MMM Living Lands
- bonzaientertainmen
- 9 hours ago
- 10 min read
I feel like we were just here together. I did a Make Mine Magic article based around Avatar Aang and the Ally creature type. We had another legend spoiled that got a lot of attention: Toph, the First Metalbender. I knew it was a trap to put her in an Ally deck. She is an earthbender first and foremost. Earhbending is a noble way to get people to attack with their lands. The mechanic takes the danger out of attacking by guaranteeing the attacker retains the land if it would die. A noble iteration, but it still won't get people to attack with their lands. People treat lands as sacred in this game. Anthousa, Setesan Hero, Noyan Dar, Roil Shaper, and even newcomer Szarel, Genesis Shepherd couldn't get it to happen.
Today's assignment is two fold: to convince you that there is a better alternative to Toph, the First Metalbender as a lands attack commander and to convince you that attacking with lands is a good and viable strategy in EDH. Who is the contender that you should be playing instead of Toph in this Archetype? Obuun, Mul Daya Ancestor is that alternative. They are both in Naya colors, so they provide equal access to colors for deckbuilding. Let's examine the cards.
Toph, the First Metalbender is a 3/3 Human Warrior Ally for 4 mana. She has the aforementioned earthbending ability. Her ceiling comes from the fact she turns nontoken artifacts into lands. Even as lands, those artifacts don't tap for mana, which I'm glad is included in the reminder text. In comparison, Obuun, Mul Daya Ancestor is a 3/3 Elf Spirit for 4 mana. We have the same power/toughness for the same mana cost. Toph does edge him out with the number of creature types she brings. Although not all creature types are equal.
Toph earthbends 2 at the end of her turn, animating a land and putting 2 +1/+1 counters on it. Not a lot of Earthbending cards have been revealed so far, so we will have to see what kind of support bending gets in the full set list. We've seen Haru, Hidden Talent, Toph, the Blind Bandit, Earthbending Lesson and a few others so far. The mechanic is going to be very limited from this one set, especially fighting with 3 other bending mechanics for space, so don't expect to get a critical mass of cards to fill out your deck. I say all that to prepare you not to expect to go wide with a Toph deck. You're going to have to go tall and power up the one or two lands you happen to Earthbend. Throw some extra +1/+1 counters on a living land and see how much damage you can do.
That plan is going to be very slow. She only provides 2 power the turn after she animates the land, so you can't expect to attack right away. Obuun offers a more immediate attack plan. He animates the land of his choice moving to combat. You can play him on your first main phase and immediately attack for at least 3 damage. He makes the land X/X, where X is his power. By the time Toph's land attacks and deals 2 damage Obuun's land will have done 6. Toph can earthbend the same land on her next end step and put an additional 2 counters on that same land. That means by turn 3, we're talking about 6 damage compared to Obuun's 9 in the same timeframe. That's not even taking into account Obuun's Landfall ability.
With Obuun's Landfall ability, he can throw +1/+1 counters around your board. The best avenue is to put the counter on Obuun and double dip on the power. What does that mean? If I put the counter on my commander, not only does he get the power bump, but the land will also get the additional power bump since it's tied to Obuun's power. Toph, the First Metalbender has a fixed ability and will not allow you to double dip on power the same way. Stacking up these counters also means Obuun can be a commander damage threat. It's not my intended way to pilot his deck, but it is an option. I would just follow that up with something like Savage Silhouette or Trollhide to keep my commander safe if it were to attack.
There is another avenue in which Obuun has superiority over Toph: liability. Obuun only makes the land a creature until the end of turn. It will be vulnerable on attack but then revert back to a land. It dodges all sorcery speed removal from my opponents, which is great. This is a contrast from Toph. Her animated land stays a creature. Sure, I could use it to block, but that means I didn't attack with it, so I wouldn't be pushing my game plan forward anyway. Sure, Earthbending keeps the land safer by having it return to the battlefield if it were to be removed, but it keeps a larger target on the land, and for longer.
