Aminatou, the Fateshifter - The 8-year-old Planeswalker

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darrenhabib
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Pronounced Ah-mee-NAH-too, this Esper wub colored planeswalker is the face of the "Subjective Reality" deck for Commander 2018.

I have to admit that the thing that drew me to this card the most, was the art of Seb McKinnon. Seb's ability to portray both creepiness and beauty in the same frame, has made me a fan for the past year now.
Actually if you're interested in his work, the youtube channel Rhystic Studies has done an in depth breakdown of his style and creations in the video in the spoiler, I highly recommend it.
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Alright enough art fan-boying, let's look at the card itself. Who is Aminatou? Well there is a full artical on the Wizards website with much of her background, you can check it out here https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/a ... -07-26?cyt

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If you can pull from history, the three mana planeswalkers have always ended up being better than their first evaluations.
Now this is true for dueling, early lock and value planeswalkers have a way of taking over a game. But from experience, playing planeswalkers in multiplayer commander does not have the same grip.
I can also tell you that the difference between going first and last in multiplayer, has a huge impact when you are looking to get value from a commander planeswalker. If you're going last, it is really hard to get ahead.

I'm just giving you insight into the pros and cons of planeswalker commanders. But there are a lot of pros, and lets look at them.

+1: Draw a card, then put a card from your hand on top of your library.

Her +1 is a very mini Brainstorm type effect. But it's immediately obvious that you're not getting through your library in an effective way on her own. Just replacing one card in hand, to get one card deeper. Even if you did this every turn, you'd only be one card deeper into your deck for the entire game.
This is where shuffle effects and cards from library that go to hand can help to make her +1 more effect over the course of a game.
This ability is only really filtering cards in a manner so that we can massage our hand to better suit the game state, setting up for some sort of answers or combos. Or just managing your land drops better for mana screw or flooding.
There are plenty of shuffle effects with searching through library for cards, whether that be fetch lands, generic tutors, or even specific card type tutors. I've gone out of my way to include a lot of these, so this deck will only be interesting if you're a fan of tutors, or understand the necessary "evil".

-1: Exile another target permanent you own, then return it to the battlefield under your control.

Her -1 is like a mini Brago, King Eternal for a single card each turn. It must be noted that a lot of cards that have "exile and return to battlefield", usually have a delayed "return at end of turn". With Aminatou the exiled card comes back into play immediately, and this is where the she really shines as a combo commander.
This ability is actually where we start to get to the guts of what makes her tick. With "enter the battlefield" effects we can look to get early value from her to push ahead.
There are a number of permanents in creatures and enchantments that get card draw, search for other cards, graveyard use, and even stealing, when they enter the battlefield.

-6: Choose left or right. Each player gains control of all nonland permanents other than Aminatou, the Fateshifter controlled by the next player in the chosen direction.

Her -6 ultimate is very unique and at first feels like a chaos effect, that you're more likely to find in red. However it is controlled action, you dictate where cards are going, and "exchanging cards" typically happens in blue.

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I've already mentioned Brago, King Eternal and it's important to get options into perspective, and thus helps you break down more effectively what you're really trying to get out of a commander that you might not already be able to get elsewhere, right?
They are clearly different, but when it comes to "entering the battlefield" effects in white and blue, Brago has been the go to guy in the past. His ability to create an engine where you get to blink multiple cards a turn is..well..all hail the King.

Where do you make the distinction to play Aminatou over say Brago? Well first of all Brago is a creature and Aminatou is a planeswalker. So here is the first clue to where you might want to skew the deck in a direction. Hint, mass creature removal might play to your advantage.
She also puts you into black. This could just be a color preference, but it does give you access to a whole suite of cards and themes.
Brago costs 4 mana and requires another full turn to potentially get value because he needs to attack (and connect). Aminatou costs 3 mana and you can get value the same turn she is played. So we do have this early game edge of being a full two turns quicker than Brago. Even Aminatou on her own, can blink a land, so that you are always a mana ahead on curve at the very least, and in competitive early turns this can be more of an advantage than you'd first imagine. Being able to blink lands is a very important aspect of getting infinite mana with Aminatou. Brago specifically has to target 'non-land'.

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It's the ability to get a lot of infinite's off her, that I will show you in the strategy sections, where the real differences are over Brago, where he can only do once off effects during combat. This is where she shines as a true combo commander and has the ability to win games on the spot.

Planeswalker commanders certainly have their own unique style of play. It's not always the easiest to keep them in play during the game.

You might like Aminatou if
  • You like a commander with many different abilities and modes.
  • You like ETB value from different permanent types.
  • You like infinite combos.
  • You like being a control player.

You might dislike Aminatou if
  • You don't like the potential fragile nature of planeswalkers.
  • You don't like intricate sequences.
  • You dislike relying on combos for winning.
  • You have Mottephobia.
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When Commander 2018 was spoiled I was one of the first people to brew around Animanou and share my theory-crafting in this thread, with my initial list generally planeswalker focused.
Through further brainstorming it became apparent that there were also nice synergies with reanimation as well.
I originally had two separate deck lists, a "Superfriends" and "Reanimation". But as time went on, the Reanimation list differences became less and less, as I personally found it hard not to play some of my favorite interactions within the Superfriends version.
For a long time I merged these themes into a single deck. I wanted to present just one deck list for clarity, so that it's quicker and easier for readers to follow this primer. "Less is more" and "simplicity is the key", are clichés, but actually really does help when it comes to presenting information in a manner that is more engaging. Therefore I have reverted the primer back to purely a Superfriends list.

I will also make a disclaimer that this primer and it's deck list is heavily dedicated to showing card interactions and combos, rather than trying to be "the best deck possible". In this way it's more of a resource to help you figure out what is possible with Aminatou. As such it's not specifically aimed at cEDH game play, as fast mana and cheap interaction is required for faster game play. There are Esper staples that could be added to this list, but I've felt the need to keep the content more focused on interactions, rather than individually good cards in commander.


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Aminatou, the Fateshifter, the 8-year-old Planeswalker - Superfriends

Mass creature removal

1 Damn

Artifact (other)

Approximate Total Cost:

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Starting Hands and Mulligans

There are only 34 lands in the deck, so realistically your mulligan decisions are going to be around making sure that you have some lands to play out over the first couple of turns.
The nice thing about Aminatou, is that you can use her +1 ability to put back more expensive cards, and hope to shuffle them away. This can help to smooth out draws more.
It is nice to have some early form of ETB effects, so that you can look use Aminatou -1 on them for value, but realistically you can't specifically mulligan to get these.

Early game

Straight away you'll have a couple of potential different modes, depending on what you have.
The question to you ask yourself is "if I cast Aminatou, can I protect her?". This dictates much of your early play. Committing some creatures to the board to block incoming attacks might be what you've been dealt, so makes the most sense.
Sometimes you just get to play out Aminatou on the third turn and opponents are busy trying to ramp, etc, to play creatures to pressure you. This is great as you get to use the value of Aminatou every turn.
However often you'll see the board play out early with opponents own creatures and your ability to defend Aminatou are going to seem unlikely.
This is where you can play a more patient game and wait till opponents have committed a lot to the board and then use mass creature removal in the form of Damn, Toxic Deluge, Supreme Verdict, Terminus, Out of Time. The deck does have a lot of tutors to get these, so it's not often that you'll be just simply hoping to draw one, most of the time you'll have the means to do this in the manner you want.

Mid game

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There are a lot of different combos in this deck, so at this stage of the game you might have drawn some of the pieces.
This will give you a direction to aim for. It might be that you have a tutor and another card that combine together, so makes sense to try and setup for that.

There is a situation where you've been able to play out Aminatou early and build her up to the ultimate -6 ability.
It's interesting because often people will stop playing out cards once they think that you are probably going to get within that range. This just makes it more likely to get to 6 loyalty, as there is even less pressure on her.
It's all going to come down to opponents as well as your own board, but you can really plan a game around it. Remember you can then start using her -1 ability to exile the cards your opponents got from you, to return them to play under your control.

Late game

This deck has plenty of late game play, in fact it's really fun if you get to this stage and might have used control elements like counterspells and mass removal to keep the game "civilized".
You have a plethora of value plays within planeswalkers and you should be much more equipped with mana to play out some of the more powerful interactions, as casting multiple spells a turn really helps with combos.

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Well one really effective use out of using Aminatou is using her -1 on other planeswalkers to get further activation's out of them. You can potentially use their more powerful minus abilities, that would put them on low loyalty, but once they are blinked out will come back on starting loyalty, giving you more scope to keep their loyalty healthier.

I can't say this is outright a "Superfriends" deck, but there are enough of them to be a theme..and I'll just get to the really juicy part of this deck, and that is really how the deck functions with either Oath of Teferi, The Chain Veil or Urza Assembles the Titans in play.

Oath of Teferi, The Chain Veil and Urza Assembles the Titans

The reason is that with Aminatou ability to blink out planeswalkers, you can in fact get up to 6 activation's in a single turn with one of these multiverse travelers.
Because you can use Aminatou -1 twice with one of these cards in play, the planeswalkers will come back each time as a new version, allowing you to use their abilities twice again. That's 3 sets of using their abilities twice.

The Chain Veil is a little more special in that you can actually keep stacking up activation's, so each time they come back into play you can activate abilities as many times more as you've activated The Chain Veil that turn.
You activate The Chain Veil, then use Aminatou -1 on the The Chain Veil and activate it again.
Then you can activate a planeswalker three times. Aminatou -1 can blink out the planeswalker twice, so you can get nine activation's on a single walker.

*I do a breakdown of the planeswalker ultimate's in another section, you can click here for details.

Aminatou + Felidar Guardian + (Oath of Teferi/The Chain Veil/Urza Assembles the Titans) Infinite Combo

Felidar Guardian can go infinite by targeting Aminatou with the exile trigger ability, and then Aminatou targeting the Cat with her -1
But this doesn't actually do anything on it's own other than give you infinite ETB triggers.

However if you have Oath of Teferi or The Chain Veil then you get to activate Aminatou twice, allowing you to target something else as well. At the very least you can get infinite mana, by just targeting a land, but if you have any other value card, then it'll allow you to do this as many times as you want.

With infinite mana you can get infinite The Chain Veil activation's as well, so you can in fact ultimate Aminatou and then also get all your permanents back with her -1. The interesting thing here is that you can actually pick any player at the table, even if it's a six player game for example, as you can keep ultimating her, so that you keep shifting around to you get the permanents of the player that you want, not just the person to left or right.

Unfortunately without any other card to help shuffle your library Aminatou +1 will not allow you to get any further, even with infinite. I do a run down on win conditions further down to give you examples of others cards you want.

Aminatou + Spark Double + Oath of Teferi/The Chain Veil/Urza Assembles the Titans Infinite Combo

Spark Double allows you to copy any planeswalker and not die due to the legendary rule, so it's literally the first card to actually let you have two versions of a planeswalker in play at the same time.
If you make another copy of Aminatou, then you can target each other with the -1 to reset them. However obviously unless you have a card like Altar of the Brood to make use of infinite blinking you need either Oath of Teferi or The Chain Veil to get additional activation's from her.
At the very least you'll be able to get infinite mana by just targeting a land. I do a run down on win conditions just below to give you examples of others cards you want.

