Thank you Venoctus, I appreciate it. I'd recommend checking out Purphoros, God of the Forge, perhaps over Terror of the Peaks. That Indestructible is much harder to deal with, and depending on game state, the 3 damage "Ward" from Terror might not be the biggest deterrence to targeted removal. Purphoros also has the added benefit of hitting all your opponents at once, making your end-game of fighting against a total of 120 life around the table a bit easier. Lol Purphoros might even be a slightly more budget option, since Terror of the Peaks is so popular for Miirym, Sentinel Wyrm decks. I guess if your budget permits it, you could run both!

You are completly right. Purphoros, God of the Forge is the better choice, i wasn't think about him. But for every Token 2 DMG is much better. BUT i cant target Planeswalker, Creatures and so on. Thats why i took Terror of the Peaks first. Do you mean Purphoros, God of the Forge is better to Gameending and i should forgot the "control element" with Terror of the Peaks ?

I would happy if you look to my Muldrotha Deck. Maybe you have also an Idea to get it better. (Landbase work in progress).

Regards.

Venoctus, if you have the budget and deck space, you could run both Purphoros, God of the Forge and Terror of the Peaks.

I think Purphoros is slightly better for helping Isshin end games because of its group slug damage. Yes, Terror of the Peaks can shoot damage at creatures and Planeswalkers, but is easier to remove.

Also, using Terror of the Peaks as removal is kinda slow and clunky. You need to have Terror stick around long enough and you need to make enough creatures to shoot the damage needed. Remember you can attack Planeswalkers directly each combat, so just send a few tokens or creatures at them. Generous Gift, Anguished Unmaking, and Vanishing Verse are all great removal pieces.

For Isshin, I've noticed it's helpful to have removal for value engine enchantments and artifacts, and attacking players and their planeswalkers will soften up their boards from blocks.

I have a deck with a similar playstyle, but I went with Rograkh, Son of Rohgahh and Tymna the Weaver as the commanders.

I think you should seriously look at Mardu Ascendancy, since it has the potential to generate you a ton of tokens (on top of having some built-in protection).

Another card I would recommend taking out of the Maybeboard is Breena, the Demagogue. She has worked extremely well for me, and she will easily draw you four cards in one turn all the while buffing your creatures into large threats.

I also think that Fiery Emancipation is a great card, and worth a consideration. The triple-damage easily ends games on the spot, and is a huge swing not many people are prepared for.

How is Dismantling Wave working for you? I like that it hits all opponents, but seems a bit pricey for artifact/enchantment removal. I run Wear / Tear instead, but might give Wave more of a look.

Death Tyrant seems fairly mana-intensive for its effect, does your meta run a lot of token decks?

Surprised not to see Boros Charm here. I would definitely give it a look, it has personally saved me more than once!

For ramp, I see you don't have any of the traditional signets (Boros Signet, Rakdos Signet, Orzhov Signet). Do you feel as though you have enough ramp already? Also, how has Liquimetal Torque worked out for you? I have considered it in the past, but never knew how often its ability would be useful.

Because your creatures are low to the ground, have you considered Austere Command?

Have you considered some of the backgrounds, namely Guild Artisan and Veteran Soldier? Artisan will generate you four treasures, and Veteran will generate 6 tokens.

Have you also considered Combat Calligrapher? Every swing will generate you a good amount of tokens, and it lures your enemies into attacking each other.

My apologies for the long post, but I hope it is helpful!

Almost forgot, two lands you might want to look into are Silent Clearing and Sunbaked Canyon, as they help mana-fix early and then can be ditched for cards in case you start to run out of fuel.

Thank you for the suggestions CommanderNeyo, also cool user name. Kind of a shame we didn't see more of Commander Neyo in later seasons of Clone Wars.

You have some pretty interesting suggestions, mixed in with a couple of cards I have played before. I'll do my best to address my thoughts on each. Of your suggested cards, I do have Breena, the Demagogue & Mardu Ascendancy in my obnoxiously convoluted Maybe List. A long response for a long post:

• Mardu Ascendancy has been on my radar since the earliest days of this deck's creation. I agree that it could fit right on, but haven't been able to decide what to swap it for.

• Breena, the Demagogue used to be in earlier versions of this deck. I swapped it out for Tymna the Weaver a few months ago. I think I swapped it out because there are 2 Breena decks in my meta that I play against semi-regularly, and I wanted to cut down on potential confusion with multi-Breenas out. Agreed though, I have had rotations in the past where I'd draw multiple cards. Might revisit this and swap Tymna back out, especially since Professional Face-Breaker fills a similar function as Tymna.

• Fiery Emancipation is cool, but I'm a bit more inclined to play that in something like Tor Wauki the Younger, which is more pinger damage focused. The triple color pip investment is not my favorite for 3 color decks. Cool card though, I can definitely see the value as a rec.

