Animar may be busted but it allows for so many different janky strategies and builds. There are at least four different Animar decks in my playgroup and they all look different from one another which is part of the fun! We regularly do an all-Animar mirror match and it's always a blast
Ani-Morph, Ani-Drazi, Animar (X) creature spells. I have an Ani-Drazi deck myself that I play when people like to play the Eldrazi precon... I bet I can get mine out faster then you !!! LOL
At our local LGS... we have a guy that plays an Animar deck that is a MORPH tribal deck. Basically with just 3 counters his whole deck becomes free to cast because even the spells are creatures if cast as morph.
Defiler of Vigor, Dreams, and Instinct reducing the colored mana costs of your creatures (Vigor and Dreams adding to the +1/+1 counter and creatures that draw synergy)
Thank you so much for making this video! I had looked up "fun mtg commanders" not too long ago and Animar was one of the ones I saw. I thought "this looks fun, why not make a deck with it". I looked it up on EDHREC and saw a #23 in it's rank. Now I know how to play it :D. Didn't even know how busted it was while picking it out lol
@@tysanthecreator try throwing in a vexing shusher and rhythm of the wild if counters are the issue or something like zada that can turn single target creature protection into full board protection for things like board wipes.
You forgot about a whole cathegory, Morph. You can reduce The mana costo of any Morph to 0, and hace a ton of options in creaturas with abilities to draw allá The deck with two draw engines. They don't Even have name, thus they work with Guardian Proyect as well, and You may cast Purphoros for 1 and shock everyone for each creature as well.
morph not really that strong animar only reduces the cost to put it in play he doesn't reduce the cost to then morph the creature and most of the good morph creatures cost more to morph
I still see Animar being played, especially with the new art reprint. We had a game just last week at my LGS against one. They won with Ancestral Statue and Purphoros. The real only removal that works on Animar is either board wipes, which are 99% of the sorceries, or blue bounce spells which are generally not that popular. If you see it across the table you best option is to hold up that counterspell for Ancestral Statue, and hope they don't have a counter to respond. I guess it could be worse, they could have white and be able to cast Silence. lol
Well the issue in cEDH is, as the animar player, you're not often afforded the time to build up enough mana to cast animar, and then combo with ancestral statue in one turn, so sorcery speed board wipes are a pretty good answer to it if the Animar player tries to combo turn 3 or 4. In my experience, ancestral statue is one of the worse combos just because you need 10 mana if you're going to use it alone, and even more if you're going to tutor it out. My preferred combo is super convoluted, but requires only 6 mana in the end. Use imperial recruiter, tutor shrieking drake. Use shrieking drake to bounce recruiter and recast it to tutor out phyrexian metamorph. Use metamorph to copy recruiter and search your library for Kiri Onna. Kiri onna bounces something when it etb's and whenever a spirit etbs. Cast it, bounce phyrexian metamorph. Recast metamorph, bouncing Kiri and itself. Now cast metamorph copying recruiter to tutor out peregrine drake. Cast peregrine drake, untap lands. Recast kiri bouncing metamorph. Now you can infinitely bounce metamorph and peregrine drake for infinite mana and etbs. Finish it off by tutoring for walking ballista by copying recruiter again and cast that for infinite and ping everyone to death. Super complicated but only requires some blue mana and one creature.
Pongify, rapid hybridization, reality shift, imprison in the moon, kenrith's transformation, lignify, beast within, stop me if I'm going on too long, oko, leadership vacuum...
@@jonlamoreaux1889 so you need very specific interaction in very specific colors. And half of those can be removed to just have animar back out a d popping
@@buddatello very specific? I would say 60% of the color pie plus colorless effects is not specific. The ten I listed were just the tip of the iceberg, many of which are instant speed, and one to two mana... animal is good, but the original comment tried to claim that you can only cast boardwipes or bounce spells to get rid of it, which is incredibly false. I mean for God's sake it dies to an instant speed lightning bolt.... you should up your removal game
I have been piloting an animar deck for about 5 years now. some of the creatures wizards has been printing into magic over the past few years, boy let me tell you. originally it was 2 decks. "ulasht the hate seed" and "edric, spymaster of trest" that I mashed together and ironed out from there. as a way to try and curb the power of animar, I only play 4 non creature spells. "cloudstone curio" "crop rotation" "sol ring" and "sylvan library" the deck is my baby and I'm so glad it gets some recognition here. Thank you.
I recently cracked a foil etched Animar alongside a textured foil Kozilek and borderless Allosaurus Shepherd from a double masters 2022 collectors booster. Feel like it's a sign I should just build an Animar deck with this video.
@@t1mac7 haha it was even better because there was 3 packs left in the box at my lgs, I ended up buying and picking my pack first and opened the God pack. The last 2 packs were opened after seeing what I got and the best card was probably an Elenda the Dusk Rose. Had the entire boxes value in my pack alone 🤣
@@benskiies9340 I’ve just gotten single good cards per pack, the first 3 packs I bought I gave one to my friend and the two I opened had Kozilek and a foil full art damnation, pulled animar from one pack and the two others I got Teferi’s protection and a full art emrakul, double masters is probably my most lucky set considering I’ve only gotten 2 packs that didn’t have anything good
Been running Animar (with dragon sub theme) for over a decade now. Been a while since I've really played but I have such fond memories of a bunch of us all going to the game shop to each buy the 2011 commander pre-cons. Good times!
@@Basically_Anybody it actually doesn’t because there’s always counter spells not to mention just cause he has protection from white and black doesn’t make harder to get rid of him
I play animar and i play a more nice one where all the fattys in the deck have multiple color pips like tidespout tyrant and many others i have not taken the step to go eldrazi titans yet
It's especially timely to bring up Animar as the upcoming Tyranid Commander precon has A LOT of cards that work quite well with Animar and in a variety of strategies. Personally, I'm thinking of doing X cost creatures with Magus Lucea Kane as a stealth secondary commander and a bunch of untap. If I can't get her or she's eliminated, oh dear, I can just untap mana dorks that produce a lot of mana or come out cheaply to get Animar going or going even faster.
