Turtle Power! precon upgrade guide

Heroes in a Half Shell pays a counter and a card every time a Mutant, Ninja or Turtle connects — and thirteen of the box's 31 creatures are none of the three.

Turtle Power! is the five-colour deck from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Eternal set, and its commander only has eyes for three creature types. Resolving the shipped decklist card by card, sixteen Mutants plus one Ninja and one Turtle outside that count give the trigger eighteen creatures to work with; the other thirteen fight without feeding it. That gap is bigger than anything wrong with the mana — though white earns its own section below — and it's the one these fifteen swaps close.

What are the best Turtle Power upgrades?

Ranked by what they do for this deck per dollar. The cut list pays for the slots.

1. Maskwood Nexus ($2.43) — every creature you control becomes every creature type, so all 28 creatures trigger the commander instead of 22.
2. Kappa Cannoneer ($0.32) — a ward-{4} Turtle that grows and turns unblockable every time an artifact enters, in a deck minting Mutagen, Clue, Food and Treasure tokens all game.
3. Changeling Outcast ($2.30) — one mana, can't be blocked, every creature type: a guaranteed commander trigger every combat from turn two.
4. Hardened Scales ($2.86) — the commander hands out counters one at a time, which is exactly where a flat +1 is at its best.
5. Realmwalker ($2.56) — a changeling body that casts your creatures off the top of the library.
6. Plaza of Heroes ($4.29) — 19 of the upgraded deck's 28 creatures are legendary; this casts every one of them in any colour, untapped.
7. Secluded Courtyard ($0.29) — the same job for the deck's sixteen Mutants, at bulk-rare price.
8. Farseek ($0.52) — fetches Smoldering Marsh, Sunken Hollow, Cinder Glade or a basic; ramp that also fixes.
9. Nature's Lore ($2.12) — an untapped Forest, including the dual-typed ones.
10. Beast Within ($0.61) — with Chaos Warp and Anguished Unmaking, moves the deck from four spot-removal spells to six.

Masked Vandal, Fellwar Stone and Kodama of the West Tree round out the fifteen; every add is argued below.

Thirteen creatures never trigger the commander

Heroes in a Half Shell has one line of rules text that matters: whenever one or more Mutants, Ninjas and/or Turtles you control deal combat damage to a player, each of those creatures gets a +1/+1 counter and you draw a card. The counters are per creature and the draw is per trigger — swinging wide grows the whole team, and damaging two players draws two cards.

The box's 31 creatures don't all show up for that. Sixteen are Mutants; Shredder, Shadow Master (a Ninja) and Steelbane Hydra (a Turtle) bring the on-list count to eighteen. The other thirteen — April O'Neil, Casey Jones, Krang, Rat King, Corpsejack Menace, Voracious Hydra, Vigor, Biogenic Ooze, Acidic Slime, Electric Seaweed, Big Mother Mouser, Roadkill Rodney and Tempestra — can attack all day without the commander noticing.

Five of those thirteen earn the slot anyway, because they pay the deck in some other currency: April O'Neil investigates whenever an on-list creature enters, Casey Jones converts every counter you place into damage, Corpsejack Menace doubles the counters, Voracious Hydra is removal on a body, and Roadkill Rodney mints Mutagen tokens when it connects. The swaps keep those five and cut the other eight.

One artifact makes every creature a Turtle

Maskwood Nexus makes creatures you control every creature type — on the battlefield, on the stack, in your library and graveyard. Under it, all 28 creatures trigger the commander, April O'Neil investigates on every creature that enters, Path of Ancestry scries on every creature you cast, and Secluded Courtyard casts anything with a face. Four mana, and the deck's biggest structural problem stops existing. When there's nothing better to do, it also makes a 2/2 changeling for {3}.

