God of the Sun and Hanna, Ship’s Navigator being second and third. Honestly, it would probably see more play with greater availability. With the reprint in Commander 2015, Karmic Justice will probably drop from its current $7 price tag, and appear in more lists.

Karmic Justice has a strong effect. If one of your noncreature permanents is destroyed by a spell or ability an opponent controls, you get to destroy a target permanent that player controls. That includes lands. Talk about serious retribution for your stuff being destroyed. If someone wipes out all of your enchantments and/or artifacts, you can deal out some serious punishment. And in those rare cases where all lands get destroyed, the payback will be serious. Note that Karmic Justice’s effect does not activate if the permanents in question are exiled - as they aren’t truly destroyed.

This is an excellent reprint. Many of today’s players have never even heard of or seen this card in action. While it will definitely hurt the price of the original Odyssey non-foil version, the $20 Odyssey foil should be a great investment now that more people will want to play this card.

Blade of Selves - A Magic the Gathering (MTG) Commander 2015 Card Review

11/3/2015

by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

Blade of Selves is an Equipment that features the Myriad mechanic, new to Commander 2015. While the effect of Myriad is useless in one-on-one Magic, in multiplayer Commander games, this Blade can be extremely powerful if equipped to the right creature. This Blade gives the equipped creature Myriad, which means for each player beyond the creature the equipped creature is attacking, you make a token copy of that creature which is tapped and attacking each other player (or a planeswalker that player controls). This seems all well and good. Being able to attack every player at once in multiplayer is pretty cool. Getting one or two (or more) extra enter the battlefield effects is just gravy.

The main downside to this is it doesn't work well on a Legendary creature, correct? Actually, despite having to sacrifice the new token copies that enter, any enter the battlefield abilities still trigger. Because of how the Legendary rule works, you can choose to keep your original Legendary on board. Also, because these tokens are forced to be sacrificed, they trigger “when it dies” effects, which for certain Legendaries, such as Kokusho, the Evening Star and Vela the Night- Clad, is a big deal. Ordinarily, you wouldn't get "when it dies" effects since the tokens are exiled at the end of the turn. But with Legendary Creatures, the rule actually benefits you with the Blade.

Most of the time, however, you’ll want to use this Equipment on non-Legendary creatures that have enter the battlefield abilities that you can abuse. Four mana seems like a bit of a steep equip cost, but it’s worth making free copies of creatures. With Eternal Witness, you can get one, two, or more extra cards back from your graveyard each time that Witness attacks! Being an artifact, there are hundreds of creatures that this Equipment will work well with and it can fit into any deck. Since these tokens must be exiled at end of turn, decks that have sacrifice outlets can benefit, as well.

There are so many options with Blade of Selves. Yes, this Equipment is only good in multiplayer games. But this includes any multiplayer format that supports Legacy-legal cards such as Archenemy or Planechase, not only Commander. Since it can fit into any deck being a colorless artifact, this is a super fun, sometimes game-ending, inclusion in a wide array of decks.

MTG Commander 2015 - Ezuri, Claw of Progress Review

11/3/2015

by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

Elf lovers rejoice! There is a new Ezuri in town, and he’s Blue/Green this time! At first, the experience counter ability of Ezuri, Claw of Progress seems underwhelming, but the ability that uses the counters is quite fascinating. Each time a creature with power 2 or less enters the battlefield, you gain an experience counter. The important part of that is the fact that all it has to do is enter the battlefield, and isn’t a cast trigger like with most of the other experience counter abilities. What do you get for those experience counters? You get to put X +1/+1 counters on a target creature at the beginning of combat for each experience counter you have.

Keep in mind that Ezuri, Claw of Progress is available in the same deck as Kaseto, Orochi Archmage, who can make creatures unblockable. Also, despite being an Elf, this Ezuri is not Elf-centric like Ezuri, Renegade Leader. Therefore, he can be played in any Blue/Green/X deck that you like. Animar, Soul of Elements has already been mentioned as a Commander who would like him in the 99. Edric, Spymaster of Trest also wouldn’t mind having him around in an Elf-ball style deck. Those experience counters can add up extremely quickly, especially with token generators.

As a Commander himself, Ezuri could find himself leading a deck of a couple different archetypes. Simic Evolve was an interesting, if not highly competitive, deck back in Return to Ravnica Standard. There are tons of Evolve creatures that see play in Commander including Fathom Mage, Gyre Sage (an Elf), Master Biomancer (also an Elf), and Renegade Krasis. You could go all out and play most of the Evolve creatures from the Gatecrash set, including Cloudfin Raptor, Simic Fluxmage, and Simic Manipulator to name a few others. Prime Speaker Zegana also has good synergy with this sort of deck, allowing you to draw a lot of cards considering how quickly the power of this deck can grow.

