Hello everyone,

I'd like to throw my hat in the ring and offer my list+primer for Nin to you all. It's been a while since she's been released or discussed within the meta, so I'd like to step up and paint a picture of where the deck sits in 2019. This is meant to be slightly more beginner-friendly of a primer, but I'm certain cEDH vets can take away some helpful info as well.

In a cEDH setting, Nin is an artifact combo list with a healthy dose of interaction and a little stax. This is because we are slightly slower than the dedicated fast combo decks anyway (Food Chain, Storm, Flash Hulk, etc.), so it is best to pack more interaction to help control the game until we can safely win. Yes, I know Thrasios is king of the infinite mana generals, but I've got a soft spot for Nin and I've enjoyed tweaking the absolute highest power list with her as possible over the years. (I'm confident she's solid tier 2 material. She actually has some advantages over fish man!)

I'll start with the deck's plan, win conditions, my local meta, then break down the card choices by card type. To keep this from being the length of your average thesis, I'm not going to go in-depth into play patterns and such, but I hope you can absorb some of that type of information from my discussion on each of the cards in the list.

Basic Metrics / Gameplan:

Land count: 31

Average CMC: 1.81

cEDH Nin is an infinite mana combo deck. I have tried everything else (Theft, Storm, Sneak Attack Eldrazi) but nothing matches the power and efficiency of the artifact mana kill. Our gameplan is to generate infinite mana using one of our compact 2-card combos and find an outlet to kill the table. Nin fills the role nicely since infinite mana with Nin means you draw your deck (and win, presumably).

Here's how you can get infinite mana:

Plan A: Isochron Scepter imprinting Dramatic Reversal + 3 mana from artifacts

Plan B: Grim Monolith + Power Artifact

Plan C: Metalworker + Staff of Domination + 3 Artifacts in hand

After you have infinite mana, you have a few options. In order to win, you usually play Walking Ballista for X = 1 million and activate its second ability a million times (holding priority) to kill the table. If you don't have it in hand, you can use Nin, the Pain Artist's ability on herself (or another creature you control) to draw your deck. You can also use Staff of Domination (or the suite of artifact tutors to find Staff) to achieve the same effect. If the Ballista gets exiled somehow, you can still kill the table with Expansion // Explosion by casting it and flashing it back with Mission Briefing. If everything has gone wrong and none of those options are available, it's time to start hitting opponents' creatures with Nin to deck them.

Why Nin over X General?

First, no, Nin is not as strong as 4-color Thrasios (No deck is, I believe it is the best deck in the format). This is partially since Thrasios doesn't care about summoning sickness to draw your library, and the extra colors allow you to take advantage of the best green and black spells out there.

But, Nin has a few unique advantages that I've found very enticing. First, the red splash offers a variety of helpful stax pieces (Blood Moon, Stranglehold) and enables unique cards that few other cEDH decks can take advantage of (Dack Fayden). This makes for a deck with all the payoff cards of a mono blue deck (High Tide, Vedalken Shackles) while still having the spiciest interaction. Second, she can hit herself midgame to refill your hand when running low on gas. Since cEDH is so fast and mana costs are so low, it's common for decks to peeter out quickly without a good draw engine. Nin fits the bill extremely well here, and there have been many situations where I've been able to ping Nin with her ability for 5 cards or so EOT, then win with my massive advantage the next turn. That efficiency just draws more cards than Thrasios/Tymna on average, which gives us an edge.

As for other infinite commanders, most either are useless without infinite mana/storm (Oona, Circu) or need colored mana (Tasigur, Breya) and require more complicated combos than the ones seen in this deck. Among other Izzet commanders, the biggest competition is new Jhoira. But that deck is too glass cannon IMO (reliant on the commander) and is forced to play tons of weaker artifacts just to hit critical mass to reliably draw cards. If Jhoira is taken out, it's very hard to get the ball rolling again. Nin can play both the control role and combo role just as effectively.

