Adam: Hello and welcome to this blog post! I’m your writer, Adam Klesh, also known online as madolaf.
Brad: And I’m your other writer, Bradley Rose, also known online as Bradley Rose!
Adam: I was tasked to write a post about making a Commander deck using Battlebond cards, and I thought, “This would be much more fun if I could get my podcasting partner and all-around good dude Bradley Rose to make a deck along with me!”
Brad: And I was asked to partner with Adam, not for podcasting this time, but for deckbuilding and writing.
Adam: We decided right away that we wanted to each use one half of a partner team as our Commander. After looking at Pir and Toothy, we found our matches. (Some people claim that Brad is actually my imaginary friend.)
Brad: I think you’re just imagining these people that are claiming that I’m your imaginary friend. But you know what’s real? Friendship. Like the bond Pir and Toothy share.
[Check out Adam’s Pir deck and Brad’s Toothy deck on TappedOut!]
Adam: Pir and Toothy love counters. In our version of these buddy decks, we are focusing on +1/+1 counters and loyalty counters.
Brad: Yeah! And it’s not just counters that rock for Toothy – drawing cards is the name of the game. Ideally, Toothy’s deck would include cards that care about both counters and drawing cards. Turns out there’s a TON of Planeswalkers (loyalty counters) in the blue color identity that also draw you cards! (*cough* Jace *cough*)
Adam: The Pir deck, which I will be running, focuses on putting +1/+1 counters on my team’s creatures and using Pir’s ability along with Hardened Scales and Primal Vigor to make our creatures as big as possible. I know Toothy doesn’t have a lot of creature pals, but the ones he does have all love getting +1/+1 counters.
Brad: Especially Chasm Skulker, who is low-key Toothy’s cousin.
And since Two-Headed Giant Commander means we share our creatures, I don’t need to worry about having blockers when Adam’s deck takes care of that in spades. Instead, the Toothy deck focuses on drawing cards, building up Planeswalkers, and proliferating all of our counters.
Adam: Don’t worry, Brad! Get those Planeswalkers out, and I’ll cover defense (and offense) with my army of beefy creatures.
Brad: And I’ll assist that game plan by providing you the mana to get those creatures out with Victory Chimes and Spectral Searchlight, protect your spells with countermagic, and clear the way of troublesome creatures with polymorphic spells like Pongify and Rapid Hybridization (3/3s are nothin’ to deal with)!
Adam: Helping each other is the name of the game in Two-Headed Giant, so we both put graft cards in our decks for that purpose. Aquastrand Spider, Llanowar Reborn, and Cytoplast Root-Kin in my half…
Brad: …and Helium Squirter and Vigean Graftmage in mine. Each helps any creatures with counters already on them, while Cytoplast Manipulator can take advantage of any of our graft creature’s ability to move counters onto an opponent’s creature to then take control of.
Adam: My favorite card in this deck is the little-used Afiya Grove. It gets extra counters when entering the battlefield as long as Pir is out, and it gives extra counters to one of our creatures every turn. Adding in the other counter helpers makes it even better. It’s not super powerful, but it’s a fun card that I think should see more play with Pir around.
Brad: My favorite card is Battlebond’s Game Plan. It’s a surprise move that can help you draw a ton of cards and grow Toothy super large. It can either be unexpectedly cast with Adam being able to assist in casting it or give Adam a fresh hand of cards without him needing to spend any mana on card draw.
Adam: And I have Fertilid and Ley Weaver to give you some extra mana to do all the things you want as well as get you your Lore Weaver!
The Pir deck has a small Thallid theme as well as a small Megamorph theme. Overlapping the two is Thelonite Hermit. He doesn’t get a +1/+1 counter for flipping up, but he boosts all the random Saprolings that my double (or quadruple) counter-per-turn Thallids create.
Brad: I focus on cards say “draw” for the best mana rates while minimizing interrupting Adam’s game plan. For example, Day’s Undoing would end up ending the turn for both me and Adam (as well as shuffle away any sweet cards in his hand). And spells that “sift” (draw cards but then require you to discard or otherwise put away cards) are the best for Toothy. Even better when they’re an instant since they’ll act as combat tricks!
Adam: I am focused less on tricks and more on smashing. I do have a few Instants, though. Heroic Intervention and Inspiring Call can save my creatures from removal, and Strength of the Tajuru is especially potent with a lot of mana and/or creatures to target.
Brad: Toothy thanks the Strength of the Tajuru for the instant beef.
Adam: Oh yeah! Glad to be of service.
I am very excited to see the interaction of Brad’s Arcane Artisan with my Doubling Season and/or Primal Vigor. Getting multiple copies of any of my strong creatures for free(!) is really going to be something cool to experience.
Brad: I love that Animation Module is in the Pir deck. The +1/+1 counters only benefit the controller, which is Adam’s thing, but the other ability allows Adam to be able to put counters on any of my Planeswalkers each turn!
Adam: There are a lot more cool interactions in these two decks. We hope to see you all at GP Vegas so we can throw down against you and a friend. You can find me on Twitter at @madolaf…
Brad: …and you can find me at @bradleyrose!
Header image: “Toothy, Imaginary Friend” by Zoltan Boros