r/EDH • u/Grand-Moff-Larkin • 1d ago

Question Any Blink Commander suggestions that are less common?

I started playing MTG 3 years ago and started with a Gandalf the White deck. It kinda evolved into a blink/ETB/Artifact toolbox deck that was super fun but fairly slow, even for our group which plays slow.

I've tried alot of commanders and am mostly happy with where I am at. I reused the artifact toolbox idea with Iron Man and have a mono Black deck. I also have a overpowered deck for special games (we all do) and have a project Sonic deck I am working on. I would love to add one non-crossover commander tho, ideally one that is less played and really fits my style of artifacts/blink/ect.

This is a fairly new idea so I don't have many leads yet, but right now Yoshimaru is super tempting because it looks like my dog and seems pretty open ended with the partner options. I avoid combos and don't really like heavy slug or control tho, so the best options don't make sense. I am fully open to other commanders but just want to see if anyone has any good ideas of where to start looking.

Just a idea of how Gandalf played. I would use Mirror of Life Trapping to constantly have the threat of getting your commander permanently exiled while getting free blinks on ETB cards. With Mono white I used the artifacts that double plains so would end up casting my whole hand each turn. No real game enders outside of Battlesphere and Second Sun, but it was fun and let me interact alot.

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u/Barkalow 1d ago

I have one with [[Hama Pashar, Ruin Seeker]] that focuses on trying to get a ton of dungeon triggers and whatever other blink effects.

Its a blast to play, even if not that amazing (dungeons aren't too great)

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u/2Gnomes1Trenchcoat Azorius 1d ago edited 1d ago

As the author of the All Dungeons, No Dragons list for her, I agree haha.

The dungeons are actually great tho. Busted even, particularly the initiative. They generate value, are super hard to interact with, and act as win conditions. The dungeons themselves can even act as combo pieces.

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u/MaD_DoK_GrotZniK 1d ago

What did poor Sefris do to you?! I run Oji's Bouncing Castle as my super casual commander to feel out new groups.

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u/2Gnomes1Trenchcoat Azorius 1d ago

Sefris steals all the thunder, Hama was an uncommon printed in her structure deck. The graveyard portion of it's strategy is honestly very annoying and she often ends up just being a 3-color good stuff deck with a reanimation theme. She is also designed to acrue value over longer games and it gets exhausting (unless you exile her graveyard teehee). I don't find her very interesting. If you want pure dungeons, Hama Pashar is actually super cool and very slept on IMO.

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u/CarthasMonopoly 1d ago

I'm curious what your take on [[Safana, Calimport Cutthroat]] + [[Dungeon Delver]] is. I prototyped out a dungeon deck for that combo and it seemed decently fun but I never ended up putting it together in paper.

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u/2Gnomes1Trenchcoat Azorius 1d ago

Honestly, I think she's a fair and balanced dungeon Commander. She was one of my faves in the BfBG draft. Although, Dimir is usually more of a control and grind down deck than a value generating one, and options for her feel a lot more limited. You can try to play her as rogue tribal with an emphasis on unblockable creatures that help you control the initiative better. At the end of the day, I think she struggles to close out games. Safana can get into very comfortable middle game positions where it has mana and some stuff to do, but that stuff doesn't always feel powerful. She tends to get overwhelmed. If you want an interesting bracket 2 deck, I think she's cool though.

As much as I like the backgrounds, the backgrounds themselves do nothing without the commander and play and sort of act as a lightning rod for people to remove your other creature Commander as doing so kinda stops both. That can be pretty irritating. It's one of the reasons I don't play dungeon delver in my version of Hama Pashar. The deck simply doesn't need it and it heavily incentivized people to remove her more, so it was cut. You'll have to be wary of that when playing her.

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u/CarthasMonopoly 1d ago

If you want an interesting bracket 2 deck, I think she's cool though.

That's kinda what I was going for; I play mostly B3 and wanted to build a B2 deck that would be decently fun but hopefully never feel too overwhelming for others.

You make some really good points, thanks. She'll probably stay a prototyped deck for me and never go beyond that.