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Pour. Live more. Greetings,

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humans. You have entered the

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Command Zone. Your destination for

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all aspects of Elder Dragon

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Highlander. Enjoy your stay. Hey

0:44

everybody and welcome back to another episode

0:46

of the Command Zone podcast. I'm your

0:48

host Rachel Weeks and today joining me

0:50

is guest-upgrader Jordan Priggin. Hi everybody, I'm

0:53

Jordan Priggin. I do writing stuff on

0:55

the channel. Sure do. Yup. And

0:57

upgrades. Yeah. You're back for

0:59

another one. Today we are

1:01

talking about the brand new

1:03

Endless Punishment pre-con from Desmoren

1:05

House of Horror. This

1:08

is the spooky, ukiest set and it's going to be a

1:10

ton of fun. We're going to

1:12

talk about what comes in this pre-constructed deck. We're going

1:14

to give you 10 cards to add, 10 cards to

1:16

take out to get it in peak fighting shape. If

1:19

you want to pick up any of the cards

1:21

that we talk about in this episode, go over

1:23

to cardkingdom.com/command. Cardkingdom has a huge selection of single,

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it for a very long time. They put it in

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a plastic box. They put a little packing peanut in

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there to keep it from jostling around. They give you

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a token. They give you a sticker. They're

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the best. They have nice little tokens. I like the tokens.

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I like the tokens. Yeah. I

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love Cardkingdom. I like shopping at a place where when

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I get one package in the mail, I get to

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start building that day. You can

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pick up some sweet cards and support. over at

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cubes. Yeah, I mean, they're the

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little. They're close, yeah. Yeah, they're cubish.

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Yeah. They're just very solid, very safe

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deck boxes. What I like about them

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is they fit a double-sleeved deck and

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they have room for tokens. There's

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a lot of tokens that come with commander decks these

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days, you need a little bit of extra room in

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your deck box to make sure that everything you need

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Haack. You Haack. Also rock. Oh,

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that's good. Oh,

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that's solid. I'm pretty funny.

3:38

Wow. We did it. Let's get

3:40

into it. We're talking about the Endless

3:42

Punishment deck. Of course, you're dishing out the

3:44

Endless Punishment to your opponents. I was excited about

3:47

this one because I feel like most of the

3:49

time it does a little bit of punishment and

3:51

then it's done. Yeah, this one's forever. And this

3:53

one is like, no, keep it going. It's not

3:55

gonna kill you. It's just gonna punish you. You're

3:58

gonna be punished. For sure. And

4:00

sometimes that's what people are into. All

4:04

right, we're going to talk about the Rakdos

4:06

group slug deck, I would say, is what

4:08

the Endless Punishment deck is. That means you're

4:10

doing damage to everyone at the table, including

4:12

yourself sometimes. So we're going to get to

4:14

know the deck that comes in the box

4:17

before we tell you how to upgrade it.

4:19

So what better way to get to know

4:21

a deck by then by meeting its lead

4:23

commander. So the

4:25

leader of the Endless Punishment deck

4:28

is sort of the spirit

4:30

behind the whole Duskmorn House

4:32

itself, Valgavoth, Harrower of Souls.

4:35

He is two, a red and a

4:37

black for a legendary creature elder demon.

4:39

He has a four-four with flying. Has

4:42

ward, pay two life. Nice

4:44

little bit of extra punishment there. And

4:46

whenever an opponent loses life for the

4:49

first time during each of their turns,

4:51

put a plus one plus one counter

4:53

on Valgavoth, Harrower of Souls, and draw

4:55

a card. We're

4:57

getting closer and closer to my

5:00

Elder Typal deck that I'm very excited about.

5:02

Oh man, Elders are all over the

5:04

place. They're all the oldest deck. They're

5:06

going to be so old. Oh man.

5:08

Five color old. Yeah. Valgavoth

5:10

is sweet. This is a four mana,

5:13

four, four flyer that protects itself. So

5:15

on rate, it's just a really

5:17

good powerful body. And then it

5:19

gets bigger whenever an opponent loses life

5:21

for the first time during each of their

5:23

turns. It's got to happen on their turn,

5:26

which is a little, like a lot of

5:28

decks can't necessarily do that, but boy, I

5:30

mean a card and a counter on a

5:32

flying warded creature, that's a huge payoff. And

5:35

I mean, it can happen four times in a

5:37

turn cycle, right? Because it's only three times in

5:39

a turn cycle. It's got to be on the

5:41

opponent's turn. So for each opponent, you can get

5:43

a counter and a card, which is

5:45

pretty serious. And honestly, it's not that hard

5:47

to meet. There's a lot of cards that

5:49

deal damage on upkeep. There's a lot of

5:51

cards that deal damage on draw. So

5:54

I'd expect a Valgavoth deck to be

5:56

full of those kinds of things. Absolutely. Two

5:59

mana, three mana. enchantments that just steady do

6:01

this burn on everybody's upkeep so you know

6:03

that you're triggering Valgavoth when he arrives. Yeah

6:06

it's just like automatic engine so you get

6:08

Valgavoth out and bam you're off to the

6:10

races. Sweet! Alright let's meet the

6:12

backup commander before we get into the

6:14

rest of the deck. This one is

6:16

the Lord of Pain! Predictably they are

6:18

friends. The Lord of Pain and the

6:20

Harrower of Souls. Fun guys. This

6:23

is three black red for a legendary

6:26

human assassin he's a 5-5 with menace.

6:28

It says your opponents can't gain life.

6:30

Nice. All especially in a puns in a deck.

6:33

Whenever a player casts their first spell

6:35

each turn choose another target player. The

6:37

Lord of Pain deals damage equal to

6:39

that spells mana value to the chosen

6:42

player. So you

6:44

can trigger this, your opponents can trigger this and

6:46

you get to choose where it goes. I love

6:49

that and it's also like when your opponent

6:51

is gonna like I don't know play their

6:53

Blasphemous Act or something you can treat it

6:55

very much and be like oh well he's

6:57

the one who cast the spell I'm just

6:59

directing it. Yeah I mean that's a

7:02

very fun effect it's like

7:04

it's vialsmashery but you're in control and

7:06

your opponents also trigger it so it's somewhere

7:08

between like vialsmasher and kairvak. And it's just

7:10

gonna add up I mean you know with

7:12

the not being able to gain life that

7:14

sort of thing starts to overwhelm

7:16

you pretty quick. I think Lord of Pain seems

7:18

really cool. It's interesting there's not a lot you

7:20

can do to build around this other than just sort

7:22

of like putting high mana value spells in

7:24

your deck. Sure and protecting yourself from everyone

7:26

trying to stop you before you kill them.

7:29

Cool I mean the Lord of Pain seems very

7:31

sweet it goes well with Valgavath. I would think

7:33

the Lord of Pain just wants to whittle away

7:36

life totals is what the 99 looks like which makes

7:38

sense for a deck like this. Yep. So honestly

7:40

these are sort of two commanders that fit

7:43

together a lot better than we've

7:45

seen in pre-cons lately. It feels like you

7:47

could go either way depending on your preference

7:49

but let's get to know the rest of

7:51

the deck before we make a decision on

7:53

who's going to be the commander. The

7:57

way that we get to know these decks is we start with the

7:59

most expensive cards in the the deck. We talk

8:01

about the notable reprints that's anything over five dollars

8:03

comes in the deck when you buy

8:05

it off the shelf. Our usual caveats

8:07

is we take these prices before they

8:09

are announced so they're a little higher

8:11

than you guys are seeing on your

8:13

end. We take all of them beforehand

8:15

so they're more of a relative price

8:17

than a literal price. But the notable

8:20

reprints in this deck are Witch's Clinic

8:22

which is eighteen dollars, give your commander

8:24

lifelink. Makes sense in a punishment

8:26

style deck. Keteract Parasite which

8:28

is sitting at fourteen dollars. Wow,

8:30

I didn't realize that was so expensive. That's

8:34

when opponents draw. It pings them, makes a lot of

8:36

sense. Up next is Rampaging Pharasadon

8:38

at thirteen dollars. Again, players can't gain

8:40

life and whenever another creature enters it

8:42

deals one damage to that creature's controller.