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There are a number of ways in the deck to setup getting infinite Aminatou activation's, so it's important to identify what cards can actually help to win once we have this setup.

Because you will be able to have infinite Aminatou +1 activation's you'll be able to constantly draw the top of your library (to put a card back from hand). This means that any shuffle effects will allow you to get re-looks for actual win conditions.

Enter the Battlefield triggers or activation's;
Planeswalker Ultimate's

I've been careful to select planeswalker to some degree on whether they have powerful "ultimates", that is building up their loyality to some big effect such as an emblem which fits with the rest of the decks theme.
You can look to protect them over multiple turns to get them up to these high loyalty values, but there are also some cards that you can look to "cheat" them so that you can activate them potential in the same turn (or at least fewer turns).

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Deepglow Skate has the advantage of getting double value in the turn it's played with Aminatou. Let's say you have her on [4] loyalty, then you cast Deepglow Skate bringing her up to 8, then -1 blink the Deepglow Skate to get her up to [14] loyalty.
Deepglow Skate also allows you get your other planeswalkers into ultimate range the turn they come into play, even if you already have it on the battlefield, as you can blink Deepglow Skate with Aminatou.

The general idea with Resourceful Defense is that you Aminatou blinking a planeswalker and then you get to put that amount of loyalty counters on any permanent. You could put them on Aminatou to build her up, but if you're worried about her being removed (still lots of creatures on board) then you can just put them onto say a land, which normally there is less removal for.
Then on a subsequent turn you can Aminatou blink that land and then put the loyalty counters onto a planeswalker to ultimate straight away.
If you have two other planeswalkers in play then when you Aminatou -1 one you can then put those directly onto the other, almost certainly guaranteed to get them to ultimate loyality.
It also comes with the added bonus that if opponents use removal on your planeswalkers and they still have counters on them then you can put them onto say a land, so that later you can get them with Aminatou -1 at a later stage.
You can of course also use the 4w ability to move counters as well if Aminatou is not available.



Aminatou's Ultimate

This is the one that looks really cool. But let's not sugar coat it, getting up to 6 loyalty is no easy feat. It is a potential 3 rounds worth of opponents turns avoiding removal/attacks, and it's not something they'll take lightly. Nobody likes to lose their cards, especially their commanders.

-6: Choose left or right. Each player gains control of all nonland permanents other than Aminatou, the Fateshifter controlled by the next player in the chosen direction.

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I feel it's important to be realistic about this one, and just take it if it comes, but don't look to make this your win condition or sole focus.

There are a few tricks if you get to ultimate. Teferi's Protection will allow you to phase out all your permanents, so that you can grab somebodies non-land permanents, while also sending everybody else game plans into disarray.
Cyclonic Rift also works as you can get your cards back, but be left with one of your opponents boards.
You can use Parallax Wave to exile your best creatures, and you'll get them all back in the upkeep of the player you exchanged with.

The honest answer is that you're never going to know what the effect of the ultimate is going to be, and this should be part of the fun of playing Aminatou. Every game will play out quite differently. What's your board like? Are your left and right opponents giving you anything of value?
There could be a real element that people are reluctant to play out cards for fear of walking into the ultimate. A self prophesying event as the creatures that they should be playing to put pressure on her, are instead held back for fear of being taken.

It must be noted that Aminatou -1 does allow you to target "cards you own", so if you did hand over your permanents, you can look to get them back with her -1.

Heart of Kiran removing loyalty counters

Another interaction that you might not have thought about with planeswalker commanders, is using Heart of Kiran ability to crew by removing loyalty counters, as actually a method of sending them to the commander zone, to recast them get further use out of them in a particular turn. With infinite mana, it means that you can get infinite uses out of them.

Aminatou + Heart of Kiran + (Oath of Teferi/Urza Assembles the Titans)
+ (Teferi, Temporal Archmage / Tezzeret the Seeker)

With mana producing planeswalkers, like Teferi, Temporal Archmage and Tezzeret the Seeker, you can actually use Heart of Kiran ability to send Aminatou to the commander zone much to your advantage.
I already mentioned that you could get 24 mana off just lands with Oath of Teferi and Teferi, Temporal Archmage. If you use Heart of Kiran to "kill" and recast Aminatou, each time you can get 16 mana, but obviously have to cast Aminatou with the additional commander tax.
The math is (16-5)+(16-7)+(16-9)+(16-11)+(16-13)+(16-15)=36. So if you're willing to risk your commander tax, then you can get up to an additional 36 mana using this trick.
If you have Sol Ring or anything else that produces more than 1 mana, then this total is a lot more.

There are more combos with Heart of Kiran and I explain them in sections below.



Aminatou + Emeria Shepherd Infinite Combos

With Emeria Shepherd you can potentially get multiple uses a turn by simply using Aminatou -1 on a Plains. This way you can play a land and do this to get multiple cards back from your graveyard each turn.

For the reason that you are targeting a Plains each time for Emeria Shepherd trigger to happen, you really want to make sure you get either Tundra and/or Scrubland as part of your fetch lands. Hallowed Fountain and Godless Shrine will mean that you can only use them for mana for as much life as you're prepared to lose. Prairie Stream will only work if you already have two basics in play.

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Aminatou + Emeria Shepherd + Heart of Kiran

You can use Heart of Kiran to send Aminatou to the graveyard by removing all but one loyalty, and use this method of targeting a Plains with Aminatou -1, to get Aminatou back from the graveyard with Emeria Shepherd trigger. Once you have infinite mana, you can also just cast Aminatou from the commander zone to get infinite uses out of her, as you can then send her back to the commander zone rather than graveyard.


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Aminatou + (Oath of Teferi/The Chain Veil/Urza Assembles the Titans) + Sun Titan + Heart of Kiran

You can do a similar thing using Aminatou last loyalty counter to target Sun Titan, bringing Aminatou back into play. However unlike Emeria Shepherd you're not gaining any advantages, unless you have some other cards to get value. You can use Oath of Teferi or The Chain Veil to give Aminatou an additional activation to make use of card advantages.


Aminatou + Parallax Wave = Value and Infinite's

Parallax Wave can be used on opponents creatures as removal. You can remove up to 4 creatures, keeping one counter on it, so that it doesn't go to graveyard in your next upkeep. Then you can Aminatou -1 it to reset it allowing you to remove up to 4 more creatures again. You can do this indefinitely while you have Aminatou.

However you can also use it on your own creatures and you can look to get value out of 'enter the battlefield' effects from them.

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Aminatou + Parallax Wave + Felidar Guardian

Parallax Wave and Felidar Guardian along with some other 'enter the battlefield' creature effect also goes infinite. You can exile the Felidar Guardian with the Parallax Wave and then Aminatou -1 the Parallax Wave which will bring all the creatures exiled back to play.





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Parallax Wave + Emeria Shepherd

Nice value plays you can do, is with Emeria Shepherd and Parallax Wave, where you can respond to removal, for example a creature board wipe, by exiling the Emeria Shepherd. Just make sure that Parallax Wave has no counters at the beginning of your upkeep. The Parallax Wave will go to graveyard and Emeria Shepherd will come back into play. Now you can Aminatou -1 a Plains to bring Parallax Wave back into play. If Aminatou was removed from play previously, then if you have a land in hand (or gamble on drawing one) then you can just let her go to the graveyard. This way when you play a land, you can return her to hand, because we will assume it's probably not a Plains you'll have. But that is fine spending wub to cast Aminatou is pretty easy.
Now you can Aminatou -1 an actual Plains to bring back the Parallax Wave.
It's just a nice way to protect everything you have, and if you have other 'enter the battlefield' creatures you can look to get their triggers each turn.

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Aminatou + Parallax Wave + Sun Titan + Heart of Kiran

You can target the Sun Titan with Parallax Wave and some number of other 'enter the battlefield' creatures, and then Aminatou -1 the Parallax Wave. This will cause the Sun Titan to come back into play. If you make sure you use Heart of Kiran to put Aminatou into the graveyard before the Titan comes back into play, so that you can bring her back. You can loop this infinitely, and as long as you have another ETB creature to gain advantage.


Aminatou Exiling Lands

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In regards to some of the lands in the deck, Aminatou offers a unique perspective as she can blink out lands, and if you use this in conjunction with ones that have entering the battlefield triggers, you can look to get reuse out of them.

I've already explained exiling Plains to get additional triggers with Emeria Shepherd.

Bojuka Bog can in fact be used multiple times during a game, to keep graveyard strategy decks under control.

Mystic Sanctuary allows you to put any instant or sorcery back on-top of your library. With Aminatou ability to blink out you can potentially trigger this each turn to sculpt your draw depending on your graveyard.
Being able to redraw mass removal like Terminus, Toxic Deluge or Supreme Verdict, means that you can constantly reset the board, freeing up your planeswalkers from attacks for the turn(s). You can really out attrition your opponents this way.

There are other technical sequences like using Demonic Tutor to get Oath of Teferi. You can then use Aminatou +1 on the Mystic Sanctuary and put the Demonic Tutor back on-top of your library. Then because you get a second planeswalker activation you can Aminatou +1 to draw the Demonic Tutor straight away for another search. Or you could simply use the Oath of Teferi enter the battlefield trigger to target the Mystic Sanctuary so that at end of turn you can put the Demonic Tutor back on-top to draw it next turn when you have mana available to cast again.

Below is an infinite combo using Aminatou to blink out Mystic Sanctuary to put an extra turn card back for loops.

Aminatou + Mystic Sanctuary + Temporal Manipulation

You can keep using Aminatou -1 on the Mystic Sanctuary to put back an extra turn card. Because you'll get another turn you'll get to draw the card again and just keep looping.
However you can only do this for as long as you have Aminatou in play and if you are using the -1 eventually you'll run out of loyalty.
So there are a number of ways that you keep Aminatou on enough loyalty to do this indefinitely.

There are a number of cards that proliferate but I do not include these in the deck; Grateful Apparition, Skyship Plunderer, Thrummingbird, Guildpact Informant, Flux Channeler, Inexorable Tide. You can just keep ticking up Aminatou each turn to keep using the -1.

Oath of Teferi and The Chain Veil also allows you to keep using the +1 each turn.
Casting the extra turn card and activating The Chain Veil will cost you 9 mana, so you need to be deep into the game to pay for that combo.

Sun Titan can bring back Aminatou from your graveyard when she runs out of loyalty.

Similarly Emeria Shepherd can be timed so that you can bring back Aminatou. You can target a Plains when Aminatou is on the last loyalty counter and bring her back into play with Emeria Shepherd. Then you can use Aminatou again to blink the Mystic Sanctuary.

Additional you can use Venser, the Sojourner instead of Aminatou to exile the Mystic Sanctuary for infinite turns with an extra turn card, or just a way to bring back an instant or sorcery every turn. Imagine also return Cyclonic Rift every turn to build up Venser, the Sojourner to the emblem.

