By @MagusoftheSalt
Hey Planeswalkers, welcome back to the Top Down Commander Blog. I'm your Sensei, the Magus of the Salt. Today we're going to be looking at a deck I'm calling the WarGames Combo.
I'm a big fan of interactivity in my commander games. After all, Commander is the "Social Format." So my goal is to get my friends involved in the game as much as I can. This deck is built around giving our opponents all the choices in the world while hiding the fact that those choices don't really matter in the end. Because, like we learned from the classic movie WarGames, the only winning move is not to play the game. First off, let's take a look at the Top Down Commander of Today's Deck.
The Top Down Commander
Okay, okay, so I know Fact or Fiction can't actually be our commander but it's the card our deck is built around. FoF is going to let our opponents divide our top 5 cards into two piles and we'll put one into our hand and the other into our graveyard. These kinds of effects define our deck all the way up to our namesake combo. But we'll get there. Until then, the actual commander of today's deck.
Kess is a powerhouse commander and admittedly more powerful than I'd usually like but the entire WarGames combo hinges on her ability to replay spells from the yard. So we're going to use Kess to keep casting FoF effects until we find our combo and pull back the curtain on our diabolical plan.
Do you really want to do that?
We're going to start off by offering our opponents choices when it comes to combat. Do you want to pay two to attack us? Do you want to pay 3 or can we have a 3/3 ogre to block with? Propaganda and Kazuul, Tyrant of the Cliffs are simple, but effective combat deterrents.
Captive Audience serves to remind our opponents that we are the masterminds of this deathtrap and that they are merely playing along in our game. They're making choices every turn, but really they're just watching the fun commence. And speaking of fun, Cruel Entertainment will have our opponents dancing like marionettes for our pleasure.
And the mother of all choice cards is, of course, Expropriate. I heard your groans through the screen. I know, this card is bonkers and very powerful but it's also on theme with the deck, so you'll have to forgive me. Also, pro-tip, always always ALWAYS choose money. (Unless I'm casting the spell. Then disregard everything I said and give me extra turns).
This one or that one?
All of the card draw in this deck is going to come at the behest of our opponents. Alongside Fact or Fiction, we're also running Fortune's Favor and Epiphany at the Drownyard. Epiphany is especially cool since we reveal the top X cards and we get to make the piles. Put your political game to the test and see if you can get the cards you want in your hand.
One of the best reasons to run Red in this deck is the inclusion of Allure of the Unknown, a new card from Theros: Beyond Death with sick Sea McKinnon art. Allure has us reveal the top 6 cards of our library. An opponent can cast one of them for free and then we get the other five into our hands. Similarly, Covenant of Minds will let us reveal the top 3 cards of our library; an opponent either lets us have those cards or we bin those and draw five instead.
Unesh, Criosphinx Sovereign and Sphinx of Uthuun both do an FoF impression when they enter the battlefield while Atris, Oracle of Half-Truths does a Fortune's Favor. All of these creatures play into the theme and in another world, Atris was the commander of this deck. But the WarGames Combo doesn't exist with Atris, so I moved him to the 99 where he's still a fun include.
Some red creatures are also going to generate card advantage for us. Every upkeep, Sin Prodder can either draw us an extra card or it'll burn our opponents faces. Combustible Gearhulk will either draw us three cards or, hopefully, ping our opponents for a good chunk of damage. And both of these creatures put cards into the yard where we can use them again later with Kess or our recursion package.
Reduce, Reuse, Recycle
We start off our recursion package with three creatures that return a spell from our graveyard to our hand. Archaeomancer, Possessed Skaab, and Izzet Chronarch all like our spells so much they want to play them again and again.
Past in Flames is mass instant and sorcery recursion like no other. Giving all of the spells in our yard flashback could get us out of a pinch if we find ourselves in one. Underworld Breach fulfills a similar, albeit different, function. Breach could (and probably should) be Yawgmoth's Will but at a fraction of the price, I thought it'd be fun to give Underworld Breach a shot and this seemed like a heck of a deck to include it in.
Stitch Together and Phyrexian Delver are going to bring creatures back from the yard. Stitch Together will only put them on the field if we have seven or more cards in our graveyard but that shouldn't be too difficult since we're filling our yard with all the FoF effects already.