There is another dimension of liability where Toph suffers. The first part of her text box turns all your nontoken artifacts into lands. A lot of removal specifically excludes lands, so you think these permanents would be safer. All these artifacts are now vulnerable to land destruction spells. Scoff all you want, but Mass Land Destruction is the future. If Toph takes off in popularity, people will be looking for creative ways to destroy large numbers of lands. Ruination would literally ruin your day if you have Toph out. I already include Cleansing in decks, so be prepared to pay lots of life to keep your Sol Ring and other ramp pieces. Don't give me more reason to play Catastrophe, Fall of the Thran, or Urza's Sylex in more decks. Even the World Shaper Precon had Planetary Annihilation. Mass Land Destruction if the future, and Toph will suffer for it.
Let's check the score and see which land animating commander has the edge. Toph has an edge in going wide with the attack plan since she can make multiple lands into creatures concurrently. However, Obuun has a larger lead when it comes to going tall. It takes 5 turns of unchecked continuous attacking before Toph overtakes Obuun in land based damage. No creature is going to stick around the field that long.
Obuun has the lead when it comes to safety. His lands dodge Sorcery speed removal, where Toph's do not. Toph also opens more permanents up to mass land destruction, which is something I never thought I would write.
Objectively, Obuun, Mul Daya Ancient is the better land animating commander. When building a commander that cares about living lands, we want to ramp, animate additional lands, and protect those lands from being removed. So let's jump into what an Obuun deck should look like.
The deck has Green, so we want quick ramp options to put lands on the field. Rampant Growth will always be a go to for me. You also need to consider that you're not ramping unless you hit your land drop each turn. Kodama's Reach lives up to that by putting a land onto the field and one in hand for an immediate or future land drop for turn. I'm not looking to be fancy or controversial in this section, just efficient. It should be no surprise to see Cultivate on this list too, with that rational. I also like Moonsilver Key. Hear me out, I get access to better lands to attack with if I pop this off. Now, imagine this: You have Fertilid and Obuun out. On the end step before my turn, I use all my free mana to activate Fertilid. Each land that hits the field means Obuun puts a counter back on the Elemental. Fertilid is just as strong, and I can use all those additional lands to reactivate Fertilid whenever it's convenient, or play multiple large spells on my next turn.
What are some of the lands I would want to tutor up with Moonsilver Key? Any with Indesructible would be great targets. Cascading Cataracts and Darksteel Citadel both produce colorless, but more importantly, they will survive any combat. The bridge series, Rustvale Bridge, Slagwoods Bridge, and Thornglint Bridge, are all indestructible as well but with the added benefit of making 2 different colors of mana. They're a little slower because they come in tapped, but they're safer to plan than other Artifact Lands.
Not all lands have Indestuctible, but they could. Darksteel Garrison is a Fortification, which is like an Equipment for lands. I can pass it around to a key land, and when I attack with it, it can give itself a stat boost. Terra Eternal is just a static effect that just makes all lands Indestructible. Yours and mine. I'm the only weirdo playing casual land destruction, so I'm only hurting myself.
Indestructible is a great quality to have for an attacker, but there are other effective qualities my attacking lands could have. Treetop Village, for 2 mana, becomes a 3/3 creature with Trample. Blinkmoth Nexus and Cave of the Frost Dragon both become flying threats. There's an interesting interaction here. If I happen to pay mana to animate one of these lands before and then use Obuun's ability on that land, I get to keep the cool abilities that land has, and I get to change the base power and toughness of the animated land. Why is this good? If I pay 1 to make Inkmoth Nexus a creature on my first main phase, I have access to a 1/1 flier. Along comes Obuun, and he uses his ability on the Nexus and I now have a 3/3 flying land. This works even better with Blinkmoth Nexus since the creature has Infect. People already take notice when Infect hits the table, but turning my 1/1 infect flier into a 3/3 infect flier is going to draw some heat from the rest of the table.
There is another class of land worth mentioning, lands that put +1/+1 counters on themselves. Raging Ravine is a familiar example of this. Sure, it starts as a 3/3, but every time it attacks I put a counter on it. Obuun still has the power to increase Ravine's power if it gets above 3/3, and then the counters will beef it up even further. Crawling Barrens works even better. It already benefits from the Obuun increasing its base stats because it animates itself as a 0/0. When I do animate it, it gets 2 counters, so it becomes a substantial threat even quicker. Roaring Earth lets my creatures accrue counters when I hit my land drops. The Channel ability is also nice to dump a lot of counters on a key land all at once.