The other option is to build a deck around Morph creatures. Since Morph creatures enter as 2/2 face-down colorless creatures, you trigger Ezuri’s ability. There are plenty of useful Morph and Megamorph creatures these days after the Khans of Tarkir block, including the Megamorph version of Eternal Witness in Den Protector. Blue/Green morph isn’t quite as good as Morph lists that feature Red led by Animar, Soul of Elements, or some Bant (white/green/blue) build that takes advantage of Mastery of the Unseen and its ability to gain you tons of life. But you can still play Whisperwood Elemental, which is Manifesting the top card of your deck every turn (making it a Morph creature that can be flipped face-up if it’s a creature). Since you’d be playing a lot of mana-ramp creatures and Morph guys, it’s very likely you’ll be able to flip those creatures over rather easily. Personally, the Evolve version seems a better way to go, especially as many of them are Elves. But I’d love to see a Morph deck build around Ezuri, Claw of Progress take shape.

Any time you have a Commander that can fit as a Commander for three archetypes (Elfball, Evolve, Morph) and is useful in the 99 of a good number of decks, you probably have a winner. Ezuri, Renegade Leader is only good with Elves, but is extremely good at that. This blue/green edition of Ezuri is more versatile and gives Elf players the ability to play a bunch of cool blue/green Elves (that includes Momir Vig!) that before now could only really work with Edric. There’s going to be a lot of brewing with this guy.

MTG Commander 2015 - Banshee of the Dread Choir Review

11/2/2015

by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

Banshee of the Dread Choir seems likely a pretty unassuming uncommon Spirit creature, until you see that it has Myriad, a keyword ability new to Commander 2015. Whenever the Banshee attacks, Myriad allows it to create a copy of itself for each opponent other than the defending player, and each copy attacks that player or a planeswalker that player controls.

The Banshee has an ability that each time it deals combat damage, the defending player discards a card. In a 3 or 4 player game, the Banshee can generate decent card advantage, especially if you happen to play a deck that benefits from opponent’s discarding cards. Commanders such as Nath of the Gilt-Leaf or Crosis the Purger will happily take Banshee of the Dread Choir into their ranks.

Another Commander that would like the Banshee is Vela the Night Clad. Since Vela gives the Banshee Intimidate, players not controlling an artifact or Black creature won’t be able to block the Banshee, meaning instant discard. Also, because the tokens that Banshee creates must be exiled at end of turn, it makes sense to find a way to sacrifice them. If you can, Vela makes each of your opponents lose 1 life for each token. Any Black deck that benefits from sacrifices like this may find a home for the Banshee, as long as you have the sacrifice outlet before their necessary exile, which won't benefit you at all. While the Banshee is a bit of a niche card, she’s a decent one.

MTG Commander 2015 - Daxos the Returned Review

11/2/2015

by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

Daxos of Meletis is back, and now he’s a Zombie, appropriately named Daxos the Returned. True to the theme of Theros, Daxos now cares a bunch about Enchantments. For each Enchantment that you cast, you get an experience counter. You then can create Spirit enchantment creature tokens with power and toughness equal to the number of experience counters you have. In Black and White, there are plenty of powerful Enchantments. Although, Athreos, God of Passage is a more popular choice for an Orzhov (Black/White) Enchantment Commander, this new Zombie Soldier version of Daxos is deceptively powerful.

The tokens that Daxos the Returned creates can quickly get out of control. In the end game, 3 mana to create a token is extremely powerful, especially when it is an Enchantment itself. There is an awkward interaction with cards like Opalescence and Starfield of Nyx that reduce their power and toughness to 0 due to the fact that they set power and toughness to Converted Mana Cost, and tokens have no mana cost (unless they are Pack Rat tokens which have a converted mana cost of 3, but that’s a rare case). However, having Enchantments like Glorious Anthem and Intangible Virtue which pump creatures allow them to at least have 1 or 2 power and toughness. But those two Enchantments don’t really synergize with Daxos.

Erebos, God of the Dead, Helios, God of the Sun, and the aforementioned Athreos do play well with Daxos, being Indestructible Enchantments that can become creatures with enough Black and/or White mana symbols on the board under your control. Also, cards with the Constellation ability are extremely good with the amount of tokens that Daxos can create. Doomwake Giant, Grim Guardian, and Underworld Coinsmith are Enchantment Creatures that can give you good incremental advantage over time. Skybind, another Enchantment with Constellation, lets you “blink” non-enchantment permanents to reuse enter the battlefield effects, although it’s hard to say how many nonenchantments you’ll be running, so it depends on the build of your deck.

