Commander Review: Oath of the Gatewatch Part 2 (Green, Multicolored, Artifact, Colorless)
We're back with Part 2 of our Oath of the Gatewatch Commander Review. Be sure to check out the first part if you haven't already: Commander Review: Oath of the Gatewatch Part 1 (Lands, White, Blue, Black, Red).
Green
Rampant Growth is a great card. This isn't quite Rampant Growth #2, but in Green decks running a couple of Wastes it pretty much is. Other decks will avoid this card as we have better options.
Exiling noncreature permanents is very powerful in Commander due to the sheer variety of threats in the format, especially when the exile effect is a trigger and cannot be countered. It's nice that you can also get back this big threat by sacrificing excess lands in the lategame. World Breaker is a good card, but the biggest problem with World Breaker is that it has lots of competition for the precious few lategame bomb slots. In a format of Terastodon and its brethren, I don't know if World Breaker is good enough.
If your meta is heavy on hexproof / indestructible creatures, Bonds of Mortality is an excellent silver bullet. It doesn't cost a lot of mana to play and use. You can use it infinite number of times, and best of all it replaces itself by drawing a card. Bonds is the type of card that decks like Uril, the Miststalker truly dread seeing.
Not quite Nature's Claim, but this card may still have enough targets to be worth a slot. There are plenty of cheap yet problematic artifacts/enchantments being played, from Sol Ring to Rest In Peace.
She's cheap to cast, her +1 makes tokens to protect her or cash in with Skullclamp, her -2 plays nicely with +1/+1 counter strategies, and her ultimate draws you a crapton of cards. Nissa, Voice of Zendikar is a solid planeswalker, useful both in Superfriends and Sacrifice decks as well.
I didn't run the numbers on the odds of hitting a card with the enter the battlefield (ETB) trigger, but assuming it's > 70% in your Superfriends deck, it's a pretty good inclusion. Her mana fixing is a huge boon for people not looking to break the bank building a top-tier 5-color mana base, though people with 10 orginal dual lands, 10 shocklands, and 10 fetches may not need the fixing that Oath of Nissa provides.
Controlling 6+ lands is trivial in Green, and some of the older "awaken" cards are quite good already, making Sylvan Advocate a legit way to end games. Decks like Kamahl, Fist of Krosa can go deep on the land creature theme and run this.
Zendikar Resurgent combines the mana doubling of Mirari's Wake with the card draw of a permanent Glimpse of Nature. If you have the mana to cast this card, chances are you don't really value the mana doubling that much on its own. But I guarantee that once you have that much mana, you are looking to draw some cards, which this enchantment does really well. Once you've got more cards to play, you'll want more mana to play them all, which this enchantment provides. Aha!
I thought this card was a crappy "win more" enchantment. Now I'm thinking that it will have its uses in Big Ramp Fatties decks for replenishing hands and going off.
Multi-Colored
Flayer Drone enables similar combos to Zulaport Cutthroat, except under more narrow applications. In my analysis of Eldrazi Displacer, I mentioned an easy combo would be the Displacer + Brood Monitor + Zulaport Cutthroat. Replace the Cutthroat with Flayer Drone and it's the same combo (except now you must also be in Red). Voila! Not as good, but still okay.
Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim looks like a more fair, Lifegain-themed Teysa, Orzhov Scion. While Ayli doesn't have the Darkest Hour combo to make infinite creatures that Teysa has access to, she functions much better as a reliable sac outlet for Sacrifice decks. Ayli also provides on-demand lifegain for Lifegain decks, and she can sacrifice one creature to exile a nonland permanent instead of being limited to just creatures. When played "fair" (non-combo), Ayli is the better commander and definitely more interesting in my opinion. Hopefully her lack of an obvious combo will make her less of a hate target than Teysa too.
Baloth Null is a beefier Gravedigger. It's a good card and the cost seems right to me, but usually I'm fine with paying less mana and getting back a single creature instead. Or maybe run Greenwarden of Murasa if I'm paying for beefy recursion because it gets back anything, not just creatures. I know Baloth Null is making some buzz with Meren of Clan Nel Toth players, and I'd probably run it too in budget lists, but eventually I'd upgrade this out for Eternal Witness and other superior cards.
This is probably the cheapest mana version for the"when you gain life, opponents lose life" effect. Vizkopa Guildmage (costs 5 to play + activate). Defiant Bloodlord and Sanguine Bond are the others. They all go infinite with Exquisite Blood combo, so yay. For those pursuing that combo, this is a great new option.
A relatively cheap commander that lets you draw an additional card each turn if you work for it. In typical Izzet fashion, she wants you to cram your deck full of cheap instants, so you can draw a card on other people's turns as well. The payoff isn't that much though. If you want to play an Izzet Spellslinger deck, Mizzix of the Izmagnus has it covered.
Oracle of Mul Daya this is not, but it's still worthwhile in some decks. The one I'm thinking about is Omnath, Locus of Rage. It may see some play in Gruul Fatty decks as well, such as Xenagos, God of Revels, where trample could be very helpful.
