Explorer #2 Mythic Four-Color Enigmatic Incarnation Deck Guide: Beat the Meta With Explorer’s Coolest Deck
Most players have to choose between playing a deck that's super sweet and playing a deck that wins, but Altheriax doesn't have to make that choice! Learn why the Four-Color Enigmatic Incarnation deck list that got him to rank 2 is the real deal in Explorer!
Hey everyone! Today I’m going to be covering my four-colour Enigmatic Incarnation deck in Explorer which I recently used to hit rank #2 with on the Arena ladder. This is a deck that utilizes Enigmatic Incarnation to provide repeatable toolbox value and Yorion, Sky Nomad to reuse all of our enter the battlefield enchantments and creatures to outgrind the opponent.
The deck has been so much fun to play, but it’s surprisingly difficult to play optimally because you have access to so many different lines; so, if you’re looking for a toolbox deck that’s easy to get into but hard to master, this is the deck for you! I’ve also put up a video on my YouTube channel with 5 matches of game play if you’re interested in seeing the deck in action.
Enigmatic Incarnation: This is the central card in the deck and the fact it provides repeatable access to a toolbox of creatures means that it can get you out of almost any situation and also helps to press the advantage when you’re already ahead or at parity.
In order to fully take advantage of Enigmatic Incarnation, almost all of our enchantments get us value immediately when they enter the battlefield which means we’re getting a 2-for-1 each time we sacrifice them to Enigmatic Incarnation.
The deck is primarily focused on sacrificing 2 mana enchantments to tutor up specific 3 mana creatures, but we do have a small number of 4 and 5 mana creatures to tutor up by sacrificing Oath of Kaya or Enigmatic Incarnation if we have two copies in play.
Spirited Companion being a creature is nice since we can use it to chump block against aggressive decks and threaten planeswalkers, but it does also make it vulnerable to creature removal so unless you need it as a creature, it’s usually best to prioritize sacrificing it to Enigmatic Incarnation before your non-creature enchantments.
Omen of the Sea is probably the best of the three since it lets you scry 2 and can be played at instant speed.
Finally, Urban Utopia is nice as it provides mana fixing in addition to replacing itself. The mana base is pretty consistent overall, but there will be certain situations where you don’t have exactly the colours you need. Since we’re running cards that require two mana of the same colour like Skyclave Apparition and Ravenous Chupacabra, so Urban Utopia helps a lot in those scenarios.
Trial of Ambition: This is really nice since it gives us access to early interaction that still works well both Enigmatic Incarnation and Yorion, Sky Nomad. This is much better than the other alternatives like Baffling End (giving the opponent a 3/3 whenever you sacrifice or blink it is a really big drawback) or Omen of the Forge (generally much worse since it can’t kill bigger creatures).
Giving the opponent the choice of which creature to sacrifice isn’t great later in the game, but it’s a complete blowout if the opponent is ever left with just one big creature in play so you can often sequence other removal to set up Trial of Ambition to kill their biggest creature.
Having access to main deck Rest in Peace is really important at giving us an edge game one against graveyard-focused decks like Greasefang, Okiba Boss and Izzet Phoenix as well as being able to shut off Cauldron Oven + Witch's Oven against sacrifice decks. The Meathook Massacre is really important as a tutorable sweeper in order to deal with wide boards and gain some life back in the process.
They both also work with Enigmatic Incarnation to tutor up 3 mana creatures so you can use them to exile the graveyard or sweep the board, and then sacrifice them afterwards to get more value.
Running a high land count is very important to be able to enable this consistently since we need to already have our fourth land in hand when we play the Moon-Blessed Cleric on turn 3, or we won’t be able to cast Enigmatic Incarnation the following turn since we know we won’t be drawing a land for the turn.
Elite Spellbinder: This is a really important tool against both control and combo decks, as well as being a nice option game 1 if the opponent hasn’t committed much to the board and you want to see what they’re up to.
Taxing removal or a planeswalker against control is really important at being able to apply pressure and race them, and taxing a combo piece like Greasefang, Okiba Boss or Transmogrify is really important at delaying their combo to help you stabilize.
Reidane, God of the Worthy: Similar to Elite Spellbinder, this is another nice tool against the control and combo decks and is generally the best option to pick if you’re already ahead on board, or you’re in a situation where you can’t beat multiple expensive spells.
The downside of Elite Spellbinder is that it only taxes one card, so if you’re in a situation where you can’t beat a sweeper for example, it’s usually better to go for Reidane, God of the Worthy, since Elite Spellbinder isn’t good enough if they have 2 sweepers in hand.
