I really wish all of these old legendary creatures would get a gold bordered printing so everyone could afford them. Imagine a precon list of the most expensive, underpowered, commanders, from 2005 and before.
Underwhelming commanders can be the staple to your wins. Your opponent(s) usually won't know your strategy and not care for those commanders giving you time to build your battlefield. I remember you saying in earlier videos to have commanders that seem weak or not showing your strategy so this is great.
I have usually experienced the exact opposite. Opponents are often weary of decks that they don't know what to expect from moreso than of decks they know how to deal with.
@@jonaderjona5805 It's hit or miss. If the table has say Iname, Ur Dragon, Atraxa, and Sliver Hivelord then the 3 decks that people know are powerful will target each other. If the table has Iname and 3 mid-tier commanders, they'll gang up on Iname assuming it's a weird combo deck.
its fun when the #3 is just "uh... vigilance is useful.. and it has two creature types.." and then the #1 is a wild and completely unique combo enabler with several different directions to go in
I was going to mention Necrotic Plague, Traveling Plague, and Takklemaggot on the topic of Bartel, but the fact that it specifies that the auras must be "spells" doesn't work. They can kill the sacrificed creature eventually, and gets returned to play enchanting a creature chosen by the controller of the killed creature. If it was protection from auras, it could work, since the creature cannot be targeted or enchanted; however, Bartel's wording makes the ability a lot worse. Same with Tetsuo Umezawa's ability. Still really cool decks! Keep up the great content!
I am trying to build a deck around this at the moment. The problem is, that there are no great damage sources to creatures in dimir that you can control yourself. That's why I probably build it more like a trap.
i will never get tired of you talking about haakon, it is one of my alltime favorit cards ever since i opend it in a boster back when i was just a boy. great video as allways!
According to EDHREC, 30% of all decks with red play Blasphemous Act, and I'd guess some % of that 70% just forgot to include it when building online tbh Good call on playing around that!
I’ve run an iname deck for years and it’s definitely a fun deck. Tombstone Stairwell is also a must include - 20 hasty zombies and 20 death triggers each turn (not just your own) is very good. Sac for mana or just blood artist 80 damage per cycle around the table.
Iname death aspect is one of my FAVORITE commanders. Nothing better than running every living death effect and putting 30+ creatures into play. And also spicier stuff like the card that wins you the game if you have four different demons (using changelings) or Mortal Combat. Big silly haymaker plays like that are what edh is all about for me.
MonoB Iname made the list on Underwhelming Commanders and i can only laugh because now I KNOW for sure the voters are relatively new to the game. No way in hell is a tribal Entomb effect underwhelming. Iname has been my favorite reanimator combo commander for ages.
The only bad part of Iname is that most monoblack spirits are kinda crap. There are still some nasty you can pull off, like Horobi + Kuro, but not too much room for variation
Dralnu, Lich Lord could be amazing in a Jon Irenicus, Shattered One deck. Give him to your opponents, goad it and give it the "can't be sacrificed" clause. If they don't have an instant or sorcery in their graveyard, they're in for a bad time.
A great way to weaponize Dralnu's first ability would be to give an opponent control of Dralnu (plenty of of blue cards for that) and then hit Dralnu with one of those black cards that do damage to a creature (March of Wretched Sorrow, Soul burn, swallowing plague). It's a bit mean but an interesting way to build into that first ability. Also Sudden Substitution would be a trick to use on that blasphemous act.
I've got a Tormod, the Desecrator and Kodama of the East Tree partner deck with a spirit tribal theme. It has the three iname spirits as well as all the green and black myojins, resulting in awesome combos. Iname as one is a lethal finisher and a flavor win.
I really like the Iname deck plan. Bummer that there aren't really good pump effects for mono-black spirits, or really non-blue spirits in general. I've been waiting years for Wizards to print an Esper spirits commander, but it hasn't happened. My only option at this point is one of the 5-color spirits or some jank, like Alharu + Silas Renn. I suppose there's also Aminatou, but she really only has a minor spirit synergy and doesn't actually reference spirits at all.
