Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker | art by Kenta Ishikawa
Combos decks are among the most interesting in Magic. Not everybody loves them, but seeing an interesting game plan win through a different method than you typically see is a lot of fun. Some decks dedicate themselves to engine combos, while others rely on assembling two- or three-card combos that win on the spot.
In the world of infinite loops, few cards are more iconic than Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker. The creature of a thousand combos, Kiki-Jiki goes infinite with pretty much anything that can flicker or untap a creature. With so many options, deciding which combo pieces to include is daunting, so let's look at the best.
What Are Kiki-Jiki Combos?
Dockside Extortionist | Illustration by Lie Setiawan
Kiki-Jiki combos refer to infinite loops utilizing Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker. These often win on the spot and involve cards that either untap or flicker the namesake card. Popular examples of cards that Kiki-Jiki combos with include Restoration Angel and Pestermite.
There are also plenty of combos similar to Kiki-Jiki combo that involve infinite flickering. I’ve included several of those combos in addition to those that work with Kiki-Jiki. There’s often a fair bit of overlap, so you can use these combos to supplement your Kiki-Jiki deck. That redundancy is especially welcome in Commander as a singleton format.
When ranking the combos, there are a few things to consider. To start, how many pieces does the combo have? Two-card combos are the strongest since they’re much more consistent than one requiring three or more combos. How quickly the combos win is also important; many win on the spot with an army of hasty tokens, but others require extra time.
Redundancy is another important consideration, which comes in two forms. Firstly, redundancy in combo pieces is important. Combos that use Goblin Bombardment as a sacrifice outlet often have a lot of redundancy in finding other free sacrifice outlets, like Ashnod's Altar and Altar of Dementia. This makes those combos more consistent because instead of drawing one specific card, you’re looking to draw multiple variations of the effect.
Redundancy as an alternative combo piece is also important. For example, Combat Celebrant is a card that goes infinite with Kiki-Jiki but works in other combos as well, making the deck less reliant on Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker and thus less susceptible to hate.
Finally, the utility of the combo pieces outside the combo matters. Cards that only win the game can be weak if they don’t help you combo off. The reason Dockside Extortionist is such a powerful combo card is because making ten Treasures is great, even if you’re not aiming to go infinite. The more utility each individual card piece has, the better the combo performs.
#30. Spark Double + Aminatou, the Fateshifter
For this combo, you need Aminatou, the Fateshifter in play. Cast Spark Double, making it a non-legendary copy of Aminatou, then use the copy’s -1 ability to flicker the original. Then use the original’s ability to flicker the copy, repeating to get infinite permanents entering the battlefield. The greatest weakness here is that it doesn’t advance the board meaningfully. You need an additional piece, like Altar of the Brood, to turn this into a win, making it effectively a three-card combo.
#29. Mutate Creatures
This combo works with Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker and any non-legendary mutate creature like Everquill Phoenix. You need to mutate your chosen creature on top of Kiki-Jiki, making the mutate creature the top card. It can then target itself with Kiki-Jiki’s ability since it doesn’t specify another. The biggest drawbacks are that this creates infinite tapped creatures, so you need to wait a turn cycle for the win and you need to put mutate creatures in your deck.
#28. Coercive Recruiter + Dockside Extortionist + Reflection of Kiki-Jiki
This combo requires all three creatures in play and that your opponents control at least one artifact or enchantment. Use Reflection of Kiki-Jiki to make a copy of Dockside Extortionist, triggering Dockside and Coercive Recruiter. Recruiter untaps the Reflection while Dockside makes at least one Treasure to activate it again. The weakness here is needing to wait for Fable of the Mirror Breaker to flip; it takes at least 4 turns to make this work, making it slow, if effective.
#27. Felidar Guardian + Aminatou, the Fateshifter
For this combo, use Aminatou, the Fateshifter to flicker Felidar Guardian, which flickers Aminatou to keep the loop going. While similar to the Spark Double combo, this has a few extra uses. Cards like Corpse Knight and Soul Warden provide more ways to win since you have a creature entering the battlefield, and Felidar Guardian is just a better combo piece than Spark Double.
#26. Felidar Guardian + Restoration Angel
Another way to get two creatures flickering each other infinitely is with Felidar Guardian and Restoration Angel taking turns targeting each other with their ETBs. This combo gets spicy once you throw a Panharmonicon into the mix; two additional triggers let you make infinite mana by flickering a land with Felidar and get infinite triggers from any creature you control. I’m partial to Spirited Companion and other ways to draw your deck.
