I've been enjoying the looter effect of Mad Prophet. Often it is R: discard a card, draw a card, which is pretty good when I don't have better stuff to do with red mana. Ogre Battledriver is probably better in a vacuum, but if it comes out after a lot of other creatures it is a bit awkward.
I don't doubt that Myojin of Life's Web is good (although not 'casting' the creatures bypasses several of the triggers I use) it's just a matter of deciding where to make the space for it. Let me settle into the most recent changes and I'll consider it again. At the moment the deck is functioning really well and so identifying the weakest parts is getting more and more difficult especially at the high end of the curve.
I don't think I run enough Wizards for Voidmage Prodigy to be really reliable, and UUU for the first counter spell can be a little tricky to keep available. Raven Familiar digs three deep instead of two, and can chump block a flyer, which is why it has kept its spot for so long, even with the echo cost. To be honest it might be better replacing Mad Prophet with Sea Gate Oracle or even Coiling Oracle provided that doesn't mess with my Birthing Pod chain too much.
Didn't play Animar all game, as the threat of Cunning Sparkmage and Lightning Bolt from Lovisa had me spooked, but none the less I had a strong ramping hand, and managed to get Words of Wind online to pretty good effect.
I lost from Aurelia general damage when he used Faith's Fetters on my Sylvan Primoridal (only available blocker at the time) and I didn't have a response, but otherwise I was about ready to start activating Words of Wind three of four times a turn (Sylvan Library, Soul of the Harvest and Prime Speaker Zegana on the battlefield meant I could draw a lot of cards).
Mad Prophet provided an instant card draw to activate Words of Wind, but not being able to target opponent's stuff is a weakness. I have to change my opinion where I though that Words could replace Equilibrium as they play out quite differently despite their apparent similarities. I do feel think it's a good replacement for Erratic Portal.
Strionic Resonator – Animar certainly makes use of a lot of triggered effects in the form of ‘Enter the Battlefield’ and ‘When cast’ abilities so there would be value to be had from the Resonator, although with cost reduction and free or cheap bounce engines (Cloudstone Curio, Equilibrium, Words of Wind) most of these triggers can already be repeated numerous times a turn, so it may be redundant anyway, especially when it can only be used once per turn. Still it is an interesting effect, and perhaps one day we will see it on a creature Elite Arcanist style which would make it much more exciting for Animar.
Somehow the potential of this card escaped my notice. Sure this deck has a lot of ways to reuse it's triggerd abilities but those are only as good as this one when Animar is around. You know I'm always in search for cards that give the deck a leg up when the commander can't be around and I could see this one being particularly powerful.
Also unlike nearly all other support permanents of this kind it has a CMC of 2, meaning that it is something you can do with your mana on turn two before Animar hits the field.
So what are your thoughts?
I don't think it's worth it for the once per turn effect. It is a powerful effect, but I like these sort of effects to be reusable multiple times a turn, because more often than not Animar combo wins after a spending a long turn digging for a win condition.
Playtested a few more games and still haven't seen either Savage Summoning or Nantuko Vigilante, but going to update the primer to include them and keep testing :).
I don't think it's worth it for the once per turn effect. It is a powerful effect, but I like these sort of effects to be reusable multiple times a turn, because more often than not Animar combo wins after a spending a long turn digging for a win condition.
It's true that the ability on the reflector is better but there's a huge difference in the casting cost. What makes the resonator viable imo is the low mana investment to get it online. At cmc2 it can be even cast on turn two before animar.
I'll report back once I got in a few games with it.
Now that the three in color gods in Theros has been spoiled, what do people think about their inclusion in Animar? I think the green one will be handy in builds the plays a lot of smaller dudes. The red one is tempting but may be harder to get devotion online. Blue, I'm not too sure about.
The best things about the Gods, is that we get Animar discounted Enchantment effects. Furthermore they are searchable with creature tutors andFabricate, so it is likely that we can find one when we need it.
You don't need to get devotion online, but I suspect it would happen most games due to the number of creatures that end up on the field.
Personally I like Purphoros, God of the Forge (the red one) best. It's trigger on creatures entering the battlefield is easy to abuse as an alternate way to kill opponents without a combat step. The creature buff is much more efficient way of ending the game aggressively than Nylea's pump ability, because Animar usually has a field full of creatures, although the R cost may be harder to cover. (I may end up replacing Psychosis Crawler with Purphoros, although I would prefer to include both).
Next most useful I would say is Thassa, God of the Sea (the blue one). Making Animar unblockable is good for voltron kills and scry 1 every upkeep is decent, especially in combination Sylvan Library as a way of removing poor top decks and improving draw quality.
