Hello and welcome to Commander Bites!

Today we are going to be taking a look at Yargle and Multani!

Yargle and Multani are a six mana 18/6 with no inherent abilities.

Game Plan

Yargle, Glutton of Urborg was a fairly popular meme creature back in the day, so when March of the Machine was being released having them come back in some capacity was a guarantee, and when they did come back pairing up with Multani and being nothing but a bag of huge stats, it was what was to be expected.

Being three points away from being able to win via Commander Damage makes the game plan of the deck very simple: boost up the duo and then swing in to win the game. We will also being taking advantage of the 18 power they have for reasons other than combat.

Support

So the first thing we need, if we are considering a Commander Damage victory, are ways to get Yargle and Multani’s power at least 21 and a way to make sure we can deal damage to our opponents.

Rancor is a great start for us because it gives the enchanted creature +2/+0 and trample and when it is put into the graveyard from the battlefield then we can put it back into our hand, so for the card effects that we are going to use that takes advantage of Yargle and Multani’s high power by sacrificing them, we have a cheap way to get them back to near lethal damage.

Power Fist is also an excellent option for us because it gives the equipped creature trample and whenever the equipped creature deals combat damage to a player, you put that many +1/+1 counters on the equipped creature. This means that even if we don’t beat a player through Commander Damage from the first attack, then we will likely do it on the next attack and then clear the table from there.

Another solid Equipment is Silver Shroud Costume, which has flash and when it enters we attach it to a creature we control and the equipped creature gains shroud until end of turn, but more importantly it makes it so that the equipped creature can’t be blocked.

We also have access to cards that make utility use of Yargle and Multani’s high power, like Essence Harvest which makes it so that target player loses X life and we gain X life where X is the greatest power among creatures we control, which can outright kill an opponent in the right situation while also potentially stabilizing us if we need to.

Rishkar’s Expertise is also a great card because we draw cards equal to the highest power among creatures we control and then cast a spell of mana value 5 or less for free. We can also combine this with Traverse the Outlands to find up X basic lands where X is the greatest power among creatures we control and put them into play tapped.

If we happen to get Yargle and Multani’s power very high but our opponents are making it difficult for us to attack, we can use Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord to sacrifice them to have each opponent lose life equal to their power.

Ruthless Technomancer is also a great card for us to use because we can sacrifice Yargle and Multani to its ability in order to create a number of Treasure tokens equal to its power. We combine that ability with something like Feign Death to bring them back onto the battlefield when they die, and we have a huge number of Treasures and we don’t need to immediately recast Yargle and Multani.

Setbacks

Seeing as we are a Voltron Commander, the issue that we will definitely face will be making sure that we can end the game as quickly as possible.

If we manage to take one player out of the game, we still likely have two opponents to deal with and that can be a struggle in our colors. We have access to one extra combat card in Genji Glove, but that is a one time use for us per turn, meaning at most we can take out two players.

That’s not to say that we aren’t out of the woods, we also need to be mindful of removal spells. Yargle and Multani having no abilities does us no favors, and while we have plenty of access to ways of making sure that we can get them back into play cheaply, that still isn’t a guarantee that we can make it out without having to recast the duo at some point.

We have access to green so we have the ramp to cast Yargle and Multani multiple times, but since we are a Voltron deck, ideally we need to have a way to make sure that we can protect them as soon as possible. Swiftfoot Boots is our best option in this case, but that still has a one mana Equip cost.

That also makes it so that our Equipment and Auras and other ways we have to boost Yargle and Multani are at risk from being removed from the board, most likely from an incidental removal spell attached to a creature or mass removal.

Bracket Rating: High 1, Mid 2

I do think that Yargle and Multani can be a fun Commander to play, though the we do need to jump through some hurdles in order to make them more effective as a Commander.

Having no protection, being a bag of stats, and having some restrictive color pips does make Yargle and Multani fairly narrow in what they can do, but there are still some interesting cards that we can play with in order to spice the deck up a bit.

You won’t be winning high powered tournaments, but there is a chance that you have Yargle and Multani win you a casual game or two and have a fun story to come out of it.

Thank you for reading, see you all tomorrow!

Peace,

From, J.M. Casual