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Helga, Skittish Seer is one of the many commanders available inMagic: The Gathering’sBloomburrow set. Helga was one of the main characters for the story of the set, taking part in the main party and one of the perspectives that were followed over the story.
As a card, Helga offers the perfect effect for Stompy strategies (a playstyle that is focused on primarily casting large creatures). It is capable of snowballing the game once it gets going, and with the right combination of cards, it can cast a ton of creatures in just one turn to immediately put you ahead of everyone else.
Ghalta and Mavren
Inga and Esika
Surrak and Goreclaw
Return of the Wildspeaker
x7 Forest
x4 Island
x4 Plains
Sunpetal Grove
Yavimaya Coast
The decklist contains37 creatures, eight sorceries, five instants, eight artifacts, six enchantments,and34 lands.Since Helga, Skittish Seer revolves around creatures with a mana value of four or greater, the majority of the deck are creatures fitting that bill.
Key Cards
Helga, Skittish Seer
Helga, Skittish Seeris the commander of the deck and what gives the deck its explosive factor. Itgrows in stats whenever you cast a creature with a mana value of four or more, which in turn can be used totap for even more manato cast more creatures. With ways to untap Helga, you can make sure its effects keep triggering.
While Helga, Skittish Seer is a very strong card, the deck is perfectly functional without it, so even if it gets countered or removed, you have other tools to make sure you can play your spells.
Helga offers a ton of valuejust by simply playing your deck. Not only does it act as a mana dork for creatures, it alsogains you lifeanddraws you cards. It only costs three mana to play itself, letting you start growing its stats very early in the game. Since Helga puts +1/+1 counters on itself, cards that give extra counterslet Helga tap to cast multiple creature spells.
Defiler Of Vigor
Since you are playing a creature-based deck,Defiler of Vigorwill put +1/+1 counters whenever you cast green permanent spells. The majority of the permanents in the deck are green, making sure Defiler of Vigor always triggers. You canpay 2 life for the green mana cost, saving mana for other spells. Since Helga gains life, this life loss hardly matters.
Helga wants as many +1/+1 counters on it as possible, so Defiler of Vigor’s effect is especially useful in growing it so it can tap for an excess amount of mana. Alot of creatures in the deck have trample, and with the addition of counters, can make them into even bigger threats than they already are.
Thousand-Year Elixir
Thousand-Year Elixiris one of the biggest enablers for Helga’s effect. Normally, you’d have to wait a turn to start taking advantage of Helga, but since it’s anactivated ability, you may use it as though it had hastewith Thousand-Year Elixir.
Thousand-Year Elixir lets youuntap any creature, letting you use Helga’s ability multiple timesa turn. This mana can only be used for creature spells, but if Helga has high power, it can potentially be enough to play all the creatures in your hand.
With Thousand-Year Elixir and Helga, Skittish Seer, you can use Helga’s ability to make one kind of mana, untap it with Elixir, and tap Helga again for another color of mana.
Keruga, the Macrosage
Of all the permanents in the deck,only 12 have a mana value of two or less, meaning almost everything will draw you a card whenKeruga, the Macrosageenters the battlefield. While you can’t use it as a companion, it’s more than worth playing it in the deck.
Since Keruga, the Macrosage doesn’t do anything after its enter-the-battlefield effect triggers, you should wait to cast it until you have a battlefield of permanent with a mana value of three or more to make sure the effect will do something impactful.
The sheer amount of cards that Kregua can draw canrefill your entire handdepending on what is on the battlefield before it. It has solid stats as well while being relativelyeasy to cast(especiallythanks to how easy it is to generate mana).
Fanatic Of Rhonas
Fanatic of Rhonasis a great backup mana dork if Helga can’t stick to the battlefield. Normally, it only taps for one mana, but itsferocious abilityis what makes it so strong. Since the majority of the time, you’ll have at least one creature with four or more power, it’s easy to tap four for green mana.
Fanatic of Rhonas haseternalize,meaning even if it ever gets removed, you can bring it back for four mana as a 4/4 Zombie. If youdo eternalize it, since its power is four, its ability will always tap for four mana.
How To Play The Deck
Helga, Skittish Seer is all aboutflooding the battlefield with creatures and amassing a giant board state. This is done with various mana dorks such asHelgaitself, along withFanatic of Rhonas, Gwenna, Eyes of Gaea,andInga and Esika,the last of which turns all your creatures into mana dorks while drawing you cards.
Since you want to tap Helga for mana multiple times a turn, cards that untap it are very useful.Thousand-Year Elixir, Kiora, Behemoth Beckoner,andPatriar’s Sealall let you do just that and should be used almost exclusively on Helga.
The deck has a ton of ways toramp to get more lands onto the battlefield. It has the usual green ramp card suite, along withBonny Pall, Clearcutter, Chulande, Teller of Tales,andKarametra, God of Harvests.
In addition, usingenchantmentsthat put more counters on your creaturesmakes them all into bigger threats, and in Helga’s case, lets it tap for even more mana.Branching Evolution, Hardened Scales,andCommunal Brewingall give extra counters, andBrokers Ascendancyputs +1/+1 counters on all your creatures every end step.
The deck is all about creating a board state that quickly gets out of hand. Thanks to its muchhigher-than-average mana generation, you can out-aggro most of your opponents. Your primarywin condition is winning through combat. You can easily grow the stats of your creatures to make them big threats and swing out at your opponents to deal large outbursts of damage, potentially enough to win in one turn.
Thebiggest weakness of the deck is it can struggle after a board wipe. Since it’s built heavily on creatures, losing all of them can prove to be a struggle. you’re able to build back up, but if your opponents can stop you before you build back up, you’ll be taken out of the game. Since Helga snowballs so fast,you’re likely to become the main enemyvery quickly, so you’ll be targeted more than your opponents.
