I realized this week that I have very few decks with Equipment. This is unintentional; I like Equipment. But in deck tweaking, I figured out why I wasn’t attached to Equipment, and I learned a ton about optimal mana use in the process. I’m co-focusing on Equipment and spare mana throughout this article, but they’re each other’s best examples, so it can’t be helped. You’ll just have to deal with two topics for the price of one! Ha!

Why I (Unintentionally) Don’t Run Much Equipment

I’m the tub-o’-decks guy of my group. I have about sixty normal decks and eight Commander decks. Of those, ten decks are equipped:

• Piston Sledge as power for Blue flyers and as a sacrifice outlet for Wellsprings, Spine of Ish Sah, and Read the Runes;
• Four different Equipment for Godo, Bandit Warlord;
• Hammer of Ruin in a Kemba, Kha Regent/Bludgeon Brawl deck;
• Behemoth Sledge and Mask of Riddles in B/G/W and G/U/B decks built for Necra and Ana Sanctuary;
• Three different Equipment for Brass Squire/Phylactery Lich (one of which, for obvious reasons, is Darksteel Axe);
• Heavy Arbalest, Viridian Longbow, and Bonehoard in a Battered Golem/Galvanic Juggernaut concoction;
• In Commander, Nim Deathmantle (Lady Evangela), Hedron Matrix (Soramaro, First to Dream), and Bonehoard (The Mimeoplasm).

Apparently, I only know three places to include Equipment: in decks that care about Equipment and artifacts in general (half of the above), in decks that care about combo pieces (almost all of the above), or in decks where the inclusion is obvious (Hedron Matrix and Bonehoard). That’s pretty narrow-minded. In this faltering relationship, clearly it isn’t Equipment; it’s me.

So what Valentine’s Day card can I send to Equipment to tell it I love it? How do I understand what Equipment wants from me, how to let it know I’m thinking about it, and how to end strange romantic comparisons in Magic articles?

It starts with understanding Equipment as a function of spare mana.

Equipment and the Spare Mana Rule

My decks with Equipment tend to prefer direct attachment; Piston Sledge, Godo, and Brass Squire all do this. And it’s no wonder—I get to cheat on my deck designs when I treat Equipment like Auras. Because of that, I don’t have any idea how to use Equipment like a normal person.

When I determined I was clueless was in tweaking my Ravnica/Time Spiral–era Rock deck a few days ago. It came from a Magic Online build I had run to some success in 2007 Extended, built around random discard, flying, and the best removal I could find. Vulturous Zombie, Nath of the Gilt-Leaf, and Oona's Prowler are potent together, and there were cool cards like Mirri the Cursed, Carven Caryatid, and Sudden Spoiling to run. Most of those transferred to this paper deck, and while it was solid, it was underperforming, so I wanted to update it.

Trepanation Blade leapt out of my binder wanting to combo with Vulturous Zombie and my cavalcade of flyers. I know there are a bunch of things you can put with Vulturous Zombie, but the Blade looks so good with one that I had to go for it. I took out some of the spot removal (Sudden Death and Ghastly Demise) and put in four T-Blades.

My goldfishing was so bad with the update that I haven’t yet played the revamped deck. It was bad for two reasons:

The equipment conflicted with my creatures. Although my creature curve is a tad clunky, it isn’t expensive; it has Oona's Prowler at 2, Guul Draz Specter and Mirri at 4, and Vulturous Zombie and Nath at 5. Trepanation Blade as a 3-drop looks like it fits. But where’s the 2 mana to get the Blade on the creatures? If I’m curving out, I don’t get to use the Blade until turn six at the earliest, at which point I’ll need the spot removal the Blade replaced.

The equipment conflicted with my instants. For reasons of power and sentiment, I would like to leave Putrefy and Sudden Spoiling in the deck. Both are at 3 mana, but I’ll never cast them if I try to work the curve like the above paragraph would have me do. Sudden Spoiling is powerful enough to be a late-game, post-curve play in the right context, but here, it’s looking increasingly like a split-second Fog . . . and I’m already in Green.

