From the Brim to the Trim – Tough Bodies and Weak Budgets
(Doran, the Siege Tower | Art by Mark Zug)
Towerfall Ascension*
Greetings and salutations from a country featuring several nice towers. I'm Arnaud and I'm thrilled to take you on a journey of uncanny brews, huge toughness and face smacking.
Guess what. There was another set coming out last week! That's right, Foundations came in, along with several announcements from Wizards of the Coast. Since this article is certainly not the right place to discuss any of these, I won't dive into that rabbit hole.
Let's just say that I'm unconvinced (AKA aghast) at the direction (AKA flavour trainwreck) that was showcased. At any rate, you're not here to hear me rant about the current situation in the Magic world, so instead let's analyse what transpired from the latest poll.
Last time, I wanted to see if you wished to toy with Isshin, Two Heavens as One a little more. Blunt answer: no. Our last Trim received less than 100 votes. While this still represents almost 30% of the results, the message is clear. Second came Ayara, Widow of the Realm, with 108 votes (33%).
This is an interesting commander, and I may throw her back in at some point. Which leaves us with this week's winner: Doran, the Siege Tower, who received 123 votes (38%). Let's have a closer look.
Boy does that hunk of wood bring back memories. Long story short, I came back to Magic after a long hiatus during the first Ravnica block. Not long after, I played in my first (and only) PTQ filled with Dorans, Faeries and Elves. At the time, this huge monster inspired awe and fear in equal terms. And with good reason. For three mana, you technically get a 5/5 that can bash heads early.
What I really like about Doran is its universality. It does not affect only your creatures, but all of those on the battlefield, which could lead to some interesting political discussions in a bind. Logically though, I feel like the list will broadly embrace high toughness beasties, but not quite in the direction treaded by Arcades, the Strategist.
Combined, EDHREC's normal and budget pages provide 332 cards. More than enough to ensure good fun. Let's delve in.
*Seriously, if you haven't yet, grab a few friends and play this gem. You can thank me later.
First Trim - The Cardboard Chainsaw Massacre
Week after week, I try to find new ways to introduce the premise of these articles to new readers. Week after week, this becomes increasingly difficult. No wit nor cleverness this time. Here, our business is all about the cheap, the budget, the poverty. No cards worth more than $1.10 shall survive. That 10 cents margin being there as a cautionary cushion to account for mild price swings.
After cutting and trimming all of the bling, we're down to 231 cards, of which 23 are worth more than $1.10 while remaining below the $2 threshold.
Let's have a quick look at the cream of these goodies, in case you'd like to indulge yourself a bit.
- Vraska Joins Up: Draw and deterrent evasion in a neat bundle. An excellent card if you're running a decent amount of legends, and missing our mark by a puny 2 cents.
- Abrupt Decay: At $1.14, this card is a steal. Will deal with a lot of annoying threats for a puny .
- Swords to Plowshares: With all the billion reprints this card has seen, can someone explain why it's at $1.15 at TCG Player and a whopping $2.49 at Card Kingdom???
- Faeburrow Elder: One of my favourite dorks in 3 colours and more decks. Decent body, vigilance, and a lot of mana produced. What's not to like?
- Skyshroud Claim: Get your best dual lands or simply ramp a couple of forests, which will enter untapped. Lovely.
- Revitalizing Repast: I'll repeat myself: get these dual lands before their prices spike to more than a couple of bucks. A great protection spell doubled with potential mana fixing. I love the whole cycle.
- Kodama's Reach: I'll ask the same question as I did for Swords. Why the hell is this respectively at $1.27 and $2.49??? These should not cost more than $0.30 if you ask me.
- Call of the Ring: Repeatable evasion and card draw all in one. I hate the whole UB concept, but mechanically, some of these cards are chef's kiss.
- Trostani, Selesnya's Voice: Despite the four coloured pips, I would have added this without a second thought. Those big bodies are bound to yield a ton of life.
- Runic Armasaur: A bit body which, by experience, yields a lot of card draw.
And finally, let's have a look at the cards between $1 and $1.10:
- Beast Within: When I think price swings, this is exactly the sort of card I'm thinking about. I've stopped counting the times I could not include this one because it was a smidge too expensive. Luck is on our side today though.
- Shamanic Revelation: Fantastic card draw outlet in any go-wide strategy. I'm not quite sure the Ferocious part will yield that much life though.
- The Battle of Bywater: A cut board wipe. I have some doubts about the actual usefulness of making that many Food tokens in our strategy, but some life won't hurt, I guess.
With this, we're down to a more reasonable 207 cards. Overall this is line with the average Trim insofar. Remind me to make some stats about that someday. Anyway, let's move on.
Second Trim - Cardward Scissorhands
All right then. Now that we have cut down the excess fat, let's get some juicy nutrients in. As the list stands, this is what we currently have in terms of veggies:
More than enough in each category, with some unique spells here and there. I'm going to keep a fairly high count of draw and ramp, since the curve already looks to loom towards the upper values. Let's trim this down.
| Draw | Ramp | Removal | Wipes |
The most perceptive of you will have noticed a significant number of Treefolk creatures in this already large list. A hint of things to come?
At any rate, after giving the land base a good makeover, we're down to 144 cards. We're making good progress here!
Third Trim - Cutting Off the Rough Edges
All right, let's sblortch into the meat. That's right, sblortch. I like the sound of that. Just say it out loud, you'll get it, you'll even taste it.
