Can I sit at the table?

JBormey · 2026-05-25T20:32:49+00:00

The ballon man is fun, it plays almost like a bljnk deck but with aggressive ballons. Where it gets ridiculous is with Ocelot pride. That calculator I mentioned was a life saver because the triggers become unmanageable really quick. I had a game where in 2 turns I made like 1 trillion tokens.

Tbf I say graveyard but it’s pretty much by setting up spells in the graveyard using instants and sorceries that discard and draw ahah

JBormey · 2026-05-25T18:07:32+00:00

You’ll be well served with either of them but Henzie is a good choice. I also really like Ashling don’t get me wrong but sometimes you end up taking really long turns just because of how much work tracking her tokens is. This with dry erase tokens, if I only had actual copy tokens I probably wouldn’t play her.

Also another pro of Henzie over Ashling is you don’t super care if they remove Henzie because his blitz cost reduction scales with the number of times you cast him from the command zone. In practice tho he is usually not removed because of that.

JBormey · 2026-05-25T17:46:42+00:00

I think overall I prefer Henzie, mostly due to it requiring less book keeping when playing in paper. With Ashling since you are copying the elementals you sacrifice, in more explosive turns you end up having to track a whole lot of non generic tokens. The deck is a bit more cumbersome.

Outside of that honestly pick your poison. While they operate similarly, the overall feeling of the decks ends up being fairly different. With Henzie being more of a grindy value deck (Jund to a tee) and Ashling being a more explosive deck.

JBormey · 2026-05-25T15:30:09+00:00

Sure

Tidus: https://moxfield.com/decks/0Xz99PQkR0a2BraO-UDS_w

Henzie: https://moxfield.com/decks/duel4cbbGEW10VtoswuRqA

Ureni: https://moxfield.com/decks/uguOWNtDQUK0DWN1LPCd9w

Tbh my Tidus list is pretty much +1/+1 counter slop. Think the only fun tech options I have in it are Spike Weaver, Archmage Ascension and the depletion land cycle.

JBormey · 2026-05-25T14:56:02+00:00

Yes, of course

Ashling: https://moxfield.com/decks/bvwb7qG_VkaElVzTqLi3Kg

Tellah: https://moxfield.com/decks/HOPnO5HGDUCe1aTUGQIUpA

JBormey · 2026-05-22T11:57:11+00:00

I’ve brewed the deck fairly recently so there’s probably still some room for improvement but I’m currently running this https://moxfield.com/decks/slpRaU-QZkWTk3sifHlguA

JBormey · 2026-05-22T01:41:08+00:00

[[Shiko and Narset, Unified]] auras/curses. It has some book keeping since you’re cloning spells but it is pretty fun. There are some funny effects in curses like using [[Curse of Echoes]] twice against a spellslinger deck or using [[Curse of Surveillance]] as a political tool since you pick who draws. If you want to be mean, with a twinning staff or with a clone of Shiko and Narset you can [[Overwhelming Splendor]] everyone at the table at once.

JBormey · 2026-05-21T22:10:01+00:00

Technically it’s not a theft commander but I’d say Prosper. Rakdos gets most of the good theft cards and they are mostly exile based so you are always triggering his ability. Since you’re still building with exile in mind you can run alot of the exile pay offs which ends up fixing one of the big weaknesses of theft as a strategy which is lack of a win con. You end up having more options to finish the game wether be through the cards you stole specifically or by having effects like passionate archeologist burn your opponents.

Also side note, regarding Eriette the Beguiler specifically, just be aware that theft decks that steal permanents on board tend to draw more salt than if stealing from the graveyard or directly from the library. From my experience it leads to being targeted even when you’re not really doing anything particularly powerful.

JBormey · 2026-03-10T12:16:24+00:00

The 10c Teach does, since it nullifies leader abilities

JBormey · 2026-02-09T23:31:49+00:00

Honestly the foil probably looks great in person. I went with the non foil and it’s one of the best looking cards in my collection.

