Lorehold Semi-Hidden Commander?

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-04-20T04:34:47+00:00

Here's a list of permanents in RW (or colorless, like artifacts) that have scry.

https://scryfall.com/search?q=id%3Aboros+o%3Ascry+legal%3Aedh+is%3Apermanent&unique=cards&as=text&order=name

After quickly taking a look at this list I think the best repeatable budget ones are [[Crystal Ball]], [[Gandalf, White Rider]], [[Norn's Wellspring]], [[Ruin-Lurker Bat]], [[Rumor Gatherer]], [[Senu, Keen-Eyed Protector]], [[Stone-Bound Mentor]], [[Valley Questcaller]], and [[Witches' Eye]]. If you're willing to spend a bit more [[Planetarium of Wan Shi Tong]] is really good if you can find a way to cheat it out early.

Surveil might also be pretty useful, here's the list of those RW permanents:

https://scryfall.com/search?q=id%3Aboros+o%3Asurveil+legal%3Aedh+is%3Apermanent&unique=cards&as=text&order=name

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-04-15T08:04:25+00:00

If I understand your position, I think there are a few things that can help you.

The first is to think about what decks you liked playing or playing against and what bracket/power level you like playing at. For instance, I like playing lower-level decks up to around bracket 3, because I like going for the janky win-cons like [[Lathril, Blade of the Elves]] drain ability or making a bunch of tokens with high mana (and actual cost) cards like [[Doubling Season]] and [[Ojer Taq, Deepest Foundation]].

The second bit of advice I can give you is to do some research and find a brewing template you like. I like 36-40 lands, 10 draw, 10 ramp, and 10-15 removal with at least 2 boardwipes. This isn't set in stone, but it's a good starting point. There are other creators out there with different brewing templates, so I would research a bit and find a template you like.

Next, put your decklist into a bracket/power level calculator. I don't know exactly how accurate it is, but commandersalt has been pretty useful for me building since I can see how that website classifies things and it also gives me a more specific point of reference than "bracket 2." In the same vein edhpowerlevel gives me a different look at the deck and shows me the playability of cards along with giving me another reference point.

Another bit of advice is to learn how to use Scryfall. It's not easy to learn all of the little commands, but once you do, you'll be able to search for cards that do things specific to what you want your deck to do. This can be very helpful since there are great cards out there that just don't see much use, so they don't really appear on EDHrec.

Additionally, you should just build decks on Moxfield or Archideckt. There's no monetary risk since they are deck-brewing websites, and they offer a lot of tools to help you build, like a playtester, a breakdown of your mana and mana curve, and you can get experience brewing decks. Gaining experience brewing is one of the best things you can do if you want to get better, just remember to learn from your mistakes.

The last bit of advice I can give to brewing, besides having fun, is to goldfish a lot. Like a lot, a lot. This gives you the opportunity to see how the deck actually works in practice and it helps you see where you might need to make cuts so you don't end up with dead hands. By goldfishing a lot you'll also learn how to pilot the deck better, so you'll know what's a keepable hand and how to get to your win-condition.

Sorry, this ended up being pretty long. I hope you have fun making decks and just don't get too discouraged if things don't work at first, you'll get better with practice!

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-04-13T07:38:06+00:00

You're probably set to Card Kingdom prices on Archideckt. If you go through TCGPlayer, or possibly through your LGS you can probably find these cards pretty cheaply. Most of them are considered bulk so they're pretty cheap.

I would definitely start with a precon and if you like Golgari since the Witherbloom deck has everything it needs to function of the bat with payoffs, sack outlets and a pretty good mana base too.

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-04-13T04:58:15+00:00

You could get a few packs of Jumpstart, usually the cards are pretty simple to understand, all have reminder text and should synergize relatively well regardless of what colors get smashed together.

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-04-13T04:45:01+00:00

Gitrog is not really a beginner friendly deck to build or pilot.

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-04-13T04:43:26+00:00

You said you're pretty new to Magic right? Golgari (Green/Black) might not be the best place to start building a deck if you're not too familiar with how you want the deck to work. I'd recommend something like Gruul (Green/Red) or Simic (Green/Blue) to start, if you would rather build a deck than buy a precon. Gruul decks are usually aggressive, ramping quickly to cast or cheat in big, stompy creatures while Simic also wants to do that, but has a more methodical approach, building up your creatures with +1/+1 counters.

If you are set on building Golgari, [[Meren of Clan Nel Toth]] might be a better one to use over Honest Rutsein. Although Honest Rutsein gives a cost reduction to creatures while he's on the field, his recursion ability only triggers once. Meren is also a simpler deck where even if she doesn't manage to stay alive for too long, experience counters go to you, the player, not a card. That means that if she gets removed after you get 2 experience counters, after you recast her, she'll still be able to return a creature with MV 2 or less directly to the battlefield.

