Chthonian Nightmare + Eternal Witness + Temporal Manipulation

3-card combo · BGU

Verdict

Yes — this 3-card loop chains Chthonian Nightmare and Eternal Witness to rebuy Temporal Manipulation every turn, locking the table out of the game.

Cards required

Cheapest stack total

$1.52

Color identity

BGU

Popularity

22 decks

Format

Commander

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Chthonian Nightmare enters, banks three energy, and immediately spends it to sacrifice a creature and return itself to hand — the energy ETB and the activation form one tight loop. Eternal Witness is the pivot: it hits the battlefield from the graveyard to recover Temporal Manipulation, then gets sacrificed on the next Nightmare activation, recurring whichever nontoken creature started the chain. Sultai shells running Muldrotha, the Gravetide or Chulane, Teller of Tales assemble this fastest, since all three pieces live in the graveyard between turns.

How it works

Prerequisites

You control a nontoken creature with mana value 3 or less.

Steps

Cast Temporal Manipulation by paying , causing you to take an extra turn after this one.
Move to your next turn.
Cast Chthonian Nightmare by paying .
When Chthonian Nightmare enters the battlefield, it triggers, causing you to get .
Activate Chthonian Nightmare by paying , sacrificing a creature with mana value 3 or less, and returning Chthonian Nightmare from the battlefield to your hand, returning Eternal Witness from your graveyard to the battlefield.
When Eternal Witness enters the battlefield, it triggers, returning Temporal Manipulation from your graveyard to your hand.
Cast Chthonian Nightmare by paying .
When Chthonian Nightmare enters the battlefield, it triggers, causing you to get .
Activate Chthonian Nightmare by paying at most , sacrificing Eternal Witness, and returning Chthonian Nightmare from the battlefield to your hand, returning a creature with mana value 3 or less from your graveyard to the battlefield.
Repeat.

Result

Infinite turns; Lock

Cheaper, tighter, alternate lines

Any creature with mana value 3 or less fills the third sacrifice slot — Gilded Goose and Birds of Paradise both qualify and pull double duty as early ramp. If Temporal Manipulation is too slow at 5 mana, Time Warp is the direct swap at the same cost; Nexus of Fate is gone from Commander legality, so there's no cheaper extra-turn alternative here. The combo is redundant on extra-turn spells but has exactly one engine — Chthonian Nightmare — so graveyard hate or a Torpor Orb stalls it completely.

Chthonian Nightmare + Eternal Witness + Temporal Manipulation

How it works

Cheaper, tighter, alternate lines

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