While MTG Spider Man was a flop on several fronts, there’s still some good to the Web-Slinging set. Besides offering some unique upgrades to various rogue decks across formats, there are a fair few infinite combos created by cards in this set. Iron Spider, Stark Upgrade, for example, is a surprisingly potent infinite combo enabler. There are all kinds of ways to get infinite mana, draw, and +1/+1 counters with this card.
Iron Spider, Stark Upgrade Combos
For three mana, Iron Spider, Stark Upgrade is an interesting new tool for artifact creature Commander decks, but the card won’t be breaking any formats. Growing an army of artifact creatures and turning your counters into card draw does give potential for Iron Spider, Stark Upgrade to become a powerful engine, and, when paired with the right cards, it can become an absolute monster.
In fact, there are 16 different infinite combos you can pull off with Iron Spider, Stark Upgrade. If you’re interested in building a larger combo toolbox into your artifact creature Commander decks, there are multiple cards that can replace one another in each of these combos. That said, none of Stark Upgrade’s variants can pull the combos off while offering infinite card draw.
The simplest version of an Iron Spider, Stark Upgrade infinite combo involves Crystalline Crawler and some sort of untap tool. Using Freed from the Real as an example, this three-card infinite combo offers infinite +1/+1 counters on all of your artifact creatures except for the Crawler itself. Here’s how it works:
- Tap Iron Spider, Stark Upgrade, placing +1/+1 counters on itself and Chrystalline Crawler.
- Remove a counter from Chrystalline Crawler, adding one blue mana
- Use Freed from the Real to untap Iron Spider, Stark Upgrade, and repeat the process.
If this is all you’re trying to accomplish, Steel Overseer acts as a cheaper replacement to Iron Spider, Stark Upgrade, but you lose your outlet for infinite card draw if another piece is added. Pemmin’s Aura is also capable of replacing Freed from the Real, but both cards have their upsides and downsides. From here, using Iron Spider, unlocking infinite mana and infinite card draw with is really easy. There are numerous ways to do this, each varying depending on your color identity. Cards that offer replacement effects that affect +1/+1 counters, like Doubling Season and Hardened Scales, are the easiest ways to do this. This means that each Iron Spider, Stark Upgrade activation will place multiple +1/+1 counters on Crystalline Crawler, unlocking infinite mana. You can then use your excess mana to start drawing infinite cards with Iron Spider’s activated ability, which makes winning the game trivial.
Going Infinite with Iron Spider in the Command Zone
For players who want to build an entire strategy around Iron Spider, Stark Upgrade, it is possible to go infinite by using a whole bunch of different cards, but they all revolve around the same shell. While some of these cards are normally a bit awkward to use if you don’t draw them together, since Iron Spider is your Commander, they should all be able to create value in a bunch of different spots.
Combining Animation Module and Thornbite Staff, with Iron Spider, for example, goes infinite as long as you can sacrifice creatures for mana. If you use Ashnod’s Altar or Krark Clan Ironworks as your sacrifice outlet, you get a completely colorless infinite combo that creates infinite mana, card draw, enters, death triggers, and more. Here’s how the combo works:
- Have Iron Spider, Stark Upgrade, Animation Module, Thornbite Staff, and Ashnod’s Altar in play. Attach Thornbite Staff to Iron Spider.
- Activate Iron Spider’s +1/+1 counter ability. This will trigger Animation Module, creating a Servo Token for one mana.
- Sacrifice the Servo, creating two colorless mana with Ashnod’s Altar. This will trigger Thornbite Staff, untapping Iron Spider.
- Repeat the process from step two. Iron Spider will grow infinitely large while you net one colorless mana from Ashnod’s Altar each time. You can then use the excess mana to draw infinite cards.
There are other infinite combos you can pull off with Iron-Spider, specifically if you can turn some other infinite combo cards, like Scurry Oak, into artifact creatures, but many of these are too complex to try and pull off. A lot of the cards in these combos we did talk about generally function well in artifact creature or +1/+1 counter-focused decks already, so you don’t have to go too far out of the way to incorporate them. Even if you aren’t going infinite with Iron Spider, creating a ton of value with the card isn’t entirely difficult, giving artifact decks an interesting new angle of attack.
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