Been proxying this deck as a new player. The Tyranid deck pairs insanely well with Animar and a Branching Evolution. I was able to deflect two board wipes in one turn because I had a copied Tyrant Guard (thanks Lucy), preserving my big monster board.
Animar is my main deck for 6 years now, I like how you can try new strategy and news cards from every set. Animar just need some creatures, and it's the only one rule, a budget deck can be a banger, you can make a real version only with commons/unco. The mains reason that I play him is because of his colors remind me Pokemon's staters :-p and just the art from Peter Mohrbacher
I'm building one. Morph/Disguise is the idea was the first idea I was going for. Free when face down, powerful if face up. This card gives absolute power to those morph cards that do nothing more than being a surprise if you have a way to turn them face up despite the massive cost to do so simply because you can play them face up for super cheap! Then I figured out there's actually a lot of cards that can just be played face up and have spell effects. It'll be trickier with the mana cost, but green knows ramp! Sakura-Tribe elder, Flourishing Bloom-Kin, Nervous Gardener, Springbloom Druid are great ramp. Paladian Myr and Rattling Mystic are your Sol Ring and Arcane Signet. Reclamation Sage and Meteor Golem destroys artifacts, Cyclone Summoner and Incinerator of the Guilty are a great board wipes, if Animar dies, Kruphix, God of Horizons takes over. There's a lot of flexibility with this commander, all the more reason to build around it! Running out of gas? Loaming Shaman can shuffle your grave back to your library.
This is my edh deck! XD I put in lab maniac in too so with ancestral statue and the "beast whisper" cards for an alt win-con. And stuff to make animar unblockable to win by commander damage
Animar is really good, and I play him on my mutate deck, but compared to urza, and some commanders you mentioned in this video, and some newer ones, it really got set back in power since most games end up in combos nowadays.
Animar is powercrept but still a A/B tier commander. Problem with Animar is that it is not as fast or consistent enough compared to other commanders. Lack of disruption is Animar's biggest weakness though. Due to how creature reliant this deck is, it is tricky to be able to find a good balance between counterspells and removal to prevent your opponent from going off or disrupting your combo. Decks like Urza and Kenrith are much more powerful due to the high versatility in the deck. Urza can be built as a stax/combo hybrid deck while Kenrith has so many activated abilities, it is hard to predict what it will do. The partner decks also are stronger than Animar due to them being much less predictable.
Animar is more like a train. He’s usually gonna take 4 turns to be able to do anything minimum, because you’ve gotta get that animar out there turn 3 and is it really worth casting your cheap shit early on before that, but once the train starts chuffing along, there is little you can do to stop it. Even if you do destroy my Animar, I’m gonna have gotten a preem board-state by the time you can usually, which will be at least a couple of turns before you’ve built up anything of the same power
If Animar was printed today there'd be another line of text letting you transfer its +1/+1 counters from it to another creature you control when it dies or it'd have trample or something.
if it was printed today, it would be experience counters and he would get +1/+1 for each experience counter and cost reduction for each experience counter
Animar was one of the earliest EDH decks I ever built (third, if I remember right) and I've tweaked and twiddled with it bit by bit over the years, but it's more or less remained intact and is one of my personal pet decks.
I run a mix of morph and then eldrazis in my animar deck. First commander deck I ever made and I went all out (besides the 3 revised dual lands). Cloud stone curio is a must have to make everything gel together better. Impact tremors as well as purphorus god of the forge help with pinging while cheating creatures out. Walking ballista and ancestral statue are best friends of animar to have an infinite commander and then an infinite creature to remove 1/1 counters to ping everyone down. And having surrak dragonclaw as well as allosaurus shepherd you can’t have your creatures countered which is a huge huge help.
Neat video! :D Someone else mentioned it already, but I have some friends that play face-down decks. One is Aminatou manifests, and it's actually pretty decent. The other is Animar, and it's p a i n f u l after it gets going. I wanted to make my own, but Roon isn't really a face-down commander, and I never got around to finishing the Kadena deck I wanted to make. I guess I should if I really wanted to. I just wish I had some more cards to consider, and maybe that I didn't lose interest so quickly while brewing. There's also the Magar card that's coming in Unfinity.
Im going for a more casual hydra x cost cast deck. Well see how it runs. Give everything haste trample and flying and protect the board with countersspells.
For Hydras I’d try running the new Temur Magus from the 40k deck instead! Or have either in the other’s deck since they pair really well for X cost creatures! So not only will you have really big Xs but you’d then DOUBLE those creatures!
I bought the original precon animar came in years ago and haven't really played much over the past 10 years or so but I'm starting to get back into mtg... Now I'm tempted to build an Animar deck
I had a game recently where my animar costed 9 mana to play but because i had a beast whisperer out, i could use my last 5 mana to get out a lot of creatures and build up an entire board
Duuuuuude, I love that you covered it but now it’s gonna be meta again. Low key added this to my miirym deck, even tho it’s already overpowered with all cards that reduce dragon costs, I’ve still added it in to have more saturation of cards like that. Keep it coming, would love to see what else you have in the backlog
i personally used derevi as a commander , loved his abilities and i would use odric with a bunch of enchantments for beefing up my creatures and for draw, had odric in there for ability copy during combat
one of the guys in my pod recently started playing animar, and tbh I didnt expect the insane impact protection from w/b actually has. as a black enjoyer not getting murdered by this is a huge hassle
Animar has been my main commander since 2012 when I first started playing MTG. Even when I quit for 5 years and coming back about 2 years ago. It’s my Boi. My precious!
I really like this videos about older commanders So i need to ask if you are going to make a vídeo about voltron ones Like rafiq of the many and uril the miststalker comparing them to new ones if they still hold up to this day
No, rule 603.2g says: "If a triggered ability’s trigger condition is met, but the object with that triggered ability is at no time visible to all players, the ability does not trigger." which I think means it won't trigger from your hand, backed up by 113.6: "Abilities of an instant or sorcery spell usually function only while that object is on the stack. Abilities of all other objects usually function only while that object is on the battlefield." But regardless, he can only have and receive counters when he's on the battlefield. According to his card rulings: "Animar's triggered ability resolves before the creature spell that causes it to trigger." So he would not be on the battlefield before attempting to place the counter when casting him or any other creatures while he's in your hand.
