Dimir Reanimator Guide

By: Muxus

Dimir Reanimator is a very powerful deck that is a bit slept on in my opinion. It offers incredibly high card quality, a fantastic combo match-up, and rewards its pilot massively for good play, mind games, and understanding the meta. It also has a good amount of options in deck building to adapt to the meta game.

The Core

• Hydroponics Architect – this is the main part of our tempo plan, and coupling Hydro with Entomb + Reanimate is the main identity of the deck. An easy inclusion at 4 copies. 

• Tamiyo, Inquisitive Student – Tamiyo is another very powerful tempo threat and a core part of the deck’s game plan. It’s less mandatory to run 4 copies of her, but we still want to see her in most games, and she’s very important for the energy matchup. I think between 2-4 copies is reasonable, with my current configuration being 3 in the main and the 4th in the sideboard. 

• Entomb – Entomb is another defining card in the deck and our incentive to drop Lurrus, at least in our starting 60. The card is completely blank without one of our 4 copies of Reanimate, meaning that it can be awkward at times. Therefore, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to run 3. Still, given how good the deck is at cantripping both to find Reanimate and to shuffle away excess entombs, coupled with how powerful the combo is, I think the full 4 copies is correct.

• Reanimate – The other half of the deck’s combo. Unlike Entomb, Reanimate can and often is used to simply reanimate a removed hydro, Orcish Bowmaster, or Lurrus of the Dream-den. The full 4 copies are a no-brainer, and if we had access to a better secondary reanimation spell than Life//Death, I’d happily run upwards of 2 playsets of the effect.  

• Ponder, Brainstorm – Cantrips are key to this deck and should never be cut. Outside of the regular uses like digging for lands and interaction, this deck also wants to assemble a combo. While the 4th ponder is often (incorrectly) cut from many blue decks, here it’s very core in the deck.

• Force of Will, Daze – These cards gave the deck a huge boost on the launch of Strixhaven, and it’s easy to see why. These cards naturally go with the regular tempo suite and also excel at protecting a combo. These are sometimes trimmed in sideboarding but should both be 4-offs in the main deck.

• Treasure Cruise – Ancestral Recall is simply too good not to run. This deck does have slightly worse card flow than regular tempo, and this, coupled with how tight space is in the deck, leads to there only being space for 2 copies. I would absolutely not go below this number, but playing a third copy somewhere in the 75 is also reasonable.

• Atraxa, Grand Unifier – This is by far the most powerful reanimation target we have access to. The huge vigilance + lifelink body, combined with usually finding free interaction to boot, instantly stabilizes the board and also loads you up on interaction while presenting a fast clock. It even pitches to force, which, coupled with the Brainstorm + surveil trick (Hold full control, play/fetch a surveil land, cast brainstorm with the surveil trigger on the stack, put Atraxa on top and surveil it to the graveyard), means that it’s rarely a terrible draw. 

• Fatal Push – The timeless format is largely defined by small aggressive creatures, leading to some number of removal spells being largely required in every deck. Fatal push is much better than the other options available to us, meaning that 4 copies of it are usually all the removal we run in the main deck.

Flex-Slots

• Orcish Bowmaster  – Bowmaster is key in blue mirrors, while also serving an important role against Energy. I believe 4 copies in the 75 to be mandatory, and you probably want a few copies in the main deck. The way space works out, it’s usually 2 in the main, but if you want to run something else, moving Bowmasters to the sideboard is a reasonable place to make space.
  
  Just keep in mind that without it, the main deck is pretty low on wincons. If you are below 8 life, Atraxa is shut off, and Tamiyo can’t actually win the game, leaving you with just Hydroponics Architect. I have yet to lose to this, as you can also reanimate their creatures or your own Hydroponics, but it’s good to keep in mind regardless. 

• Psychic Frog  – Psychic Frog is a fine role-player that represents another snowballing threat. However, trading down against removal is rough in the current metagame, leaving me somewhat down on the card. You can run a copy or two in the deck without problems, but I’ve found it rather mediocre. In a deck whose slots are as tight as Dimir Reanimator, I struggle to justify it. 

