Winter, Misanthropic Guide is one of the many legendary creatures introduced inMagic: The Gathering’s Duskmourn set. Winter was one of the main characters of the plot of the set, acting as the guide for Duskmourn’s mansion and ruler to the heroes visiting off-plane.
As a commander in the Commander format, Winter, Misanthropic Guide can be a huge problem for your opponents. The deck is built around loading up your graveyard with card types while giving your opponents cards to draw while burning them for doing so. While giving your opponents cards is never ideal, with Winter, it’ll be the only cards they’ll have to work with.
Nath of the Gilt-Leaf
Drag to the Roots
x5 Forest
x6 Mountain
x7 Swamp
Underworld Dreams
Waste Not
The decklist containsthree battles, two planeswalkers, 24 creatures, 11 sorceries, eight instants, nine artifacts, eight enchantments,and34 lands. There are a lot of different card types toensure that you can make your delirium count highfor Winter’s effect.
Key Cards
Winter, Misanthropic Guide
Winter, Misanthropic Guideis the commander of the deck and what the whole deck is built around. Youwant to turn your delirium on as quickly as possibleas to lower your opponents' maximum hand size. This makes it harder for your opponents to stay in the game, as they’ll have to discard their top-end cards so they can actually cast them.
Winter’s effect to make every player draw two cards is mandatory, so youdo not want to cast Winter until delirium is live. The one exception is if you really need card draw, especially if the game has slowed down and you don’t have any cards in your hand to work with.
Thanks toWinter’s ward two ability, it is much harder to remove, especially if you manage to get it on the battlefield ahead of your curve. Winter draws you a lot of cards, and since you don’t have to discard them to hand size, it’sbest used with cards that remove your hand size limit.
Waste Notis one of the primary ways to get advantage out of all the cards your opponents will be forced to discard. The effect Waste Not gives you is determined by whatever card type is discarded. Notably,it triggers off of every card discarded, not just one.
Waste Notgives you card draw, ramps you with mana, and generates a board presenceof 2/2 Zombie tokens. Since Waste Not only costs two mana to cast, you’re able to set it up before you start getting Winter’s ability going so you can benefit from it immediately.
Bone Miser is also included in the decklist, which is a creature with an identical effect to Waste Not, letting you double up on the effects if both are on the battlefield.
Bandit’s Talent
Bandit’s Talentis a way to punish your opponents for not having cards in their hand and drawing cards because of it. Leveling up Bandit’s Talent is very easy and only takes a total mana investment of seven to max it out.
The first effect will already impact all your opponents,forcing them to discard their nonland cardsto put them behind. It’s even possibleto max out Bandit’s Talentthe turn it enters late-game, and early game punishes your opponents if they don’t have a loaded hand.
Skull Prophet
While there are a few mana dorks in the deck (creatures that can tap themselves to add mana to your mana pool),Skull Prophetis the best one in the deck. This is because of its utility. Being able to tap for more than one color is great, but so is the ability to mill the top two cards of your library.
Since you wantas many card types in your graveyard as possible, Skull Prophet’s mill is a great way to keep sending cards there without having to pay a mana cost. If you are not tapping it for mana,you should be tapping it to mill your library.
How To Play The Deck
AWinter, Misanthropic Guide deck is one built around forced discard, making sure your opponents have little cards to work with so that you can run away with the game. Winter, Misanthropic Guide is the key to the deck’s function, andeven if it gets removed, by the time your opponents can, you’ll likely have the mana to recast it right away.
There are a ton of different ways for you to discard cards in your hand to ensure you have multiple card types in your graveyard.Thrill of Possibility, Big Score,andInvasion of Ergamonare some ways, having you discard a card to draw two cards.
Winter will force your opponents to draw cards, but there are a lot of cards you can use to punish them for doing so.Razorkin Needlehead, Megrim,andLiliana’s Caressall deal burn damage whenever an opponent draws a card, helping you to close out the game quicker.
While Winter can force discards to maximum hand size being low, there are other ways to force discards.Cunning Lethemancer, Nath of the Gilt-Leaf, and Bottomless Pitare all more hand hate cards that will keep your opponents' hands as close to zero as possible.
Winter, Misanthropic Guide will have everyone draw two cards each upkeep,but only you aren’t affected by its delirium ability. As such, cards likeSpellbook, Decanter of Endless Water,andThought Vesselare especially important to get rid of your maximum hand size limit, so you will always have way more to work with than your opponents.
Thebiggest weakness of a Winter deck is that you will be made public enemy very early on. No one likes losing their hand before they have a chance to play their cards, so you should be expecting to be targeted early on by your other opponents.
Thewin condition of the deckis out-valuing your opponents. Youshut down your opponents' ability to play the game by getting rid of their entire hands, all while reaping the benefits of Winter’s extra card draw. Games can get grindy, and with how many cards you draw, you should have answers to anything your opponents will try to do. You’ll slowly win through burn damage from static abilities that punish card draw while attacking in with your creatures in combat.