The all-star of my Dralnu deck is Mirror Mad Phantasm. 4UUU draw ~40. Pretty good! My deck is UB control. I dont really have fun countering everything so I barely play it anymore
I don't think combos are that bad. SO I don't mind having them in my decks, even less if they are cards that are a must in the deck, like "Mind Crank" + "Duskmantle Guildmage" in a Mill deck. The again, I don't use tutors in my decks, unless the deck in particular have some piece that need to be on the board to work properly (Krark's Thumb for coinflips, Pharadox Haze for Jhoira of the Ghitu). And that las deck remind me of one of mine that I call my "Combo Tribal". It's a "Mairsil, The Pretender" with more than 10 diferent "Creature/Artifact" two or three card combos. . . not all of them are game enders. But there is a catch: There's only 4 tutors ("Final Parting", "Oriq Loremge", "Arcum Dagsson" and "Tesseret, The Seeker"), and I wanted all responses and interactions come from my commander... so there's no Instants in the deck. :) Every game is like a different Commander for the random skill sets. And in exile with cage counters, a pile of cards that a Mutate deck can only dream to be that big.
I’ve been looking for a bartel runaxe deck for so long. I tried building one that featured a lot of enchantments that buffed him without being auras but it was pretty weird and I gave up
The Iname as one list seems really cool, but I'm really not sold on the Mikaeus in there. Just not that keen on generic combos and it also nombos with the Maskwood Nexus. Also I don't know if you also checked the Changelings too, cause Bloodline Pretender would also be a pretty insane one to mass reanimate.
Just ran across a card that I don't remember if you covered. Telim 'Tor's Edict, really this this card screams commander. Only one red, instant, draw and exiles something that might be stole you and so on.
Hey Demo! I have a question, my dad played a morph creature (chromeshell crab) that gains control of target creature, my brothers creature that he was targeting just came into play. My brother wanted to in response use an activated ability (pay 3 mana and blow up an artifact) before losing control of Zacama, Primal Calamity. Does he get to do the ability, or is it never on the stack and my dad gets the creature before he can do that? Thank you so much, sorry the long question 😅
I believe morphing a creature is a special action that doesn't use the stack. So I don't think a morph can be responded to because it isn't on the stack so no priority is passed. Assuming I understood the question correctly.
@@ozxander619 I should habe clarified, it was my brothers turn so he had priority, casting a creature isnt put on the stack right? Right when he played it, my dad morphed to take it, and then he wanted to trigger an ability before losing it
@@DmanDominatewhen you cast a creature spell it goes from your hand to the stack. The crabs controller had to wait for the spell to resolve. I believe after the spell resolves the crab can be flipped face up but the morph can't be responded to. And I don't think morph requires priority since it doesn't use the stack but that I'm not sure on. Tldr I don't think he could activate it before it's stolen
@@ozxander619 does playing a planeswalker use the stack? I womder in one of his videos he said it didnt which is why you can get a loyalty ability off before an opponant can kill it. So I was thinking maybe the same would be for playing a creature?
@@DmanDominate A planeswalker is put on the stack when it is cast, the opponent can respond to this (e.g. counterspell it or kill something on the battlefield that the planeswalker might want to target with a loyalty ability). After the planeswalker resolves, the person who cast it has priority. This means they can activate an ability on the planeswalker before the opponent can target it with removal. The loyalty ability uses the stack, so the opponent can respond to the loyalty ability before it resolves, but the loyalty ability will resolve if its targets are still legal even if the planeswalker is removed. Morphing a creature does not use the stack, which means if the morph player gets priority they can morph the creature and get the flip triggered ability. You can't respond to the morph activation and kill the morph creature to stop it from flipping, so once the morph has been activated it's flip ability will always trigger. The ability that triggers when the morph creature is flipped does use the stack though, so you can respond to it before it resolves. So in your example, your brother casts the creature, and it resolves. Your brother now has priority and could do something else, but in your example he doesn't do anything else and passes priority. Your dad now has priority and activates the morph ability of the crab. Your brother can't respond to the crab morphing so there is nothing he can do to stop it from flipping now so it's flip ability trigger will go on the stack before your brother gets priority again to do something about it. The flip ability goes on the stack and priority goes back to your brother, so he has a chance here to respond to it and activate Zacama's ability. In the end, Zacama blew up an artifact and Zacama is exchanged with the other creature.
I am so annoyed that Bartels Flavor Text reads: "Thundering down from Hammerheim, no foe could slow Bartel's charge.", but he doesn't have trample. Which means, that a 0/1 could, in fact, slow his charge.
