MKM Blame Game Commander Deck guide and Upgrade suggestions (MTG)

Blame Game is a Boros preconstructed Commander deck released alongside of Magic: The Gathering’s Murders At Karlov Manor. It is one of four decks made for Commander, meant to be played right out of the box for those who want to get into the Commander format. This guide will go over the themes and archetypes found within the deck, along with an analysis of how to play it. In addition, while precons are playable right away, certain cards can be replaced to upgrade them to boost up the power of the deck. This is the Blame Game Commander deck guide.

Blame Game Decklist

Category	Cards
Commander	Nelly Borca, Impulsive Accuser
Creatures	Agitator Ant, Ancient Stone Idol, Angel of the Ruins, Anya, Merciless Angel, Boros Reckoner, Brash Taunter, Darien, King of Kjeldor, Etali, Primal Storm, Feather, Radiant Arbiter, Fiendish Duo, Frontier Warmonger, Gisela, Blade of Goldnight, Havoc Eater, Kazuul, Tyrant of the Cliffs, Keeper of the Accord, Loran of the Third Path, Orzhov Advokist, Otherworldly Escort, Selfless Squire, Solemn Simulacrum, Stalking Leonin, Steel Hellkite, Sun Titan, Vengeful Ancestor, Wall of Omens, Windborn Muse
Planeswalkers	Elspeth, Sun’s Champion
Sorcery	Disrupt Decorum, Mob Verdict, Prisoner’s Dilemma, Promise of Loyalty, Sevinne’s Reclamation, Spectacular Showdown, Winds of Rath
Instants	Comeuppance, Deflecting Palm, Gideon’s Sacrifice, Immortal Obligation, Take the Bait
Artifacts	Arcane Signet, Bloodthirsty Blade, Fellwar Stone, Mind Stone, Ransom Note, Sol Ring, Talisman of Conviction, Thought Vessel, Tome of Legends
Enchantments	Curse of Opulence, Duelist’s Heritage, Ghostly Prison, Hot Pursuit, Martial Impetus, Redemption Arc, Rite of the Raging Storm, Seal of Cleansing, Shiny Impetus, Smuggler’s Share, Soul Snare, Trouble in Pairs, Vow of Duty, Vow of Lightning
Lands	Access Tunnel, Ash Barrens, Boros Garrison, Castle Ardenvale, Command Tower, Escape Tunnel, Exotic Orchard, Furycalm Snarl, Kher Keep, Labyrinth of Skophos, Mountain (7), Myriad Landscape, Needle Spires, Plains (9), Reliquary Tower, Rogue’s Passage, Scavenger Grounds, Slayers’ Stronghold, Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion, Temple of Triumph, Temple of the False God, Throne of the High City, War Room

✓ Johnny’s Annotation:

Notable Reprints:

The Blame Game precon comes with some much welcomed reprints, some of which had been very costly before its release. Fiendish Duo, Smugger’s Share, Elspeth, Sun’s Champion, and Comeuppance are all valuable cards.

Blame Game Themes And Archetypes

The main theme of the Blame Game precon is goad. Goad is a mechanic where it forces a creature to attack, and it has to attack someone other than you (if possible). As such, Blame Game has plenty of cards that goad creatures. 

In addition to that, there is a sub-theme on the goad side of things that discourages your opponents from attacking you. Curse Of Opulence enchants a player so anyone who attacks them creatures a Treasure token (as do you), Ghostly Prison forces a mana tax on attacking you, and Trouble in Pairs gives you draw power for attacking you. 

The other theme in the deck comes from the alternate commander, Feather, Radiant Arbiter. This theme relies on you casting noncreature spells targeting Feather to copy them and target other creatures with them. This can spread Auras that goad creatures while giving stat boosts, or give multiple creatures a strong effect that is targeting Feather. 

Blame Game Deck Analysis

Blame Game is a deck about keeping everyone attacking everyone else. You can politic your way around combat, and if that fails you can force it to go down. Since it is only a two-colour deck, the mana base, while simple, gets the job done so that you will always have the proper colours to cast your spells. 

The deck is also a bit of a Group Hug list, meaning it’s beneficial for your opponents to work together. This is largely due to Nelly Borca, Impulsive Accuser’s effect that lets both you and an opponent draw a card whenever a creature deals combat damage to another opponent. This can be forced thanks to the plethora of goad effects in Blame Game. 

There are multiple cards that can cause devastating amounts of damage to your opponents. Fiendish Duo makes all damage deal double damage to an opponent and Gisela, Blade of Goldnight also does the same but halves all damage that would be dealt to either you or a permanent you control. Duelist’s Heritage is a way to increase damage output as it lets you give any attacking creature double strike until the end of the turn. You don’t have to control the attacking creature, so you can give a powerful goaded creature double strike to deal enough damage to potentially take someone out of the game. 

