Because I play with my daughter a lot, I find that the duel decks are often fun ways to enjoy games of magic. But, there's another reason I bought them as well.
I needed Coat of Arms for my tribal decks. I nearly always have a tribal deck floating around. At the moment it's soldier variant running Odric, Master Tactician but it's been known to be zombies and may be evolved into warriors with the imminent release of Amonkhet.
Chloe, my daughter, runs Prime Speaker Zegana, it's basically ramp into Krakens and other large beasties. She also runs Mizzix the Izmagus which is just an adapted version of the out of the box commander deck. Both of these could play Beacon of Tomorrows.
Now I'm in possession of the decks I decided to have a better look at them.
For starters they come with no less than seven legendary creatures.
I have to admit I have several copies of Talrand including the a foil version from the same set of Intro decks and I got my foil Odric. I do not have copies of Jhoira or Jori En so it'll be fun seeing if they fit in either Chloe's Mizzix deck or a new deck of their own.
I'm thinking Samut, Voice of Dissent in a Warrior tribal build would work well. Crucially he is Red/Green/White which gives you access to plenty of decent warriors.
Zo-Zu the Punisher is a build around or possibly part of some kind of Goblin deck. I'm thinking though you'd play it in a deck that let your opponents play more than one land a turn. However, that's a risky strategy.
Although Kamahal, Pit Fighter can ping for 3 he is very weak and easily dealt with in combat dispite his 6 power. Radha, Heir to Keld is great for mana acceleration and would make for a very cheep commander based purely on CMC. The deck would ramp well as well.
But that's just the tip of the ice burg as the saying goes.
Desperate Ritual can be used as part of a game wining infinite combo in Mizzix.
There are two other cards that like storm counts in the decks: Temporal Fissure and Mind's Desire
Mind's Desire could let you storm through your entire deck, but any X spells would be cast for 0 and there are a lot of X spells in the Mizzix deck.
Note that Temporal Fissure doesn't say 'Nonland' so it can be used to completely wipe your opponent(s) board states.
Given the increased number of sorceries and instants that are played in the Mizzix deck Spellheart Chimera is in the running to be added to the deck if I can find something I want to remove.
Two more creatures in the Mind deck that I like the look of are:
Deep-Sea Kraken is a possible in Chloe's Prime Speaker deck. The Unspeakable is a possible in her Mizzix deck.
The Mind deck does contain these three:
I can see myself casting Firemind's Foresight grabbing these three, casting them just to put The Unspeakable into play. Just for laughs.
However, I'm more likely just to add Peer Through Depths to the deck.
Nucklavee is another creature I quite like the look of:
Getting spells back from your graveyard is always good and this can grab two of them.
There are a couple of damage spells that deserve consideration:
They are OK, but there are better damage spells available to Commander players.
Volcanic Vission on the other hand could really pay dividends in the Mizzix deck if you've got a card to target. It is absolutely going into the deck.
I spoke earlier about making a Warrior tribal deck - well the Might side of these two decks is pretty much that and includes a couple of interesting warriors for me:
Use Boldwyr Intimidator to make Lovisa Coldeyes a warrior and she'll give her self a +2/+2 boost. Rubblebelt Raiders has the potential to get very big very quickly.
Sylvan Might is my final pick. I like cards that can be cast twice and I like combat tricks. It might not necessarily win EDH games but it can turn the tide of any engagement,
I hope that's given you some ideas and also proven that sometimes Duel Decks can contain extra bonuses you don't at first expect.
Until next time may your hand always be full of spells.
Phil
