5 Innovative Dandân Variants Worth Seeking Out

Last updated on March 19, 2026

Dandân | Illustration by Drew Tucker

Magic has no shortage of obscure creatures, but few have risen to the heights of Dandân, popularized the efforts of Nick Floyd, who created a sub-format around Dandân that become so popular it recently got a Secret Lair printing, which attracted some of the worst people to ever touch trading cards—scalpers.

In short, Dandân—or Forgetful Fish—is a format where two players play from a shared deck that includes multiple copies of Dandân and Memory Lapse alongside top deck manipulation. It’s a challenging resource war complicated by 10 copies of Dandân being the only win condition. Floyd’s creation has spawned a slew of decks with similar ideas, like those below.

Ichorid

Ichorid | Illustration by Rk post

Deck Credit: LV MTG

Ichorid sticks close to the themes of Dandân with a single threat capable of winning: Ichorid, a horror from Torment that embodies the Live Fast/Die Young philosophy.

Created by LV MTG, the format moves faster than Dandân because players have lower life totals and Ichorid has haste. But it feels similar to Floyd’s format because it’s built around a color's core mechanic; Ichorid revels in black’s graveyard manipulation, from self-mill like Darkblast to graveyard hate like Fade from Memory.

Forgetful Ship

Phoenix Fleet Airship | Illustration by Thanh Tuan

Deck Credit: Tagazok2012

Forgetful Ship, created by redditor u/Tagazok2012, bears its inspiration on its sleeve but, like Ichorid, prefers the dark excesses of black to blue. Built around Phoenix Fleet Airship, this variant focuses on sacrifice synergies.

No Dandân format would be complete without card draw and removal, and Forgetful Ship lacks neither—it uses them to synergize with the Airsheep. Cards like Hellish Sideswipe and Deadly Dispute maximize the Airship’s ability to spawn token copies, which is vital considering it has no creatures to crew it. Painful Memories is particularly cute with the shared deck format.

Gingerbread

Food | Illustration by David Frasheski

Deck Credit: electricbaba

Rather than being built around a central card, Gingerbread uses Food and has a variety of special rules—for example, Food tokens are used to track life. The format was created by u/electricbaba.

Gingerbread focuses on racing to 20 Food or making your opponents lose all their Food. You share a library full of cards that create and consume Food, like Feasting Troll King and The Underworld Cookbook. Notably, this variant can be played with 2-4 players rather than just 2.

Green Dandân

Scrapshooter | Illustration by Chris Rayn

Deck credit: SomeTallShortGuy

Green Dandân is one of four Dandân variants created by u/SomeTallShortGuy that transplants the core creature + signature spell formula onto Magic’s other colors. This one features Scrapshooter and Storm Seeker.

This variant uses the gift on Scrapshooter to force your opponents to draw cards, with Storm Seeker punishing your opponents for the cards gifted or drawn via group hug cards like Otherworld Atlas and Rites of Flourishing. If nothing else, it’s fascinating to see a deck built around giving your opponents cards—typically one of the worst game actions you could take.

Top Deck

Thunderous Wrath | Illustration by Adam Paquette

Deck credit: Sarusta

Top Deck, developed by u/Sarusta, is the only as the only Dandân variant here without a creature wincon. Games are won by casting Thunderous Wrath for its miracle cost.

Top Deck feel closest to Dandân as it leverages blue’s top deck manipulation for Thunderous Wrath. They even share cards like Brainstorm and Memory Lapse. Perhaps the most exciting facet of this variant is the timing—you can cast Thunderous Wrath on your opponents’ turn with delayed draws from Mishra's Bauble and Portent.