My meta:

As any tuned deck should, this list is tuned for my local playgroup. If you're looking to take inspiration from this deck, feel free to adjust things if you find they won't be as helpful in your pods. cEDH has a lot of silver bullet stax cards, so it's expected to pick and choose the best for your most frequent opponents. On a given day, I'll be against:

Thrasios + Tymna

Prime Speaker Yannifar

Chain Veil Teferi

Animar, Soul of Elements

Karador, Ghost Chieftan

Arcum Daggsun

Jhoira, Weatherlight Captain

Multrotha, the Gravetide

Brago, King Eternal Stax

Gitrog Dredge

Yisan, the Wander Bard

Kess Storm

Jace, Vyrn's Prodigy

Food Chain Tazri

Alesha Stax

Meren Stax

Approximately 8 million Flash Hulk variants (Tasigur is the main one in this group)

All of these are at or near the cEDH level. If you're not against other cEDH decks, don't build a deck like this. You'll be seen as a pubstomper asshole and it's kinda rude.

Let's dive into the decklist. Here you'll find a quick explanation for every card in the list - separated by card type.

Creatures:

Gilded Drake: Simply best in slot for commander theft. Obviously better than just killing an enemy commander since they'll need to kill it to use it again. Plenty of cEDH decks rely on their commander (Yisan, Selvala, Animar, Yannifar, etc.) and this stops them dead in their tracks (particularly greedy decks like Gitrog that don't interact at all).

Dockside Extortionist: Excellent new guy from C19 - he serves as a piece of ramp and leaves a body to be hit by Nin afterwards.

Metalworker: Yikes, what a card. Any card that can generate more mana than it costs is a contender for cEDH, and lil' robot provides. With 3 artifacts in hand, he combos for the win with Staff of Domination. Otherwise, often taps for a lot of mana, then gets sacrificed to Nin for a fresh hand.

Spellseeker: Can find Dramatic Reversal for the combo, Transmute Artifact to find the Scepter, or countermagic to protect the combo if you already have it in hand. If you're really in a pinch, go find Cyclonic Rift.

Trinket Mage: Basically Sol Ring on a stick. Still worth it even at 3 mana. Sometimes can snag Grafdigger's Cage when an opponent is eyeing their graveyard or about to tutor something directly into play.

Snapcaster Mage: Excellent all-arounder. Works as a double of your essential card draw spell or interaction against disruption. I prefer this over Mission Briefing since the body is relevant (you can ping him with Nin later to draw cards).

Tribute Mage: An even better variant, since it can find combo pieces such as the Scepter or Monolith. If you need to, it can find a different rock or hate piece.

Thing in the Ice: A recent addition but welcome one. It blocks well, has a big butt so I can hit it with Nin for cards, and applies pressure when it flips. A 2 mana creature wipe is extremely rewarding, and shines when your meta is dominated by creature combo decks (as mine is).

Walking Ballista: The kill card of choice. With infinite mana, you win the game. Remember to hold priority after each activation of his damage ability to prevent people from interacting with you. Can find it with Trinket Mage, Inventor's Fair, and several other artifact tutors.

Instants:

Pact of Negation: Cheap countermagic is the king of interaction in cEDH. Who cares about the upkeep cost if you win the game the turn you cast it?

Brainstorm: Legacy staple for a reason. Good here because of our shuffle effects (Ponder, Fetches, tutors, etc.). Handy for hiding cards you want in your library right before a Wheel of Fortune.

Chain of Vapor: No one's going to sac a land to copy it. 1 mana bounce is great.

Galvanic Blast: A metagame choice. Brago, Linvala, Meren, Atraxa, Karador, Zur, and Kess are tough to deal with - Blast helps me efficiently deal with these pesky 4-toughness commanders. Sometimes you just have to kill a commander or lose (Yisan, Selvala, Zur). Most don't expect it, and punishes people who go a little too deep with Ad Nauseum. Most often gets rid of a hatebear, which is just fine. Also is a nice spell to imprint under the Scepter when I'm going for Plan D to win, which has happened a few times.

