Spotlight: Vedalken Shackles

Vedalken Shackles is repeatable creature steal. Let that sink in.

Saddy McSadpants

Stealing creatures (and other permanents) has been a blue thing from way back. There are quite a few cards that will let you snag whatever tickles your fancy at the table. And unlike simply killing creatures, stealing creatures is a knife that cuts both ways. Your opponent is now down one creature, but you are up one creature.



For 5 mana, Mind Control gets the job done. But every slot in your deck must do a lot. I'm not a big fan of one-time spells in the Commander format. If it's going to happen once during the game, it better be big, big, big!



For 6 mana, Confiscate will the job done on any permanent (not only creatures). If you are willing to commit more to blue, you can use Volition Reins to get the job done and even untap the permanent for your trouble.



Want to spend even less mana to get the job done? Reach way back to Control Magic to steal a creature for only 4 mana. At 2 mana, use Gilded Drake. Sure, it's a trade, but you set the terms. Oh, and if the Drake gets killed (or bounced!), you get to keep the creature. Isn't that nice?

Which brings me to Vedalken Shackles. Unlike these other options, the handcuffs are repeatable. If the creature you steal gets dead, as creatures tend to get in this format, your handcuffs are still around to grab the next best creature that shows up.

Oh, but it gets better.

Let's say you slap down the Shackles and leave two mana up instead of snagging a creature right away. If you are running blue, you probably have counterspells. Now, you can still counter something terrible if you need to, but you also have the option of waiting until just before your own turn to steal the best thing at the table before your next untap.

Options are good.

Another fun use for the Shackles is this. Wait until attackers are declared. Is a beating coming your way? Great! Now, activate your handcuffs and grab a blocker from someone else. Block with that dude's creature instead of your own. Thankyouverymuch. Oh, he's open now? I sure hope no one takes advantage of that.

The handcuffs are also a political tool. Has someone at the table created an unassailable wall of creatures? Grab one and let one of your other opponents attack you instead of that guy. When you block with his creature, it gets dead. Rinse and repeat. It's like horrible, repeatable creature killing.

You want more horrible, repeatable creature killing?

(Who wouldn't?)



If you have a way to sacrifice creatures, the handcuffs get even better. For 2 mana, you can grab and sacrifice creatures away from your opponents for fun and profit, turn after turn after turn. This works even better if you can untap your Shackles several times per turn with cards like Tezzeret the Seeker, Voltaic Key, and others.



But it's not all roses.

Unlike the one-shot cards listed above, the Shackles have a restriction on what you can grab. You are limited to grabbing creatures that have a power equal to the number of Islands you control. In a mono-blue deck, that's not a huge restriction really. In two-color and three-color decks, it's probably going to be severely limiting.



The good news is that lots of utility creatures have a relatively low power and a ripe for the taking. Prophet of Kruphix and Seedborn Muse both clock in at a power of 2. These creatures create so much swing that it's downright scary. Of course, in the case of Seedborn Muse, you'll have to re-steal it every turn, but everything untaps so you should have the mana to spare.

Vedalken Shackles isn't going to work in every deck. But, if you are running any sort of creature stealing, it's worth comparing it to what have in those slots right now. The handcuffs have interesting (and interactive) uses that keep the game interesting for everyone. And being able to use them more than once is golden.

Oops! All Demons: Griselbrand Gets a Promo

Griselbrand is still the tippity-top of cool Magic cards in my book. I mean, look at him! He's got crazy scoop-knife things for hands. That's commitment.



But, except for the few short weeks where I actually got to use him as the Commander of my demon-tribal deck, he's been sitting in my collection, starting back at me with those Hello Kitty eyes. It doesn't look like he'll be coming back to the format anytime soon.

Just because he's banned in the Commander format doesn't mean that the flying lifelinker isn't used in other formats. He is busted as hell, after all. If you're looking for things to reanimate, a guy that turns into a fistful of cards and keeps swinging isn't a bad way to go. Thanks to his awesomeness, he's getting a promo card. Check it out!



I do love me some promo cards. They just look so damn good in black.

I keep my demon tribal deck together, waiting for the day I get to sleeve this guy back up. The format has matured quite a bit over the past few years, with lots of new cards printed and new strategies tested. Maybe, just maybe, he'll sneak back in. You can keep up with the comings and goings of the deck here, Oops! All Demons.

