Commander Clash S2 Episode 18: Commander 2016 Partners
Hello and welcome to Commander Clash, a video series where several MTGGoldfish contributors battle in a four player Commander game for fun and bragging rights. This week we continue our exploration of the new Commander 2016 cards by building decks around the new partner commanders: these are special commanders that let you run two commanders in your deck so long as both those commanders have the "partner" keyword. While individually these commanders aren't as powerful as some singular commanders, paired up they have numerous benefits such as a seperate commander tax on each commander, access to four colors, and powerful partner synergies that are conveniently available in your command zone. Here are the pairings that we're running:
- Tom goes deep into the red zone with a combat-focused deck led by Bruse Tarl, Boorish Herder and Ikra Shidiqi, the Usurper
- Seth breaks from his usual trend of durdly decks to instead play an aggressive Equipment/Artifact deck led by Akiri, Line-Slinger and Silas Renn, Seeker Adept
- Richard focuses on +1/+1 synergies with two Tarkir natives, Ishai, Ojutai Dragonspeaker and Reyhan, Last of the Abzan
- Tomer plays a Wheel deck, forcing everyone to discard their hand and draw (or not draw) new ones for value with Kydele, Chosen of Kruphix and Vial Smasher the Fierce
When first reviewing C16 I predicted the partner mechanic would be my favorite thing out of the set. Let's see if that's still the case! But first, quick reminder: if you like Commander Clash and other video content here on MTGGoldfish, make sure to subscribe to the MTGGoldfish Youtube Channel to keep up with the latest and greatest.
Toms' Deck (Bruse & Ikra)
Seth's Deck (Akiri & Silas)
Richard's Deck (Ishai & Reyhan)
Tomer's Deck (Kydele & Smasher)
Post-Game Thoughts
Okay, my deck was a bit too strong this week. I think Leovold, Emissary of Trest and Notion Thief really put it over the edge: it's just too easy to strip each opponent of their hands in one wheel and put them in a position where they can't bounce back. Without those, the deck is incredibly strong but not ridiculous.
I do think Kydele, Chosen of Kruphix is the strongest partner of the bunch: she effortlessly ramps for silly amounts of mana in any decent Simic deck. Simic has always been, and will always be, the strongest color pairing because it marries Green's ramp with Blue's card draw, and in Commander, Ramp + Draw = Easy Wins. Kydele is just another example of taking the best of both colors and enabling degenerate turns. I don't think she is ban-worthy, however. Kydele requires setup to do serious work; without card draw, she only taps for 1 mana. Sure, the decks that do run her will be consistently tapping her for 5+ mana, but she is manageable in a vacuum. I'd much rather see some other cards like Cyclonic Rift and Survival of the Fittest get banned before she does.
Next Week: Atraxa and Conspiracy 2!
Next week, Richard will be playing the last main commander from C16, Atraxa, Praetors' Voice. Joining her will be some of the new commanders from Conspiracy 2! Sorry it took so long to showcase them, but we only got (some) of the CN2 cards on Magic Online only recently! As always, we love to hear from you guys! Tell us what you like to see, what you don't like, any ideas that we can put forward for future videos, or anything else you'd like to tell us! You can reach us in the comments section below or tweet me @BudgetCommander.
