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Amazing Juniper-Man

This Week: I take a commander that wants we to attack my opponents, but rewards my creatures for having low power. I take this mismatch and make it work in a single EDH deck.

Decklist on Moxfield

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Sometimes you come across a commander that seems at odds with itself. Where it has an ability that doesn’t blend with its stats or works in opposition to another ability. Tadeas, Juniper Ascendant is such a commander. Let’s look at the second ability first. It says that you can draw a card when one or more of your creatures deal combat damage. It’s combat focused, so I automatically think high power. If you’re getting in for damage, you’re going to make the most impact and move toward eliminating an opponent. Here’s where the split starts. The first ability cares about your creature having low power. The first ability makes your attacking creatures unblockable by creatures with greater power. You also get to untap the creature is it has Reach for some reason. So, you’re rewarded for attacking, but with low power, and the payoff caps at 1 card, so going wide isn’t as rewarding. This Human Monk is all over the place. 


 

This was an exciting challenge. Rather than fight the incongruous parts of the text box, I latched onto the one that didn’t matter. Untapping creatures with reach is interesting. You can use your creatures to attack and still have them able to work. Blocking is an easy leap, but not a great motivator. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, people don’t attack enough in EDH. It’s sad. If my attacking creatures also had tap abilities though, I could still have access to them after the combat step. Rather than cross reference all creatures with Reach and a tap ability I knew I could do better. I’ll just give all my creatures activated abilities.         


 

The best use of creatures outside of combat is to make resources. There are some great Green enchantments that do just that. One of the most recognizable is Cryptolith Rite. It essentially turs every creature into Llanowar Elves. That’s not the only mana based activated ability available to me though. Springleaf Parade was a bit of stretch to add, but I like including cards from newer seta in my builds. This enchantment has the potential to make lots of Shapeshifter creature tokens. The enchantment then gives creature tokens the ability to tap to generate mana. It’s not as good as Cryptolith Rite per se, but it feeds itself, which is a strength. My other mass resource generator is Enduring Vitality. I’m not worried about this Glimmer dying and losing access to the mana ability since after death it comes back as a non creature enchantment.       


 

I would spend a lot of deck slots trying to give all my creatures activated abilities and a passive ability; Reach. I couldn’t repeat the same mindset, I had to rely on the creatures to have Reach, and what better creature type to start with than Spider. Spiders bring the deck together around Tadeas, Juiper Ascendant. Key word, check. Lots in Green and White, check. Low power, check. Most Spiders have low power and high toughness making them great attackers with Tadeas, great blockers on my opponents turns, and beneficiaries of the tap abilities I provide. Hold your horses, this isn’t going to devolve into a Spider-Man Universes Beyond deck. But it does give me the opportunity to finally play Hidden Spider. If you read my Kykar Vehicles deck, you’ll know I’ve been looking for a home for this pet card.


 

I started with Spiders that made more Spiders. Twin-Silk Spider, Penumbra Spider, and Brood Weaver all make an equivalent Spider token, either when the creature enters or dies. Arasta of the Endless Web makes a 1/2 token each time an opponent casts an instant or sorcery. She makes more than 1 token in any game I’ve played her in. Sporeweb Weaver makes tokens too, but they happen to be 1/1 Saporlings . They may not have reach, but their low power makes them harder to block with my commander.


 

Arachnogenesis isn’t a creature, but it fits my Spider token making plan. It pulls double duty as a one sided fog. Curse of Clinging Webs also pulls double duty, this time making tokens and acting as graveyard hate.


 

There were other good options out there. Acid Web Spider is pricey at 5 mana, but its removal against flying creatures. Ettercap splits that effect up into an Adventure, Web Shot, to destroy the flyer, and the creature itself. Oran-Rief Recluse has been an underperformer comparatively. I don’t mind it having 1 power, but not at 3 mana, but to pay 3 additional mana to destroy a flyer, I’m never excited at see this card.     


 

Spiders fill other interesting roles in the deck. Spinner of Souls is like card advantage, turning my dying spiders into cards in hand, keeping my game plan moving. Sweet-Gum Recluse also offers card advantage in a way since Cascade lets me cast another spell free. I actually like to pair it with Sporeweb Weaver and give it 2 counters since I want it to be blocked and take damage or do the blocking itself. Chainweb Aracnir provides me with recursion, and a higher power level thanks to the 3 +1/+1 counters it escapes with.