#25. Spark Double
For this combo, you’ll need to control Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker and have Spark Double come into play as a non-legendary copy. The original Kiki-Jiki can make a copy of the non-legendary Kiki-Jiki, which can make a copy of itself, and so on. The main weakness here is, again, tapped tokens. You need to use this on the end step before your turn, giving the table plenty of time to find an answer.
#24. Conspicuous Snoop
Conspicuous Snoop gives you another way to make infinite tapped tokens… assuming Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker is your top card. That’s fairly easy to set up with tutors like Worldly Tutor or Vampiric Tutor. One interesting way to leverage this is using the Snoop as a backup Kiki-Jiki; you can tutor it to the top of your library and try comboing with itself or another combo piece, forcing your opponent to answer the Snoop and leaving you with a Kiki-Jiki next turn.
#23. Kiora’s Follower or Fatestitcher
While making infinite tapped tokens isn’t as effective as you’d like, Kiora's Follower is the best means to doing so. Kiora's Follower is just a great card as a mana dork that interacts with mana rocks like Mana Vault and pitches to Force of Will. It's a prime example of a combo piece with utility beyond the infinite loop. Other untappers, like Fatestitcher, fit here as well, but Kiora's Follower is hands-down the best of the bunch.
#22. Worldgorger Dragon
Utilizing Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker alongside Worldgorger Dragon is a great way to generate infinite mana. With Kiki-Jiki in play, you need to cast Worldgorger, then tap all your lands and make a copy of Worldgorger Dragon. The copy exiles all your permanents, including the nontoken copy, before the original Worldgorger trigger resolves. Once it does, the first trigger exiles the copy, returning all your permanents to play and allowing you to repeat the loop. You’ll need some way to spend the mana at instant speed, like Comet Storm or Bhaal's Invoker.
#21. Vivien on the Hunt Assembly
The Vivien on the Hunt combo is more of a means of assembling Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker + Felidar Guardian, but it’s worth examining. All you need in play is Vivien and any 3-mana creature, with the two combo cards and Karmic Guide in your library. The steps are:
- +1 Vivien, sacrificing your three-creature to find Felidar Guardian.
- Felidar flickers Vivien, allowing you to activate the planeswalker again. Sacrifice Felidar to find Karmic Guide.
- Karmic Guide returns Felidar to play, flickering Vivien. +1 Vivien to sacrifice Felidar and put Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker into play.
- Use Kiki-Jiki to copy Karmic Guide, returning Felidar to play. This time, Felidar flickers Kiki-Jiki, and you can combo off.
This requires a lot of specific cards, but it can be a great way to power out your combo when nobody expects a win. The biggest weakness is that drawing one piece can fumble the entire combo, so make sure you have enough utility creatures that Vivien on the Hunt’s Birthing Pod ability has value outside the combo.
#20. Goblin Bombardment + Lightning Crafter
This combo requires Kiki-Jiki and Goblin Bombardment in play, with Lightning Crafter in hand. Cast the Crafter, targeting Kiki-Jiki with the champion trigger. Before it resolves, tap Kiki-Jiki to make a copy of Lightning Crafter. Exile Kiki-Jiki with the token copy’s champion trigger, tap it to deal 3 damage, then sacrifice it to Goblin Bombardment. This returns Kiki-Jiki to play, allowing it to make another Lightning Crafter copy. All this happens before the original champion trigger resolves. This combo offers direct lethality through damage instead of requiring your creature to attack, which is great against cards like Ghostly Prison that stop you from attacking with infinite creatures. You can also build plenty of redundancy, as Goblin Bombardment can be replaced with any free sacrifice outlet.
#19. Skirk Prospector + Thornbite Staff
For this combo, you need all three cards in play, and for Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker to have Thornbite Staff equipped. Use Kiki-Jiki to make a copy of Skirk Prospector, then sacrifice the token to produce . This untaps Kiki-Jiki for an easy route to infinite mana. Red has plenty of ways to use infinite red mana for a win, but a multicolor deck could use infinite death triggers with Blood Artist and similar effects.
#18. Great Oak Guardian
Great Oak Guardian is a little expensive, but having flash makes it quite interesting as a win condition. If making infinite creatures and attacking with them all doesn’t work because of effects like Crawlspace, you have the option of attacking and then making all your creatures infinitely large after blocks.