This is the only silver bullet creature that I’m running more than one of because it’s the most versatile removal you have access to off Enigmatic Incarnation and is also killed pretty frequently. If the opponent kills your first Skyclave Apparition and you’re not running a second, you’d then have to tutor up Deputy of Detention to kill other creatures which is significantly worse so 2 in the main deck has felt important, and I’m running the last 2 copies in the sideboard for the matchups where it’s good.
Glasspool Mimic: I’m a really big fan of 4 Glasspool Mimic in this deck since it essentially means you’re running 5 copies of all of your 1-ofs assuming they don’t get killed, and it also acts as a land when you need which is really important since this deck wants to be hitting each land drop until turn 5 ideally.
The other two modes are also pretty useful, the fact it can always replace itself is great, especially if we draw it against a deck where we don’t need the graveyard hate, and the ability to put an extra body into play that gains life when it dies can be important at stabilizing against wide boards too.
If the opponent has a must answer threat like a Teferi, Hero of Dominaria or Korvold, Fae-Cursed King in play, we can tutor up Deputy of Detention to temporarily get rid of it. Obviously, this isn’t ideal since they get it back if they can kill Deputy of Detention, but even getting it off the battlefield for a few turns gives you time to set up a clean answer to it, and if they don’t have removal, it can end up winning you the game.
It’s also really important at being able to deal with tokens, which is something Skyclave Apparition can’t do. The fact it also exiles all tokens with the same name means you can clean up all of the tokens from something like The Wandering Emperor or Shark Typhoon in one go.
Knight of Autumn: This is mainly here as an efficient way to deal with artifacts and enchantments, as well as being able to gain you a decent chunk of life. Skyclave Apparition can deal with most of the commonly played artifacts and enchantment in the format, but it’s generally better to use Knight of Autumn to kill them since the opponent won’t get a token if Knight of Autumn is subsequently killed.
Renegade Rallier: This is a really useful card if you’re at parity to be able to rebuy one of your 2 mana draw a card enchantments to draw an additional card, and ensure you have an enchantment in play to use with Enigmatic Incarnation the following turn.
The fact you can pump mana into this to kill planeswalkers without ever needing to attack is huge since most of the decks running planeswalkers are pretty good at defending them from attacks. Additionally, being able to give it indestructible means it also survives a decent amount of removal.
Oath of Kaya: This is great as additional removal that is great to blink with Yorion, Sky Nomad, and gives us access to 4 mana creatures off Enigmatic Incarnation. The life gain it provides is huge at stabilizing against creature decks and it’s also very effective at picking off planeswalkers that are otherwise difficult to deal with like Narset, Parter of Veils.
Additionally, it provides decent reach since you can point the damage directly at the opponent and I’ve managed to win multiple games by finishing the opponent off with Oath of Kaya, especially in conjunction with Yorion, Sky Nomad.
Since Skyclave Apparition is the main form of creature removal in the deck, it does make you more vulnerable to more expensive creatures, so having access to Ravenous Chupacabra helps to shore up that weakness.
Even though you’re only running 4 Oath of Kaya, you can tutor it up with Moon-Blessed Cleric to then set up a search for Ravenous Chupacabra, and once it’s in play, you can then copy it with Glasspool Mimic to deal with any other problematic creatures they might play.
Yasharn, Implacable Earth: This is the other 4 mana tutor target and is incredibly important against the sacrifice decks. Typically, the sacrifice decks won’t have that many ways to kill Yasharn, Implacable Earth game 1 so you can potentially steal the game by getting this into play early.
Korvold, Fae-Cursed King is probably the most problematic card for this deck. As a note and by extension Jund sacrifice running Korvold, Fae-Cursed King is the worst matchup so this deck might not be the best choice if you’re expecting to face a lot of Jund sacrifice. On the flip side, the deck is actually pretty good against most other non-Korvold sacrifice variants, but getting Yasharn, Implacable Earth into play before they play Korvold, Fae-Cursed King really limits the amount of advantage they can get off it so racing to Yasharn, Implacable Earth is your best bet in that matchup.
Elder Gargaroth: Having a 5 mana creature in the deck is important since it allows you to sacrifice one of your Enigmatic Incarnation if you have 2 in play. Elder Gargaroth is definitely the best option for this slot in my opinion since it’s great at stabilizing if you’re behind and great at closing out the game if you’re at parity or behind.
When I published older versions of this deck that I was working on in Historic, I’d often have people suggest running a main deck Yorion, Sky Nomad in this slot, but I’m really not a fan of that. You’re going to be constantly sacrificing your enchantments to Enigmatic Incarnation if you have it in play, so by the time you have two, you’ll likely not have that much left in play to blink.