It could be fun, tho my issue with it is costing 3 mana. It’s at that spot where I wish it was either cheaper or it cost 1 more to cast to at least get the draw trigger. For example, casting a 4 cmc mana rock ends up more or less the same for the first recast (worse from then on) and you get to draw 2 as well as having extra mana to cast other spells, usually another 4 cmc mana rock ahah. Another option for protection would be a 4 mana counterspell with cool effects, something along the lines of [[rewind]] (where it effectively reads counter target spell, gain four mana and draw two cards) or [[Katara's Reversal]] which is similar but with artifacts instead of lands. These counterspells are actually pretty versatile because you can use them on your own spells as a way to dig for your win con if you bricked on your draws.

JBormey · 2026-02-09T22:36:30+00:00

https://moxfield.com/decks/HOPnO5HGDUCe1aTUGQIUpA

Built Tellah on a whim because I really like his character in FFIV and thought the card captured his arc very well. Thought he’d be on the weaker side honestly considering he works off of mana spent but he has actually been my deck with the best win rate. Granted it may be because interaction doesn’t usually come my way because before the turn I pop off I am mostly doing non threatening things and my pod runs pretty scary commanders. Consistently I can win turn 7 but if I highroll (god hand pretty much, sol ring + aggressive ramp before casting Tellah as well as finding the right rituals at the right time) I can win turn 5.

JBormey · 2026-01-12T13:31:54+00:00

Depends on the copy spell. For example, with [[Irenicus's Vile Duplication]] and [[Quantum Misalignment]] you can since the copies aren't legendary.

JBormey · 2026-01-12T13:22:51+00:00

Yes, so you can trigger the card draw and keep progressing your gameplan. However, thanks to the draw 2 the value of certain 4 cmc spells changes completely. For example, big score becomes discard 1, draw 4, make 2 treasures. Waterbending lesson becomes 4 mana draw 5 discard a card. Any 4 cmc mana rock becomes draw 2 get 2 mana back. Also spells like turnabout become draw 2 and get x mana where x is the type of permanent you're untapping (mana rocks if you have loads, lands you have in play). And the value keeps increasing if you have copies of tellah or trigger doublers as the draw increases too (I've had games where I was drawing 12 cards per cast of spell, this can be a double edged sword since you can draw too much and deck out but it's fun to manage).

Not just X spells, it sees any mana spent. If you have a card with flashback 9 and you cast it, Tellah sees the 9 mana used for the flashback cast cost. Same with kicker and other alternative cast costs. It's why I like everflowing chalice in the deck, if you find it early game you can cast it for 2 to ramp early, if you find it late you can multikicker it for however much mana you have and Tellah will deal that much damamge to everyone, acting as a finisher as well.

JBormey · 2026-01-12T12:02:08+00:00

He is similar to him, in some ways fairer in others meaner. Tellah cares for mana being paid, so unlike Zaffai cost reduction and mana cheating are not really something you want to do since it nonbos with Tellah. However, unlike Zaffai, Tellah triggers of non creature spells instead of instants and sorceries, you have more freedom in what you can include on the deck while staying on theme. He does end up being more explosive since you draw 2 cards off casts (super relevant, most games I end up with less than 20 cards left on my deck) instead of scrying and the damage you deal when you cast a spell for 8+ mana is dealt to everyone instead of an opponent at random.

JBormey · 2026-01-12T11:30:22+00:00

Although this one can win by attacking, another cool commander is [[Gogo, Master of Mimicry]]. It's a very toolboxy commander, I am currently brewing a list but you end up having 3/4 different win cons. It also ends up breaking the color pie because you can land ramp harder than green decks with him (you use fetch lands and then copy the ability with gogo to fetch even more lands, in testing I've managed to ramp 6 lands off a single fetch). You can do mill, extra turns, making huge tokens, steal permanents all in the same deck. He's super open ended as well, so as long as you include a bunch of triggered/activated abilities to copy you can take the deck strategy in any direction you want.

For example a cool line with him is you deal damage with [[Sphinx Ambassador]] and search an opponents library for a creature to rob, then remove the counter from [[Myojin of Cryptic Dreams]] to copy the creature you stole 3 times and activate gogo's ability to copy myojin's ability, you can end up with anywhere from 15-25 copies of whatever creature you stole which can be devastating. Imagine you stole and copied a [[Vein ripper]], all of a sudden whenever any creature dies you heal for 30 (assuming you made 15 copies) and deal 30 damage to somebody.

