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Niv Rizzet, Papa Parun

Commander / EDH Bracket 4 Combo Spellslinger UR (Izzet) Wheels

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Instant (27)

Creature (4)

Land (39)

Artifact (9)

Planeswalker (1)

Commander (1)

Commander: Niv-Mizzet, Parun

Sorcery (15)

Enchantment (4)

Maybeboard

Instant (3)

Is it Izzet Niv Mizzet or Izzent It?

It is izzet. About as izzet as you can get. Ya like wheels? Ya like control? Ya like combos? Ya like jazz?

Then take a look!

I have been playing Niv Mizzet as a commander for over 10 years. He’s my main deck, and I’ve cultivated a large collection of cards that fit into his 99.

There’s a few ways to build him, and before we go any further, I’d recommend starting with Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind before deciding to build a Parun deck. He feels like a much more budget friendly commander. The 2UURR cost vs the UUURRR may not seem like a big difference, but the investment in lands will have to go up significantly to get Parun to run at speed.

This started as a Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind deck back in 2015. Wheels were always more interesting than the Curiosity combo, but back then it was budget wheels like Magus of the Wheel, Mindmoil, Arjun, the Shifting Flame and Teferi's Puzzle Box instead of Wheel of Fortune, Echo of Eons and Time Spiral. But I also liked the idea of spell slinging cheap cantrips, so there was a bunch of budget plays like Murmuring Mystic, Talrand, Sky Summoner and Saheeli, Sublime Artificer. The Locust God eventually became a lieutenant commander to try and merge wheels and spell slinging together. The deck was all about going wide to protect our commander, and to ping where we could. The constant effect wheels would eventually draw us a Curiosity, and if everything worked right, we’d have our commander out to attach it to. Otherwise, it would get discarded or shuffled back into the library on the next wheel trigger. The stars really had to align to combo off.

This worked OK, but it was obvious there were competing interests in the deck. Lots of payoff cards didn’t scale on draw. Lots of low cost spells weren’t drawing a lot. Kind of clunky, but budget friendly and fun.

I suggest anyone who is looking to make a Niv Mizzet deck start with Firemind, or maybe even Niv-Mizzet, Visionary! In my experience, Firemind was much easier to pilot than Parun is.

Niv-Mizzet, Parun solves a lot of what my original Firemind deck wanted to do. Parun thrives on both wheels AND spell slinging.

But that comes with a price. His mana cost.

There’s no way of getting around it, UUURRR absolutely sucks to pull off.

That change in cost is the biggest challenge when it comes to making a Parun deck. The deck’s average CMC got leaner over the years to have more flexibility. Constant wheel effects like Arjun, the Shifting Flame just cost too much. Everyone at the table already hates you for playing Parun, so big flashy permanents tend to get removed quick. Doesn’t feel great to pay six for Arjun, next turn pay six for Niv, and then get blown up. New cards came out that helped with that, and then they got banned. Jeweled Lotus, Dockside Extortionist and Hullbreacher bans really, really sucked for us. They sucked for everyone, but especially for Parun. 6 colored mana, in Blue/Red, does not have many options for early game ramp.

Wheel effects now had incentive to be instant/sorcery based. Cantrips now look twice as good. The curve naturally came down over time. We also get more stability than we did with Firemind when it comes to drawing Curiosity and holding onto it for when we need it.

My hope is that these design choices will get you thinking like a Niv player. Along the way, I’ll also call out budget friendly alternatives and additional cards if you’d rather lean into a certain play style.

My Parun deck is a mix of spell slinging, combos and wheels. But any of these archetypes make for a fun Parun deck.

We’re back to old school rocks. Sky Diamond, Fire Diamond, Arcane Signet,Talisman of Creativity and Izzet Signet round out the 2CMC colored Mana Rocks. Sol Ring is still in the deck, and it’s still one of the best rocks. It just serves a different purpose now.