Think Multiplication: Commander Decks That Go Big

If you get into the commander format from one of the other formats in Magic, it can be tricky to change the way that you evaluate cards for deckbuilding.



Instead of thinking about addition when you build your deck, think multiplication.

Card Advantage is a fundamental theory of Magic. If you've played competitive Magic for a while, you know all about card advantage. Here's the short version.

Imagine that at the beginning of a game, you get to draw your entire deck and you don't lose for not being able to not draw a card. Your opponent draws a regular hand. And go!

What happens?

Well, your deck becomes super-consistent, for one. You never miss a land drop. You always have the card you need, right when you need it. And, you can put together sick combos without too much trouble. Having access to all of the cards in your deck makes it nearly impossible for you to lose.

Silly right? Now, flip the situation around.

Imagine that at the beginning of a game, you draw a regular hand. But! Your opponent doesn't get to draw any cards, ever.

Now, what happens?

You are likely going to win this game, too. Your opponent will never make a land drop, never have an answer to your threats, and can never assemble a game-winning combo.

In other words, having access to more cards than your opponent means that you have more answers and more options, more consistency, and therefore a higher chance of winning.

So, in a normal game of Magic, how do you get card advantage?



There are lots of ways to think about card advantage, including "virtual" card advantage, but for simplicity's sake, consider this. When you cast a spell like Sign in Blood, you use one card (the spell) to get two cards back. You are +1 card. But you actually have 2 new cards since the spell you cast replaced itself.

It's like a minor version of what I described above. You are now ever-so-slightly closer to the situation where you have all the cards in your deck and therefore all of the options. Maybe it allows you to make a land drop you otherwise would have missed. Maybe it gives you the removal spell you needed, right when you needed it. Maybe it even gives you the game-winning combo piece.

This is called incremental card advantage and it's usually the only kind of card advantage you can get consistently. Many competitive decks are built around this concept (or around virtual card advantage).

The reason this works is easy to see. More cards = more options = more winning. In competitive, one-vs-one Magic, your opponent is not only trying to get the same incremental card advantage you are, they are trying to stop you from doing the same. So, it's a battle of little victories. A few cards here. A few cards there. These incremental advantages add up until a critical mass is reached and then boom: we have a winner!

What does this have to do with commander?



Everything! You may be inclined to build a deck that "adds up" these incremental advantages. Popular cards in the format like Cultivate and Solemn Simulacrum do this. There's nothing wrong with it. It's the backbone of getting consistency out of an otherwise unwieldy pile of 100 cards. But at some point in the game, you want to stop adding and start multiplying.

Commander games are won and lost by the most overwhelming positions. In competitive, one-vs-one Magic, games are often won by the person that can force through that one extra attacker, that one extra point of damage, or that one extra counterspell. Commander isn't often like that. It's usually a cataclysmic explosion of card advantage that wins the game.

You don't get killed by one unblocked attacker, you get killed by 1000 trampling tokens. You don't lose to your opponent resolving Ancestral Recall, you lose to your opponent resolving Enter the Infinite. (Hey! That looks familiar.)



That sort of thing happens a lot. If not that, it's the "get to 14 mana and take infinite turns with Beacon of Tomorrows and Planar Portal." Or, "Kick Rite of Replication on my Blightsteel Colossus with Warstorm Surge in play." Heck, I get killed by swarms of Pegasus tokens more than is healthy thanks to Stormherd. And don't get me started on Tooth and Nail.



To put it another way, I can sit around all game long getting incremental advantage and still get blown out by a crashing death wave. You can't counter everything. You can't stop everyone. And by turn 10, everyone will be able to do something crazy, every turn.

Here's a fun combo:

Doubling Season + Almost ANY Planeswalker



How about Planeswalker ultimates the turn they come into play? Seems good, right?

There's nothing incremental about that. It happens and suddenly where there was nothing, there are now game-breaking emblems. Lurking Predators is another card like this. Cast it and pass your turn. By the time it's back around to your attack step, it's clobberin' time.