Nylea, God of the Hunt (the green god) is the least desirable in my opinion. Individual creature pump isn't really the aim of the deck, and trample is useless compared to Thassa's unblockable ability.
Note: Links to the God cards will be broken until cards are released.
Edit: Fabricate cannot find the Gods, although it can find their signature weapons (Legendary Enchantment Artifact).
Edit 2: Consensus seems to be that using the Bestow ability is casting an Enchantment Aura spell, and it is not a creature spell. As such it does not put a counter on Animar, nor can it benefit from the cost reduction.
I agree on the gods. I definitely want the red and the blue one in my list. They are indestructible permanents (so it won't be caught up in most sweeps wich is awesome in a deck which is very vulnerable to them) with very relevant (game winning!) abilities and you can cast them of Animar (at least I hope that the rules work this way...)
I guess that the red one will almost never be a creature could even work in our favor since there are very few ways to deal with indestructible enchantments.
EDIT: I found the answer: http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=534861
It's just as I thought: The devotion only matters when they are on the field, when they are anywhere else (library, GY, hand, stack) they are always both enchantment and creature.
I reckon the red is an auto include in animar, but the blue and green are questionable. Scry is nice but if you have future sight/magus or oracle of mul daya then it's a bit redundant. The unblockable is definitely more powerful than trample, but the cost to activate probably balance it out some what. Animar needs all the mana to drop more dudes, and if its not combo orientated, then even more so. Might be best to run all three and cut green/blue if it not performing too well after a few games.
Yep, that Prophet is just palin stupid in this deck. Zhur-taa Ancient sounds good. They are at the same cmc and do a rather similiar thing but the Prophet doesn't also help our opponents.
Welcome to the mythical land of Theros, a land of Gods and Monsters! As we explore this place of heroes and massive beasts, what lays in wait to woo Animar, Soul of Elements…
Unfortunately there are some big let downs. None of the mechanics in the set have synergy with Animar, which is a shame, especially as three of them appear exlusively on creatures which usually play so well with our little elemental. On the other hand there are some true gems in the set, some which I would dare say are auto-includes! Together, let us explore the world of Theros!
Mechanics:
Theros introduces four new mechanics (Heroic, Bestow, Devotion and Monstrosity) and revisits Scry. It also has a strong Enchantment theme, including Enchantment Creatures and Enchantment Artifacts. None of these mechanics play particularly well with Animar, however I will discuss the cards that have the most potential in an Animar deck.
Heroic - I don’t really include enough (any) spells to trigger Heroic, so it is unlikely that any heroic creatures will make it into my deck, but if you really wanted to include the spells these are the heroic creatures that you can play with.
Artisan of Forms – a clone variant, misses out on enter the battlefield effects, but is cheap and can shift form multiple times.
Triton Fortune Hunter – draws a card every time you target it with a spell. Could be a draw engine with enough spells or reusable spells? Not the best draw engine for the deck though.
Wavecrash Triton – an Opposition variant I suppose, although has a ‘doesn’t untap’ clause as well. Is it worth it? I think if you want this effect, just play Opposition or even Brine Elemental instead.
Akroan Crusader – a cheap token generator (Animar doesn’t really care about tokens).
Arena Athlete – a way to get around blockers (if you can target them), I think this might be the least useful hero (among mostly useless heroes) in an Animar deck.
Labyrinth Champion – enjoys a reasonable Animar discount, and can ping opponents and small creatures.
Centaur Battlemaster – can get big quick, could potentially do some work in a ‘+1/+1 counters matter’ build, but in the end I suspect there are more synergistic creatures with +1/+1 counters.
The main dilemma with Heroic, is that you have to build around it, which means removing creatures to add spells to activate Heroic. None of these creatures are worth that loss of synergy.
Bestow – When this mechanic was first spoiled I wondered whether the Bestow cost could be reduced by Animar’s discount, unfortunately this does not seem to be case, which makes these creatures pretty useless to Animar (Casting a creature for its Bestow cost turns it into an Aura spell, which does not benefit from Animar’s cost reduction). None-the-less you may want to play Animar Enchantress deck, so here are the Bestow creatures in our colours.
Nimbus Naiad – a 2/2 flyer or +2/+2 and flying for Animar (or your heroic creatures!).
Thassa's Emissary – a 3/3 Scroll Thief or +3/+3 and Scroll Thief ability for Animar. Possibly the best of the bunch, because at least this can replace itself.
Purphoros's Emissary – 3/3 difficult to block, or +3/+3 and make Animar more difficult to block.
Spearpoint Oread – 2/2 first strike or +2/+2 and first strike for Animar.