Artifact
A sweet new equipment for the Allies deck, as the Ally tokens generated will trigger your Ally abilities.
Where does Seer's Lantern fit in terms of Commander playability? Here's a quick guide:
- Multicolor decks will rather have mana rocks that produce colored mana for fixing such as Coalition Relic, Chromatic Lantern, and Commander's Sphere, and Ravnica signets like Izzet Signet which produce colored mana for cheaper.
- Mono Color and Colorless decks will want to play Mind Stone (same mana generated, cheaper to cast, cashes in for a card) and Worn Powerstone (same CMC but produces more mana). After that, however, Seer's Lantern becomes a sweet choice, better than Pristine Talisman or Crystal Ball.
I like playing 12+ mana rocks in my decks, and I can easily see Seer's Lantern as one of them in my Mono Color and Colorless decks.
Potentially big beats in a tribal deck. Not my style personally, feels sort of "win more," but it's potentially very mana-efficient at what it does.
Colorless
I don't think this is a good card. It costs too much mana, it's a "vanilla" creature itself, and it's dependent on the randomness of your top deck.
And yet, I love this card.
You see, I have a pet project in store for a future Budget Commander deck. This project revolves around one card: Pathbreaker Ibex. The entire purpose of the deck will be to see how much damage I can do with the mighty goat. The deck will feature Rite of Replication, but also shenanigans like making giant token armies and then making them all copies of the Ibex with silliness like Mirrorweave. Swing for billions. Literally billions of damage. Make Magic Online cry like a baby figuring it out.
Deceiver of Form is a new key card in my plan. The idea is simple:
- Make a big army somehow.
- Play Deceiver of Form.
- Put Pathbreaker Ibex on top of my library with Scroll Rack, Sylvan Tutor, or whatever.
- Reveal Pathbreaker Ibex with my Deceiver, turning my army into goats.
- Swing for stupid numbers.
I cannot express how excited I am to do this. SOON YOU SHALL COWER BEFORE THE MIGHTY GOAT ARMY!
Colorless decks got a silly fun card to play with. Ping stuff, dictate the flow of combat, or draw cards. Colorless decks and Mono Red Artifacts will both enjoy this.
Here he is in all his reality-altering glory: Kozilek, the Great Distortion. There is a debate whether or not New Kozilek is better than Old, Kozilek, Butcher of Truth. I think Old Kozilek is slightly better because I love drinking the tears of my foes when I equip my freshly-casted Kozzy with Lightning Greaves and annihilate someone. But that's not to say New Kozilek is bad. Far from it, and he may indeed be even better! New Koz can (potentially) draw even more cards for you, and he has menace which is better if you're looking to win with commander damage, and he can counter spells! Outside of Blue! Whaaaat!
No matter which Kozilek is leading your Colorless deck, the truth is that you're going to put the other in your deck anyway. Pretty much any deck currently running Old Kozilek will have to think hard about cutting something for New Kozilek as well. I know Rakdos, Lord of Riots and Animar, Soul of Elements players in particular are hurrying to make a cut for this new gift.
I don't know which deck wants Matter Reshaper, but I do know it's a sweet card that has a Hearthstone feel to it. This card is value! Perhaps Animar, Soul of Elements wants it? Marchesa, the Black Rose?
Exile a nonland card from an opponent's hand. It's an ETB trigger, so you can blink Thought-Knot Seer or reanimate it for additional value. Target opponent draws a card once it leaves play; it doesn't have to be the same opponent that you took a card from. This card screams political plays, taking a card away from the main threat at the table and help an ally draw into gas. Now you're working together to take down the threat. This is AWESOME!
Even in 1v1 situations where the same opponent draws a card eventually, it's still a sweet deal taking their best card from their hand and (later) giving them a random card that is probably worse. All this on a 4/4 for 4. Wow!
This card is bonkers good. Seriously bonkers. I can imagine this card seeing tons of play in Standard and Modern, and yes, some Commander too. I'll be testing it out for sure.
ONE MORE THING! The name is awesome, Thought-Knot Seer! So evocative. I'm imagining it tangling up your thoughts, confusing and disorienting you. Also "thought-knot," like "I thought not?" Clever! I love it!
The big thing here is that every deck now has access to Envelop. Not saying people will run this card, but it's pretty decent at what it does, and it helps shut down combo decks. That alone gets a nod of approval by me.
Top 10 Cards
These cards are the ones I'm most excited to see. In no particular order:
Special mention goes to Deceiver of Form, not because it's a good card, but because of Goats.
That's All, Folks!
Hope you guys enjoyed this review of Oath of the Gatewatch cards. We'll be back with more Budget Commander and Sphinx's Revelation articles soon!
Follow me on Twitter @BudgetCommander for notifications on when the next article is up, updates on future decks, and input for what to work on next. Thanks for reading!