With your other planeswalkers you can draw additional cards, which can possible draw you into further ways to keep Aminatou in play.
It might be that you don't have the means to go infinite, but you can build up your planeswalkers to the ultimate's by getting as many extra turns as you have loyalty counters on Aminatou.


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Comprehensive list of cards in the deck, and further interactions that I might not have detailed in the 'Playing the Deck' section.

Planeswalkers
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Each opponent can cast spells only any time they could cast a sorcery.

The new static abilities of planeswalkers from War of the Spark, has a throwback to the original legendary creature Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir ability to lock down opponents to sorcery speed only. This is an incredible ability in commander, to force opponents into acting in their own turns, and shutting down things like counterspells completely. The downside is that if another player is looking to cast something big/win and you can't stop them and one of the other opponents have disruption then they will be unable to help.

+1: Until your next turn, you may cast sorcery spells as though they had flash.

Realistically this ability will not be all that helpful, you can setup some mass creature removal at instant speed, but it not the ability you are looking to abuse.

-3: Return up to one target artifact, creature, or enchantment to its owner's hand. Draw a card.

This is a great tempo swing, allowing you to not only return a problematic permanent, but also drawing a card.
With Aminatou ability to reset him, you can use this ability once a turn, or with Oath of Teferi / The Chain Veil you'll be able to do this three times.
For a three mana planeswalker this is a really powerful ability and you can set this up early with Aminatou.



Spells and abilities your opponents control can't cause their controller to search their library.

In more competitive match-ups tutors run rampant and this card can really stop what opponents can assemble if you are able to protect it.

-1: Target player puts the top four cards of their library into their graveyard. Then exile each opponent's graveyard.

Good against graveyard strategies.



Each opponent can't draw more than one card each turn.

Excellent against most decks that look for additional draw. It must be noted that the deck doesn't have any symmetrical draw multiple cards like Timetwister or Windfall, which would make this walker better in general.

-2: Look at the top four cards of your library. You may reveal a noncreature, nonland card from among them and put it into your hand. Put the rest on the bottom of your library in a random order.

Solid draw walker at 3 mana. An excellent way to get rid of a card you might not want in hand with Aminatou +1. Using this with Aminatou +1 each turn means that you can look at 8 cards, which is very powerful in enabling you to find particular cards.



0: Exile Kaya, Ghost Assassin or up to one target creature. Return that card to the battlefield under its owner's control at the beginning of your next upkeep. You lose 2 life.

You can use this as a delayed exile effect to get additional triggers out of your ETB creatures. You can also use it to "hide" a creature if you were going for your own mass creature removal spell to save it. There might be times when you are unable to cast your walkers into a board of creatures that are going to attack them, so sometimes you can just cast Kaya and use the exile on herself to setup later down the track.

-2: Each opponent discards a card and you draw a card.

Kaya, Ghost Assassin and Oath of Teferi / The Chain Veil with Aminatou can make each opponent discard six cards, and you draw six. Certainly the type of swing that can really crush your opponents.

-1: Each opponent loses 2 life and you gain 2 life.

I always use Kaya, Ghost Assassin -1 as my actual way to finish opponents once I go infinite (drawing deck, etc) with her -1 deal life loss. So once you've gone infinite, then make this the card you're going to actually kill opponents with.



+1: Look at the top card of your library. If it's a noncreature, nonland card, you may reveal it and put it into your hand.

You can get perfect information with using Aminatou +1 ability, so this can be used to combine to make sure you draw a non-creature, non-land spell.

-2: When you cast your next instant or sorcery spell from your hand this turn, it gains rebound. (Exile the spell as it resolves. At the beginning of your next upkeep, you may cast that card from exile without paying its mana cost.)

There are not a lot of instant or sorcery that are beneficial if doubled up in the deck, but you can use it with your mass creature wipes with Toxic Deluge, Supreme Verdict, Terminus to get back-to-back removal, which sort of acts as an extra turn for the purpose of setting up some planeswalkers. Also can get double up with your tutors, and Aminatou can help with the top of library ones to make them more effective. For example if you cast Mystical Tutor with "rebound" then normally you'd just be replacing one with another during your upkeep, so you literally need additional draw to get the effects of casting two of them. The extra turn cards in Temporal Manipulation and Temporal Mastery are also great with rebound.

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-9: You get an emblem with "Your opponents can't cast noncreature spells."

Very hard for your opponents to come back from being shut out of non-creature spells. Realistically wins you the game most times you get this emblem.



+2: Exile target permanent you own. Return it to the battlefield under your control at the beginning of the next end step.

Another way to get additional triggers out of your permanents. It doesn't come back until end of turn, so you can't use it in the same combo way as Aminatou with infinite's, but you can still get great value with ETB triggers.

-1: Creatures can't be blocked this turn.

You won't be using this ability at all, unless you plan some sort of lethal attack, or there is an opposing planeswalker that you are looking to get off the board.

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-8: You get an emblem with "Whenever you cast a spell, exile target permanent."

He only starts on 3 loyalty, so you need to setup for at least another turn to get his ultimate with the various other ways to increase loyalty. A great way to exile opponents biggest threats and won't take too long with the emblem to close out the game entirely.



+1: Draw a card. At the beginning of the next end step, untap two lands

Teferi, Hero of Dominaria and Oath of Teferi / The Chain Veil with Aminatou means that you can potentially draw 6 cards and untap up to 12 lands.

-3: Put target nonland permanent into its owner's library third from the top.

You can use this ability up to twice each turn (Aminatou + Oath), so it is likely that you'd probably mix this with drawing 3 cards and untapping 6 lands, to control opponents.

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-8: You get an emblem with "Whenever you draw a card, exile target permanent an opponent controls."

Teferi, Hero of Dominaria ultimate is pretty hard to beat as there is a lot of renewable draw in the deck, including Aminatou +1.
I will note that some of the planeswalkers don't have "draw" abilities, rather they put cards into hand for card advantage.
But if you can protect Teferi, Hero of Dominaria and Aminatou, then exiling three opponents cards a turns is a pretty great soft lock.




+1: Look at the top two cards of your library. Put one of them into your hand and the other on the bottom of your library.

You'd probably look to mix it up with draw and mana, by using his +1 for card advantage as well.

-1: Untap up to four target permanents.

Teferi, Temporal Archmage can go infinite with The Chain Veil and Aminatou.
But you can also get insane value with Oath of Teferi, because you can get six activation's with Aminatou -1 you can get a bare minimum of 24 mana just off lands.

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-10: You get an emblem with "You may activate loyalty abilities of planeswalkers you control on any player's turn any time you could cast an instant."

This is actually super amazing with Aminatou -1 ability. You can use it in response to removal on your cards at instant speed.
You can even use it to remove another planeswalker being attacked, as the "new" version will not be considered the same one that was chosen to be attacked.
This emblem allows you to use every planeswalker per opponents turn, so you can Aminatou +1, perhaps every other player turn, to then be able to use her -1 to be able to keep paying for multiple uses of other planeswalkers.


Aminatou + Tezzeret the Seeker + Proliferate Infinite Combo

There is an instant win combo package with Tezzeret with Aminatou in play and using any means to get Tezzeret onto 5 loyalty, which will allow you to search for The Chain Veil and remain in play.

1.) Add a loyalty counter to Tezzeret with either Flux Channeler, Oath of Gideon.
2.) Tezzeret -4 getting The Chain Veil.
3.) Aminatou -1 on Tezzeret.
4.) Tezzeret -1 getting Mana Vault -or- -2 getting Grim Monolith.
5.) Activate The Chain Veil tapping Mana Vault/Grim Monolith and another mana source.
6.) Tezzeret +1 untapping The Chain Veil and Mana Vault/Grim Monolith.
7.) Aminatou -1 on Tezzeret.
Tezzeret now has two activation's.
8.) Tezzeret -1 getting Sol Ring or Mana Crypt.
At this stage you can get infinite planeswalker activation's, where you can just keep +1 and -1 Aminatou on Tezzeret to keep looping activating the The Chain Veil and untapping your artifacts.
You can keep activating Sensei's Divining Top to draw and re-search each time with Tezzeret to draw the deck.

As I've already mentioned normally I use Kaya, Ghost Assassin -1 to deal the actual killing damage to opponents, so it just becomes a case of going through your deck until you find her.

Alternative Tezzeret combos
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Previous deck builds have used different cards to win with Aminatou interactions. I've made changes as I've re-purposed the deck in subtle ways.

1.) Tezzeret -3 getting Rings of Brighthearth.
2.) Aminatou -1 on Tezzeret.
3.) Tezzeret -3 getting Basalt Monolith.
4.) Activate Rings of Brighthearth for 2 on Tezzeret ability to also get Sensei's Divining Top.
5.) You have infinite colorless mana with Basalt Monolith + Rings of Brighthearth.
6.) You have infinite draw with Sensei's Divining Top and Rings of Brighthearth.
This method requires having 4 available at time when you start this combo.
If you have something to spend infinite colorless mana and don't need to get the Sensei's Divining Top, then you only need 2 available at the start of the combo.

Another combo possible combo with Tezzeret is:
1.) Tezzeret -2 getting Throne of Geth.
2.) Aminatou -1 on Tezzeret.
3.) Sacrifice an artifact to Throne of Geth (likely itself) to put a loyalty counter on Tezzeret bringing the loyalty to 5.
You can at this stage use the same method as already mentioned by getting The Chain Veil, as long as you have 4 to activate it.



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Aminatou + Oath of Gideon + Tezzeret the Seeker

Because Oath of Gideon puts a loyalty counter on Tezzeret straight away (5 loyalty) you can look to combo with even less mana.
You can Tezzeret -4 to get The Chain Veil straight away, and he will stay in play on 1 loyalty.
Then you can Aminatou -1 on Tezzeret and he can go through for example Mana Vault.
So you only need an extra 1 to activate the The Chain Veil. This means you only need a natural 6 mana (5 mana to cast Tezzeret in the first place) to combo win.

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Aminatou + (Oath of Teferi/Urza Assembles the Titans) + Tezzeret the Seeker

Tezzeret the Seeker and Oath of Teferi will allow you to go infinite with no additional mana left available to you! The aim is that you use Tezzeret to search for the artifacts you need to be able to get enough to produce at least 4. For example you can Tezzeret -1 to get Mana Vault, then Tezzeret -2 to get Azorius Signet. Use Aminatou -1 to blink Tezzeret, and so he'll come back with 4 loyalty. This time you can tap 4 mana (Vault + Signet) into your pool, and use the Tezzeret +1 ability to untap them. Then Tezzeret -4 to get The Chain Veil. At this stage you can go infinite.
Planeswalker support
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Heart of Kiran - As discussed in the strategy section, click here for more details.
Perfect as a blocker through out all the stages of the game. Is often your best turn 2 play if looking to defend Aminatou.
Survives mass creature removal.

Oath of Gideon - A key card for the Aminatou + Oath of Gideon + Tezzeret the Seeker combo, which you can click here for more details.
The ability to create multiple 1/1's is perfect for defending Aminatou and other planeswalkers. You can use Aminatou -1 to go wide with blockers.

