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Trostani Reanimator EDH

Commander / EDH

ThallionDarkshine


This is not your typical Trostani tokens build: instead it relies on creating token copies of normal creatures to populate with Trostani for value. It functions as somewhat of a value/reanimator build, first ramping up and filling your graveyard with creatures, then reanimating them either normally or as tokens to populate. I've really enjoyed playing with this deck, and the amount of value you can generate in a single play always amazes me. It was heavily inspired by Mtg Muddstah's Trostani reanimator deck, but I tried to put my own spin on it wherever possible.

  • Resolving an Ulvenwald Hydra with Panharmonicon , Emeria Shepherd , and a sacrifice outlet on board sounds like fun.
  • You want your turns to be a complex puzzle, with lots of complex sequencing and tons of different paths to take.
  • You like taking a fairly well established commander and going off in a completely different direction.
  • You like the idea of accidentally outhealing damage-based decks.
  • You like using the graveyard as an extension of your hand.
  • You want your turns to be short and sweet, without any of that pesky sequencing getting in the way.
  • You think that playing lifegain in your deck makes games too easy.
  • You hate the idea of having fun.
  • You have an inexplicable and irrational hatred towards dryads.
  • Help! I got permanently exiled in this tappedout page by Fiend Hunter .
  • Does anyone even read this far down a list?
In the early game, focus on building your mana with early ramp spells. In addition, work on filling your graveyard to set up for future reanimation and drop various utility pieces.
As you transition into the mid-game, you should be looking for some sort of engine, whether through populating token copies of value creatures with Trostani, bouncing value creatures with Temur Sabertooth , or many other options. Continue to develop your resources (hand, board, and graveyard), and react to other opponents' actions with your removal tools.
Finally, as the game nears completion, try to find some way to finish off the table. This deck is very flexible in its win conditions: it can swing with a team buffed up by Gavony Township + Seedborn Muse , a buffed up swarm of plants from Avenger of Zendikar , or even just end the game immediately with one of the infinite combos.
There are two combos that are actually infinite, as well as many synergies that simply represent ridiculous amounts of value.

Fiend Hunter + Sun Titan / Karmic Guide + Sacrifice Outlet: Infinite creature etb/ltb/death triggers; Infinite of whatever the sacrifice outlet does.

Karmic Guide + Reveillark + Sacrifice Outlet: Infinite creature etb/ltb/death triggers; Infinite of whatever the sacrifice outlet does; Infinite etb/ltb/death triggers of any creature w/power<=2 in your graveyard.

Emeria Shepherd + Ramp Creature + Sacrifice Outlet: Depending on the ramp creature, can either fetch all the plains in your deck, find you as many lands as your mana permits, and sometimes even draw you a bunch of cards.

Vitu-Ghazi Guildmage / Trostani, Selesnya's Voice + Token Copies: Ridiculous amounts of value, depending on what the original token copied.

Angel of Sanctions - This is probably the worst way to make token copies, since it can only make a token copy of itself. However, populating Oblivion Ring s is pretty good, though giving everyone back their stuff when someone board wipes is not all that great. One neat thing you can do is use this to flicker your creatures, getting to reuse their etb/ltb triggers.

Bramble Sovereign - This card is super sweet, letting you double up on the etb-triggers of some of your value creatures, while simultaneously setting them up to be populated by Trostani. This card is interesting in that it's the only one of our token copy generators that requires you to play the creature to copy after it. In most cases in this deck, it's ideal to play out cheap cycling creatures in the early game to copy later on in the game. This card promotes a different playstyle, where you wait until after it hits the field to start playing out value creatures. It's still great, but topdecking it right after playing out a hand of value creatures feels really bad.

God-Pharaoh's Gift - This card is great because it can turn all our derpy little value creatures into actually powerful attackers. Swinging with your board of Wood Elves has never seemed so threatening! However, besides that this card is pretty eh... 7 mana is a lot, especially when you want to be populating the token in the same turn. In addition, you can only make one token per turn cycle, unlike other things that can actually make one every turn.

Mimic Vat - This card is unique in that it is the only one in our arsenal that can actually copy opposing creatures. I may like this card a little bit too much (I'm currently running it in 3 of my 4 paper decks), but in this one it fits incredibly well. It can be draw, ramp, recursion, removal, or maybe even a win condition depending on what creatures opponents are playing.

Mirrorpool - This is probably my favorite card in this entire deck, mostly because in my opinion, it's actually the single card that enables the deck the most. Because it is a land, you can tutor for it much more easily than some of the other options, and enables a powerful suite of nonbasic lands with land tutors to back them up. One of my favorite lines of play is ramp to 6 mana, drop Ulvenwald Hydra fetching this, and then proceed to start populating hydras on your next turn.

