It’s time to look at the new The Brothers’ War (BRO) precons and see where we can make changes to keep them within the boundaries of our own Battlecruiser power level … is what I’d usually say for an article in this series.

I find these precons quite hard to sidegrade with ‘just a few cards’. They’re hectic and trigger-heavy in game design, to a point I wouldn’t hand these to a brand new player who’s just starting out with Magic.

Don’t get me wrong, they’re plenty strong and fun decks, but they seem quite complicated to ‘play right’ compared to previous precons we’ve seen so far. Knowing it can take several years before a product that gets developed actually makes its way to a physical release, maybe these two decks in part helped spark the debate of ‘we need starter decks that are easier to understand’?

The potential synergy lines and presence of strong staples makes these decks quite explosive under the right conditions, in the hands of an already experienced player. There are a lot of linked triggers on top of payoffs and often snap decision making is involved if you want to play these decks well, and not all of them are ‘obvious’ from a new player’s point of view.

For these two precons, rather than ‘consider these 5 cards and effects and you should be good for Battlecruiser (BC) still’, I thought I’d first highlight how we look at these precons and which types of synergy and ‘obvious includes’ we monitor for in terms of the PlayEDH server’s version of the BC power level.

This will be article one out of two. Let’s kick things off with Mishra’s precon.

Mishra’s Burnished Banner

Mishra, Eminent One
‘Token copy animate any noncreature artifact I own and turn it into a 4/4 with haste. Attack you with my Sol Ring creature copy’ is always going to sound weird. When first reading this card, I thought the precon was going to go for aggressive haste ‘attack every turn’ strategies, but that’s rarely the case.

More often than not, you’ll be creating the Mishra’s Warform 4/4 Construct token and want to keep it on the board so you have two copies of the same artifact, or so you can sacrifice it with one of the various sac outlets to generate a bigger board advantage than the copied artifact provides.

Let’s talk about some of the cards, synergy pieces, topics and restrictions that come to mind when wanting to make changes in the context of BC on our server.

Balancing out an inherently imbalanced format

Limit the amount of (free) artifact generation
The easiest way of making noncreature artifacts is probably Treasure tokens at the moment - though Powerstone tokens will likely make an impact on our format soon. There’s only one card present in the precon that makes Treasures and that’s Fain, the Broker - and this will very much be a deliberate design choice.

Pitiless Plunderer, Revel in Riches, Ruthless Technomancer - It’s hard to imagine a game of EDH nowadays where people aren’t utilizing Treasures to their advantage. We can’t fault people for slotting these cards as upgrades - staples are staples for a reason - but when trying to make changes to stay within the lowest power level we have on our server, including several best in slot considerations is likely not the way to go.

One thing you can do to keep Mishra under control is to make sure you don’t always have a ‘free’ token you can copy. The deck has 30 noncreature artifacts by default, which is already quite high, but you’re paying mana to get those into play (most of the time) and they won’t increase your artifact count by 10 simply because they happened to resolve, unlike the cards mentioned above.

A lot of the cards in the precon also want to sacrifice ‘any’ artifact to turn that into an upside, and cramming every staple option that generates lots of Treasures is likely a quick way of making your board and your commander get out of hand.

There are probably enough sacrifice outlets in the base precon
Audacious Reshapers; Slobad, Goblin Tinkerer; Fain, the Broker; Farid, Enterprising Salvager; Herald of Anguish; Smelting Vat and Trading Post - that’s 6 sacrifice outlets in a single precon, which is already quite high compared to previous releases.

Mishra’s act of weaponizing noncreatures self balances somewhat because the token you create goes away at the beginning of the next end step. Having the ability to sacrifice that creature and turning it into further benefits like top deck knowledge, card draw or free value on top of already having 6 ways of doing so - limited mostly by costing mana, or tapping to activate in the base precon - would mean you’re completely negating your commander’s downside.

