One Last Sweep

Alright, here we are. I think I'm done; Yennet feels like it's in that 'tuned but not focused' zone. It can do some cool stuff but it doesn't want to do broken things and I like that.

I cut Barren Moor, Secluded Steppe, and Lonely Sandbar for Island, Swamp, and Evolving Wilds. The shuffle effect from Wilds matters to this deck and SO MANY lands enter the battlefield tapped that I wanted to make gameplay a little faster for me. Those were the last changes I made to the deck.

The way I've built Yennet, it has a pretty severe disadvantage in 1v1 situations; the game pictured looks pretty good for me, but I made a critical mistake by being too aggressive and then Noah was able to blow me out with lots of zombie tokens.

Still, I like what this does and how it functions, and now I'm looking forward to getting on the next one!

Commander-Yennet, Cryptic Sovereign

1 Azorius Signet
1 Commander's Sphere
1 Crystal Ball
1 Dimir Signet
1 Mind Stone
1 Orzhov Signet
1 Seer's Lantern
1 Sol Ring
1 Swiftfoot Boots

1 Enigma Sphinx
1 Magus of the Balance
1 Night Incarnate
1 Sower of Discord
1 Yuriko, the Tiger's Shadow
1 Adarkar Valkyrie
1 Conundrum Sphinx
1 Djinn of Wishes
1 Sphinx of Jwar Isle
1 Sphinx of Uthuun
1 Phyrexian Delver
1 Duskmantle Seer
1 Silent-Blade Oni
1 Loyal Unicorn
1 Geode Golem
1 Mulldrifter
1 Ninja of the Deep Hours
1 Pilgrim's Eye
1 Urborg Emissary
1 Stormscape Battlemage
1 Stormscape Familiar
1 Prognostic Sphinx

1 Soothsaying
1 Future Sight
1 Mind's Dilation

1 Utter End
1 Return to Dust
1 Brainstorm
1 Telling Time
1 Esper Charm
1 Mortify
1 Crib Swap
1 Pollen Lullaby
1 Stir the Pride
1 Dismantling Blow

1 Isolated Watchtower
6 Plains
6 Island
4 Swamp
1 Forge of Heroes
1 Arcane Sanctum
1 Azorius Chancery
1 Azorius Guildgate
1 Command Tower
1 Dimir Aqueduct
1 Dimir Guildgate
1 Dismal Backwater
1 Forsaken Sanctuary
1 Halimar Depths
1 Jwar Isle Refuge
1 Meandering River
1 Mortuary Mire
1 New Benalia
1 Orzhov Basilica
1 Orzhov Guildgate
1 Scoured Barrens
1 Sejiri Refuge
1 Submerged Boneyard
1 Tranquil Cove
1 Evolving Wilds

1 Aminatou, the Fateshifter

1 Terminus
1 Skull Storm
1 Entreat the Angels
1 Army of the Damned
1 Akroma's Vengeance
1 Dream Cache
1 Ponder
1 Portent
1 Treasure Hunt
1 Evangelize
1 Conqueror's Pledge
1 Demonic Collusion
1 Temporal Cascade
1 Mystic Speculation
1 Beacon of Unrest
1 Cleansing Nova

Ever Forward

The last game of Commander I played took three hours. It was against people piloting Derevi, Sydri, and Queen Marchesa and it was quite a bit of fun!

But three hours wears on you, I'll tell you that much. However, I kept my wits about me and was able to pull off a victory against some really interesting and well put together decks, so that feels good.

It also allowed me to see a great deal of my deck, so I was able to see how it preforms and some of my takeaways are:

Future Sight is awesome and opponents were generally willing to ignore it.

Mind's Dilation is really awesome.

I need some shuffle effects in this deck or more ways to manipulate the library because I spent a lot of turns with lands on top of my deck. Sometimes this was good, as when Duskmantle Seer is in play but often I felt frustrated, since despite my best efforts, I never saw a Soothsaying or a Mystic Revelation.

Enter: Beacon of Unrest. Here's something that will fulfill at least two great roles in this deck; first I get a shuffle effect and second, I could get a win condition from any graveyard.

And Yennett needs both of these things, because it's a slower deck and wants to get to the long game. Once Yennett is online, the goal is to just keep drawing enough cards to overwhelm the opponents but that doesn't happen until turn six, frequently. But it is, as friends are saying, a 'value engine' it just takes a little time for the engine to warm up.

This is going to be the last post for a little bit; I'm out of town for ten days so I won't get much gaming in. But I'll be back in July!



 

Odd Vs Even

After all those changes, how does the deck feel to play?

It's a little clunky. The higher casting cost of cards means that this deck is a bit of a slow roller.

However! The upgrades are clearly better. Aminatu's ability becomes useful and rewards smart decision making. Future Sight is a very cool addition, Temporal Cascade acts as a way to mess with people's hands (and future plans) but more relevantly, graveyard based strategies.

The decision making for Yennet has started to become far, far more complex and this engages me a lot as a player. It means that of the problems to solve in Commander games, I have some tools to help me solve them....most of the time.

As I said, it's still a little clunky; having a Soothsaying and a Mystic Speculation at the same time can feel foolish, for example. But cutting one seems even less wise, since having repeatable effects are important. It's probably worth investigating the mana base again, since the new cards may have weighted the deck towards a color in a way that I haven't compensated for yet.

The tension I'm noting, I finally realize, is the difference between feeling like I'm doing something cool, versus doing something cool. I still need some more games with this deck though but the biggest difference is that I'm looking forward to those games. If I'm actually doing cool things, then that is a definite improvement.

Detailed Sphinx

"That game came down to the wire!" Jason said. "I love those games."

"Me, too, but...god I wish this deck wasn't so boring."

"Well, what're you trying to do?" he asked.