Seance - I love this card, but without the correct shell to support it, it can be very bad. This is 100% the correct deck to run it in, filled with cheap cycling or ramp creatures, and coming complete with ways to make permanent copies of the tokens it makes. While it's hard to populate a token on every turn, most of the tokens we make with this don't actually need to stick around, and permanently exiling that Wall of Blossoms from our graveyard isn't a big deal.

For the purpose of this category, I will be defining a value creature as any creature that has an effect that generates value when it etbs, ltbs, or dies.

Acidic Slime - Blowing up basically any non-creature permanent is pretty good. EDH players love running around with powerful artifacts, enchantments, and even lands (this deck is a prime example), and this card is a great way to say no to that.

Angel of Finality - Graveyards-matter strategies are another staple of EDH, and a very powerful one at that. Unfortunately for all those Muldrotha players out there, we don't want other people to have fun, so this card is here to shut down other peoples' graveyards.

Angel of Sanctions - Previously mentioned in the token copies section, this is a great temporary answer to any troublesome nonland permanent.

Avenger of Zendikar - Making a giant army of plants that grow as you play lands is always pretty alright. It gets even better if you have combos that can, say, fetch all the plains in your deck. Or maybe, populate Avenger of Zendikar so you get multiple landfall triggers for each land you play. While I hate the idea that this card doesn't draw me cards or fetch me lands or blow up problematic permanents, this is probably one of the most synergistic win conditions for this deck.

Elvish Rejuvenator - A sort of Rampant Growth on a stick, this guy is really great because, while he can whiff sometimes, he can also find some of our powerful utility lands, which can do some incredibly powerful things.

Elvish Visionary - One of our cycling creatures, this guy's actually the only one of our 2-cmc cyclers that can actually attack (really important for Blade of Selves ).

Eternal Witness - This card is a staple in green decks, and gets even better with how many ways we have to reuse his effect.

Farhaven Elf - Probably the worst of our ramp creatures, however he's still a 3-cmc Rampant Growth on a stick, which is really good in this deck.

Fiend Hunter - Cheap removal on a stick is always good, and this guy's one of the cheapest. In combination with a sac outlet, you can permanently exile an opposing creature. In addition, this guy can combo with Sun Titan or Karmic Guide to give you infinite sacrifices.

Fierce Empath - This card is incredibly powerful. There's so much power on the 6+ cmc creatures in the game. In this deck, it can fetch you a finisher, ramp, removal, recursion, draw... Basically it can be literally whatever you need at the time. I remember one game, I was sitting around basically doing nothing with just Trostani in play and one card in hand (a land). My opponent had set up lethal, and I needed this draw to be a big one to get me out of this pickle. I drew Fierce Empath , and proceeded to find Emeria Shepherd , get back a God-Pharaoh's Gift , use it to reuse the Empath, and finish the turn off by playing out a 20/20ish Ulvenwald Hydra . As you can imagine, this play kind of tipped the scales in my favor, and I ended up winning the game.

Greenwarden of Murasa - Eternal Witness is so good in this deck that we play a 6-mana E-Wit. The second part of this guy doesn't come up all that much, so basically that's what this guy is, and he's still fantastic!

Karmic Guide - Reanimating a creature onto the battlefield with a creature is a very powerful ability. While this card theoretically has the downside of its echo cost, often we actually like that it can sacrifice itself. In addition, this is one half of several infinite combos, all giving infinite sacrifices, and one letting you recur a large part of your graveyard in addition. The only downside to this card (if you can call it that), is that it costs 5 mana instead of 6, and can't be fetched by Fierce Empath .

Meteor Golem - I was really excited when this card was printed, because it gives so many decks a lot more options, letting them include a card that can get rid of basically any problematic permanent (with the exception of lands). In addition, this card hits two very relevant card types, and has 6+ cmc to be found with Fierce Empath .

Regal Behemoth - So let's get this straight, this is a nonlegendary creature-based mana doubler that can draw you cards? That doesn't sound broken at all... I really like the effect the monarch mechanic can have on games, and in addition to that this is just a great card. Have you ever gotten to the point where each of your lands taps for 15 mana? If not, I definitely recommend it. Basically, this card is ridiculous in this deck. It's very mana hungry, so doubling your mana is sweet, and if you can make a token copy of it, it scales extremely well.

Reveillark - A large number of our value creatures have power 2 or less, so it's fairly easy to draw a couple cards or fetch a couple lands off of its ltb trigger. Not only that, this forms a loop with Karmic Guide that gives you infinite sacrifices and loop every creature with power 2 or less in your graveyard.

