Continuing The Chromatic: Karn!

The finish line of the Great Chromatic Project to build one deck of each possible color combination is in sight. Today, we get to colorless, the 26th of
27, leaving only Five Color to complete the set. Technically not a color, colorless is still a choice, what with all the artifacts and Eldrazi available.
There are only three possible commanders, and since I’ve wanted to do a Karn deck since before Kozilek, Butcher of Truth and Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre ever
existed, it’s the one I went for.

I don’t think I broke too much new ground here, but I’ve assembled the janky (junky?) deck that I think I’ll have fun with. There are a few combos (like
the Fifth Dawn stations), but nothing crazy (Mycosynth Lattice was never in the running). Mostly, I just want to be the beatdown with artifacts animated by
Karn. Here’s the list:

Karn, Beatdown Golem

Sheldon Menery

Test deck on 10-09-2014

Commander

Creatures (17)

Planeswalkers (2)

Lands (38)

How the Deck Wins

Mana rocks ramping into giant creatures. Perhaps alpha striking with said mana rocks. Maybe getting tricksy with some of the card interactions.

How the Deck Loses

Planar Cleansing, although there is some indestructible stuff. If the mana rocks get wrecked early, it’s going to be a long game for Karn. Rebuild is a
blowout.

Let’s look at it card by card:

Creatures:

Karn, Silver Golem: The uses for Karn are reasonably well-known by this point. He plays good defense, and he can make non-creature artifacts into
creatures. There are two basic uses: to battle with your own Spine of Ish Sah, or to turn someone else’s irritating artifacts into creatures in response to
Wrath of God.

Colossus of Akros: 20/20 tramplers get into the red zone reasonably well, especially the indestructible kind.

Darksteel Colossus: An old favorite. While not quite as large as his Akrosan cousin, Iron Giant will get there. And just in case you’re wondering, I won’t
play Blightsteel Colossus (and wouldn’t even if poison were changed to twenty for Commander, which it’s not going to be).

Darksteel Juggernaut: We’ll see how well he deals damage and survives destruction-happy boards.

Duplicant: Dupli-CAN. One of my favorite cards of all time.

Lodestone Golem: As an early turn play, this will likely be what enables the deck to stay in the game with ramp-happy green decks.

Metalworker: I can see the conspiracy theorists circling around this one already. “He waited until he wanted to build an artifact deck to unban it!” What I
love about conspiracy theorists is their great creative ability. They come up with interesting stories. Will this occasionally be crazy good? Yes. Will it
always? I doubt it.

Mycosynth Golem: I see possibilities to get this out pretty early and fuel some silliness. I also see it as a really expensive 4/5.

Myr Battlesphere: I thought about going a whole myr direction with the deck, then pitched the idea. I did, however, include Myr Matrix.

Platinum Emperion: Without too much lifegain, I figured that some damage prevention would be cool.

Scarecrone: One of the cards in the deck that will enable chicanery, Scarecrone can also replace itself if it gets nuked. There are a few ways to get it
back and start all over again.

Soul of New Phyrexia: The deck is pretty vulnerable, so I have a few things to try to help out. This is one of them. And hey, it’s a 6/6 trampler for six.

Steel Hellkite: There is very little board control in the deck, so Steel Hellkite is a must. I like the ability to blow up token armies for zero mana. In a
pinch, I can be sure he’ll get through by using Rogue’s Passage.

Stuffy Doll: People that I play with love Chain Reaction and Blasphemous Act. Stuffy Doll will love them to death.

Voltaic Construct: Mostly here for Metalworker and Scarecrone, but untapping a giant monster to block with is also a good idea.

It That Betrays: Speaking of giant monsters, I thought I’d give a whirl to an Eldrazi suite. I’ve wanted to play this in a number of decks and it just
hasn’t worked out. I might try to put it back into Animar, but I’m having so much fun with that deck anyway, it doesn’t need it.

Kozilek, Butcher of Truth: Gotta draw cards. Gotta be mill-proof. Gotta do big bashes. If I were going to use one of the Eldrazi as a commander, it would
be Kozilek over Ulamog, simply for the card draw.

Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre: Blowing up stuff is still something you want to do.

Artisan of Kozilek: People are going to want to kill some of the creatures that I’d like to bring back to life. There isn’t any etb-silliness, I just want
some protection.

Spawnspire of Ulamog: I don’t care that the last ability doesn’t work, I want the one that makes Eldrazi spawn.