8:45

More ways to ping. Vial

8:47

Smash of the Fierce called it. She's

8:50

sitting at ten dollars. Graven Cairns is

8:52

one of the lands. It's nine dollars.

8:55

Raids Arisen Nightmare at eight

8:57

dollars. Lightning Greaves at seven dollars

8:59

and fifty cents. And finally the group

9:02

slug master himself. Mogis God

9:04

of Slaughter at seven dollars and fifty

9:06

cents. This is a pretty good

9:08

setup of reprints I gotta say. Yeah,

9:10

I love these. I love to throw back to

9:12

some old slug commanders. I'm Mogis and Vial's match

9:15

I think are familiar faces in the Rakdos group

9:17

slug situation and

9:19

they throw around a lot of damage. Definitely.

9:21

And I always love it when Lightning Greaves gets a reprint in

9:23

one of these things. You can

9:26

just throw that into almost every commander deck.

9:28

Worth noting this is some hot new

9:30

art for Lightning Greaves. There's some glowing

9:32

sneakers that is fresh for Duskmorn. There

9:34

are eight cards over five dollars which

9:36

is quite good in a pre-con like

9:39

this. But let's talk about the total

9:41

reprint value to see if the rest

9:43

of the deck matches that trend. Worth

9:46

noting that these decks are pre-ordering around forty five fifty dollars.

9:48

We did all of our math based on a forty

9:50

five dollar pre-order price which is pretty normal for

9:52

these kind of commander decks. All

9:55

of that being said the total reprint

9:57

value is... Yo.

10:03

Nice. Nice. Pretty

10:05

good. I mean, these decks are

10:07

pre-ordering for $45, and this

10:10

only includes the 72 reprints in the deck.

10:12

It doesn't include Basic Lands. It doesn't include

10:14

many of the new cards. It also doesn't

10:16

include the 10 Arch Enemy cards that

10:21

come in every pre-con for Dusk of Morn.

10:23

Oh, yeah. Neat. We're not going to be

10:25

talking about them because they don't change the deck

10:28

mechanically, but they're in the deck. There's a little

10:30

bit of added free value. There's

10:32

also two main set cards in this deck

10:35

that we don't know the pricing on. So

10:37

169 is pretty good. If

10:39

you buy the deck at $45 and you'll get

10:43

$169 worth of reprint value, which means

10:46

you're getting $3.76 for your one American dollar spent,

10:51

which is insane. Yeah, that's great.

10:54

That's really good. Almost quadrupling your value

10:56

there, and that's not including 28% of

10:58

the deck. This

11:00

is well above the average reprint value compared to last year,

11:02

which was $123.75, and

11:06

the average bang for your buck was $2.60. This

11:09

is the highest reprint value in Dusk Morn.

11:12

So if you want to get the

11:14

best bang for your buck, this is the one to pick up. That

11:18

being said, that's what's in the deck financially. We

11:20

want to talk about what's in the deck mechanically.

11:23

We're going to break down the choo, choo,

11:25

choo, choo, choo, stats.

11:27

Stats. Stats. Stats. Stats.

11:29

We love stats. We do. We

11:32

like to break down the vegetables in the deck. Just

11:35

the stuff that goes in every commander deck.

11:37

Do you want to walk us through those numbers?

11:39

Yeah. Just for staff. So the basic deck stats,

11:41

the things we always talk about. First, this has

11:43

12 pieces of ramp, 15 card

11:46

draw cards. Nice,

11:48

including the commander, or one of the

11:50

commanders. Eight pieces of interaction. Interesting. Four

11:53

wipes of some sort. And

11:55

then 38 lands with 16 basic lands. Great.

11:59

So this is the vegetable. levels are looking pretty healthy

12:01

across the board. We also

12:03

like to break down the stuff that is more

12:05

specific to this deck, so you get an idea

12:07

of what the deck's actually trying to do, what

12:09

its strategy is. There are

12:11

35 cards that directly burn your opponents

12:13

in some way, those could be spells,

12:16

those could be permanents. There

12:18

are 26 cards in the deck that can

12:20

trigger your commander on other people's

12:22

turns. That isn't necessarily

12:24

enchantments that just regularly trigger, it's

12:27

just only cards that like instance

12:29

that could burn your opponents on their turn.

12:32

Sure, or things that like have a chance

12:34

of doing it on their turn, but don't

12:36

necessarily automatically do it. Yeah, stuff like rampaging

12:38

for Ossadon that's only if a creature entered,

12:40

can trigger your commander on your opponent's turn. I

12:43

think we counted stuff like Blood Artist on that

12:45

list that was like, oh yeah, this can, if

12:47

something dies on their turn it'll trigger it and

12:49

stuff. Some of it more situational than we'd

12:51

like, but still some pretty good stuff. There

12:54

are seven damage payoffs, stuff that care

12:56

about having dealt damage this turn. There

12:59

are eight dies synergy cards,

13:01

we mentioned Blood Artist. There's sort

13:03

of a large category of those

13:05

cards. It's a little confusing, it feels

13:07

a little out of place in the

13:09

deck, but it's there. Yeah, we mentioned braids before,

13:11

but it is sort of a large package. There's

13:14

also nine life gain cards,

13:16

which makes sense. You're doing a

13:18

lot of damage, you want to protect your life total as

13:20

well. Yeah, because if you're low too, people will

13:23

just remove you. Uh-huh, because you're

13:25

annoying. So those are the, it's

13:27

a bird's eye view at the deck. We wanted to zoom in

13:29

and take a look at some of the better cards in the

13:31

deck. These are the ones that were, if

13:33

you draw them you're like, okay, I know my

13:35

deck's online, I've got one of the better synergy

13:37

pieces in the deck. So let's talk

13:40

about those, starting with one we've already mentioned actually. Yeah,

13:42

this is one of the highest value reprints

13:44

and it is Keterict Parasite. This card is

13:47

perfect for the deck. It is one black

13:49

for a one-one creature horror. And whenever an

13:51

opponent draws a card, if you control a

13:53

red permanent, you may have Keterict Parasite deal

13:55

one damage to that player. So yes, you

13:57

do need to, like you can't just have

13:59

Keterict Parasite. and you're good to go.

14:01

But for instance, Keteract Parasite and your

14:03

commander just means that on everyone's upkeep,

14:06

they are going to be at least pinging for

14:08

one when they draw the first card, which turns

14:11

your commander on. It means if they get some

14:13

big combo engine going and they're drawing a bunch

14:15

of cards, it's going to be really punishing stuff

14:18

for them. Absolutely. That's just one mana to

14:20

get it down. That's the thing that's best about

14:22

this card, is the efficiency is really there. And

14:24

you can tell how efficient that is, because we

14:26

think Fate Unraveler is also one of the better

14:29

cards in the deck. And it's a four mana

14:31

Keteract Parasite. Whenever an opponent draws a card, it

14:33

deals one damage to that player. Just

14:36

anything that can consistently trigger your commander,

14:39

draw you a card, get you a

14:41

counter on your opponent's turn, is going

14:43

to feel so good. Absolutely. The

14:45

big difference between Keteract Parasite and Fate

14:48

Unraveler is Fate Unraveler is four mana,

14:50

which shares the mana value as your commander.

14:52

So it's a little more awkward in your curve. Yes.