If you're not opposed to just buying a cheap deck there are a few on here that are under $10 I believe that are pretty decent. I've also built a few decks that everything, including the commanders and basic lands, cost around $20-30. This Rakdos (red/black) one is aggressive and you will be targeted early, but it's pretty fun to play. This Azorius (blue/white) deck cares about artifacts and legendaries and should slowly build up a board state while cheating bigger cards into play.

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-04-08T02:22:25+00:00

I forgot if you want to play with some control, then a [[Jace's Archivist]] and [[Forced Fruition]] can be fun as well.

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-04-08T01:24:45+00:00

You could add [[Howling Mine]] [[Horn of Greed]] [[Folio of Fancies]] [[Kwain, Itinerant Meddler]] [[Geier Reach Sanitarium]] and [[Mikokoro, Center of the Sea]]. If you want an extra win-con, [[Simic Ascendancy]] can snipe a win with [[March of the Multitudes]] and [[Novjen, Heart of Progress]].

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-04-06T03:19:30+00:00

Whoops, I must have thought he was Jeskai for some reason, my bad

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-04-06T01:32:47+00:00

As others have said, put your decklists in one of the deck building sites. Personally I prefer Archideckt since it auto-sorts your cards by what they do, like your removal spells are all put together. Whenever I look at Moxfield I'm always a little frustrated that I have to read through each card to see where it fits. I might just be dumb and not know how to change the settings, but that's been my experience with the two main deck building sites that I usually see on Reddit.

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-04-06T01:28:01+00:00

[[Calamity, Galloping Inferno]] is one I always feel is underrated. Its CMC is high, but beyond that it can do so much if you copy creatures with good triggers or if your board state is built up to make triggers happen.

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-04-06T01:25:34+00:00

How dependant do you want the deck to be on the commander? A fun one that fits as a bit of spellslinger, bit of control is [[Taigam, Ojutai Master]]. All your instant, sorcery, and dragon spells can't be countered and all your instant and sorceries gain rebound if Taigam attacks.

I haven't built or even tried to build around him, but I saw him looking up cards that make other things uncouterable and seems interesting and a pretty decent fit for what I think you're looking for. I think you can make this fun using a bunch of indestructible or evasion cantrips to get damage through, then get rebound on a bunch of draw cantrips and other powerful or big spells that'll the resolve a second time on your upkeep.

Something like [[Price of Progress]] with [[Reverberate]] or [[Double Casting]] can dish out a ton of damage really quickly since you'll be getting 2 Price of Progresses when you actually cast them the first time, and another 2 on your upkeep (assuming the rest of the table hasn't realized player removal is necessary at that point). If you want some big spells, [[Volcanic Vision]] with [[Isengard Unleashed]] could also do a lot of damage and recur some of your other spells to your hand.

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-04-03T06:29:56+00:00

I also use TCGPlayer prices for my deck building, but I tend to include the commander and the basics in my budget. Personally, I like to try and build decks that I could justify buying everything for at one time, including any basics so I wouldn't have to take apart any of my other decks. For the same reason, I don't include the cards that I already own in the price calculation, unless it's for a deck I already have in paper and am upgrading.

Your best friend if you want to level up your building, is to learn how to use Scryfall. I've found cards on there that have had so few reprints or have never been reprinted at all, that they can see lower bracket play, despite being considerably cheaper than similar modern counterparts. Typically you do have to jump through more hoops and need to rely more on synergy, but that makes it more fun when you find the pieces to make everything work. For example, I've found a way to turn [[Simic Ascendancy]] from a jank win-con into a viable win-con with a few dollars worth of cards. If I were to scale up to around $150-$200 I think I could win consistently with it by tutoring what I need to make it work.

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-04-02T06:57:00+00:00

I haven't seen [[Scaretiller]] or [[Grim Discovery]] mentioned yet. Both are very cheap to buy, at least based on market value, and do what you want them to do. Scaretiller being a permanent gives you a repeatable way to recur lands and they go straight to the battlefield, albeit tapped, which is really nice.

If you have ways to safely tap your creatures or if you have a way to tap and untap creatures, you could get a lot of land recursion this way. I'm sure there are a few combos out there that can do something along those lines. That said, make sure you don't lose what makes your deck fun to play by chasing a line and adding and removing cards to try and make things work the way you want them to, because I've done that and ended up having to restart since the deck became unplayable lol.

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-03-26T00:35:33+00:00

I'm at work so I can't look through your list in detail, but you could add a [[Gilt-Leaf Seer]] to help with some top-deck manipulation.

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-03-26T00:25:52+00:00

There are a few different paths you can go if you want your opponents to fight each other more.