The broken thing about Animar is just how many easy to assemble combo pieces that work with other different combo pieces that are also good utility with Animar alone you can put in that deck. Like for example you can have infinite mana with Palinchron and no mana sink at the time in your hand but that's still infinite mana you can spend to cast your eldrazi and then eldrazy are also combo pieces when it comes to etb cloud of Curio to bounce itself back to repeat cast abilety infinite times.
Animar is vulnerable to any small damage pings in the early game is the problem. For instance I have a niv mizzet deck which absolutely loves to just ping down 1/1s with my early game creatures.
One of Animar's biggest weaknesses is the anti synergy he has with fast mana artifacts like Sol Ring and Mana Vault. The only one of these cards that is usually played (at least, in cEDH) is Mana Crypt. Jeweled Lotus also took away one or his greatest strengths. With a mana dork, you can pretty consistently cast him on turn 2. But now, other decks can consistently do that, and Animar can't even play it to keep up. In Animar, Jeweled Lotus is effectively just a much worse Lotus Petal.
Animar is actually my oldest deck at over 8 years and it's 1 of 2 decks I've never taken apart (Grixis Marchesa at 7 years is the other). I've owned staples for the deck since they were cheap (thank god). Gilded Drake at $20, Palinchron at $15, foil Cloudstone Curio at $30, gold border Gaea's Cradle at $30, Earthcraft at $20, etc. Animar for me started pseudo fair with no infinite damage combos (draw/mana infinites were there though.) but it's evolved into something gross that's entirely combo focused at this point.
I've never seen an artifact deck built around animar bit. That would be broken as hell cause he could basically act as an Omniscience letting you dump you hand full of artifacts and being blue gives you draw out the ass just letting you at that point playing your entire deck and out valuing everybody
Ive beaten Animar a few times. Very difficult to play against and even more fun to pilot. You know what I haven't beaten? 4 varying power levels of Narset. Ever.
The main downside of the deck is the fact that creature decks are easy to interact with. Every color has good creature removal. Unless you're going for a combo build running protection is essential, which worsens the engine. Also worth mentioning is that protection doesn't stop untargeted destroy effects, so most boardwipes will kill this, even in w/b.
I got that Double Masters version of animar because i usually play quite janky stuff. I like that. But on the other hand, I am up vs someone who uses all the good tutors, boardwipes and other staples (also fetches). I WILL make this one of my stronger decks. Currently using Zegana as a ' handsize matter' commander deck, but I will switch that one up to animar soon.
I literally just picked him up just to see if I could add it to my Jodah the Unifier deck, make that 1/1 bigger and and increasing +1/+1 counters with Jodah’s ability since casting one legendary creature could end up with two 🤷🏾♂️. I’m new but I think it could work. And I completely for got about it’s protection, that’s crazy! Great video!
Animar himself can be but there’s still likely gonna be the rest of the board-state to worry about. Plus there are some great ways to rebuild him, not limited to Ozolith and Forgotten Ancient
Back when I first started playing commander I built a jhoira deck and was playing against animar and Rhys the redeemed. It was a early play testing and each opponent played their commander and I played electrolyze killing both of them and drawing a card lol was a great play
The best strategy i have seen with Animar is to play cheap creatures with some fat ones, put the draw engine in play, draw like a mofo and finish it off with anything that works like a Craterhoof Behemoth or Overrun effect.
My best friend plays an Animar Morph deck filled with Eldrazis. We just got finished playing about five minutes ago. I lost every game. I use black or white in every one of my decks so he specifically chose Animar to play against me.
Initially I loved playing busted commanders, I had a Korvald and Aesie deck but now I'm distancing myself from those options. You just put yourself a massive target on your back and some people don't like going against them so they just focus you out of the gate. It's also not very challenging to build in my opinion, rather build a flash Nymris or Ivy copy. But that's my opinion 🙂.
Yea agree with you about broken commanders. Opponents lose all types of rationality when you have a powerful commander. It's like they have PTSD and relapse and attack you for any and all reasons. They forget they're playing against other players it's it's bad.
@@labranehit7687 hahaha watch for it next time! It's real. As soon as you arrive arrive the table and they see your Commander- they're locked in...you can't politic your way out of it....trust me I've tried so many different tactics
@@Commander_Claw as I said, I played Korvald, I've seen those symptoms before. But to be honest it's difficult not to agree at some level with the threat assessment. Some commanders just need to be killed the moment they arrive depending on how well build the deck is. The problem is that it quickly becomes boring for everybody. Then again, if everyone is playing scary commanders it does even the playing field.
@@labranehit7687 i can't stand Hinata decks...it's always the other players loading the battlefield with permanents that make the X spell with targets get out of control. I agree about everyone playing scary commanders. But some playgroup don't have any interactions...it's just tunnel vision of their strategy...
Oh okay, I gotcha now. I thought you were trying to use the Statue with Curio to Cyclonic Rift the board. Wasn’t thinking infinite +1/+1 counters on Animar. Thanks for the clarification.
Animar is so ridiculously busted with the new Tyranid cards in the 40k stuff with all the X creatures. That also spread +1/+1 counters. So much synergy
Yea that's brilliant. Bc the tyrnaid precon has the ravenous mechanic and everything +1/+1 counters. I bought that deck I felt like it was the weakest out of the new four 40K precons
Never played Animar as a commander. I did just dip my toe in the animar water with the new Jodah. I was able to unleash him in a game and oh my! Things get ridiculous
@@rosethorn_48 Unfortunately I don't think so. As the Gatherer states : "Because targets are chosen for activated abilities before costs (such as “Sacrifice Salvager of Ruin”) are paid, Salvager of Ruin's ability can't target itself."
@@rosethorn_48 No probs ^^ choosing targets really happens when you cast the spell, before anything else. I'd love to have another "fast and easy" combo but Ancestral statue is definitely the only man here !
I built animar mutate so that he would be become non legendary. Then run a bunch of copy creatures to get 4-5 animars on my board to start putting out huge hydras. So sick.