14:55

It's also worth noting that both of these are asymmetric,

14:57

which is nice, because there's a lot of things that are

15:00

going to do damage in the deck, which are just like

15:02

symmetric do damage to everybody. But these

15:04

ain't. The next one we

15:06

have also mentioned, but

15:09

he's sick in the deck. Oh, so

15:11

good. It's Lord of Pain. The

15:13

backup commander, I think whether you are playing with

15:15

him as the commander or in the deck, he

15:17

is great in the deck. He

15:19

is. We already went over his stats

15:22

and stuff. So it's just basically the

15:24

fact that he is going to constantly

15:26

be dealing damage to people every turn

15:28

that they are doing stuff. This

15:31

is just the inevitability you need

15:33

to make a group

15:35

slug deck kill people. The

15:38

way that group slug decks win

15:40

is eventually they're sort

15:42

of stacks pieces that don't tax

15:44

your mana, they don't tax your

15:47

hand, they restrict what you can

15:49

do overall. If I

15:51

play three more creatures, I die. If I

15:53

cast another big spell, I die. If I

15:55

tap this many lands, I die. So you

15:57

need to be very careful with your mana.

16:00

life resources and the Lord

16:02

of Pain is one of those big cards that you can

16:04

slam at the end that says, okay, I can't cast anything

16:06

over five mana because what if

16:08

my opponent casts something that's over five mana

16:10

and this opponent casts something over five mana.

16:12

I'm only at 15 life or something. You

16:15

know? When you're at low life and

16:17

you see that there are two people who have turns before

16:19

you, you're in a tough

16:21

situation if the Lord of Pain is out. Yeah.

16:24

I think this is going to be one of

16:26

the big damage dealers in five mana is a

16:29

pretty solid rate for the amount of damage that

16:31

he can do. He's comparable to

16:33

something like Karavac which is seven mana

16:35

and has sort of been outpaced in Commander of

16:37

the East days. I do think Karavac's in the

16:39

deck but if you've got Lord of Pain, Karavac's

16:42

going to seem like small potatoes basically. All

16:45

right. We've got one more card that we

16:47

want to talk about in the best cards

16:49

in this deck and it's a new one.

16:51

This card is Sadistic Shell Game. This

16:54

is four and a black for a

16:56

sorcery and it says, starting with the

16:58

next opponent in turn order, each player

17:00

chooses a creature you don't control. Destroy

17:03

the chosen creatures. I

17:06

think this is super cool. Yes.

17:09

So this is interesting. There's a lot

17:11

to like about this card. Starting with

17:13

it's the first voting card that starts

17:15

with an opponent rather than the caster

17:17

of the spell. So what that does, which is

17:19

really nice, is it means that you don't just

17:22

get to choose something and then everyone goes, well,

17:24

we all agree it's that thing and they all

17:26

vote for it and that's all you lose. You

17:30

get a minimum of two things because

17:32

they have to vote for something and

17:34

you vote for something else. So it's

17:36

five mana, kill two things guaranteed, but

17:38

you can kill up to four things

17:41

depending on how your opponents are working

17:43

together. And if you're a little political

17:45

about it, like this immediately

17:47

makes me think of Council's judgment. Yeah.

17:50

But the council votes before you

17:52

do and you get the veto on. Yeah,

17:55

exactly. You get to make sure whatever it

17:57

is you were trying to get rid of,

17:59

like gets guy. got, for sure. Which

18:02

is nice. I

18:04

think this deck is going to take a

18:06

lot of attacks. And you need

18:09

something that's going to take out multiple threats

18:11

on the board, because all

18:13

of them are a threat to you.

18:16

So the more creatures you can take

18:18

off, the fewer creatures are coming at

18:21

you, which is going to protect your

18:23

life total. A huge consideration when

18:25

you're playing group slug is that you are

18:27

going to be the loudest deck at the

18:29

table, no matter what you do. People

18:31

will never forget you are there. They will

18:34

never forget that you

18:36

are a problem they would like to deal with.

18:38

So having two-for-ones like this that can take two

18:41

threats off the board and cost you a lot

18:43

of mana, five mana's a lot. But

18:46

it can really protect your life total in

18:48

the later game when you are very clearly

18:50

the big bad. It's worth mentioning, too,

18:52

that this gets around hexproof, because it

18:54

is a choose card. So you don't

18:56

have to worry about ward or hexproof

18:58

or any of that stuff. All

19:01

right, so that's what's in the deck off the

19:03

shelf. Those are the things that you're guaranteed to

19:05

get if you buy it. We're

19:07

going to talk about the changes that we are going to

19:09

make to this deck. But before we do, I want to

19:11

talk about our goals. What are

19:13

we trying to improve with Val'Gath as the commander?

19:15

I think we decided that with the card

19:18

draw, it's just really difficult to justify

19:20

putting Lord of Pain in the command zone,

19:22

even with him being as powerful as he

19:24

is. Yeah, he's great in the deck. If

19:26

you want to pop him into the thing,

19:29

go for it. But I think that Val'Gath's

19:31

an engine, so it just makes sense as

19:33

it. I think the first thing that we

19:35

wanted to bring into this

19:37

deck is the ability to protect yourself. Because like

19:40

we just said, when you are playing a group

19:42

slug deck, everyone is going to

19:44

want to kill you. They are going to

19:46

notice. Because you're trying to kill everybody. Yeah.

19:48

Even if you're just doing one or two

19:50

damage to people every turn, people notice and

19:52

remember that. The deck

19:55

will constantly bring that back to people's mind. So

19:57

we want to add things that will protect your

19:59

commander. protect you, and let

20:02

you keep your game plan going. Something

20:04

that I've been talking about a lot lately

20:06

is the what's doing that effect in Commander.

20:09

These days there's so many things on the board that

20:12

you're not constantly aware of everything that's going on

20:15

on the board. But if there is one thing

20:17

that is repeatedly doing two damage to you, it

20:19

makes your opponents go, OK, what

20:21

is doing that? That's exactly right. Every time you're like, I

20:23

cast a spell, you're like, take two damage from the something

20:25

something. And you'll be like, wait, wait, wait. What

20:27

is making me take two damage? Yeah,

20:29

it's like, I don't know everything about what's on

20:32

the board. Yeah, I don't know everything that's

20:34

on the board, but I do want that gone. So

20:37

I think you need to

20:39

be aware of that, going into it

20:41

emotionally, and also mechanically. You need to

20:43

have defensive spells to protect your life

20:45

total and also just your things. The

20:49

deck is also not great at just

20:51

consistently triggering your commander. There's some things

20:53

like Keterok, Parasite, and Fate, Unraveler that

20:55

will trigger your commander every single turn.

20:58

But we want you guaranteed to have one

21:00

in your hand. The consistency is so

21:02

important. Yeah, the ideal situation is that you

21:04

can focus your efforts on your board and

21:07

doing your thing, and the card draw and

21:09

the growing is automatic. It's just happening already

21:11

because of what's on the battlefield. This

21:14

deck is good at doing damage. We mentioned it's

21:16

got like 35 ways to

21:19

burn people's life total, but a lot of them are

21:21

sort of ticky tacky, one damage at

21:23

a time. One, two damage, things like that. We wanted

21:25

more effects. We wanted more effects that didn't work around

21:27

a little bit, too. We wanted more effects that just

21:29

slam the door. That's like, OK, I got

21:31

your life total to 20. Now I need something

21:33

that does 15. That

21:35

just gets people to dead faster because,

21:38

again, they're going to be aware that

21:40

you're the problem, and you're going to be the

21:42

first person they're going to target. Yeah, and things

21:44

that basically when people start going, oh my god,

21:47

we need to get rid of that player before

21:49

he can beat us, we want to be able

21:51

to slam the door on

21:53

them. Absolutely. Finally,

21:55

to protect yourself, something that we

21:57

talked about was just board wipes, making sure the board wipes.

22:00

can actually take out the entire board

22:02

when you need it to be taken out. And

22:05

you know, three is, or four is plenty,

22:07

but they're not necessarily the most consistent cards

22:09

in the world. So, those

22:11

are the changes that we're trying to make with

22:13

this upgrade. We're gonna get into the exact 10

22:16

cards we're adding and the 10 cards to take

22:18

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27:55

Welcome back, everybody. We

27:57

are upgrading the Endless Punishment Pre-Combat.

