Party Time precon upgrade guide

Nalia can cast every one of the 44 creature cards in the 99 off the top of your library, and the box has two instants that answer a threat. Fixing the second problem costs less than four dollars.

Read the type lines first. Nalia casts Cleric, Rogue, Warrior and Wizard spells from the top of your library, and the 99 are stocked with them: 14 Clerics, 9 Warriors, 11 Wizards and 5 Rogues, plus five cards that count as every type (Burakos, who is also a Cleric, Rogue, Warrior and Wizard, and four creatures with changeling). That is 44 cards, which is every creature card in the 99. Crib Swap joins them, because changeling works in every zone and an instant that has it is a Cleric spell in your library too. With the top card in view all game, there is no creature in this list she can’t cast from there.

What the box doesn’t have is a way to answer a problem. Two instants remove a single permanent: Despark, which only reaches mana value four or more, and Crib Swap, which leaves the victim’s controller a 1/1 changeling.

Zendikar Rising printed the fix, and it prices like a bulk bin. Deadly Alliance, Journey to Oblivion and Coveted Prize each cost {1} less for every creature in your party, and Nalia is the Rogue herself. At a full party that takes each of them to a single mana: {B} to destroy a creature or planeswalker, {W} to exile any nonland permanent an opponent controls (until Journey to Oblivion leaves the battlefield), {B} to tutor for any card. Together they cost 58 cents.

What are the best Party Time upgrades?

My buying order, first to last:

1. Deadly Alliance ($0.15) and Journey to Oblivion ($0.11). The deck’s missing answers, at one mana apiece once the party is full.
2. Swords to Plowshares ($0.89). One mana at any party size, which the other two can’t say.
3. Coveted Prize ($0.32). A tutor for {B} at a full party, with a free spell of mana value four or less on top.
4. Isolated Chapel ($0.27), Caves of Koilos ($0.28) and Concealed Courtyard ($0.97). Three white-black lands that come in untapped when it matters, for the two tapped lands and one colourless land they replace.
5. Emeria Captain ($0.15). A flying, vigilant Warrior that is a 5/5 at a full party.
6. Mind Stone ($0.21). The fifth mana rock, where the box has four.

Nine cards come out. The list is below.

Nalia is the Rogue, so the party needs three more bodies

A full party is four different creatures: a Cleric, a Rogue, a Warrior and a Wizard, with each creature filling only one slot. Mirror Entity can be any of them, but it is one creature. Nalia fills the Rogue slot herself, so the discounts switch on when you also control a Cleric, a Warrior and a Wizard.

How often does that happen? I counted the first eleven cards of the deck (seven plus four draws on the play) and let each of the five every-type cards fill whichever slot was missing. In the box, those eleven cards hold a Cleric, a Warrior and a Wizard 63% of the time. After the swaps it is 59%. The cuts take two Wizards and two Clerics out, and one new Warrior doesn’t fully pay for that. This counts cards seen, not creatures cast.

So I chose discounts that still help below a full party. A party of three makes Deadly Alliance cost {1}{B}, and a party of two makes it cost {2}{B}.

Three cards that cost far less than they read

The box has seven cards at six mana or more, and three of them aren’t what the number says.

Valiant Changeling reads seven. It costs {1} less for each creature type among your creatures, up to five. With Nalia on the battlefield, a full party always has five: Human and Rogue from Nalia, plus Cleric, Warrior and Wizard. So the 3/3 double-strike changeling costs {W}{W}, and any changeling already in play gets you there alone.

Thwart the Grave reads six and costs {B}{B} at a full party. It returns a creature card and up to one party-type creature card from your graveyard to the battlefield, and every creature in this deck is a party type. Two creatures for two mana.

Dusk // Dawn reads nine because the curve adds both halves. Dusk costs {2}{W}{W} and destroys every creature with power three or greater. Nineteen of the 44 creature cards print power three or more, 23 print two or less, and Archpriest of Iona and Nighthawk Scavenger vary. It stays, as the late reset it is. Dawn costs five from the graveyard and gets the small ones back.

One side effect for the numbers. Average mana value goes from 3.29 to 3.34 after the swaps. Part of that rise is Deadly Alliance, Journey to Oblivion and Coveted Prize, which count at their printed five even when they cost one.

Six spells out, and the table-levellers go first

Stick Together and Magus of the Balance both level the table down to its smallest player. Stick Together has everyone choose a party and sacrifice the rest. Magus (five mana, tap, sacrifice) does the same to lands, hands and creatures. A deck with 44 creatures and a combat trigger that pumps every one of them has the most to lose from either. Magus is also a Wizard, so that cut shows up in the 59% above.

Pontiff of Blight costs six with {B}{B}, and its extort wants another {W/B} for each trigger. Calculating Lich is the six-drop that stays, because it drains one life for each creature that attacks an opponent and asks for no mana to do it.

Eight-and-a-Half-Tails gives one permanent protection from white for {1}{W}, which blanks white removal and nothing else. Deep Gnome Terramancer only fires when an opponent’s land enters without being played, a fetchland activation or a ramp spell, and only once each turn.

Folk Hero is the closest call. It draws a card once each turn, but only with Nalia on the battlefield, and only for the 22 cards in the 99 that share Human or Rogue with her (21 creature cards and Crib Swap). It is a two-mana enchantment that needs a second spell before it does anything, and Nalia can’t cast it from the top. The FAQ covers the one reason to keep it.

Four creatures leave and Emeria Captain comes in, so the 99’s 44 creature cards become 41. The cards Nalia can cast from the top go from 45 to 42 with Crib Swap counted. I’ll take that trade because the cards that left are the ones that do least when they arrive.