Animar's power is truly broken! My buddy Mike did a deck tech of Animar on my channel a few days ago. He focused landfall effects and creature etb triggers to ramp, draw and get Animar infinite. Then casting Walking Ballista for game. 😁
for everything Animar is, it's only "strong" because all the "best removal" is in black and white. Kenrith is the most broken commander. You can't build a bad kenrinth but maybe if you don't run seedborne muse you can try.
the board wipes can't be black or white. because of that protection exile all would get to it. but effects that say destroy would do nothing to animar.
@@CommanderVoid i thought the ruling was the damage and effects that says destroy wouldn't effect the creature if the creature has protection against that color
@@brunomarinovic8571i already came to terms what is protection its just shroud and unblockable am i wrong? Also i know i was wrong about the ruling its been two months after all.
Protection still doesn't help against board wipes and sacrifice and luckily Animar doesn't have access to blue counterspells ... oh wait ... he does :)
Animar may be busted but it allows for so many different janky strategies and builds. There are at least four different Animar decks in my playgroup and they all look different from one another which is part of the fun! We regularly do an all-Animar mirror match and it's always a blast
Animar was the 3rd deck I built. I put as many mutate cards in it and called it Monster Mash
And the reason that works like that is, to quote Syndrome, “when everyone’s super… No one is”
I'm building an Animar hydras deck for my first! Sounds like I might be able to get multiple decks out of it with a little swapping.
Ani-Morph, Ani-Drazi, Animar (X) creature spells. I have an Ani-Drazi deck myself that I play when people like to play the Eldrazi precon... I bet I can get mine out faster then you !!! LOL
At our local LGS... we have a guy that plays an Animar deck that is a MORPH tribal deck. Basically with just 3 counters his whole deck becomes free to cast because even the spells are creatures if cast as morph.
This is my favorite way to play animar too
That's how I had my Animar deck built as well. The funny thing is, it's one of the more fair ways to play him and it's still busted.
Yeah plenty of people play morph with him. It's a good strategy!
But i like the morph commander from 2019 more. It's fun too.
Ah yes, Animorphs.
The most fair and hilarious Animar deck.
I play kadena morphs but animar sounds like a ton of fun. Are there good red morphs?
Animar was my first commander I bought singles for. Was a great introduction to the format
Defiler of Vigor, Dreams, and Instinct reducing the colored mana costs of your creatures (Vigor and Dreams adding to the +1/+1 counter and creatures that draw synergy)
Thank you so much for making this video! I had looked up "fun mtg commanders" not too long ago and Animar was one of the ones I saw. I thought "this looks fun, why not make a deck with it". I looked it up on EDHREC and saw a #23 in it's rank. Now I know how to play it :D. Didn't even know how busted it was while picking it out lol
I’ve been staring at my Animar for years now and didn’t really know which way to go with it. This really pointed out the danger it creates.
Ahhhh yes, my favourite Eldrazi commander.
Boooooring. How about you try something interesting with this commander instead.
I can never get it to consistently work. My playgroup has to much interaction:(
@@ScaredHelmet How about you get bent and let him do w/e he wants with the cardboard he paid for?
@@tysanthecreator Same here
@@tysanthecreator try throwing in a vexing shusher and rhythm of the wild if counters are the issue or something like zada that can turn single target creature protection into full board protection for things like board wipes.
You forgot about a whole cathegory, Morph.
You can reduce The mana costo of any Morph to 0, and hace a ton of options in creaturas with abilities to draw allá The deck with two draw engines. They don't Even have name, thus they work with Guardian Proyect as well, and You may cast Purphoros for 1 and shock everyone for each creature as well.
I’ve been wanting to build an Animar Morph deck. I’ve never played against one before and it looks powerful. Do you have an Animar morph list?
@@LVMTG yes I do i Will post it later
A N I M O R P H S
@@frago321 Nice. I look forward to it.
morph not really that strong animar only reduces the cost to put it in play he doesn't reduce the cost to then morph the creature and most of the good morph creatures cost more to morph
I still see Animar being played, especially with the new art reprint. We had a game just last week at my LGS against one. They won with Ancestral Statue and Purphoros. The real only removal that works on Animar is either board wipes, which are 99% of the sorceries, or blue bounce spells which are generally not that popular. If you see it across the table you best option is to hold up that counterspell for Ancestral Statue, and hope they don't have a counter to respond. I guess it could be worse, they could have white and be able to cast Silence. lol
Well the issue in cEDH is, as the animar player, you're not often afforded the time to build up enough mana to cast animar, and then combo with ancestral statue in one turn, so sorcery speed board wipes are a pretty good answer to it if the Animar player tries to combo turn 3 or 4.
In my experience, ancestral statue is one of the worse combos just because you need 10 mana if you're going to use it alone, and even more if you're going to tutor it out. My preferred combo is super convoluted, but requires only 6 mana in the end. Use imperial recruiter, tutor shrieking drake. Use shrieking drake to bounce recruiter and recast it to tutor out phyrexian metamorph. Use metamorph to copy recruiter and search your library for Kiri Onna. Kiri onna bounces something when it etb's and whenever a spirit etbs. Cast it, bounce phyrexian metamorph. Recast metamorph, bouncing Kiri and itself. Now cast metamorph copying recruiter to tutor out peregrine drake. Cast peregrine drake, untap lands. Recast kiri bouncing metamorph. Now you can infinitely bounce metamorph and peregrine drake for infinite mana and etbs. Finish it off by tutoring for walking ballista by copying recruiter again and cast that for infinite and ping everyone to death. Super complicated but only requires some blue mana and one creature.
Pongify, rapid hybridization, reality shift, imprison in the moon, kenrith's transformation, lignify, beast within, stop me if I'm going on too long, oko, leadership vacuum...
