Annihilator is a mechanic that has a bit of infamy to it. In fact, there have only been 19 cards with annihilator since its introduction in 2010. Despite how little the mechanic has appeared, its name brings terror into many Commander players. In fact, one of these cards is banned in Commander, so there are only 18 annihilator cards you’ll actually see in the format. If you want to be the public enemy and play with one of the best mechanics ever, this annihilator guide will go over how to make the most of the mechanic.
What Is Annihilator?
Annihilator is a mechanic that triggers when a creature attacks. When they do, your opponent must sacrifice a certain number of permanents. For example, if a creature has annihilator 3, when it attacks, the defending player must sacrifice three permanents.
If you want a commander with annihilator, you only have four options. The best is Azlask, the Swelling Scourge, as it lets you play with all five colors. As for the rest, they generally lean on Voltron, as their effects are much less relevant to the overall game. These are Kozilek, Butcher of Truth, Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre, and Ulamog, the Defiler.
There are two ways to give a creature annihilator, with Eldrazi Conscription and Nazgul Battle-Mace. A benefit of Eldrazi Conscription in particular is that it’s not legendary, so you can make copies with it and spread it to other creatures to give them a massive stat boost and a powerful ability. It doesn’t start with annihilator, but Idol of False Gods can eventually become a creature with it while making Spawn tokens to ramp with.
The best card with annihilator is It That Betrays. This lets you steal your opponents’ creatures when they have to sacrifice them. More generic permanents are Pathrazer of Ulamog, Ulamog's Crusher, and Hand of Emrakul don’t have flashy abilities, but are still solid. Artisan of Kozilek is a good reanimation card if you can cheat it out. Both Flayer of Loyalties and Hideous Taskmaster can steal a creature for a turn and give them annihilator to really make your opponents’ creatures betray their controllers.
The last cards with annihilator are Nulldrifter, Eldrazi Ravager, Breaker of Creation, and Spawnsire of Ulamog. All these cards are great, and are often played in most Eldrazi/Annihilator decks.
Supporting Sacrifice
So, now that you know all the cards that have annihilator, how should you be using them? If you haven’t guessed already, the mechanic is very intertwined with the Eldrazi creature type. So, if you want to build an Annihilator deck, you’ll be building an Eldrazi deck. If you want to focus exclusively on annihilator, then you should be using Azlask, the Swelling Scourge as your commander. Its the best enabler, and lets you play all colors so you can take advantage of sacrifice support cards.
You can use Mayhem Devil as a way to turn all annihilator triggers into burn damage. It is a bit minimal, but can be used to remove low-toughness creatures. You can burn more directly while gaining life with cards like Blood Artist, or gain life with The Meathook Massacre.
In many decks built around annihilator, you need a lot of mana. Eldrazi’s main gimmick is powerful effects with the trade-off of them being costly in mana. Luckily, there are multiple permanents that can help ramp your with Treasure tokens. You can use Negan, the Cold-Blooded to turn all sacrificed creatures into Treasure tokens. If other creatures are sacrificed, both Revel in Riches and Mahadi, Emporium Master give you more Treasures. You can even steal all creatures being sacrificed if you run Tergrid, God of Fright.
The War Of Attrition
One thing you should know about annihilator is that often, these creatures are going to get removed. This is just going to happen, especially since many of them don’t come with any layers of protection. So, you want ways to recur your creatures from your graveyard so you can get them back into your hand to replay.
One of the creatures with annihilator that helps you with this is Artisan of Kozilek, but this only works when it’s cast. Depending on your build, you may wind up with a lot of Eldrazi Scion and Spawn tokens, making Dread Return an easy card to flashback. Sheoldred, Whispering One can keep reanimating creatures every upkeep, so if one of your Eldrazis get removed, it’s not for long. Likewise, Portal to Phyrexia does the same thing while forcing your opponent to sacrifice creatures when it enters.
If you have the colors for it, you can run some Reanimator cards to make sure you can keep your cards with annihilator around (or cheat them onto the battlefield without ever paying their mana costs). Victimize can get you two creatures at the cost of one sacrifice, and Eerie Ultimatum can get all permanents (with different names) onto the battlefield from your graveyard. Since you’re usually ramping a lot, the seven mana price of admission isn’t the worst. Stitch Together can return a creature to the hand if you want to re-use a cast trigger, or can return the creature to the battlefield if you have a lot of cards in your graveyard.
Like the idea of Reanimator? You can check out our overview of the Reanimator archetype over here, A lot of cards discussed in this article are great in Reanimator decks.
Ramp, Ramp, Ramp
As you’ve noticed, cards with annihilator cost a lot of mana. The cheapest creature with it that doesn’t have any hoops attached to it costs six mana. So, if you’re playing with annihilator, you need ways to generate a lot of mana. Luckily, since most annihilator decks are Eldrazi decks, there are a lot of ways to create scion tokens to cast them more quickly. Some examples of these include Writhing Chrysalis, Malevolent Rumble, and Void Attendant. These cards create tokens that can be sacrificed in order to generate mana.
Another trait of cards with annihilator is that they are all colorless. And luckily, there are plenty of colorless cards that make it easier to cast big spells. For example, Eldrazi Temple and Shrine of the Forsaken Gods can make two colorless mana for no extra cost. If you get Forsaken Monument out, that means they’ll all tap for an extra colorless mana too. Ugin, the Ineffable can discount all your colorless spells, as can It That Heralds the End and Eye of Ugin.