Boon Satyr – 4/2 flash or +4/+2 to Animar at instant speed. I think Bloodrush is a far superior ability if you want combat tricks (Ghor-Clan Rampager is better in almost every way, even if it isn't a permanent buff).
Leafcrown Dryad – 2/2 reach or +2/+2 and reach for Animar (yawn…)
Thank god that’s the last of them! These are really boring creatures and Bestow is way too expensive for its effect in this deck. If you want to pump Animar, just cast more creatures! Perhaps the evasion might be useful if you’re trying to push Animar through for Commander damage, but it’s simply not worth the Bestow cost, there are simply so many better options out there that have better synergy, greater efficiency or both at the same time.
Devotion - Devotion works best in a mono-colour deck where all your mana symbols are the same, however Animar is quite capable of putting a lot of permanents on the table at a time, so devotion counts in green and blue could easily be above 5. I’ll address the non-God Devotion cards first, and then the Gods separately.
Master of Waves – could potentially put a lot of baby elementals on the table at once. Would play really well with Opposition (but I don’t run Opposition) and/or Skullclamp (I don’t run Skullclamp) although really this only benefits when there is already a hefty board presence, so it’s probably win more. Protection from Red is nice as is the bonus +1/+1 to Animar, I guess.
Fanatic of Mogis – devotion to red is probably the hardest to achieve in the deck, although Kiki-Jiki kicks it up to 3 all on his own. It could be possible to burn all opponents to deck by bounce looping the Fanatic, but I suspect more often than not this would be dealing 1 damage to each opponent, which is pretty underwhelming.
Karametra's Acolyte – could add a lot of green mana to the mana pool (better with haste), but this is bonus mana when I’m probably already ahead to an extent that I don’t need all that green mana.
Nylea's Disciple – could gain a chunk of life. But if I needed life gain I would probably go for something less conditional and generally better (Thragtusk).
Reverent Hunter - may be worth playing in a ‘+1/+1 counters matter’ build, although can only ever be an efficient beat stick.
Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx – I doubt I will end up including this land in my deck as colourless producing lands are quite awkward in Animar, although I may test it because it could easily be used to generate coloured mana profits at the right stage of the game. Obviously this gets a lot better in certain decks, those that run plenty of colour heavy enchantments for example. I suspect this will be very good in a lot of decks, but in three colour it’s iffy.
(and the Gods!) – As we’re discussing devotion, it seems like the right place to discuss the Gods themselves and their legendary weapons. It is important to note that the Gods do benefit from Animar’s cost reduction, even if you don’t have enough devotion to keep them as creatures on the battlefield. This is really great, because it essentially gives us discounted enchantment effects. Furthermore these enchantments are indestructible!
Thassa, God of the Sea – As an enchantment Thassa is pretty cheap even without Animar’s discount and she provides steady card filtering each upkeep with her Scry 1 ability. She also can make Animar unblockable for a reasonable mana cost, which can facilitate a Voltron win. As a creature she is a 5/5 and indestructible which makes her both a fearless attacker (who can be unblockable) and a strong blocker. She certainly has a lot of utility for a low cost so she may be worthwhile fitting into the deck.
Bident of Thassa – Her legendary enchantment artifact. This is basically Coastal Piracy plus. If you are playing an aggressive game, this can generate a lot of card advantage. It can also force your opponents to attack unfavourably, so it is also a political tool. As a bonus it can be searched up with Fabricate. It’s mana cost is a little heavy, but reasonable for the effect (like I say, Coastal Piracy plus!), I probably won’t run this because I focus on combo rather than aggro, but it is a great option to have.
Purphoros, God of the Forge – In my opinion the greatest of the Gods! He can come out for R and then using the multiple creature chain casts and bounce loops burn all my opponents to death. It’s unlikely to become a creature due to the low number of red permanents in the deck, but that probably acts as protection against creature exile effects anyway. His pump ability could also make a difference if you’re reduced to attacking with a bunch of small utility critters as it affects the whole team, and Animar is known to generate a big team. Definitely making a spot for him in my deck.
Hammer of Purphoros – Fervor plus! Although slightly harder to cast with double red. I doubt I would use its second ability as 3/3 tokens are fairly lacklustre in Commander, and for that reason, I doubt I’d include the Hammer in my deck. Slightly easier to search up than Fervor, but then again, haste granting creatures are easier to search for than both Fervor and the Hammer.
