Commander 2014: Top 10 New (non-Planeswalker) Cards

The new Commander deck has been out for almost a week now, and I've had the good fortune to be able to play the decks in a Sealed environment. I highly recommend doing so if you can get 4 buddies together for a full day.

There are a number of exciting new cards released that are having me chomp at the bit to play them in a Constructed setting. I've drummed up a list of the most interesting new cards in the set. I've deliberately left the Planeswalkers off the list as they're in a bit of a category of their own, and fit great in specific decks. The cards in this list are ranked not only for power, but also for their versatility, potential Johnny usefulness (this is a Johnny blog, after all), as well as their long-term monetary value. I try to keep a keen eye on the ebb and flow of card values, and that's something I'd like to integrate into this blog. Essentially, these are cards that I suggest everyone add to their collection.

Decklist: WUBRG Elementals

Before wrapping up the mission I started with my post on building tribal decks, I had one last deck to share in that respect. This one's a bit more of a gimme, as Elementals are not without their innate support cards. I wanted to post a Commander tribal deck before capping things off however, and despite cheating on my part (this isn't that off-brand, as even the commander explicitly helps the tribe) the deck does have its own theme.

Decklist: WURG Tribal Changelings

Come on. Don't look at me like that. Changelings are a tribe too! Sure, they're every tribe, and technically I should be calling this a Tribal Shapeshifter deck. But aren't tribal decks so much fun when you can include tribal cues from any tribe??

Decklist: Monoblue Tribal Djinns

Here's a decklist that took some serious conceptual work to put together. You're probably thinking "But wait, Djinns don't have any tribal synergy!", and you'd be right. What this deck manages to do is weave together a mechanical theme through the tribe, giving us a nice, polished, and most of all thematic product.

Decklist: Monoblack Tribal Clerics

To cap off tribal week fortnight month, I'm going to share a trio of decks that will demonstrate different approaches to tribal deck building. First on the docket is a deck that has a bit of an identity crisis; a Cleric deck that wants to summon Demons and other abominations, but a lot of those Clerics also happen to be Zombies.

Decklist: RG Tribal Hellions

Continuing Tribal Week (more like Tribal Fortnight at this point, amirite), here's another deck I've mentioned in the main article: a Tribal Hellions deck.

Decklist: Monoblack Tribal Horrors

My earlier Off-Brand Tribal post mentioned tribal decks that have no overt strategy to gel it together, but rather more subtle cues that let us build something cohesive if we pick up on them. This is one of those decks.

Decklist: Monogreen Tribal Wolves

As a follow-up to my post on building an off-brand tribal deck, I've dusted off some old tribal decks and given them a bit of an upgrade to stay current. Up for review today: a monogreen Wolf deck.

How to Build an Off-Brand Tribal Deck

For this post, I wanted to go over some techniques and strategies for building off-brand casual tribal decks. By "off-brand", I mean creature types other than the obvious build-around types (Goblins, Elves, etc.) that have little-to-no proper support. You can find a list of tribal decks that I've put up at the end of this article.

The first thing to keep in mind is that this obviously isn't going to result in a competitive build. You're going to be making decisions that favor certain cards based solely on the fact that they promote the creature type of your choice, so as long as you stay within the casual spirit, you should have a good time.

Onto the actual deckbuilding process:

Khans of Tarkir - Drafting Strategy

I just drafted the heck out of Khans this past weekend. I feel like I say this every set but: This set is GOOD. It's got some solid cards for both casual and competitive play, it's got a cycle of rares that are already established as money cards, and the limited environment it creates is a very challenging one.

Welcome to the Johnny Blog

Welcome all to the Johnny Blog! I wanted to get a decent backlog of posts before officially declaring this blog up and running and now that that's done you can expect something of a regular output from here on out. I'll be posting decklists, reviews, drafting tips, and other articles from a Johnny slant.

First and foremost, I wanted to give a huge thanks to The Munson's Apps for their help in setting the autocard feature up. I'm not the most tech-savvy guy out there, but they were able to effortlessly walk me through everything. Give them a visit if you have any coding needs!

Now, a little about myself:

Decklist: BR Graveyard Burn

A while ago a friend of mine and I both coincidentally ran some Wheel of Fortune-based decks at the same time. I'm obviously a Johnny player, so I based mine off of the Commander format (Nekusar being my obvious commander-in-chief) and filled it with 99 other fun cards to make everyone draw. My friend is more of a Timmy player, and hence went for power.

Decklist: WU Self-Bounce

Here's a fun little Vintage deck I built a year or so ago. The concept is simple: the deck likes to bounce your own permanents back to your hand. Almost everything in the deck costs 2 or less, so you can promptly replay whatever you've bounced for fun and profit.

One of the best things about this deck is that it's incredibly cheap to build, consisting mostly of commons, so it should appeal to new players just getting into the game.

Onto the list, then:

Decklist: Commander Grenzo

I don't know about anyone else, but Grenzo, Dungeon Warden makes my inner Johnny squeal with glee. Let's see how we can best utilize this guy's potential.

Unshackled, indeed...

Out of all the cards coming out in M15, I'm sure Ob Nixilis, Unshackled raised more than its share of eyebrows.