28:00

from Duskmorn House of Horrors. This

28:02

is a group slug deck. We told

28:05

you everything that we're doing to upgrade

28:07

the deck. We're going to get right

28:09

into the cards to add, starting with a

28:11

couple of things that just trigger your

28:13

commander consistently. Every turn, cheap, steady

28:16

damage. Yep. The first,

28:18

and this is the first one I thought of

28:20

adding to the deck, is just roiling vortex. Perfect.

28:23

This is one and a rad for an enchantment.

28:25

It says, at the beginning of each player's upkeep,

28:28

roiling vortex deals one damage to them.

28:31

Easy. Honestly, I'm shocked this isn't

28:33

in the deck. Yeah. This strikes

28:35

me as one that they were like, this will be

28:37

an easy one people can upgrade. It

28:40

also says, whenever a player casts a

28:42

spell, if no mana was spent to

28:44

cast that spell, roiling vortex deals five

28:46

damage to that player. Cool, manic right.

28:49

This gets more relevant every

28:51

day. Yeah, I mean,

28:53

there's more and more commanders that cascade. There's more and

28:55

more that are

28:58

just free spells, plotting

29:00

stuff. They

29:03

have to actually be casting the spell. If they

29:05

cheat something into play, like off of a Calia,

29:07

they just put something into play, then it doesn't

29:09

trigger it. But if I cast it in Eldrazi

29:11

with Rakdos that I've reduced, I'm

29:15

taking damage a lot. Plus,

29:17

it also says, red pay red, colon,

29:19

your opponents can't gain life this turn.

29:21

That's nice. That can really

29:23

get somebody too. I

29:26

mean, you probably don't even need to activate that most of

29:28

the time, because people are just going to not do

29:31

their big lifelink or whatever thing. For sure.

29:34

They can't invest in a big

29:37

heliads intervention or something as long

29:39

as you have red up. And that's how

29:41

your deck loses, right? If somebody casts a gray

29:44

merchant of Asphodel and gains 15 life out

29:46

of nowhere, you're like, that is not something you've accounted

29:48

for. So you need stuff like the Lord of Pain

29:50

or the rampaging for us on rolling vortex to

29:52

just be like, all right, I have prepared for

29:54

this eventuality. No.

29:57

No life gain. Red can also say no.

30:00

Two dollars and fifty cents for a roiling vortex

30:02

pick them up now. It's perfect in this deck This

30:05

next card does a similar thing to

30:07

what roiling vortex does it is forsaken

30:09

waste It is two in a black

30:11

for an enchant world. Yeah world enchantment

30:14

It says players cannot gain life and

30:16

during each players upkeep that player loses

30:18

one life And if

30:20

forsaken waste is the target of

30:23

a successful successfully cast spell that

30:25

spells caster loses five Life

30:27

now that this is being added into the

30:29

deck for one reason which is to hate

30:32

on Concordant crossroad We

30:34

love your Gordon crossroads gives you your stuff ace

30:36

too. Yes, but well the only reason I

30:38

say that is because it's like one of those weird

30:43

Some people don't even know this is

30:45

a rule thing Yeah, but the world

30:47

keyword actually means that there can just

30:49

be one Enchantment with

30:51

the world keyword on the battlefield so

30:53

Highlander rules Yes, if

30:56

there is a Concordant crossroads across the table

30:58

from you and you play this that one

31:00

blows up If

31:02

they play a Concordant crossroads after you've done

31:05

forsaken waste your forsaken waste blow up just

31:07

a weird You know

31:09

they were trying stuff. Yeah, I

31:11

have it's roiling vortex, but worse

31:13

but cooler The

31:16

arts incredible it's a cool cool old

31:18

weirdo that you can still pick up for three dollars and

31:21

fifty cents Hair standing on in like

31:23

slightly Inefficiency here like it being

31:25

three mana versus two mana doesn't make a big

31:27

difference to me because it still is cheaper than

31:29

your commander And once it's out it just like

31:31

means your commander is on yep, and that's

31:33

great speaking of steady damage

31:36

The next card we talked about adding

31:39

was Chandra awakened Inferno Awake,

31:41

this is six mana Chandra. She comes

31:44

she cannot be countered which is a

31:46

bummer It's

31:50

a tick up is what we're here to talk about

31:52

it's each Opponent gains an emblem

31:54

with at the beginning of their upkeep

31:56

this emblem deals one damage to you

31:58

so Each player gets

32:02

an emblem, it deals damage to them on their upkeep, they can't

32:04

get rid of it. They never stop it. So

32:07

the damage train keeps on rolling. And

32:09

if you keep it around for a couple turns, those

32:11

emblems really start to add up. They really

32:13

do. This card is such a

32:15

huge pain in the butt, it also comes

32:17

down and is immediately 8 loyalty because

32:20

you play it for 6 and you take it

32:22

up to 2 and 8 is enormous. 8 serious. Especially

32:24

when you've got something like Vagavot that's getting bigger

32:26

and can block all day. It also

32:29

has a minus 3, deals 3 damage to each

32:31

non-elemental creature, can clean up all the little creatures

32:33

that are attacking you. It has

32:35

a minus 6 that can deal damage to one

32:37

target creature if you really really need... Creature

32:40

or planeswalker. Or planeswalker.

32:42

If you really need something gone. But this is

32:44

in the deck for the emblems I think. It's definitely

32:46

in for the plus 1, but as

32:49

we said having a little bit of extra board wipe

32:51

breach ain't bad. Really nice. Plus

32:53

it's only $300 in... $300

32:57

and 50 cents. $3

33:00

and 50 cents after a couple of reprints.

33:02

This one really does it all. The

33:06

next one's your lad. We talked about slamming the

33:08

door shut. So this is part of

33:10

why I wanted to do this upgrade

33:12

because I have an Obnixilus captive kingpin

33:15

deck and these decks are brothers in

33:17

many ways. They are. So the card

33:19

I'm adding is Obnixilus captive kingpin. Who

33:22

is? Two black red for

33:24

a legendary creature demon. Four, three.

33:26

Flying, trample. Whenever one or more

33:28

opponents each loses exactly one life,

33:30

put a 1-1 counter on Obnixilus

33:32

captive kingpin. Exile the top card

33:35

of your library until your next

33:37

instep. You may play that card. Giant

33:40

fliers that grow when you deal

33:42

damage. It is an enormous end.

33:44

Give you cards. Everything you want

33:46

to do for Valgavoth is going to

33:48

be triggering Obnixilus. A ton of things

33:50

in the deck are incidentally triggering Obnixilus.

33:53

So this is sort of like having,

33:55

you know, a backup

33:57

engine card draw thing. that

34:00

can also kind of distract from your commander a little

34:02

bit. Yeah. When I'm

34:04

playing a commander that I

34:06

know is super scary. It draws cards and it's

34:08

huge and it's encouraging damage and it has ward.

34:12

I love putting other things in the deck that

34:14

are also like you have to remove this though. You also have

34:16

to remove this. Yeah. And you have

34:18

to remove this. So it's one of those

34:20

things where you exhaust the removal spells in

34:22

your hand by spreading out your threats. Object Solace

34:24

is a huge threat. Your commander is a huge

34:27

threat. The Lord of Pain, huge threat. Chandra,

34:30

what? Yep. So you have to, I love

34:33

the idea in Arachdos deck of like your

34:35

best defense is a strong offense. In

34:38

a way more threats are also protection for

34:41

your commander. Yep. You have to get

34:43

people into panic, remove everything and then run out of

34:45

resources mode. He too is only $3.50 and

34:47

goes along perfectly with

34:50

everything the deck is trying to do. Which

34:53

leads us to our most expensive ad

34:55

for this one so far. Which is,

34:58

Sulfim, Mayhem Dominus. This

35:00

is a two red red for a legendary

35:02

creature Phyrexian Horror, which is a five four.