@@jonlamoreaux1889 so you need very specific interaction in very specific colors. And half of those can be removed to just have animar back out a d popping
@@buddatello very specific? I would say 60% of the color pie plus colorless effects is not specific. The ten I listed were just the tip of the iceberg, many of which are instant speed, and one to two mana... animal is good, but the original comment tried to claim that you can only cast boardwipes or bounce spells to get rid of it, which is incredibly false. I mean for God's sake it dies to an instant speed lightning bolt.... you should up your removal game
No whats worse is how i run my animar deck. I have like 15 phase spells to cancel your removal and keep my counters
I have been piloting an animar deck for about 5 years now. some of the creatures wizards has been printing into magic over the past few years, boy let me tell you. originally it was 2 decks. "ulasht the hate seed" and "edric, spymaster of trest" that I mashed together and ironed out from there. as a way to try and curb the power of animar, I only play 4 non creature spells. "cloudstone curio" "crop rotation" "sol ring" and "sylvan library" the deck is my baby and I'm so glad it gets some recognition here.
Thank you.
I recently cracked a foil etched Animar alongside a textured foil Kozilek and borderless Allosaurus Shepherd from a double masters 2022 collectors booster. Feel like it's a sign I should just build an Animar deck with this video.
I think that was a sign to play the lottery actually
@@t1mac7 lmao I've probably used all that luck on the booster.
@@benskiies9340 fair enough I had some decent pulls and actually built an animar deck with The one I pulled, but nothing as crazy as that pack
@@t1mac7 haha it was even better because there was 3 packs left in the box at my lgs, I ended up buying and picking my pack first and opened the God pack. The last 2 packs were opened after seeing what I got and the best card was probably an Elenda the Dusk Rose. Had the entire boxes value in my pack alone 🤣
@@benskiies9340 I’ve just gotten single good cards per pack, the first 3 packs I bought I gave one to my friend and the two I opened had Kozilek and a foil full art damnation, pulled animar from one pack and the two others I got Teferi’s protection and a full art emrakul, double masters is probably my most lucky set considering I’ve only gotten 2 packs that didn’t have anything good
Been running Animar (with dragon sub theme) for over a decade now. Been a while since I've really played but I have such fond memories of a bunch of us all going to the game shop to each buy the 2011 commander pre-cons. Good times!
Animar are also hated out pretty quickly if people know what he can do
100% why I took apart my animar deck. Wasn't fun anymore to get targeted from turn 1
@@Shadorenify that’s why I tend to play out of the norm decks like burn or goad or even tribal tribal
protection from black and white, the 2 big removal colors, makes it harder than you think
@@Basically_Anybody it actually doesn’t because there’s always counter spells not to mention just cause he has protection from white and black doesn’t make harder to get rid of him
I play animar and i play a more nice one where all the fattys in the deck have multiple color pips like tidespout tyrant and many others i have not taken the step to go eldrazi titans yet
It's especially timely to bring up Animar as the upcoming Tyranid Commander precon has A LOT of cards that work quite well with Animar and in a variety of strategies.
Personally, I'm thinking of doing X cost creatures with Magus Lucea Kane as a stealth secondary commander and a bunch of untap. If I can't get her or she's eliminated, oh dear, I can just untap mana dorks that produce a lot of mana or come out cheaply to get Animar going or going even faster.
Been proxying this deck as a new player. The Tyranid deck pairs insanely well with Animar and a Branching Evolution. I was able to deflect two board wipes in one turn because I had a copied Tyrant Guard (thanks Lucy), preserving my big monster board.
🤫
Animar is my main deck for 6 years now, I like how you can try new strategy and news cards from every set. Animar just need some creatures, and it's the only one rule, a budget deck can be a banger, you can make a real version only with commons/unco. The mains reason that I play him is because of his colors remind me Pokemon's staters :-p and just the art from Peter Mohrbacher
I'm building one. Morph/Disguise is the idea was the first idea I was going for. Free when face down, powerful if face up. This card gives absolute power to those morph cards that do nothing more than being a surprise if you have a way to turn them face up despite the massive cost to do so simply because you can play them face up for super cheap!
Then I figured out there's actually a lot of cards that can just be played face up and have spell effects. It'll be trickier with the mana cost, but green knows ramp! Sakura-Tribe elder, Flourishing Bloom-Kin, Nervous Gardener, Springbloom Druid are great ramp. Paladian Myr and Rattling Mystic are your Sol Ring and Arcane Signet. Reclamation Sage and Meteor Golem destroys artifacts, Cyclone Summoner and Incinerator of the Guilty are a great board wipes, if Animar dies, Kruphix, God of Horizons takes over. There's a lot of flexibility with this commander, all the more reason to build around it!
Running out of gas? Loaming Shaman can shuffle your grave back to your library.
This is my edh deck! XD
I put in lab maniac in too so with ancestral statue and the "beast whisper" cards for an alt win-con.
And stuff to make animar unblockable to win by commander damage
Animar is really good, and I play him on my mutate deck, but compared to urza, and some commanders you mentioned in this video, and some newer ones, it really got set back in power since most games end up in combos nowadays.
Animar is powercrept but still a A/B tier commander. Problem with Animar is that it is not as fast or consistent enough compared to other commanders. Lack of disruption is Animar's biggest weakness though. Due to how creature reliant this deck is, it is tricky to be able to find a good balance between counterspells and removal to prevent your opponent from going off or disrupting your combo. Decks like Urza and Kenrith are much more powerful due to the high versatility in the deck. Urza can be built as a stax/combo hybrid deck while Kenrith has so many activated abilities, it is hard to predict what it will do. The partner decks also are stronger than Animar due to them being much less predictable.
Animar is more like a train. He’s usually gonna take 4 turns to be able to do anything minimum, because you’ve gotta get that animar out there turn 3 and is it really worth casting your cheap shit early on before that, but once the train starts chuffing along, there is little you can do to stop it. Even if you do destroy my Animar, I’m gonna have gotten a preem board-state by the time you can usually, which will be at least a couple of turns before you’ve built up anything of the same power
If Animar was printed today there'd be another line of text letting you transfer its +1/+1 counters from it to another creature you control when it dies or it'd have trample or something.
But it probably wouldn’t have protection, your version sounds more fair
if it was printed today, it would be experience counters and he would get +1/+1 for each experience counter and cost reduction for each experience counter
@@spagandhi let’s be real winota gives indestructible for no reason I don’t see how animar won’t get trample today it’s a simic card
Animar was one of the earliest EDH decks I ever built (third, if I remember right) and I've tweaked and twiddled with it bit by bit over the years, but it's more or less remained intact and is one of my personal pet decks.
