Marvel Super Heroes Deck Tech: Hit-Monkey

Hit-Monkey | Art by Peter Scanlan

If you know me, you'll know that I absolutely love the color green in Magic, and I get really excited when a new mono-green legend has cool abilities. I have close to a dozen mono-green Commander decks in paper, including my signature Grothama, All-Devouring deck!

Hit-Monkey is stuffed with cool abilities, the proverbial keyword salad, plus that coveted "can't be countered", so I just had to brew up a Commander deck! Welcome to Hit-Monkey's deck tech!

What Does Hit-Monkey Do?

Hit-Monkey can't be countered, and it's got reach, vigilance, deathtouch, hexproof, and haste! That's a lot of great abilities to staple onto a 3/3 for four mana.

Hit-Monkey reminds me quite a bit of Thrun, Breaker of Silence and Leatherhead, Swamp Stalker. Both of these are a bit bigger and have trample, which makes them excellent candidates for boosting their size with Equipment or Auras. For Commander games, however, I really love that the Monkey Assassin has haste, vigilance, and reach, making it an excellent attacker and blocker.

Of course, Hit-Monkey is just a 3/3, which will get outclassed quickly in a typical game of Commander, so my approach is to "go Voltron" and load it up with Equipment and Auras to make it much more threatening.

One thing I purposely did was avoid having ways to permanently make Hit-Monkey indestructible. That built-in hexproof is already going to make it tough to interact with outside of a sweeper or edict effects, and given its abilities to both attack and defend if it was also indestructible that might lead to a game state that's not much fun for the other players. I want games against Hit-Monkey to be fun puzzles for my opponents to figure out.

Key Cards for Hit-Monkey

Hit-Monkey's hexproof and deathtouch make it quite suitable for bite spells that have a creature deal damage to another creature, and I'm playing many of the best of them in this deck. There's Ram Through, which gets even better when you have a large creature with trample to target. There's the incredible flexibility of Archdruid's Charm, and with enough mana you can Super Combo to take down multiple creatures.

Spinning Wheel Kick is a little less mana-efficient for fighting multiple opponents, but it can also take down planeswalkers. It's Clobberin' Time! is another flexible spell, giving you options on what you need to remove, twice! Betrayal at the Vault is a bit expensive, but I really like that it's an instant.

Hunter's Talent gives you that bite effect when it enters, and Level 2 gives your attacker a small power boost and that coveted trample ability to push through damage. Animist's Might lets you bite for twice the power of your creature, and I really like that mana discount since we're going to be targeting Hit-Monkey most of the time.

Master's Rebuke and Hard-Hitting Question are two more bite spells that are pretty simple and effective. These give a lot more creature removal options than green typically gets!

Next up, I went looking for ways to give Hit-Monkey trample, which combines really well with deathtouch: since one point of damage is considered lethal from a creature with deathtouch, all the rest of the damage moves on to the next blocker or smashes into the defending player's life total. Rancor is a classic, and since it comes back to your hand if it ends up in the graveyard from the battlefield you can keep the trample beats coming. Shadowspear is an incredible card, providing both trample and lifelink, and you can activate it to turn off hexproof and indestructible for your opponents' permanents. This is also secretly a way to give opponents a way to interact with Hit-Monkey if they can copy or steal Shadowspear. Then there's the nifty Rune of Might that draws a card when it enters.

I really like the ability of Power Fist to grow equipped creature when it deals damage to a player. Rhonas's Monument provides a nice mana discount to your green creature spells and a significant size boost and trample for the turn. Cycling Agonasaur Rex and targeting Hit-Monkey with counters, trample, and indestructible sounds fab.

Giant Inheritance is like a super-sized Rancor, but notably it gives trample from the Monster Role Aura it creates upon attack, so you can make a Monster Role for another attacker if you don't need that trample. Season of Gathering is one of my all-time favorite cards: all of its modes are awesome at different points in a game, but the card draw is what you're almost always going to choose.

First strike is another great ability to pair with deathtouch, especially at instant speed, like Hidden Blade, which can ambush an unsuspecting blocker. The Masamune only gives first strike when equipped creature is attacking, but it also forces the defending player to block it for you own personal The Abyss! Chariot of Victory provides two of the abilities you really want to add to Hit-Monkey, trample and first strike.

What's better than first strike? Double strike, of course! Leyline Axe and Genji Glove give us that, with the Axe giving trample and the Glove giving an extra attack step, which is very appreciated.

Power Matrix is an onboard trick, and just the threat of using it can change how opponents decide to attack or block Hit-Monkey. Akroma's Memorial loads up all your creatures with a bunch of keyword abilities, and striking terror in the hearts of black and red players.

Hit-Monkey's hexproof makes it a great target for mutate abilities. Gemrazer boosts Hit-Monkey's size and provides trample while destroying an artifact or enchantment. Migratory Greathorn gives a toughness boost while ramping you a Forest.

Sawtusk Demolisher and Auspicious Starrix provide a body that's twice the size, with some extra tossed in.

I hunted up a few more excellent Auras. Strong Back helps load up the hexproof Monkey and boost its size; Snake Umbra potentially draws a card but more importantly that totem armor ability gives some protection from a battlefield-sweeper.

Bear Umbra is another awesome totem armor card, and since you want to be attacking with Hit-Monkey you'll get to untap all lands you control. Super State adds the coveted first strike and trample abilities, boosts the base size to 9/9, and when it deals damage to one opponent it will deal that damage to each opponent. Boom!

Since the Monkey is also an Assassin, we can dip into Assassin's Creed cards that care about Assassins, like Brotherhood Regalia and Adrestia. Virulent Emissary is an Assassin too so I've slotted it in.

Since Hit-Monkey has so many cool abilities, why not play Majestic Myriarch to take advantage of all that? Toski, Bearer of Secrets provides a resilient card draw engine, and Questing Beast is here to ensure that Fog effects don't stop Hit-Monkey from doing its combat damage thing.

Leatherhead, Swamp Stalker and Thrun, Breaker of Silence provide some redundancy if Hit-Monkey's commander tax has grown too large since either one is a good target for Equipment or Auras.

How Does This Hit-Monkey Commander Deck Win?

If I can give Hit-Monkey trample, then Blackblade Reforged means I can beat players with combat damage. With enough creatures, Thunderfoot Baloth can be a mini-Overrun each turn. Speaking of enough creatures, Ezuri's Predation can end up giving a bunch of 4/4s if an opponent has "gone wide" with a lot of little creatures.

Hit-Monkey Commander Deck List

Conclusion

I built this deck as a Core (Bracket 2) deck, where we can have longer, interactive games where creature combat can win games. The commander is tough for opponents to deal with, so you'll want to have an honest Turn 0 discussion ahead of the game to make sure opponents are cool with you playing it. Some players don't play much interaction, in which case Hit-Monkey and a few ways to boost it can just take over the game.

I think the deck is strong and fun if your opponents have the tools to deal with Hit-Monkey and would enjoy the puzzle of dealing with it.

For higher-power brackets, feel free to toss in more ways to make Hit-Monkey indestructible. What sort of cards would you put in your Hit-Monkey Commander deck? And I'm curious to know, what is your favorite mono-green commander?

---

Read more:

How Good Is Marvel Super Heroes for Commander?

Best Commanders from Marvel Super Heroes!