35:05

And it says, if a source you control

35:07

would deal non-combat damage to an opponent or

35:09

a permanent opponent controls, it deals double that

35:11

damage to that player or permanent instead. And

35:14

then it has the activated ability of one

35:16

and two red Phyrexian mana. Discard

35:18

two cards, put an indestructible counter

35:20

on Sulfim, Mayhem Dominus. Huge. Awesome.

35:24

You're drawing a ton of cards so it's easy to

35:26

protect Sulfim and all of your work that you're putting

35:28

in is now doubled for a very efficient

35:30

raid. I'm usually pretty

35:33

iffy on these like just damage

35:35

increaseers or doublers and stuff. But

35:37

Sulfim is just so good. I

35:40

agree. I tend to not like them. I think

35:43

it's because they're five mana and higher. Like

35:45

he's more efficient, he protects himself, he's

35:47

also a body on the board that

35:49

can protect you. Like a five four

35:51

indestructible means it's you're much more difficult

35:53

to attack. Especially when all of your opponents

35:56

want to kill you. Yeah, that's a

35:58

really serious body. does enough.

36:02

And $16 is like, this is the kind of

36:04

card that if you invest in a soul femme,

36:07

having one makes all of your future burn

36:09

decks even better. I

36:11

put him in so many decks that I didn't expect

36:14

to, because he's that good. It's also worth noting that

36:16

a lot of the cards that do things like this

36:18

only say like a red source you control, or a

36:20

red or an artifact source you control, or something like

36:22

that. It's better in two-color decks for sure. Soul femme

36:24

is just like anything that you do, which

36:27

is great. Well, you're non-creature stuff. All

36:31

right, up next, this card's a little risky.

36:34

Yes. But it's totally busted if you

36:36

can pull it off. It can absolutely end

36:38

the game. It's Shondra's Ignition. Three

36:41

red red for a sorcery. Target creature you control

36:43

deals damage equal to its power to each

36:45

other creature and each opponent.

36:49

You've got a commander that grows all

36:52

the time. It's always getting bigger. You've got

36:54

an obnixillus that grows all the time, is

36:56

always getting bigger. It's just a

36:58

great way to wipe the board. It's to do

37:00

a huge amount of damage all at once to

37:04

force a removal spell. If you're worried

37:06

about one, you can choose a creature

37:09

like Lord of Pain that's a 5-5. I feel like

37:11

I'm going to burn everybody for five and wipe the board.

37:14

Yep. And see if they

37:16

have the removal spell to

37:18

kill it. And that's one fewer removal spell for your

37:20

commander. And this can absolutely end the game too. Sometimes,

37:23

Valgavoth or Obnixillus will be

37:26

big enough to even kill

37:28

two of the players and then destroy

37:31

all the blockers that stop them from swinging in

37:33

and killing the other one. Because the one thing

37:35

that it leaves on the board is the thing

37:38

that you target with it a lot, especially if

37:40

it was the biggest creature there. I

37:42

guess I talked around it. I didn't actually say it.

37:45

The thing that's dangerous about Shondra's Ignition is

37:48

if they remove the creature that you're targeting, the spell

37:50

fizzles. So

37:52

if they remove your commander in response to

37:54

the Shondra's Ignition, you lose your wincon and

37:56

your commander. And if they have the option to

37:59

remove your commander, they They almost always

38:01

have to do it when you play Shondra's Ignition.

38:03

So it is, you do have to look

38:05

around and be like, all right, how many cards are

38:07

in hand, how much mana is open, is now the

38:09

time, like, am I going to get blown out by

38:11

Difari's Protection or something like that? But this

38:14

wins the game if you can pull it off. So

38:17

even if it doesn't win the game, it wipes the

38:19

board, which is pretty nice. Yeah, it can be

38:21

a huge swing. All right, that's also $3.50. They

38:24

all are today. Yeah, $3.50 is a

38:27

real magic number. We

38:32

alluded to it, but this deck needs some protection, some

38:34

way to protect your commander, some ways. Because we attack, but we

38:36

need to also protect. We need to also protect. Yeah.

38:39

And a good way to protect is to call on

38:41

Tybalt. Yes. A

38:43

little bit of Tybalt's trickery. This

38:46

card, you probably know it by now, is one

38:48

in a red. For an instant, it says counter

38:50

target spell. Choose one, two, or three at random.

38:53

Its controller mills that many cards and exiles cards

38:55

from the top of their library until they exile

38:57

a non-land card with a different name than that

38:59

spell. They may cast that card without paying its

39:01

mana cost. Then they put the exiled cards at

39:03

the bottom of their library in a random order.

39:06

It's a counter that spell. It's a

39:08

counter with a little bit of meh. A

39:11

little bit of risk. Yeah, but it's fun. A little

39:13

bit of trickery. It's

39:16

chaos-y. Yeah,

39:18

this is for countering removal spells, board wipes,

39:21

crater roofs. That are just

39:23

like, you know it's coming at you. If they have it, it's

39:25

coming at you. So you need to be able to defend yourself.

39:28

And a counter spell goes a long

39:30

way. It's $9, but it's

39:32

worth it. When you get people with a Tybalt's trickery, pfft. Nobody,

39:36

even as long as Tybalt's trickery has been

39:38

in the format now, people still don't see

39:40

Tybalt's trickery coming. No, they do not. If

39:44

you're more of a Pyroblast gamer, go

39:46

that way. Yeah, got a lot of

39:48

blue in your format. Do the red elemental blast.

39:50

That kind of thing. Alright,

39:52

$9 for Tybalt's trickery. Up next,

39:54

more protection for your commander. He's big,

39:56

he's scary, he's your entire draw engine.

39:58

Yes. Swifty! They're

40:01

$3.50. The boots with the fire.

40:05

Not much to be said about Swift Foot boots. Haste is great.

40:09

And your commander's scary. Hexproof's great. Hey, yep,

40:11

love it. It's all very good. Sorry,

40:14

not all that creative an ad, but boy,

40:16

it'd be useful. Really, really helpful. Lightning

40:18

Greaves are already in the deck, but again,

40:21

the protection is a huge deal. Yep. Up

40:23

next is sort of a pet card

40:25

favorite of mine, too, which is Imbrewild

40:28

Captain. This is

40:30

three and a red for a gen

40:32

pirate for two. When Imbrewild

40:34

Captain enters the battlefield, you become the monarch.

40:36

And whenever an opponent attacks you while you're

40:38

the monarch, Imbrewild Captain deals damage to that

40:40

player equal to the number of cards in

40:42

their hand. It's a

40:45

Bernie Ghostly prison. Yeah, exactly. And

40:47

you do get a lot of this

40:49

because people want the monarch. And

40:52

you have the ability to take the monarch back

40:54

pretty easily because you have a big flying commander.

40:57

You've got flyers. Yeah, I

40:59

like Imbrewild Captain a lot in here.

41:01

It's another way to get your opponent

41:03

swinging as well. Introducing the monarch and having

41:05

them take it from you is like, well, now

41:07

they're throwing damage around and working for their

41:10

benefit, but also yours. Yep,

41:12

exactly. Imbrewild Captain,

41:14

only $2.25. It

41:17

is creeping up in the world. But

41:19

this is under the stop hitting me category,

41:23

as is this next one, which is disrupt decorum all the way

41:25

down to $0.50. Go

41:27

to all creatures you don't control. I'm playing this

41:29

in more and more decks. I love this card. I

41:32

count it as a soft board wipe a lot of the

41:34

time, where it's like, you get to keep your stuff. You

41:36

get to do your cool thing. But it is not

41:39

my problem for a rotation. It will

41:41

wreck everybody else's boards. It does a

41:43

ton of damage to each other. They have to figure out

41:45

how not to kill each other, which is always good when

41:47

they're whittling down everyone's life totals. I

41:50

think it's just exactly what you want. I'm sort of surprised

41:52

it's not in the deck, to be honest. Yeah. That

41:54

gets our total upgrade to $47.75. Those

41:58

are the 10 cards we're adding a lot. A lot

42:00

of damage, a lot of protection, and a

42:02

little bit more value. Yeah.