The best part about this is that overwhelming card advantage is fun! It's more-or-less unique to the slower, multiplayer formats like commander. And, it's an epic way to end games that, if done right, actually make losing exciting.

Incidentally, this is what makes combo so "good" in the commander format. You have all kinds of time to put the combo together. And when it goes off, you are duplicating the situation where you get to do stuff and your opponents do not that I described earlier. Basically, you win because they can't do anything about it. This happens a lot too, but it's not as much fun.

Why does it feel better to lose to a massive army of elf tokens instead of Laboratory Maniac Doomsday combo? I don't know. It just does. At least you are getting attacked. There's some level of interaction. But, to each their own.

The point of all this is that card advantage matters in commander the way it does in other formats, but on a different level. Incremental card advantage, which is a staple of successful decks in other formats, only goes so far here. In this format, you really have to pour it on. You have the turns and mana to get there, so cards like the aforementioned Rite of Replication can swing the game so far into your favor that it's overwhelming. Insurrection often does the same. Genesis Wave is nuts.



Here's an exercise: Go through your deck and identify if a card is there to give you incremental advantage or if it gives you mind-shattering, game-breaking, crippling advantage. If the second pile is looking weak, you aren't doing yourself any favors. And, you probably aren't making the game fun for everyone else either.

Commander 2014 Spoiler: Teferi, Temporal Archmage

Really big news, incoming. Planeswalkers as commanders in the new Commander preconstructs.

Let me say that again a different way: Planes. Walkers. As. COMMANDERS.

Stay on top of all the details over at MTGSalvation.

What we know right now:

1) The new Commander sets will be mono-colored.
2) There are new, special Planeswalkers that can be used as your commander.

The mono-blue planeswalker is Teferi. This is pre-mending Teferi, so he's still all juiced up with his spark.



I was at my local card shop yesterday (winning!), and the idea of using planeswalkers as commanders in an official way was polarizing. Half the group thought it was awesome. The other half thought that it was the death knell for the format.

Since the planeswalkers in question have specific text that allows them to be used as a commander, we probably aren't opening Pandora's box too far on this round. Plus, Teferi doesn't look that crazy.

We'll see how this plays out, especially as the new planeswalkers get spoiled. I, for one, am interested to see what they do with the old 'walkers. As a long-time follower of Magic lore, this is a pretty exciting time to be seeing new cards.

That said, I was under the distinct impression that the pre-mending 'walkers were much more powerful. I remember Bolas saying something about it in one of the novels, even. This version of Teferi as a planeswalker doesn't seem to represent that power, at least not on the surface.

Speed vs. Cunning Spoiler: New Duel Decks

Head on over to Mythic Spoiler or your other favorite Magic spoiler site and behold:



That Arcanis artwork is going to look amazing!

How exactly does someone go about getting the nickname "Omnipotent?" I've tapped to draw three cards plenty of times in my day and I felt pretty damned omnipotent doing it. Unfortunately, about the only time I see this guy anymore is when he is across the table and used in combination with Long-Term Plans.




Looks like they went with the rewritten flavor text for this version of the card. I prefer the flavor text from Onslaught: "He has journeyed where none have been before. Now he returns to ensure that none follow."

Spooky.

The other half of this duel deck is captained by Zurgo Helmsmasher. So, if you have any helms laying around keep a good eye on them. They gon' get smashed.



We have more of this to look forward to in the next block.

M15 Spoiler: The Chain Veil, Soul of Theros, Jalira, Ob Nixilis, Yisan, Sliver Hivelord, Perilous Vault

The full M15 spoiler is out! Check it out over at Mythic Spoiler in all of its glory.

After playing Magic for so long, the bar is pretty high for cards that's I'm interested in from a new set. But there are a few cards in M15 that look like I'll either be finding room for them in my decks or getting smashed by them across the table. Let's take a look at a few.



Up first, The Chain Veil. Yikes. I see all kinds of misunderstandings with this card in my future. But even after all the pesky rules issues get worked out, this thing will takes superfriends decks to the next level. There are a few five color planeswalker decks where I play. I'm not sure that they needed another toy as potent as this one. It might be a win-more card in the end, but it's a win-more-spectacularly card.