The 3CMC rock is just Commander's Sphere. It’s included for the draw ability. Games have been won sacrificing the Sphere to trigger the curiosity combo (self-starting the combo is something we lost when switching from Firemind to Parun - in most cases, we have to pay to start it now). The free draw effect on Sensei's Divining Top plays a similar role.

Pyretic Ritual is a new post-ban addition to the ramp package. If it works to cast Parun, great. Playing the ritual with Parun out leans into our spellslinging agenda and gives card draw, positive mana and damage. That’s a spicy meatball.

The three best curiosity combos for Parun are Curiosity, Ophidian Eye and Tandem Lookout. The eye is probably my favorite.

If you were more combo inclined, Curiosity + Glint-Horn Buccaneer has a cleanup step exploit where you get stuck in a loop discarding down to 7 and redrawing an 8th off the Buccaneer’s damage ping. Personally I find it tacky and hard to explain to people who haven’t seen it before. It’s just such an “ackchewally here’s how MtG works” combo. We’re playing Parun, we’re pretentious enough.

If you want a fourth Curiosity effect, and want to be cheeky about it, you can run Niv-Mizzet, Parun + Niv-Mizzet, Visionary . But this deck does not benefit from playing Visionary on his own, which makes Tandem Lookout a lower costed Curiosity creature. Visionary also Combos off with Firemind, and I can see that being a really fun deck.

Not quite as reliable as Curiosity but worth a mention: Dramatic Reversal + Isochron Scepter + Sol Ring or enough mana rocks to tap for 2 colorless will give you infinite card draw with Parun out, and make you go mana infinite if there’s enough rocks out. This combo is a holdover from the old Firemind days, but instead of untapping Firemind off of Dramatic Reversal and tapping for his draw/ping trigger, Parun gets his trigger on the casted copy of Dramatic Reversal. There are certainly enough removal instants at 1 or 2 CMC that make the Scepter a decent 99 include on its own, but Dramatic Reversal as a solo card in this style of deck doesn’t give me the warm fuzzies. It’s a dead card with no return until there’s 3 mana worth of rocks laying around, or until Parun is on the field. Although, at that point there’s usually at least 1 mana rock - Maybe 1 draw, 1 damage for 1 mana is good value if you’re fishing for a Curiosity. I think I’d run it in a Visionary style deck where you have a bunch of creatures tapping for ping damage.

They weren’t really your friends anyway. You don’t need them and they don’t need their hand of cards. Wheel them away with Narset, Parter of Veils’s static ability.

It’s also our hard counter to any other Niv Mizzet decks out there.

We play enough nonland, noncreature cards for the activated ability to provide consistent value.

She is also great at getting damage directed away from your face.

Planeswalkers

There are a lot of Counterspell targets that will let your opponent win the game. But there’s only one card out there that will make us lose the game.

Narset, Parter of Veils will shut us down when we play against her. She will slam that door to victory harder than your mean-drunk dad used to when he couldn’t find his belt to whip you with.

But we still love her… it’s just, hard to deal with. Planeswalkers hate in general is not our strong suit.

We don’t run a lot of creatures to pressure planeswalkers, so restricted target removal is what we use if she lands. Red Elemental Blast is in the main board just for her. Another good option is Imprison in the Moon. You’re best off never letting them land if they’ll affect us.

Enchantments

A lot of the spells we have to deal with planeswalkers also deal with enchantments, and in UR, direct enchantment hate is rare. Swan Song helps a little. Not in the deck but another counter spell I have my eye on is An Offer You Can't Refuse.

Creatures

Lightning Bolt provides burn and so does Parun. We have a board wipe in Mizzium Mortars that also takes care of early game threats cheaply. I think it wins over Blasphemous Act in versatility. Blasphemous Act could clear the board for cheaper at scale, but it kills Niv-Mizzet, Parun.

Ovinize might seem like an odd include if you’ve never seen it before. But turning off a creature’s abilities and damage for a turn is just the bottom of the value floor. Parun turns this card into a 1U Draw a card & destroy target creature effect.