42:05

And then. We do have an honorable

42:07

mention. Look, I had to mention this. Yeah.

42:10

Because I love this card. It's objectively

42:12

worse than a lot of the other

42:14

cards I added. And it's more

42:16

expensive than most of them. It's pretty expensive. Because

42:18

it's only been printed in like, you know, alpha,

42:20

beta, and Revive. Last time it

42:23

revised. Yeah. But it is copper tablet. If

42:25

you want to deal damage to people with style, you want

42:28

to drop a copper tablet. It's a top of a copper

42:30

tablet. It deals one damage to each player during his

42:32

or her upkeep. That's the

42:34

old text, of course. Yeah, it's perfect. It's

42:36

two mana. It comes down. It deals one

42:38

damage every time that person untaps. It's

42:40

old school. You just whack them with a

42:42

tablet every turn. I

42:45

love this card. It's old school. Yeah.

42:49

It's biblical almost. Exactly.

42:52

Yeah, copper tablet's sweet. It's $25 if you

42:54

get like a cheap damage version. So it's

42:56

pretty spendy. But again, you want tons of

42:58

these effects. And copper tablet is a very

43:01

cool version to pick up. Tablets. All

43:03

right. We've added 10 cards, 10 and 1.5 if you're looking

43:05

at copper tablet. So we've

43:08

got to cut some cards to make space

43:10

for them. The first one that

43:12

we're removing is a card that they have tried. And

43:14

I don't think it's very good. Yeah, it's

43:16

red enchantment removal. That's what people really

43:18

want, right? Nope,

43:20

it's Enchantress Bane. This

43:22

is basically one and a red. And it sits on an

43:25

enchantment and makes it deal damage to them every turn unless

43:28

they sacrifice it. It

43:30

only deals damage to one player is the

43:32

big thing here. And it's not going

43:34

to remove the enchantment. If it's good enough for them to pay

43:36

life for, they will. Yeah. And

43:38

if you want it to deal damage, it probably isn't

43:41

dealing enough. And it may not be doing it to

43:43

the right player because they don't have an enchantment. You

43:45

don't have enough control over it. This

43:48

next one breaks my heart. It is my

43:50

true, my one and only, my

43:52

Rakdos boy, Lord of Riots. He's

43:55

a demon that reduces colorless costs on your

43:58

card. creatures.

44:01

But he himself is black, black, red, red, and

44:03

you can only cast if you've dealt damage this

44:06

turn. And a lot of the damage

44:08

enablers that you're putting in the deck will damage on their

44:10

turn. He

44:12

looks like he goes very well with your commander, when in

44:14

fact, I think they do not synergize

44:17

particularly well because of the

44:19

timing. Cool cards, there's been a lot of decks, but not

44:21

this. You also just don't have that many creatures. It's a

44:23

very enchantment-heavy deck. Up

44:25

next is a new card from

44:28

the main set. It's fear of burning

44:30

alive. I mean, totally

44:32

valid fear. Sure. Six mana nightmare. I don't

44:35

want to burn alive. Now, I definitely have this

44:37

fear if this is a fear you can have. Yeah, I

44:39

don't think about it very often, so I don't know if I call

44:41

it an active fear. But if people are like, you want to burn

44:43

alive, I'd be like, that sounds scary. No, I'm afraid of that. Six

44:47

mana for an enchantment creature nightmare. When

44:49

it enters, it deals four damage to

44:51

each opponent. And then

44:54

if you have delirium, it deals

44:56

more damage. Yeah. Yeah.

45:00

I don't know how good this deck is

45:02

at getting delirium, is sort of the first problem.

45:04

I mean, it doesn't have anything that enables

45:07

delirium. We've got the thrill

45:09

of possibility, I think, is in

45:11

here. But it's not a self-mill deck. You

45:14

could sort of incidentally eventually get delirium,

45:17

but I don't think it's going to

45:19

be consistent enough to justify

45:21

playing what is basically otherwise

45:23

just a six mana deal four damage to each

45:25

opponent. It's just not

45:28

quite good enough. It also doesn't trigger your commander.

45:31

Yeah. Because it only burns them on your turn. We've

45:33

added some better ways to slam the door shut.

45:35

I don't think we need to be afraid of

45:38

burning alive anymore. Yes. Sadly, this other one we

45:40

are cutting is also a new card, which

45:42

is kind of neat. But this is

45:44

a barb flare gremlin, which is three

45:46

and a red for a three-two creature

45:49

gremlin. It has first strike and haste.

45:51

And whenever a player taps a land

45:53

for mana, if barb flare gremlin is

45:55

tapped, that player adds one mana of

45:57

any type that land produced, then that

45:59

land deals one. damage to that player.

46:01

So it's a bit like... Mana

46:06

barbs. Mana barbs. It's mana

46:08

flare, mana barbs. Mana flare plus mana

46:10

barbs for everybody. Oh

46:13

yeah, it's barbed player Krelin. Yeah, oh. Oh.

46:15

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

46:17

ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. Oh

46:19

my god. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

46:22

ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. Of

46:25

course it is. Yeah,

46:27

we just realized that. It's like we were both

46:29

like, is it mana flare or mana barbs? Oh!

46:33

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. So

46:35

this is interesting. It only works

46:37

if he's tapped. Yeah,

46:40

no. Yeah, if barbed player Gremlin is

46:42

tapped. Oh, yes. That player

46:44

adds. So it's almost harder to

46:46

trigger on your turn than the

46:49

other players. Yes, yeah. I

46:51

think he's difficult to get tapped. And then when he

46:53

is tapped, he's extremely dangerous. He has first strike and haste,

46:55

but he's still just a 3-2, which

46:58

just doesn't make him, you don't

47:00

necessarily want to attack all that much with him. And

47:03

then the big problem I see

47:05

is that I like the when you

47:08

tap, when they tap their lands, they

47:10

deal damage to them, because that can

47:12

really tax people. But giving them basically

47:14

double mana as well, they're going

47:17

to go, well, there's a

47:19

big problem on the board. I've got double mana. You know

47:21

what that double mana would be great for? Eliminating

47:24

that player. Yeah,

47:26

you're the most annoying player at the table.

47:29

Giving everybody double resources

47:31

to deal with you is

47:33

dangerous. This will really focus the table.

47:35

But? It will focus it on you. It's

47:37

chaotic. True. Very

47:40

true. Yeah, I like this better in a

47:42

deck that can control when he's tapped and untapped. I think

47:44

there's some really cool things you can do with barbed player

47:46

Gremlin. In this deck, when you're

47:48

probably going to need number one, I think it's pretty

47:50

tricky. Up next

47:52

is another new card. It's Séance Board. It's

47:54

a two-man artifact with more bid at the

47:56

beginning of each end step. If a creature

47:58

died this turn, it's put a soul counter

48:01

on Seance's board. Okay. Okay.

48:04

Add X mana of any one color where X

48:06

is the number of soul counters on Seance's

48:08

board. So this mana only to

48:10

cast instant sorcery, demon

48:12

and spirit spells. Woo,

48:15

much worse. There's a

48:17

lot that this deck is not good at.