Ulamog’s Crusher: I may end up completely hating the eldrazi and annihilator stuff. For the most part, we don’t attack each other with Eldrazi unless
there’s a good reason (stripping someone who is already land-light isn’t good enough), but annihilator is a reasonable tool if you’re using it to keep
someone who has gotten out of hand in check. That kind of violates the second half of “build casually, play competitively,” but I would rather run the risk
of losing a game in which the other player has a chance instead of winning a game in which they don’t.

Spells:

All is Dust: Plague Wind for everything.

Basalt Monolith: One of the mana rocks. I have a few things in here which I’m counting on having extra mana at end of turns to play around with.

Blasting Station: Piece number one of the station combo, it’s one of the reasons that I was considering running more myr generators.

Blinkmoth Urn: I’m not a huge fan of giving mana to my opponents, so if this backfires enough times, it’s getting tossed. I can see it as a good deal of
upside for me, but we’ll see if it’s enough upside.

Cloud Key: Kind of like ramp, and it helps everything in the deck except for Eldrazi stuff.

Coalition Relic: Another mana rock.

Darksteel Forge: When I did a search on “darksteel” knowing that this would come up, I also saw…

Darksteel Reactor. I thought it might be fun, but then realized that I don’t have any proliferate cards and not too many games are going to last the
twenty+ turns this would need. Add to that I’m not a fan of “you win the game” cards.

Darksteel Ingot: Indestructible ramp.

Dreamstone Hedron: Finally a deck that this card can work in! I’ve tried it in so many others, and it’s just always been disappointing.

Druidic Satchel: Man bag! It’s inexpensive and thoroughly useful.

Elixir of Immortality: The Eldrazi should provide a sufficient amount of mill protection and reuse of my stuff. If they don’t, the Elixir will get me
there.

Everflowing Chalice: I don’t want to be too greedy with the Chalice. Maybe a little, but not too much.

Gilded Lotus: In other decks, I look forward to Gilded Lotus giving me a mana boost. In this one, I look forward to it attacking.

Grafdigger’s Cage: The only card in the deck which the Cage impacts is Scarecrone, so I can certainly play around it. Other people (me being one of those
other people) love to abuse their graveyards, so there’s a good reason to shut them down.

Grim Monolith: I hear Grim Monolith and Voltaic Key are having an affair. It’s the worst kept secret since Rob Halford.

Grinding Station: There are times I want artifacts in my graveyard in order to get them back. There are times when people tutor for scary things and put it
on the top of the library. Grinding Station is a friend in both of those situations. It’s the most loyal friend with Spine of Ish Sah in play.

Ichor Wellspring: Drawing two cards for two mana with the ability to bring it back around is the little utility card this deck needs.

Krark-Clan Ironworks: Speaking of Spine of Ish Sah. Ironworks is also a sacrifice outlet in case someone wants to steal or exile my artifacts.

Mana Vault: I’m profoundly skeptical about the mana rock plan, but we’re on it, so let’s go all the way.

Mimic Vat: Creatures will die. I would like to make copies of them, please. Card you’re unlikely to see under this Mimic Vat: Solemn Simulacrum.

Mind Stone: Mana rock that’s useful when it’s not useful any more.

Mind’s Eye: Card draw is a thing that this deck doesn’t do particularly well. There should, in most circumstances, always be enough mana laying around to
make use of it.

Myr Matrix: This is less about the pump than it is the production. They’re artifact creatures, so they also go with the Stations.

Nevinyrral’s Disk: It was either Disk or Oblivion Stone here. I liked the once in a while idea of Disk plus Darksteel Forge, so I’m playing what is
objectively probably the weaker card here.

Planar Portal: If I can regrow artifacts, it might be better to play Ring of Three Wishes because it’s one cheaper to cast and one cheaper to activate. If
I find that Planar Portal gets blown up too frequently, especially before I can use it three times, it’ll probably be worth the switch.

Predator, Flagship: Colorless ways of killing giant flyers are significant weapons in one’s arsenal.

Rings of Brighthearth: Copy Mimic Vat? Copy Predator, Flagship? Copy Karn? The possibilities are tasty.

Scrabbling Claws: I like my own graveyard too much to play Relic of Progenitus.

Sculpting Steel: Putting the card in this deck makes me think it’s worth putting into another deck or two. Maybe I’ll build a Riku of Two Reflections deck
that does nothing but copy stuff. I’ll call it Riku of Lots of Reflections or something.

Sol Ring: No, I’m not also playing Mana Crypt. That thing kills you.

Spine of Ish Sah: I’m fond of this card and in this deck, with plenty of artifact sacrifice outlets, it will see quite some use. I’m overly fond of the
idea of attacking with it.

Staff of Domination: Good players tell me that flexibility is powerful. I believe them.