Resourceful Defense is sort of like Deepglow Skate but does work differently.
The general idea is that you Aminatou blinking a planeswalker and then you get to put that amount of loyalty counters on any permanent. You could put them on Aminatou to build her up, but if you're worried about her being removed (still lots of creatures on board) then you can just put them onto say a land, which normally there is less removal.
Then on a subsequent turn you can Aminatou blink that land and then put the loyalty counters onto a planeswalker to ultimate straight away.
It also comes with the added bonus that if opponents use removal on your planeswalkers and they still have counters on them then you can put them onto say a land, so that later you can get them with Aminatou -1 at a later stage.
You can of course also use the 4w ability to move counters as well if Aminatou is not available.

The Chain Veil - One of the signature cards of the deck, works with getting value and infinite's from the planeswalkers, which you can click here for more details.
A key card for the Aminatou + Tezzeret the Seeker Infinite Combo, which you can click here for more details.
A key card for the Aminatou + Felidar Guardian + Oath of Teferi / The Chain Veil Infinite Combo, which you can click here for more details.

Oath of Teferi - One of the signature cards of the deck, works with getting value and infinite's from the planeswalkers, which you can click here for more details.
A key card for the Aminatou + Oath of Teferi + Tezzeret the Seeker Infinite Combo, which you can click here for more details.
A key card for the Aminatou + Felidar Guardian + Oath of Teferi / The Chain Veil Infinite Combo, which you can click here for more details.

Deepglow Skate - Used to gets lots of loyalty counters on planeswalkers, which you can click here for more details.


Creatures
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Baleful Strix - Great two drop creature that can threaten to block any creature attacking your planeswalkers. Perfect for getting value from Aminatou -1, and also can be used as a way to draw your deck once you have infinite activation's of her.

Wall of Omens - Another great two drop blocker, which you can use Aminatou -1 to get value. With infinite Aminatou activation's can be used to draw your deck.



Snapcaster Mage - You can use this to get value from your graveyard in a number of ways.
Used as a key card in winning with the Aminatou + Spellseeker into Razaketh, the Foulblooded combo, which you can click here for more details.
Can be used to double up disruption spells, and used as a blocker for your planeswalkers.
With Aminatou -1 you can use it to acts as a mini Buried Alive with Entomb, as you'll get to put two creatures into your graveyard. Same with Reanimate, you can potentially bring back two creatures.

Spellseeker - A key card for the Aminatou + Spellseeker into Razaketh, the Foulblooded combo, which you can click here for more details.
An over all superstar in the deck, as you can get a lot of cards to answer or protect the game states. Aminatou -1 can get additional cards every turn while in play, including, Lim-Dûl's Vault, Tithe, Vampiric Tutor, Demonic Tutor, Enlightened Tutor, Mystical Tutor, Pact of Negation, Swan Song, Arcane Denial, Mana Drain, Cyclonic Rift, Swords to Plowshares.

Trinket Mage - Great with Aminatou -1 as a way of just getting way ahead on artifact mana or some utility; Sensei's Divining Top, Luxior, Giada's Gift, Mana Crypt, Sol Ring, Mana Vault.

Skyclave Apparition is a great removal card that can be Aminatou -1 every turn to remove the biggest threat 4 cmc and under. It will give your opponents some creatures, but as long as you can establish a blocker or wait for mass creature removal, probably won't care much about them.



Felidar Guardian - A key card for the Aminatou + Felidar Guardian + Oath of Teferi / The Chain Veil Infinite Combo, which you can click here for more details.
A key card for the Aminatou + Parallax Wave + Felidar Guardian, which you can click here for more details.

Spark Double - A key card for the Aminatou + Spark Double + Oath of Teferi / The Chain Veil Infinite Combo combo, which you can click here for more details.
You can copy any creature or planeswalker, so the most versatile clone creature ever.
With Aminatou -1 you can reset what it is, which is a great toolbox card.

Thalia's Lancers - Is able to get your planeswalkers, but also a number of other legendary cards; The Chain Veil, Oath of Teferi, Razaketh, the Foulblooded, Search for Azcanta, Oath of Gideon, Phyrexian Tower.
The 4/4 first strike body turns out to be quite relevant in a lot of games. It's hard to attack into you when it can usually kill off an opponents creature without loss.

Cavalier of Dawn - Catch all for removal and also a way to return a lot of the combo or value artifact or enchantments from your graveyard. Phyrexian Tower can be used to purposefully kill it if really wanting to bring something back from graveyard.

Sun Titan - A key card for the Aminatou + (Oath of Teferi / The Chain Veil) + Sun Titan + Heart of Kiran combo, which you can click here for more details.
A key card for the Aminatou + Parallax Wave + Sun Titan + Heart of Kiran combo, which you can click here for more details.

I should point out that with The Chain Veil and Sun Titan / Emeria Shepherd that you can get infinite Aminatou uses. Once you can get at least three activation's of Aminatou, then you can -1 until she is down to 1 loyalty counter, then target the Sun Titan. She will go to graveyard and you can use the Sun Titan to return her to play. You can keep looping.
Getting three activation's of Aminatou is going to require 8 to activate The Chain Veil twice.

On that note you can use Sun Titan under normal circumstances to use her last loyalty to blink the Titan to get her back into play with 3 loyalty, while being able to reuse an ability again that turn. So I guess it's just a free way of getting two loyalty.
Emeria Shepherd can do the same thing, but you just need to target a Plains on the last loyalty.

Emeria Shepherd - A key card for the Aminatou + Emeria Shepherd + Clever Impersonator combo, which you can click here for more details.
A key card for the Aminatou + Emeria Shepherd + Heart of Kiran combo, which you can click here for more details.
A key card for the Parallax Wave + Emeria Shepherd combo, which you can click here for more details.
Top deck manipulation
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Sensei's Divining Top - With Aminatou +1 you are able to get access to always three cards deep into your library. Because you can tap to draw a card, with Aminatou +1 it means that you can draw the Sensei's Divining Top and play it again, which means that for 1 you can make sure you are getting deeper into your deck with Aminatou +1.
A key way of winning with Aminatou + Tezzeret the Seeker Infinite Combo, which you can click here for more details.

Brainstorm is a premium cheap draw card and can be used instead of Aminatou to setup Miracle cards with Terminus and Temporal Mastery. With the deck aimed to have quite a few shuffle effects with tutors and fetchland it does mean that you can better manipulate your hand for draw that are more benefial for that stage of the game.

Search for Azcanta - Is able to potentially put the card you put on-top of library with Aminatou +1 into graveyard, so you can dig deep into the deck for more relevant cards for that stage of the game. The transform land is also amazing at providing value if the game plays out long and card advantage is necessary.

Lim-Dûl's Vault - A mass tutor effect, the commander 40 life total, means that you really can go through your entire deck, looking for a key card and then setting up four other cards that you can play with.

Search library (shuffle)
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Vampiric Tutor - With lots of combos in the deck, a great source for completing them. Plus with only a select amount of removal, can be instrumental in answering what opponents are doing to stop you.




Enlightened Tutor - Another way of searching for either early artifact mana acceleration, or key combo cards like, The Chain Veil, Oath of Teferi, Animate Dead, Dance of the Dead, Necromancy.

Mystical Tutor - Gives you access to many disruption cards, and perfect for miracles in, Terminus and Temporal Mastery. Also combo cards like Flash, Reanimate, Entomb, Intuition, Buried Alive.




Demonic Tutor - With lots of combos in the deck, a great source for completing them. Plus with only a select amount of removal, can be instrumental in answering what opponents are doing to stop you.

Wishclaw Talisman - You can use the ability to search for any card, and then use Aminatou +1 to return it back to your control. This means that you can keep it indefinitely and use it at least once a turn as long as you have Aminatou in play. You can also use it to double tutor in a turn if you resolve to letting one of your opponents have it, but often you can set up a combo win, so won't be passing the turn anyway. Note that the counters get reset with Aminatou +1 so you will always have the ability to use it.
Mass removal
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Damn - A Wrath of God with the overload, but with the flexability to use as spot removal when a creature is posing a big problem.

Toxic Deluge - At three mana this is the most cost efficient method of removing creatures, and can get around abilities like indestructible. The life loss is negligibly with commanders 40 life.




Out of Time is like a Parallax Wave on steroids as far as creature removal, but because of phasing you won't get ETB effects. But unless opponents specifically remove it, there will be no creatures if you get to keep exiling it to reset the board again.

Parallax Wave - A key card for Aminatou + Parallax Wave = Value and Infinite's, which you can click here for more details.



Supreme Verdict - Important against control heavy decks, where you really need to ensure a creature wipe.


Terminus - A signature card for the deck, with Aminatou +1 ability to be able to put it back on-top of library, you can always set this up for the discounted cost.
Enchantments (other)
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Mystic Remora - Nice card advantage with more competitive matchups where players are casting a lot of non-creature spells.

Rhystic Study - Not really much to say about this,





Parallax Tide - Can be used to give you more mana by targeting your own lands after you've tapped them for mana, and then using Aminatou +1 to then exile the Parallax Tide to bring the lands back into play and resetting the Tide counters. Also can be used on opponents lands to take them off mana. Imagine exiling some untapped lands your opponent might be holding up to disrupt you, move to another phase, and then cast your spell. Also you can just keep opponent(s) off 4 lands if you just keep exiling the Tide every turn with Aminatou.

Disruption and protection
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Swords to Plowshares - The deck is more aimed at removing all the creatures on the board with sorcery or enchantments, but having at least one spot removal card in the deck can be good for disrupting opponents and none are better than this for effectiveness to cost ratio.

Teferi's Protection - Is a very versatile card and of course great for making sure opponents don't attack and kill your planeswalker, but also sometimes a big or lethal damage on yourself. One great trick is when you use Aminatou -6 exchange ability you can respond with casting Teferi's Protection and then you'll end up saving all your permanents while still getting ther person to left or right that you've selected.

Pact of Negation - Because this is a combo deck, being able to counter disruption happening when you are tapped out can be very important to push your spells through.


Swan Song - Cheap casting counterspells are important when you are often not holding up much mana to cast your own spells. The most important element is that it can counter instant and sorcery, but as a bonus you can counter enchantments like Rest in Peace.


An Offer You Can't Refuse - Another one mana counterspell for non-creature spells and indeed for it's cost effectiveness it is an offer that I can't refuse to included.


Mana Drain - If you don't have the budget for this then Counterspell or Delay are fine replacements.



Fierce Guardianship can be a zero cost with Aminatou in play which is great for tapping out, but keep in mind that opponents' can attack her with their creatures so it's a little harder to rely on this disruption than a creature commander deck in my opinion.

Cyclonic Rift - Catch all for removing opponents problematic permanents.
Extra turns
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Temporal Mastery - Another miracles card that can be setup with Aminatou +1. With planeswalkers, extra turns means that you can get a lot of additional value on those turns potentially.

