Miracle Worker Precon Review - Duskmourn
September 17, 2024 by
Andy Zupke 
Hey friend! Welcome back for another precon guide here on EDHREC. Today we’ve got another deck from Duskmourn: House of Horror on tap, and I can’t wait to see what’s inside. So let’s unlock Miracle Worker, led by Aminatou, Veil Piercer.
Who Are the Commanders of Miracle Worker?
Aminatou is a 2/4 Human Wizard for four mana () that surveils 2 at our upkeep. She also gives each enchantment card in our hand miracle, with a mana cost reduced by . The miracle ability allows us to cast a card for the alternate cost if it’s the first card we draw in a turn.
So we should obviously expect a lot of enchantments, including enchantment creatures, but also ways to manipulate the top card of our deck. We should also expect a bit of overlap with last year’s Enduring Enchantments deck from Commander Masters, as the decks share two colors.
We’ve seen Aminatou in a precon before, back when she was a planeswalker leading the Subjective Reality deck from Commander 2018. As Aminatou, the Fateshifter, she was far more concerned with top-deck manipulation and blinking permanents, rather than enchantments.
Our backup commander is The Master of Keys, not to be confused with Vinz Clortho, the Keymaster of Gozer. This 3/3 Horror with flying costs , and when it enters we put X +1/+1 counters on it and mill twice X cards.
It also gives each enchantment in our graveyard escape, with a cost of the card’s mana cost plus three other cards exiled from the grave.
Here’s the full deck list:
(DSC) - Miracle Worker
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What Are the New Cards in Miracle Worker?
Let’s start with our new enchantment creatures.
First up is Soaring Lightbringer, a 4/5 Bird Glimmer which has flying and gives our other enchantment creatures flying. And whenever we attack a player, we also create a 1/1 white Glimmer enchantment token tapped and attacking that player.
Sending a 1/1 into battle rarely affects the game, even when it has flying. But what’s important here is that the token is an enchantment, meaning it’ll trigger all of our Constellation and Eerie effects. And that is why this card is sick.
And keep in mind, it happens for each player we attack, so if we manage to attack all three opponents, that’s three enchantments entering the board.
That can make things massive with cards like Nylea’s Colossus or Boon of the Spirit Realm. Or you draw three cards with Eidolon of Blossoms and Setessan Champion.
Or keep your opponents without a hand with Thoughtrender Lamia. Basically, this card is very good in enchantment decks.
Next up, and possibly even better than Soaring Lightbringer, is Fear of Sleep Paralysis. This 6/6 Nightmare with flying taps a creature and puts a stun counter on it whenever an enchantment enters or when we unlock a Room. Okay, interest piqued. What else?
Oh, your opponents can’t remove stun counters while Paralysis is in play. That’s right, we’re locking down the board with this thing.
No more big threats attacking us, barring anything with hexproof or shroud, and our attackers get to waltz on in unimpeded. Get some hexproof on this thing, and the game is yours.
Our last enchantment creature is Ancient Cellarspawn, a 3/3 Horror that gives us a one-mana discount on all Demons, Horrors, and Nightmares that we cast.
But that’s not the good part; here’s the real treat. When you cast a spell, if you spent less mana to cast it than its actual cost, target opponent loses life equal to the difference. The uses for this are far and wide. Obviously it works with the miracle effect in this deck.
But it also works whenever we cast a spell without paying its mana cost. Think Etali, Primal Conqueror, Aetherworks Marvel, Aminatou’s Augury, anything with suspend or rebound, Arcane Bombardment, Fevered Suspicion, One With the Multiverse, the list goes on and on.
The only problem here is Cellarspawn’s color. Black doesn’t really delve into the free spells part of the color pie nearly as much as blue or red, although it certainly has options (Gix, Yawgmoth Praetor and Grima, Saruman’s Footman).
But that’s what Grixis decks are for! This effect is so cool, it makes me wish it was on a legendary creature. And can you imagine how good this would be in Golos, Tireless Pilgrim decks? RIP.