These are issues of mana curve, but not the normal sort. Equipment invokes the spare mana rule:

I’m defining support as the utility in your deck—spells and abilities—untied to a specific path to victory. In this B/G deck, those would be Putrefy, Sudden Spoiling, and Trepanation Blade if I don’t build enough around it. I’m trying to ride a wave of Flying and discard to victory; these cards don’t do that. Conversely, I have a G/U control deck that wants to AEther Mutation something large and have Garruk Wildspeaker lethally pump my new Saproling army on the next turn. There, the 5-mana sorcery AEther Mutation isn’t strictly support; it’s a bounce spell that’s part of a win condition.

If I’m curving out with a turn-two Prowler, a turn-three Blade, a turn-four Mirri, and a turn-five Zombie, I don’t have any spare mana. I certainly want to get that awesome creature suite out ASAP, so if it falls behind by a turn—turn-three Prowler, turn-four Blade, and so on—I still only have 1 spare mana a turn. Now, I could save those creatures for later and play control in the midgame with Putrefy and Sudden Spoiling, but that doesn’t work with the Blade at all. I could treat the Blade as a reusable 5-mana Aura, but that leaves me with twenty 4- and 5-drops and no ramp.

Simply put, Trepanation Blade needs this to be a deck with at least two spare mana and a creature to use it on, and as it’s configured, it never will be. What are my options? The germ of the answer comes from . . . well . . . Germs.

What Living Weapon Taught the World About Equipment

Although I was aware of spare-mana construction principles, I didn’t understand it relative to Equipment until I thought about Living Weapon. Mirrodin Besieged and New Phyrexia got us to rethink the value of Equipment. “Free creature with every purchase!” advertised the Phyrexians—and nobody’s sure what to buy.

The problem is that each Living Weapon Equipment functions very differently if you’re looking at spare mana. Some of them are meant to equip cheaply, while others are about the creature—the initial casting. Some fill your curve out with incidental benefit later; some are just an Aura deluxe. Take a look:

• Bonehoard: This one begs you to consider it high on the curve. Once it’s out there long enough, the Equip cost of 2 is all right, because it should be spare by the time you can move it.
• Flayer Husk: As a 1-drop, it fits into any curve already. This is one of many reasons the Puresteel Paladin Standard deck worked; its Equipment was its curve was its creatures.
• Mortarpod: As removal, Mortarpod is slow, but every time you used the spare mana to re-equip it was to kill something, which is what you might use your other support to do anyway.
• Skinwing: The Germ’s on-curve; the Equip cost definitely isn’t. This is a 2/2 flyer with a vague chance of doing something later.
• Strandwalker: This Germ’s on-curve too; the Equip is hard to tell.
• Batterskull: Equipping is the least-used activated ability on this Equipment.
• Lashwrithe: On-curve as a Germ, and the Equip cost doesn’t require mana, which is why Lashwrithe is on the fringes of tournament viability.
• Necropouncer: The opposite of Skinwing. It’s a terrible Germ, but in the late game, paying 2 to give new creatures +3/+1 and Haste is fantastic. In other words, by the time you cast this, your future turns should leave you the spare mana.
• Sickleslicer: In between Skinwing and Strandwalker. Neither side is exciting.

Most of these are fine as creatures; you’re not giving up a turn to cast them. The spare mana rule is friendly to Bonehoard, Mortarpod, Lashwrithe, and Necropouncer, but that’s because they don’t require mana or because you’ve curved out by the time it makes sense to move them in an abstract curve.

Therefore, my conclusion from Living Weapon is that, if your Equip costs don’t fit your spare mana, the equip costs must top your curve to work out—that is, you can play a creature and equip on the same turn—or you must focus your deck around the Equipment. Trepanation Blade can be at the top of a good deck’s curve—an Aura deluxe—in that sense. If you’re a Prickly Boggart/Oona's Prowler deck, the Blade boosts them at the time you need the boost. If you don’t get the Blade, you’re still laying threats. That deck type also has abundant spare mana because its victory conditions are cheap. The Equipment becomes the power for whatever it’s on, like Loxodon Warhammer on random Lorwyn Faeries back in the day or Kessig Wolf Run on random dorks today.