The three changelings run the same trick one card at a time. Changeling Outcast can't be blocked, which makes it the most reliable trigger in the deck: from turn two it connects every combat for a counter and a card, and the counters make it a real clock surprisingly fast. Masked Vandal is the same rules text on a 1/3 that exiles an opposing artifact or enchantment on the way in. Realmwalker names Mutant and lets you cast your creatures off the top of the library — and since it's a changeling, it's also a Mutant, a Ninja and a Turtle itself.

Kappa Cannoneer is the priciest mana cost of the adds and the cheapest dollar cost, at 32 cents. Improvise lets Mutagen, Clue, Food and Treasure tokens pay for it — the box makes all four — and once it lands, every artifact that enters puts a counter on it and makes it unblockable for the turn. Ward {4} makes it miserable to answer, and it's a Turtle, so every hit is also a commander trigger.

White shows up for two cards, and both are cuts

The box runs 39 lands, more than almost any precon needs, and still misses. White has 19 sources against the 24 you'd want for a turn-two white spell — an 83.1% hit rate — and the only cards asking for double white are Together Forever and Vanquish the Horde, which push the target to 36 sources. Nineteen against thirty-six comes back at 54.8%.

Both cards leave. Together Forever is two counters and a rebuy clause; Vanquish the Horde is a third symmetric board wipe in the deck that's usually the one with the board. With them gone white's only job is single pips, and the land swaps nudge it from 19 sources to 20.

Those land swaps: Grand Coliseum and Big Apple, 3 a.m. always enter tapped, and they make way for Plaza of Heroes and Secluded Courtyard, which enter untapped and cast most of the deck in any colour — 19 of the 28 creatures are legendary and sixteen are Mutants. Evolving Wilds goes too, as the sixth effect fighting over twelve basics alongside Fabled Passage, Ash Barrens, Escape Tunnel, Vibrant Cityscape and Everything Pizza. Always-tapped lands drop from eight to six, and two of the survivors are paying rent: Path of Ancestry scries on 22 of the 28 creatures, and Hidden Hideout taps for any of the commander's five colours.

The one check I'm leaving alone is Wave Goodbye, which wants double blue by turn four and gets there 75.3% of the time. It's also the deck's best sweeper — after a commander connect or two it returns every creature without a counter, which is to say their board and none of yours — and in practice it's a card you cast on turn six with mana to spare.

What I'd cut

Fifteen. Eight are creatures the commander can't see, two are the double-white cards, three are lands, one is a wipe the deck didn't need, and one is an Aura that bets everything on a single creature.

• Biogenic Ooze — its end-step counters only land on Oozes, and the deck's only other Ooze is Acidic Slime, also a cut.
• Acidic Slime — five mana for a body stapled to a Naturalize. The slot becomes instant-speed removal that can hit anything.
• Vigor — six mana and triple green in a colour already short on double pips, and it never triggers the commander. Yes, with Blasphemous Act it hands your survivors thirteen counters each; that's eleven combined mana across two specific cards.
• Electric Seaweed — a Defender in the deck that gets paid to attack, and the box's only card demanding double red.
• Big Mother Mouser — hoards its counters and pays out only in death. Robots aren't on the commander's list.
• Krang, the All-Powerful — five mana to double abilities that trigger on drawing, in a box where Baxter, Fly in the Ointment is the only one.
• Rat King, Pale Piper — a Rat making Rats in a Turtle deck; the commander sees none of them.
• Tempestra, Dame of Games — three mana plus an artifact for a copy that dies at end of turn, and the deck now wants its artifacts for Kappa Cannoneer's improvise.
• Mole Module — crewing it taps two would-be attackers to move a Vehicle the commander ignores.
• Vanquish the Horde — the third symmetric wipe, double-costed in the deck's shortest colour.
• Together Forever — the box's other double-white card. Support 2 and a {1} rebuy don't cover that pip bill.
• Grand Coliseum — always enters tapped, then charges a life per coloured use.
• Big Apple, 3 a.m. — enters tapped locked to one colour, and the five-mana button makes Rats the commander can't see.
• Evolving Wilds — the sixth effect competing for twelve basics.
• Level Up — two cards invested in one creature, in a deck whose commander pays every connecting attacker at once. Its draw doesn't switch on until the enchanted creature hits power 10; the commander pays a card for any combat that goes well, no threshold attached.