#17. Helm of the Host
For this combo, you need Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker in play equipped with Helm of the Host. At the beginning of combat, Helm makes a non-legendary copy of Kiki-Jiki. The original can then copy the copy to make infinite tapped tokens. Tapped infinite tokens are still weak, but I like this combo for two reasons: One, Helm of the Host provides plenty of combo redundancy for additional infinites, and two, this combo leaves you with extra copies of Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker for future combo turns.
#16. Drumbellower or Village Bell-Ringer
For this combo, use Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker to copy Drumbellower or Village Bell-Ringer to untap all your creatures. In addition to infinite creatures, a mana dork results in infinite mana. The biggest drawback here is that white already has a lot of great combo options to pair with Kiki-Jiki, making these feel unnecessarily redundant.
#15. Hyrax Tower Scout or Corridor Monitor
Hyrax Tower Scout + Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker is your quintessential Kiki-Jiki combo that floods the board with infinite tokens. The main problem is that these cards are largely ineffective on their own. Corridor Monitor can interact with cards like Mana Vault and Grim Monolith, but you’re only interested in drawing these when you’re ready to win. Of course, this combo is worth respecting as it wins on the spot.
#14. Dockside Extortionist + Staff of Domination
For this combo, you need Dockside Extortionist to be able to produce at least five Treasure tokens on ETB and to have Kiki-Jiki and Staff of Domination in play. Use Kiki-Jiki to make a copy of Dockside, creating five Treasure. Then, use four of those Treasures to untap Kiki-Jiki and the Staff, repeating the loop and netting a Treasure each time. You can then draw your entire deck. If Dockside makes only four Treasures you can win with infinite hasty Docksides, but where’s the fun in that?
#13. Saheeli Rai + Felidar Guardian
The copycat combo that besieged Standard can win as early as turn 3 with some fast mana. With Saheeli Rai in play, cast Felidar Guardian. When it comes into play, flicker Saheeli, then use its second ability to make a hasty copy of Felidar. The copy flickers Saheeli again, letting you rinse and repeat. This is efficient, with Saheeli curving into Felidar, and it’s a great bit of redundancy for a Jeskai deck already using Kiki-Felidar.
#12. Karmic Guide + Goblin Bombardment
You need all three cards in play for this combo. Activate Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker targeting Karmic Guide, then sacrifice Kiki-Jiki to Goblin Bombardment’s trigger in response. Kiki-Jiki’s trigger resolves, making a copy of Karmic Guide that returns the goblin to play. You can rinse and repeat for infinite damage. The strength of this combo comes from Karmic Guide being useful for other combos, and the flexibility of the sacrifice outlet. You can use Phyrexian Altar to generate infinite mana or Altar of Dementia as an alternate win condition, giving this combo a lot of utility and redundancy.
#11. Port Razer
Port Razer and Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker wins quite simply by untapping Kiki-Jiki at the beginning of the infinite combats we’ll be taking. There’s nothing flashy here, and it wins the game as well as anything in the top ten. I like the additional utility of other combo pieces better.
#10. Felidar Guardian or Restoration Angel
Felidar Guardian or Restoration Angel flicker Kiki-Jiki to generate infinite tokens. There’s another combo here with both these pieces. I certainly prefer Felidar Guardian because it’s a distinctly unfair card with plenty of alternative combos, but Resto providing protection for Kiki-Jiki is quite nice.
For this combo, you need Deadeye Navigator to be soulbonded with either Peregrine Drake or Dockside Extortionist (Dockside needs to make at least three Treasures). Use Navigator’s ability to flicker them and generate infinite mana. Rather like Kiki-Jiki, Deadeye Navigator is the kind of card that combos with a little bit of everything. This simple combo utilizes other creatures that combo well with other parts, building a web of combos throughout your deck.
#8. Pestermite or Deceiver Exarch
Pestermite and Deceiver Exarch are better known for another combo, but they work fantastically with Kiki-Jiki. If you have mana rocks like Gilded Lotus and Sol Ring, you can use the untap ability to win out of nowhere or tap an opponent’s lands to deny them mana to answer your combo with. There’s a lot of flexibility with these two creatures that make them invaluable.
#7. Coercive Recruiter
Another way to simply win, Coercive Recruiter does the deed when Kiki-Jiki copies it. A fun quirk is that you can copy any pirate with Kiki-Jiki’s ability to get infinite untaps. This creates infinite mana with Dockside Extortionist or direct damage with Lightning-Rig Crew, which are useful alternatives to get around effects that prevent attacks.
