The Jolly Balloon Man - A Commander Deck Tech
Throughout history, no character trope is quite as hard to fathom as the clown. A figure steeped in history with mythical and controversial depictions, in media from ages immemorial to now, the idea of the clown is highly divisive. Adults may often find them amusing, children may find them terrifying, and many find them downright uncanny. Nevertheless, Magic: The Gathering has chosen to embrace humankind's utter dread surrounding these figures in their newest set, Duskmourn, with the advent of The Jolly Balloon Man, a new legendary creature with art by Campbell White.
On the other hand, I have decided to embrace the humor of the humble fool with this deck tech. Be warned! The deck tech you are about to peruse contains the lead-up to perhaps one of the silliest ideas this humble author has devised when building a Commander deck. With that... Ladies and gentlemen, neither, both, or in-between! Step right up as we astound you with what might be the most derivative, most absurd, and somehow still competent, deck this side of Duskmourn!
The Setup For A Rough Idea
Picture this: an otherwise normal pod of casual Commander players forms. You sit down with your deck, the players to your left and right sit down with theirs and I with mine opposite yours. We strike up a relatively normal Rule Zero conversation. We begin the game, when a few turns in you notice something peculiar: some of my cards begin to rhyme. Sure, it must be mere coincidence that I've played both High Noon and Winter Moon in a deck that cares about Balloon tokens... right?
And then, before long, you see this hit the table:
That's right, this deck cares not just about Balloons, but Judoon Balloons upon the Moon at High Noon!
Alright, it's a wishful board state, and one that only provides me with a spiritual victory, but then again, there are a ton of Stax-style cards on my board.
Is it possible that this deck concept, based initially upon a really stupid joke... Is good?
With that, dear readers, let us look at what this deck is and what it does. The answer to the above question may yet astound you.
The One-Two Punchline
The Jolly Balloon Man is a commander that does a very good impression of Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker. The card is almost as easy to break open as Kiki-Jiki, too, due to the inherent lack of necessary combo-proofing measures seen on so many other cards nowadays. It also doesn't hurt that he has one additional color and that this color likes effects that trigger off of something entering the battlefield. The addition of white soups up the concepts of a Kiki-Jiki or Splinter Twin build tenfold, and we have ways to truly capitalize on this.
Want a Balloon, Georgie?
The primary strategy in a deck like this is that we will want to produce as many Balloon tokens as possible during every one of our turns. Since The Jolly Balloon Man's ability can only be activated at sorcery speed, we want to capitalize on this on our turns to compensate for the lack of Balloon production at other times. To this end, Illusionist's Bracers and Patriar's Seal help us achieve that goal nicely. At the same time, Helm of the Host provides us with additional copies of our Balloon Man commander, ensuring we can make even more Balloons. This concept is similar to skirting around a genie's typical caveat: if you can't wish for more wishes, wish for more genies.
Nevertheless, we can also utilize a few combo lines to reach a critical mass of Balloons. To ensure we can make enough of the red rubber abominations to close out a game, Village Bell-Ringer and any mana dork, such as Gold Myr or Iron Myr, can be used in conjunction.
Blink and You'll Miss It
Blink is defined as a permanent entering exile and then immediately re-entering the battlefield. While this deck wants to utilize a major Blink strategy (in that effects like Sun Titan, et al, really like this), this list utilizes blink very minimally. This is because there is only one surefire method to blink Balloon tokens: phasing.
Once You (Don't) Pop, You Can't Stop
Smaller effects, like Haystack, or larger ones, like Teferi's Protection or Out of Time, all shown above, can be used for a variety of purposes. They can protect our commander, they can protect our boards entirely, or they can be used as a short-term board wipe. But did you know? They also can serve to protect any Balloons you may want to keep on the board. To a similar effect, Sundial of the Infinite can also save your Balloons from prematurely popping.
This is because The Jolly Balloon Man's wording creates a delayed trigger with every Balloon that's created. At the beginning of the next end step, Ballo0n tokens get sacrificed. However, that sly little word "next" is in there, and it's one worth exploiting. Once you're past that end step, your Balloons stick around until something else pops them.
A Brief Interlude About Jackdaws
There are even more minute manipulations that we can exploit in this deck. For example, this little factoid might shock you: Balloons can fly! Because The Jolly Balloon Man gives the copies flying, a first for effects like this, some players might overlook this concept. But, being the smart lads and lasses (et al) that we are, we know to make use of this.
Jackdaw Savior, a card from the bygone days of Bloomburrow, acts similarly to the way Scrap Trawler does in the most busted casual artifact decks. While the Savior cannot bring back creatures with equal mana value using its ability, a Balloon token is, in essence, a Copy token as well. As such, it retains the mana value of the original. This means that, with a sacrifice outlet like Goblin Bombardment, we can bring back a plethora of fallen creatures in style.
Humor is a Battlefield
The final mechanical aspect to cover is exactly what to do with all of those Balloons. They have to lead to a win condition of some sort, and that's what we need to discuss next.
Impact Tremors, a card that for many is the source of much ire, can be used extensively here to provide an avenue to victory. But why stop there? There are plenty of cards that do the job just as well, including Warleader's Call, Witty Roastmaster, and the new Agate Instigator.
Note: we have purposefully omitted Purphoros, God of the Forge from this list for the same reason we have omitted Kiki-Jiki: these cards put too much of a target on us from the outset. They're famously known for combing out with a ham sandwich, and we do not want to let on that we are that scary just yet.
Potential Upgrades
There are plenty of cards we have chosen not to add to this deck but might be worthwhile as additions for your build. Besides Purphoros and Kiki-Jiki, Felidar Guardian is another broadcast-the-combo card that will draw near-immediate removal. However, using these cards wisely might spell victory for your feral Clown friend. Additionally, Magewright's Stone and Staff of Domination are solid inclusions that will amplify The Jolly Balloon Man's token production by a lot. Finally, Godo, Bandit Warlord allows us to tutor up Helm of the Host which, again, will make more proverbial genies for all your wishing needs.
A Demented Clown's Decklist
The Lead-Up To A Really Stupid Joke
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"But That One Joke From Earlier!"
We nearly forgot about the most important takeaway for this entire article. The joke, Judoon Balloons upon the Moon at High Noon, is extremely derivative. It's a masterclass in absurdity first found in the beloved Universes Beyond product-turned-BBC sci-fi show Doctor Who. As it were, a few methods can be found to make this build even more... that. For one, you can add Blood Moon, a card I simply didn't have handy when I crafted this deck. It's another decent Stax piece and can be complemented with Magus of the Moon, which is getting a Secret Lair reprint quite soon. Or, if you want to use the deck at its basest form, Psychic Paper (another Doctor Who card) can be used as an additional copy of Judoon Enforcers. Identity theft is no joke... until it is.
99 Red Balloons Go By
As it stands, The Jolly Balloon Man is a card that thematically hearkens back to a couple of current pieces of media. Stephen King's It has not only received a miniseries and two major films, but it is due for a television series based on the property. The other work is the short horror manga The Hanging Balloons by Junji Ito. While an illustrated work (and an animated entry in the Maniac anthology), it is no less horrifying.
And then there's this abomination of deckbuilding. Do you have any plans to build a deck based around The Jolly Balloon Man? Feel free to sound off below!