Temporal Manipulation - A key card for the Aminatou + Mystic Sanctuary + Temporal Manipulation Infinite Turn, which you can click here for more details.
Just slightly technically better than Time Warp as it doesn't target, meaning that opponents can't cast spells which change the target of the spell.
Artifacts
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Luxior, Giada's Gift is a way to prevent opponents from attacking a particular planeswalker. Great for getting a lot of value out of Aminatou in the early game if you draw it and then you can be secure in casting another planeswalker onto the board if the board is full of opponents' creatures.

Scroll of Fate - You can use this card as a way to put any permanent card into play at a reduced cost. What you can then do is use Aminatou -1 to exile the manifested card and then it will come into play face-up.
So if it was a card like Razaketh, the Foulblooded or Omniscience, then you get that card without paying the mana.
This card is a great alternative to reanimation, as you don't need to use your graveyard, which can be important when you've come across graveyard hate in a game, which is shutting you out from taking those lines.




Sol Ring - Ban this already, too good for the format.

Mana Crypt - One thing to understand is that with the infinite turn combo you obviously need to be aware that you run the risk dying via lost coin flips. If you have the means to draw or search additional cards, then it is possible to remove it yourself via Teferi, Time Raveler, Teferi, Hero of Dominaria, Leonin Relic-Warder, Cavalier of Dawn. Or even Tezzeret the Seeker making it a creature for further creature removal.
But this is a risky proposition.


Mana Vault - A potential key card for the Aminatou + Tezzeret the Seeker Infinite Combo, which you can click here for more details.

Grim Monolith - A potential key card for the Aminatou + Tezzeret the Seeker Infinite Combo, which you can click here for more details.




Arcane Signet - Is the only colored artifact mana source so during some infinites can be used to make sure you get your Esper colors.

Lands
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Mystic Sanctuary - Is one of the most versatile and powerful lands in the deck, due to it's ability to be searched via a number of fetch-lands, so that you have access to instant and sorcery in your graveyard. Couple this with Aminatou +1 ability to draw the card immediately and also being able to use Aminatou +1 to target the Mystic Sanctuary to trigger it multiple times, means that this a flag ship land for the deck. Now it does have a stipulation that you must have 3 other Islands in play for it to come into play untapped, which will allow the trigger to happen. With a mana base that is spread between 3 colors, you really need to plan carefully for this. Using your fetch-lands to setup your mana-base in a manner that is going to allow this to happen is something that needs considerations throughout the game.
A key card for the Aminatou + Mystic Sanctuary + Temporal Manipulation Infinite Turn, which you can click here for more details.

Tundra, Hallowed Fountain, Irrigated Farmland, Prairie Stream, Scrubland, Godless Shrine - The duel land Plains that can be important for Emeria Shepherd landfall ability.

Raffine's Tower, Tundra, Hallowed Fountain, Irrigated Farmland, Prairie Stream, Underground Sea, Watery Grave, Sunken Hollow, Fetid Pools, Island - All the lands that have type "Island" which plays an important role on meeting the requirements of Mystic Sanctuary needing 3 other Islands in play.


Mystic Gate, Fetid Heath, Sunken Ruins - Allow you to get double mana of the colors you might need to cast spells. There are a number of double white spells so are excellent to fix your color requirements perhaps in regards to these.

Bojuka Bog - A "free" way to help against graveyard strategies. With Aminatou -1 ability you can keep removing opponents graveyards if necessary.



Otawara, Soaring City and Eiganjo, Seat of the Empire are lands that can be used as removal in situations as well. Of note Thalia's Lancers can search for these if you are really wanting to hit land drops or wanting the threat of removal.

Misty Rainforest, Polluted Delta, Scalding Tarn, Flooded Strand - These fetch lands allow you to shuffle your library, so are excellent with Aminatou +1 to get rid of unwanted cards at the time.
These are the ones that can specifically get Island type, and so keep them in mind if wanting to search for Mystic Sanctuary maybe when wanting to put an instant or sorcery back on-top of your library.

Arid Mesa, Marsh Flats, Windswept Heath, Bloodstained Mire - These fetch lands allow you to shuffle your library, so are excellent with Aminatou +1 to get rid of unwanted cards at the time.


Change Log
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02-08-2018
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+ Oath of Liliana

Removed
- Rhystic Study
29-08-2018
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+ Flash
+ Academy Rector
+ Arena Rector
+ Throne of Geth
+ Wall of Omens

Removed
- Land Tax - Only 5 basics, which was OK for just searching up 1 at a time, but would like more basics to make this more consistent.
- Rings of Brighthearth - besides the planeswalkers don't actually have other cards to activate with.
- Gilded Drake - great card for hosing some commander strategies, but the 3/3 flying body is relevant against pressuring Aminatou.
- Treasure Map - This card is still great, but only good cards being cut.
- Jace, Architect of Thought - the thing is that even with Deepglow Skate and being able to ultimate at -8 loyalty means that Jace goes to the graveyard if you don't uptick. Still good, but just need to make room.
01-09-2018
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+ Thalia's Lancers

Removed
- Gilded Lotus
03-09-2018
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06-09-2018
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+ Act of Authority

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- Wrath of God
09-09-2018
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+ Dark Confidant

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- Will Kenrith
15-12-2018
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30-12-2018
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01-10-2019
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+ Scroll of Fate

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- Soul Summons
04-10-2019
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27-10-2019
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01-15-2020
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10-04-2023
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Last edited by darrenhabib 4 months ago, edited 70 times in total.

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darrenhabib
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Post by darrenhabib » 4 years ago

I finally got around to transferring this Aminatou primer from Salvation to Nexus. There hasn't been much on my radar since War of the Spark.

But I will give a quick run-down of cards that I have at least thought about.

Watcher for Tomorrow hideaway ability makes it guaranteed that you can dig 4 cards deep into your library with each Aminatou [-1] activation.
Honestly the only downside is that it enters the battlefield tapped, and for any creature it's important that they can block incoming attacks on your planeswalkers. If it came into play untapped then it would be an automatic include.

Scheming Symmetry combined with Aminatou [+1] means that you can draw the card straight away. If you use it to setup a combo that same turn then you might not have to worry about what opponent searches. However a lot of the combos involve using Aminatou [-1], so it's less likely that you can do both.

Silent Clearing is a land option. However it not likely that this deck would trade in a land for card draw. It does let you potential turn on Land Tax again however by going a land down.

Cavalier of Dawn is one of the cards that I have added to the deck recently. I used to have Ashen Rider as a potential reanimation target. But Cavalier of Dawn can do a similar job at a cost reduction. The 3/3 is easily blocked by the 4/6 stats. The ability to get back artifacts or enchantments means that you have further access to your combos. Getting back keys cards like The Chain Veil, Oath of Teferi or even the reanimation enchantments Animate Dead, etc, is great backup.


I'm pretty excited about this one. Because you can use Aminatou [-1] on it after use, it means that opponents will not get a chance to use it.
So with Aminatou you can literally do a Demonic Tutor effect every turn.

You can use it twice in a turn to get 2 cards from library, so if you are trying to win in that turn anyway it might not matter giving it to your opponent. who can't use it until their turn anyway.

This card is bonkers combined with Aminatou.


MitoZ
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Post by MitoZ » 4 years ago

What do you think about Scroll of Fate for Aminato build instead of Soul Summons ?
If you already have Aminato and Scroll on the battlefield you can put any permanent to the battlefield and opponents couldn't cancel it without Stifle, for example use Scroll to manifest Omniscience from hand then use Aminato(-1) to blink that manifest.

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darrenhabib
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Post by darrenhabib » 4 years ago

MitoZ wrote:
4 years ago
What do you think about Scroll of Fate for Aminato build instead of Soul Summons ?
If you already have Aminato and Scroll on the battlefield you can put any permanent to the battlefield and opponents couldn't cancel it without Stifle, for example use Scroll to manifest Omniscience from hand then use Aminato(-1) to blink that manifest.
Actually that's a really great call. The problem with Soul Summons is that if you Aminatou [+1] to put a card on top to manifest then unless you have The Chain Veil or Oath of Teferi, then you have to wait a full turn to use the Aminatou [-1] to flip it into play.
Scroll of Fate is going to allow you to do it immediately.
The only thing you'd miss out on with Soul Summons is when you do it in the dark and hope to hit something big. You gain a resource as you didn't have to use a card from your hand, but that's a pretty weak play.

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Post by darrenhabib » 4 years ago

I was watching a Legacy stream and a Miracles deck was using Mystic Sanctuary to keep putting Terminus back on top of their library. Because it's an Island type, any fetch-land was able to be turned into mass creature removal basically.
It was very strong against creature decks.

It got me thinking that with Aminatou [-1] ability to blink lands that this card will just mean repeatable access to any instant or sorcery each turn.
So the example is just to keep putting back cards like Terminus, Toxic Deluge, Supreme Verdict and it's just impossible for your opponents to get any traction with literally a board wipe each turn if necessary.

The fact that it's an Islands means that you'll access to it very easily with Misty Rainforest, Polluted Delta, Scalding Tarn, Flooded Strand.

Will need to make sure to have 3 other Islands in play but this can be achieved with some careful planning.


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Post by darrenhabib » 4 years ago

Alright further to discuss Mystic Sanctuary I was watching a LSV (Luis Scott-Vargas) video of him playing a "Taking Turns" deck for Modern last night.
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It further uses Mystic Sanctuary with especially fetch-lands to search for them to put cards like Time Warp and Savor the Moment back on-top, along side drawing additional cards with Howling Mine, Dictate of Kruphix and a few planeswalkers to make additional use of the extra turns and find more action. It's a really busted and sweet deck, if you're into that sort of style..you know where opponents can go off and make dinner during a game.

So of course it got me thinking with Aminatou ability to blink the Mystic Sanctuary you can always put an extra turn card on-top of library to keep taking turns.
Now it's not quite this simply as that, as using the [-1] ability will mean that Aminatou will run out of loyalty. So you need ways to make sure you can keep using her indefinitely.
So my brain started churning and I couldn't resist theoretically coming up with a tuned deck for this idea. And so here goes..

Mystic Sanctuary Infinite Turns Deck
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Mystic Sanctuary Infinite Turns

Additional planeswalker activation's

Enchantments (other)

Top deck manipulation

Mass removal

Approximate Total Cost:




The general premise is that you assemble particularity combinations of cards.


One of the key elements is that you need ways to keep Aminatou from running out of loyalty to keep activating her indefinitely.
So they main ways of doing this are through proliferation.

There are a number of creatures who can do it when they deal combat damage and they all have flying, so it's very likely that you'll get at least one opponent who can't block them.
There are also ones that will trigger when you cast the extra turn cards with Flux Channeler and Inexorable Tide, so are guaranteed.

Oath of Teferi allows for multiple activation's of Aminatou, so you can just [+1] her as well to keep her on the same loyalty.
The only other card like this is The Chain Veil, but I think that spending 4 as well as an extra turn card each turn is likely a little expensive to be realistic for a quicker combo. So not playing it.

I will point out that you will kill the opponents who don't have flyers, so in this respect you don't even need a way to get additional advantages in this scenario. It's possible that none of them have flyers, so gg.