• Harbinger of the Seas  – This is a card with the ability to swing a game against greedy manabases completely, and is thus very strong into a lot of our weakest matchups as it’s by far our best tool against Eldrazi and is also a key player against Energy. Harbinger usually doesn’t see that much play as it’s incompatible with Lurrus, but this deck is perfect to take advantage of its unique profile.

   

  Having another medium-sized creature to reanimate is also not the worst, as it gives us another option when we assemble the combo after going below 8 life, and it’s sometimes better than Atraxa against a tapped-out opponent. Still, it’s a very matchup-dependent card that is largely useless against tempo or the many stompy decks running chrome mox. Maindecking a copy of Harbinger is thus a meta-call, but it has a clear spot in the sideboard. 

Flex interaction 

As always with blue decks, there are lots of different options for cards you could run. I’ll list a couple of alternatives, but at the moment I think main decking any of these cards is suboptimal.

• Bloodchief’s Thirst  / Requiting Hex  – These cards are good against Energy and tempo, but are too lackluster against most of the stompy decks to be worth playing in my opinion. Hex being instant-speed and having the option to gain life is pretty nice, while Thirst can hit flip walkers and can be hard removal in the late game.

• Sheoldred’s Edict – This is the spiritual opposite of Thirst and Hex, as it cleanly answers everything out of stompy, while costing 2 mana means that it’s lackluster against energy and tempo. 

• Dismember – Dismember cleanly solves the mana value problem, but 4 life is a lot in the deck and ends up causing a lot of problems, meaning that it’s not actually that much better into Lurrus strategies. 

• Unable to Scream / Witness Protection – These are flexible removal spells that hit everything, although notably not at instant speed. A removal spell pitching to force is also not something to overlook. 

Notable exclusions

• Grief, Troll of Khazad-dûm – Grief and Troll were banned out of this shell in legacy, meaning that they come to mind as potential playables for this deck. But from playing with these cards, it’s apparent they only really function with more than 4 reanimates in the deck. Playing a free Thoughtseize that costs a card isn’t a good deal against most of the meta game, and Troll is outside of being reanimated mostly just a tap-land.
  
  These cards go above rate when paired with Reanimate, but the 4 copies of Reanimate we play always get great value regardless. Therefore, these cards end up mostly being below rate, and it would take a complete restructuring of the deck for me to want to play them.

• Saint Elenda, Iona, Shield of Emeria, Valgavoth, Terror Eater – There is some consideration to run a second reanimation target, but, as in all Entomb + Reanimate decks, Atraxa ends up being the best option 90% of the time. Dedicating an entire deck slot to those 10% is just not worth it when Atraxa still ends up winning most of those games.

Manabase

In my opinion, the manabase is pretty set in stone. We really want our 2 basics and the surveil land ( a.k.a. Undercity Sewers), as the former are important for saving life to enable Reanimate, and the surveil land lets us easily bin Atraxa with a brainstorm, apart from just providing value like it would in any other deck. 

Next, we really want 4 copies of Strip Mine. I can confidently say these improve the deck massively, as they are huge against Mardu Energy, Eldrazi, and Sneak and Show (SnS), while also representing free wins against many decks. Simply put, you should play strips in all Hydroponics Architect decks. 

On the topic of Hydro, we also need a critical mass of fetch lands to support it. With 4 Watery Grave that shakes out to a mana base of 16 + 4 strips, with notably only 14 untapped blue sources, meaning that 86% of hands contain an untapped blue source, which could be better. 

I wouldn’t go below 20 lands and also wouldn’t cut the strips, so I can absolutely see running more lands if you could find the slots somewhere. See Chestheir’s Blue Deckbuilding Guide for more information on mana bases in blue decks.

Sideboard

The essentials

• Stern Scolding – This card is required for the deck to have a respectable Energy matchup. We simply need a way to trade efficiently against their 2-drops, which all pose a huge threat in one way or another if not interacted with. This card is also medium-well in tempo mirrors, as answering bowmasters and Lurrus cleanly is nothing to scoff at. Still, I like them more on the play and maybe wouldn’t board all 4, as they are particularly bad if the opponent already has a threat in play.
  