• Dismantling Wave and Wear / Tear - I've been running both of them in my 99 for this deck since its inception more or less. I like removal options that are versatile, and/or can hit multiple targets at once without necessarily being a wipe. I like both cards. Dismantling Wave feels helpful and relevant each time I've played it, & usually takes care of at least one value engine per board.

• Death Tyrant is an admittedly funky inclusion. Definitely a more experimental and flex spot that I've changed around the most over the past 10 months. I do play in a pretty token heavy, go-wide meta. I frequently play against the likes of Jetmir, Nexus of Revels, Xyris, the Writhing Storm, Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver, Chatterfang, Squirrel General, and Krenko, Mob Boss. I've seen Death Tyrant pop off for the Wilhelt deck. I've tempered my expectations that it would do a fraction of that here. Definitely a spot I could try something else. Possible landing spot for Mardu Ascendancy?

• Boros Charm is great. I liked it a lot in my Osgir, the Reconstructor deck when it was still built. I think between Teferi's Protection, Akroma's Will, and Flawless Maneuver I feel pretty decent on instant speed protection. Definitely something I've considered, especially with the other modal options. I love modal spells lol.

• Ramp overall feels fairly solid. Admittedly, I don't like the Signets as much because of the activation cost. My deck is fairly low to the ground, and rarely have felt the need for it. Zhentarim Bandit and Captain Lannery Storm can really gas things up with 1-2 swings each. Each time I've played Sword of the Animist, I wasn't the biggest threat until a couple turns later, and most of my Basics are on board now.

• Austere Command is a top end removal option I've gone back and forth on. I recently added Ruinous Ultimatum to the deck as my top end nuclear option. It sat in my hand during a game I played this past weekend where I had the 7 mana, but one of the mana generators was Liquimetal Torque lol. On paper, I like Ruinous Ultimatum as a problem solver, but am not a fan of the very specific color pip investment.

• Segue to Liquimetal Torque - I run it in most of my decks as just a rock. There's been a couple of occasions where I was able to turn something into an artifact when a Vandalblast went off. Not often, but still cool to know the option is there.

• Guild Artisan and Veteran Soldier - I honestly hadn't considered them at all. I don't attack with Isshin often. The times I do, he's wearing Boots or Greaves, Dolmen Gate or Iroas are on board, or I have some kind of protection in hand ready to go. I try not to risk him in combat if I don't have to.

• Combat Calligrapher was in one of the earliest versions of the deck that had more "pillow" effects like Marchesa's Decree. I played it once or twice, but my opponents would swing with it a couple times to get their Inklings, then kill the Calligrapher so they could then attack me with the creatures I gave them. One of the aforementioned Breena decks in my meta runs Calligrapher. They have had similar things happen to them lmao.

Crow-Umbra After a few months of being in various states of completion, I finally added my Isshin deck to the site earlier today. It's currently set to private, as most of my decks start out as, but I'll probably write up a little something for it and make it public this weekend. It has some fairly obvious weak points as I just threw in some random stuff I had on hand to hit 100 cards so I could playtest it in paper, and I'd love some pointers if that's alright with you. I love playing my token-based Isshin deck on Arena and I would like to replicate that feeling with the paper deck.

Sounds good to me KBK7101! I'd be happy to take a look at it once you're ready to make it public.

It's always best to start off with what you have at home before investing in upgrades.

If you have a local LGS meta or regular playgroup, I'd be happy to offer some more tailored suggestions with that additional context as well.

I have been testing Seasoned Dungeoneer and Caves of Chaos Adventurer in my Isshin list and they have been doing work! Highly recommend. Otharri in the boros pre-con coming up is another card to consider!

Thank you for cool the suggestions DawnsRayofLight. I've played Seasoned Dungeoneer a bit in my Burakos, Party Leader/Folk Hero deck before I swapped it out. I totally forgot about Caves of Chaos Adventurer.

My playgroup has a house rule where we introduce Monarch into our games at the end of the third turn rotation. The person going last in turn order becomes Monarch at the end of that turn. I think I may have placed some of the Initiative cards on back burner because I didn't want to have my group track both Monarch and Initiative/Under City at the same time.

Otharri and Neyali are both pretty cool tech. I think the Equipment Voltron Isshin lists are going to get some of the most tech with the newer equipment in the pre-con. I've been play-testing Neyali, Suns' Vanguard a bit in the slot I have Professional Face-Breaker rn. The impulse draw from Neyali is cool for some second-main set up, but feels a little annoying when she impulses some of my instant speed removal & protection.

I'm also testing Mondrak, Glory Dominus in the slot I have Leonin Warleader rn. Norn's Decree is also interesting. Hoping my submission will be live soon.

Congrats on one year of Isshin! I always look forward to when this deck gets an update.