Staying Protected
Cards with annihilator are very threatening. After all, if they go unchecked, they can run away with the game. And since they cost a lot of mana to cast in the first place, if they get removed quickly, you wasted all that mana for nothing. The only cards that have protection of any kind that have annihilator are Breaker of Creation, Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre, and Ulamog, the Defiler. Even so, the ward cost is easy enough to pay, and the indestructible can be got around by any removal spell that exiles.
There are a lot of specific counterspells that Eldrazi decks can play that Annihilator decks can take advantage of. Most of your creatures have at least seven power, so Not of This World can often be a free counterspell for any targeting removal. Eldrazi Confluence can blink creatures if they ever become a removal target, while also offering other utility effects as well. If you have your commander out, Deflecting Swat is helpful as well. Cards like Teferi's Protection and Semester's End can get rid of your battlefield for a while, ensuring your creatures stay safe from board wipes.
There are a handful of artifacts and enchantments that help to protect your battlefield by giving your creatures keywords. Akroma's Memorial provides a ton of useful abilities, and Eldrazi Monument gives them all indestructible so long as you can sacrifice a creature for its upkeep cost. They can only protect one creature, but Lightning Greaves and Swiftfoot Boots can make a creature hard to remove. Some Auras such as Alpha Authority and Bear Umbra can help a creature stick around by giving it keyword abilities that make it much harder to remove.
Sample Annhilator Commander Deck
So, you want to play a deck that utilizes as many Annhilator cards as possible. As mentioned before, the best commander for an Annhilator deck is Azlask, the Swelling Scourge, which is what we’ll go over here. There is a sub-commander in the deck with Ulalek, Fused Atrocity, which can copy all your Edlrazi spells for just two colorless mana. The idea is to make a ton of Scion and Spawn tokens, sacrificing them to gain experience counters and providing a stat boost to all your specific creatures (which you can make all your creatures into Spawns and Scions with Maskwood Nexus.
The deck contains a lot of ways to passively make Scions and Spawns without needing to pay mana. The easiest ways are with Awakening Zone and From Beyond, which make one at every upkeep. In a pinch, the latter can be used for a tutor for any Eldrazi card. Your mana curve is fairly high, so Kozilek's Unsealing will often be making Spawn tokens and drawing you cards. In the late game, if you have a lot of Eldrazi creatures in your graveyard, Spawnbed Protector can put two Scion tokens onto the battlefield.
There are multiple ways to discount your spells in the deck. Urza's Incubator makes them two less when you name Eldrazi, which almost every creature in the deck is. It’s one less mana, but Herald of Kozilek is still useful, with It That Heralds the End making your colorless spells that cost more than seven mana one less. To help with color fixing for your command’s abilities, you have Chromatic Orrery, Chromatic Lantern, and The World Tree to help you out.
A sample decklist can be viewed below. The deck veers on the upper end of bracket 3 and the lower end of bracket 4. It has a slow start, as all decks of this kind do, but has an explosive endgame.
Commander
Planeswalkers (1)
Creatures (30)
Instants (9)
Sorceries (9)
Artifacts (11)
Enchantments (6)
Lands (34)
100 Cards
$661.38
Sample Budget Annihilator Commander Deck
If you want to play a more budget build, Malik, Grim Manipulator (also known as Negan, the Cold-Blooded). The commander was discussed earlier, being able to turn all annihilator triggers into Treasure token generation. So, when you’re triggering the annihilator ability on your Ulamog's Crusher and It That Betrays. you’re getting value. Especially in the latter’s case, since you get control of the creatures your opponents are sacrificing (assuming they aren’t tokens).
With how much forced sacrifice goes around in the deck, there is a lot of payoffs for Treasure tokens. Hellkite Tyrant is a win condition if it sticks around, as getting to 20 artifacts is trivial. With how many creatures that die, Gadrak, the Crown-Scourge will make a lot of excess Treasures, along with Mahadi, Emporium Master. With these Treasures, you can cascade with Rain of Riches, or use them as damage with Vihaan, Goldwaker.
Eldrazi Conscription is a very useful Aura for forcing more sacrifice across the board. On top of that, there are plenty of mass sacrifice board wipes including By Invitation Only, Promise of Loyalty, and Single Combat. Many of these leave one creature behind, so you can either leave your commander or a powerful Eldrazi on the battlefield for everyone to still have to deal with.
A sample decklist can be viewed below. This build gets around the downside that many Annihilator decks have by having a strong backup plan instead of going all in on Eldrazi or the Annihilator mechanic. And another plus side, if money is a concern, it’s a lot cheaper than optimal Eldrazi builds!
Commander
Planeswalkers (1)
Creatures (30)
Instants (11)
Sorceries (14)
Artifacts (8)
Lands (34)
100 Cards
$157.72
In Conclusion
Annihilator is one of the best mechanics ever released in Magic. It is one that is not going to get many new cards, and barely has gotten any new cards since the mechanic’s introduction. So, don’t expect to get too many toys to play with it. But the bright side is that you’ll not have to keep investing in new annihilator cards if you’re aiming to build an Annihilator deck.
As mentioned before, annihilator is very intertwined with the Eldrazi creature type. We happen to have an Eldrazi overview that you can check out to learn more about them.