Nylea, God of the Hunt – Unfortunately Nylea is least interesting of the Gods in my opinion. While a 6/6 indestructible creature for 3G is pretty powerful, she has by far the least utility. Animar doesn’t mind being granted trample, but Thassa can outright make him unblockable. Likewise the pump effect targets only a single creature, so it doesn’t scale as well as Purphoros with a critical mass of creatures, so Nylea is not going to find a spot in my deck.
Bow of Nylea – Much like the green God herself, her bow feels pretty lacklustre in Commander. Attacking creatures with deathtouch are not nearly as good as defending creatures with deathtouch (except when they all have trample, but then the creatures may as well just have unblockable). The activated ability gives a lot of choices, but none are particularly note-worthy for Animar. Putting an extra +1/+1 counter on him for 1G might be worthwhile sometimes. I’m not going to include in my deck.
Monstrosity – is a very expensive activated ability, which pretty much has anti-synergy with Animar. While the effect is on creatures, the base creatures tend to be pretty efficient but have no utility, so they don’t enjoy much of an Animar discount. And even if you do ‘cheat’ them into play, you still then have to spend probably a whole late game turn to use Monstrosity, because it is so expensive. Some maybe useful if you care about the +1/+1 counters, but all in all I think these big creatures will not find a place in my Animar deck. In the interests of completeness, here are the Monsters I will not be playing.
Sealock Monster – May not even be able to attack until you Monstrify it…
Shipbreaker Kraken – acts as a form of late game control and gives you a 10/10 once you make it a monster. Still not worth it in this deck.
Ember Swallower – By the time you are activating it’s ability, is it worth making everyone sacrifice three lands?
Ill-Tempered Cyclops – Is going to be a great card in limited and probably won’t be seen in any other format.
Stoneshock Giant – If I have a spare 8 mana, I think I have better things to do than simply stop my opponents’ non-flying creatures from blocking.
Stormbreath Dragon – Protection from white, flying and haste is a good combination of abilities on a red creature. It also may kill off greedy opponents with Reliquary Towers if you can afford the monstrosity cost. Not bad as it hits multiple players, but damn, 7 mana is a lot for a one off effect like this (on top of the initial mana to cast the dragon).
Arbor Colossus – very heavy green cost with plummet attached for 6 mana. I mean you do end up with a 9/9 reach creature for the other flying creatures that might still be attacking you.
Nemesis of Mortals – a big beatstick with an ability to reduce its own cost. Again, great in limited...
Nessian Asp – Another limited bomb that simply gets bigger.
Polukranos, World Eater – with enough mana this can act as pretty good removal, while simultaneously giving a huge creature (who already has a fine 5/5 body for 2GG to start with). Probably the best monster of the bunch, but that is expected of a Mythic.
Polis Crusher – Protection from enchantments might be useful in some metas.
Colossus of Akros – Can come out for free! Then it remains an indestructible 10/10 defender until you have a spare 10 to throw into monstrosity. Don’t get me wrong, an indestructible 10/10 defender for free is pretty good, and a 20/20 indestructible trampling Colossus for 10 mana is also pretty good. But Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre or even Blightsteel Colossus is just so much better.
The biggest upside to Monstrosity is that it can be used at instant speed. Once you have it sitting on the table and enough mana, it acts as a constant threat to throw out combat math and probably do some other stuff… but by Purphoros, it is soooo expensive…
Scry – I’m not going to talk about scry on its own, as it is tacked on with so many other effects in the set, so instead I will move onto…
The Rest:
I’m not going to discuss every card in Animar’s colours in the set, so instead I’ll talk about those which I feel may be poorly evaluated or potentially brilliant additions to Animar decks.
UUUBLUEUUU
Breaching Hippocamp – another creature that combos with Kiki-Jiki to create infinite Horse Fish. There are quite a range of these creatures now, and I feel that this one probably won’t make the cut. Compare with the three best (in my opinion): Pestermite also has flash, is a flyer to get around Moat effects and likely has a more relevant creature type. Deceiver Exarch has high toughness to avoid being burned out by Volcanic Fallout and variants. Zealous Conscripts can steal an opponent’s Kiki-Jiki for the win. Poor Horse Fish doesn’t fly, has lower toughness and does nothing else. Poor Horse Fish.
Curse of the Swine – RUG has limited ways of exiling creatures, so Curse of the Swine may be a great include, although as a spell, it lacks synergy in the deck. It should be noted that this may well become a threat used against Animar too, to exile our creatures that we usually like to bounce and and re-use.
Omenspeaker – a small creature which can fix draws in the early game and help build up Animar’s first few counters. A shame it doesn’t draw a card, but at the same time it is cheaper than Raven Familiar or Sea-Gate Oracle.