The fact that Elder Gargaroth isn’t legendary is also huge as it allows you to copy it with Glasspool Mimic. If I have 2 Enigmatic Incarnation and a 2 mana enchantment in play, a line I take quite often is to sacrifice an Enigmatic Incarnation with the first trigger to put Elder Gargaroth in play, then sacrifice the 2 mana enchantment with the second trigger to put Glasspool Mimic into play copying Elder Gargaroth which is really hard for a lot of decks to beat. You can then keep sacrificing 2 mana enchantments on later turns to get more Glasspool Mimics copying Elder Gargaroth and build up an unbeatable wall of huge creatures.
Yorion, Sky Nomad: Typically I’m not a huge fan of Yorion, Sky Nomad in Arena formats since I think you’re usually better off going 60 cards for more consistency, but I think Yorion, Sky Nomad is really needed in this deck.
I’ve tried building 60 card Enigmatic Incarnation decks in the past, but they never worked out because you’d always run out of tutor targets too quickly. Obviously in a 60 card deck you have less room for your 1-of creatures which means you have less flexibility and run out of targets quicker (at which point Enigmatic Incarnation goes from the best card in your deck to a completely dead one), and you’re also more likely to draw your tutor targets which compounds the issue even further.
For that reason, it’s always felt necessary to be running more than 60 cards in order to fit in more tutor targets and reduce your odds of drawing them too so going up to 80 cards is more of a necessity. Additionally, Yorion, Sky Nomad works perfectly with the cards we want to be running anyway. We want all of our enchantments to have enter the battlefield abilities so we get 2-for-1s off Enigmatic Incarnation and we want most of our tutorable creatures to have enter the battlefield abilities. Since we get value off them immediately, they all work really well with Yorion, Sky Nomad when we don’t have Enigmatic Incarnation.
The biggest downside of going up to 80 cards in a deck built around a 4-of is that you’re less likely to draw the card the deck is built around, but the great thing about Yorion, Sky Nomad is that it always gives you access to good top end even if you don’t draw Enigmatic Incarnation. Blinking all of your early enchantments and creatures to gain a bunch of extra value and put a 4/5 flyer into play is often good enough to win the game on its own.
Mana Base
The deck is running 34 lands plus 4 Glasspool Mimic which is the equivalent of 28.5 lands in a 60 card deck. Running a high land count is really important as the deck wants to be hitting land drops ideally until turn 5 in order to play Yorion, Sky Nomad, and missing land drops in the first 3/4 turns will prevent you from using Moon-Blessed Cleric to tutor up Enigmatic Incarnation at best, or put you too far behind that you just lose the game at worst.
In terms of the actual lands themselves, I’m running a selection of triomes, shock lands, and check lands along with a single basic Plains. The basic has felt necessary to not get blown out by Field of Ruin and running a Plains also means you get value off Yasharn, Implacable Earth‘s enter the battlefield ability. I much prefer check lands over slow lands since you really need to have access to untapped lands on turn 2 to play your enchantments on curve.
3 Rest in Peace: This is here mainly for Greasefang, Okiba Boss, Izzet Phoenix, and sacrifice decks. Since we’re not running any instant-speed interaction, we’re basically relying on graveyard hate in order to stop Greasefang, Okiba Boss from comboing so it’s really important there, and shutting off Arclight Phoenix and Cat/Oven helps shut off the most threatening parts of the phoenix and sacrifice decks. We also don’t mind running multiples of this since we can always sacrifice excess copies to Enigmatic Incarnation.
3 The Meathook Massacre: The deck has great access to single target removal off Enigmatic Incarnation, but fast go-wide aggressive decks can be difficult to deal with on the draw, so having access to the full 4 copies of The Meathook Massacre against aggro is great. Similar to Rest in Peace, we can also sacrifice this to Enigmatic Incarnation to get more value once we’ve swept the board if we don’t need the life gain or we’ve drawn multiples.
4 Destiny Spinner: This is the best card in the deck against control and other counterspell decks post-sideboard as it allows us to resolve our big plays like Enigmatic Incarnation and Yorion, Sky Nomad uncontested. The ability on it is also great at attacking down planeswalkers if we have a lot of enchantments in play and it’s also an enchantment itself so we can sacrifice it to Enigmatic Incarnation if we need.
2 Unlicensed Hearse: This is here pretty much exclusively for the Greasefang, Okiba Boss matchup since finding graveyard hate consistently is so important and I don’t think just 4 Rest In Peace in an 80 card deck is enough.
2 Skyclave Apparition: Final 2 copies of Skyclave Apparition for creature decks and decks running cheap non-creature permanents this can hit like sacrifice.
Best of 1
I don’t think I’d make any changes for best of 1 since the main deck is fairly well set up against most decks and is already full of tutor targets. The only downside of running this deck in best of 1 is that it’s quite soft to Greasefang, Okiba Boss decks which seem more prominent in the Bo1 metagame.