Of the extra turn cards there only ones being played are the ones that you can actually use Mystic Sanctuary.
There are some that get exiled as part of the cost and some that shuffle back into library, and we don't want these.
The only ones I'm not playing that can do this are Savor the Moment and Time Stretch.
The only one that does get exiled is Temporal Mastery but this is used as a setup card instead to help you get there, just because it works so well with Aminatou [+1] if you've already drawn it.


Being that Mystic Sanctuary has the Island type there are 7 lands that can search for it. This is one of the strengths of the deck is that you can easily tutor for this card itself.

Also the land base that are not search lands of some kind mainly have the Island type to make sure that you have the required 3 other Islands in play to trigger Mystic Sanctuary ability.
This is why you won't find Commander Tower or the like.


Another important element is getting enough mana to do things. In theory as long as you have assembled it then it should only cost you to cast the extra turn card itself which is 5-6 mana.
But there are other cards to help with this in Foretold and Parallax Tide.
An example of using Foretold is that you might have assembled the combo all but deploying the card advantage element. So you can just keep taking extra turns and build this up till you have enough to cast the other cards in your hand to actually get traction.
Parallax Tide can be used to target Mystic Sanctuary and your other lands, then you use Aminatou to blink out the Parallax Tide itself. This way you can double up on mana you get from lands while also getting the Mystic Sanctuary trigger.

There are a bunch of cards that allow you to search for various cards you might need to assemble the combo.
Recruiter of the Guard can get your proliferate creatures.
Spellseeker can get another tutor like Demonic Tutor for example to get anything.

The rest of the deck is disruption, mana rocks, cost reduction and a few other good stuff cards to help the general plan.
Of note Mana Crypt is a bit too risky to play with infinite turns, especially if you don;t have really good additional advantages to quicken the game, so it's not in.



If you are taking infinite turns but your natural draw is always the extra turn card, then you need a way to get some sort of advantage during that additional turn. Whether that is getting additional draw to find further cards or simply using a planeswalker it doesn't matter.

For example if you have Jace, Vryn's Prodigy, even though you are only filtering, with infinite turns you'll be able to get a set of emblems to mill your opponents out.
All of them are like this, they provide win conditions more or less on their own. I've focused mainly on 3 mana planeswalkers simply for curving into the combo.
So it's tempting to have powerful planeswalkers like Teferi, Hero of Dominaria, Teferi, Temporal Archmage, Will Kenrith that are in my original list, but unless you'd actually want to use them for drawing into combo pieces in the first place, it means that you won't be able to curve playing a planeswalker to then setup casting the extra turn card continuously.

A sort of example game you might want to sequence your turns if you have them.
Turn 2 you play proliferate creature.
Turn 3 you play Aminatou.
Turn 4 you play another planeswalker.
Turn 5 you play extra turn card for the win.

Venser, the Sojourner can actually exile the Mystic Sanctuary himself, so you don't even need proliferation to work with him as it's a plus ability.

There are also some draw cards to make sure you draw into action as well with Howling Mine, Kami of the Crescent Moon, Phyrexian Arena, Dictate of Kruphix.

The other thing is that it can be ANY card not just planeswalkers or draw to give you advantages, just so long as it allows you to win.
An example is that Blighted Agent would do the trick, so if you wanted to make a budgeted version then just look for anything that will allow you to win but NOT have to invest further mana into, just so that if you only have enough to keep casting your extra turn card you'll be fine.
Last edited by darrenhabib 4 years ago, edited 1 time in total.

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Post by darrenhabib » 4 years ago

Well I've fallen in love with the interactions of Mystic Sanctuary, and so I just found it too hard to pass up on the infinite turn combo using Mystic Sanctuary and extra turn card and Aminatou.

I've re-purposed the deck so that the Tezzeret the Seeker combo doesn't use Basalt Monolith and Rings of Brighthearth, which was honestly a bit cumbersome with mana requirements and not a large amount of uses for infinite colorless.

So you need some of the proliferate creatures to make the Tezzeret combo to work, but they give you more flexibility in general.

Exchanged some lands to have more "Islands" in the deck for the Mystic Sanctuary.

Took out the Clever Impersonator that was part of a infinite combo using Aminatou and Emeria Shepherd. Was basically the combo that I lined the least over games, so it's fine to let that one go.

I've worked hard on incorporating all the new interactions into the primer itself, so scan the appropriate sections if you are wondering what this new tech is all about.


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Post by Ardeyn » 4 years ago

Thanks for your awesome writeup, darrenhabib.
I really enjoy reading your deck techs even when I'm not as interested in the commander per se. With Aminatou however, your thread really made me want to play her. 😏
In the latest version, is there any reason you do not play God-Eternal Kefnet, which lets you take Infinite Turns with Aminatou's Plus ability and an extra turn spell?
Seems like a rather effective way to do this once you're playing Time Warp and friends anyway.
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Post by darrenhabib » 4 years ago

Ardeyn wrote:
4 years ago
Thanks for your awesome writeup, darrenhabib.
I really enjoy reading your deck techs even when I'm not as interested in the commander per se. With Aminatou however, your thread really made me want to play her. 😏
In the latest version, is there any reason you do not play God-Eternal Kefnet, which lets you take Infinite Turns with Aminatou's Plus ability and an extra turn spell?
Seems like a rather effective way to do this once you're playing Time Warp and friends anyway.
God-Eternal Kefnet would be a great addition and Jace, the Mind Sculptor would also be a good backup to Aminatou for putting cards back on top.

I'll change just swap out Ponder and Ashiok, Dream Render for God-Eternal Kefnet and Jace, the Mind Sculptor.

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Post by Ardeyn » 4 years ago

Now I'm curious: Do you have any reports on how the new configuration of the deck plays out?
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Post by darrenhabib » 4 years ago

Ardeyn wrote:
4 years ago
Now I'm curious: Do you have any reports on how the new configuration of the deck plays out?
Just to be clear, I'm just a person who likes to focus on theory crafting, so even though I did play the "Mystic Sanctuary Infinite Turns" deck a few times, it's not the sort of thing I'd keep going back to. But the concept of the Aminatou + Mystic Sanctuary + extra turn + proliferate turned out so appealing that I did add elements of it to the deck that I do constantly play with, which is the primer itself.
You might have been referring to that anyway when you say "new configuration" (meaning additions to the primer) so I just don't want to assume anything and find out we are talking about different things.
I've definitely enjoyed the benefits of adding in the combos and managed to pull it off a few times with the primer deck. My only thing was if adding the proliferate creatures was a bit weak considering there are not a lot of planeswalkers in the deck. But I've found them to be fine even without lining up a combo. After all they present a blocker in desperate situations and you can always use them to tick up Aminatou loyalty during other stages of the game.
Admittedly I really do want to add at least two more planeswalker into the deck to benefit from the proliferate creatures more. But I'm so squeezed for slots. The hardest part is that I'm still running the reanimation package which takes up a lot of cards. When I first created decks I had a specialist superfriends list and a specialist renanimation list. I ended up merging them more the sake of presenting a thread that was going to be easier to follow than two separate lists. But I'm getting to that stage again where I could really do with some additional slots for planeswalkers and their support.
The example is that I really want to put Narset Transcendent and Venser, the Sojourner in the deck now that I have those proliferate creatures. You have a better chance of building them up to the [-8] ultimates within a few turns.
Let's say you have 2 of them out (for example Grateful Apparition and Skyship Plunderer), then you can ultimate both of them just the turn after you cast them.
But the problem is "what to take out"? Honestly I just loath to take anything out. I mention the renamination because I think at this stage it might need to be a portion of that I take out.
Maybe like Dance of the Dead and Reveillark?

Yeah I think that's what I'm going to do try Narset Transcendent and Venser, the Sojourner and replace Dance of the Dead and Reveillark.
I'll post back with my thoughts once I get a few games with experiences with them.

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Post by pokken » 4 years ago

I think you're playing too many proliferate creatures when you have recruiter and vampiric/demonic. I'd try playing only one of the 2-cmc ones and then add flux channeler back if needed.

(The thinking is that one of the proliferate creatures is unlikely to add that much generic value to your gameplan; it's kinda lie The Chain Veil in that it's more of a combo piece -- you just don't have enough things that benefit from proliferating for you to ever really want to draw two of them).

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Post by darrenhabib » 4 years ago

pokken wrote:
4 years ago
I think you're playing too many proliferate creatures when you have recruiter and vampiric/demonic. I'd try playing only one of the 2-cmc ones and then add flux channeler back if needed.

(The thinking is that one of the proliferate creatures is unlikely to add that much generic value to your gameplan; it's kinda lie The Chain Veil in that it's more of a combo piece -- you just don't have enough things that benefit from proliferating for you to ever really want to draw two of them).
The thing is that they are a central competent to a few combos. However I have removed the Skyship Plunderer as it was in general the worst of them only being able to target one, rather than the powerful proliferate.

I ended up adding the two planeswalkers, and as I result I wanted to have a bit more walker protection as they are more key to the general strategy of the deck. So I added one of my favorite flavor cards with Mystic Barrier.
I removed a some of the reanimation components for these.


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Post by Ardeyn » 4 years ago

Thank you for your extensive reply, darrenhabib.
I had wondered if you'd played the Turns version a bit and was referring to it. I find the idea quite powerful, however, I also prefer the hybrid approach you're currently pursuing.
I love that with Venser you have another way to abuse Mystic Sanctuary.
Are the Proliferate Creatures pulling their weight? I think, I'd rather have Contagion Engine, even though it's a lot of mana. Still it provides some board control with flicker effects such as Aminatou's minus ability.
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Post by darrenhabib » 4 years ago

Ardeyn wrote:
4 years ago
Thank you for your extensive reply, darrenhabib.
I had wondered if you'd played the Turns version a bit and was referring to it. I find the idea quite powerful, however, I also prefer the hybrid approach you're currently pursuing.
I love that with Venser you have another way to abuse Mystic Sanctuary.
Are the Proliferate Creatures pulling their weight? I think, I'd rather have Contagion Engine, even though it's a lot of mana. Still it provides some board control with flicker effects such as Aminatou's minus ability.
I mean when the proliferate creatures allow you to win the game, then they feel like they are pulling their weight. Then in other games when they don't help you at the game stage at all, then they feel like dead weights. So they are very much combo cards, you have to view them as more like a Painter's Servant in that until you have something else to truly use them with they are only sort of sitting there.

Contagion Engine is just too much of mana investment. You need 9 mana to use it with the extra turn card. I think for a similar thing I'd use Karn's Bastion.
I get what you mean you can keep Aminatou [-1] the Contagion Engine to keep putting more -1/-1 counters on creatures, but it's still just a bit expensive to cast in the first place.

