Magar (EDH / Commander)

Strategy
Step 1: Put some kind of game-winning instant or sorcery in the graveyard.
Step 2: Play [[Magar of the Magic Strings]] and animate the spell from the graveyard.
Step 3: Profit.

Gameplan
The best thing to do is play something in the first few turns that can discard. This includes all the [[Tormenting Voice]] variants as well as [[Burning Inquiry]], [[Goblin Lore]], and [[Wheel of Fortune]]. These will allow a nasty spell to hit the graveyard, which accomplishes step 1. The same result can be achieved by playing [[Rakdos Carnarium]]/[[Guildless Commons]] or casting [[Sign in Blood]] or [[Night's Whisper]] on turn 2, which will result in 1 card being discarded in the cleanup step. Other than stocking the graveyard, the first few turns can be used for ramping or for playing one of the on-board evasion pieces.

The ideal start involves playing a 2-mana rock on turn 2 followed by a card like [[Big Score]] on turn 3. This means 6+ mana is available on turn 4, which is enough to cast and activate [[Magar of the Magic Strings]]. This means that you will be untapping on turn 5 with about 5 or 6 mana to create some evasion ([[Access Tunnel]], [[Dauthi Embrace]], etc.) and attack with a very powerful ([[Xander's Pact]]) or maybe even game-winning ([[All is Dust]]) spell.

When all else fails, you can always puppet up a random draw spell and try to make something happen.

[[Transmogrify]] Package
There are a few large dragons to hit off of one of the [[Transmogrify]] effects or off of [[Dragonstorm]].

• The only creature in the deck that is not a dragon is [[Mishra, Claimed by Gix]], which melds with [[Phyrexian Dragon Engine]]. Since there are enough of these polymorph effects, it should be relatively easy to assemble [[Mishra, Lost to Phyrexia]]. But since the meld isn't that back-breaking, there are other dragons to search out.
• [[Brainstealer Dragon]] is an excellent source of card advantage that can kill opponents. [[Scourge of the Throne]] and [[Blast-Furnace Hellkite]] can provide additional hits with any number of [[Magar of the Magic Strings]]'s puppets.
• [[Drakuseth, Maw of Flames]] and [[Ancient Copper Dragon]] are just really powerful.
• [[Capricious Hellraiser]] can sometimes be cast cheaply and sometimes be spun into, but regardless it should provide some fun value. Plus, when it's done its effect and is just a 4/4 flier, it can be transmogrified again into a different dragon.

Finally, some cards like [[Chaotic Transformation]] can actually be used as pretty good removal in some cases.

Locks
Some of the cards can lock out the game or specific opponents when turned into puppets.

• [[Worst Fears]] is great because you can take someone's turn, during which you make sure they have no blockers or do whatever you want. [[Worst Fears]] is supposed to exile itself, but it’s a copy so you can just do it again next turn.
• [[All is Dust]] can wipe the board every turn because the puppets are colorless. The other board wipes are one-sided as well.
• [[Cruel Entertainment]] can be a fun card to resolve multiple times and can lead to a weird form of lockdown.
• The other board wipes also get cast every turn.
• [[Savage Beating]] results in infinite combats as long as you can get through.
• [[Rise of the Eldrazi]] results in infinite turns, removal, and card draw as long as you can get through.

Other

• Don’t forget about [[Access Tunnel]], [[Rogue’s Passage]], [[Minas Morgul, Dark Fortress]], and [[The Black Gate]] because they are important evasion pieces in the mana base.
• The MDFC lands can become puppets when not needed as lands.
• [[Cursed Mirror]] is interesting because it can become a copy of an existing puppet or it can just be a big dragon. It also can copy whatever the opponents are doing.
• [[Dragon’s Hoard]] can actually trigger sometimes, which is cool.
• [[Grave Upheaval]] is nice because it puts itself into the graveyard for cheap, but makes a great puppet.
• [[Key to the City]] and [[Zephyr Boots]] are cool because they accomplish 2 meaningful tasks: getting something into the graveyard and also forcing a puppet through blockers.

Maybeboard and Exclusions

• [[Surge to Victory]] seems cool, but it doesn’t work as a puppet. Also copying some spells doesn’t do a lot (e.g. [[Plague Wind]]). For similar reasons, the copy spells ([[Twinferno]], [[Repeated Reverberation]], etc. and even [[Sins of the Past]]) are left out. Copying other spells just isn’t good enough because the spells are already so big and great on their own, and if you don’t have something to copy it’s a disaster.
• Tutors ([[Entomb]], [[Demonic Tutor]], [[Unmarked Grave]]) are great and may come in later on.
• Cheaper removal might be necessary, but for now I would rather try to do the thing and wipe everyone than spend cards destroying single targets. [[Hurl Through Hell]] is neat since you can cast it on a puppet and then cast the puppet card, but that’s just not very strong really. [[Bedevil]] and [[Feed the Swarm]] aren't as good as nuking everything.
• There are some other creatures that could come in, but they dilute the deck and the ones here are already very good.
• Ramp ([[Mind Stone]], [[Thran Dynamo]], [[Everflowing Chalice]]) is a good backup plan against graveyard hate, but it’s not so fun; however, [[Chromatic Orrery]] and/or [[Coveted Jewel]] might come in handy anyway.
• I really liked the idea of [[Yawgmoth’s Will]] at first, but I realized even if you can cast it every turn, you still need to pay for the stuff in the graveyard and that’s not so great of a plan.
• There are some other evasion equipments in the maybeboard that might be added later based on balance.
• [[Guildless Commons]] is pretty suspect because of the colorless mana, but I really like the idea of getting a card into the graveyard on turn 2 for "free."