Our noncreature enchantments in this deck are both Rooms. First up is Secret Arcade // Dusty Parlor. (Give me a sec while I crane my neck at an uncomfortable angle so I can read these cards on my screen).
Secret Arcade turns all of your nonland permanents into enchantments. As we’ve seen with our earlier discussion of broken constellation effects, this is obviously really good in enchantment decks.
Although we have seen it before with Enchanted Evening, this is more of a one-sided version of that, and it ignores lands. The Dusty Parlor half adds +1/+1 counters to a creature equal to the mana value of each enchantment spell you cast.
I’m not sure this card replaces Enchanted Evening in decks that want it, but it does open the effect up for non-blue enchantress decks. (Is there such a thing as a non-white enchantress deck? Oh yeah, I made one!)
Next up is Cramped Vents // Access Maze. Cramped Vents deals six damage to a creature, and you gain life equal to any excess damage.
Access Maze gives you a once-per-turn ability to cast a card from your hand paying life equal to its mana value instead of mana. Maze is clearly the more interesting part of this Room, and works really well with Ancient Cellarspawn. But is it worth seven mana? In a world with Bolas’s Citadel, Access Maze feels a bit underwhelming.
Next let’s look at our new miracle cards. First up is Redress Fate, a sorcery that returns all artifacts and enchantments from your graveyard to the battlefield.
This isn’t a new effect, as we’ve seen it before with Triumphant Reckoning and Brilliant Restoration. Where it beats those two is its miracle cost, which is only . If you can cast it for this price, it’s on par with Replenish, which is a $90 card.
Then we’ve got Metamorphosis Fanatic, a 4/4 Human Cleric with lifelink that returns any creature from your graveyard to the battlefield with a lifelink counter when it enters.
As with Redress Fate, where this becomes interesting is its miracle cost, which is only . I’ve seen some rumblings about this being absolutely broken in the Legacy format, but I expect it’s gonna be amazing in Commander as well.
Our last new card for the deck is Phenomenon Investigators, a 3/4 Human Detective that gives you a choice of Believe or Doubt when it enters.
For Believe, you get a 2/2 Horror enchantment creature token whenever one of your nontoken creatures dies.
For Doubt, you can return a permanent you own to your hand at your end step. And if you do, you draw a card. My first thought with this is that Doubt would be extremely good with Wishclaw Talisman, since it returns something you own rather than control.
Believe will also be great if your deck has a mix of enchantment and aristocrats strategies, although that’s more Orzhov turf than Dimir.
What Are the Themes and Strategies of the Deck?
This deck is all about getting a discount. Aminatou demonstrates this perfectly by giving you the ability to cast your enchantments for four fewer mana with the miracle ability.
We’ve also got a few miracle cards in the deck, including the new cards we discussed and the reprints Entreat the Angels and Terminus. Ancient Cellarspawn, in addition to giving a discount on a few creature types, loves when you cast discounted spells.
Demon of Fate’s Design gives you the ability to spend life instead of mana on enchantment spells. One with the Multiverse gives you access to the top of your library and a free spell every turn. And last, Starfield Mystic gives a one-mana discount on all enchantments.
Speaking of enchantments, you’d expect something as enchantment-heavy as this deck to be overloaded with constellation effects.
But you’d be mistaken. The only card in the deck with the ability is Doomwake Giant. And the only eerie card in the deck is Fear of Sleep Paralysis. But there is Ondu Spiritdancer, who doesn’t have a keyword ability, but gives us a token copy of the first enchantment that enters our board each turn.
So we won’t be benefitting from enchantments entering as much as I’d hoped. However, we do have effects from casting enchantments, like Sigil of the Empty Throne, Shark Typhoon, and Secret Arcade // Dusty Parlor.
We also have a small, but powerful sub-theme for tokens, with Entreat the Angels, Extravagant Replication, Ondu Spiritdancer, Shark Typhoon, Sigil of the Empty Throne, Inkshield, and Soaring Lightbringer.