Simply put, this deck cares about huge toughness. In fact, the higher the better. The good news is that, said toughness will also serve as a towering defense against our opponents' onslaughts. The core of strategy will therefore rely strongly on lumbering behemoths, ready to pounce with their might on our puny adversaries.
I'm going to focus on lowering the curve as much as I can, while keeping the most resilient critters around. I'm aiming at 25-30 creatures in the final list, to make sure we have enough hulks to consistently beat any opposition to a pulp. As a sidenote, we have an underlying Treefolk theme, but that's not extremely relevant in our case.
There's also an underlying layer of interesting evasion. Several cards provide skulk, an underused mechanic that will serve wonders here. Since our creatures have power worth 1 or 2 at best, this is getting as close to unblockable as it gets.
We also have a decent amount of pump spells. Some of these can bump our damage by 7 or 10, which is nothing to scoff at. Cherry on the cake, they are either enchantments, equipments (a bit underwhelming usually) or instants, paving the way to formidable combat tricks.
Add in a few nice recursion spells to choose from, some protection outlets and a couple of tutors we'll mercilessly cut from the list, and we've got our hands quite full.
Finally, I've noted no less than four spells that more or less provide our Commander's much needed ability, switching power and toughness around. That coupled with Doran's low mana value is bound make sure we can consistently swing and bash heads.
Let's try and trim down this list to the last threshold.
| Creatures | Evasion/Protection/Recursion | Pump | Misc. |
And just like that, we're already at the final stretch. 110 cards, without breaking a sweat.
Final Trim - Heart-Wrenching Choices
Well, folks, it's been a nice journey, but things have to come to an end. As usual, let me remind you that no cards in the following are actually bad choices. If they've made it this far, they deserve a spot in the final list. Sadly, we have to follow the rules to the bitter end. 100 cards, no more and no less.
I'll therefore make 11 cuts, and add back a little something that I feel is cruelly missing here. I'll try to lower the curve a bit if possible, as we're currently standing at a 3.53 average. Ouch.
I present to you my 10 final slashes:
- Yedora, Grave Gardener and Everbark Shaman: People see Yedora and immediately think combo. While I like the idea of getting more Forests on the battlefield, these two fellow hinder our couple of recursion outlets. Plus, they're on the expensive side.
- Shamanic Revelation: Given our high curve, I feel like this will yield neither many cards nor a lot of life.
- Stroke of Midnight and Mythos of Nethroi: We have plenty of removal spells already.
- Belbe's Armor: It's a lovely outlet, but a bit too mana intensive for my taste.
- Abzan Beastmaster: I need to cut a draw spell, and this is the worst of what's left.
- Ensouled Scimitar: The pump is nice, but again, slightly too mana intensive to be worth it.
- Inversion Behemoth: This is a huge hulk for . But I fear the colorless mana will be hard to attain. Also, can someone explain to me why Indomitable Ancients is a frigging $8 card?
- Slaughter the Strong: 4 board wipes is one too many.
- Black Poplar Shaman: I've hesitated for long over this one. But you know what, you only live once, and there are so many exiling effects these days that...
And for my final trick, I'll include Garruk's Uprising. Giving trample to your team is invaluable, and will make sure that damage goes through. And the (very) occasional card draw is nice, I suppose.
Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome... The Tower.
Additional Trim – A Look Into the Past
As is now our custom, let's have a look at an old list of ours and see how it fared since basically a year and a half ago.
This time, we're auditing Lulu, Loyal Hollyphant and Master Chef.
The least I can say is that this did not stand the test of time. No less than 9 cards are above the $1.10 threshold. Let's have a look:
- Swords to Plowshares: $1.15
- Felidar Retreat: $1.15
- Awakening Zone: $1.18
- Harvest Season: $1.20
- Gavony Township: $1.32
- Incubation Druid: $1.65
- Gyre Sage: $1.84
- Swiftfoot Boots: $1.97
- Kami of Whispered Hopes: $2.36
All for a grand total of $13.82. Ouch, double, triple ouch even. Here's what we can try replacing these with:
- Path to Exile will more than fill the spot for our classic StP.
- Llanowar Elves, Wild Growth and Fertile Ground will fill the gap for ramp.
- Let's bring back good old Abzan Battle Priest for some life gain.
- Evolution Witness is a must-play here, bound to recur an insane amount of cards.
- Same goes with Basking Broodscale. Awakening Zone it is not, but it's bound to make some tokens nonetheless.
- Scrollshift is a nice blinker with card draw to boot, and Getaway Glamer is both removal and blink. Sold.
- Finally, for a touch of personal flavour, here's a nostalgic one for me: Loxodon Hierarch. Elephant and protection all in one!
And there we go, here's the updated list.
Conclusion
I hope you enjoyed this journey into huge-body land. I'd love to hear from you now.
Are there any cards you feel are amiss? Have I blatantly overlooked a neat strategy?
Let me know below, and I'll see you in two weeks!
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Arnaud Gompertz
Arnaud Gompertz has been playing Magic since 4th Edition, back in 1995. He's been an assiduous EDH enthusiast since 2012, with a soft spot for unusual and casual Commanders. He'll always favour spectacular plays against a boring path to victory. Aside from mistreating cardboard, he's a dedicated board games player, loves a challenging video game and occasionally tries to sing with his choir.
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