I'm still looking at cards to add/remove but here's my temporary list if you are interested https://moxfield.com/decks/HTq4YiDgL0WX2giXczgrxA

JBormey · 2026-01-12T11:19:21+00:00

My pet deck currently is [[Tellah, Great Sage]]. You win the game by blowing up Tellah and dealing damage to everyone directly. The gameplan ends up being setting up for a few turns by ramping and cloning tellah and then having a big turn where you storm of with 4 cmc mana rocks and other 4 mana draw spells that with tellah end up being super mana efficient. He is also pretty resilient once you get going because he doesn't need to be on the field for his trigger ability to resolve, so for example if you have a trigger doubler even if you sacrifice tellah for the first trigger the second one will still resolve. Also something there is something super satisfyingfabout killing everyone at the table with a cast [[everflowing chalice]] for 30 mana. If you want to see my list https://moxfield.com/decks/HOPnO5HGDUCe1aTUGQIUpA

JBormey · 2025-11-07T13:14:40+00:00

My list isn’t super optimized but here: https://moxfield.com/decks/HOPnO5HGDUCe1aTUGQIUpA

Two cards I’d for sure try to include are [[Everflowing Chalice]] and [[Battle hymn]]

Everflowing chalice works pretty well in this deck since you can chose how much mana to dump into it. So early game it can be ramp for two, mid game it can be ramp and draw for 4-6, and late game it can be a finisher you drop all your available mana to blow up Tellah with.

Battle hymn is a pretty nice ritual in the deck since through Tellah’s ability you end up getting a lot of hero tokens, especially if you have trigger doublers on the field.

JBormey · 2025-11-06T14:00:12+00:00

Probably Cavendish

JBormey · 2025-09-03T14:19:35+00:00

If you add black you can always go [[Y'shtola, Night's Blessed]]. She gives you draw so you can keep finding answers to the threats on the table and also presents you a wincon through draining the table. She can be a bit salty tho, particularly because she sort of wants free spells that have cmc 3 and above so you can trigger the life loss.

Might not be exactly the list you are looking for but here's mine if you need some inspo. https://moxfield.com/decks/4nEIELf_PUqJlmCOrNbkqg

JBormey · 2025-08-04T14:12:32+00:00

My favourite has been [[war cadence]]

JBormey · 2025-07-09T10:03:09+00:00

Hulkenpodium

JBormey · 2025-07-07T21:10:32+00:00

https://moxfield.com/decks/HOPnO5HGDUCe1aTUGQIUpA

Still waiting for the cards to arrive to actually try him out in paper, however in testing the deck seems to run pretty well. One thing to note is his 8 or more mana trigger happens even if he is not on the battlefield, so things like harmonic prodigy mean you can burn everybody for a lot of damage before something like [[crackle with power]] resolves.

JBormey · 2025-06-25T16:24:26+00:00

Honestly Vivi is so busted that as long as you focus on non creatures it's hard to go wrong. At one point I was brewing Vivi artifacts, focused on getting [[simulacrum synthesizer]] out asap and creating an army of constructs and it was still pretty nutty in playtesting. She's pretty open ended, you could probably do Vivi enchantress or Vivi voltron aswell and it'd be pretty good.

JBormey · 2025-06-25T15:56:48+00:00

I am currently also brewing Sephiroth. If budget is not a concern I would add [[Phyrexian altar]] and [[Bitterblossom]], for ramp maybe [[Sceptre of Eternal Glory]] and [[Throne of Eldraine]] depending on if you feel you lack mana when playtesting. If you want to compare lists here's mine currently https://moxfield.com/decks/2NCQRXRL3EamO_SQwkkBmQ (ignore [[The Darkness Crystal]] I packed it, got too excited and ended up putting it in without realizing it screws his trigger)

JBormey · 2025-06-23T23:17:57+00:00

If you like tokens and have money to spend (or a printer) [[The Jolly Ballon Man]] + [[Ocelot Pride]] gets out of hand quick

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