Commander Highlights: Forgotten Realms

[Morganator 2.0]

Did I forget to do one of these for Modern Horizons? Oh well. There's actually not much for Adventures in the Forgotten Realms, so let's get into it.

Circle of Dreams Druid

This is likely to be a chase card. Mono green creature ramp is very common. I think this card is unlikely to see more play than Priest of Titania, but it will go in many of the same decks.

Deadly Dispute

This comes off as a very useful sacrifice-based draw spell. 2 mana, sacrifice either a creature or artifact, draw two cards, and then get a rebate? I'd like to hear what the aristocrat players on this site think of this card.

Flumph

Now this is an interesting draw effect. It has a strong political motive where you can make deals with people and let them draw cards. If you don't want them to draw cards, you choose to not block, or block and give the draw to someone else. Very interesting, and a good card at 2 mana and in white.

Moon-Blessed Cleric

As she can get any enchantment, she's probably going to see just as much play as Heliod's Pilgrim.

Power Word Kill

Another two mana black kill spell. This one should remind you of Victim of Night. I wonder if there is a way to figure out which one of these cards is better...

Xorn

Treasure-based mana ramp is becoming increasingly common. I'm not sure if Xorn is worth the initial three mana investment, but I'm sure there are decks that will be glad to take it.

[CleanBelwas]

Deadly Dispute

This comes off as a very useful sacrifice-based draw spell. 2 mana, sacrifice either a creature or artifact, draw two cards, and then get a rebate? I'd like to hear what the aristocrat players on this site think of this card.

Deadly dispute is an interesting one.

I used to run Altar's Reap and Costly plunder in a lot of decks. I love these kinds of effects, even outside of aristocrats. Creatures die all the time in EDH, and being able to cash them in for cards is great. Even better if you are saving them from exile in the process.

Then they printed Village Rites.

A difference of 1 mana doesn't sound like a lot, but it is.

For Aristocrats, I don't think the upside of a treasure is worth the extra mana now that Village Rites exists. It runs low enough to the ground that having the extra mana next turn is less important than only having to leave one mana open. Our best interaction is already 1 mana anyway with the likes of Swords, Path, Tragic Slip, Defile etc. so it's a lot easier and more natural to sit there with one mana open than two. I can see running both, but if I only had room for one, I'd pick Village Rites every time for Aristocrats.

That said, I do think that Deadly Dispute has a place. I will be running it in artifact matters decks without question. Breya, Fain, the Broker and 5 colour Academy Manufactor. 3 decks I run that have Marionette Master as a back up win condition (I like to win by sacrificing things if you hadn't noticed). Having an effect that is will worth running anyway while also leaving behind a permanent of a relevant type that can sacrifice itself is pretty great.

[The Golgari Guy]

So, here are the cards (apart from those already mentioned) that caught my attention (however I have mainly considered cards that I could include in my decks when looking at the spoilers):

- Guardian of Faith

This seems very very strong. A mini Teferi's Protection that can be bounced and flickered? Wow.  Probably an instant staple for white decks with creatures / flicker synergies.

- Old Gnawbone

This one can be bonkers in the right deck. I'm especially looking forward to trying this in Xenagos: 7 mana for 14 damage and 14 treasures seems decent.

- Neverwinter Dryad

As a Golgari and Aristocrats aficionado, I love myself a second copy of Diligent Farmhand.

- Loyal Warhound

A more easily splashable Knight of the White Orchid, this is gonna see play in non-green decks.

- Teleportation Circle

Solid redundancy for Conjurer's Closet, and this one can target artifacts too.

- Grazilaxx, Illithid Scholar

Combining an effect similar to Reconnaissance with Coastal Piracy this seems like it could be a solid mono U commander.

- Asmodeus the Archfiend

Maybe he's not Griselbrand, but this sure is a sweet payoff for big mana black decks.

- Plate Armor

Seems very solid in Equipments matter decks.

- Treasure Vault

I'm not sure which decks are going to play this one, but I'm sure that it's very strong.

- Oswald Fiddlebender

Birthing Pod for artifacts? This is gonna be good, both as a commander and as a card in the 99.