Prognostic Sphinx – difficult to remove, acts as a discard enabler (for Anger perhaps?) and provides an incentive to attack. This is a pretty solid creature. Not really flashy, but I imagine the Scry 3 would pay off if you were playing an aggro Animar deck. Has great synergy with Sylvan Library.
RRRREDRRR
Anger of the Gods – I’m probably not going to play this, but like Curse of the Swine, this may have an unpleasant impact on Animar’s board state, as so many of my utility creatures can be exiled with this effect. (Maybe worth putting sacrifice effects back in the deck? Phyrexian Altar would be my choice.)
Titan of Eternal Fire – Lets just pretend Animar Human tribal is a thing and that you can generate lots of Red mana to burn all opposing creatures and players to death!
Wild Celebrants – Certainly bigger than Acidic Slime, but only destroys an artifact. Might be worthwhile if you need a lot of artifact control because of your meta?
GGGGREENGGG
Commune with the Gods – This is a reasonably costed dig card, but would be better if the graveyard was a more reliably accessed resource. I do play some recursion (I find it hard not to!) but probably not enough to warrant using this. It would also be awkward if I had to discard a key combo piece like Cloudstone Curio.
Sylvan Caryatid – a mana dork that is somewhat resistant to removal is nice, although I’m not that keen on mana dorks in Animar, as I feel they die before I get much use from them. I would probably run Bird of Paradise first, then this.
Horizon Chimera – this isn’t too bad. Gaining a life for every card drawn could really add up in my build as I end up drawing a lot of cards. If you’re facing a lot of heavy damage dealing decks this is a pretty good way to offset life loss.
Prophet of Kruphix – A cross between Seedborn Muse and Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir, this is an auto include. Teferi has always been good for the deck, except for his awkward mana cost, and Seedborn Muse wasn’t really great unless you had a flash enabler out. Together in the same creature essentially gives you a turn for every opponent. As long as you keep drawing cards (which is part of the combo anyway) this should pretty much guarantee victory in short order. Amazing. Simply amazing.
Xenagos, the Reveler – His first ability is pretty much Gaea's Cradle, although harder to abuse as it cannot easily be activated more than once turn. Interestingly Xenagos plus Domri Rade plus Cloudstone Curio could be used to generate infinite mana as long as you have at least 8 creatures. You also get infinite Planeswalker activations this way. If you include Garruk Wildspeaker you can begin to untap lands that generate additional mana. Cloudstone Curio is such a powerhouse. Xenagos’ second ability is not really that great for Animar. A 2/2 haste Satyr is rarely going to matter in this build (unless you use the above loop to gain an infinite number of 2/2 haste Satyrs). His final ability will probably put at least 3 creatures onto the table for free, but having to exile non-creature/non-land cards could risk losing some of the enchantment and artifact combo pieces, so it’s a bit risky.
x0ARTIFACTS & LANDSxx
Burnished Hart – This little artifact Elk is going to make some waves in commander giving pretty efficient ramp to non-green decks. With the artifact recursion available in blue (Academy Ruins), red (Goblin Welder) and white (Sun Titan) this offers a reliable way to reach the end game faster for those colours. I’m not going to run it in Animar, because green has better options (even though we can reduce the cost), but I mention it because this is going to be a staple in many decks from now on.
Opaline Unicorn – If you’ve considered running the Mirrodin mana Myrs (Alloy, Copper, Iron, Silver) then this adds another option to the pool. Unlikely you run them all, but consider running a Unicorn (although you are giving up a 2/2 Myr for a 1/2 Unicorn).
Temple of Abandon and Temple of Mystery – R & G and G & U scry lands. I think that these lands are lot more powerful than people initially estimated and while they’re relatively cheaper than a lot of multilands it may be worth picking them up. Personally I won’t be running them as I attempt to decrease the number of ‘enter the battlefield tapped’ lands in the deck, however if you don’t mind giving up a little speed for improved card quality these will be great.
There are two cards in Theros that I intend to add to the deck as soon as I can aquire copies of them: Purphoros, God of the Forge and Prophet of Kruphix. I think both will be powerhouses that should improve the victory conditions available to the deck. For the rest, there are some fun choices available to push the deck in different directions and I am impressed by some of the powerful cards in the set as a whole, even if the main set mechanics don’t play well with this particular deck.
I was always wary casting the Ancient, in case my opponents would gain more advantage from him than I could. Prophet of Kruphix offers such a huge tempo boost and a way to play more defensively. It is a very solid card.
Probably not for this deck, but it is worth mentioning.
Fair enough. I agree that it's not for this deck, and that was mainly what I focused on, but Steam Augury is a valid option in the colour identity as a playable Fact or Fiction variant.