  It can also counter Thassa’s Oracle, which could be relevant but usually falls short as Doomsday either uses Unearth or Cavern of Souls to dodge it. It can still have uses, like countering the second oracle in the classic scour pile, meaning that it, coupled with a counterspell for Unearth (or a removal spell if they don’t have Narcomoeba), can beat the standard doomsday pile. 

• Orcish Bowmasters – As mentioned above, this card is crucial for post-board games against both tempo and energy, and I want a total of 4 copies in the 75.

• Harbinger of the Seas – I won’t repeat all its use cases as I’ve mentioned them earlier, but this card is exceptional against Energy and Eldrazi, which are our toughest match-ups. The card is a little clunky, which, coupled with cantrips letting us find it when we need it, means that 4 copies is a bit much. I’d recommend running at least 2, and the third copy also feels good. 

• Grief, Thoughtseize – These cards are very poor in the main deck, but do shine against the combo decks of the format. Discard is powerful here as it lets us take reanimation targets to Reanimate from SnS and can’t be countered by pact out of Turbo Reanimator. Grief is generally the better option of the two, as turning your reanimate into a discard is powerful, coupled with a decent clock from the 3/2. However, our pitch count for it is somewhat low, and it is countered by Vexing Bauble, which the rest of the interaction in the deck is already weak to. Thus, it can make sense to play Thoughtseize instead to guard against Vexing Bauble.

• Lurrus of the Dream-den – Running Lurrus in a deck like this is somewhat unintuitive, and it’s a pretty weak Lurrus deck as it does limit our options, while also giving away if we juked out of the Entomb package. I’ve found that Lurrus is good enough even if we only board it in against tempo – having your powerful sideboard card stick to your hand as an 8th card is just stupid.
  
  Couple that with it having huge synergy with reanimate; if you reanimate Lurrus and immediately cast a creature with it, they have to spend 2 removal spells on your Reanimate instead of just one. This play is also available using the opponent’s Lurrus, but good players will delve away their creatures after their Lurrus is removed to limit your Reanimate targets.

Flex Slots

• Surgical Extraction, Force of Negation, Faerie Macabre – This deck doesn’t need any more help against combo decks, and the graveyard hate cards also aren’t good into every combo deck the way Thoughtseize or Grief is. I’d stay away from these cards as you really shouldn’t need them to win against opposing combo decks. 

• Bloodchief's Thirst, Requiting Hex, Sheoldred’s Edict, Dismember, Unable to Scream, etc. – These more situational removal spells are more suitable for the sideboard, as they all have match-ups they are less useful in. See more thoughts on them above. I’m currently most inclined to run Unable to Scream and Dismember; I really like that they hit Eldrazi Linebreaker for cheap as well as having game against Sheoldred, the Apocalypse, Barrowgoyf or Broadside Bombardiers, and being fine answers to an Orcish Bowmaster in a pinch.
  
  I’ve played 2 Bloodchief’s Thirst in this slot for a very large number of games, and I think I’ve landed on not being very high on them; you cut Daze and Force for them against Energy, and it’s questionable how much better they are in that matchup. It’s better against Tempo, but Unable to Scream hits most things in the matchup, and I’m not embarrassed to run a Dismember against them either.

• Tamiyo, Inquisitive Student, Psychic Frog, Dauthi Voidwalker, Treasure Cruise – I also like playing 1-2 somewhat generic tempo cards in the sideboard, as it increases our card quality when we juke. If you are below 4 copies of Tamiyo in the main deck, I’d play the rest of the playset here, as it’s just too important not to have postboard game one against Energy.
  
  Otherwise, you can play any reasonable card depending on what you want to target; Psychic Frog is reasonable all around and good into stompy, Dauthi Voidwalker is good into tempo, and Combo, Treasure Cruise gives card advantage against Tempo and Energy, etc.