I see that Otharri, Suns' Glory made it into the deck. Thoughts on that card so far? I was debating adding it to my own Isshin deck but I feel like it might be a bit "slow".

Thank you KBK7101! Honestly I'm kind of surprised with how popular Isshin became in the past year. He's already in or near the top 10 commanders in EDHREC. A year ago I thought that Satoru Umezawa or Hinata, Dawn-Crowned would have been the most popular commanders from Neon Dynasty.

I try to post updates when I feel they're relevant enough or worth posting lol. I printed out a copy of Otharri to try to play-test in the games I played last weekend, but sadly I didn't get the chance to play it irl then. I did like Skyhunter Strike Force and Mondrak, Glory Dominus when I played them in that game.

In solo play-testing I've mostly liked Otharri so far. I like that it has Haste baked in, so it is a bit speedier for a 5 drop. Although it has the baked in self-recursion, I'm not sure how often that will be relevant or used. If it manages to stick around or come back, then its token production potential will continue to scale up each swing with new Experience counters. I like that Otharri has flying, as I've wanted a little more "verticality" for attacking and defense.

I feel like the 5-drop and 6-drop creature slots are ones I've experimented with the most. I've also tested stuff like Balor, Death Tyrant, Karlach, Fury of Avernus, Ilharg, the Raze-Boar, and Adriana, Captain of the Guard at various points as 5-drop options.

Hi Crow-Umbra, I'm new to MTG and wanted to build an Isshin deck. This primer is fantastic. If you don't mind, I have a question about its power level. Using the general standard 1-10. Where would you place this deck? Knowing gives me an idea where I'll finish up within my meta so I can build it over time. (Starting a little cheaper) Thank you for an amazing primer. My first was a Yuriko primer that was incredible aswell. These help us new players immensely.

Thank you Madchase, I appreciate it. I'd be happy to look at your list & offer some suggestions once you have it finalized.

Honestly, I've stopped trying to use the "1-10 power scale" because it's so variable & subjective. If I had to try, I'd say I was aiming for like a 7.5-8.5, something that is fast, low to the ground mana-wise, & can be explosive/dynamic.

In case you didn't see it, I did write a short section in the primer called "How do I play the deck?" Which gives an idea of what I try to look for in opening hands or around the table.

If anything, I'd say my deck has had some of its worst match-ups against Aristocrats decks that run a lot of sacrifice based removal. I think this gets diminished a bit once I have a decent number of tokens on the board. This deck has consistently had a rough time against a friend's Muldrotha, the Gravetide deck, because I only have so much graveyard removal/hate, and also why I emphasized more Exile based removal as possible.

Some of the older updates have quick game summaries if you want a slight idea of snapshots of past performances. Not complete pictures of course, but I try to capture what I could remember best.

The various group slug effects & token generation go hand in hand to either win via combat damage or through group slug/drain damage. One damage type can soften up opponents to make the other move viable.

I think Isshin decks benefit from as much board protection at instant speed preferably, with a mix of effects like Dolmen Gate and Reconnaissance. The more you can keep your board intact to maintain momentum, & reduce the need for rebuilds will help close games out.

I frequently become the arch-enemy with fast aggro starts, and honestly that is a lot of fun for me. I like to be a problem that everyone has to deal with, even if I don't ultimately win. It becomes a compliment to get dealt with first lol.

Madchase - I forgot to mention some things in my last comment since I was typing on mobile. About $100ish of the price of this deck is tied up in foils and alternate printings. Picking up the cheapest version of each card should knock off about $100-$150. I haven't built many new decks in the past year, and if I have, I usually do so by recycling pieces from old decks and am mostly buying singles and upgrades.

Additionally, I think the 1-10 power scale is challenging to effectively nail down; the running joke is that everyone's deck is a 7. I think it's most important to find out (the hard way) what kinds of match ups are bad for your deck, and tailoring your removal and interaction to help minimize some of those deficiencies. Beyond the match up meta-game stuff, ultimately what is most fun and interesting for you.

Isshin go-wide, and other creature intensive strategies can have a rough time against volleys of removal. A variety of protection effects will help minimize that. Aside from the graveyard deck challenges and attrition from heavy removal, this deck can be challenged by other token strategies that establish faster. This was a big reason I've leaned into the group slug and drain to get "around" other big boards, and also why I've included cards like Legion Loyalist and Gruesome Realization. I also pack as much enchantment and artifact removal to help deal with troublesome value pieces, and stax/pillow fort effects like Ghostly Prison, Crawlspace, etc.

The deck isn't going to shine in every game or match up, and that's fine. When it does shine it can be explosive and dynamic in a way that I find to be fun.

Once your deck list is ready, give me an idea of what your meta is generally like, and what avenues for Isshin interest you most so I can try my best to give some more tailored suggestions.