(Nebuchadnezzar | Art by Richard Kane Ferguson)

My Name is Nebuchadnezzar, King of Kings

Hello everyone, and welcome back to Conditions Allow, the article series where I take a look at legendary creatures with a drawback and try to turn it into a strength. This week I’m taking a look at a Human Wizard with more than a couple of restrictions on his activated ability. Some are worse than others, but I don’t think that stops Nebuchadnezzar from having lots of potential.

Nebuchadnezzar has perhaps my favorite artwork on any Magic card, which is unfortunately not paired with my favorite effect. But this old king still has a pretty cool activated ability: you can pay any amount of mana and tap Nebuchadnezzar to name a card, then an opponent reveals a number of cards from their hand equal to the mana you paid, and they discard all cards revealed this way with the selected name.

One crucial thing about this card is the timing: since naming the card isn't part of the cost (it's before the colon), you name the card as the ability resolves, which means that the player you target can't cast the named spell in response and fizzle Nebuchadnezzar's ability.

There are several commanders that commonly helm Discard-themed decks, such as the new Kroxa, Titan of Death’s Hunger or the more classic Neheb, the Worthy. Unlike these popular commanders, Nebuchadnezzar lets you choose which card your opponent will discard, as long as you can correctly guess what cards are in their hand. This allows us to take a more nuanced approach to the Discard theme than most other popular commanders for the archetype.

Discard-themed decks can attract a lot of negative attention from a group of players, because no one likes being forced to discard cards. Also, Kroxa, Titan of Death's Hunger lets your opponents choose what card they discard; the only way to make them discard their best cards is to make them discard all of their cards. Gwendlyn Di Corci makes the discard random, but you still can't be sure you're getting rid of the card you need to. In either case, the best strategy is to empty each opponent's hands entirely. Nebuchadnezzar, on the other hand, gives you more control. Being able to cast a Thoughtseize every turn sounds pretty good. If we can untap Nebuchadnezzar, we can keep everyone's best spells out of their hands.

I Can See Your Mind

Of course, this only works if we know what's in each player's hand. Otherwise, we're just guessing blindly. Luckily, a little Telepathy means we'll always know what our opponents are up to. Seer's Vision is another version of this effect which can also pick an important card out of someone's hand at a key moment if Nebuchadnezzar is out of commission. More common, however, are the symmetrical effects. Zur's Weirding lets your opponents see your hand, as well, but gives you more control over what each player is allowed to draw. Just remember: the same effect applies to you, as well. Wandering Eye, on the other hand, is much more straightforward, simply revealing each player's hand.

Playing black means we can tutor for one of those four cards, but blue offers a number of temporary effects, as well. Gitaxian Probe is excellent in the early game, letting us get a free look at one player's hand in the early game, before Nebuchadnezzar enters play. Peek is another great version of this effect that fits under an Isochron Scepter. I just recommend writing down notes so you don't forget what you get a Peek at.

An Insight Into Your Plans

Another way to know what is in everyone's hands is to see the cards they draw. Breathstealer's Crypt forces each player to reveal every card they draw, and it can even cut off creature-based decks in the mid to late game entirely. Lantern of Insight has a similar effect, with the ability to shuffle away problematic cards on top of libraries if you aren't in a position to force your opponents to discard them. The Lantern is a powerful control tool in 60-card formats, in the same vein as Jace, the Mind Sculptor's +2 ability. Alongside Nebuchadnezzar and Emry, Lurker of the Loch, Lantern of Insight might even translate into our multiplayer format, as well.

This is where we run into a slight problem with Discard decks. Once no one has any cards, they're not really set up to do anything. The Haunt of Hightower gets around this by getting huge, but Nebuchadnezzar has no such ability. Looking at his EDHREC page, most players try to capitalize on this situation with cards like Megrim and Shrieking Affliction. These turn discard into damage, and our main strategy into a real threat if left unanswered. I am more interested, however, by the presence of Lazav, Dimir Mastermind among Nebuchadnezzar's top cards.

They Say Imitation is the Sincerest Form of Flattery

Discard decks may be focused around denying opponents access to their hand, a vital resource in Magic, but they also fuel another key resource: the graveyard. So far, the plan with Nebuchadnezzar seems to be a slow, grindy game where we pick powerful cards out of our opponents' hands before they can cast them. It would be a shame for them to just sit in the graveyard, wouldn't it? Luckily, the Dimir have plenty of techniques for stealing from the graveyard. Lazav, Dimir Mastermind intercepts creatures on their way down, but Dimir Doppelganger and Havengul Lich opt to bring them back. Both of these creatures have the added benefit of removing cards from their owner's graveyards so we don't enable the Muldrotha, the Gravetide deck at the table. The same logic applies to Animate Dead and Necromancy.