Boneyard Parley is the reanimator version of Fact or Fiction. It allows us to choose five creatures from any graveyard, have an opponent put them in two piles and then put one of those piles onto the battlefield under our control. Very on theme and surprisingly useful late in the game.
Finally, we've got my favorite recursion spell in the deck, Shrouded Lore. For one black mana, target opponent is going to pick a spell out of our graveyard to return to our hand. But if we don't like that card, we can pay one black and make them choose another, different, card. We can repeat this process as many times as we have the mana until we get what we want. Remember what I said about our opponents not really having a choice?
Which of your toys do you like more?
The next section of the deck is all about forcing our opponents to consider Sophie's choice. Which of your babies would you sacrifice if you had to. We start off with classics like Fleshbag Marauder and Plaguecrafter but we get more creative as time goes on.
Next up are Do or Die and Breaking Point. Do or Die has us sort an opponents creatures into two piles and then they choose which pile to keep and which to destroy. Besides being where are our opponents are with all these choices, Breaking Point is a spell that's going to destroy all creatures unless an opponent wants to take 6 damage.
We're also running Killing Wave and Torment of Hailfire as big X spells that can clear the board. Once again, we're not killing any of our opponents creatures without offering them a choice first. Do you want to lose life or sacrifice those creatures? It's not my fault what you choose, is it? Torment of Hailfire can also act as a finisher in this deck, especially since we can cast it twice or more between Kess and all of the spell recursion in the deck.
My favorite piece of "removal" for this deck is Choice of Damnations. This is an interesting card that I don't see nearly enough of. If an opponent chooses a large enough number, we can just make them lose that much life but if they choose a small enough number, we'll just wipe away the majority of their board instead. If your plan is to have your opponents make choices, you can't leave out this one.
The WarGames Combo
Okay, okay, I've strung you along for long enough. Without further ado, the WarGames Combo. We start with Kess, Dissident Mage on the battlefield and cast Intuition, which allows us to search up 3 cards from our library. An opponent will put one on of those cards into our hands and then the other two go into the yard.
SHOW KESS AND INTUITION
With intuition we search up Reanimate, Demonic Consultation, and Thassa's Oracle. (Barring counter spells). No matter which card our opponent gives us, we win the game! Don't believe me? I'll prove it.
Ex. 1: They put reanimate into our hands. We cast the reanimate from our hands putting Thassa's Oracle back onto the battlefield. With the Oracle trigger on the stack, we cast Demonic Consultation from the graveyard (thanks to Kess), naming a card that isn't in our deck, and win the game!
Ex. 2: They put Demonic Consultation into our hands. We cast reanimate from the graveyard (thanks to Kess) targeting Thassa's Oracle. With the Oracle's enter the battlefield trigger on the stack, we cast Demonic Consultation from our hand, naming a card that isn't in our deck, and win the game!
Ex. 3: They put Thassa's Oracle into our hands. We cast the Oracle from our hand and with its ETB trigger on the stack, we cast Demonic Consultation from the yard (thanks to Kess)... you get it by now right?
So what have we learned from this combo? That's right! I'm a scumbag. No, wait, that the only winning move is not to play the game. Well with all that in mind, what could possibly Sensei's Top Pick of the deck?
Sensei's Top Pick
Sensei's Top Pick of the Deck is my choice for the best card in the deck and, hands down, the Top Pick for this deck is Demonic Consultation.
Demonic Consultation is so good in this deck, it borders on unfair. In fact, if it wasn't integral to the namesake combo, I probably wouldn't have included it at all. Kess allowing you to essentially double cast Consultation means that the deck feels especially degenerate. With Kess on the field, you can cast Consultation to find Thassa's Oracle, then recast consultation from the yard (thanks to Kess) and win the game, fun theme be damned. Even without Kess, there's enough recursion in this deck that you can usually get Demonic Consultation back even if without Kess. It definitely gives the deck a win condition, but it can make the deck more competitive than fun. So player beware!
For the full decklist, check out the Archidekt link here.
That's All Folks
And that's my deck review for Kess, Dissident Mage aka The WarGames Combo aka Fact or Fiction Tribal. I hope you enjoyed this deck overview. For the full list, head over to Archidekt. If you can, I'd love for you to check out my youtube channel below. For this video deck tech, click HERE. I'd also love to interact with you on twitter or facebook.
Until next time, Keep Kicking Ass!
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Twitter: @MagusoftheSalt
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