How to Lose Friends Fast: Pariah’s Plate
Tired of dying to combat damage? Does your deck just not have enough “fog” type effects/spells? Well boy do I have a card combination for you!
Presenting to the Brewdlings: the Pariah’s Plate!
For those who haven’t gotten the combo, let’s break it down! Equip the Darksteel Plate to a creature to make it indestructible, then equip the Pariah’s Plate to the indestructible creature. Whenever we would take damage, the Pariah’s Shield will divert that damage to the Darksteel equipped indestructible creature.
Now we can equip these two cards to any random creature and just buffer our life with it, but where is the fun in that?? I think we need to add a bit of spice to the mix!
Punish your opponents for attacking you by suiting up a Truefire Captain, Boros Reckoner or Spitemare with the Pariah’s Plate. A real “Why you hittin’ yourself?” moment when the Nekusar deck makes you draw a metric butt-ton of cards and then THEY are the ones taking the damage from the draws.
Create a small but gradually growing army whenever an opponent tries to beat your face in. In the case of Hornet Nest, you get an actual swarm of flying deathtouchers.
With the introduction of Ixalan, we received a new mechanic in the form of Enrage, which I find works really well with the Pariah’s Plate. Speaking of enrage, let’s use this as a seg-way into the next part of this post, how to abuse the Pariah’s Plate:
Equip the Cacophodon with the Pariah’s Plate, then tap the Spear Spewer to deal 1 damage to each player. Pariah’s Shield will deflect the damage we would take back to the Cacophodon and then trigger its enrage ability, untapping the Spear Spewer. You can also replace the Spear Spewer with a Hidetsugu if you really want to go for the dramatic kill and draw immediate attention to yourself!
Equip the Ripjaw Raptor with the Pariah’s Plate and cast Arcbond on the Raptor. Whenever we would draw a card, if Nekusar is out under an opponent’s control, we take one damage, redirected to the Raptor, dealing one damage to everyone and drawing a card, redirecting the damage back to the Raptor, dealing one damage to everyone and drawing a card, and rinse and repeat. We could essentially draw ourselves out to death since there is no “may” on Ripjaw but we’re gonna lay on the hurt to that darn Wheel-n-Deal monster while we do it!
Nearly impossible to remove once fully equipped with the Pariah’s Shield and Darksteel Plate. Hexproof, indestructible AND it takes all the damage that would ever be dealt to you but doesn’t die. As long as the Pariah’s Plated Angler Turtle is in play, you essentially cannot die and all your opponents will have to tap out each turn to attack you, leaving you wide open for the back swing. My FAVORITE use of this combo by far. Definitely an all star.
Along the lines of Angler Turtle, hexproof and indestructible are nearly impossible to get around outside of sacrifice type effects. Sigarda, Host of Herons just eliminates that factor, adding a whole new level of protection to your impenetrable fortress.
What Doesn’t Kill Me… Probably Kills You:
Equip the Wall of Hope with the Pariah’s Plate and then enchant it with Spiteful Shadows. Whenever we take any damage, that damage will be redirected to the Wall of Hope, gaining us that much life, and then triggering Spiteful Shadows since the Wall took damage, dealing that much damage back to us again, looping the damage and life gain until we have a large enough pool of life to use an Aetherflux Reservoir to pay 50 life at instant speed to deal 50 damage to any creature or player… preferably an opponent. If the Reservoir is destroyed and we have no way to stop the combo we will end the game in a stalemate as there is no “may” abilities on the cards. We will gain infinite life.
A parting thought on the Pariah’s Plate. This card combo is incredibly fun to assemble and use but I encourage moderation and protection. While the equipped creature will be indestructible, it can easily be removed with exile and bounce effects. Having a Swiftfoot Boots or Lightning Greaves in play before hand is always encouraged as the hexproof and shroud add another line of defense to the combo.
Some commanders I could really see abusing this strategy besides Sigarda, Host of Herons are Thantis, the War Weaver, Tajic Blade of the Legion, Sapling of Colfenor and any of the Amonkhet Gods.
With Vigilance, Reach, and Indestructible from the Darksteel Plate, Thantis will be a complete boss unit as it forces your opponents to tap out into it, growing itself for the backswing while you safely take no damage.
For the last three I mentioned (Sapling, Tajic and the Amonkhet Gods), they don’t really need a Darksteel Plate as they themselves have indestructible. Running a Pariah’s Shield in any of these decks would be a definite improvement to help stall out the game a bit as your opponent tries to figure out a way to deal with the damage lock.
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