Nine tapped lands become seven, and the colours barely move

Bojuka Bog and Snowfield Sinkhole go. The Bog taps for {B} only and exiles a graveyard, and the Sinkhole is a plain tapped dual. Starlit Sanctum goes for a different reason. It is one of six lands that tap for only colourless (with Mutavault, Vault of the Archangel, War Room, Ash Barrens and Myriad Landscape), and its two abilities want you to sacrifice a Cleric, which is one of the four bodies the party needs.

Isolated Chapel is untapped if you control a Plains or a Swamp, and the deck has 20 basics. Caves of Koilos is always untapped and deals 1 damage when you tap it for colour. Concealed Courtyard enters untapped on your first three land drops and tapped after that, and those first three land drops are the window that matters here. Shattered Sanctum is the mirror image, untapped only once you have two other lands, and I didn’t want a dual that comes in tapped on your first two land drops.

The result is small. Always-tapped lands go from nine to seven. White sources go from 22 to 24 and black from 24 to 25, which moves {W}{W} by turn three from 63.9% to 69.4% and {B}{B} from 69.4% to 71.8%. Twelve white spells and nine black spells in the box want a double pip that early, and no land swap fixes that. These swaps buy speed.

Mortuary Mire stays tapped on purpose. It puts a creature card from your graveyard on top of your library, and Nalia can cast any creature card from there, so it is recursion on a land. The other tapped lands each do a job too: Shambling Vent is a creature, Temple of Silence scrys, Windbrisk Heights hides a free spell for a three-creature attack, Orzhov Basilica returns a land, Path of Ancestry makes either colour, and Myriad Landscape is the box’s one way to turn a land into two.

Three cards that look wrong in a go-wide deck

Skullclamp equips one creature at a time in a deck with 44 of them, which is why it looks like a cut. It stays because the deck makes the right bodies. Squad Commander creates a 1/1 Kor Warrior for each creature in your party, Mardu Strike Leader makes a 2/1 Warrior every time it attacks, and Mage's Attendant leaves a 1/1 Wizard. Equip any of those tokens and it dies at once, for two cards.

Multiclass Baldric goes on Nalia. At a full party it prevents all damage that would be dealt to her, and because she is a Rogue it gives deathtouch too. It does nothing against destroy or exile effects.

Archpriest of Iona and Mother of Runes are one-mana Clerics. Archpriest’s power equals your party size, so it is a 4/2 at a full party, and Mother of Runes can give Nalia protection from a colour each turn. Both fill a party slot for a single mana, which is the whole point of them here.

Three dollars and thirty-five cents

All nine adds cost $3.35 at the cheapest released printing of each, checked in October 2026, and a cheapest printing can be a promo. Six of them cost less than thirty cents. None of them is a Game Changer, so the bracket floor stays at 1.

Skipped, and worth naming: Godless Shrine ($8.64) is the best white-black land I left out, and it is reprinted in Star Trek on 13 November 2026, so the price should fall. Smothering Tithe ($55.85) is a Game Changer, and one would lift the floor from 1 to 3. Vindicate, Anguished Unmaking and Path to Exile all fit, and I left them out because Deadly Alliance, Journey to Oblivion and Swords to Plowshares already do the job.

The upgraded decklist

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FAQ

Does Nalia count as the Rogue in her own party?

Yes, as long as she is on the battlefield. She is a Human Rogue, so a full party only needs a Cleric, a Warrior and a Wizard beside her, and each of those has to be a different creature. Mirror Entity or any other every-type creature fills one slot, not all four, so a lone changeling doesn’t switch the discounts on.

Can Nalia cast Crib Swap off the top of my library?

Yes. Crib Swap is a Kindred Instant with changeling, and changeling works in every zone, so in your library it is a Cleric, Rogue, Warrior and Wizard spell all at once. Nalia only grants permission to cast from the top. The timing stays whatever the card normally has.

How much do the nine swaps cost?

$3.35 at the cheapest released printing of each add, checked in October 2026. Six of the nine are under thirty cents. The priciest are Concealed Courtyard at $0.97 and Swords to Plowshares at $0.89, and the three lands total $1.52.

Which cards in the box cost less than their mana value says?

Three. Valiant Changeling reads seven but costs {W}{W} once your creatures have five types between them, which a full party with Nalia guarantees. Thwart the Grave reads six and costs {B}{B} at a full party. Dusk // Dawn reads nine because the curve adds both halves, and Dusk alone costs four. Deadly Alliance, Journey to Oblivion and Coveted Prize join them from the adds.

Does Dusk // Dawn kill my own creatures?

Mostly, yes. Dusk destroys every creature with power three or greater, and 19 of the 44 creature cards in the box print power three or more (Archpriest of Iona and Nighthawk Scavenger vary). With a full party, Nalia gives each of your creatures a counter as combat begins, so most of the small ones stop being safe after a turn or two. Dawn then returns every creature card in your graveyard with power two or less to your hand.

Which strong cards did you leave out, and why?

Godless Shrine is $8.64 and is reprinted in Star Trek on 13 November 2026, so I’d wait for the price to move. Smothering Tithe is $55.85 and a Game Changer, which would lift the bracket floor from 1 to 3. Vindicate ($0.33), Anguished Unmaking ($1.55) and Path to Exile ($0.64) are fine cards that Deadly Alliance, Journey to Oblivion and Swords to Plowshares already cover.

Can Burakos and Folk Hero lead this deck instead of Nalia?

Yes, they are a legal commander pair. Burakos has Choose a Background and Folk Hero is a Background, and together their colour identity is white and black, the same as Nalia’s. This guide is written for Nalia and cuts Folk Hero, so if you switch leaders, keep it and treat the other eight swaps as a starting point. The party math changes too, because Burakos is every type but still counts as a single creature.