• If you are expecting a lot of Chalice of the Void and/or want some cute tech, you can run a card like Serum Snare or Experimental Augury to proliferate it to 2, as it counters most of our deck and Dimir is very low on answers to artifacts.    

• Glistening Deluge, Path of Peril, Toxic Deluge — These are, in theory, a good way to reset the board and catch up against Energy. But in practice, you are usually forced to cast these sooner rather than later, and end up not getting enough value to justify 3 mana and the sideboard slot.

Match-up Notes and Sideboarding

UBx Tempo

This is mostly a mirror match, with the big difference being that we have access to reanimate. The combo does end the game if you manage to push through interaction, but our main advantage is reanimate, giving us access to a functional 8 copies of Orcish Bowmaster. This gives us a big edge in the mid-to-late game, as the person with an active Bowmaster has a huge advantage. In game one, we have a significant disadvantage in not having access to Lurrus, so try to pull ahead before they get access to it, or make sure it’s only worth a card by answering it immediately. Post-board, I like turning into a regular tempo deck with 4 Reanimate. This match-up is pretty good as long as you are competent in the tempo mirror and leverage Reanimate well.

Mardu Energy

Game one, our best bet is to combo fast and use Force of Will to protect Atraxa. Post-board: The optimal sideboard plan depends on their sideboard. If they are heavy on graveyard hate, the combo is pretty bad and should be boarded out. If you don’t see any graveyard hate, you can board it back in. When you board out the combo in other match-ups, you should keep Reanimate in, as the card is simply good. 

The one exception is Energy, as they are dominant enough on board and their creatures don’t do much for you, so board out of the Reanimates as well. The Hydro Daze Strip Mine mana denial plan is very powerful on the play, but on the draw, you can board Hydro out if you want the slots elsewhere. Harbinger of the Seas is another tool in the matchup that acts as a bomb that can solo the game if deployed at an opportune moment.

Sneak and Show

This match-up is excellent. We have better card advantage, a faster combo, and better interaction. Our main focus here is to deny them as many resources as we can, and then win either through the combo or strip mining them out of the game with hydro. Post-board we want to board in our discard, and usually cut the Entombs, as many SnS lists run Faerie Macabre in high numbers. If you don’t see any Macabre game 2, you can board Entomb back in. Keep in mind that you can discard and reanimate their copies of Atraxa, but not Emrakul, as it shuffles in their graveyard. One of the few ways we can lose this match-up is if we can’t remove a Hexing Squelcher, so make sure to keep 2-3 copies of Fatal Push solely for this reason.

Eldrazi

Eldrazi is arguably our toughest match-up, especially if we don’t respect it. Chalice, Cavern of Souls, Kozilek’s Command, and Linebreaker are all a problem for the deck, and if we don’t win fast enough, Sire of Seven Deaths is almost unbeatable for us. Luckily, we are prepared. Harbinger of the Seas usually solos them, and a fast combo is also pretty effective, as long as they don’t have too much graveyard hate. You can board out Entomb if you see a lot of it. 

Discard is also a powerful tool that lets us disrupt them as well as steal a Sire to reanimate a good amount of the time. One question is how many counterspells to keep in, since they play Cavern of Souls. They don’t always have it, and it can always target Kozilek’s Command and Warping Wail, which is a card you should keep in mind as it can be a blowout when it counters Reanimate or Treasure Cruise. I’ve concluded to keep most of the counterspells on the play and keep just forces on the draw. If they play Vexing Baubles, you can consider playing fewer counterspells. 

Stompy 

We generally have good games against stompy decks, with the main problem card being Chalice of the Void. Being a tempo deck that can reanimate its removed creatures is a good place to be, so I’d probably board out the combo in favor of disruption against Mono-Red and Mono-Black. I haven’t played against Mono-White on this deck as most of my reps are from before the deck was popularized, but from the look of it, the match-up looks bad, particularly for the combo as they have heaps of white removal. That’s another match-up I would try boarding out some or all copies of Reanimate along with Entomb, as creatures will be going to the graveyard less often.