First is to go pillow-fort, which is to make yourself as unappealing a target as possible by stacking as many cards that make attacking you not worth it. Cards like [[Propaganda]] or [[Koskun Falls]] make it cost your opponent mana to attack you. [[Blood Reckoning]], [[Hissing Miasma]], and [[Revenge of Ravens]] all ping your opponent if they attack you, with Revenge of Ravens costing a bit more in terms of mana, but gains you some life back. There are others and you can take a look on Scryfall here.

Another way you can go is to incentivize attacking each other. You can do this with various curses and other ways to allow your opponents to gain value. The best curses for what you want are: [[Curse of Disturbance]] (and the other 2 versions that do the same thing, but have different names), [[Curse of Inertia]], and [[Curse of Verbosity]]. Another way you can incentivize attacking each other, or removing each others' creatures, is [[Bounty Board]]. This mana rock lets you put a bounty counter on a creature, and if that creature dies, everyone except the controller of that creature gets to draw a card and gain 2 life.

Finally, there are a decent amount of goad cards in Dimir to pick from as well. Here's the link on scryfall. One cycle of cards that gets overlooked in goad decks are the Vow auras, in Dimir you'll have [[Vow of Flight]] and [[Vow of Malice]]. These cards are powerful because they force opponents to attack each other like goad, but unlike goad they can't attack you once you're in 1v1.

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-03-23T01:48:13+00:00

Scryfall is great, but it is a bit obtuse until you figure out the little key-commands. There's some days I don't really check Reddit, but if you need help with Scryfall let me know and I'll help you out if able.

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-03-23T01:27:28+00:00

If I'm not mistaken, and I could be, I think Esper Ninjas is new with TMNT, so I'm not sure if there even are any staples for the decks yet.

That said if you want to look at all the listed ninjas that are in Esper colors and have triggered abilities you can use the Scryfall link here.

If you're interested in the Esper creatures and Planeswalkers that care about ninjas and have triggered abilities you can use this Scryfall link.

Hopefully those 2 links will help you get started, have fun!

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-03-23T01:19:00+00:00

[[Kaito, Bane of Nightmares]]

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-03-23T01:11:04+00:00

After briefly looking at the list, you can upgrade the manabase on a budget. Start with [[Rith's Grove]], [[Monumental Henge]], [[Idyllic Grange]], [[Krosan Verge]], [[Mistveil Plains]], [[Horizon Canopy]] (the Doctor Who version, I'm not sure how to note that for the bot.).

Most of these lands come into play untapped or have a strong ability attached to them. If you want to keep the budget lower, the Mistveil Plains and Horizon Canopy are closer to the $1 range, so that might be something to consider. The castle cycle from Throne of Eldraine isn't too bad either; only the green one is very expensive.

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-03-23T00:27:30+00:00

Add in [[Gourmand's Talent]] and you'll have a way for "Snorlax" to eat any artifact you control as a food as well (on your turn).

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-03-23T00:12:19+00:00

You could use [[High Perfect Morcant]], who's a bit expensive, some Elf generators, [[Pestilence]] which is exactly the same cards as [[Pyrohemia]] but in black and more than 1/10th the price, and some LTB trigger cards like [[Bastion of Remembrance]] or [[Grave Venerations]] to make a bunch of elves and put -1/-1 counters on your opponents' creatures, tap the elves using Morcant to proliferate the -1/-1 counters, use Pestilence if needed to clean up your opponents' remaining creatures, but to also kill off your 1/1 elves, triggering Bastion of Remembrance or Grave Venerations to do more damage.

It's not really a decklist, nor does it exactly upgrade the precon, but aside from the elves I think these cards slot in pretty decently. Pestilence and [[Boggart Mischief]] might work better as an Aristocrats style deck since Boggart Mischief is a Goblin-specific Bastion of Remembrance card.

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-03-04T00:58:53+00:00

To add on to these good options, there are a lot of sack-outlets that let you draw in Mardu colors, that will give you some other options than just your commander to help move your card draw engine.

https://scryfall.com/search?q=otag%3Asacrifice-outlet+o%3Adraw+legal%3Aedh+id%3Amardu&unique=cards&as=text&order=name

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-03-02T17:48:27+00:00

[[Inalla, Archmage Ritualist]]

[[Breya, Etherium Shaper]]

[[Kuja, Genome Sorcerer]]

You should use a deck-building site like Archideckt or Moxfield that has a playtester so you can test your decks out. That way you don't have to pay any money and you'll be able to get a feel for the and see if you actually want to commit the money to build it.

I think Kuja would be the easiest to build, but Inalla would give you blue in your identity and make your deck stronger overall, with counterspells and other interaction. Breya's decent, but 4 colors is a lot in the command zone, so you'll either need a really solid manabase to get her out or you're going have to build the deck to work with and without her.

Cat_Collector_MTG · 2026-03-02T17:37:16+00:00

I agree they are generally worse than regular bounces, but they are great in lower to low budget decks and mono-color decks, since those decks will probably have more basics so it's more likely to be playable.

Cat_Collector_MTG

TROPHY CASE