48:19

Yeah. So first thing, it doesn't enter

48:21

with a Seance counter. So you have, a

48:23

creature has to die to make this tap for

48:25

any mana, which is very difficult on turn three,

48:27

which is when this would first be adding mana

48:29

most of the time. And the deck only has

48:31

16 spells that this can cast

48:33

even if you do get a counter on

48:35

it. Yep. And it's not like you have

48:39

like things to force everyone

48:41

to sacrifice all that much. Yeah. You

48:45

have removal. It's not cheap enough to make this ramp when

48:48

you want it to be a ramp. And it's not

48:51

consistent enough to cast most of your spells. So I

48:53

just don't think it's very good. With the right matchup, this

48:55

could incidentally get pretty big, but I just feel like it's

48:57

gonna sit there and do nothing for you too much. Yeah,

49:00

I agree. All right. We've alluded

49:02

to it a little bit. The next, we're

49:04

gonna cut five cards that are all sort of

49:06

for the same reason. And they're

49:08

all just a part of

49:10

this like sacrifice creatures dying

49:12

package that Seance board is even

49:14

included in. Yeah. So this next

49:16

one, I get why this is in the deck.

49:18

It makes sense. I just don't think it's very

49:21

efficient, which is Mask of Grizzle brand. This

49:24

one is just a three

49:26

mana equipment that gives a quick

49:28

creature flying in lifelink. And when

49:30

they die, you can pay X

49:32

life and draw

49:35

X cards, which, you know. So

49:38

it's six mana, give your commander flying, whichever

49:41

he has in lifelink, which is fine. And then

49:43

when it dies, you can draw a bunch of cards, but you're

49:45

not a sacrifice deck. You don't have great

49:47

ways to get your creatures into the graveyard.

49:50

And the most popular removal in our format

49:52

is exile. I

49:54

don't think you're gonna get the card draw off of

49:56

this very often. And there's way more efficient ways to

49:58

give your commander lifelink. And re-equipping this thing

50:01

for three feels so bad. Brutal, yeah. It

50:03

also makes your scary commander even scarier, not

50:05

necessarily what we want. Braids

50:08

we brought up already. Braids are risen in Nightmare. At

50:10

the beginning of your end step, you may sacrifice an

50:12

artifact creature in Shaman Land or Planeswalker. If

50:14

you do, your opponents have to sacrifice, or

50:16

they pay two life and you draw a

50:19

card. Usually,

50:21

Braids goes in decks where you've got

50:23

stuff flying around. Yeah, you make a lot of tokens and

50:25

you get rid of those. You've got artifacts tokens to stack.

50:27

You've got creature tokens to stack. This deck is

50:29

sort of precious about its permanence. You're paying a

50:31

lot of mana to get these four mana enchantments

50:33

into play. You just don't have free stuff to

50:35

sacrifice. So it almost hurts

50:38

you more than it hurts your opponents. Yeah,

50:41

I just don't think this really synergizes here at all.

50:45

This card is sort of incidentally pretty good, but

50:47

I just don't think it fits with the plan

50:49

of the deck, which is morbid opportunist, which is

50:51

just two in a black for a card that

50:53

says whenever one or more creatures die, draw a

50:55

card. This ability triggers only once each turn. It's

51:00

like if you had a way to kill

51:02

one of their things every turn or really

51:05

consistently make this go, it's a

51:07

very powerful card. Yeah, usually it goes in decks

51:09

where you're the one sacrificing the creatures, so you're

51:11

in control of when you're drawing. And then

51:13

you also draw when your opponent's stuff dies. Yeah,

51:15

and you maybe sack a token on every turn

51:17

to get them cards out of it. It seems

51:19

great. Yeah, I don't think this quite

51:22

does enough and it certainly doesn't defend you.

51:25

Falcon Wrath, Noble, and Bastion of Remembrance

51:27

are also in this deck. Bastion of

51:29

Remembrance is particularly bad. It only triggers

51:31

when a creature you control dies, which

51:34

you just don't have tokens in this deck. It

51:36

makes one token and you hope that's good enough.

51:38

And then Falcon Wrath, Noble triggers whenever

51:41

any creature dies, but again, you're not really

51:43

in control of that. Yeah, and

51:45

technically Falcon Wrath, Noble could trigger your commander if

51:47

stuff dies on their turn, but it's not going

51:49

to be consistent. It's four mana for a drain

51:52

one each time it happens. Yeah,

51:54

I don't think this package gets there. If

51:57

you want to lean into a more aristocratic

51:59

build of your- I think that's

52:01

absolutely a way that Valga Both could

52:03

be built. Yeah. You use blood artists

52:05

and tokens to sacrifice them to deal

52:07

damage to your opponents on their turn. That

52:09

is definitely a way that

52:11

this deck could work, but it is not currently

52:13

supporting that. Yeah. And none of these

52:16

have the mean potential of Copper Tablet. That's true.

52:18

Yeah. Yeah. I play

52:20

Copper Tablet. Way better. Yeah, totally.

52:23

All right. So those are the 10 cuts. We

52:25

cut the sacrifice package in a couple of cards

52:27

that are more inconsistent

52:29

than the ones that we added. Now

52:31

that we've made these changes, how do

52:34

you see this deck just playing out?

52:36

Like, walk us through a couple of turns.

52:39

So I think that unlike a lot of decks,

52:41

you don't necessarily want to just speed out your

52:43

commander as fast as possible. I agree. Yeah. Because

52:45

you are going to look like a big threat

52:47

pretty quickly. I think your goal in this deck

52:50

is to spend a couple of turns getting down

52:52

things that are starting to do the damage, starting

52:54

to drain people, get some

52:56

of that engine and enablers online, and

52:59

then get your commander down

53:01

so that he is immediately starting to grow,

53:03

starting to get you cards, and stuff like

53:06

that. I would even say, and this

53:08

is from my experience playing with an ob-Nixilus

53:10

captive kingpin deck, it

53:13

can sometimes be good to let

53:15

another player look a little threatening

53:18

before you start kicking into gear.

53:21

Because you have a powerful enough engine going on

53:23

with your commander that you can often jump ahead

53:25

and do the damage you want,

53:28

but it's nice to not have as much attention on you

53:31

when you actually do it.

53:34

It is worth noting that with your commander, it

53:36

has the word pay to life. So if they're

53:39

using a removal spell on your commander, you are

53:41

minimally drawing one card. Which is nice. Which is

53:43

nice. If it gets hit in a board wipe,

53:45

then you don't draw anything. So timing is going

53:47

to be really important about when Valgevoth comes down.

53:49

And I agree a little bit later, once you're

53:51

set up, maybe you have a redundancy

53:53

in damage, is

53:56

a better time for Valgevoth to come

53:58

down. That being said, if you can. When you get

54:00

Valgeball going, I think he's going to snowball

54:02

very fast. I mean, if you do like

54:04

a one-mana cataract parasite, a two-mana ramp spell,

54:06

three-mana Valgeball, terrifying. Yeah. Absolutely.

54:09

That's it. It will just start

54:11

going. Yeah. I mean, you'll probably

54:13

be able to get your commander to the point

54:15

where he's dealing like really serious commander damage. That

54:18

being said, as soon as an opponent draws a removal spell,

54:20

they're going to spend it on your commander. He

54:23

is gone. Which I think it's a good

54:25

idea in this deck to like kind of immediately

54:27

decide which player probably has the

54:29

most interaction, has the ability to stop

54:31

you and stop your commander and maybe

54:33

like target them early. I

54:36

know people playing commander tend to want

54:38

to kind of spread things out and

54:40

let everyone do their thing, but I think this is the

54:42

sort of deck that is going to heavily benefit from taking

54:46

someone out if you can. Yeah. I

54:49

mean, it's a scary deck and you're spreading a

54:51

lot of love. There's damage on everybody's turn. I

54:54

think if you're allowed to attack

54:56

with your commander, you need to be very calculated

54:58

about it. Okay.

55:02

Definitely have build up some redundancy, but things are

55:04

going to snowball. If you draw three cards off

55:06

of this and then somebody answers your commander, you're

55:09

like, that's fine. That's fine. You

55:11

got three cards. I got three cards and eight or removal spell.