Boldwyr Intimidator? Both a Giant *and* a Warrior, makes Warriors unblockable, and helps your non-Warrior Giants get the benefits of your Warrior payoffs
"en-AHM-ey", not "en-NAME", sorry I get really touchy about pronounciation of things. I hate to be a grammar Nazi but also it annoys me if I don't say anything
I really wish all of these old legendary creatures would get a gold bordered printing so everyone could afford them. Imagine a precon list of the most expensive, underpowered, commanders, from 2005 and before.
Underwhelming commanders can be the staple to your wins. Your opponent(s) usually won't know your strategy and not care for those commanders giving you time to build your battlefield.
I remember you saying in earlier videos to have commanders that seem weak or not showing your strategy so this is great.
I have usually experienced the exact opposite. Opponents are often weary of decks that they don't know what to expect from moreso than of decks they know how to deal with.
@@jonaderjona5805 It's hit or miss. If the table has say Iname, Ur Dragon, Atraxa, and Sliver Hivelord then the 3 decks that people know are powerful will target each other. If the table has Iname and 3 mid-tier commanders, they'll gang up on Iname assuming it's a weird combo deck.
its fun when the #3 is just "uh... vigilance is useful.. and it has two creature types.." and then the #1 is a wild and completely unique combo enabler with several different directions to go in
Man the Iname Deck is a really cool idea
Love the giant warrior idea i might build a deck like that
Love all these three decks Demo, you really out did yourself!
Props for figuring out the phasing for Dralnu it’s definitely great protection for him lol
I was going to mention Necrotic Plague, Traveling Plague, and Takklemaggot on the topic of Bartel, but the fact that it specifies that the auras must be "spells" doesn't work. They can kill the sacrificed creature eventually, and gets returned to play enchanting a creature chosen by the controller of the killed creature.
If it was protection from auras, it could work, since the creature cannot be targeted or enchanted; however, Bartel's wording makes the ability a lot worse. Same with Tetsuo Umezawa's ability.
Still really cool decks! Keep up the great content!
I made an Iname EDH deck because of this channel months back. It absolutely slaps.
Passing control of Dralnu could be a great way to force huge sacrifices on opponents.
I am trying to build a deck around this at the moment. The problem is, that there are no great damage sources to creatures in dimir that you can control yourself. That's why I probably build it more like a trap.
i will never get tired of you talking about haakon, it is one of my alltime favorit cards ever since i opend it in a boster back when i was just a boy. great video as allways!
According to EDHREC, 30% of all decks with red play Blasphemous Act, and I'd guess some % of that 70% just forgot to include it when building online tbh
Good call on playing around that!
I’ve run an iname deck for years and it’s definitely a fun deck. Tombstone Stairwell is also a must include - 20 hasty zombies and 20 death triggers each turn (not just your own) is very good. Sac for mana or just blood artist 80 damage per cycle around the table.
Really cool iname deck! But isn't maskwood nexus a bit of a nonbo with mikaeus, since it makes everyone human?
Mikeaus Triskellion actually is a combo on it's own. You just have to make sure to use the last +1/+1 counter to ping itself.
You actually need to use 2 pings since Triskelion is not a human and gets +1/+1 and Intimidate from Mikaeus.
Classic Mike and Trike.
@@twilightwolf90 right, forgot triskelion is a 1/1
A great phasing card i use for voltron is the enchantment Vanishing from the visions set.
Iname death aspect is one of my FAVORITE commanders. Nothing better than running every living death effect and putting 30+ creatures into play. And also spicier stuff like the card that wins you the game if you have four different demons (using changelings) or Mortal Combat. Big silly haymaker plays like that are what edh is all about for me.
MonoB Iname made the list on Underwhelming Commanders and i can only laugh because now I KNOW for sure the voters are relatively new to the game. No way in hell is a tribal Entomb effect underwhelming. Iname has been my favorite reanimator combo commander for ages.
The only bad part of Iname is that most monoblack spirits are kinda crap. There are still some nasty you can pull off, like Horobi + Kuro, but not too much room for variation
Tried that Death Aspect deck and wow. Crazy good😅
My Iname deck wins of turn 6-8 pretty consistantly.Put about 35 spirits in you deck and play one of these..... Syr Konrad, Dreadhound, Lotleth giant
Dralnu, Lich Lord could be amazing in a Jon Irenicus, Shattered One deck. Give him to your opponents, goad it and give it the "can't be sacrificed" clause. If they don't have an instant or sorcery in their graveyard, they're in for a bad time.