What I'd add

The creature package — Maskwood Nexus, Kappa Cannoneer, Changeling Outcast, Masked Vandal and Realmwalker — is argued above. The other ten:

• Hardened Scales — commander counters arrive one at a time, and the box already runs Corpsejack Menace: through both, each connecting attacker gets four counters instead of one. Add High Score and it's six.
• Kodama of the West Tree ($20.28, the one add that costs real money) — every modified creature you control that deals combat damage to a player fetches a basic land onto the battlefield, and one commander trigger makes the whole connecting team modified. A three-attacker turn is three lands. He also hands trample to everything modified, which is what stops a board full of counters from being chump-blocked to death. The honest cap: twelve basics to fetch, so late in a game he thins more than he ramps.
• Farseek — the box's second two-mana ramp spell, and it can fetch Smoldering Marsh, Sunken Hollow or Cinder Glade to fix two colours at once.
• Nature's Lore — a Forest onto the battlefield untapped, including Cinder Glade, Sodden Verdure and Vernal Fen.
• Fellwar Stone — at a four-player table this is an Arcane Signet impersonator far more often than not.
• Beast Within — answers any permanent at instant speed; the 3/3 is a fair price for a deck this good at blocking for value.
• Chaos Warp — the red answer to anything, including the enchantments and lands five-colour decks otherwise stare at.
• Anguished Unmaking — exile, no restrictions, three life. The cleanest answer in the 99.
• Secluded Courtyard — names Mutant and casts sixteen creatures plus the commander in any colour, untapped, for pocket change.
• Plaza of Heroes — any colour for nineteen legendary creatures, and late game it can exile itself to save the commander mid-combat.

One card is priced out rather than argued out. Roaming Throne naming Turtle makes the commander's ability trigger twice — two counters on every connecting attacker and two cards, every combat — and nothing else printed does that for this deck. At $52.12 when this page was written it costs more than the fifteen adds combined, which is a proportionality call on a $96 box, not a quality call. If you keep upgrading past this page, buy it first.

The five I'm keeping anyway

A shortlist of 34 cut candidates came out of the stock analysis, and these five kept surviving the argument.

• Shredder, Shadow Master — five mana with no evasion keyword is the classic cut shape, but he's a Ninja, so the commander sees him and every copy his attack makes. Attack one player and a tapped copy attacks each other opponent; every copy that connects is its own commander trigger, with “that player loses half their life” stapled on.
• Blasphemous Act — the nine on the sticker is a fiction; it costs one less per creature on the battlefield, and this deck fills battlefields. After cutting Vanquish the Horde it's one of two wipes left, and Continue? un-wipes your half for two mana.
• Casey Jones, Back Alley Brute — the commander can't see him, and I don't care: every counter placed on your creatures becomes damage at an opponent's face, which makes him a payoff for the exact thing the deck does every combat.
• Raphael, the Muscle — another five-drop without evasion, but after one commander connect the whole team has counters, and Raphael doubles all of their combat damage from there.
• Fast Forward — costs one less per opponent attacked this turn, so cast after a wide swing it's regularly two or three mana. Goading the whole table's creatures the turn they'd otherwise line up blockers is how this deck buys its next clean attack.

The numbers after the swaps

Creatures go 31 to 28, and the commander's audience goes 18 of 31 to 22 of 28 — with all six holdouts kept on purpose, and Maskwood Nexus converting even them when it's down. Average mana value falls from 3.43 to 3.1: the box kept twelve cards at five mana or more, the upgraded list keeps seven, and one-drops double from two to four.