Steam Augury is good for playing a psychological game with an opponent, sometimes making it worthwhile to create a pile of 1 and a pile of 4. You're signaling to your opponent that you need that 1 card, tempting them to give you the pile of 4 instead. It's tricky, but ultimately you have less control over what you get compared to Fact or Fiction.
Will almost certainly see play in Riku of Two Reflections spell-slinger builds, among others.
I'm going to try out Swan Song. At the very least, stopping board wipes for a single U seems pretty good, and we've got a million ways to bounce the bird away.
I'm going to try out Swan Song. At the very least, stopping board wipes for a single U seems pretty good, and we've got a million ways to bounce the bird away.
Hmm I have a Swan Song but I admit I did not consider it for this deck. Looking through similar counter spells the other options to counter a sorcery for the same cost are Flusterstorm, Envelop and Disrupt. Swan Song certainly has more options and is a hard counter, even if it does give a 2/2 bird.
I considered Swan Song for my Edric deck, but there the 2/2 bird is a much bigger problem against my 1/1 flyers.
Good call Bismuth, I might see if I can fit Swan Song into my deck too!
Xenagos, the Reveler is relevant, while not a creature, it's boss mode if you pack hydras and expensive non-creature cards
Yeh, I discuss Xenagos in my review. In general I'm not keen on using Planeswalkers in Animar, because unlike creatures, they're difficult to reuse multiple times in a turn, however, Cloudstone Curio does let you bounce a pair of Planeswalkers back and forth, so with Garruk Wildspeaker and Xenagos, the Reveler you could potentially generate infinite mana and then infinite hasty 2/2 satyrs.
I don't doubt that Myojin of Life's Web is good (although not 'casting' the creatures bypasses several of the triggers I use) it's just a matter of deciding where to make the space for it. Let me settle into the most recent changes and I'll consider it again. At the moment the deck is functioning really well and so identifying the weakest parts is getting more and more difficult especially at the high end of the curve.
I don't think I run enough Wizards for Voidmage Prodigy to be really reliable, and UUU for the first counter spell can be a little tricky to keep available. Raven Familiar digs three deep instead of two, and can chump block a flyer, which is why it has kept its spot for so long, even with the echo cost. To be honest it might be better replacing Mad Prophet with Sea Gate Oracle or even Coiling Oracle provided that doesn't mess with my Birthing Pod chain too much.
There are plenty of interesting morph creatures and personally I think I'd include Coral Trickster, Mischievous Quanar or Fathom Seer before Voidmage Prodigy. Coral Trickster could be especially valuable as a way of untapping Gaea's Cradle or Birthing Pod.
Didn't play Animar all game, as the threat of Cunning Sparkmage and Lightning Bolt from Lovisa had me spooked, but none the less I had a strong ramping hand, and managed to get Words of Wind online to pretty good effect.
I lost from Aurelia general damage when he used Faith's Fetters on my Sylvan Primoridal (only available blocker at the time) and I didn't have a response, but otherwise I was about ready to start activating Words of Wind three of four times a turn (Sylvan Library, Soul of the Harvest and Prime Speaker Zegana on the battlefield meant I could draw a lot of cards).
Mad Prophet provided an instant card draw to activate Words of Wind, but not being able to target opponent's stuff is a weakness. I have to change my opinion where I though that Words could replace Equilibrium as they play out quite differently despite their apparent similarities. I do feel think it's a good replacement for Erratic Portal.
Still haven't seen Savage Summoning or Nantuko Vigilante yet during a game.
Somehow the potential of this card escaped my notice. Sure this deck has a lot of ways to reuse it's triggerd abilities but those are only as good as this one when Animar is around. You know I'm always in search for cards that give the deck a leg up when the commander can't be around and I could see this one being particularly powerful.
Also unlike nearly all other support permanents of this kind it has a CMC of 2, meaning that it is something you can do with your mana on turn two before Animar hits the field.
So what are your thoughts?
GWKarametra - The MistveiledGW
GWR Marath - The Egg-laying Wool-Milk-Pig GWR
RBGrenzo - Restrained RakdosRB
UWRGBHorde of NotionsUWRGB
Retired: Karador, Ghost Chieftain | Rafiq of the Many | Animar, Soul of Elements | Maelstrom Wanderer
Edit: Just seen Minion Reflector in Cryogen's build. If you really want the doubling effect of Strionic Resonator, I think Minion Reflector does it better, because it doesn't tap.
It's true that the ability on the reflector is better but there's a huge difference in the casting cost. What makes the resonator viable imo is the low mana investment to get it online. At cmc2 it can be even cast on turn two before animar.