The way you lose this matchup is letting them outrace you as they’re essentially forced into the aggressive role; keeping their board clear in the early game and not letting them get too aggressive is really important. Both The Meathook Massacre and Skyclave Apparition are important to that end.
Additionally, be wary of Thoughtseize when you’re thinking of putting Yorion, Sky Nomad into your hand. If you want to go for a big Yorion, Sky Nomad turn and you’re getting close to 9 mana, it’s usually better to wait until you can put it into hand and cast it in the same turn.
Graveyard hate is really important in this matchup so you generally want to mulligan a little more aggressively unless you have a strong hand. If you can resolve a Rest in Peace or Unlicensed Hearse, you can out grind their backup plan fairly easily whether they’re playing Mardu or Esper.
You’re generally a favourite in this matchup since you have effective ways to deal with their creatures, access to life gain, Yorion, Sky Nomad and Elder Gargaroth as blockers, and graveyard hate.
This sideboard plan assumes the opponent is playing Cat/Oven, if they’re not, then bring in 3 The Meathook Massacre instead of 3 Rest in Peace. Like I said previously, Korvold, Fae-Cursed King is the single biggest problem for this deck since it immediately generates so much card advantage and is difficult to kill so the Korvold-based sacrifice decks are significantly harder than the other variants.
Never keep a hand without either Destiny Spinner or early interaction as they’ll pretty easily win the game if they keep early creatures in play and trade 1-for-1 with their counterspells. Destiny Spinner is by far the most important card in this matchup since they’re pretty reliant on counterspells to interact, but be aware that they might bring in Aether Gust which gets around Destiny Spinner.
Stabilizing is the most important thing so prioritize killing their creatures as quickly as possible as if the game goes long, you’ll be able to cast multiple spells a turn which they struggle to deal with.
I’ve found this matchup to be pretty reasonable, but you do get punished pretty hard for making mistakes. Destiny Spinner is by far the best card in this matchup at forcing through your powerful cards like Enigmatic Incarnation and Yorion, Sky Nomad so tutoring it up with Moon-Blessed Cleric if you already have one of those is usually good.
Oath of Kaya is lowkey one of the most important cards in the matchup at being able to pick off planeswalkers like Narset, Parter of Veils (which can be a real problem since it shuts off all of our draw a card enchantments), Teferi, Hero of Dominaria if they use the -3 etc. as well as being an important tool at closing the game out once the opponent is at a low life total so think carefully about when you use it.
You generally want to kill their creatures as fast as possible to keep them off Embercleave or to limit the amount of damage they can force through with something like Torbran, Thane of Red Fell so ensure you keep a hand that has early interaction or creatures that can trade off in combat. Gaining life once you’ve stabilized is crucial so tutoring up Knight of Autumn to gain 4 life and copying it with Glasspool Mimic is important to put the game out of reach.
Keeping them off Transmogrify and having a plan to kill their planeswalkers are the two most important things in this matchup as those are the two main ways they can get ahead. Kill their tokens on sight if you can with Trial of Ambition / Oath of Kaya / Deputy of Detention to keep them off Transmogrify in the early game.
If you copy Yorion, Sky Nomad with Glasspool Mimic, make sure you always choose to keep the original Yorion, Sky Nomad. This will then allow you to blink the original Yorion, Sky Nomad which will then allow you to blink all of the other permanents again when they re-enter.
Similarly, if you’re using Glasspool Mimic to copy Yorion, Sky Nomad off Enigmatic Incarnation, don’t forget that everything you blink won’t return until the opponent’s end step since you’re doing this all during your end step.
You can blink an enchantment with Yorion, Sky Nomad and still sacrifice it to Enigmatic Incarnation during your end step, assuming you order your triggers correctly.
Sequencing your lands is incredibly important in this deck to ensure you have the right colours available on the right turn, so think carefully about the order you play them in – this is important for both the cards in your hand as well as cards you could potentially draw.
Casting Yorion, Sky Nomad on turn 5 can be crucial to stabilizing in certain scenarios so always consider taking a turn off to put it into your hand when you’re planning out your first few turns.
It’s potentially a good idea to have access to the deck list in your first few matches with the deck to see all of the potential options you have. The deck has so many potential lines because of the Enigmatic Incarnation toolbox so it can be easy to miss some if you’re unaware of all of the creatures in the deck.
Conclusion
I absolutely love playing Enigmatic Incarnation decks so this has been so much fun to play and there are a lot of potential directions you can go with different tutor targets so it’s fairly adaptable to metagame shifts too. Come join our Discord and let us know how you go with the deck or have any questions. Thanks a lot for reading!
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Alth is an MTG Arena grinder who has been #1 on the ladder multiple times and is always looking to bring new ideas and archetypes to the format and push them to the top spots on the ladder. You can follow him on Twitter and YouTube.
