Devour for Power
I bought the Devour For Power card:The Mimeoplas (CMD) deck in 2011 and have been playing it eversince. I just love it to death. When this ooze becomes your commander, death becomes your friend. Opponents will watch in terror as you devour creatures from the graveyard to help you pound your opponent into the ground. It’s a fiendish carnival of cadavers. And lets face it; the dude has a freaking T-Rex as an arm. How awesome is that?!
You will enjoy The Mimeoplasm if:
- You enjoy being able to take advantage of all zones of play, especially the graveyard.
- You like a general that gives you a lot of utility, but can also serve as a wincon.
- You like to use many of the most powerful cards in the format to ramp, draw, and tutor.
- You enjoy playing with fatties.
- You’re looking for a deck that combos off as quickly as possible.
You might not enjoy The Mimeoplasm if:
- Your meta is filled with graveyard hate.
- You don’t like using staple cards.
- You don’t plan to cast your general.
- You are on a budget.
- You fail to see how awesome having a T-Rex arm is.
A Brief History
The Mimeoplasm is a Sultai Reanimator deck.
Sultai cards in this deck feature mechanics that allows you to manipulate resources. The color wedge is (focus color), and .
Reanimator (named after Reanimate) is a classic deck that shares traits with both the Aggro and Combo archetypes, but is distinct from the both in the manner in which it gets creatures into play.
While some Mimeoplasm decks follow the more standard Voltron approach, my biggest win-cons are combos.
General Strategies and Synergies
Although this Mimeoplasm is primarily a Combo deck, in many ways, it behaves like an Aggro deck; it has a proactive, aggressive plan and tries to deny its opponents a way out.
The aim is to combine a relatively small number of cards to instantly or very quickly win the game.
Because of this I emphasize on the ability to find specific cards quickly and win as fast as possible. This deck makes use of the best mana acceleration, card drawing and engines available.
The deck runs multiple combo's that will turn The Mimeoplasm into a kill-switch. Warning: Tables will be flipped my friend!
Some examples are:
Phyrexian Devourer + Triskelion in your graveyard with Necrotic Ooze in play.
The Mimeoplasm + Putrefax + body of power 5
In order to quickly setup these combo's we need cards that give flexibility, added bonus or have incredible value to begin with. Most powerfull cards have a buildin drawback to prevent them from becomming over-powerfull. This deck uses the drawback as extra value. Cards like Careful Study, Strategic Planning and Frantic Search allow you to draw cards and fill your graveyard at the same time. Other cards like Sphinx of Uthuun, Fact or Fiction,Intuition and Flash also abuse abilities that would normally be considered drawbacks; turning powerfull cards into over-powerfull cards.
Overall this deck is incredible powerfull but very vulnerable to graveyard hate. Cards like Bojuka Bog or Tormod's Crypt will ruin your day and only Stifle provides real protection. That being said; because of the high value in this deck you will still have a fighting chance.
Card Choices
Mana acceleration is very important in Duel Commander. We need to be faster then the other guy. There are multiple ways to achieve this feat. While mana rocks like
Coldsteel Heart and landfetch cards as
Cultivate are solid options I prefer to run the reliable six;
Arbor Elf,
Birds of Paradise,
Elves of Deep Shadow,
Elvish Mystic,
Fyndhorn Elves, and
Llanowar Elves.
I also run the following ramp cards:
Primeval Titan - The old faithful. Good body, great ability!
Deathrite Shaman - This deck runs all 9 possible fetchlands. Combined with Deahtrite Shaman that equals incredible mana acceleration. This card can also disrupt graveyard strategies, and grant inevitability. As far as value goes, this card is nuts!
How to fill your graveyard?
Careful Study, Compulsive Research, Strategic Planning, Fact or Fiction, Forbidden Alchemy, Frantic Search and Thirst for Knowledge all allow you to draw cards and fill your graveyard at the same time!
Sultai Charm - Also allows you to draw cards and fill your graveyard at the same time but comes packed with two other nice option. Great value.
Buried Alive - The cornerstone of every reanimator deck.
Intuition - If selected correctly you still get what you need.
Sphinx of Uthuun - Intuition on a solid body.
Survival of the Fittest - A solid engine to get multiple creatues in the graveyard.
Liliana of the Veil - Gives you the possibility to discard creature cards, while disrupting your opponent. The second ability provides solid protection. Great value, great card.
How to abuse your graveyard?
Recurring Nightmare - Hitting your opponent with the same fatty over and over again. It just never ends.
Exhume - Yes, your opponent may also reanimate. But you have the best targets in your graveyard!
Reanimate - A signature card like, Animate Dead, Dance of the Dead and Necromancy. These cards give you the possibility to trick big creatures into play relatively easy.
Necrotic Ooze - The more creatures in graveyards, the better. Phyrexian Devourer and Triskelion are his best friends. Your opponent will sigh out of disbelieve.