In the 99, Daxos could be a good ally for Zur the Enchanter. However, Zur’s ability to put an Enchantment directly into play doesn’t synergize well with Daxos’ experience counter ability. It’s hard to say exactly what other Commanders outside of White/Black could use him effectively, although many White/Black decks play a great many Enchantments that Daxos could help you benefit from. However, like a good many Legendary Creatures created specifically for Commander, Daxos the Returned is best utilized as a Commander, built around for maximum effect.

MTG Commander 2015 - Mizzix of the Izmagnus Review

11/2/2015

by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

Mizzix of the Izmagnus is like a Goblin Electromancer, except she gets better with time. Each time you cast an instant or sorcery with a converted mana cost greater than the number of experience counters you have, you get another experience counter. For each of those counters, instants and sorceries you cast cost one colorless mana less. While she may be a bit tricky to build around, the real benefit to Mizzix’s ability is that because of how the rules about converted mana cost work, spells with X in their mana cost become extremely valuable.

While X spells typically count X as 0 in their Converted Mana Cost, as soon as an X spell is placed on the stack, whatever X is made is added to its Converted Mana Cost. This means that if you set an X spell such as Bonfire of the Damned (Casting cost of XXR) to 5, due to it having two X’s in its cost, that Bonfire is treated as having a CMC of 11. What this mean is that by having lots of X spells in the deck, you can scale up on experience counters rather quickly. Also, even with the casting cost reduction, the Converted Mana Cost itself doesn’t change, as it only affects how much mana you actually pay. Therefore, you could play Blue Sun’s Zenith (Casting cost XUUU) to 5, with 7 experience counters, cast it for 3 Blue mana, and still get an experience counter due to the CMC being 8.

As a compliment to an Izzet (Blue/Red) Commander such as Melek, Izzet Paragon, Mizzix could be quite a deadly force. But on her own, Mizzix has plenty of strong X spells to draw from. The most obvious play alongside Mizzix would be the powerful Epic Experiment, which could essentially be cast for only UR, and cast X spells without having to pay their mana costs. But there are many others. The best of these include:

Banefire, Blue Sun’s Zenith, Bonfire of the Damned, Braingeyser, Clash of WIlls, Comet Storm, Commune with Lava, Condescend, Curse of the Swine, Devil’s Play, DIsplacement Wave, Distorting Wake, Goblin Offensive, Invoke the Firemind, Mindswipe, Red Sun’s Zenith, Repeal, Rolling Earthquake, Rolling Thunder, Stroke of Genius, Tempt with Vengeance, plus many more!

Another card that has been suggested is Call of the Skybreaker, which has a casting cost of 5 colorless mana and two Blue/Red hybrid mana (7 CMC). It has Retrace, meaning you can cast it from your graveyard by discarding a land card in addition to paying its mana cost. But with 5 experience counters, you get a 5/5 flying token for (U/R) (U/R) and discarding a land you probably don’t even need. This is an awesome way to get some big threats on board. Of course, there’s also Talrand, Sky Summoner, who can create a whole ton of 2/2 flying Drakes in such an instant and sorcery heavy deck.

Mizzix should be a good friend of instant and sorcery spellslingers as a member of the 99. But if you are to build a deck loaded with X spells, Mizzix could be very interesting. You don’t need all that many experience counters for this deck to do plenty of damage quickly, and having Storm spells such as Grapeshot and Empty the Warrens can end the game if you cast enough spells in one turn. While Melek, Izzet Paragon will probably remain more popular, Mizzix has a lot of potential.

MTG Commander 2015 - Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest Review

11/2/2015

by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

Hailing from the plane of Ravnica, Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest is a Legendary Creature with strong Commander potential and has plenty of synergies with existing Commanders such as Ghave, Guru of Spores. Any card that requires a player to sacrifice a permanent, an effect that’s quite plentiful in Black, pumps your entire team with Mazirek on the board. Even better, you don’t even have to be the one sacrificing permanents. Even a fetchland being sacrificed, whether it’s yours or anyone else’s, activates this ability.

There is an obvious synergy is with an artifact creature called Pentavus and another even older artifact called Ashnod’s Altar. With Pentavus, you remove a +1/+1 counter from it for a single colorless mana to make a token. You then sacrifice it with Pentavus’ second ability, then a +1/+1 counter is placed on Pentavus and you can repeat the process. However, you can only do this for as much mana as you have. Using a sacrifice outlet like Ashnod’s Altar with that token instead to create 2 colorless mana not only lets you get as many tokens as you’d like, but you can also get infinite amounts of colorless mana, as well.

