I know they're typically considered silly cards, but since you can't keep a board-state style protection (pillowfort), have you considered Comeuppance, Fog, Holy Day, Darkness and the like? Maybe even Spore Frog or Kami of False Hope? They all fall into what your deck already does if you can squeak them in. Also/Alternatively, Angel's Grace or Intervention Pact?

Overall awesome silly deck and it will be interesting to see where you take it, so plus one from me.

Other graveyard hate cards that are somewhat easy to slide in:

Scavenger Grounds, Relic of Progenitus, Tormod's Crypt, Crook of Condemnation...

Land protection is harder to come by, but maybe just making them indestructible:

Terra Eternal, Avacyn, Angel of Hope

In terms of cards like Blood Moon and Back to Basics...Just don't let them resolve/kill them with Krosan Grip or play Prismatic Omen

Also another good way just to ensure you get the right colors for basic lands if you fear playing against Blood Moon or Back to Basics...use Land Tax to allow you to find the correct basic lands to play around both of those types of cards.

UpperDeckerTaco Land Tax is a card I've been seriously thinking about, and same with card's like Exploration and Burgeoning. My deck runs a loooooot of ramp, and land tax seems like it may not do a whole lot if i'm always ahead of curve. My fear is that their usefulness will fall rather short because of my tendency to ramp into a child on turn 4 or 5 followed instantly with sacrificing child to clear the board and discourage my opponents from winning. And those cards are extremely powerful early game. It's something I will have to test and see how effective it is versus a sorcery like Explore or Urban Evolution which i can very easily recur with Archaeomancer,Izzet Chronarch,Mnemonic Wall. But Eternal Witness and Noxious Revival can grab anything. So I think it is something that will just come down to testing.

I love this deck and am interested in seeing where you go with it but I'm wondering why you have cards that sacrifice creatures for value along with reanimation cards when you are barely playing any creatures, and the creatures aren't nearly as big as the usual reanimation targets.

DanteBeleren I really like this idea, because I am often caught in a situation where I am sacrificing child to blow up Maelstrom Wanderer only for the person to cast them again and then hit like Xenagos, God of Revels or some other crazy combat card that lets them either finish me off or put me in "check" with commander damage. I think I will see about Comeuppance because it turns the combat against the attacking opponent which i think is more powerful than just stalling a turn with a Fog card. thank you! I have never even heard of Comeuppance and it's in a commander set??? how was I not aware...

mattman856 think about it this way, if you take Child of Alara's death trigger and add it to a lot of my spells, it's almost like getting an added wrath to a lot of my spells, further locking down the board. The deck heavily relies on playing child of alara, and sending it to the graveyard, because it has to in order for the death trigger to happen. Momentous Fall + Child of Alara basically reads "Gain 6 life, draw 6 cards, destroy all nonland permanents. they can't be regenerated" which for 4 mana (technically 9 because you need child to be in play) is incredibly strong. Abjure is really funny because I'm probably countering a spell that an opponent is casting to try and disable or slow me down, and while I do that for a single blue mana, I'm also blowing up the board. The playstyle is very much "cast child, sacrifice child, reap the benefits". I tried to design the deck with the versatility of not needing permanents, hence how spell heavy it is, because of child dying as often as I need it to. The few creatures in the deck are there for their utility or to strengthen the synergy. I have two gods in the deck Xenagos, God of Revels which makes child a 12/12 haste trample commander damage that if you kill will just destroy the board, and Erebos, God of the Dead is to shut down life gain and to have a Greed effect. and the benefit of the gods is that they create an effect that I care about, and stick around even while I'm blowing up the board just about every turn.

Isnt there a ew card with something like 'creatures lose Indestrucible til end of turn' that is awesome for childs nemesis, Avacyn

Hour of Devastation

Bonds of Mortality

Cybersix I think it would make more sense to maybe run 1 or 2 "this creature loses all abilities until end of turn" spells because not only can I run them at instant speed, but it solves way more issues than just indestructibility. They're often cheaper too, like Gift of Tusks and Ovinize. I can also run something like Polymorphist's Jest that can affect every creature thus dodging an Asceticism.

Already in the deck is Capsize, which in most cases fixes my problems. If you have not used this card before it is incredibly versatile. In my playgroup is an Avacyn, Angel of Hope and normally I capsize their commander in response to a child trigger, and they lose their board. Something to exile their graveyard should soon be put in order afterwards because they're playing white. But then they only have avacyn, and avacyn by herself isn't very scary.

I'm definitely going to have to consider this! thank you for bringing it up!

Now I understand how that whole "sac child, reanimate, reap benefits" strategy and I like it a lot. I see the focus now and it's pretty creative. Great job!

you'll only get more consistency throughout a proper land base and a lot less redundant cards but you probably know that but then again 5 color consistency is a contradiction by itself... if you plan to utilize all 5 colors even with fetches and shocks you'll still be a bit behind...