 

The early version of the deck played the way I expected it to. I could attack successfully, draw cards, and make mana effectively with the deck. There was just 1 problem, it was slow in closing out the game. Low power doesn’t lend itself to knock out power. I couldn’t raise the power level though. If I added a static effect like Sylvan Anthem or Collective Blessing or a source of +1/+1 counters like Cathar’s Crusade I was sabotaging myself. My creatures are only unblockable if their power is lower than any blockers. Raising their power just means my creatures will be blanked. Could I add in Trample? Sure, but then why build this deck and not any other high power attack based deck?


 

Was the deck a win or a loss? It did what I set out to do, which is a win, but closing out a game was not guaranteed, and losing games is a loss. I needed a way to get myself out of the corner I had boxed myself into. My answer came from an older card in my collection that I went from really enjoying to finding better tech for. The card is Leonin Sun Standard. This artifact allows me to pay 1 and a White mana to give my creatures +1/+1 until end of turn. This was fun in my early creature decks, but always got eclipsed by static effects like Glorious Anthem. But that card shined in the deck. I could let my low power spiders go into battle, sneak by bigger defenders, then pay mana into Sun Standard and pump up my attackers enough to make a real difference in opponent’s life totals. What an elegant fix. Now, 1 card does not save a strategy, so I needed greater threat density.


 

My next best option was Gerrard’s Battle Cry. It’s cheaper to cast but costs a little more to activate. I would have loved more artifact or enchantment options, but this is a creature based deck, so I included some creature options to fill the role. My favorite it Selesnya Guildmage. It's cheap at 2 mana, color doesn’t matter. The pump is a pricier at 4 mana, but it provides me more flexibility with the ability to make tokens. Those tokens work great with Springleaf Parade and even better with Spidersilk Armor since they’ll now have reach and Tadeas will untap them after they attack. It all feeds into the strategy.


 

The deck lends itself to one other strategy and exploiting it doesn’t work at odds with the rest of the deck. Toughness matters often gets a bad rap and lumped into a defender strategy. These tend to be glass cannons and fall apart once a key piece, like the commander, gets removed. I’m familiar with this from my Jund Walls deck. The recent Abzan Dragonstorm deck went a long way to addressing this weakness. Me, I’m insulating myself. My timely pump effects like Leonin Sun Standard also increase creatures’ toughness, so they play well with the toughness matters as well as the base function of the deck.

 

Assault Formation is one of the most well known toughness matters cards, and it fits perfectly. It matches the other pump effects thanks to the ability to pay three to give my creatures +0/+1. I call this ability butt breathing. Hear me out. Firebreathing is an old Aura that gives a creature an ability to pay 1 red mana and increase its power by 1. Butts is a reference to toughness, specifically high toughness. So, increasing toughness in the same way-butt breathing. Jokes aside, if the enchantment is removed my long term strategy doesn’t suffer and I stick to the plan. I went the next step and added Huatli, the Sun’s Heart as a trap. It plays into the toughness matters strategy and creates a trap for opponents. If they’re spending time and resources to eliminate this Planeswalker I always come out ahead because I’ll still be attacking and unblockable.    

 

So, what does the deck look like? Take a look.

 

The deck really came together with those little additions. It also has some great small synergies I built around. Low power Spiders protect themselves from certain boardwipes. Almost all my creatures are safe from Dusk/Dawn and Retribution of the Meek. I don’t fire these off for no reason. I’m not afraid of opponent’s board states since I’m largely unblockable and have blockers available, but I’m not going to be caught without a boardwipe available. I also really like Veteran Beastrider here. It acts as a backup commander in ways, untapping my creatures at the end of the turn. It plays even better with Tadeas since my creatures attack, use their activated abilities on the second main phase, then can reuse them on opponents’ turns this way.


 

What do you think? Did I hit my goal of building around 2 abilities that seemed not to fit together at first? What other commanders have this level of mismatch?

 
 
 

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