If you can make your Equipment part of Plan A in other ways, you start to move the Equipment out of the spare mana rule and into AEther Mutation territory. Whether that’s being fine with it as an Aura deluxe or bringing other, cheaper support spells into the deck, you can swing it with the right context. Maybe you include Werewolves, who by their nature or nurture want you to have spare mana even as they curve out. (FYI, Werewolves keep Ambush Vipers as pets . . . )

As support, most decks can include Cobbled Wings, Blazing Torch, or Swiftfoot Boots, but 2 mana to equip is much greater than 1. I had 3 mana lying around for Putrefy and Sudden Spoiling, but that was because they could be useful under the curve of my creatures. Trepanation Blade can’t, but it’s so good with my creature suite that I can move it into Plan A and change the support around. Without these considerations, I wouldn’t have seen that I have to do that if the Blade’s going to do anything.

So Where Does That Leave Me?

I know what’s definitely in: Oona's Prowler at 2, Vulturous Zombie and Nath of the Gilt-Leaf at 5, and Trepanation Blade technically at 3, but functionally undetermined. That’s sixteen cards. I’m also replacing the Golgari Rot Farms with basic lands so that I have more spare mana on random turns; since Rot Farms aren’t a (good) first-turn play, they’re going to conflict with my desired curve no matter how I flesh this out.

For curve, I had to take out either Mirri the Cursed or Guul Draz Specter; I chose the latter for being slower. Necrogen Scudder took its place. The removal suite became Rathi Trapper, Augur of Skulls, and Ranger's Guile. I also reinstated Royal Assassins—a free activation is a great defense, and if opponents need to burn removal on one before Vulturous Zombie arrives, that’s fine by me. Rathi Trapper can team with the Assassin to shoot random creatures, and while I don’t know how often I’ll have a open, actually casting the Trapper is curve-friendly.

Same idea with Augur of Skulls; I don’t know how often I’ll have it regenerate, but the option’s there, and the discard synergizes with Vulturous Zombie and Nath, making it an okay late-game draw. Having cheap, utility creatures instead of instant removal lets me play an early game with Blade if that option’s available—second-turn creature, third-turn Blade, fourth-turn equip—or I can go defensive until my flyers show up, using the Blade as an Aura deluxe. I can play tempo with Trappers, tapping whatever would block my flyers if that plan shows up in the opening hand, or I can use Ranger's Guile, Blade, and a cheap creature to play protect-the-Voltron. (I’m pretty sure that came out on ColecoVision.)

The important takeaway is that my starting seven should give me a plan, and Trepanation Blade can work around any of them. Each plan has a different amount of spare mana, but that’s where splitting up the Blade’s cost between casting and equipping comes in handy—I’ll just slot the Equipment where it makes sense with the creatures instead of having to represent Sudden Spoiling and its ilk. When I think I can spare the mana, I’ll play the Equipment, but now I’ve made a deck that conceivably has that mana instead of just wishing for it.

So Where Does That Leave You?

I hope this analysis will help you figure out how to optimize your Equipment and mana use. I had to take out several of my favorite removal spells to do it, and I hate that, but this version looks like it will work, as opposed to my previous version, with which I could sit with an empty board and admire the “all these” I still had in my hand.

Check your deck’s spare mana at crucial points in the game and see if your deck’s doing what you meant it to do. A fifth-turn Woolly Thoctar is just a more colorful Spined Wurm. If your Equipment’s not attaching to a creature until the late game, is that Equipment worth a deck slot, should the creatures change, or is it something else?

As the Equipment master would say, “Go! Do!” (Then again, he could just be introducing himself.)

"Blade Flyer"

• Creatures (29)
• 3 Augur of Skulls
• 3 Rathi Trapper
• 3 Royal Assassin
• 4 Necrogen Scudder
• 4 Oona's Prowler
• 4 Vulturous Zombie
• 4 Mirri the Cursed
• 4 Nath of the Gilt-Leaf

• Spells (8)
• 4 Ranger's Guile
• 4 Trepanation Blade

• Lands (23)
• 14 Swamp
• 9 Forest

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