In case you missed the news last week, to better meet the needs of the community, I’m going to be focusing on Commander content for the foreseeable future. And as you may have already gathered, the subject for today is this fine gentleman:

Kiki’s always done cool things, but in recent years, Wizards of the Coast has been releasing more and more creatures with enters-the-battlefield triggers, in the process, turning this little Goblin into an absolute monster. Of course, seeing as his color identity restricts us to mono-red, the range of effects is somewhat more limited, but if you’re looking for ways to burn things, you have almost forty options.

Beat It

• Bogardan Hellkite
• Fire Dragon
• Firemaw Kavu
• Inferno Titan
• Outrage Shaman
• Bloodshot Cyclops
• Living Inferno

Each option has its own advantages. Firemaw Kavu, Bogardan Hellkite, Inferno Titan, and Living Inferno let you divvy things up as you see fit, Outrage Shaman and Fire Dragon can kill really large creatures, and Bloodshot Cyclops still dishes out damage when you have something better to copy. But even in a mono-red deck, burn isn’t the only way to deal with problematic creatures. Grim Poppet is happy to pick off regenerators or grind down big threats, and Duplicant can undo even the preposterously large. Really, though, it seems a shame to have creatures that don’t serve as burn spells, so why not throw in these nice enchantments for good measure?

Then again, people may not take kindly to having their best creatures repeatedly turned to ashes, so the rest of their armies could be coming your way.

Don't Stop 'til You Get Enough

• Chancellor of the Forge
• Goblin Marshal
• Myr Battlesphere
• Pentavus
• Siege-Gang Commander
• Triskelavus
• Rukh Egg
• Wurmcoil Engine

And heck, while you’re at it, you may as well get some attacks in. With, say, a Myr Battlesphere token tapping eight 1/1s along with a markedly less hasty nontoken Battlesphere. Yeah, that seems like a good idea.

Smooth Criminal

Making Kiki-Jiki your commander doesn’t make the problem disappear, but the choice certainly goes a long way in the right direction. You can copy Scarecrone and then sacrifice and revive the original before sacrificing the copy to draw two cards a turn. You can make a Knollspine Dragon after one opponent kicks another’s teeth in. You can go up both a land and a card from Solemn Simulacrum with every activation. You can even tutor for a new artifact each turn with Hoarding Dragon!

Moreover, there’s no need to stick to red creatures. Sure, you may not be able to stick Disciple of Bolas or Sphinx of Uthuun in your deck, but if somebody else goes to all the effort of casting one, the least you can do is Grab the Reins and take it for a spin. Heck, Zealous Conscripts and Conquering Manticore are easily repeated using Kiki-Jiki; now, if only there were some way to use him twice in the same turn . . . 

• Thousand-Year Elixir
• Rings of Brighthearth
• Puppet Strings
• Conjurer's Closet – But then again, why stop at two?
• Umbral Mantle
• Staff of Domination
• Sword of the Paruns

Sword of the Paruns will even make your token army deadlier while you’re at it! But the absolute best part about ways to untap Kiki-Jiki an arbitrary number of times? They make a great excuse to generate ludicrous amounts of mana, and really what more can you ask for?

This Gauntlet of Might’s not going to cast itself.

Billie Jean

She’s just a girl who thinks that I have just won. There are a few more cards that seem to do cool things with Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker that I haven’t included.

How cool would it be to use Kiki-Jiki on each player’s turn by equipping him with Thornbite Staff and letting the copy sacrifice itself at each player’s end step? What about pulling a similar trick for 3 damage by championing Kiki with the token of a Lightning Crafter? Or making Myr Battlespheres with Mana Echoes out?

Unfortunately, these cards lead to infinite combos far too often for my liking. If I were the only one who was going to play the deck, I could just decide never to burn Lightning Crafter with its own ability, thus avoiding an unbounded number of Warstorm Surge triggers. I could vow never to use Bloodshot Cyclops’ ability while Kiki was holding Thornbite Staff or activate Umbral Mantle’s ability with Mana Echoes on board. But I lend out my Commander decks, and I’m posting this on the Internet. At some point, somebody will think one of these combinations is novel and execute it in his or her casual playgroup, and people will go home angry.

So, this is a warning. If you play in a combo-friendly group or you’re going to regulate yourself, these cards can be fun and worthy of inclusion. Otherwise, you’d best leave them on the sidelines.

Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'

With that out of the way, let’s get things into a playable form, shall we? Try this on for size:

"Breaking Mirrors and Taking Names"

• Commander (1)
• 1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker

• Answers (15)
• 1 Shattering Pulse
• 1 Tuktuk Scrapper
• 1 Bogardan Hellkite
• 1 Duplicant
• 1 Fire Dragon
• 1 Firemaw Kavu
• 1 Grim Poppet
• 1 Inferno Titan
• 1 Outrage Shaman
• 1 Bloodshot Cyclops
• 1 Living Inferno
• 1 Electropotence
• 1 Warstorm Surge
• 1 Blasphemous Act
• 1 Chaos Warp

• Board Presence (11)
• 1 Clone Shell
• 1 Chancellor of the Forge
• 1 Goblin Marshal
• 1 Myr Battlesphere
• 1 Pentavus
• 1 Siege-Gang Commander
• 1 Triskelavus
• 1 Rukh Egg
• 1 Wurmcoil Engine
• 1 Confusion in the Ranks
• 1 Tyrant of Discord

• Raw Resources (15)
• 1 Hoarding Dragon
• 1 Knollspine Dragon
• 1 Mindless Automaton
• 1 Solemn Simulacrum
• 1 Scarecrone
• 1 Mindclaw Shaman
• 1 Junk Diver
• 1 Myr Retriever
• 1 Skullclamp
• 1 Mimic Vat
• 1 Erratic Portal
• 1 Mind's Eye
• 1 Staff of Nin
• 1 Reiterate
• 1 Wild Ricochet

• Kiks and Jiks (8)
• 1 Thousand-Year Elixir
• 1 Staff of Domination
• 1 Rings of Brighthearth
• 1 Puppet Strings
• 1 Sword of the Paruns
• 1 Umbral Mantle
• 1 Splinter Twin
• 1 Conjurer's Closet

• Finders Keepers (6)
• 1 Word of Seizing
• 1 Act of Aggression
• 1 Blind with Anger
• 1 Conquering Manticore
• 1 Zealous Conscripts
• 1 Grab the Reins

• Ramp (9)
• 1 Sol Ring
• 1 Mind Stone
• 1 Everflowing Chalice
• 1 Worn Powerstone
• 1 Dreamstone Hedron
• 1 Extraplanar Lens
• 1 Gauntlet of Power
• 1 Gauntlet of Might
• 1 Caged Sun

• Mountain Range (35)
• 1 Spinerock Knoll
• 1 High Market
• 1 Keldon Necropolis
• 1 Miren, the Moaning Well
• 1 Temple of the False God
• 1 Thawing Glaciers
• 1 Mystifying Maze
• 1 Vesuva
• 1 Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle
• 1 Haunted Fengraf
• 1 Scrying Sheets
• 1 Mouth of Ronom
• 23 Snow-Covered Mountain

Buy This Deck

Kiki-Jiki offers great opportunities both for grinding out value and executing huge, swingy plays, making him highly customizable and good to lend out as an introduction to the format. Do you have a Kiki-Jiki deck? Are you planning to try one out? Share your thoughts in the comments! Next Monday, it will be Pro Tour: Return to Ravnica Week, which might seem like it has very little to do with Commander. I’m not so sure about that, but I guess we’ll find out then.

For those who haven’t yet voted in it, here’s last week’s poll again.

[poll id="207"]