55:13

That's fine. Probably gained seven life off that sword's to

55:16

plowshares. Well, then I think the game is going to

55:18

move to the point where everyone is like these pingers

55:20

and these life drain things add up a lot

55:23

faster than people think because as a magic player,

55:25

especially a commander player, you start to kind of

55:27

see a little bit of life drain and you're

55:29

like, ah, not that important. Right. Yeah.

55:32

Then you'll start to realize that everyone at the table is

55:34

at 10 except the Valgavoth player. Yep.

55:38

Watch the, it's the Dominaria United

55:40

deck where Josh plays with a

55:42

Keterak parasite. Yes. And

55:45

boy, do we ignore it. And I don't remove it because I'm

55:47

like, I'm an aggro deck. This is fine. And

55:49

I die to it. Yeah. It's

55:52

a serious thing. And that's of course, when

55:54

you're going to want to pull out one of your big

55:56

finisher spells, your Shondra's ignitions, things

55:59

like that. burn spells, big things

56:01

that'll slam the door shut so you

56:03

can win all at once. You have to

56:05

remember, you're racing the whole table, they're just racing

56:07

you. Then they'll deal with the other players. Yes.

56:10

So, careful with your timing, understand

56:12

who you are at the table when you're

56:14

playing this, and be prepared to be the

56:16

big bad here on Duskmorn. To

56:19

the listeners, what do you think of

56:21

this pre-com? Any cards we missed that absolutely have to go

56:23

in the 99, you're like, find space

56:25

for copper tablet. You've gotta have it. Any

56:28

cards we suggested to take out or add that

56:31

you disagree with. Tell us, you're like, you know what,

56:33

I actually really like the aristocrat package and I would

56:35

just add token support to make it a little bit

56:37

easier. That's totally fair and another way that you can

56:39

go. Yeah, maybe that's a totally different way to build

56:41

it, go full aristocrats. If you're a patron,

56:43

get on our Discord, there's a channel that we talk

56:45

about, all of these pre-cons. You can

56:48

check out our architect where we will

56:50

have the link to this upgrade. You

56:52

can check out and do some gold fishing on

56:55

architect, see how the deck

56:57

plays post upgrade. If

56:59

you wanna pick up any of the cards that

57:01

we talked about in this episode, go to cardking.com/command,

57:03

get yourself this pre-con and get yourself a copper

57:05

tablet and the Sulfim Mayhem

57:08

Dominus, also all the sulfuric

57:10

vortexes of the world. We

57:12

didn't even add that one. We added roiling vortex,

57:14

small sulfuric vortex. Sulfuric vortex

57:17

is good though. Yeah, all

57:19

of them do exactly what the deck wants to do.

57:21

There's a ton of cool options for a Val'Givoth and

57:23

you can pick up all of them and card kingdom

57:26

and get them all in one package. Ship to you

57:28

safely at once. You're

57:30

not chasing dozens of envelopes through the

57:32

mail, crossing your fingers, hoping that they arrive in

57:34

good shape. I love that Card Kingdom knows cards

57:36

and knows how to ship them. So the cards that I

57:38

buy online are the ones that show up on

57:41

my doorstep. It means a lot to me that my cards are

57:43

in good condition. So I appreciate that it means a lot to

57:45

Card Kingdom as well. cardkingdom.com/command.

57:48

And once those cards are in your hand,

57:50

you're gonna need to protect them. Go over

57:53

to UltraPro, and check out some of these

57:55

sweet new Duskmorn play mats, binders, deck boxes.

57:57

They are doing all sorts of wild. stuff

58:00

for the new sets. We're rocking

58:03

Valgavoth and this ugly

58:05

guy playmats. Probably

58:09

not a friend. If you're

58:12

like, oh thank God, Bloomboro's over and I

58:14

get to move on to the spooky ooky

58:16

monsters, celebrate by getting yourself a cool playmat

58:18

with all the officially licensed art over on

58:21

the Ultra Pro website. And you can do

58:23

so while supporting the show if you go

58:25

to ultrapro.com/command. Before we go, we're gonna

58:27

say, oh, we have an end step. Do we wanna talk

58:30

about something outside the world of magic? What's

58:32

your favorite horror movie? My

58:35

favorite horror movie, this

58:38

is like an easy

58:40

answer, but it's kind of a thing. The

58:43

thing is, I mean, it's just phenomenal. I

58:47

watch it every year. I know it's also

58:49

one of Gaurav's favorites. We sometimes have gotten

58:51

together and like watch the thing every year.

58:53

But it really is just like sort of

58:55

a perfect horror movie. It's great. It's made

58:57

really well. In

59:00

case you haven't seen it, I won't spoil

59:02

the ending, but just the idea that this

59:05

creature could be anywhere and it's smart enough

59:07

to like try and trick you and you

59:10

can't trust anything, including kind of yourself a

59:12

lot of the time. I

59:15

love that movie. I am not a

59:17

big horror person. I love the thing. The

59:19

thing transcends horror. I

59:21

agree. It is just such

59:23

a good thriller while also

59:25

being legitimately really scary. That's

59:29

a great answer. Man, I don't

59:33

know. I was trying to think of one and then you said

59:35

the thing and then I just started thinking about the thing. I

59:38

was like, yeah, that is a great movie. I

59:40

like to watch every Halloween. I like to watch one

59:44

like real classic horror movie. Like I'll

59:46

watch a Texas Chainsaw Massacre or something

59:48

like that. And then one clunker,

59:52

like one just be

59:54

werewolf movie. Those are amazing. And

59:57

you know what? This isn't a good answer for what my favorite

59:59

horror movie. but this is one that I watched recently that

1:00:01

I was like, you know what? I

1:00:04

like it. And the world didn't, and that's

1:00:06

fine. It's Van Helsing. Oh,

1:00:08

wait, Van Helsing is great. We talked about

1:00:11

this a little bit. Van Helsing

1:00:13

is a, Hugh Jackman plays Van

1:00:15

Helsing and he goes out into

1:00:17

the world to murder

1:00:19

Dracula. And it's

1:00:21

weird and big and it makes

1:00:24

these wild choices. In

1:00:27

a lot of ways it's terrible. I

1:00:29

enjoyed the entirety of Van Helsing. There's

1:00:31

like Van Helsing's queue where he goes

1:00:33

in the back of a monastery and they

1:00:35

show him all these cool new, here's

1:00:39

your fancy crossbow. It's

1:00:41

awesome. It's a very fun movie.

1:00:43

If you're into sort of campy, weird

1:00:45

horror movies, you should check out Van Helsing. It

1:00:47

is not scary. No.

1:00:51

All right, that's our end step for today. We'll

1:00:53

go to the cleanup and we'll say thank

1:00:55

you to our amazing team here at the

1:00:57

Command Zone. Thank you to Eric Lem, Rachel

1:00:59

Kendra, Gaurav Gulati, Jamie Block, Jake Boss, Josh

1:01:02

Murphy, Manson Lung, Karina Cruz, Jared Robinson, Sebastian

1:01:04

Salazar, Evan Limburger, Sam Waldo, Josh Lique, Jimmy

1:01:06

Wong, and of course to Jordan Pridgen taking

1:01:08

the time for doing this upgrade. Thanks for

1:01:10

having me, Rachel. Anytime. It was very

1:01:12

fun. Hope you get

1:01:14

to inflict endless punishment on your play group.

1:01:16

We'll see you next time. Bye.

1:01:20

Thank you for your attention. For

1:01:23

further inquiries, send an email to

1:01:26

commandcastatrocketjump.com or ask us on

1:01:28

Twitter at JFWong and

1:01:31

at Josh Lique. See

1:01:33

you later, alligator. Greetings,

1:01:36

humans. I am the leader

1:01:38

of the team. I am the leader of

1:01:41

the team. I am the leader of the

1:01:43

team. I am the leader of the team.

1:01:45

I am the leader of the team. I

1:01:48

am the leader of the team. Thanks, human. This

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