How Do You Play Miracle Worker?
Let’s not beat around the bush. Aminatou, Veil Piercer is an extremely powerful commander. I’m not exaggerating when I say she’s one of the best precon commanders we’ve had. In playtest after playtest, she was the star of the show. So much so, that I worry she’ll get hated off the board.
However, she doesn’t do anything that directly impacts opponents, so not everyone will see the threat until it’s too late. And once you’ve got a good engine going, it’ll be hard to stop it.
Her four-mana discount can’t be understated. One with the Multiverse wasn’t meant to be a turn-five card (or even sooner if you ramped into Aminatou a turn early), just as Doomwake Giant wasn’t meant to only cost one mana. But to get there, you need a lot of top-deck manipulation.
The fact that Aminatou gives you that herself is why she’s S-Tier. Her surveil ability ensures that you’ll be able to make the most of the miracle discount. And even when you can’t get an enchantment to the top, you’re still making sure to filter through the chaff in the deck that will slow you down.
For more top-deck manipulation, we can look to Brainstone, Brainstorm, Telling Time, Prognostic Sphinx, Portent, Ponder, Otherworldly Gaze, Moon-Blessed Cleric, Diabolic Vision, and even more.
With the surveil ability, you may find yourself pitching a lot of cards to the graveyard. Thankfully, there’s quite a bit of recursion in the deck. This includes our backup commander, The Master of Keys, who gives your enchantments in the graveyard escape. Spirit-Sister’s Call brings you back a permanent at the cost of another permanent of the same type.
Nightmare Shepherd makes 1/1 token copies of your nontoken creatures that die so that you can continue to reap their benefits. This works really well with Athreos, Shroud-Veiled, because the creature you exile will also come back, as long as you had a coin counter on it.
And Auramancer brings an enchantment back to your hand from the grave when it enters.
The deck is a blast to pilot, aside from one big issue: the lands. The land suite in this precon is particularly bad.
We’ve got two Tainted lands, Tainted Field and Tainted Isle, which only give you colorless mana unless you control a Swamp.Which is unfortunate, because there are only five Swamps in the deck.
Combine this with the number of lands that enter tapped (15), and you may find yourself having a really rough time with mana in the early game.
The only saving grace here is the “Pain” lands present (Underground River, Adarkar Wastes, Caves of Koilos), as well as a very welcome reprint for Hall of Heliod’s Generosity.
There are a few cards in the deck that go straight for life totals, like Ancient Cellarspawn and Life Insurance, but your main path to victory will be combat. And this will mostly be done with massive swarms of tokens from cards like Sigil of the Empty Throne and Shark Typhoon.
There’s also one of my favorite cards, Archetype of Imagination, which will ensure that your army is all but unblockable (barring any creatures with reach).
Is Miracle Worker Worth Buying?
A-
The deck is solid, and a lot of fun. Enchantress is already a very popular theme for Commander decks, and this is a very cool addition for the Esper color combination.
The biggest hit to the score is the playability, which is really only hindered by a piss-poor land package. Dear Wizards, just because it’s more than two colors, doesn’t mean the lands have to suck. Really, darling, we can do better.
As I said before, Aminatou is a very powerful commander, and I expect to see her pulling some huge numbers with deck builders. I’m not so sure about The Master of Keys, though.
The deck also has a solid reprint package. Nothing here as spicy as what Jump Scare! has, but we’ve still got some great cards here, like Inkshield, Hall of Heliod’s Generosity, and Extravagant Replication.
Can I make this deck better…without changing all the lands? Find out in my Upgrade Guide here. And stay tuned for the rest of the precon party from Duskmourn, right here on EDHREC.
More Precon Fun:
Counterpunch - Ghave Precon Upgrade
Andy Zupke
Andy's been playing Magic on and off since Fallen Empires. He loves to travel, drink, eat, and spend time with family and friends.
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