Doctor Doom leads the Doom Prevails precon, so you play the God of Mischief event as Loki with Doom in the command zone. Each separate discard of a land removes six life from the heroes' shared pool. Loki's Tricks give you extra cards, blockers, removal, and reach every turn. Your plan is to land Doom early, blunt the heroes' first big swing, then convert Villains and Illusion copies into one decisive attack.
▸ The official God of Mischief rules, in brief
- Players: four. One is Loki, which is you, and the other three are the Heroes playing as one team.
- Life: Loki starts at 60. The Heroes also start at 60 but share a single life total, so any gain or loss moves the one shared pool.
- Turn order: Loki takes the first turn. The Heroes then take one shared turn, untapping, drawing, and attacking together, and may play in any order.
- Loki's Tricks: at the start of your first main phase you put a mischief counter on one of Loki's Tricks that does not already have one, and that Trick's ability triggers.
- "Each opponent": when Loki plays anything reading "each player" or "each opponent," every member of the Heroes is affected individually. This is the line that turns Doom's 2-life drain into 6.
- Combat: as Loki attacks, you choose per attacker which hero, planeswalker, or battle it hits. The Heroes declare blockers as a team, so any Hero creature can block for an ally.
Why Doctor Doom plays Loki so well
Doom's own text reads Whenever you discard one or more land cards, each opponent loses 2 life. In a normal game that is two life. In this event it is not. The official rules sheet is explicit that when Loki plays something reading "each opponent," every member of the Heroes is affected individually. Three heroes, two life each, one shared pool, so one land discard is six life gone.
Doom's second line matters just as much: At the beginning of combat on your turn, target Villain you control gains menace until end of turn. It connives. Connive is draw a card then discard a card. If the card you pitch is a land, that is another discard event, another six life off the heroes, and the menace helps that Villain get through their team block. So Doom hands you a repeatable six-point drain attached to a combat step you were taking anyway.
The land-discard math, stated carefully
Doom triggers once per discard event that contains at least one land, not once per land. Pitching two lands in the same discard is still six, not twelve. To stack drains you need separate discard events: the combat connive is one, and any Trick or card that makes you discard a land on the same turn is another. Two separate land discards in a turn is twelve life off a sixty-life team, which is the tempo this deck is built to produce.
Your opening hand
- Doom costs {1}{U}{B}{R} and wants all three Grixis colors, so keep hands with fixing.
- Arcane Signet, a Talisman, and clean colored sources are what let Doom land on curve.
- Before Doom arrives you are the one player three decks are aiming at, so early survival is real: cheap blockers, a removal spell, and Propaganda are worth keeping over a greedy top end.
- Once Doom is down you want at least one repeatable way to discard a land: the combat connive covers this for free, and a loot or rummage effect lets you choose to pitch lands you no longer need.
- A keepable hand is roughly dependable mana, one early speed bump, and a path to Doom by turn four.
Loki's Tricks, and when to spend each
At the start of your first main phase you put a mischief counter on one of Loki's Tricks that does not already have one, and that Trick's ability triggers. You get one new Trick per turn. Each Trick is used once, with a single exception: Temporal Trickery removes every mischief counter, including its own, which frees the others to be selected and fired again. So the real skill is spending the right Trick at the right time, and saving Temporal Trickery for a turn when a full reset buys you a second run at your best Tricks.
All ten Tricks below are quoted from Wizards' official play aid. Read the board, then reach for the bucket that fits.
Develop, when nothing is pressuring you
- Realms of Illusion: Reveal the top three cards of your library. Put all land cards revealed this way onto the battlefield and the rest into your hand.
- Schemer's Insight: Draw five cards. Then discard two cards unless you discard an instant or sorcery card.
- Arcane Deception: This turn, your spells cost {1} less to cast.
- Illusions of Grandeur: Create three 3/3 blue Illusion creature tokens. Instant blockers for the one seat three decks are aiming at.
Control the board, when the heroes threaten
- Mischief Unleashed: Destroy all creatures target opponent controls.
- Selective Chaos: For each opponent, destroy up to one target artifact or enchantment that player controls.
- Weaver of Whim: Tap all creatures your opponents' control and put a stun counter on them. (If a permanent with a stun counter would become untapped, remove one from it instead.) A team-wide tap-down and stun that blunts their shared swing.
Convert and finish, when you are ahead
- Lord of Misrule: Choose target creature you control. Each creature you control other than the chosen creature becomes a copy of that creature until end of turn, except it isn't legendary. No mana, no tap, and it fires in your first main phase, so you copy your best bomb before you attack.
- Agent of Chaos: For each opponent, gain control of up to one target creature that player controls until end of turn. Untap those creatures. Until end of turn, they become Villains in addition to their other types and gain haste. Borrow one creature from each hero, and they even count as Villains for Loki's combat-damage draw.
- Temporal Trickery: Remove all mischief counters from all Loki's Tricks (including this one). The reset, so you can run the best Tricks a second time.
A Trick spent on tempo you did not need is the one that loses you the game three turns later.