If I'm too straightforward with my plan, opponents will outmaneuver me. Just because people dislike destroying lands doesn't mean they won't once they become creatures. Mina and Denn, Wildborn allows me to bounce a land back to my hand. If it's about to eat some removal, I can activate the ability and save that land, and then play it again since the Elf Ally allows me to play 2 lands per turn. If I'm about to encounter some unfavorable blocks, I get to cast Encircling Fissure and blank that damage. If I use Awaken, I can also add 2 counters to a key land, which might make the difference in defeating a blocker.
I'm going in two key directions to make my lands a real threat, giving lands key words and giving creatures with +1/+1 counters key words. Embodiment of Fury and Embodiment of Insight are great for this. They give my living lands Trample and Vigilance, respectively. More importantly, they Landfall a land into a 3/3 creature. It's only until the end of turn, so it dodges Sorcery speed removal, just like I argued for being important with Obuun vs Toph.
Since my lands tend to get counters thrown on them, and Obuun goes further and gives creatures +1/+1 counters, the next couple of cards were easy to add to my list. Abzan Falconer and Abzan Battle Priest are quite the pair. Flying and lifelink are great key words, especially when given to multiple creatures. Outlast isn't a great mechanic, but that small upfront cost to get a counter on the creature can pay dividends long term. Envoy of the Ancestors provides some redundancy for the lifelink aspect as well. I'm including Tuskguard Captain and Duskshell Crawler for the same kind of redundancy (was that redundant to say?). Hamza, Guardian of Arashin works a little differently. It profits from having mutiple creatures with counters on them both before he hits the field and afterward. Cost reduction is powerful and always worth considering, and it makes the land animating costs more palatable since it reduces the cost of future creatures I cast.
I could go on, but I think this is a good time to see the deck list.
Crush Contraband | Geode Rager | Ondu Rising |
Reclamation Sage | Living Twister | Mina and Denn, Wildborn |
Requisition Raid | Spelunking | |
Promise of Loyalty | Earth Surge | |
Hour of Revelation | Wilderness Reclamation | |
Master Chef | Sacred Ground | Waker of the Wilds |
Roaring Earth | ||
Akki Battle Squad | Nature's Revolt | |
Longshot Squad | Rootwise Survivor | |
Rishkar's Expertise | Elite Scaleguard | Encircling Fissure |
Return of the Wildspeaker | ||
Ainok Bond-kin | ||
Armorcraft Judge | Heroic Intervention | |
Tokik, Distinguished Advokist | Bastion Protector | |
Dusk Legion Duelist | Evolution Witness | Sylvan Awakening |
Leinore, Autumn Sovereign | Kamahl's Will | |
Lithoform Engine | Shalai, Voice of Plenty | |
Strionic Resonator | Evolution Sage | Rhythm of the Wilds |
Darksteel Garrison | Felidar Retreat | |
Planar Outburst | Sylvan Advocate | Loyal Guardian |
Karn's Bastion | Tyrite Sanction | Blast Zone |
Scavenger Grounds | Kessig Wolf Run | Jungle Shrine |
Raging Ravine | Needle Spires | Restless Biouvac |
Treetop Village | Nantuko Monastery | Mobilized District |
Blinkmoth Nexus | Inkmoth Nexus | Ghitu Encampment |
Crawling Barrens | Cave of the Frost Dragon | |
Plains x6 | Mountain x6 | |
Forrest x5 | Sunken Citadel |
Let's recap. Obuun, Mul Daya Ancestor and Toph, the First Metalbender both open up an animated land strategy. Obuun edges out Toph for the better option because he enables more damage from the attacking lands, protects his lands against Sorcey speed removal, and doesn't create liability of his artifacts against land destruction spells.
Obuun is great with lands attacking and with +1/+1 counter strategies. He can make himself a threat and spread that additional power around to his animated lands to double up the value. Try a land attack strategy out and let Obuun show you the broad spectrum of power Naya offers. What do you think? Have I convinced you to Make Your Magic?
Thanks for reading and all the support to date. I have affiliate links with Mana Pool and TCG Player to help fund these off the wall strategies. It's what makes all this possible.
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