Echoing Truth can manage token creatures (or any token nonland permanent like Treasures, Food, Clues, etc)

Artifacts

Vandalblast, baby!

Abrade and Shenanigans are looking really good, too. I’m now wondering why I’m not running one of those.

Really.

Your opponents will not want you to have a board state because they have heard (or perhaps have seen) how disgustingly brutal a Niv deck can be. We don’t run creatures for a few reasons:

  • a political choice designed to keep them unaware of how dangerous you are

  • maximizes our spell slinging plan

  • makes us evasive to permanent removal and points those cards to other players/threats

There is a great chance you will be giving your opponents more creatures than are in this deck with cards like Curse of the Swine, Pongify, Swan Song and Rapid Hybridization. How silly is that?

Creature Design

Our creatures should help us go all in on the plan, and they should have a payback before the start of our next turn. We don’t run big beefy creatures that look scary and do something when tapped because we want SPEED.

I also hate entertaining the “yeah but it dies to removal” argument. Dude, everything dies to some sort of removal. Please bring something more intellectual to the argument. By not running any creatures like this, I get to hear this conversation less.

There’s a lot to love about Baral, Chief of Compliance.

He’s easier to cast than a Goblin Electromancer or Stormcatch Mentor (which are fine cards if you want to lean into playing spell slinger), and will usually get us an extra draw. Since he only costs 1U, it’s possible to play him “for free” the first turn he’s out.

Yeah, that’s right. Thassa's Oracle. Don’t like it? Too bad, I feel no shame. EDH banned my Jeweled Lotus, my Hullbreacher and my precious, precious Dockside Extortionist. Well if I can’t have nice things, NO ONE CAN.

If you’re losing to my UUURRR commander that doesn’t have any great ramp, that’s on YOU, buddy. That’s on you. Besides, chances are good we’ll ping the table to death before the Oracle even needs to be played. It’s just an insurance policy. But like, an insurance policy that isn’t a scam and actually pays you back and doesn’t tell you the damage didn’t meet the deductible.

Snapcaster Mage helps us out in our flexibility and survivability. He won’t be able to use any of our overload costs on Vandalblast or Cyclonic Rift, but he’ll help out in a pinch to grab a needed Counterspell, Pongify or even on offense with a Wheel of Fortune to keep the Niv train going.

If you’d rather have the cards in hand, or want a budget option, Archaeomancer is a fine creature for this slot.

Whirlpool Warrior is a double wheel. Once on entering the battlefield and once at instant speed for one red mana and a sacrifice. It can be useful to get a wheel effect on an opponent’s turn.

It’s our slowest and most removable combo piece, but it’s still a combo piece.

If it’s in hand during early game and you don’t have any other plays, go ahead and run it out for a chump block or to get a removal card out of an opponent’s hand. That’s much more value than waiting around to try and hit the combo.

Wheels are our most versatile cards. They can:

  1. Fix land drops

  2. Remove opponents’ in hand threats

  3. Stock our graveyard for Cephalid Coliseum and flashback cards like Faithless Looting and Echo of Eons

  4. Shuffle our graveyard back into the library

Most of the wheels are instants or sorceries, with the exception of Whirlpool Warrior. This package has synergy with our spellslinger plan and all of these wheels give payback on resolving or entering the battlefield.

I love Teferi's Puzzle Box and Mindmoil, but they don’t give their effect until follow up events happen, and they take away some of the control we have. They are great in an all-in Wheel strategy, but not in this hybrid shell.

Utility do things and do them well feel good stuff.

Lots of lands all the lands

Nothing but the lands.

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Casual

98% Competitive

Date added 1 month
Last updated 1 week
Key combos
Legality

This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)

3 - 0 Mythic Rares

29 - 0 Rares

21 - 0 Uncommons

23 - 0 Commons
Cards 100
Avg. CMC 2.28
Tokens Ape 3/3 G, Bird 2/2 U, Frog Lizard 3/3 G
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