Great insight! Also, it's a good series to check on older commanders. Keep it up!
I run a mix of morph and then eldrazis in my animar deck. First commander deck I ever made and I went all out (besides the 3 revised dual lands). Cloud stone curio is a must have to make everything gel together better. Impact tremors as well as purphorus god of the forge help with pinging while cheating creatures out. Walking ballista and ancestral statue are best friends of animar to have an infinite commander and then an infinite creature to remove 1/1 counters to ping everyone down. And having surrak dragonclaw as well as allosaurus shepherd you can’t have your creatures countered which is a huge huge help.
Ok...you've convinced me...I'm building an Animar deck now...
Neat video! :D
Someone else mentioned it already, but I have some friends that play face-down decks.
One is Aminatou manifests, and it's actually pretty decent. The other is Animar, and it's p a i n f u l after it gets going.
I wanted to make my own, but Roon isn't really a face-down commander, and I never got around to finishing the Kadena deck I wanted to make. I guess I should if I really wanted to. I just wish I had some more cards to consider, and maybe that I didn't lose interest so quickly while brewing.
There's also the Magar card that's coming in Unfinity.
One combo I like with Animar is ancestral statue with terror if the peaks. Infinite damage to your opponents.
Turn 3 or 4 ancestral statue spam into walking balista is hilarious
Im going for a more casual hydra x cost cast deck. Well see how it runs. Give everything haste trample and flying and protect the board with countersspells.
For Hydras I’d try running the new Temur Magus from the 40k deck instead! Or have either in the other’s deck since they pair really well for X cost creatures! So not only will you have really big Xs but you’d then DOUBLE those creatures!
There’s definitely a Hydra Commander- Gargos or Zaxara are both great
I bought the original precon animar came in years ago and haven't really played much over the past 10 years or so but I'm starting to get back into mtg... Now I'm tempted to build an Animar deck
I had a game recently where my animar costed 9 mana to play but because i had a beast whisperer out, i could use my last 5 mana to get out a lot of creatures and build up an entire board
Duuuuuude, I love that you covered it but now it’s gonna be meta again. Low key added this to my miirym deck, even tho it’s already overpowered with all cards that reduce dragon costs, I’ve still added it in to have more saturation of cards like that. Keep it coming, would love to see what else you have in the backlog
i personally used derevi as a commander , loved his abilities and i would use odric with a bunch of enchantments for beefing up my creatures and for draw, had odric in there for ability copy during combat
one of the guys in my pod recently started playing animar, and tbh I didnt expect the insane impact protection from w/b actually has. as a black enjoyer not getting murdered by this is a huge hassle
Animar has been my main commander since 2012 when I first started playing MTG. Even when I quit for 5 years and coming back about 2 years ago. It’s my Boi. My precious!
Back in the day I had a budget Animar deck. Ended up not being all that much fun because everyone quickly learned to kill it IMMEDIATELY 😂
How did they kill it tho?? 😅
Love the vid! Look forward to seeing more of these!
Love this guy. Mine is a +1/+1 Counters build.
Kinda.
He's gotten more Goodstuff-y over the years.
I really like this videos about older commanders
So i need to ask if you are going to make a vídeo about voltron ones
Like rafiq of the many and uril the miststalker comparing them to new ones if they still hold up to this day
Correct me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't animar enter with a 1/1 counter because he sees himself cast, and it doesn't say "another" creature spell.
No, rule 603.2g says: "If a triggered ability’s trigger condition is met, but the object with that triggered ability is at no time visible to all players, the ability does not trigger." which I think means it won't trigger from your hand, backed up by 113.6: "Abilities of an instant or sorcery spell usually function only while that object is on the stack. Abilities of all other objects usually function only while that object is on the battlefield."
But regardless, he can only have and receive counters when he's on the battlefield. According to his card rulings: "Animar's triggered ability resolves before the creature spell that causes it to trigger." So he would not be on the battlefield before attempting to place the counter when casting him or any other creatures while he's in your hand.
I run a Hamza EDH deck from Commander Legends. Similar to Animar, lots of fun. Gonna find some morph cards to add to it
Blue for counters and draw. Red for burn and haste enablers. Green from curb stomping and ramp. It's raining beefy bois.
Damn here I was trying to make a deck everyone forgot about.
i have an animar deck with mostly colorless creatures and card draw when you play them for a creature storm deck
This was great thanks Commander 😊
Love with the birds of paradise. Turn 2 animar is nasty
The broken thing about Animar is just how many easy to assemble combo pieces that work with other different combo pieces that are also good utility with Animar alone you can put in that deck. Like for example you can have infinite mana with Palinchron and no mana sink at the time in your hand but that's still infinite mana you can spend to cast your eldrazi and then eldrazy are also combo pieces when it comes to etb cloud of Curio to bounce itself back to repeat cast abilety infinite times.
No Animar deck on your Moxfield profile though 🤔
Animar is vulnerable to any small damage pings in the early game is the problem. For instance I have a niv mizzet deck which absolutely loves to just ping down 1/1s with my early game creatures.
I like an Animar tribal elemental deck with Omnath and his buddies. Brings the power level down enough to make games fun
One of Animar's biggest weaknesses is the anti synergy he has with fast mana artifacts like Sol Ring and Mana Vault. The only one of these cards that is usually played (at least, in cEDH) is Mana Crypt.
Jeweled Lotus also took away one or his greatest strengths. With a mana dork, you can pretty consistently cast him on turn 2. But now, other decks can consistently do that, and Animar can't even play it to keep up. In Animar, Jeweled Lotus is effectively just a much worse Lotus Petal.
My Animar deck goes infinite consistently by turn 4 or 5. It's so one-note and almost impossible to stop.
Do you have a decklist?
@@n.o.6504 Not really. Just remember any cast-creature-to-draw cards and Ancestral Statue. Infinite draws and at least 50 counters on Animar.
Great content!!
I run Kozilek, Ulamog and Palinchron in my Animar deck, but I also run Talas Researcher and Magus of the Unseen...