↑ Back to topThe precon's real winning combos
These are the interactions already inside the stock deck, each read from the actual card text.
Loki, the Deceiver copies your best Villain into combat
Whenever Loki attacks, create a tapped and attacking token that's a copy of another target Villain you control as an Illusion, sacrificed at end of turn, and whenever one or more Villains you control deal combat damage to a player, draw a card. Attack, copy your scariest Villain for a free extra body, connect, and draw. The copy is temporary, so this is a damage-and-cards burst, not a permanent board.
The Lord of Misrule Trick turns your team into copies of one bomb
Lord of Misrule is one of Loki's Tricks, not a card in this deck. When you place its mischief counter it reads Choose target creature you control. Each creature you control other than the chosen creature becomes a copy of that creature until end of turn, except it isn't legendary. It costs no mana, needs no tap, and fires in your first main phase, so you copy the right creature before combat and the whole board becomes it.
Best copy targets in the stock deck: The Squadron Sinister, whose Other Villains you control get +2/+2 and have flying and haste stacks across every copy, so four Squadron bodies each pump the other three. Living Laser, which on attack makes a token copy of itself for each card you discarded this turn, so a board of Lasers after a discard-heavy turn is an avalanche. Or Loki, the Deceiver himself, since every copy brings its own attack trigger and its own combat-damage draw.
The two best Lord of Misrule targets, up close
The Squadron Sinister is an anthem you can multiply: copy it across your board and every body is a 5/5 flier with haste handing the rest more. Living Laser rewards a discard-heavy turn, which this deck produces naturally through Doom's connive and looting, so copying it after several discards floods the board with attacking tokens. Either can close a game the turn you fire Lord of Misrule, when you have the bodies and the heroes cannot block or interact their way out of the swing.
Lady Loki, Agent of Chaos punishes your spellcasting
Watch the naming overlap: Agent of Chaos is also one of Loki's Tricks, the creature-steal listed above. The card by that name in the stock deck is Lady Loki, Agent of Chaos, and her text is a spell-chain engine rather than theft. Whenever you cast your first instant, sorcery, or Villain spell each turn, exile it, then exile cards from the top of your library until you exile a nonland card. Lady Loki deals damage to each opponent equal to the difference between that spell's mana value and that nonland card's mana value. You may cast that card without paying its mana cost. Because it reads "each opponent," that damage also hits all three heroes individually. Lead your turn with a cheap spell and flip into a bigger free one for reach plus a free cast.
Cards whose value shifts in this event
Several stock cards read differently once "each opponent" means three heroes.
Draw and go-wide that scale with the team
Syphon Mind is Each other player discards a card. You draw a card for each card discarded this way. Against three heroes that is three cards drawn off one sorcery, so it climbs your card-advantage pile. Endless Ranks of HYDRA reads For each opponent, you create a 2/1 black Villain creature token with menace, so three bodies at once, and a second line returns it from your graveyard to hand when your commander enters or attacks and you pay {1}{B}. Titania, Proud Pummeler grants melee to your team, and melee counts every opponent you attacked this combat, so spreading attackers across all three heroes maximizes the pump.
Reach and removal that fan out
Tri-Sentinel, Act of Vengeance reads When Tri-Sentinel enters, for each opponent, Tri-Sentinel deals 3 damage to up to one target creature that player controls, so it can hit one creature per hero. Propaganda reads Creatures can't attack you unless their controller pays {2} for each creature they control that's attacking you, which taxes the heroes' alpha strike and buys you the turns Doom needs.
Kang Dynasty is double-edged here
Kang Dynasty is a Saga whose first two chapters read For each opponent, tap up to one target creature that player controls. Goad those creatures. Until your next turn, whenever any of those creatures deals combat damage to a player, draw a card. In a team game the goaded hero creatures cannot attack their own allies, so the goad can point them straight at you on the heroes' shared turn. It can draw you cards and it can also throw the team's creatures at your face. Confirm the exact goad interaction with your event judge before you lean on it, and keep Propaganda up when you do.
Correction from the earlier version of this page
An earlier draft called Molecule Man a vanilla five-drop and cut him. His real card is a {6} 5/5 that reads Nonland cards in your hand have miracle {0}. (You may cast a card for its miracle cost when you draw it if it's the first card you drew this turn.) Miracle only applies to the first card you draw each turn, so it is your normal draw step that can turn a spell free, not your connive or your post-combat Loki draws, which come later in the same turn. He still earns his slot, since on any turn your draw step reveals a nonland you cast it for nothing, but plan around that timing rather than expecting connive to feed him. He stays.
Your closing sequence
Put the pieces in order and the game plan is short.
- Develop Grixis mana and get Doom down.
- Use early Tricks and cheap interaction to survive the first coordinated hero turn.
- Grind the shared pool with connive land-discards while your Villains build.
- When you are ahead, fire the Lord of Misrule Trick on your best body, or attack with Agent of Chaos, swing into a block they cannot cover with menace and evasion, and let the combat-damage draws refill you if they somehow stabilize.
You did not need to upgrade the deck to do this. You needed to point the stock cards at the event they were printed for.
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