High Tide: 1 mana to make like 5 mana? OK. 1 mana = 1 card with Nin, so I'm down for that. We have lots of basic islands to afford to play with this.

Mental Misstep: A LOT of cEDH cards are CMC 1. The fact that this is free is even better.

Mystical Tutor: Not much that needs to be said here, generically useful tutor effect.

Swan Song: 1 mana hard counter for 3 card types. The bird doesn't matter.

Pyroblast: It's good disruption and combo protection all in one, especially if you know there will be a lot of countermagic trying to interact with you.

Abrade: Very versatile interaction - either blows up a piece of fast mana (Sol Ring, Mana Crypt), hatebear or other relevant creature (Yisan, Thalia, Baby Jace), or stax piece (Trinisphere, Null Rod, etc.). Really helps round out my removal suite since most of my other interaction doesn't hit artifacts or creatures.

Counterspell: Classic. 2 mana is good enough for an unconditional counter.

Cyclonic Rift: One of the remaining board wipes left in the deck, and the one with the most punch. Some decks cut this, but I think Nin makes enough mana to reliably overload it when really necessary.

Dramatic Reversal: Part of the primary combo. Not even terrible when you aren't imprinting it under the scepter, especially when you need to reset Grim Monolith or Mana Vault.

Expansion // Explosion: I'm interested in this as a replacement for Comet Storm (previous back-up plan kill card), so I'm trying it out. You can get Comet storm with Muddle the Mixture, but you can get this with Merchant Scroll. I like that it is a good early interactive spell that can counter opposing counters, or borrow some of black's tutor power when an opponent casts something, all while still being a good outlet for infinite mana when it's time to win (burn an opponent and make another deck themselves, or deck myself and draw into Walking Ballista if I don't have it yet). Besides, I'm not using the burn portion of Comet Storm much since I've been happy with Abrade and Galvanic Blast.

Impulse: Handy and efficient card draw when Nin isn't online. (Can put it under the scepter in grindy games.)

Mana Drain: Oof. I hope you don't need me to explain why this card is busted.

Muddle the Mixture: Secret powerhouse. It finds both pieces of Plan A and Plan B combos, and can also counter things when needed.

Narset's Reversal: Wonderfully tricky interactive spell. Can borrow some of black's tutor power while delaying opponents' tutors, or redirect their removal at their own board. This works nicely against counterspells since you can return your own spell to your hand in response, then recast it.

Negate: Unless your meta is filled with Elfball and Creature combo decks, negate will always be great.


Whir of Invention: Chord of Calling for artifacts. The fact that this is instant is huge - not much else to say here. It's a tutor = It's good.

Fact or Fiction: Recently added back into the deck. I thought 4 mana was too much, but turns out that's still a great rate for what you get here.

Force of Will: See Pact of Negation. If this was some 4 color nonsense deck, I'd think twice about using this. We're nearly monoblue, so no regrets.

Sorceries:

Gitaxian Probe: Free card draw. Useful for checking if the coast is clear to combo off, and 0 mana to get a Paradox Engine trigger sounds great to me.

Ponder: Obviously good card selection. Cheap and effective.

Preordain: See Ponder.

Vandalblast: Every cEDH deck uses fast artifact mana, and most use even more artifacts as engines, stax pieces, or kill cards (Like this deck). 5 mana to kill 8+ mana worth of rocks, Cursed Totem, and your Chain Veil? Insane. 1 mana to get your Sol Ring? Still good.

Merchant Scroll: Obvious generically good tutor. Main targets are counterspells, Dramatic Reversal, and Cyclonic Rift.

Transmute Artifact: Best there is. Easiest tutor to sneak Paradox Engine into play early.

Fabricate: Obvious generically good tutor. A tad expensive, but can't complain.

Pyroclasm: Wrecks the elfball / hatebear decks. I wanted a cheap sweeper to fight against creature decks since most of my remaining removal is designed to fight blue.

Wheel of Fortune: 3 mana for 7 cards. We want as many of these as we can get after dumping mana rocks early. Try to use this right after an opponent tutors for something to hand.

Windall: See Wheel of Fortune.