I was thinking about other cards that can do similar results as far as the proliferate creatures role that might be more versatile. If you can return Aminatou to your hand to recast then that would be able to keep up infinite turns.
An example is using Aminatou [-1] on Venser, Shaper Savant to return Aminatou to hand to recast (resetting loyalty). As long as you have 8 mana you can do this. But you actually only need 7 lands (or mana sources) in play as when you use Aminatou [-1] on the Mystic Sanctuary it gives you that additional mana to use.
Brago, King Eternal, Vedalken Mastermind, Temporal Adept, Time Elemental, Tidespout Tyrant, Sanctum of Eternity are all examples of other cards that can continuously bounce/flicker Aminatou when needed.

I think I'll try out a different configuration with Venser, Shaper Savant, Brago, King Eternal over the proliferate creatures to see if they are just better to be more robust long term as slots in the deck.
Now they don't help with putting a loyalty counter on Tezzeret the Seeker for the same turn combo, or in fact the other walkers, but clearly they have a bigger upside in general with the rest of the deck.
So yeah I'll give these a go instead.

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Post by pedrofausto » 4 years ago

Have you ever considered the others Parallax cards?
I've tested Parallax Tide and Nexus on my Aminatou a lot. Enjoying so far.
Nexus isn't THAT good in a competitive game but works a lot like a deterrence by exiling 4 cards from your opponent, giving you more chance to avoid counters and other answers.

Parallax Tide is nuts in this deck. It can work as mana ramp or a pseudo "land destruction", since you can in your opponent upkeep exile 4 lands and deprive them of their mana.

You should try at least the tide one.
Congrats for this guide.

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Post by darrenhabib » 4 years ago

pedrofausto wrote:
4 years ago
Have you ever considered the others Parallax cards?
I've tested Parallax Tide and Nexus on my Aminatou a lot. Enjoying so far.
Nexus isn't THAT good in a competitive game but works a lot like a deterrence by exiling 4 cards from your opponent, giving you more chance to avoid counters and other answers.

Parallax Tide is nuts in this deck. It can work as mana ramp or a pseudo "land destruction", since you can in your opponent upkeep exile 4 lands and deprive them of their mana.

You should try at least the tide one.
Congrats for this guide.
Yeah I've actually played Parallax Tide in a Brago deck, and it was awesome in there.
The fact that you can exile opponents lands to take them off removal, means that you can push through combos in this manner.
Plus the fact that you can get up to five additional mana (or more like 3-4) each turn means that basically the main bottleneck of the deck, which is casting spells can be helped a lot.
You've convinced me.


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Post by pokken » 4 years ago

huh, it never occured to me that you could use parallax tide essentially as a peregrine drake for combo purposes. That's pretty gross. Also works with armageddon effects which is filthy. You can get a ramp of +5 from an aminatou minus since it doesn't go away until the upkeep trigger.

I've won a lot of games with treachery enabling big mana turns (aminatou, minus, spark double, minus, cast oath of teferi, make infinite mana).

Interestingly if you have a temple, it also lets you find the last combo piece cos you can infinitely scry by blinking the temple then draw it with an aminatou activation. That's pretty sick.

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Post by benjameenbear » 4 years ago

I didn't consider Parallax Tide as a mana ramper. Genius.

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Post by darrenhabib » 4 years ago

I did a post back on the MTGSalvation highlighting "The Power of the Two-Drop Creatures with Aminatou". I've reposted the thread in the spoiler below.
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The Power of the Two-Drop Creatures with Aminatou
Just thought I'd add a post on reflection of how two mana costing creatures can be really good for your Aminatou, the Fateshifter deck.

With Aminatou costing three mana, there is an importance to protecting her during the early stages of the game.

Having a one or two mana creature with an "enter the battlefield" ability can really set you up, as you cast it on Turn 2, then you can cast Aminatou on Turn 3 and use her [-1] to get additional value.
This creature can then threaten to block early game creatures.

I've made a select list of creatures to help you potentially on deciding if you want to run some of these creatures for your own version of Aminatou, the Fateshifter.

The sort of criteria is making sure that ETB is effective, and also the stats of the creature (power/toughness) can hold up to other common early play creatures.

Opponents playing mana creatures is popular, so you could expect Llanowar Elves, Arbor Elf, Deathrite Shaman, etc.

So I personally think that playing 1/1 creatures yourself is not advisable, as you be trading off. You really want to be at least able to survive an attack from a 1/1, so that all the opponents small creatures are held off in the early stages. So in general looking for higher toughness than 1, but there are some 1/1 creatures that have in built abilities to kill creatures, and these can be an exception.

Aether Theorist - Scry 1 is relevant to Aminatou [+1].
Auriok Champion - If your meta seems to run black or red consistently then this can also combo with Felidar Guardian for infinite life.
Contraband Kingpin - Solid blocking stats, and you can use Aminatou [-1] to blink an artifact to get the Scry 1.
Fogwalker - Locking down a creature for a couple of turns might be enough for you to get the traction you need.
Merfolk Trickster - Locking down a creature for a couple of turns.
Harbinger of the Tides - Return to hand is even more of a tempo play.
Jeering Homunculus - Goad means that the creature has to attack another player.
Kitesail Freebooter - This isn't perfect, as if you blink it, the card will return back to opponents hand. But you can use this to sniff out opponents, as you might not hit anything of relevance on the first opponent, so can do it on another. The 1/2 isn't great either, but in combo heavy metas is an option.
Leonin Relic-Warder - Same deal that blinking will mean that the card will return. However it is a blocker, and allows you to readjust the target if needed.
Omenspeaker - Scry 2 is relevant to Aminatou [+1].
Oreskos Explorer - Probably unlikely to get value on a Turn 2 play, but can be a blocker and then later on in the game you can look to get value out of it, if you come up against ramp decks.
Thraben Inspector - Bare minimum stats to block mana creatures, but you can get slower draws off it from the clues.
Suncleanser - Meta specific, but look to this card to potential setback opponents plans using particular counters strategies. Solid blocking stats at 1/4.

Any time you have cards that specifies a card type, it pays to do a little math. When you have cards that say look at top X cards of your library, and you can get a particular card type, then you really want 1/X of your deck to be of that type to get consistent value.
Augur of Bolas - Is a third of your deck instants or sorceries? Now if you are OK with only getting value half of the time, then this number can only be a 1/6 of your deck which is much more realistic.
Glint-Nest Crane - Is a third of your deck artifacts?
But it's also important to note that Aminatou [+1] can set you up with putting a particular card type on top, so you can look to guarantee value this way.
For example
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So when looking to see if these cards could be played in my decks I do a count.
Super Friends
10/99 (1/10)- Artifacts
26/99 (near 1/3) - Instants and sorceries.

1/10th for artifacts is too low to get consistent value.
Near 1/3 is borderline, but it is actually reasonable to run Augur of Bolas in the deck.

Reanimator
14/99 (1/7) - Artifacts
33/99 (1/3) - Instants and sorceries.

1/7 is a low number, but if you're OK with hitting an artifact less than half of the time you play the creature, then it's not unfeasible to run it. For the reasons that it does have a reasonable blocking stat and is a flyer as well.
1/3 is the perfect number for just hitting the mark, so Augur of Bolas would be a good card to include in the deck.
These are 1/1s, but do have good ETBs. I personally would not play them, but you might find they are good enough as early value and once off blockers.
Augury Owl
Dusk Legion Zealot
High Priest of Penance

These are premium two-drops that I am running in my decks:
Knight of the White Orchid - The First Strike is surprisingly relevant, holding off many creatures, and then early ramp is great.
Baleful Strix - The draw is great and can threaten to kill any creature, but is prone to the 1/1 mana creatures.
Wall of Omens - Perfect for draw and can survive blocking most early creatures.
Snapcaster Mage - Nothing needs to be said about this fulla.
Heart of Kiran - Altough not a creature as such, or an ETB trigger, the ability to cast on Turn 2 and the cast Aminatou on Turn 3 and potentially have a 4/4 flyer to block at any stage is big enough to deal with any creatures cast during those early stages, or even late game.
The reason I'm harking back to this post it is simply because Thassa's Oracle is an amazing two-drop for Aminatou decks.
It does 3 things for you.
  • Has a great ETB ability so that you can dig deeper and clear off any cards you might use Aminatou [+1] ability with.
  • A solid blocker as a 1/3 during those early turns.
  • Just so happens to have an alternative win condition, aka Laboratory Maniac.
Given that it is a great card for this build, it's just a necessary evil to include Demonic Consultation as a way to win. I've tried to keep the build as unique as possible, without going the usual route of cEDH decks, but sorry this is just too good to pass up on.

The Mana Drain seems like a though cut, and it is, but this deck is very proactive and tapping out is very common.

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Post by pedrofausto » 4 years ago

Does the current list any free slot to Omen of the Sea ?
It's not the most efficient card draw engine but acts a top manipulation tool too.

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Post by darrenhabib » 4 years ago

pedrofausto wrote:
4 years ago
Does the current list any free slot to Omen of the Sea ?
It's not the most efficient card draw engine but acts a top manipulation tool too.
I did end up cutting Oath of Jace after a time, which I think might be technically better in this build with the reanimation and planeswalkers.
The thing is that I prefer to play creatures with ETB's as they can provide blocking as well.

In a much more low to the ground build however I think Omen of the Sea would be pretty good. Two drop into Aminatou for immediate value is always going to be good.

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Post by tstorm823 » 4 years ago

Have you considered the new card Elspeth Conquers Death? 5 is a lot of mana, but with a blink every turn it becomes an exile every turn plus an almost permanent 2-mana tax on all your opponent's noncreature spells. And then the 3rd chapter reanimates a creature or planeswalker with an extra counter on top.

I looked at this card just because I love Venser, the Sojourner, but it doesn't particularly suit the rest of my deck and yours looks like a better fit with both reanimation and superfriends going. Venser keeps the saga chugging with his plus so you can do it forever, and should someone happen to kill Venser, it brings him back on 4 loyalty, which would be particularly great with The Chain Veil and Aminatou going because at 4 loyalty and 3 activations you can bring him back and go straight to ultimate the same turn.
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Post by darrenhabib » 4 years ago

tstorm823 wrote:
4 years ago
Have you considered the new card Elspeth Conquers Death? 5 is a lot of mana, but with a blink every turn it becomes an exile every turn plus an almost permanent 2-mana tax on all your opponent's noncreature spells. And then the 3rd chapter reanimates a creature or planeswalker with an extra counter on top.

I looked at this card just because I love Venser, the Sojourner, but it doesn't particularly suit the rest of my deck and yours looks like a better fit with both reanimation and superfriends going. Venser keeps the saga chugging with his plus so you can do it forever, and should someone happen to kill Venser, it brings him back on 4 loyalty, which would be particularly great with The Chain Veil and Aminatou going because at 4 loyalty and 3 activations you can bring him back and go straight to ultimate the same turn.
I did a whole post on Sagas on my Aminatou MTGSalvation thread back when Dominaria was released and I did a break down of which ones I think are relevant and how to support them better in builds.
So I've decided to repost it here, but updated with the relevant Theros Beyond Death Sagas as well.

In answer specifically to your question, I do think 5 mana is a little costly for the effects currently. But as I talk about Sagas below, when you combine with support cards like proliferate and/or enchantment recursion, the more you skew your build towards Saga interaction, the better they become.

