Halana and Alena, Partners | Trampling +1/+1 Counters | Commander | EDH | Budget| Cut-Rate Commander

[@oxpolitik]

Great content, great deck. Green Stompy has been a favorite archetype of mine since the days of Crash of Rhinos.

[@GrazzetMTG]

Glad you enjoyed it! Green/Gruul Stompy decks are a guilty please of mine as well - sometimes you don't need fancy game plans or tactics when turning huge creatures sideways does the job!

[@drewharmon2300]

Been looking for inspiration to build a deck with this commander since pulling it in a draft. You got me hooked and moving forward on a build, great stuff!

[@GrazzetMTG]

Glad you enjoyed it and I hope you have fun with you're own build!

[@SwiftDeath0608]

The Upgrades Unleashed Commander Precon actually has a lot of these cards included, and a lot of other good Gruul counters- based cards. Raised By Giants from the Baldurs Gate set is a good enchantment to add, turning Helana and Alena into a 10/10 making a giant beatstick every combat phase.

[@morrius0757]

Great deck, glad you're feeling better.

[@GrazzetMTG]

Glad you enjoyed it! Yep, I'm back to 100% and eager to put out more deck techs!

[@morkyness]

I thought you'd add their original printing fro Commander Legends for additional partners. Lol. This is a pretty good deck tech.

[@GrazzetMTG]

Glad you enjoyed it! The individual Halana and Alena, while not bad additions, did not do enough in testing so I opted to cut them. Still, if you want to go all in on these hunters, adding them for some flavor is a fine choice.

[@TxarlesN]

Nice to have you back. Although these two do not enchant me as a commander, the truth is that I do like their lore. Good deck and thanks for the video.

[@GrazzetMTG]

Glad to be back! Halana and Alena's are certainly a good inclusion by WotC, since it does give more representation to within their world building.

[@geogaddimaxima7421]

Good to see you're well! ☕📓🖊️

[@GrazzetMTG]

Yep, I'm back to 100% and ready to make tackle builds!

[@BoronBullet]

This one is dope. Love a boosted tramplers

[@GrazzetMTG]

Glad you enjoyed it! If Gruul is good at one things, its big creatures and making those creatures even bigger! (I guess that's 2 things but hey, we're in Gruul - we're not so good with the maths)

[@lukabrdar5631]

Great job sir, u should have more views.

[@GrazzetMTG]

Glad you enjoyed the content and thank you for your kind words.

[@nicktofani8455]

Timothar gets my vote, would love to see some of the interesting interactions you come up with.

[@GrazzetMTG]

Thanks for voting! I think Timothar has the makings of an interesting aristocrats vampire build, so I'll certainly have fun putting the deck together if he can keep the top spot.

[@mortycremwatch]

Rhonas’ Monument seems great here. Reduces the cost of a big chunk of the deck while growing Halana and Alena to dish out more counters

[@GrazzetMTG]

That is a good point, seeing as we're already a creature heavy build and it lets us swing in with our commander afterword's too with for guaranteed damage thanks to the trample it grants. Great suggestion!

[@morkyness]

Great deck tech as always. My vote goes to either Timothar or Donal. Geralf lacks black to be a zombie tribal.

[@GrazzetMTG]

Thanks for the vote! I personally like Geralf's take on zombies but yeah, not being in black does hurt him in that department.

[@nickatwork]

Geralf wouldn't need to be zombie tribal, just big butts tribal.

[@prodangl]

Another great deck to consider, Id love to see a Nekusar build :p

[@GrazzetMTG]

Glad you enjoyed it! It looks like a good number of folks want me to work on some older commanders. so we Nekusar could see some love in the future!

[@masontalley3073]

AYE! I made the video!

[@johnrobinson6352]

I use this card in my minsc beloved ranger deck letting you use his pay x change creatures base power and toughness to x x to get two buffed creatures at onece

[@GrazzetMTG]

Sound like she would be a powerful supporting piece in that build to make her huge then in turn make something else huge - which is exactly what Minsc want to do!

[@raleighpentecost7684]

Stonecoil serpent seems like a great include here as well.

[@GrazzetMTG]

Very true! Its a scalable threat with trample, surprise reach, and it protection is relevant in our format - not to mention its price has come down quite a bit since I last looked at it. I agree that if you want to slot it in, it would make a great addition.