But try and find some more proper Reanimators cards in the Mtgtop 8 site like they use more competitive consistent cards like Dance of the Dead just a small example and there are like small upgrades you could find in the top used cards there xxx

Just wondering what exactly is your win condition?

Enral, I'm in the process of writing a guide for the ins and outs for this deck. But there are really only 2 win conditions: Commander damage, and Maze's End. Both are viable, in fact I've won with commander damage in a pod of 6. Scapeshift is the easiest way to get a Maze's End win, and that can be done in a single turn with Amulet of Vigor and enough lands in play. The combo requires 11 cards, our 10 Guildgates, and Maze's End.

Example: I could have 2 Guildgates in play, and 7 other lands. You can do a number of things here depending on your hand. Have Maze's End and Scapeshift? Play the Maze's End, and if it sticks until you're next turn you can win by tapping lands you wish to sacrifice to Scapeshift, floating the remaining mana, grab 7 guildgates, spend 3 for maze's ends ability to fetch the last one, and you've got all 10 now And win on resolution. This can be done as early as turn 6, which isn't incredibly fast for most CEDH players. But this isn't a CEDH deck.

The other win condition that I rely on more so than Maze's End is good old fashioned commander damage. People have a hard time blocking when they have no permanents. Even when they do Child of Alara has trample and threatens to destroy their boardstate if they kill it. Only 4 unblocked swings with child is needed to kill with commander damage. This however is sped up immensely by Xenagos, God of Revels, who gives haste and doubles P/T. Allowing Child of Alara to swing for 12/12 trample haste, and blows up the board if you kill it. It's very easy to put child back into my hand from the grave, cast it main phase, and then swing that turn for 12. Then during the end step of the previous players turn or whenever I need to I can sacrifice child. Then recur it again and have an empty board to swing into on my turn for more commander damage.

The deck can get pretty stax-like towards the late game, and sometimes people just can't answer it. In many cases during testing if a decks win conditions are permanents and I have been pretty resilient in not letting them initiate any combos, followed by exiling their graveyards, they often concede. Many decks are not equipped to deal with this kind of oppression and value generator. Momentous Fall draws me 6 cards, gains me 6 life, and destroys all nonland permanents at instant speed for 4 mana.

Kiyomeii I agree with you somewhat on the efficiency of the reanimation spells that I have chosen for the deck, and your comment on my land choices. I'll take a second to try and explain what I've tried to accomplish.

Dance of the Dead, Animate Dead, and Necromancy are pretty hard to use multiple times because the theme with my deck, and one of the best things it can do for itself is to sacrifice my commander, Child of Alara, to wipe away the board. So these cards once they are in the graveyard can be rather tricky to efficiently return in order to continually benefit off of child. There are some incredible enchantment recursion cards out there, but some of them in my current list would require me to cast Argivian Find targeting necromancy or the like. Then casting the animation spell, which works entirely, but then if I want to do it again because I decided to cast Abjure, sacrificing child, to counter something like a Blightsteel Colossus, I'd have to go the route of casting a Noxious Revival or something else to try and do the same thing again. Plus cards like Animate Dead and Dance of the Dead have drawbacks to them. They are often susceptible to cheaper removal, thus getting rid of child in the process. It feels way more comfortable to Breath of Life child into play with no strings attached. Then my Archaeomancer just targets that and I'm off to the races. No middle man shenanigans.

Now, the reason all this is important, and why I assume that I'm going to have to do this multiple times is because child is a 6/6 and everyone at the table has 40 life (they also hate child). You only need 21 damage to win which is 4 unblocked swings with child but that all together is swinging 12 times in a row completely unblocked. That is not going to happen. The easiest way to control the board state with child is to purposefully sacrifice it. And if you have spells or abilities that sacrifice as a part of the cost, the trigger for child's death goes on the stack before I pass priority to the next player. It's why Perilous Research is probably going to be coming out, because it sacrifices on resolution. So if the spell gets countered I don't get my cards or a child trigger on the stack.

The reason Necromancy is in the deck is because there are creatures out there that have haste. Some of them are whatever like Glitterfang, but there are other creatures like Maelstrom Wanderer that are often the commander of a deck. So that player always has access to them, And it sucks when an 8 cmc, 7/5 haste, gives other creatures haste, cascade cascade creature drops in 2 big threats or a Protean Hulk and tries to kill me or the board. Necromancy can be played at instant speed, and I sacrifice at the end of turn, but I would probably do that anyways. I like to think of Necromancy as a combat trick more than anything. Maelstrom Wanderer is part of the reason I'm considering adding Comeuppance to the deck.

The other thing this deck has going for it is Maze's End and I've spent some time explaining how efficient that can be if you have the right cards in hand. Plus it's a combo that is available to 5 colors, and doesn't go away when I sacrifice child. A turn 4 Maze's End could mean I'm color fixed for the rest of the game.