So there is absolutely a great build that would enjoy Elspeth Conquers Death to it's full extent. Removing a 3 cmc or more permanent each turn is going to be back breaking against certain decks. Then the 2nd Saga is actually an ability that carries on through opponents turns, so if you are blinking it each turn, you get the removal, then on your following turn you get the tax effect, and then Aminatou [-1] again, so that your opponents are always under costing more.
Combine this in a build that has more tax effects, and you're onto a winner.

Sagas

I was doing some combo interactions with The Eldest Reborn in another thread, and it got me to thinking how Sagas can be used with Aminatou.

People have mentioned some already in this thread, and her ability to reset them by [-1] does mean you can keep them around indefinitely.

I thought I'd list some interactions that you could use if you wanted to build around a Saga theme.

These are the most powerful of the Sagas in Esper;
Dominaria
Fall of the Thran, History of Benalia, Phyrexian Scriptures, The Antiquities War, The Eldest Reborn, The Mirari Conjecture, Time of Ice
Theros Beyond Death
Elspeth Conquers Death, The Birth of Meletis, Kiora Bests the Sea God, Medomai's Prophecy, Tymaret Calls the Dead



It's more than feasible that you could have a build that supported all of these.
Now I've already touched upon ratios of number of card types when playing things like The Antiquities War or The Mirari Conjecture.
Normally you'd want at least a 1/5 ratio of artifacts in order to make a trigger successful for The Antiquities War.
Similarly you'd normally want a number of instants and sorcery for The Mirari Conjecture in order to get value each trigger.
But I feel in a Saga focused build these numbers don't need to be as high as you can get more value out of them in a specific build, and I'll try and show you how.




First off, lets look at card that can retrieve enchantments from graveyard in Esper;
Argivian Find
Auramancer
Cleansing Meditation
Crystal Chimes
Dawn to Dusk
Hanna, Ship's Navigator
Mine Excavation
Monk Idealist
Open the Vaults
Replenish
Restoration Specialist
Second Sunrise
Silent Sentinel
Starfield of Nyx
Tragic Poet
Skull of Orm
Archon of Falling Stars
Cavalier of Dawn
Dance of the Manse
Griffin Dreamfinder
Lagonna-Band Storyteller
Lotus-Eye Mystics
Mine Excavation

Auramancer and Monk Idealist can be repeatable blinked with Aminatou [-1] to return an enchantment.
Hanna, Ship's Navigator, Silent Sentinel, Starfield of Nyx can get one back every turn.

Replenish and Open the Vaults are just the most powerful effect for returning all your enchantments.

Crystal Chimes would be worth considering especially in a build that has The Antiquities War.




Another aspect of Sagas is actually to get value out of the Sagas themselves more quickly. So anything that can add counters to them;
Contagion Clasp
Contagion Engine
Core Prowler
Flux Channeler
Fuel for the Cause
Grateful Apparition
Grim Affliction
Inexorable Tide
Spread the Sickness
Steady Progress
Tezzeret's Gambit
Throne of Geth
Thrummingbird
Viral Drake
Skyship Plunderer

Proliferate also has the advantage of adding loyalty counters to Aminatou or any other planeswalkers you might have.

I've played Inexorable Tide in my Will & Rowan Kenrith deck, but found it too slow in that build. However this can be a combo card for a Saga build. If you are getting infinite's then you can use this to move through Sagas.

Contagion Clasp and Contagion Engine are mana intensive in general, but again in a build that has The Antiquities War along with plenty of artifact mana is certainly worth looking at.
Viral Drake is similar in that it requires mana to activate, but this can be done multiple times each turn if you have the mana.

Throne of Geth, Thrummingbird, Skyship Plunderer are already cards that I have played in my Superfriends deck with much success, so will add even more value in a Saga theme.

Getting back to the Sagas themselves there are some powerful abilities.


Fall of the Thran allows you to keep the land count down, and you could run a good number of artifact mana to mitigate less lands. Being able to reset it with Aminatou [-1] does mean that opponents are kept to two lands, and this lines up nicely with being able to defend Aminatou as opponents can only cast so many spells being shorted on mana.
Because the Saga happens in your turn, you're more likely to get use of the lands coming into play before you reset it back to destroy all lands.


The Eldest Reborn has three different abilities. You can use Aminatou [-1] to get multiple creature/planeswalker sacrifices in a turn.
With some of the return enchantment from graveyard creatures you can get The Eldest Reborn back with the 3rd Saga trigger.
Auramancer, Monk Idealist, Restoration Specialist can be used to get it back straight away.
Hanna, Ship's Navigator, Silent Sentinel can do it as well, but summoning sickness will probably mean delayed for a turn.


The Mirari Conjecture has certainly powerful effects and can be abused in a number of ways. Maybe you are getting back an instant for control like counterspells or using it with tutoring effects like Vampiric Tutor, Enlightened Tutor, Mystical Tutor.
You can get Argivian Find or Second Sunrise to return The Mirari Conjecture later on.
Similar with the 2nd Saga with sorcery, you can use Replenish, Open the Vaults or Cleansing Meditation to keep getting back your Sagas indefinitely.


Phyrexian Scriptures, History of Benalia, Time of Ice can be used to to control creatures to a certain extent.
Resetting them all before the 3rd Saga, so that you can keep protecting Aminatou and perhaps other planeswalkers or just your life total.


The Antiquities War can be used as a solid value card for getting artifacts, and in conjunction with artifacts that naturally allude to supporting the other Sagas. For example if playing Fall of the Thran then artifact mana will be good so running Gilded Lotus, Thran Dynamo, Signets, etc.
Phyrexian Scriptures doesn't destroy artifact creatures, so you could have a number of artifact creatures to support this theme.


Similar to The Eldest Reborn in that it has removal on the first Saga, and reanimation on the 3rd. If your deck had some other "tax" cards, meaning those that make your opponents have to pay additional mana or remove mana, then the 2nd ability is better.
For example if you combine this with Fall of the Thran then the 2nd Saga will really cramp what your opponents can do.


Although The Birth of Meletis is by no means powerful, it is a way to ensure a land drop every turn if your deck has a number of basic Plains. Then producing a 0/4 will protect Aminatou from a lot of early game attacks.
If you can imagine that your early game is simple producing walls and getting lands, then you are actually pretty happy with this.


Kiora Bests the Sea God is an absolute bomb in dueling, but in multiplayer the abilities are not quite as good. But this obviously still has powerful effects, it can set you up to protect your planeswalkers nicely, deterring opponents' ability to attack, and the 3rd Saga stealing any permanent is always a huge tempo play.
But I mean just creating a series of 8/8 hexproof by using Aminatou [-1] each turn is going to gum up the ground. In a game with no flyers you can feel pretty safe running out your planeswalkers.


Medomai's Prophecy is more of a low impact Saga, but actually all the abilities are useful and at the cost of 1u means that it's also easily castable.
The Scry is relevant with Aminatou [+1] to draw a card. Then in a further couple of turns on Saga 3 you get to draw a couple of cards, replacing itself as well as netting you a card.
Even the last Saga can give you information about the top of your library, meaning you might want to draw it with Aminatou [+1].

I will bring up Omen of the Sea as it's the same cost and has similar effects. The thing with Omen is that you get to draw a card straight away, so if you are wanting to use Aminatou [-1] to get value each turn Omen is the card which will give you a better return on investment. Needing to wait on Sagas to tick over, does mean waiting additional turns as Medomai's Prophecy has that 2nd Saga of actually not doing anything.


Tymaret Calls the Dead along with History of Benalia are able to produce token creatures, which can be useful the clog up the ground with potential blockers.
Tymaret Calls the Dead has the ability to put cards into your graveyard which can be beneficial for a reanimation build, however you do need to exile an enchantment or creature to get the token benefits and I would say often this would be counter productive to the reanimation/recursion plan in the first place.


Now because Sagas are enchantments, it'll pay to look for further enchantment support.
The problem with cards like Greater Auramancy or Fountain Watch is that you cant then use Aminatou [-1] ability to reset the Sagas.
You probably should be running Starfield of Nyx for it's value, but it does have a double edged sword in that you can then use your enchantments as creature beat down plan, but then you're exposed to creature removal as well.
Opalescence can also be used if wanting to go the enchantments as creature beatdown plan, and combos with Parallax Wave to remove all opponents creatures indefinitely, using tricky timing making sure to have the exile triggers on opponents creatures on the stack, before resolving your own exile on Parallax Wave to itself (as it's a creature). This way the Parallax Wave is a new copy of the card coming into play, so opponents creatures will be stamped with a different copy of the card, and remained exiled forever.
Of course Parallax Wave is already da.bomb.com in Aminatou decks, don't leave home without it.

Skybind can be used to good effect if you're running a number of non-enchantment "enter the battlefield" effects. Auramancer and Monk Idealist can be used to get back other enchantments at end of turn.
Unfortunately because it takes effect of return at end of turn, Skybind is a little less useful for planeswalkers.

Sigil of the Empty Throne could be used if you have enough enchantments to protect your planeswalker or life total, or go on the offensive!

If you are running some number of proliferate cards to further your Sagas for value, then some number of planeswalkers can be beneficial.
It's hard to completely recommend what to run as it'll depend on the rest of your build. There are going to be the usual suspects in;
Tezzeret the Seeker, Teferi, Temporal Archmage, Kaya, Ghost Assassin.
But if you're running a number of artifacts already and supporting the The Antiquities War more, then Karn, Scion of Urza and Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas, Tezzeret, Artifice Master are worth a look.
Open the Vaults can be slightly more abusable in a build which has more of a spread between your artifacts and enchantments.

I also like Liliana, Death's Majesty if you're running a number of creatures like Auramancer, Monk Idealist, Restoration Specialist, Hanna, Ship's Navigator, Silent Sentinel.

Finally with so many interactions with returning enchantments from graveyard, actually getting enchantments into your graveyard from hand or library can be beneficial. So if you look at the Reanimation build in my primers, you can use some of the cards that normally you are looking to put creatures into your graveyard, for enchantments instead; Entomb, Intuition, Oath of Jace, Windfall, Predict, Frantic Search, Search for Azcanta, Jace, Vryn's Prodigy, to name a few.
Also with Animate Dead, Dance of the Dead, Necromancy being enchantments, you can look to integrate some number of reanimation. Even just being able to reanimate Auramancer, Monk Idealist, Restoration Specialist, Hanna, Ship's Navigator, Silent Sentinel could be worth it, but again some other usual suspects in Felidar Guardian and Academy Rector, along with other powerful low-cost creatures like Trinket Mage, Spellseeker, Recruiter of the Guard means that you don;t actually need big creatures to make reanimate enchantments really good.

Damn you Aminatou and wanting to pack in so many themes that work together!!!!

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benjameenbear
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Post by benjameenbear » 4 years ago

Yup, Aminatou is super powerful. I think I'm actually going to be building my newly posted Breya list towards Aminatou instead, since I had such a delightful time playing her when I had her last built.

Excellent, analysis, btw.

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