[CleanBelwas]

Gather round, fellow deckstatians, it's story time!

A month or two ago, my buddy shows me this idea for a custom card he'd came up with and says "check this out, it's right up your street". It was a legendary creature that did birthing pod for artifacts.

I love pod chains, I love artifacts and I love sacrificing things. I absolutely loved it.

We did some balancing to make it fair and what we ended up with was almost exactly like Oswald.

It's uncanny. We made it a bear (2/2 for 2) and mono white to counteract the obvious power of this ability. The only differences were that he was a human instead of a gnome and you could use phyrexian mana to activate it (in homage to original pod). That's it. Everything else was identical (functionally at least. Artistically it was based on Artie Ziff).

"That's it. That's my invitational card if I ever win a pro tour" I confidently asserted, knowing full well I will never move beyond casual commander and having no desire to do so. "It's (almost) everything I love in magic".

Fast forward two months and Oswald gets spoiled. Needless to say I was incredibly excited.

Ideas for pod chains have been buzzing around my head ever since.

The icing on the cake? Oswald was my nickname all through my late teens and early 20s after someone misheard my surname and it stuck.

I've found a forever deck and I'm so excited to build it.

[The Golgari Guy]

Gather round, fellow deckstatians, it's story time!

A month or two ago, my buddy shows me this idea for a custom card he'd came up with and says "check this out, it's right up your street". It was a legendary creature that did birthing pod for artifacts.

I love pod chains, I love artifacts and I love sacrificing things. I absolutely loved it.

We did some balancing to make it fair and what we ended up with was almost exactly like Oswald.

It's uncanny. We made it a bear (2/2 for 2) and mono white to counteract the obvious power of this ability. The only differences were that he was a human instead of a gnome and you could use phyrexian mana to activate it (in homage to original pod). That's it. Everything else was identical (functionally at least. Artistically it was based on Artie Ziff).

"That's it. That's my invitational card if I ever win a pro tour" I confidently asserted, knowing full well I will never move beyond casual commander and having no desire to do so. "It's (almost) everything I love in magic".

Fast forward two months and Oswald gets spoiled. Needless to say I was incredibly excited.

Ideas for pod chains have been buzzing around my head ever since.

The icing on the cake? Oswald was my nickname all through my late teens and early 20s after someone misheard my surname and it stuck.

I've found a forever deck and I'm so excited to build it.

Happy for you! I'm sure you're going to build a sweet deck.

I actually don't find your story so difficult to believe, since I remember seeing some time ago a Colfenor card on the custom magic cards reddit that ended up being basically identical to the Commander Legends version (Colfenor, the Last Yew). So these kind of things can definitely happen!

[robort]

Xorn is sweet basically an anointed procession/parallel lives for treasures on a stick. Not to mention that it pairs well with Hullbreacher, Smothering Tithe, Dockside Extortionist, and Pitiless Plunderer.

[WWolfe]

There's not too many cards that I'm overly excited about for slotting into my existing decks, but like I mentioned in another thread I've been contemplating rebuilding my old Daxos of Meletis voltron deck and the bant voltron Commander deck has some cards that I could see slotting into the deck.

[anjinsan]

Deadly Dispute doesn't fit the play patterns of Village Rites anywhere near as well - you want to be able to get value back for things that would die anyway. However being able to sac artefacts is big, and anyway it's a better Costly Plunder. In some cases I would even prefer it to Rites, because the mana for treasure is often a net plus, but probably only where I was planning to sac stuff anyway e.g. Aristocrats types, Spine of Ish Sah, etc. or the treasure would give further artifact or saccing synergies.

[The Golgari Guy]

Deadly Dispute

This comes off as a very useful sacrifice-based draw spell. 2 mana, sacrifice either a creature or artifact, draw two cards, and then get a rebate? I'd like to hear what the aristocrat players on this site think of this card.

Once there was Altar's Reap, then they printed the strictly better Costly Plunder, and now we have a strictly better version of the latter...

This card is great, imho. It's not going to replace Village Rites in most decks, but if you want a second Village Rites effect, this is the card for you.

Also, it's probably going to be better than Village Rites in some decks, for example Korvold, Fae-Cursed King or Fain, the Broker.