Sakura-Tribe Elder - Another great ramp creature, this one is probably the best, if only because it comes down a turn sooner than the others. In addition, it sacrifices itself, so it can fetch all the plains in your deck with Emeria Shepherd without even needing a sac-outlet.

Satyr Wayfinder - Kind of a cycling creature, it finds you a land while also helping to fill your graveyard with recursion targets. Each effect on its own is pretty mediocre, but together I think they add up to a reasonable card.

Skullwinder - An Eternal Witness that can be used politically to help the table get out of a tricky spot. In addition, it has deathtouch, so it makes a pretty threatening blocker.

Skyscanner - The only 3-cmc cycling creature in the deck, this guy is actually really good, because it doesn't require colored mana and is a flier for when you need to block big scary dragons.

Solemn Simulacrum - This guy is great value, getting you lands on etb, then cycling when he dies. Much like Skyscanner , the fact that he doesn't require colored mana can occasionally come in handy.

Sumala Woodshaper - This is a great cycling creature for its ability to dig and help you find whatever you need at the time. Adding the ability to find enchantments was what pushed it over the top for me, since you can dig for your sacrifice outlets off of this. In addition, having a 4-drop cycling creature that doesn't need to be sacrificed is nice for Uncage the Menagerie piles.

Sun Titan - Much like with Reveillark , this guy's ability can recur a large number of the other value creatures in this deck, as well as getting back some of our powerful enablers. And here's the obligatory mention that he combos with Fiend Hunter for infinite sacrifices.

Terastodon - This card is like an Acidic Slime on steroids: it can blow up tons of troublesome permanents, or even blow up your own stuff to get elephants to populate. Unfortunately, this can't hit artifact/enchantment creatures like Acidic Slime , but that's a fairly minor downside.

Ulvenwald Hydra - Getting any land in the deck is incredibly powerful, letting you find Mirrorpool to start populating creatures, Buried Ruin to recur artifacts, Reliquary Tower if you have to many cards in hand, or even just a lowly dual land if you need colored mana. The possibilities are pretty much endless with this guy.

Wall of Blossoms - One of the cycling creatures in the deck, it can't attack for Blade of Selves , but is pretty great in all other regards.

Wall of Omens - One of the cycling creatures in the deck, it can't attack for Blade of Selves , but is pretty great in all other regards.

Wood Elves - The final ramp creature in the deck, this guy can be really good to generate you some more colored mana in the middle of a power turn.

Bramble Sovereign - See entry under "Token Copies".

Emeria Shepherd - This card is bonkers in this deck. Since pretty much all of our ramp comes in the form of land fetch, this guy turns all your late game ramp into reanimation spells. In addition, you can often chain out a large portion of your graveyard with her off of one initial plains.

Fauna Shaman - I really wish I could afford a Survival of the Fittest for this deck, but this card can make a pretty good impression of it. All of our main combos are pretty much completely creature-based besides the sacrifice outlet, and only require you to have one piece in hand. Basically, this card just really makes the deck come together.

Knight of the Reliquary - A repeatable land tutor that also can act as somewhat of a mana dork? Sign me up! He also gets lands into your graveyard for synergies with Ramunap Excavator and Sun Titan .

Ramunap Excavator - I tried to include a lot of utility lands to make the most of the land tutors. This guy is good to ensure you keep hitting land drops with fetches, to reuse powerful utility lands like Mirrorpool , or even just to play some random lands you discarded to hand size early in the game. I have chosen to run this card over Crucible of Worlds because as a creature it is much more tutorable.

Seedborn Muse - Populating on each turn is very powerful, making this a great inclusion. I really wish its ability was actually a trigger, since it would let us populate tokens of them to untap multiple times every turn. However, it's still a very strong effect, and synergizes great with all our utility lands as well as Trostani.

Temur Sabertooth - In the unlikely event that we are unable to make token copies to populate, we'll need some other way to generate value. This card synergizes very nicely with all our etb creatures, and can help protect us against board wipes by bouncing important creatures.

Vitu-Ghazi Guildmage - You know what's better than populating once per turn cycle? Populating more than once per turn cycle. This deck generates a ton of mana, so it should be very possible to populate 2-3 times per turn. In addition, this can make us a vanilla token to populate if we can't find a way to make token copies.

Altar of Dementia - Of our sacrifice outlets, only this and Ashnod's Altar can be used infinitely with one of our loops. In addition, this is the only one that can actually win the game this way. It also gains additional utility because we can mill ourselves with it in the early game to fill our graveyard.