I'll report back once I got in a few games with it.
GWKarametra - The MistveiledGW
GWR Marath - The Egg-laying Wool-Milk-Pig GWR
RBGrenzo - Restrained RakdosRB
UWRGBHorde of NotionsUWRGB
Retired: Karador, Ghost Chieftain | Rafiq of the Many | Animar, Soul of Elements | Maelstrom Wanderer
I'm not sure there is spare mana during those early turns to get nearly enough advantage out of dropping it on turn two.
I'm interested to hear how it performs though
and Fabricate, so it is likely that we can find one when we need it.You don't need to get devotion online, but I suspect it would happen most games due to the number of creatures that end up on the field.
Personally I like Purphoros, God of the Forge (the red one) best. It's trigger on creatures entering the battlefield is easy to abuse as an alternate way to kill opponents without a combat step. The creature buff is much more efficient way of ending the game aggressively than Nylea's pump ability, because Animar usually has a field full of creatures, although the R cost may be harder to cover. (I may end up replacing Psychosis Crawler with Purphoros, although I would prefer to include both).
Next most useful I would say is Thassa, God of the Sea (the blue one). Making Animar unblockable is good for voltron kills and scry 1 every upkeep is decent, especially in combination Sylvan Library as a way of removing poor top decks and improving draw quality.
Nylea, God of the Hunt (the green god) is the least desirable in my opinion. Individual creature pump isn't really the aim of the deck, and trample is useless compared to Thassa's unblockable ability.
Note: Links to the God cards will be broken until cards are released.
Edit: Fabricate cannot find the Gods, although it can find their signature weapons (Legendary Enchantment Artifact).
Ahem, they are enchantment creatures, not artifact creatures. Fabricate cannot find them :p.
stuff
I was crediting them with way too many types (Legendary Enchantment Artifact Creatures) *facepalm*. Getting confused with their signature weapons.
I will amend my previous post.
I don't know, but that's a great question! I will ask in the Rules Forum.
Edit: Asked here - http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=534981
Edit 2: Consensus seems to be that using the Bestow ability is casting an Enchantment Aura spell, and it is not a creature spell. As such it does not put a counter on Animar, nor can it benefit from the cost reduction.
I guess that the red one will almost never be a creature could even work in our favor since there are very few ways to deal with indestructible enchantments.
EDIT: I found the answer: http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=534861
It's just as I thought: The devotion only matters when they are on the field, when they are anywhere else (library, GY, hand, stack) they are always both enchantment and creature.
GWKarametra - The MistveiledGW
GWR Marath - The Egg-laying Wool-Milk-Pig GWR
RBGrenzo - Restrained RakdosRB
UWRGBHorde of NotionsUWRGB
Retired: Karador, Ghost Chieftain | Rafiq of the Many | Animar, Soul of Elements | Maelstrom Wanderer
So this has to go in. What should I cut?
Edit: My thought is Zhur-taa Ancient...
GWKarametra - The MistveiledGW
GWR Marath - The Egg-laying Wool-Milk-Pig GWR
RBGrenzo - Restrained RakdosRB
UWRGBHorde of NotionsUWRGB
Retired: Karador, Ghost Chieftain | Rafiq of the Many | Animar, Soul of Elements | Maelstrom Wanderer
Welcome to the mythical land of Theros, a land of Gods and Monsters! As we explore this place of heroes and massive beasts, what lays in wait to woo Animar, Soul of Elements…
Unfortunately there are some big let downs. None of the mechanics in the set have synergy with Animar, which is a shame, especially as three of them appear exlusively on creatures which usually play so well with our little elemental. On the other hand there are some true gems in the set, some which I would dare say are auto-includes! Together, let us explore the world of Theros!
Mechanics:
Theros introduces four new mechanics (Heroic, Bestow, Devotion and Monstrosity) and revisits Scry. It also has a strong Enchantment theme, including Enchantment Creatures and Enchantment Artifacts. None of these mechanics play particularly well with Animar, however I will discuss the cards that have the most potential in an Animar deck.
Heroic - I don’t really include enough (any) spells to trigger Heroic, so it is unlikely that any heroic creatures will make it into my deck, but if you really wanted to include the spells these are the heroic creatures that you can play with.
The main dilemma with Heroic, is that you have to build around it, which means removing creatures to add spells to activate Heroic. None of these creatures are worth that loss of synergy.
Bestow – When this mechanic was first spoiled I wondered whether the Bestow cost could be reduced by Animar’s discount, unfortunately this does not seem to be case, which makes these creatures pretty useless to Animar (Casting a creature for its Bestow cost turns it into an Aura spell, which does not benefit from Animar’s cost reduction). None-the-less you may want to play Animar Enchantress deck, so here are the Bestow creatures in our colours.