I run a lot of basics because they're easier to ramp out into play. A lot of competitive land destruction targets nonbasic lands too, if that counts for anything. And there's plenty of reasons why I don't want to run a Hermit Druid 0% basic land combo deck with a hyper efficient fetches and shocks mana base.

If I ever get around to making a recording of the deck working well in a multiplayer pod, I will definitely upload it to this page to help provide insight on how I play the deck. And how I react in most situations with my experience in commander while running my list.

shandiris I have Corpse Dance in the maybeboard already, because it is awesome. And I will definitely add Bound/Determined and Phyrexian Tower to that list as well!

Deck is sick! Any thoughts on adding Fool's Demise or Gift of Immortality for recurring recursion?

dizzierabit Wow those cards are awesome! I'm definitely going to have to look into them!

I see, you play what you want to play of course, and I wish you the best of luck with upgrading your deck to its highest potential ;), I don't really see your mindset behind its consistency and all in all the viability in a competitive pod but I am not here to judge your playgroup...

May you beat many people with your child xD !!

Would love to see a proper primer though if you have time, I try to write primers and it's a great read most of the times to understanding others playstyle.

Kiyomeii Absolutely. I'm trying to be specific and take the time to fully deconstruct and explain the potential and goal of the deck. But I will remind you that it is not meant for a CEDH pod. Like tier 4 at best I suppose and I'm not rooting to compete with this deck. Just be annoyingly consistent.

All my CEDH decks have been taken apart since my playgroup has no interest in the matter. No more Zur or Teferi unfortunately.

I love this deck I really do, but why not have creature lands? You know, the ones from zendikar, they could even replace the guildgates as a direct upgrade. In case yoou dont know what I'm talking about, Link is here, just copy and paste it since the current link thing doesnt work http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Search/Default.aspx?action=advanced&type=+[%22Land%22]&text=+[becomes]+[creature]

But really there is no reason not to play these due to Child of Alara saying Nonland, these are still lands, so even in creature form they wont die to the Child of Alara death trigger.

I've been running Child using/abusing the Suspend mechanic, especially Greater Gargadon for a sac outlet.In my experience, colour fixing and ramp are not actually the main problems...

Good match-ups:

Child is quite good against Superfriends 'cause you don't care about Nevinryall's Disk.

Token decks, obviously.

Surprisingly good at Blue non-Counterspell Control, i.e. decks that use Roil Elemental/Frost Titan/Hover Guards/Ixidron etc to lock down an opponnent, I see this deck with Teferi, Planewalker and Tamiwha. The ability to sac in response can basically avoid these decks, especially if you have a sac outlet that can't be touched like Greater Gargadon.

Bad Match-up:

PROSH. Prosh doesn't even need to run to Food Chain, fast flying big damage is tough for Child.

Azami-Lab Man type decks..if you don't get Cavern of Souls it can be rough.

My favourite Child cards.
Victimize: Looks lacklustre, but remember the key text, 'as a cost for casting, sac a creature...', i.e. even if countered, Child is still going to the yard.Greater Gargadon: Potentially sac 10 times in the exile zone.

I like Child 'cause there are several ways to build it. I did Suspend, but you could also go massively in the Living Death direction and basically go hard on reanimate and Entomb type effects. It could also be an Artifacts/Indestructibility deck where you deny opponents flying, and go for Artifact stuff like Darksteel Forge, Myocosynth Lattice etc.

Tardigrade_Cain Thanks for taking a look into the decks land base! it is something I am always interested in improving upon account of a 5 color land base. Things can sometimes get tricky especially if you are trying to utilize some utility lands like I am attempting here.

I do want to say though how I disagree with your comments about creature lands in the deck. I'll firstly apologize for the delayed response, but I work often 70 hours a week and have to pick and choose carefully how I spend my free time. I disagree partially out of opinion, but here is my argument against creature lands for the deck;

I don't find that they are very good. Creature lands are not very big, and so although it is definitely beneficial that they are not susceptible to destruction in my efforts to abuse Child, it must be considered that they take up a slot in the deck, and in this case the land base which may result in loss of color even. Now I prefer to weigh a cards value if the card is getting me any closer to winning, and while my favorite creature lands available to me that could make sense in the deck, Svogthos, the Restless Tomb, and Inkmoth Nexus are arguably good cards they don't entirely get me very much closer to winning. Unlike commander damage from Child which kills in just 4 swings alone, or only 2 swings with Xenagos, God of Revels' start of combat phase trigger while in play.

Now my big fat personal opinion on the matter is that I love love love Maze's End and that strategy was the birth of this deck. So for the time being I will definitely continue to play in this style, but that doesn't mean I may venture away from it at some point.

Thank you for the intrigue and giving me something to think about over the weeks! Svogthos, the Restless Tomb definitely can see play in this deck as it cares about graveyards, this deck tends to be graveyard heavy, and ultimately can be nulled from my own child shenanigans. So it will sit in the maybeboard until I decide to give it a chance.