Animar is actually my oldest deck at over 8 years and it's 1 of 2 decks I've never taken apart (Grixis Marchesa at 7 years is the other). I've owned staples for the deck since they were cheap (thank god). Gilded Drake at $20, Palinchron at $15, foil Cloudstone Curio at $30, gold border Gaea's Cradle at $30, Earthcraft at $20, etc.
Animar for me started pseudo fair with no infinite damage combos (draw/mana infinites were there though.) but it's evolved into something gross that's entirely combo focused at this point.
For Earthcraft try 80+$ noyadays 😛
I've never seen an artifact deck built around animar bit. That would be broken as hell cause he could basically act as an Omniscience letting you dump you hand full of artifacts and being blue gives you draw out the ass just letting you at that point playing your entire deck and out valuing everybody
Ive beaten Animar a few times. Very difficult to play against and even more fun to pilot.
You know what I haven't beaten? 4 varying power levels of Narset. Ever.
Those first commanders were pretty pushed not going to lie. Maelstrom Wanderer seems to have more of a reputation but he’s very strong.
The main downside of the deck is the fact that creature decks are easy to interact with. Every color has good creature removal. Unless you're going for a combo build running protection is essential, which worsens the engine.
Also worth mentioning is that protection doesn't stop untargeted destroy effects, so most boardwipes will kill this, even in w/b.
I got that Double Masters version of animar because i usually play quite janky stuff. I like that.
But on the other hand, I am up vs someone who uses all the good tutors, boardwipes and other staples (also fetches).
I WILL make this one of my stronger decks. Currently using Zegana as a ' handsize matter' commander deck, but I will switch that one up to animar soon.
If you have protection from a color and you block something of that color with trample, will anything go through?
I literally just picked him up just to see if I could add it to my Jodah the Unifier deck, make that 1/1 bigger and and increasing +1/+1 counters with Jodah’s ability since casting one legendary creature could end up with two 🤷🏾♂️. I’m new but I think it could work. And I completely for got about it’s protection, that’s crazy!
Great video!
Ever play Blind Seer with Animar?
Protection from everything at that point
Its broken until they bounce it or pongifiy it, its a snow ball commander, but once they stop him is slow as hell to recover.
Animar himself can be but there’s still likely gonna be the rest of the board-state to worry about.
Plus there are some great ways to rebuild him, not limited to Ozolith and Forgotten Ancient
With Animar, Nettle Drone and ancestral statue it makes for a fun infinite 1 damage to opponents
My animar deck has 1 strict rule: no noncreature nonland cards in the whole deck. That rule is secretly what makes it so powerful; all gas no brakes.
Back when I first started playing commander I built a jhoira deck and was playing against animar and Rhys the redeemed. It was a early play testing and each opponent played their commander and I played electrolyze killing both of them and drawing a card lol was a great play
And then the stacks player makes it so you can’t untap lands or put counters on animar and he’s just a 1/1.
Animar is stupid good against stax decks if built correctly.
The best strategy i have seen with Animar is to play cheap creatures with some fat ones, put the draw engine in play, draw like a mofo and finish it off with anything that works like a Craterhoof Behemoth or Overrun effect.
Jin Gitaxias costing 2 blue mana is ridiculous
My best friend plays an Animar Morph deck filled with Eldrazis. We just got finished playing about five minutes ago. I lost every game. I use black or white in every one of my decks so he specifically chose Animar to play against me.
Tweak the deck to specifically counter his Animar deck haha
@@Plebble haha yes! I was thinking about it lol. He plays Eldrazi tribal and Animar and wonders why everyone hangs up on him.
He is definitely going in my legendary creature deck which is +1 counter based
Initially I loved playing busted commanders, I had a Korvald and Aesie deck but now I'm distancing myself from those options. You just put yourself a massive target on your back and some people don't like going against them so they just focus you out of the gate. It's also not very challenging to build in my opinion, rather build a flash Nymris or Ivy copy. But that's my opinion 🙂.
Yea agree with you about broken commanders. Opponents lose all types of rationality when you have a powerful commander. It's like they have PTSD and relapse and attack you for any and all reasons. They forget they're playing against other players it's it's bad.
@@Commander_Claw commander PTSD 🤣🤣 you got a chuckle out of me with that one. But yes I fully agree with you.
@@labranehit7687 hahaha watch for it next time! It's real. As soon as you arrive arrive the table and they see your Commander- they're locked in...you can't politic your way out of it....trust me I've tried so many different tactics
@@Commander_Claw as I said, I played Korvald, I've seen those symptoms before. But to be honest it's difficult not to agree at some level with the threat assessment. Some commanders just need to be killed the moment they arrive depending on how well build the deck is. The problem is that it quickly becomes boring for everybody. Then again, if everyone is playing scary commanders it does even the playing field.
@@labranehit7687 i can't stand Hinata decks...it's always the other players loading the battlefield with permanents that make the X spell with targets get out of control.
I agree about everyone playing scary commanders. But some playgroup don't have any interactions...it's just tunnel vision of their strategy...
I’m missing how Ancestral Statue is going off by itself with Cloudstone Curio…..???
It enters and you have the ability bounce itself to your hand.
Except Cloudstone Curio says “Whenever a nonartifact permanent enters the battlefield…” And Ancestral Statue is an artifact creature.
@@Yugimons03 I know, that’s why you don’t need it for ancestral statue to combo with itself
Oh okay, I gotcha now. I thought you were trying to use the Statue with Curio to Cyclonic Rift the board. Wasn’t thinking infinite +1/+1 counters on Animar. Thanks for the clarification.
Very fun with morph as well. I play empty handed most of the times.
Here's a scary thought: Anmar but with a ton of Eldrazi and colorless artifact creatures.
i mean animar is good and all, but i'm not sure it's even played competitively today.
Animar is so ridiculously busted with the new Tyranid cards in the 40k stuff with all the X creatures. That also spread +1/+1 counters. So much synergy
Does It help with X cost?
Yea that's brilliant. Bc the tyrnaid precon has the ravenous mechanic and everything +1/+1 counters. I bought that deck I felt like it was the weakest out of the new four 40K precons
@@Commander_Claw one Animar changes entirely how that deck plays
Add in hullbreaker horror and bounce everyone's deck. it is my first commander and still my fav.