Ashnod's Altar - Of our sacrifice outlets, only this and Altar of Dementia can be used infinitely with one of our loops. While this cannot actually win the game in this way, generating incidental mana can be very useful in fueling power turns.

Birthing Pod - This is one of the most powerful cards in green, especially in graveyard-centric decks. Turning one of your early game cycling creatures into a ramp creature is pretty decent value, and if your opponents don't immediately remove it, it can do so much more work.

Evolutionary Leap - I've tried to run this card in many of my decks over time, but it never really fit all that well. In this deck, however, you've got lots of cheap value creatures that you want to kill off, that maybe cycled already. Turning them into new creatures is incredibly good, letting you generate tons of value while filling your graveyard with value creatures.

Greater Good - This card is a great fit in the deck, but can sometimes be fairly dead. A lot of your value creatures are fairly small, so you actually go down cards by sacrificing them to it. However, it's great if you can even go card neutral with it, since you really like cards in your graveyard and just seeing more cards is almost never bad.

High Market - A great utility land, letting you sacrifice your creatures for minimal benefit, potentially saving them from exile.

Austere Command - One of the most flexible board wipes in the game, there's basically always a pretty good set of modes to use.

Beast Within - Great unconditional removal, and you can even use it on your own stuff if you want it dead or need a token to populate.

Cleansing Nova - Normally I run just another creature-wipe in this slot, but I'm going to try out the nova for now, since blowing up artifacts and enchantments is often very useful. The only question I really have about it is how often it's worth sacrificing our supporting pieces to blow up opposing artifacts/enchantments.

Cultivate - Ramps your mana and helps make sure you keep hitting land drops. Great card.

Dusk / Dawn - I wanted a third wrath in the deck, and this feels like probably the most synergistic. There are some important creatures that this is unable to destroy, but the upside of later being able to recur most of the value creatures in your graveyard makes it worth it.

Dawn of Hope - I really like how this is an incredibly cheap value-engine that basically turns all your creatures into cycling creatures with Trostani on the field. Its token production can potentially be very relevant with the amounts of mana this deck can produce. Definitely a great card for this deck.

Eladamri's Call - Pretty much every effect you'll need in this deck can be found on a creature, making creature tutors really good. In addition, this is a really cheap tutor, finding the card to your hand for only 2 mana.

Eldritch Evolution - This card is ridiculous in the deck, and the best part is that it does not specify the exact mana cost, only that the creature tutored be less than a certain cost. You can quite easily tutor up some of the strongest threats in the deck with lots of mana up afterwards to abuse them.

Green Sun's Zenith - Nothing special, just another powerful creature tutor. Only being able to find green creatures can occasionally be a problem, but most of the time you'll be able to find the effect you want with this one way or another. It's possible the deck wants Dryad Arbor so this can be a 1-cmc ramp spell, but I'm having trouble with land slots as is, so for now this can only ramp you for 3 mana by getting Sakura-Tribe Elder .

Lightning Greaves - I definitely think there should be at least one copy of this effect in the deck, but I'm not sure whether there should be more. Since we are fairly reliant on our commander, protective boots are pretty good, and we have a surprising number of creatures that like to have haste. Perhaps one day I'll put Swiftfoot Boots back in, but for now I'm sticking with just the greaves.

Mirari's Wake - Mana doublers are very good in this deck, and a 5-cmc one is ridiculously good. It's incredibly easy to slam it down during a turn where you develop other things because of the amount of ramp in the deck, how cheap are cards are, and how cheap it is, as far as mana doublers go. In addition, the +1/+1, while not all that important, is not entirely irrelevant.

Panharmonicon - Take a look at this deck. See how many etb triggers we have? This deck runs this card... It can do ridiculous things, especially with a ramp creature and Emeria Shepherd , but even on its own, it makes your cycling creatures actually draw, doubles the effectiveness of your removal and ramp, and gains you a little more life off of Trostani.

Selesnya Signet - Just a good, efficient ramp spell. It is especially good because we have a lot of colorless lands that we need to fix into colored mana for our commander.

Skullclamp - While this isn't necessarily the greatest Skullclamp deck, we do have a bunch of x/1s running around to draw off of, and even if we can't find one of those, we have quite a few sacrifice outlets to pair it with.

Swords to Plowshares - Great removal spell, basically the most efficient creature removal in the format. It you're playing white, you play this card.