When it comes to goading, you don’t want to waste your Shiny Impetus or Martial Impetus on a weak creature as if they get blocked, the goad will simply go away if the creature dies in combat. However, putting it on a creature with a high statline can ensure they deal big damage to your opponent and aren’t able to do anything to you. 

Blame Game has a handful of removal spells as well. Promise Of Loyalty can get around most protection abilities since it forces all but one creature to be sacrificed on each players’ battlefield, and the ones left behind can’t attack you either. Winds Of Rath is a more traditional boardwipe, simply destroying all creatures. 

Lastly, Blame Game has a lot of damage protection cards to keep both you and your creatures in the game. Gideon’s Sacrifice can force all damage onto one creature, be it one with indestructible like Brash Taunter or a creature you don’t care about dying. Comeuppance, Take Take The Bait, and Selfless Squire all prevent combat damage to keep yourself safe from any troublesome creatures. 

There are only 26 creatures in the deck, some of which are meant to be sacrificed so you are heavily relying on goading your opponents’ creatures to deal the damage for you, then swooping in at the end to finish the last player off to secure a victory.

Budget cards to upgrade Blame Game with

As Blame Game is heavily built around goad and forced combat, the best upgrades are more payoffs and enablers for that strategy. 

Bothersome Quasit

One such upgrade is Bothersome Quasit. It turns all noncreature spells you cast into goad triggers, and since most ways you’re goading are attached to Auras, Bothersome Quasit is a way to get two creatures goaded for the price of one. It also makes it easier to attack into your opponents, since you will goad most of them Bothersome Quasit makes them unable to block. 

Life of the Party

Another card you should look at for upgrades is Life Of The Party, an Elemental creature that gives all your opponents copies of itself. The important part is that they are goaded for the entire game, meaning no matter what the goad can not be removed (something that usually ends after combat). This feeds into Nelly Borca’s effect, as Life Of The Party has first strike and trample to make it easy for your opponents to connect to each other for damage.

Taunt from the Rampart

Taunt From The Rampart from Tales Of Middle-earth is another great card for closing out games. For five mana, all your opponents’ creatures get goaded and can’t be blocked. This means they will all be guaranteed to attack into each other, letting you pick at anyone who remains standing after it resolves since you don’t have to worry about any of your creatures being blocked.

Geoge Rager

Lastly, Geode Rager is a fantastic way to goad your opponents. To goad a creature, you simply have to play a land which will trigger its landfall ability to goad each creature a player controls. Being Boros, Blame Game, unfortunately, doesn’t have many ways to trigger the landfall ability multiple times a turn, with the only consistent ways being through sacrificing Escape Tunnel or Myriad Landscape for a basic land. However, for one land, goading every creature an opponent has is great and an easy way to spread goad quickly to the player with the scariest board state.

Cards to cut from Blame Game

Feather, Radiant Arbiter

As with every upgrade, you do need to cut cards in order to make room for new ones. One suggested cut is Feather, Radiant Arbiter. While it’s a fine card on its own, it doesn’t do a whole lot for the main strategy Blame Game is built for. As such, it’s better to remove Feather for its own deck instead of trying to keep it around in Blame Game.

Anya, Merciless Angel

Anya, Merciless Angel is another cuttable card. It doesn’t do anything for the strategy and is merely a solid creature late-game that can give itself indestructible. However, it requires a lot of setup to get to the point where it would be impactful, and that space is better dedicated to playing into your main gameplan more.

Ransom Note

Ransom Note is a card that while alright, the deck won’t miss if it’s gone. It surveils one when it enters the battlefield, and can later be sacrificed to goad a creature, draw a card, or cloak the top card of your library (put it face-down and able to be cast for its mana value if its a creature). While having access to a goad is nice, it’s one-time use makes it less than desirable. Not only that, it doesn’t progress your board state too well that it’s better left excluded instead of in the deck.

Etali, Primal Storm

The last of the cuttable cards is Etali, Primal Storm. Etali is rather infamous for being included in practically every Commander precon that has red, and is often one of the main cards that get cut for upgrades. The card is perfectly fine, but spending six mana on a creature you have to wait a full turn cycle to get any use out of is less than desirable. It doesn’t synergize with any of the strategies Blame Game is going for, so there’s little reason to keep it in the deck.

The upgrades listed here avoided any card worth over $5, intended to be budget upgrades rather than full-fledged ones. There are many powerful cards that Blame Game would love to have, but that requires digging deeper into your wallet to obtain. You don’t have to upgrade Blame Game either. There are some Commander players who enjoy the lower-power levels of precons, and play games exclusively with other precons. While an unedited Blame Game precon could struggle with refined decks, it is solid against other precons and can hold its own quite well.

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If you’re using Commander precons, you might be interested in our MKM draft guide to test your hand at Sealed decks instead. Similarly, our Murders at Karlov Manor deck building guide might interest you, so you can have a go at creating similarly adept Standard decks.