Not everyone plays creature decks, though, so we need to be prepared to steal spells, as well. Memory Plunder and Spelltwine are great options for picking instants and sorceries out of graveyards. Diluvian Primordial gets three spells at once, and can be used multiple times with the reanimation effects in the deck. A slightly more repeatable effect comes in the form of Wrexial, the Risen Deep. Every time this Kraken hits a player, you get to cast an instant or sorcery from their graveyard for free. With both Islandwalk and Swampwalk, it is very likely that multiple players won't be able to block this sea beast.

We can build on this Theft theme with a few more cards that also disrupt our opponents' plans: Gonti, Lord of Luxury and Thief of Sanity both pick cards off the top of other players' libraries. Mindleech Mass is another avenue to looking at players' hands, but steals a card on the spot rather than having to discard it first. Finally, Praetor's Grasp is a great way to remove combo pieces or help someone search for a vital piece of removal.

Don't Discount the Discard

Before showing off the entire decklist, we do have to contend with Nebuchadnezzar's other downside: his ability costs mana to activate. If we want to ensure we get the card we want, we'll have to pay an amount of mana equal to the number of cards in our opponent's hand. This deck plays some pretty expensive cards which we'll want to be casting in order to develop our position. It isn't realistic to expect to pay five to seven mana to make one player discard a card every turn. That just won't have enough impact.

Keeping the number of cards in hand low is important, but we don't need to keep them empty. This is why I'm not including cards like Oppression, which will quickly grind a game to a halt. Instead I'm including Bottomless Pit, which has much less of an impact while still keeping hand sizes low. Narset, Parter of Veils plays a similar role by preventing any big draw effects from outpacing our discard engine. Creatures like Dimir Cutpurse can target the player who is furthest ahead, while Rankle, Master of Pranks keeps everyone in check at once. Rankle, Master of Pranks also comes with a lot of flexibility. His sacrifice ability in particular helps keep the field clear of any pesky creatures that do manage to hit the field. I also really like The Haunt of Hightower in this deck, both for the extra discard effect and for the ability to put pressure on life totals, something this deck isn't great at doing otherwise.

There is also, of course, the nuclear option. I've already mentioned Isochron Scepter, which is famous for its synergy with Dramatic Reversal. In this deck, the two cards let us generate infinite mana and untap our commander to allow us to activate him as many times as we wish. This certainly isn't the main goal of the deck, but it is a powerful option, should you need it. Slightly more reserved are Thousand-Year Elixir and Illusionist's Bracers. Other than giving pseudo-haste, Thousand-Year Elixir can untap our commander, while Illusionist's Bracers doubles his effect. As I mentioned at the very beginning of the article, you name a card as Nebuchadnezzar's effect resolves rather than at activation. This means you can copy it with Illusionist's Bracers and force two opponents to discard different cards. The Bracers dramatically increase the power of Nebuchadnezzar's effect, and they should usually be the first card you search for.

With plenty of mana rocks to account for this deck's high curve, and a couple of wheel effects (to go with Narset, Parter of Veils), we have ourselves a deck.

Nebuchadnezzar is a tricky card to play. A lot of the time, it'is difficult to both progress your board state and use mana to activate his ability. It's probably best to wait until later in the game to cast Nebuchadnezzar, using his ability to prevent your opponents from building their game-winning combos and then piecing together a win from their graveyards. Just remember that you can only activate Nebuchadnezzar's ability on your turn (but not, as is common with this restriction, only at sorcery-speed). This is a proactive control deck, seeking to remove threats before they are even cast. Rankle, Master of Pranks and Bottomless Pit are both all-stars in the early turns, and both pair amazingly with Waste Not. They're also great at fueling Lazav, Dimir Mastermind and Wrexial, the Risen Deep if Nebuchadnezzar is moving too slowly for your tastes.

But what do you think? Is it better to stick with Megrim and power out Isochron Scepter and Dramatic Reversal? Or is there another card I overlooked that has particular synergy with Nebuchadnezzar? Let me know in the comments, and, as always, thanks for reading.

Ben Doolittle

Ben was introduced to Magic during Seventh Edition and has played on and off ever since. A Simic mage at heart, he loves being given a problem to solve. When not shuffling cards, Ben can be found lost in a book or skiing in the mountains of Vermont.