Uncage the Menagerie - This has become my pet card of late. There are so many ridiculous things you can do with it, and even in any random creature-based green deck, you probably have Eternal Witness to enable the line of uncage for 3, e-wit it back, then uncage again. The card is especially ridiculous in this deck because there are multiple values of x that find entire combos (minus the sacrifice outlet). Doing it for x=3 gets you Fiend Hunter and Fierce Empath to find Sun Titan , while x=5 finds you Reveillark and Karmic Guide , potentially with Acidic Slime if you can't actually win off of the combo on its own. Even if you don't play it to set up your combo, it can just generate a ridiculous amount of value, since we have so many value creatures clustered around 2-3 cmc.

Zendikar Resurgent - Doubling our mana and letting us draw off of each of our cheap value creatures is exactly where we want to be with this deck. I remember one game where my opponent had like 25 unblockable damage on board, and I was sitting around 23 life. I developed this card and gained a little life off of Trostani, putting me just outside of his range, counting on the power of this card to carry me to a win on my next turn. Long story short, mana doubling and card draw is pretty ridiculous, and I managed to cycle my way to a combo kill that next turn.

Long story short: Ulvenwald Hydra is probably the best card in this deck, so we'll probably tutor it up at our first convenience, and then start copying it for value. Because of this, I constructed a powerful package of utility lands around it. These lands allow us to generate card advantage, become a draw-go deck, and so much more.

Buried Ruin - Lots of important cards in this deck happen to be artifacts, so we've got this to make sure we can keep them on the field.

High Market - With so much recursion in the deck, it can be very important to get our creatures dead. Having access to a free sacrifice outlet on a land is incredibly powerful for the deck.

Krosan Verge , Myriad Landscape - These are pretty straightforward: ramp cards that basically don't take up deck slots.

Memorial to Unity - Occasionally I find myself rushing out an Ulvenwald Hydra and then realizing that my hand literally does nothing after that. In situations like that, it's important to have a land that can generate card advantage, which this does.

Mirrorpool - This card is the reason why Ulvenwald Hydra is nutty in the deck. We want to copy our creatures and start populating them ASAP, and this lets us find a way to make token copies with a creature we want to copy.

Reliquary Tower - This deck can generate ridiculous amounts of card advantage, so being able to easily tutor up a way to keep lots of cards in hand is very important.

Selesnya Sanctuary - This card's not spectacular, but it can let us make our land drop for a turn if we don't have another land to play. Sometimes being able to reuse a land's effect can also be important.

Winding Canyons - This land is incredibly powerful, comboing with Seedborn Muse to let us take an additional turn during each opponent's turn. Alone, it gives us the option to play like a draw-go deck, playing our land and passing with a boatload of mana up to respond to opponents.

Suggestions

Updates Add

This is just a collection of some minor updates to the deck. I acquired Green Sun's Zenith and a Winding Canyons, so they have made their way into the deck. In addition, I wanted an additional wrath, so I threw in a Dusk / Dawn.

I've been testing some additional changes, including an artifact package with Inventors' Fair to find my free sacrifice outlets. In initial testing they have felt really good, so I'm probably going to be shifting towards that in the next update. I also am doing some testing with Traverse the Ulvenwald, which seems very good either to help us hit land drops in the early game or find a finisher later on in the game.


+Green Sun's Zenith: This is just another powerful creature tutor in a deck that really likes creature tutors, since they can get pretty much any effect you need at the time.

+Dusk / Dawn: I really like this card. I haven't done much testing to see how it matches up against opposing creatures, but I like the idea of pulling back a graveyard full of value creatures with the dawn half.

+Winding Canyons: This is coming in to replace Gavony Township to generate value with Seedborn Muse. I never really liked Gavony Township, since I don't like turning my creatures sideways, so instead getting to play more value creatures during opponents' turns fits my playstyle better.

-Growing Rites of Itlimoc  Flip: I liked the mana this could generate in playtesting, but its poor performance after board wipes convinced me to let it go. Plus, I was whiffing on its etb trigger way too often. I would keep hands depending on finding gas off of it, and then just whiff and be stuck with a hand full of garbage.

-Sylvan Reclamation: This card is very good, but I feel like my creatures give me enough ways to deal with artifacts and enchantments, so I'm swapping it for a wrath to better deal with aggressive creature-based decks.

-Gavony Township: This card is great, but it's just not for the deck, so I'm switching to Winding Canyons.

Comments

Date added 6 years
Last updated 5 years
Key combos
Legality

This deck is Commander / EDH legal.

Rarity (main - side)

10 - 0 Mythic Rares

34 - 0 Rares

22 - 0 Uncommons

17 - 0 Commons

Cards 100
Avg. CMC 3.76
Tokens Angel of Sanctions 3/4 W, Beast 3/3 G, Centaur 3/3 G, Copy Clone, Elephant 3-3 G, Plant 0/1 G, Soldier 1/1 W w/ Lifelink, The Monarch
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