In related news, several of the new planeswalkers will almost certainly make a showing. Ajani Steadfast seems well suited for a tokens and/or a superfriends deck. Because if planeswalkers needed something, it was ways to ultimate sooner. :)



Next up, the new Avatar cycle looks fine with Soul of Theros looking particularly swingy. We all operate under the "old way" of thinking about life gain. In Commander, if you can swing your life total up by an eye-popping amount, you do actually build a buffer that is difficult to overcome. Soul of Theros can get you there. So can Resolute Archangel. Yeesh.



M15 brings us some new legendary creatures to build around, too. I'm super-pumped about the new Ob Nixilis, Unshackled. He fits right into demons tribal and mono-black control with a stax theme. Jalira, Master Polymorphist, and Yisan the Wanderer Bard are both abusable, if a little slow. Plus, Angels!



Lest we forget the mighty sliver? Nay. Behold! Sliver Hivelord. Get your Terminus ready, it's Sliver season.



Speaking of dealing with a filthy horde of indestructable slivers, why not try Perilous Vault? For the low, low price of only 9 mana (spread over two turns, if you like), it solves most problems - permanently(ish). Thank the good lord it exiles itself, too.



Indulgent Tormentor will probably earn a slot in many a black deck. (It's the promo!) Typically, I don't like giving my opponent(s) the option of making choices, but this one comes with a 5 power flyer for 5 mana. Not too shabby. Plus, it contains the special phrase, "draw a card."

There are several other gems in the set that will make it into decks, I'm sure. Happy hunting.

Solving a Puzzle: Building a Commander Deck

Imagine going to a thrift store and buying a unlabeled box full of puzzle pieces. You can see the individual pieces, and you might even have an idea of what the puzzle will be be when you finish, but you're not exactly sure what's going on when you start.



Building a Commander deck is like that.

Usually, I get a deck idea from thinking about a few card interactions, a new card coming out, or a Legendary creature that would make a slick Commander. From there, I start searching and making a list of cards.



Initial list size? 250+ cards, easy. We've all been there. It's just a box of cards at that point. By the time the list gets pared down to the legal limit of 100 cards, there's card wreckage everywhere. Heck, most of the sweet cards I pulled get left behind. "I'll build another deck, just for these cards." At least, that's what I tell myself.

Okay, I've got my 100 cards ready to shuffle up. But the puzzle isn't really solved. I'm still not sure what it is until I've played a few games with it. Smash face. Get smashed. Do it all over again.



"Oh, I didn't see that interaction when I built this!" Sometimes, my subconscious throws fun little synergies into my decks for me to discover later as I play. Sometimes, I just get lucky. But, the more I play with a deck, the more the cards start to make sense together. Swap this. Cut that. Someone suggests something awesome I haven't thought of. That goes in.

The deck is taking shape now. The puzzle is mostly solved. This deck is just about what it is. This is where things get tough. What do I cut?

The short list consists of a handful of cards that I know - just know - need to be in the deck. But, what do I cut to fit them in? If I rip this card out, it ruins a certain synergy or line of play. It slows me down or speeds me up. It mangles the curve. Or, it starts to turn into a different deck. Oh boy, that's a problem I run into a lot. Over time, a deck focused on one thing morphs into an entirely different deck. Not better, just different.

I try to make notes about what the deck is so that it doesn't veer too far off course. "There's lots of ways to build a blue / black deck, but this blue / black deck is about milling cards." That sort of thing keeps it from turning into some other monster.



Occasionally, there is a flat-out upgrade to a card I have in a deck. Those cuts are easy. Murder --> Hero's Downfall. But wait! Maybe I need Murder and Hero's Downfall. Doh! Usually, the cut is much more difficult because it means diluting one aspect of the deck to put some other effect in.



For example, my mono-blue Thada Ramp deck wants the effect from Vedalken Orrery. Playing nonland cards at instant speed is bonkers. The effect of the card is worth a slot because when it's in play, it warps the rules of the game in my favor. It opens up a lot of technical plays. But, I'm not sure what theme I want to weaken to jam it in. Do I want less creatures? No. Do I want less ramp? Hell no. Libary manipulation? Jeez, it seems like I need that or the deck turns into some other monster.

The puzzle is (mostly) solved. But those last few pieces are a real problem to fit in.