Artifacts:

Chrome Mox: A lot of these will be busted mana rocks, so let me lay it out here - fast artifact mana is absurd in cEDH. In a game like magic that is balanced by limited resources, if you can have 5 or 6 mana on turn 2-3, you'll win a vast majority of those games. There's no mystery why every powerful deck is filled with these 0-2 CMC rocks (minus Animar). In our deck, more mana = more cards with Nin, and a greater likelihood of doing something insane with Dramatic Reversal + Isochron Scepter or Paradox Engine the moment they hit the field.

Lotus Petal: Yeah, still good enough. See Chrome Mox.

Mana Crypt: Busted. See Chrome Mox.

Mox Amber: It's a mox, albeit the weakest of the bunch.

Mox Diamond: It's a mox.

Mox Opal: it's a mox.

Grafdigger's Cage: Stops Reanimation, Hulk combos, Yisan, and Chord effects. Hardly affects me at all.

Mana Vault: Busted. See Chrome Mox.

Sensei's Divining Top: Provides a little bit of extra digging when you need it. You can stack draw triggers when you have a Paradox Engine loop to draw through your deck.

Sol Ring: Busted. See Chrome Mox.

Fellwar Stone: 2 mana, comes into play untapped, makes colored mana. "Rock" solid.

Arcane Signet: Great new rock! Even better than Fellwar.

Grim Monolith: Busted. See Chrome Mox. One of the pieces for Plan B infinite mana combo.

Isochron Scepter: One of the pieces for Plan A/D infinite mana combo. Don't be afraid to imprint something other than Dramatic Reversal if you can't find the combo after a while. Mana Drain / Impulse / High Tide / Whatever every turn is still pretty sick.

Izzet Signet: 2 mana, comes into play untapped, makes colored mana.

Mind Stone: Weakest among the rocks here, but cycles when I'd rather have something else. Still good enough.

Talisman of Creativity: 2 mana, comes into play untapped, fixes mana when you need colored.

Scroll Rack: One of the best ways to dig through your deck, especially after scooping up a bunch of cards after using Nin to refill your hand or a Wheel of Fortune effect.

Staff of Domination: an infinite mana outlet, and a piece to achieve infinite mana in Plan C. Usually we use this to draw our deck.

Vedalken Shackles: A little expensive mana-wise, but much stronger than it looks. Most creatures in a competitive environment are small, so I usually only need a few islands to threaten to steal anything. Makes strategies that rely on a commander very difficult (Yisan, Brago, etc.). Sometimes just steals mana dorks, which I'm fine with since I can hit it with Nin and steal another one the next turn.

Enchantments:

Mystic Remora: A cEDH staple that has still gone under the radar in a lot of casual circles. Will either force everyone to play slower for a few turns or draw you like 8 cards.

Power Artifact: The other piece of the Plan B infinite mana combo. Usually find this guy via Muddle the Mixture.

Blood Moon: I live off the tears of greedy 4-color manabases. Straight up locks some decks out of colored mana, and doesn't affect me at all. Stops other stuff that's tough to interact with (Gaea's Cradle, Cabal Coffers, etc.).

Back to Basics: Another excellent payoff for being primarily blue with a light red splash. Decimates greedy manabases of 3+ color decks. Unlike Blood Moon, you can play this when opponents are tapped out to completely lock them off of mana (instead of giving them a bunch of mountains).

Planeswalkers:

Dack Fayden: Consistently awesome and one of the biggest payoffs for going UR. There is always a good mana rock to steal.

Narset, Parter of Veils: One of the more recent heavy-hitters in cEDH, Narset is an excellent stax and card advantage piece all in one. Notably, you can Nin opponents' creatures with Narset out, and they'll only draw 1 card (0 if you're doing it on their turn). Also pairs especially well with Wheel effects, since you'll strip opponents of their hands.

Tezzeret the Seeker: Expensive, but excellent. Think of it like a copy of Transmute Artifact, but if you're lucky you can use it twice.

