A budget Animar deck mostly making cuts to higher end lands to reduce price of the overall cost of the deck. Some other creatures were also not considered as their price to unfairness ratio was high (as I wanted to keep this deck relatively fun to play with for my opponents). Many card decisions came from this MtG Salvation thread. I will attempt to enumerate all combos in the deck here:
Ancestral Statue
+ Animar, Soul of Elements: Simplest combo in the deck, creates an infinite Animar as long as he has four counters on him.
Cloudstone Curio + Animar, Soul of Elements + 2 morph creatures: Have each morph creature bounce the other = infinite Animar. (Beastcaller Savant can replace one of the morph creatures)
Shrieking Drake + Animar, Soul of Elements + Earthcraft + Island: Play shrieking drake targeting himself to bounce, Tap him with Earthcraft in response, untap and Island, repeat = infinite Animar. (Dream Stalker or
Man-o'-War
can replace Shrieking Drake.)
Shrieking Drake + Animar, Soul of Elements +
Phyrexian Metamorph
: 21/21 Animar with cost of 36 life.
Any infinite creature cast or ETB combo + Purphoros, God of the Forge: Infinite damage across the board
Palinchron + Animar, Soul of Elements: Infinite Animar and infinite mana (Requires four blue tapping lands in play)
Peregrine Drake + Animar, Soul of Elements + Temur Sabertooth: infinite Animar and infinite mana
Cloudstone Curio + Cloud of Faeries + Peregrine Drake: infinite Animar and infinite mana (requires Animar cost reduction or lands that tap for more than one mana, can replace one of the land untapping creatures with a morph creature)
Palinchron + Deadeye Navigator: infinite mana
Peregrine Drake + Deadeye Navigator: infinite mana
Ancestral Statue
+ Animar, Soul of Elements + Earthcraft + Basic Land: infinite Animar and infinite mana
Cloudstone Curio + Animar, Soul of Elements + Zealous Conscripts + Earthcraft + Mountain + Karoo land + Morph Creature: infinite Animar and infinite mana. First tap Zealous conscripts with Earthcraft to untap a mountain and use Zealous Conscripts untap ability to untap the karoo land. Use Cloudstone Curio and the morph creature to loop Zealous Conscripts into play.
Cloudstone Curio + Peregrine Drake + Cloud of Faeries + Karoo land: infinite mana
Rattleclaw Mystic + Cloudstone Curio + Morph creature: Infinite mana
Infinite mana + Infinite Animar + Sage of Fables: Draw entire deck
Infinite mana +
Equilibrium
or Cloudstone Curio + Creature listed below:
Mulldrifter: Draw entire deck
Man-o'-War
: Bounce all opponents creatures
Farhaven Elf: Ramp out all basic lands
Solemn Simulacrum: Ramp out all basic lands
Maelstrom Wanderer: Infinite cascade
Fierce Empath: Search up all big creatures
Zealous Conscripts: Gain control of all opponents permanents
Pestermite: Tap all opponents permanents
Infinite creature cast or ETB + Soul of the Harvest or
Primordial Sage
: Draw entire deck
Pestermite + Splinter Twin: Infinite creatures
Zealous Conscripts + Splinter Twin: Infinite Creatures
Earthcraft +
Squirrel Nest
: Infinite squirrels for hilarity
Many of these combos can be combined or done in a much more inefficient way, so enumerating every single possibility would take a long time. These are the most common ones which can be started in a typical game.
As for some other card choices I made in this deck, here are nearly all of them:
Birds of Paradise: Amazing turn one, helps get out Animar quickly
Ainok Survivalist: Enchantment and artifact hate as well as morph redundancy
Beastcaller Savant: Acts as morph redundancy and helps get Animar out quicker
Den Protector: Morph redundancy and get back things from grave
Elvish Visionary: Early counter on Animar, can be used in bounce engines to get more draw
Rattleclaw Mystic: Morph redundancy, nice ramp, can do infinite mana
Stratus Dancer: Morph redundancy, protects Animar
Willbender: Morph redundancy, protects Animar
Kruphix, God of Horizons
: Backup plan if Animar gets killed
Vesuvan Shapeshifter: Morph redundancy, and good card overall
Xenagos, God of Revels: Survives board wipes, while giving good discounts
Prime Speaker Zegana: Hilarious synergy with Animar
Artisan of Kozilek: Can be cast for free with Animar, good abilities
Birthing Pod: Very good for getting the combo enablers needed
Hardened Scales: Accelerates Animar
Evolutionary Leap: Get some value out of creatures that are about to die
Chord of Calling: Get a combo enabler straight to the battlefield
Vorel of the Hull Clade
: Accelerate Animar
Bloodbraid Elf: Good early counters on Animar, since cascade is a cast ability. Gross bounce potential
Coiling Oracle: Good early game utility, and also decent bounce potential
Deepfathom Skulker: Make Animar unblockable to kill an opponent if he is over 20 power
Desolation Twin
: Gross bounce potential, as it acts as a morph creature in all combos if Animar has 10+ counters on him. Nets a 10/10 for each bounce
Endless One
: Can become insanely big with a big Animar
Etherium-Horn Sorcerer
: More fun Animar acceleration, can bounce himself for more jankiness
Grinning Ignus: Is not infinite by himself, but does get some counters on Animar
Hooded Hydra: Can become huge with Animar discount, morph redundancy as well
Managorger Hydra
: Can become big very quick in many instances
Shaman of the Great Hunt
: Decent card itself, very good draw to keep the game going if hand is empty
Surrak Dragonclaw: Good protection overall to casting cards
Sylvan Caryatid: Helps get Animar out faster, hexproof could be relevant in some cases
Woodland Bellower: Another creature on a stick. Good to get Fierce Emapth with
Aluren
: Helps out with possibility of other combos, good card overall in deck
Temur Ascendancy: Good card draw and haste is very relevant when dumping many creatures in one turn
Glamerdye
: Great protection for Animar, can be taken out of graveyard to use again on him
Stubborn Denial: Usually is a counter for free, as getting a creature 4 or greater is expected in this deck
Lightning Greaves: Great protection for Animar
Note to Self: Solemn Simulacrum, Zealous Conscripts, and Command Tower are shared.