"Play stuff off the top of my deck, use Ninjas and Yennett to play things for free."

"How does Yennet work?"

And this was the question that led to me looking up Yennet in Gatherer to see what the rulings are and we found this tidbit:

If you cast a card “without paying its mana cost,” you can’t choose to cast it for any alternative costs, such as evoke costs. You can, however, pay additional costs. If the card has any mandatory additional costs, such as that of Tormenting Voice, those must be paid to cast it.

That's good to know, since additional costs would include Kicker, Entwine, and Buyback, for example.

Suddenly, there's something I can work with.

With that in mind, I'm removing: Devastation Tide, Banishing Stroke, Predict, Lightform, Cloudform, Sigiled Starfish, High Priest of Penance, Varna, Lich Queen, and Primordial Mist.

Adding: Evangelize, Dismantling Blow, Stormscape Battlemage, Stormscape Familiar, Mystic Speculation, Temporal Cascade, Demonic Collusion, Future Sight, Conqueror's Pledge, and Urborg Emissary.

Then I cut two Plains for a Swiftfoot Boots and a Stir the Pride. 40 lands is a lot and the analysis was that I had a lot more white than I needed. Swiftfoot Boots protects Yennet which is critical, and Stir the Pride could be a great turnaround moment in the game.

So this should be fun to test!

Cuts to Yennet

So, when I promoted this deck at the casualmtg forums on reddit, a user suggested I didn't really understand Aminatou, and then presented their deck choices. That person had some pretty cool ideas, and I think it's worth a read. Maybe someone will take some inspiration from them and arrive at a cool deck of their own!

But I'm sticking with Yennet on this one.

I don't like Cloudform, Lightform, Primordial Mist or Jeskai Infiltrator.

However, Yennet's deck is geared up to work the top of the library. That means that Cloudform/Lightform might be fun or clever. So I'm going to give everything except Jeskai Infiltrator a shot; maybe I just need to play the cards to see what they can do.

After that, I want to cut Aethermage's Touch, Serra Avatar, Banishing Stroke, and Boreas Charger. Boreas Charger is so bland. I don't have any dual lands to help color fix so I'd just be getting Plains. Too many of Yennet's lands enter tapped anyway; why is this card here? So no.

This deck clearly needs Soothsaying and that's probably why WotC didn't include it (EYE ROLL).

Also going in is Pollen Lullaby, Windreader Sphinx, and Revive the Fallen. I am keeping Banishing Stroke against my better judgment, as a way to deal with the gods from Theros, since in nearly any other situation, Disenchant would be better.  But I see those gods enter and this deck really can't deal with those cards.

I also hate the mana base. So much coming into play tapped just feels so grindy and sets this deck on its back foot. Maybe that doesn't matter; experts designed the mana base and I am a little reluctant to mess with it, especially since I'm not going to be putting a lot of money cards into the mana. Still; after the changes, running it through the deckstats.net algorithm might help me make some changes.

I just wish I was more excited about this deck. It wants to do something unique to most Magic games, much less Commander games and yet it just feels so boring to me, even after the Commander change up.  Hopefully, getting some practice under my belt will reveal something.

Commander - Aminatou, the Fateshifter

I want to continue the Commander deck improvements (that I started with Saheeli) with Aminatou, the Fateshifter. Here's the base deck:

Instant Aethermage's Touch Utter End Banishing Stroke Return to Dust Brainstorm Predict Telling Time Esper Charm Mortify Crib Swap	Artifacts Azorius Signet Commander's Sphere Crystal Ball Dimir Signet Mind Stone Orzhov Signet Seer's Lantern Sol Ring
Enchantment Lightform Cloudform Primordial Mist	Sorcery Terminus Aminatou's Augury Entreat the Dead Skull Storm Entreat the Angels Army of the Damned Akroma's Vengeance Devastation Tide  Dream Cache Ponder Portent  Treasure Hunt
Lands Isolated Watchtower 8 Plains 5 Island 3 Swamp Forge of Heroes Arcane Sanctum Azorius Chancery Azorius Guildgate Barren Moor Command Tower Dimir Aqueduct Dimir Guildgate Dismal Backwater Forsaken Sanctuary Halimar Depths Jwar Isle Refuge Lonely Sandbar Meandering River Mortuary Mire New Benalia Orzhov Basilica Orzhov Guildgate Scoured Barrens Secluded Steppe Sejiri Refuge Submerged Boneyard Tranquil Cove	Creatures Enigma Sphinx  Varina, Lich Queen Yennett, Cryptic Sovereign Boreas Charger Magus of the Balance Night Incarnate Sower of Discord Yuriko, the Tiger's Shadow Serra Avatar Adarkar Valkyrie Conundrum Sphinx Djinn of Wishes Jeskai Infiltrator Sphinx of Jwar Isle Sphinx of Uthuun Phyrexian Delver Duskmantle Seer High Priest of Penance Silent-Blade Oni Loyal Unicorn Loyal Subordinate Geode Golem Mulldrifter  Ninja of the Deep Hours Sigiled Starfish Pilgrim's Eye

 
OK, so this deck..................

I hate it.

Aminatou doesn't do anything really interesting, the ultimate is the sort of play that makes games go on FOREVER, and the setup/payoff for that ultimate is way too much work, the mana base is absurd with all the lands that enter tapped, I actively despise Lightform and Cloudform, Aethermage's Touch is not a thing, stop trying to make it a thing, I am 100% sick of WotC shoving Serra Avatar into white decks...basically, this deck exhausts me. It is for someone. But not for me.

I'm going to change it up and run Yennett, Cryptic Sovereign as my commander instead. That's the payoff card, meant to work with Aminatou, in my opinion. I'd much rather encourage game states where I am pushing things towards the conclusion, even if that conclusion is: I lose.

So here we go.