Magebane Armor is a very good card in Dralnu. It can protect him from Blasphemous Act and similar effects
A great way to weaponize Dralnu's first ability would be to give an opponent control of Dralnu (plenty of of blue cards for that) and then hit Dralnu with one of those black cards that do damage to a creature (March of Wretched Sorrow, Soul burn, swallowing plague). It's a bit mean but an interesting way to build into that first ability. Also Sudden Substitution would be a trick to use on that blasphemous act.
I've got a Tormod, the Desecrator and Kodama of the East Tree partner deck with a spirit tribal theme. It has the three iname spirits as well as all the green and black myojins, resulting in awesome combos. Iname as one is a lethal finisher and a flavor win.
That sounds really awesome! Could you link the decklist?
I really like the Iname deck plan. Bummer that there aren't really good pump effects for mono-black spirits, or really non-blue spirits in general. I've been waiting years for Wizards to print an Esper spirits commander, but it hasn't happened. My only option at this point is one of the 5-color spirits or some jank, like Alharu + Silas Renn. I suppose there's also Aminatou, but she really only has a minor spirit synergy and doesn't actually reference spirits at all.
The all-star of my Dralnu deck is Mirror Mad Phantasm. 4UUU draw ~40. Pretty good!
My deck is UB control. I dont really have fun countering everything so I barely play it anymore
FWIW, Iname is pronounced "ee - nah - meh" ( sounds like Spanish vowels ).
He talks about that character all the time, too 😭
I don't think combos are that bad. SO I don't mind having them in my decks, even less if they are cards that are a must in the deck, like "Mind Crank" + "Duskmantle Guildmage" in a Mill deck.
The again, I don't use tutors in my decks, unless the deck in particular have some piece that need to be on the board to work properly (Krark's Thumb for coinflips, Pharadox Haze for Jhoira of the Ghitu).
And that las deck remind me of one of mine that I call my "Combo Tribal".
It's a "Mairsil, The Pretender" with more than 10 diferent "Creature/Artifact" two or three card combos. . . not all of them are game enders.
But there is a catch: There's only 4 tutors ("Final Parting", "Oriq Loremge", "Arcum Dagsson" and "Tesseret, The Seeker"), and I wanted all responses and interactions come from my commander... so there's no Instants in the deck. :)
Every game is like a different Commander for the random skill sets. And in exile with cage counters, a pile of cards that a Mutate deck can only dream to be that big.
I love Oriq loremage for my Alesha deck, definitely one of the best cards in it
I have a mono black Iname combo deck and I love and cherish it
Btw IMO Kuro Pitlord is the best spirit for Iname reanimation. You just become the board police.
Wait, Cryptic Ghast is allowed in a mono B deck ? the hybrid mana doesn't count as 2 colored identity ?
the white mana symbol is in the reminder text (in parentheses), not the ruletext of the card.
My favorite passing card is Vanishing. Its just a better version of the vodolian illusionist as far as i can tell.
In regards to the lich there are a few cards that prevent noncombat damage (i know an equipment at lest but cant remember the name, ...armor)
I’ve been looking for a bartel runaxe deck for so long. I tried building one that featured a lot of enchantments that buffed him without being auras but it was pretty weird and I gave up
Death Aspect was my first EDH and I gotta admit I’m waiting for some new cards to push for a rebuild
Treacherous Link works well with Dralnu
The Iname as one list seems really cool, but I'm really not sold on the Mikaeus in there. Just not that keen on generic combos and it also nombos with the Maskwood Nexus.
Also I don't know if you also checked the Changelings too, cause Bloodline Pretender would also be a pretty insane one to mass reanimate.
Dralnu is the OG combo commander. I've seen cEDH Dralnu on other channels before. I would not call him an underwhelming commander in any way.
Doesn't Mask Wood Nexus cancel out Mikaeus' undying effect since all your creatures would be human as well?
Patriars seal would be good in Dralnu I think, just because you're tapping your commander
Also I’d love to see your take on ib halfheart goblin tactician
Just ran across a card that I don't remember if you covered. Telim 'Tor's Edict, really this this card screams commander. Only one red, instant, draw and exiles something that might be stole you and so on.
Can you do a shisato deck? I’d love to see how you’d build it, because I’m trying to build it right now
Kinda surprised you forgot about the card Conspiracy, the first card with that effect.
My solution to Dralnu is to just have it in the 99 of my mairsil deck. It keeps the good activated ability and loses the risky static.