Again, upgrading your sacrifice outlets feels like a logical step when upgrading your deck, but can lead to situations where you have so many fail safes in place, your board turns into this engine that is hard to stop. Viscera Seer, Woe Strider and whichever of the repeatable Altars will provide a sizable advantage to your board. It’s likely fine to replace one of the slower sacrifice outlets with one of these, adding several of these should likely be reconsidered.

Compare these outlets to a card like Witch’s Oven on the other hand, which is limited to one activation per turn, and provides you with 2 food tokens because your animated artifact creature is a 4/4. These food tokens on their own aren’t going to speed up your game plan too much since they don’t provide ramp, mana, or card draw, but they do give you a noncreature artifact to copy on your next turn.

I’d question the edibility and logistics of forcing an animated Ichor Wellspring into a cake tin, but I’m sure you can ask Asmoranomardicadaistinaculdacar for advice on how to make that recipe work.

Ending the turn early and additional combat steps
Mishra’s ‘sacrifice at the beginning of the next end step’ clause immediately puts cards like Sundial of the Infinite and Obeka, Brute Chronologist on my mind. If you’re curious how those cards work, Chief and I already highlighted these in our Confusing Cards article.

I believe for the most part, adding these is relatively safe. You’re keeping a 4/4 copy of an artifact around for another turn. That’s not something mind blowing or an action that’s going to outvalue the table quickly - pending available artifacts to make copies of. In a gently upgraded precon where you’re not really increasing the amount of artifact threaths, it’s probably fine to have one or the other.

I’d like to use this opportunity to highlight Teferi’s Veil as a ‘weirder’ alternative for this effect. While it’s true you’re not keeping the body to block with because it’s phased out, it does bypass the sacrifice part of Mishra’s ability, so on your next turn, the creature is still there.

Outside of this precon, repeatable extra combats can already be an issue for BC on our server, and ‘cloning my best artifact each combat to animate it on top of several combats per turn’ does feel like something that should be avoided. The deck does a fine job giving you repeat copy triggers already without needing to put extra combat steps in. I’m sorry Bloodthirster and Karlach, Fury of Avernus fans.

Judge Calls

Ashnod the Uncaring and copying triggers
Ashnod’s The Uncaring, the deck’s alternate commander, has a weird ability, and the deck has ways to copy abilities outside of Ashnod. I expect several people to either have questions in regards to this or maybe play these interactions incorrectly, so it’s time to involve our in-house Judge and Mentor Reyemile again.

On the battlefield: Ashnod the Uncaring, Audacious Reshapers and Ichor Wellspring. Activate Audacious Reshapers, sacrificing Ichor Wellspring, triggering Ashnod the Uncaring. I do not need to sacrifice a second artifact to get Ashnod to copy Audacious Reshapers’ ability, because that part of the ability is a cost to activate it, which we’re skipping with Ashnod, right?

Correct. Copying an ability puts a xerox of the ability directly on the stack, and bypasses the part where you'd have to pay costs. Note that we're only copying the Reshapers’ part in this example. The death trigger on Wellspring isn't affected.

On the battlefield: Mishra, Eminent One; Strionic Resonator or Lithoform Engine and 2 legal targets for Mishra to make token copies of. When I copy the triggered ability from Mishra, I can choose a new target artifact to copy into a 4/4 Construct, correct?

Yup, both of those cards say you can choose new targets, so you do what it says on the card and get two Warforms of different artifacts. They'll both be named Mishra's Warform though, so if they target two legendary permanents then both Warforms will be legendary and one of them will die as a state-based action, even if their costs and text boxes are completely different!

New card highlights

Smelting Vat
Reveal your top eight. YES, EIGHT! This will likely show up in storm/Cheerios decks quite soon. Pay one, sacrifice your 0 drop artifact, look at your top 8 and put two brand new 0 drop artifacts into play. Trigger your choice of card draw and artifact untappers and do it all over again. It’s 4 mana, so for competitive play that might be a little steep, but this will definitely see play. Speaking of Smelting Vat … how do Ashnod the Uncaring and Smelting Vat work together? JUDGE?!