Gaea's Revenge - Slugger. A fast punch will not hit hard unless you put some body weight behind it. This beast has haste and a big body to back it up. He also has great buildin protection against most staple cards. This card is perhaps one of the most underappreciated creatures in the format.
Griselbrand - Mean Mr. Grinch. His insane card drawing ability makes him a instant gamechanger. Exspect alot of hate for this guy.
Jin-Gitaxias, Core Augur - The Core Shaker. This preator will lock your oppponent out of the game.
Massacre Wurm - The Stomper. This big worm destroys most token zerg decks. The life-gain is a nice added bonus.
Putrefax - The Stinger. Combined with a another solid body this little bug turns into a one-hit wonder; killing your opponent with 10 poison counters.
Rune-Scarred Demon - The Teacher. A solid 6/6 flyer that lets you tutor the card you need.
Terastodon - The Bull. This biggest body in the deck and comes with perhaps the most bad-ass ability ever to be printed on a creature. This will set your opponent back so far that he can't recover.
Woodfall Primus - Jimmy Two Times. They will hate him the first time, they will learn to fear him the second time.
Your opponent won't just roll over and die when he discovers your running The Mimeoplasm. In Duel Commander you can exspect to run into nasty combo's and fiendish plays. Your best protection is to disrupt your opponents play early on by screwing with the cards in hand. This decks runs the best in the business.
Duress, Inquisition of Kozilek and Thoughtseize will take care of the job. You will notice that I don't run Hymn to Tourach. Hymn is a great card but tricky to cast early on because of .
Diabolic Edict - Workaround for the popular hexproof mechanic.
Abrupt Decay - There are alot of powerful cards in the format that cost 3 mana or less. Abrupt Decay will take care of the job and can't be countered. A solid choice.
Dismember - Easy to cast and takes care of most creatures, including those who can regenerate.
Go for the Throat - Cheap and versitile.
Maelstrom Pulse - Solid destroyer of things.
Toxic Deluge - Can be everything between a mana elf stomper or a board whipe. Best part is, you get to deside the cut-off point! With so many fatties in this deck there is a good change that one of your creatures will surive and claim the game.
Pernicious Deed - Much like Toxic Deluge you have some say in what survies or doesnt. Good thing those fatties have a high mana cost!
We are almost done. Bare with me. Let's look at the cards not mentioned before.
Demonic Tutor - Perhaps the best tutor in the game.
Gitaxian Probe- Provides some insight and let's you draw a card for 2 lives!
Green Sun's Zenith - Helps you start that elf mana acceleration going early on or brings fatties into the battlefield when it matters the most.
Ponder, Preordain and Brainstorm provide insight and card draw. Not happy with what's going back on top? Just fetch a land. Told you those 9 fetchlands would be great!
Flash - Brings out big and nasty supprices at instant speed. Just when your opponent thought you where wide open. Boom! You flip the board.
Lim-Dul's Vault - With 40 starting lives a tutor in disguise!
Pact of Negation - Provides protection when you cast your kill combo. I run this over Force of Will because I never have a blue card in my hand when I need it the most. Don't worry about the drawback of Pact. You will win the round you need it.
Remand - Provides protection when you cast your kill combo. Its cheap and easy to cast. Don't worry about the drawback. You will win the round you need it.
Stifle - Much needed protection against graveyard hate.
Sylvan Library - Early on it can be a beast. Just spend the lives to draw cards so that you need to discard at the end of turn. Mid-game it turns into a filter card. Cards on top arent the ones you need? Just take damage and plough through your deck until they are. Don't go overboard though!
How to play
Early Game
Your focus should be on card draw, discarding creatures into the graveyard and ramping up using utility creatures and spells. Key cards here are cards like Careful Study, Deathrite Shaman, Gitaxian Probe etc. Cards like Primeval Titan or Terastodon can give you a big advantage early on. Get them out fast by either reanimating them, or by using Flash to put them into the battlefield.
Don't be supriced when your opponent folds the game when you do. The setback is that big!
Occasionally you might stumble upon some insane draws where you can simply reanimate a giant creature on turn two. If you can, you should! It might seal a quick victory. However, this will not happen very often, so you will usually need to play the more conservative gameplan.
Mid Game
After you have your resources up and running, you need to focus on building up card advantage through the use of value creatures and graveyard manipulation. Survival of the Fittest is amazing because it fills up your graveyard while simultaneously tutoring the perfect creature for any given situation. Keep control over the board by using your spot removal. Don't worry to much about getting overrun. Remember, once you get your combo on the table; its over!
End Game
When you reach the late game, you should have a sufficient advantage in resources over your opponents. Jin-Gitaxias, Core Augur and Griselbrand will provide a slow but steady win while Putrefax or Necrotic Ooze (backed with Phyrexian Devourer & Triskelion) serve as win-cons.
Conculsion
This is it! Thank you for taking the time to read my very first primer. I hope I did good.
If you have any suggestions about the deck or the cards I am running; please do. I'm open to all comments, suggestions, and advice.