(Notable) Lands:

Academy Ruins / Buried Ruin: Our tiny recursion package, just in case critical cards get milled or destroyed.

Inventors' Fair: It's a tutor!

Notable Exclusions:

Timetwister / Mishra's Workshop / Volcanic Island: The benefit just isn't worth it in real world dollars. I'm not doing any infinite Timetwister loops, so it's just an insanely expensive wheel effect. Mishra's Workshop is not even good, and while including Volcanic Island would be nice, the benefit is marginal for how much it costs.

Past Inclusions + Currently Testing:

Paradox Engine: Goodnight, sweet prince. It was nice while it lasted. RIP

Kuldotha Forgemaster: Too expensive / clunky.

Consecrated Sphinx: Casual all-star, but 6 mana to maybe draw some cards is too much to ask.

Magus of the Moon: Great when Karador, Animar, Kess, and T&T are at the store, but lately there's been a lot of Edric, Yisan, Yannifar, and Teferi (who don't care about this effect).

Great Furnace: Used this to make sure Mox Opal would be active more often, but I've found it's more important to just have Islands (Vedalken Shackles, Blood Moon effects, etc.)

Annul: The blue 1-mana disenchant. The cards I'm most terrified of are Stony Silence, Null Rod, and Cursed Totem - all of which are hit by Annul. Also, there are plenty of scary targets besides the one I mentioned. There are other 1 mana answers that are more useful though.

Thought Vessel: Got cut as the weakest of the 2cmc rocks as more hatepieces made their way into the deck (Grafdiggers, Blood Moon, Stranglehold, etc.)

Voltaic Key: If we're treating this as a mana rock, it doesn't net mana often enough to be worth it. (Grim Monolith, Mana Vault, Sol Ring, Mana Crypt are the only good targets)

Torpor Orb: Karador has mostly left the local meta, so I feel better about taking this one out. The only deck this really messes with nowadays is Animar and Brago, but I have some tech for him already.

Stranglehold: Gets better the more competitive your group is. Brutal when powered out early, since it also turns off fetchlands. Love playing this against Yisan and Sisay players in my group.

Gamble: This card was in the list for years, and it was only recently that I took it out. I understand why it's popular (it's a 1 mana tutor in red!), but in my years of experience I've found it to be overrated. You usually use tutors to find the second piece of your two card combos (Iso/Scepter or Grim/Power). By that time, there usually isn't much else left in your hand, so discarding one of your combo pieces is likely. So, perhaps you use this to just tutor for fast mana or silver bullet stax pieces? But you can't do it when you have any combo piece in hand, since you're SOL if you discard it. Sometimes you're just unlucky. Generally, I only use this card when I've drawn a lot of cards with Nin and the probability of discarding something critical is low. So, most of the time Gamble is a win-more card. I'm testing taking this card out, but who knows. Most cEDH lists use it, maybe I've been using it wrong.

Spell Snare: Just like Mental Misstep, most people in cEDH play cheap spells. This slot was at first reserved for protection against the scariest stax pieces (Stony Silence, Null Rod, Cursed Totem), but I realized that Spell Snare is more useful than most counters not just against these hate cards, but tons of others. Hits Survival of the Fittest, Kataki, tons of hatebears, Isochron Scepter, several counterspells, Grim Monolith, Flash, Thrasios, etc. Currently replaced with Into the Roil since it's more versatile.

Dispel: Turns out cEDH has a lot of good instants to counter. Most non-elfball decks run at least 20-25. Handy for protecting Nin when attempting to shoot herself to refill my hand, or countering disruption during combo turns.

IN GENERAL: the 1-mana "narrow" counter/removal slot(s).... I'm constantly flip-flopping between Spell Pierce, Pyroblast, Annul, and Spell Snare. Judging from other cEDH lists, Spell Pierce is the most popular, followed by Pyroblast...but I'm not too fond on any of these cards.

Thanks for checking out the guide! If you have any questions/suggestions about the deck, feel free to comment below.

(Sidenote: My playgroup allows PEngine, which I've replaced narset's reversal with.)