1 Animar, Soul of Elements
1 Bristly Bill, Spine Sower
1 Dreamtide Whale
1 Roaming Throne
1 Spark Double
1 Forgotten Ancient
1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
1 Imperial Recruiter
1 Painter’s Servant
1 K-9, Mark I
1 Champion of Lambholt
1 Sun Quan, Lord of Wu
1 Karlach, Fury of Avernus
1 Lightning Greaves
1 Ogre Battledriver
1 Urabrask the Hidden
1 Maelstrom Wanderer
1 Apex Devastator
1 Shadowspear
1 Legion Loyalist
1 Pathbreaker Ibex
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
1 Kodama of the West Tree
1 Mana Crypt
1 Sol Ring
1 Birds of Paradise
1 Delighted Halfling
1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
1 Cloud of Faeries
1 Nature’s Lore
1 Dockside Extortionist
1 Nissa, Resurgent Animist
1 Vizier of the Menagerie
1 Sowing Mycospawn
1 Saryth, the Viper’s Fang
1 Defiler of Vigor
1 Mirri’s Guile
1 Sensei’s Divining Top
1 Faerie Mastermind
1 Pollywog Prodigy
1 Sylvan Library
1 Rhystic Study
1 Twenty-Toed Toad
1 Shaman of the Great Hunt
1 Guardian Project
1 Beast Whisperer
1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Ohran Frostfang
1 Shamanic Revelation
1 Tatyova, Benthic Druid
1 Consecrated Sphinx
1 Disciple of Freyalise
1 Kozilek, Butcher of Truth
1 Evolution Witness
1 Siren Stormtamer
1 Spellskite
1 Azure Beastbinder
1 Hydroelectric Specimen
1 Hope-Ender Coatl
1 Tranquil Frillback
1 Endurance
1 Glen Elendra Archmage
1 Terror of the Peaks
1 Silverback Elder
1 Cyclonic Rift
1 Balefire Dragon
1 Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger
1 Command Tower
1 City of Brass
1 Mana Confluence
1 Exotic Orchard
1 Cavern of Souls
1 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Wooded Foothills
1 Scalding Tarn
1 Prismatic Vista
2 Forest
2 Island
2 Mountain
1 Urza’s Cave
1 Gaea’s Cradle
1 Minamo, School at Water’s Edge
1 Yavimaya Hollow
1 Kessig Wolf Run
1 Strip Mine
1 Shifting Woodland
1 Cinder Glade
1 Breeding Pool
1 Stomping Ground
1 Steam Vents
1 Cascade Bluffs
1 Fire-Lit Thicket
1 Flooded Grove
1 Dreamroot Cascade
1 Rockfall Vale
1 Stormcarved Coast
Never played Animar as a commander. I did just dip my toe in the animar water with the new Jodah. I was able to unleash him in a game and oh my! Things get ridiculous
salvager of ruin and ancestral statue go brrrrr
Salvager of ruin can't target himself.
@@LeCrabeASMR if it said "another target permanent" then it wouldn't work, but in salvager of ruin's case it works
@@rosethorn_48 Unfortunately I don't think so.
As the Gatherer states : "Because targets are chosen for activated abilities before costs (such as “Sacrifice Salvager of Ruin”) are paid, Salvager of Ruin's ability can't target itself."
@@LeCrabeASMR ohhh you're right, I've been using this combo for edh for 2 years and no one knew it doesn't work, thanks man hahahaha
@@rosethorn_48 No probs ^^ choosing targets really happens when you cast the spell, before anything else.
I'd love to have another "fast and easy" combo but Ancestral statue is definitely the only man here !
I have a fun little Mutate/Modified build going on with him. It's nothing too crazy, but does have some fun stuff. Definitely not cEDH
I built animar mutate so that he would be become non legendary. Then run a bunch of copy creatures to get 4-5 animars on my board to start putting out huge hydras. So sick.
Can't be that broken I beat it last night with a precon
Animar, the ozolith, hydras, branching evolution.
Is THIS why Temur can't get any new things?
As someone with Temur color identity I'm a bit frustrated.
Animar's power is truly broken! My buddy Mike did a deck tech of Animar on my channel a few days ago. He focused landfall effects and creature etb triggers to ramp, draw and get Animar infinite. Then casting Walking Ballista for game. 😁
Definitely another good excuse to run your Arcane Laboratory or Rule of Law effects. Keep those decks fair!
Blightbeetle says hi
I have a bounce deck and a colorless stompy deck both for animar
Also, being blue, you can play the hated Thassa's Oracle. Finding way to draw your entire deck with Animar is not that hard.
He was illustrated by a former art teacher of mine lol
Prossh next?
This is my Favorite Commander Elemental tribal
Still love this commander. Just a pile of creatures makes him go BRRRR.
I ran Glamerdye to change the protection on thw fly
Animar would be fair if it didn’t have the protection against the two creature removal colors.
for everything Animar is, it's only "strong" because all the "best removal" is in black and white. Kenrith is the most broken commander. You can't build a bad kenrinth but maybe if you don't run seedborne muse you can try.
the board wipes can't be black or white. because of that protection exile all would get to it. but effects that say destroy would do nothing to animar.
Protection wouldn't stop a normal board wipe like Wrath of God or Damnation
@@CommanderVoid i thought the ruling was the damage and effects that says destroy wouldn't effect the creature if the creature has protection against that color
@@ROYALR0SE it has to say target on a card for him to have protection
@@brunomarinovic8571i already came to terms what is protection its just shroud and unblockable am i wrong? Also i know i was wrong about the ruling its been two months after all.
@@ROYALR0SE you are not wrong
I play the morph version because it's fun for me
I play Animar, but I keep losing to these noninteractive turbo Thassa's Oracle + Underworld Breach decks on T's 2-3.
Animar isn't really a cEDH commander though. Stop trying to bring a sword to a nuclear war
Protection still doesn't help against board wipes and sacrifice and luckily Animar doesn't have access to blue counterspells ... oh wait ... he does :)