Despite being a fantastic resource system, MTG’s biggest flaws lie in its lands. Draw too few, and you can’t play the rest of your cards. Draw too many, and your opponent’s extra spells will eventually run you over. In both cases, you’re unable to play Magic properly, making for some incredibly unenjoyable games.
While this is usually due to a combination of deckbuilding and luck, there is one forgotten MTG card that can essentially force this situation on your opponents. While it’s not always the best card, Head Games can create some absolutely devastating plays.
MTG Head Games
Head Games lets you sculpt an opponent’s hand, turning it into whatever collection of cards you want from their deck. This can easily turn your opponent’s spells into Basic Lands, but if you ramp it out, Head Games can also do the opposite. Targeting an opponent with just a few lands in play, you can turn their hand into the biggest spells in their deck, making their hand unplayable. There are some political factors with Head Games, too, like allowing an opponent to access the perfect removal piece against a must-answer threat.
Thanks to this, you’ll rarely find yourself without a use for Head Games, but maximizing the card’s value can prove difficult. In addition to Head Games’s inability to impact the board, the biggest weakness with this card is that it only triggers one opponent. Fortunately, Commanders like Zevlor, Elturel Exile can fix this by making Head Games target every opponent. While not quite as efficient, Magar of the Magic Strings can also get additional copies of Head Games by turning it into a creature. Either way, forcing multiple opponents to flood on lands can close out games quickly.
If you aren’t interested in using Head Games as a forced flood option, Sen Triplets can flip the script with the sorcery. Instead of tutoring bad cards with it, you can tutor game-ending combos into your opponent’s hand, like Thassa’s Oracle and Demonic Consultation. With Sen Triplets’s ability, you’ll be able to play that combo yourself, winning the game.
Full Discard
While this isn’t particularly needed, if you want to avoid giving your opponent anything with Head Games, you can take things a step further. Leonin Arbiter essentially turns Head Games into a forced discard, preventing your opponents from putting any cards in their hands.
Notably, even if your opponent pays the two mana to Leonin Arbiter, Head Games will still leave them empty-handed. Because you’re the one searching your opponent’s library with Head Games, so long as you don’t pay Arbiter’s tax, you’ll leave your opponent empty-handed.
While this is a neat interaction, it sadly goes both ways. Since you’re searching your opponent’s library, cards like Opposition Agent and Aven Mindcensor won’t work with Head Games.
Powerful, but Not Cheap
While it takes some work to maximize, Head Games is the perfect card for a casual Commander table. Causing opponents to read a card before getting blown out in a bizarre way, this card can easily create gameplay scenarios no one has seen before.
Strangely, despite only appearing in about 5,000 decks according to EDHREC, Head Games is surprisingly expensive. Only having two printings in Onslaught and Tenth Edition, the card’s cheapest available copy is about $4.85 after shipping. While this means that Head Games isn’t a budget pickup, it can still be game-altering, especially if you can copy it.
Stick with us here at mtgrocks.com: the best site for Magic: The Gathering coverage. Be sure to check out our deckbuilder for your next big brew, and our brand new MTG Rocks Podcast!