Staff of Nin: The card draw is way more important than the ping.

Summoning Station: We really need Mycosynth Lattice to make all this infinite. I really don’t like playing that card. Or infinite combos, so it’s all good.
Still, Summoning Station is going to make quite a few creatures.

Tawnos’s Coffin: Such a flexible card. I can save something of mine or temporarily get rid of someone else’s, either as a Fog effect or to clear the path
for that attacking Spine.

Torpor Orb: I have a few things that trigger on creatures coming into play, but they’re not really the central parts of the deck. Shutting down all the
tomfoolery of other players is a better idea.

Thran Dynamo: Rampishness.

Trading Post: I’ll resist the urge to put Goat Post in every day. It’s Staff of Domination for a new generation.

Voltaic Key: I also have Voltaic Key and Nevinyrral’s Disk in my Glissa deck. It saved my bacon the first time I ever played the deck, which is a sign that
it will happen every time I play the cards. That’s the way math works, right?

Worn Powerstone: I might have to reconsider the choice since it’s not available in foil.

Planeswalkers:

Karn Liberated: I love this card for no other reason than that the first time someone played it against me and used the +4 ability, the card I chose was
Brooding Saurian.

Lands:

I won’t go through all of them, but I’ll hit the highlights. I thought that finding enough lands to play was going to be difficult. How 2006 of me. My
initial search revealed 50-something lands, so I had to cut it down. Most of the ones which got cut were the ones that make colorless, but you can pay
something to make colored mana. I went with lands that did other things as well. By the letter of the law, cards like Bant Panorama would be legal, but if
I’m going to give people stuff about playing off-color fetches, it would be hypocritical to use them (plus there are better choices). I’d consider doing
that if there actually weren’t enough lands to play, but that worry has long passed. You can see on the list the usual suspects, such as the Urzatron. I
particularly like Seraph Sanctuary and Radiant Fountain because they gain life but don’t come in tapped. Rogue’s Passage will hopefully lead to some
successful battles. With all the sacrifice outlets, I’m not sure I need Homeward Path-but since it produces mana, there’s no downside. I am particularly
fond of Tomb of the Spirit Dragon and look forward to it gaining me bunches of life. The land count is at 38 instead of my normal 37 because Maze of Ith
doesn’t make mana (unless Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth is on the battlefield).

If my count is correct, there are 1122 playable cards for this deck (that’s counting artifacts which have no color identity and colorless nonartifacts).
There are many ways to go. I think I’ve chosen one that will be interesting to play, not oppressive, and have a chance of keeping up with the other decks
in my local environment.

This week’s Deck Without Comment is The Mill-Meoplasm:

The Mimeoplasm

Sheldon Menery

0th Place at Test deck on 06-17-2014

Commander

Creatures (26)

Planeswalkers (2)

Lands (36)

If you’d like to follow the adventures of my Monday Night RPG group (in a campaign that’s been alive since 1987), ask for an invitation to the Facebook
group “Sheldon Menery’s Monday Night Gamers.”

Here is the latest database version of all my decks:

ADUN’S TOOLBOX
; ANIMAR’S SWARM;AURELIA GOES TO WAR;DEMONS OF KAALIA;EREBOS and the HALLS OF THE DEAD;GLISSA, GLISSA;HELIOD, GOD OF ENCHANTMENTS;DREAMING OF INTET;FORGE OF PURPHOROS;HALLOWEEN WITH KARADOR;KARRTHUS, WHO RAINS FIRE FROM THE SKY;KRESH INTO THE RED ZONE;LAVINIA BLINKS;LAZAV, SHAPESHIFTING MASTERMIND;ZOMBIES OF TRESSERHORN;MELEK’S MOLTEN MIND GRIND;MERIEKE’S ESPER CONTROL;THE MILL-MEOPLASM;NATH of the VALUE LEAF;OBZEDAT, GHOST KILLER;PURPLE HIPPOS and MARO SORCERERS;ZEGANA and a DICE BAG;RAKDOS: LIFE IS SHORT;RITH’S TOKENS;YOU DID THIS TO YOURSELF;RURIC THAR AND HIS BEASTLY WEREWOLF FIGHT CLUB;THASSA, GOD OF MERFOLK;THE ALTAR of THRAXIMUNDAR; TROSTANI and HER ANGELS

Continuing The Chromatic: Karn!

Creatures (17)

Planeswalkers (2)

Lands (38)

Spells (42)

Creatures:

Spells:

Planeswalkers:

Lands:

Creatures (26)

Planeswalkers (2)

Lands (36)

Spells (35)