Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles — Shell Formation

Commanded by Leonardo, Fearless Leader and Splinter, Master of Ninjutsu, this five-colour 100-Card Commander Deck is about cover. Four brothers, raised in a pump station under Manhattan by a rat who learned ninjutsu through the wire of a cage, are outnumbered every night by the Foot Clan, and they are still alive because they never stand alone. Every fight is fought two at a time: one holds the corridor and the other goes through.

• Shell Formation: as long as a creature with Formation is untapped, another Turtle you choose has indestructible and can't be blocked by more than one creature. It can never choose itself, and Leonardo forbids vigilance to Turtles, so the one who protects is never the one who strikes. Fifteen cards carry it, and Splinter hands it to every other creature you control. The Foot Clan is a deck of 1/1s; Formation makes them come down the corridor one at a time.
• The Lair: for {2} and a tap, a creature with damage marked on it goes down to the Lair and comes back at your next upkeep with all damage and counters removed. Each creature can go down only once per game. The healing is a finite pool of decisions, not a loop, and the second time Raphael comes home bleeding there is nowhere for him to go.
• Two combos: Back to Back — Donatello and The Shell Cell untap each other forever, and Two by Two, Back to Back grows a Turtle with every untap. The Foot Does Not Run Out — Karai, Tatsu and Oroku Saki, the Shredder spend an endless supply of Foot Soldiers and drain the table.

Why Five Colours

Not a fixing excuse: a cast of five, one colour each. White is Leonardo, the plan drawn before it is used. Blue is Donatello, the workbench, and the only brother who reads a manual. Red is Raphael, who attacks each combat and is the one Turtle without Formation, because he is never the half that stands still. Green is Michelangelo, the pizza and the mutagen. Black is Splinter and the Shredder together, because the master and the clan are the same lineage. Take one colour away and a named brother stops existing.

A complete 100-card Commander deck plus 5 tokens, tuned for Bracket 4, available as a digital print-yourself edition or a printed physical deck, and offered in 10 languages.