There’s also a cool interaction with Mazirek and creatures with Persist. While you need an sacrifice outlet on board, as well, being able to reuse creatures like Puppeteer Clique and Woodfall Primus is powerful. Because creatures with Persist come back into play with a -1/-1 counter, you can put Mazirek’s +1/+1 counter ability on the stack and counteract that -1/-1 counter. If you have the sacrifice outlet, you can literally reuse Persist creatures as often as you like. Having Primus machine-gun every noncreature permanent of your opponents is pretty mean, but it’s been done before with the Undying ability - the opposite of Persist - of Mikaeus the Unhallowed.

With how many creatures and Enchantments in Green and Black that give you benefits from sacrifice, Mazirek should be a very effective Commander and will find homes in many Green/Black/X decks. Savra, Queen of the Golgari is a great friend for Mazirek, as in the right combinations you can force opponents to sacrifice all of their creatures or gain infinite life, or both! There are many existing Commanders that would be happy to have Mazirek in their 99. Shattergang Brothers, a Commander who is all about sacrificing permanents, would definitely enjoy Mazirek helping him and his forces out. but this Death Priest could make a fantastic for Insect Tribal, Infect, or your traditional “goodstuff” Golgari deck based around benefiting from sacrifice. With all of the cards in Battle for Zendikar that benefit this archetype, such as Smothering Abomination, this should be a really fun Legendary Creature to build around.

MTG Commander 2015 - Kaseto, Orochi Archmage Review

11/2/2015

by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

Snake Tribal has been a viable budget Commander deck for a long time. Until now, however it was always mono-Green due to the available Legendary Creatures. With the release of Kaseto, Orochi Archmage, Snake Tribal gets a great new leader that can make any creature, including herself, unblockable. Not only that, she can give Snakes +2/+2 and unblockable until end of turn. Best of all, this pump ability that costs UG (1 Blue, 1 Green) can be used multiple times in a turn on the same creature. This means that you can make Kaseto a lethal threat due to the existence of the Commander damage rule.

Kaseto's colors allow you to play extremely powerful Blue cards such as Cyclonic Rift, plus all of the counterspells and other tempo options available in the color. Having backup countermagic makes building up your army so much easier and alpha strikes become much easier. Also, now you can play three of the best Snakes in the game in your Snake Tribal deck: Coiling Oracle, Lorescale Coatl and Mystic Snake. Helpfully, all three of those were included in the same Commander deck as she. You can also pack in all the Blue "good stuff" that you like! Ophidian, a mono-Blue Snake that draws you a card when it isn’t blocked, works well with Kaseto, as well.

With Seshiro the Anointed and the other Legendary Snakes all being pretty good on their own, Snake Tribal becomes a lot more competitive. There is also an enchantment called Xenograft that gives all of your creatures a chosen creature type. By setting it to Snake, you can play any Blue or Green creature you like. These include powerful Legendary Creatures such as Momir Vig, Simic Visionary, or utility creatures such as Master Biomancer or Murkfiend Liege. You can also play any Blue or Green Changelings that you’d like - such as Chameleon Colossus - as they count as all creature types at all times.

In the 99, Kaseto seems like a good option in any deck that you want unblockable creatures. Blue/Green/X or 5-color decks that play big creatures could benefit, even without the extra +2/+2 boost exclusive for Snakes. Kaseto is best played as a Commander, however, as she screams “build around me.”

Get suggestions on what cards to use in your Kaseto, Orochi Archmage deck from EDHREC.

MTG Commander 2015 - Kalemne, Disciple of Iroas Review

11/2/2015

by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

Kalemne, Disciple of Iroas was the first Commander 2015 card spoiled! The stats are good - a 3/3 double striker with Vigilance for 2WR is definitely above average. It has two relevant creature types in Giant and Soldier, especially for its color combination. The most interesting part about Kalemne, though, is her experience counter ability.

Experience counters were mentioned as a new mechanic awhile back by Wizards of the Coast, and in this case, Kalemne benefits from creature spells costing 5 or more. For each experience counter, Kalemne gets +1/+1. The good thing about these experience counters is that they are much like emblems - they stay with you for the entire game.

While this isn't the best "Boros" (Red/White) Commander ever, she fits into pretty much any Red/White aggressive strategy ever. She's a good creature. Boros has plenty of 5 or higher CMC (Converted Mana Cost) creatures, such as Angels and Dragons. Another interesting thing to consider is that creatures that have an alternate casting cost that have an original CMC of 5 or higher will also trigger Kalemne’s ability. Evoke creatures in particular are a good option - as even though you have to sacrifice them immediately after cast using an Evoke cost, you would still get an enter the battlefield effect and the experience counter for Kalemne. The choices in Red and White include Faultgrinder, Glarewielder, Ingot Chewer, Reveillark, and Spitebellows.

Kalemne is a very efficient creature on both offense and defense. While most may prefer her as one of the 99 in a Commander deck, if you want a build-around “Voltron” style commander, Kalemne is a good choice.