Magic has a comprehensive list of what is and isn't a "copyable value," and while I don't want to go through the entire rules subsection, "costs paid to activate/cast a spell/ability" is on the list. The copy will know what was sacrificed for the original ability, and calculate your choices based on the same mana value.

Wondrous Crucible
Seven mana is quite a lot, but a colorless card that provides ward 2 for your entire board seems versatile, especially in decks that lack the ability to provide board-wide hexproof. I’m a little bummed this doesn't allow you to play lands from your graveyard but in a deck that’s already on a mill or reanimation strategy this is likely not going to be a terrible card.

Cuts and replacements

I understand putting an artifact from your opponent into play and making it into a copy with Mishra is likely a fun thing to do, Geth Lord of the Vault is 6 mana, and activating him to maybe get something useful is also quite expensive. You’re not on a mill your opponents gameplan in the precon either.

If you instead slot something like Thunderhawk Gunship, you’re now making two 2/2 tokens with vigilance every time you copy the Gunship with Mishra. You’re always going to lose your animated token at the end of your turn, and while playtesting I noticed you often struggle having blockers open, so you might need an effect that keeps small bodies around so you can survive incoming attacks.

Workshop Elders
This is one of the few cards that’s going to allow Fain to create Treasure tokens, but other than that, it’s not not all that great. I’d likely replace this card with something like Cyberdrive Awakener instead. A 4/4 Flying creature that provides you with the same board-wide flying bonus, and for one turn animates all your noncreature artifacts into 4/4’s. Cyberdrive Awakener has the potential to be your late game overrun effect! Rise and Shine is probably good as a secondary backup here too.

In the precon you’re going to mostly activate Muzzio, Visionary Architect for 4 mana to get a 2-drop - of which the precon has 13 - artifact off the top of your library . While that’s not terrible, it’s not great either. I’d slot another big beater over Muzzio.

Something like Myr Battlesphere (if you want a retro frame one, the Urza precon has one) or Wurmcoil Engine (which got a retro frame printing in the latest set) would be great here. Cards that can be strong enough on their own after a boardwipe, and more specifically cards that don’t require Mishra to be there to be good.

Most of the creatures in the precon tend to be backline engine pieces you want to keep around for payoffs, not creatures you want to send into combat, so adding a few more of those seems smart.

For 7 mana Hellkite Igniter is quite hit or miss. There are so many sacrifice outlets present in the precon. More often than not, you’ll want to keep recycling your artifacts to draw more cards, get top deck knowledge or drop other threats on the table. Hellkite Igniter needs you to go very wide with your artifact count, and unless you’re going to rework the precon to be focus on a go-wide artifact creature strategy, this card indirectly clashes with what the deck is trying to do.

Kappa Cannoneer seems like a solid replacement. It gets way bigger over time than you think it does and it’s close to always going to be unblockable in this precon. I understand that from a ‘not on our server’ point of view this card might be a little weak, but the swingy nature of our own BC environment is going to make this turtle connect more often and for way more damage than you originally anticipated.

Conclusion
Mishra’s Burnished Banner is an artifact-heavy deck that wants to lay out value backline pieces which can utilize the Warform creature as cannon fodder for digging through the deck and cheat other artifacts directly to the battlefield.

It’s trigger-heavy, and in practice plays a less aggressive combat step game than you might have first thought when reading Mishra’s abilities. This deck will thrive in games where it gets enough time to set up, and once you reach a threshold of 3-4 engine pieces, prepare to take long turns with lots of decision making, where sometimes you might be spinning your wheels for a while before finally being able to close out the game after you find your closing piece.

If you enjoy the playstyle of Osgir, the Reconstructor; Breya, Etherium Shaper or Jan Jansen, Chaos crafter, then you’re likely going to have a great time with Mishra, Eminent One.

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