#6. Eternal Witness + Time Warp
One of the few loops that doesn’t occur in a single turn, you’ll cast Time Warp with Eternal Witness and Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker in play. You can then copy Eternal Witness to return Time Warp to your hand and repeat on your next turn for infinite turns. Taking infinite turns is a great way to dig for your other combos. There’s also an amazing amount of redundancy. Any extra turn spell that doesn’t exile itself works, as does any creature that returns a card or sorcery to your hand. You can play three versions of each without breaking a sweat, and they’re all just good cards, both of which help this three-card combo shine.
#5. Intruder Alarm
Intruder Alarm requires another creature to go infinite with Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker, but that’s where the fun starts. Kiki-Jiki gets untapped after copying any creature. Something with power wins on the spot, but you can get spicy here. Birds of Paradise and other mana dorks make infinite mana, cards like Cloudkin Seer draw your deck, and Inferno Titan just wins on a million different axis.
Another way to take infinite turns, you’ll make a copy of Timestream Navigator with Kiki-Jiki, then activate the token copy’s ability. Getting the city’s blessing is a breeze, and this is a fantastically compact combo that requires very little mana once both creatures are in play.
#3. Zealous Conscripts
Of all the 5-mana combo pieces, Zealous Conscripts is my favorite. This card does a lot of work on its own, especially if you find yourself in an aggressive deck. Alongside sacrifice outlets (many of which have alternative Kiki-Jiki combos), this is a removal spell. In the face of planeswalkers, it’s often a devastating two-for-one. It just has far more utility than alternatives like Port Razer and Coercive Recruiter.
#2. Splinter Twin + Pestermite or Deceiver Exarch
Despite being a list of Kiki-Jiki combos, the combination of Splinter Twin with Pestermite or Deceiver Exarch is by far the most iconic combo on this list, and it’s as powerful as ever. It’s much cheaper than the Kiki-Jiki combo and can easily win on turn 4, especially if you can back it up with interaction like Force of Will or Deflecting Swat. A simple, clean win utilizing already powerful cards? What more could you want?
#1. Combat Celebrant
Combat Celebrant is the cheapest two-card combo with Kiki-Jiki. Spending 8 mana on both pieces is a lot, but far more feasible than nine or ten or other options, letting you win from nowhere. You don’t need any extra colors either, and Combat Celebrant works as a combo piece with enough other spells that it still functions, even if you don’t have Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker. This card plus Kiki-Jiki doesn’t just win but sets the stage for plenty of combos throughout your deck.
How Do You Stop Kiki-Jiki Combos?
You have lots of tools to stop Kiki-Jiki combos. The first place to look is instant-speed interaction. Using counterspells to stop the pieces from resolving is ideal, but spot removal works as well. The best time to deploy it is after Kiki-Jiki has been activated.
To demonstrate: Your opponent controls Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker, and Pestermite. They activate Kiki-Jiki, targeting Pestermite. In response to Kiki-Jiki’s ability, cast your removal targeting Kiki-Jiki. Kiki-Jiki dies, and then your opponent creates their Pestermite token.
The timing and targeting are important. If you cast your removal before your opponent activates Kiki-Jiki, they’ll combo in response. If you kill the Pestermite, the ability fizzles since its target has been removed. But leaving an opponent with Kiki-Jiki in play is far more dangerous than Pestermite or whatever they were attempting to combo with.
Another method of attacking Kiki-Jiki combos is with stax pieces. Torpor Orb and Pithing Needle end the entire operation. Most Kiki-Jiki combos also fall apart against Torpor Orb effects. Rampaging Ferocidon and Harsh Mentor are options that shut down Kiki-Jiki combos as well as many loops trying to use creatures like Dockside Extortionist and Deadeye Navigator.
Wrap Up
Timestream Navigator | Illustration by Zezhou Chen
Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker is one of Magic’s most iconic combo pieces. It’s a blatantly unfair card with incredible potential. Every time I’ve put it into an EDH deck, I’ve found an extra combo.
With such power and utility, Kiki-Jiki is often worth building an entire deck around. Even if you want to play it “fairly” without infinites, it offers immense value. What’s your favorite Kiki-Jiki combo? Do you like combos in casual EDH? Let me know in the comments or on the Draftsim Discord!
Stay safe, and keep breaking mirrors!
Follow Draftsim for awesome articles and set updates:
Add Comment