Hey Demo! I have a question, my dad played a morph creature (chromeshell crab) that gains control of target creature, my brothers creature that he was targeting just came into play. My brother wanted to in response use an activated ability (pay 3 mana and blow up an artifact) before losing control of Zacama, Primal Calamity.
Does he get to do the ability, or is it never on the stack and my dad gets the creature before he can do that?
Thank you so much, sorry the long question 😅
I believe morphing a creature is a special action that doesn't use the stack. So I don't think a morph can be responded to because it isn't on the stack so no priority is passed. Assuming I understood the question correctly.
@@ozxander619 I should habe clarified, it was my brothers turn so he had priority, casting a creature isnt put on the stack right? Right when he played it, my dad morphed to take it, and then he wanted to trigger an ability before losing it
@@DmanDominatewhen you cast a creature spell it goes from your hand to the stack. The crabs controller had to wait for the spell to resolve. I believe after the spell resolves the crab can be flipped face up but the morph can't be responded to. And I don't think morph requires priority since it doesn't use the stack but that I'm not sure on. Tldr I don't think he could activate it before it's stolen
@@ozxander619 does playing a planeswalker use the stack? I womder in one of his videos he said it didnt which is why you can get a loyalty ability off before an opponant can kill it. So I was thinking maybe the same would be for playing a creature?
@@DmanDominate A planeswalker is put on the stack when it is cast, the opponent can respond to this (e.g. counterspell it or kill something on the battlefield that the planeswalker might want to target with a loyalty ability). After the planeswalker resolves, the person who cast it has priority. This means they can activate an ability on the planeswalker before the opponent can target it with removal. The loyalty ability uses the stack, so the opponent can respond to the loyalty ability before it resolves, but the loyalty ability will resolve if its targets are still legal even if the planeswalker is removed.
Morphing a creature does not use the stack, which means if the morph player gets priority they can morph the creature and get the flip triggered ability. You can't respond to the morph activation and kill the morph creature to stop it from flipping, so once the morph has been activated it's flip ability will always trigger. The ability that triggers when the morph creature is flipped does use the stack though, so you can respond to it before it resolves.
So in your example, your brother casts the creature, and it resolves. Your brother now has priority and could do something else, but in your example he doesn't do anything else and passes priority. Your dad now has priority and activates the morph ability of the crab. Your brother can't respond to the crab morphing so there is nothing he can do to stop it from flipping now so it's flip ability trigger will go on the stack before your brother gets priority again to do something about it. The flip ability goes on the stack and priority goes back to your brother, so he has a chance here to respond to it and activate Zacama's ability.
In the end, Zacama blew up an artifact and Zacama is exchanged with the other creature.
Could you add Krenko, Tin Street Kingpin to a poll sometime?
I am so annoyed that Bartels Flavor Text reads: "Thundering down from Hammerheim, no foe could slow Bartel's charge.", but he doesn't have trample. Which means, that a 0/1 could, in fact, slow his charge.
We need more cards that care about creatures that share more than one type.
Tomik is my recommendation for the next poll.
How the hell would someone build that
Maybe you should try building a deck with Shisato
Let’s see a deck tech for Stangg. Love me some old janky cards
so my dragonlord atarka deck was originally a stangg deck. he's just so bad that I had to switch.
Dralnu is awesome
How about Nebuchadnezzar or Rubinia Soulsinger for the next poll
Seems you missed Crypt of Agadeem
Dralnu doom tide is a cEDH deck
as far as i can tell, pretty much any commander can helm a cedh deck these days.
@@edhdeckbuilding yeah, but Dralnu was there for the birth of cEDH. Back in the day when lab maniacs was just getting started.
Boldwyr Intimidator? Both a Giant *and* a Warrior, makes Warriors unblockable, and helps your non-Warrior Giants get the benefits of your Warrior payoffs
I dont think, mikaeus works with maskwood nexus in play
correct. gotta watch for those nonbos in this deck.
Mikaeus, unfortunately, will be turned off by the maskwood nexus
"en-AHM-ey", not "en-NAME", sorry I get really touchy about pronounciation of things. I hate to be a grammar Nazi but also it annoys me if I don't say anything
Trust Sorin Markov to be a grammar Nazi, eh?
the problem with dralnu is that there are commander with similar ability like kess or lier, and don't have a you lose the game effect
It's pronounced i-nah-may. It's japanese.
I like your content but I hate your intro music.
you would be the first