The mana tightens the same direction. Lands go 39 to 38, always-tapped lands eight to six, and the double-pip demands in white and red disappear with their only askers. Spot removal climbs from four to six, wipes fall from three to two plus the one-sided Wave Goodbye, and draw sits at seven before counting the commander, who is the real draw engine — one lower than the box, because Level Up's conditional draw left with it.

Ramp reaches eight pieces with Kodama of the West Tree counted — the bottom of the typical eight-to-twelve, and the count undersells the deck anyway. Coin of Mastery makes a Treasure every turn, Exploding Barrel taps for any colour, Mona Lisa, Science Geek taps for X mana where X is her power, and Ninja Pizza turns every Food into a rainbow ritual.

The bracket floor doesn't move: no Game Changers in either list, Bracket 1 either way. The money: the box resolves to $96.02 at Scryfall market prices and the upgraded hundred to $127.64. Fourteen of the fifteen adds come to $21.92, with Plaza of Heroes at $4.29 the dearest of them; Kodama of the West Tree is the rest of the bill, and the section above says why he's worth it.

The upgraded decklist

The full hundred after the fifteen swaps. Hover any name to see the card and its current prices.

Load into the deck builder Copy decklist

“Load into the deck builder” opens this list in your account, pinned to the printings the box shipped, ready to edit or save. “Copy decklist” gives you plain text for Moxfield, Archidekt or Arena — no account needed.

FAQ

How good is Turtle Power! before any upgrades?

The engine is real: the commander grows the team and draws a card every combat the right creature connects, and the box backs it with counter payoffs like Corpsejack Menace, High Score and Raphael, the Muscle. The holes are structural — 13 of 31 creatures never trigger the commander, six ramp pieces, four spot-removal spells, and eight lands that always enter tapped. It plays fine out of the box at a precon table; the swaps sharpen what it already does.

Do changelings really count as Mutants, Ninjas, and Turtles?

Yes. Changeling means the card is every creature type, everywhere, at all times — so Changeling Outcast, Masked Vandal, Realmwalker and Maskwood Nexus's Shapeshifter tokens are Mutants, Ninjas and Turtles at once. They trigger Heroes in a Half Shell when they connect, they scry off Path of Ancestry, and they cast off Secluded Courtyard no matter what type it names.

What do I name with Realmwalker and Secluded Courtyard?

Mutant. It's 16 of the upgraded deck's 28 creatures, the commander included, and the changelings are covered whatever you name because they're every type. Once Maskwood Nexus is on the battlefield the choice stops mattering entirely — every creature spell you control is every type.

Can two of the Turtles be the commanders instead?

Yes — Leonardo, Donatello, Splinter, Raphael and Michelangelo all have Partner—Character select, and so does April O'Neil, so any two of them can lead the deck. The trap is colour identity: Leonardo's activated ability costs all five colours, so any pair that includes him keeps every card in the 99 legal. A pair without him — say Raphael and Michelangelo — shrinks the identity to their colours and strands most of the deck.

Why keep Blasphemous Act in a creature deck?

It costs one less per creature on the battlefield, so at a full table it's usually three or four mana, and after cutting Vanquish the Horde it's one of only two full wipes. The box also ships its own recovery: Continue? returns up to four of your creatures that died that turn for two mana, so on your own turn you can reset the board and keep your half.

Does attacking two players draw two cards?

Yes. The trigger fires once per player your Mutants, Ninjas and Turtles damage, so connecting against two players gives two separate triggers — two rounds of counters and two cards. The counters land on each connecting creature; the draw is one card per trigger, however many creatures connected.

Which add pulls the most weight?

Maskwood Nexus. For four mana every creature you control is every creature type, so all 28 creatures trigger the commander, April O'Neil investigates on every creature that enters, and Path of Ancestry scries on every creature you cast. One card, about $2.50, and the deck's biggest structural problem is gone.

Is the upgraded deck still Bracket 1?

Yes. Neither list runs a single Game Changer, so the floor stays at Bracket 1 — the swaps buy consistency, not a different power tier. Paste the list into the bracket checker if you want the card-by-card accounting.