Arcane Foundry › Commanders › Gollum the Abandoned
Gollum the Abandoned
Legendary Creature — Halfling Horror · {1}{B} · Black commander
Gollum can't block.
When Gollum enters, exile up to one target card from an opponent's graveyard. Each opponent loses 2 life.
{2}, Sacrifice an artifact or creature: Return this card from your graveyard to your hand. Activate only as a sorcery.
Build a Gollum the Abandoned deck →
What Gollum the Abandoned actually does
Read off the card by the same engine the Forge and Analyzer use — this is the mechanical classification, not a summary.
- Triggered ability · etbWhen Gollum enters, exile up to one target card from an opponent's graveyard. Each opponent loses 2 life.
- Activated ability{2}, Sacrifice an artifact or creature: Return this card from your graveyard to your hand. Activate only as a sorcery.
What a Gollum the Abandoned deck needs
Plays as aristocrats. What the commander asks of the other 99 — read from the card and checked by hand.
- artifacts (its text counts them)
- expendable creatures and tokens to sacrifice (the commander is a sacrifice outlet)
- blink and recursion aimed at the commander itself (its value is its own enter trigger)
- drain and life-loss payoffs (the damage is not combat damage)
- self-mill, discard and recursion (the graveyard is a resource its text reads)
The Gollum the Abandoned deck plan
The roles the Forge fills for this commander, and how many cards of each.
- 12× Life loss that is not combat damage — each opponent loses life, repeatably
- 6× Exile a permanent you control and return it — the button a value-ETB deck presses
- 22× A permanent of the exact NON-creature type the commander counts — artifacts for an artifact commander, enchantments for an enchantress
- 16× Creatures you are happy to sacrifice — a free sac outlet on the commander is worthless with nothing to feed it
- 8× A permanent whose value is in its enter-the-battlefield trigger — the payload a blink deck reuses
- 6× Put your own cards into your graveyard as a resource
- 5× Actually remove one problem permanent — preventing its damage is not removing it
- 9× Find the exact card the plan needs
- 1× Answer a whole board at once
Best cards for Gollum the Abandoned
Ranked by an engine that reads what each card does — its real cost, its delay and how reliably it works — rather than counting how often other people play it.
Life loss that is not combat damage — each opponent loses life, repeatably
- Zulaport Cutthroat2 mana
- Leechridden Swamp0 mana
- Marionette Apprentice2 mana
- The Meathook Massacre2 mana
- Mirkwood Bats4 mana
- Ayara, First of Locthwain3 mana
- Bastion of Remembrance3 mana
- Bontu's Monument3 mana
Exile a permanent you control and return it — the button a value-ETB deck presses
- Conjurer's Closet5 mana
- Voyager Staff1 mana
- Golden Argosy4 mana
- Diabolic Servitude4 mana
- Eldrazi Confluence4 mana
- Ashnod's Intervention1 mana
A permanent of the exact NON-creature type the commander counts — artifacts for an artifact commander, enchantments for an enchantress
- Chrome Mox0 mana
- Everflowing Chalice0 mana
- Lotus Petal0 mana
- Mox Amber0 mana
- Mox Diamond0 mana
- Mox Opal0 mana
- Lion's Eye Diamond0 mana
- Ornithopter0 mana
Creatures you are happy to sacrifice — a free sac outlet on the commander is worthless with nothing to feed it
- Nurgle's Rot1 mana
- Aclazotz, Deepest Betrayal // Temple of the Dead5 mana
- Phyrexian Triniform9 mana
- Exquisite Huntmaster4 mana
- Grixis Slavedriver6 mana
- Liliana, Heretical Healer // Liliana, Defiant Necromancer3 mana
- Hangarback Walker0 mana
- Enduring Tenacity4 mana
A permanent whose value is in its enter-the-battlefield trigger — the payload a blink deck reuses
- Orcish Bowmasters2 mana
- Accursed Marauder2 mana
- Solemn Simulacrum4 mana
- Cauldron Familiar1 mana
- Fleshbag Marauder3 mana
- Plaguecrafter3 mana
- Gray Merchant of Asphodel5 mana
- Burglar Rat2 mana
Put your own cards into your graveyard as a resource
- Takenuma, Abandoned Mire0 mana
- Stitcher's Supplier1 mana
- Ripples of Undeath2 mana
- Eden, Seat of the Sanctum0 mana
- Tomb Fortress0 mana
- Millikin2 mana
- Perpetual Timepiece2 mana
- Syr Konrad, the Grim5 mana
Actually remove one problem permanent — preventing its damage is not removing it
- Defile1 mana
- Tragic Slip1 mana
- Infernal Grasp2 mana
- Fatal Push1 mana
- Bitter Triumph2 mana
- Black Sun's Twilight1 mana
- Cut Down1 mana
- Erebos's Intervention1 mana
Find the exact card the plan needs
- Entomb1 mana
- Demonic Tutor2 mana
- Diabolic Intent2 mana
- Vampiric Tutor1 mana
- Imperial Seal1 mana
- Demonic Consultation1 mana
- Grim Tutor3 mana
- Tainted Pact2 mana
Answer a whole board at once
- Toxic Deluge3 mana
- Damnation4 mana
- Bontu's Last Reckoning3 mana
- Sickening Dreams2 mana
- Crypt Rats3 mana
- Extinction Event4 mana
- Endemic Plague4 mana
- The Meathook Massacre2 mana
Build this deck in the Arcane Forge →
Arcane Foundry is free to join and every tool is included: the Arcane Forge deck builder, the ARCANE Analyzer that scores a deck by simulating games rather than counting staples, a card scanner, a collection vault, and live webcam Commander tables.
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