Deck & Commander Strategies
Gau, Feral Youth
Aggressively grow Gau by attacking and exiling cards from the graveyard to deal damage to all opponents, leveraging graveyard interactions and haste to overwhelm the table.
Ghyrson Starn, Kellermorph
Use pingers and instant/sorcery synergy to chip away at opponents’ life totals while generating value and controlling the board through incremental damage.
Negan, the Cold-Blooded
Sacrifice opponents’ creatures to disrupt their board and gain advantage, leveraging creature removal and pressure through sacrifice mechanics.
Sauron, Lord of the Rings
Utilize a high-cost, impactful commander to exert control and create a powerful board presence later in the game, supporting graveyard and creature synergies.
Gameplay Insights
- 1
Managing graveyard order was crucial for maximizing the value of graveyard exile effects and triggers, adding a layer of complexity to resource management.
- 2
Gau’s ability to deal damage to all opponents each end step triggered by exiling cards from the graveyard created a powerful recurring threat that ramped up quickly.
- 3
The interaction between discard outlets (like Fateless Looting) and exile effects (Bag of Holding, Pyrexian Furnace) enabled a steady stream of damage and card advantage.
- 4
Players effectively used treasure tokens to ramp mana, supporting higher-cost plays and multiple activations in a single turn.
- 5
Negan’s strategy of sacrificing opponent creatures pressured boards heavily but needed to be balanced with threat presence to avoid falling behind on damage.
- 6
Sauron’s late-game potential was hinted at but not fully realized early on, highlighting the tension between early aggression and waiting for powerful commander plays.
Notable Cards
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Gau, Feral Youth
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Bag of Holding
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Unexpected Windfall
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Rogue's Passage
Gameplay Summary
The game started with players deploying their commanders and early board presence, including Gau, Feral Youth quickly hitting the battlefield to begin its damage-dealing and graveyard interaction engine.
Early plays saw multiple graveyard synergies in action, especially with cards that exile from the graveyard to generate value, such as Bag of Holding and Pyrexian Furnace.
Gau steadily grew stronger with each attack and card exiled from the graveyard, dealing incremental damage to opponents.
Meanwhile, Ghyrson Starn focused on pinging opponents and utilizing instants and sorceries for incremental damage and control, while Negan aimed to disrupt by sacrificing opponent creatures.
Sauron utilized his powerful eight-mana abilities to exert control and pressure on the table. Key turning points included the successful activation of graveyard exile combos that powered Gau’s damage output, as well as the deployment of significant threats like Out of the Tomb that threatened a graveyard-based reanimation win condition.
Players carefully managed graveyard order, aware it was critical for their synergies.
The conflict escalated with damage pinging and treasure token generation, culminating in a tense board state where Gau’s explosive damage and Negan’s creature sacrifice effects threatened to end the game.
The gameplay highlighted the interaction between graveyard manipulation, incremental damage, and resource denial, creating a dynamic and chaotic board state with multiple potential win paths.
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