[@GustavpSPires]

@@GrazzetMTG unfortunately the serpent is a nombo as it has protection from multicolored and cannot be targeted by the commander. ):

[@Crymble]

​@@GustavpSPires Was about to say lol don't want anyone having a rude awakening

[@CJVIagic]

Thanks a lot for the video! Great work. I'm curious about your deck building philosophy. I've noticed you often don't run mana rocks. Is there a reason for this?

[@GrazzetMTG]

Glad you enjoyed it! Regarding mana rocks - I tend not to run them in decks with green in them in favor of land based ramp. The reason is multifold. Firstly - lands are much more difficult for our opponents to interact with, thereby keeping our mana base safe from generic removal effects (of which artifact removal is fairly common and can cripple our manabase if where unlucky). Secondly it helps thin our decks, as land based ramp actually removes cards from our deck while mana rocks do not. Granted the percent is small in which this thins a 99 card deck, but if most of our ramp sources are land based and fetch 1-2 cards, we can see some noticeable results as we draw less basics and more gas as the game progresses. That said, its often not incorrect to run a Sol Ring in every single commander deck, since it us undoubtedly the best source of mana in our format for the cost, so you would like to make any changes to green decks mana bases I would recommend that. I often do include it myself since I find that the decks don't "need" it since they have access to a lot of ramp sources already, but I will agree that it would make a fine inclusion. Hope that helps explain my line of thinking.

[@CJVIagic]

@@GrazzetMTG Understood. Thank you very much for the rundown! I agree with sol ring as an autoinclude (unfortunately).

[@jasonmckeogh7376]

Soldier deck! Gruul counter is definitely different, that’s usually a simic archetype. Please do Geralf!

[@GrazzetMTG]

Glad you enjoyed it! Ghuul certainly has the tools for counter decks and can give simic a run for its money in that department. Geralf still has a ways to go to claim the top spot, but we still have time for an upset. Lets see if he can make up the distance!

[@kevendescoteaux5080]

I love ur contents !

[@GrazzetMTG]

Glad to hear you are enjoying it!

[@eliotchan6119]

Always wondered - do you do lore research for all your videos for your little blurbs before the deck descriptions actually begin?

[@GrazzetMTG]

I do some light lore research - nothing too crazy but enough that it fits with the decks theme.

[@Heavyarms525]

Deck barely needed red with how stomps it was! Voted for Geralf, because for some reason blue has some of the better zombie payoff cards, even if their zombies aren’t as numerous or good.

[@GrazzetMTG]

True enough, but a splash of red was all it needed! Thanks for voting - Crimson Vow certainly gave us some potent zombie payoffs in blue, which I suppose goes some way to make up for Geralfs lack of access to black.

[@Jonnyguitar1877]

I am using them as my commander in Brawl on arena and wow I underestimated them at first.

[@GrazzetMTG]

Yeah, their ability looks somewhat basic at first bit if left unchecked they can certainly make quick work of an opponent in Brawl or Commander.

[@Jonnyguitar1877]

@@GrazzetMTG Getting Ghalta out as a 14/14 with haste is pretty gross. Lol 😂

[@doritodust0076]

I voted for Geralf, as you can't split the twins apart. Additionally if like to ask about the secret lair commander deck: When it drops, or sometime around it, do you plan on doing a "precon" upgrade guide for it?

[@GrazzetMTG]

Thanks for the vote! Honestly, I have no plans to do a deck tech around secret layers (I just have enough time to do my weekly releases at this point) - though I would enjoy to take a crack at them if I find myself with some time (or build my own budget coin flip themed deck).

[@Galchoo1]

Oh, boy, here comes the Innistrad Power Couple, out to kill the CisHet Patriarchy... Uh, I meant The Monsters of Innistrad. Then again, it will probably take some testing of this sweet deck to notice the difference. My vote goes to Donal, The Birbmaster, because copying shenanigans will always have a bit more potential than tribal and/or graveyard ones in my book. Also, we can make Donald Duck jokes, and that writes half the script by itself. Day 131 of waiting for Grazzet's face reveal. If you could design an alternate win card, what would it be like? Cause I am curious to see if your idea will be broken in half by the community like Thassa's Oracle.

[@GrazzetMTG]

Thanks for the vote! Alternate wincons are quite hard to balance properly, since they are either useless or broken with only a rare few somewhere in the middle. Honestly a legendary creature with a 13 themed wincon like Triskaidekaphile would be fun (preferably in Dimir into have as many cards that care about 13 as possible).