Thank god that’s the last of them! These are really boring creatures and Bestow is way too expensive for its effect in this deck. If you want to pump Animar, just cast more creatures! Perhaps the evasion might be useful if you’re trying to push Animar through for Commander damage, but it’s simply not worth the Bestow cost, there are simply so many better options out there that have better synergy, greater efficiency or both at the same time.
Devotion - Devotion works best in a mono-colour deck where all your mana symbols are the same, however Animar is quite capable of putting a lot of permanents on the table at a time, so devotion counts in green and blue could easily be above 5. I’ll address the non-God Devotion cards first, and then the Gods separately.
(and the Gods!) – As we’re discussing devotion, it seems like the right place to discuss the Gods themselves and their legendary weapons. It is important to note that the Gods do benefit from Animar’s cost reduction, even if you don’t have enough devotion to keep them as creatures on the battlefield. This is really great, because it essentially gives us discounted enchantment effects. Furthermore these enchantments are indestructible!
Monstrosity – is a very expensive activated ability, which pretty much has anti-synergy with Animar. While the effect is on creatures, the base creatures tend to be pretty efficient but have no utility, so they don’t enjoy much of an Animar discount. And even if you do ‘cheat’ them into play, you still then have to spend probably a whole late game turn to use Monstrosity, because it is so expensive. Some maybe useful if you care about the +1/+1 counters, but all in all I think these big creatures will not find a place in my Animar deck. In the interests of completeness, here are the Monsters I will not be playing.
The biggest upside to Monstrosity is that it can be used at instant speed. Once you have it sitting on the table and enough mana, it acts as a constant threat to throw out combat math and probably do some other stuff… but by Purphoros, it is soooo expensive…
Scry – I’m not going to talk about scry on its own, as it is tacked on with so many other effects in the set, so instead I will move onto…
The Rest:
I’m not going to discuss every card in Animar’s colours in the set, so instead I’ll talk about those which I feel may be poorly evaluated or potentially brilliant additions to Animar decks.
UUU BLUE UUU
RRR RED RRR
GGG GREEN GGG
RGU MULTICOLOUR UGR
x0 ARTIFACTS & LANDS xx
There are two cards in Theros that I intend to add to the deck as soon as I can aquire copies of them: Purphoros, God of the Forge and Prophet of Kruphix. I think both will be powerhouses that should improve the victory conditions available to the deck. For the rest, there are some fun choices available to push the deck in different directions and I am impressed by some of the powerful cards in the set as a whole, even if the main set mechanics don’t play well with this particular deck.
Any cards that excited you that I’ve missed?
Out:
- Zhur-Taa Ancient
In:
+ Prophet of Kruphix
I was always wary casting the Ancient, in case my opponents would gain more advantage from him than I could. Prophet of Kruphix offers such a huge tempo boost and a way to play more defensively. It is a very solid card.
Steam Augury?
Probably not for this deck, but it is worth mentioning.
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Fair enough. I agree that it's not for this deck, and that was mainly what I focused on, but Steam Augury is a valid option in the colour identity as a playable Fact or Fiction variant.
Steam Augury is good for playing a psychological game with an opponent, sometimes making it worthwhile to create a pile of 1 and a pile of 4. You're signaling to your opponent that you need that 1 card, tempting them to give you the pile of 4 instead. It's tricky, but ultimately you have less control over what you get compared to Fact or Fiction.
Will almost certainly see play in Riku of Two Reflections spell-slinger builds, among others.
I'm going to try out Swan Song. At the very least, stopping board wipes for a single U seems pretty good, and we've got a million ways to bounce the bird away.
stuff
Hmm I have a Swan Song but I admit I did not consider it for this deck. Looking through similar counter spells the other options to counter a sorcery for the same cost are Flusterstorm, Envelop and Disrupt. Swan Song certainly has more options and is a hard counter, even if it does give a 2/2 bird.
I considered Swan Song for my Edric deck, but there the 2/2 bird is a much bigger problem against my 1/1 flyers.
Good call Bismuth, I might see if I can fit Swan Song into my deck too!
Yeh, I discuss Xenagos in my review. In general I'm not keen on using Planeswalkers in Animar, because unlike creatures, they're difficult to reuse multiple times in a turn, however, Cloudstone Curio does let you bounce a pair of Planeswalkers back and forth, so with Garruk Wildspeaker and Xenagos, the Reveler you could potentially generate infinite mana and then infinite hasty 2/2 satyrs.