Clattertron

[dc]I[/dc] wrote last week about building a Magic: The Gathering Commander deck (which led to some unintended spousal hilarity, as often does when Magic comes up). Because I’m falling back down this geek hole (…gross?) faster and faster by the day, here’s my Magic Commander deck (aka Elder Dragon Highlander or EDH or Reasons My Wife Wants to Hide My Wallet).

For those who don’t care about my current rabid case of 1990’s card game nostalgia, perhaps you would rather go read some comics?

Let’s move on, and prepare yourself for a lot of card game geek speak (…which is probably the name of a podcast somewhere. And if not, why not?)

Quick Reminder: the rules for building a Magic Commander deck are,

• Pick a legendary creature as your commander.
• Only include colors shared by your commander.
• Only one copy of a card, except for basic land.
• The deck size has to be 100 exactly (including your Commander), no more, no less.
• This is probably the Magic equivalent of writing Star Wars fanfic.
• Actually, fanfic based on my deck would be fun. Maybe? “Goblins. Why did it have to be goblins?” the Lord of Tresserhorn said as he gripped his axe.
  
• Don’t tell anyone about your Magic fanfic.

Fresh Blood

I bought one of the pre-built Commander decks, Sworn to Darkness, to jump-start my deck building—and to get some new cards. I haven’t bought any new Magic cards in 10 15 years, so some fresh blood never hurts.

I planned to build a Black heavy deck, and after researching the cards in Sworn to Darkness, I decided it was a good way to get started, and a good way to keep my wife wondering if I was hit on the head recently.

Black, Blue, and Red All Over

Lord of Tresserhorn is my commander. He’s a Blue, Black, Red legendary creature, who is 10/4 and can regenerate for one Black mana—and he only costs four mana (converted, in the vernacular of today): 1 Blue, 1 Black, 1 Red, and 1 colorless. There’s a trade-off though, when Lord of Tresserhorn enters play, I have to sacrifice two creatures, lose two life, and an opponent draws two cards.

Ouch. A tall order, but not impossible, especially given the large size of a Commander deck. A feature of Commander is your commander is always in the ‘command zone,’ and can be cast from there whenever you want. Unlike a traditional deck, I don’t have to wait to draw a copy of Lord of Tresserhorn: he’s always ready to join the party (assuming I have the three mana colors and two creatures to kill).

My goal for this deck: handle the costs of summoning Lord of Tresserhorn and have fun with a zombie/demon/vampire theme. I cannibalized the cards I wanted from Sworn to Darkness and tweaked as needed. This meant a few trips to the local gaming shops to look through boxes of commons and uncommons, but at least it got me out of the house…and quickly back inside. 

Purple Pain

Before I start, I need to mention this Commander/EDH deck building article on MTG Salvation as being a huge help. Building a deck for Commander is very different from standard play, and this article helped me reconsider my approach.

Coming back to Magic 15 years older means I’m a bit better at strategy and understanding deck building concepts. There’s a difference between a 19 year-old and a 34 year-old playing Magic. One should know better, and the other hopes his wife won’t make him sell his cards.

OK, here we go.

(* = cards I kept from the Sworn to Darkness deck)

Commander – Lord of Tresserhorn colors: Red, Black, Blue (The Big Zombie on Campus, the guy in charge, El Tresserino if you are in to the whole brevity thing.)

Black

Creature

Butcher of Malakir*

Carnophage

Crypt Ghast*

Demon of Wailing Agonies*

Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief*

Flesh Carver*

Ghostly Changeling

Ghoulcaller Gisa*

Ghoulrasier

Grave Titan*

Gravebane Zombie

Gravedigger

Gray Merchant of Asphodel*

Nekrataal*

Nightscape Apprentice

Liliana’s Reaver*

Overseer of the Damned*

Raving Dead*

Reassembling Skeleton

Shriekmaw*

Zombie Master

 

Enchantment

Blanket of Night

Breeding Pit

Sadistic Glee

 

Instant and Interrupt

Cruel Revival

Dark Banishing

Dark Ritual

Diabolic Edict

Feast or Famine

Malicious Affliction*

Slaughter

Terror

 

Sorcery

Black Sun Zenith*

Demonic Tutor

Diabolic Tutor

Disturbed Burial

Dregs of Sorrow*

Necromantic Selection*

Profane Command*

Victimize*

Zombie Apocalypse

Blue

Creature

Ertai, Wizard Adept (OK, he doesn’t really fit the zombie/demon/vampire theme, and might go. Or he’s just the Cousin Marilyn of this crew.)

 

Instant and Interrupt

Arcane Denial

Counterspell

 

Red

Creature

Orcish Settlers

 

Instant and Interrupt

Shattering Pulse

 

Sorcery
Disintegrate
Fireball
Rolling Thunder

 

Multi-Color

Creature

Siren of the Silent Song

Thraximundar

 

Artifact

Ashnod’s Altar

Chariot of Victory

Commander’s Sphere*

Erratic Portal

Izzet Keyrune

Jet Medallion*

Nuisance Engine

Obelisk of Grixis

Power Matrix

Sol Ring*

Sultai Banner

Tablet of the Guilds

Unstable Obelisk*

 

Land

Basic

Island x 6

Mountain x 5

Swamp x 16

 

Non-Basic

Bojuka Bog*

Cinder Marsh

City of Brass

Crypt of Agadeem*

Dragonskull Summit

Drowned Catacomb

Myriad Landscape*

Nephalia Drownyard

Thawing Glaciers

Unholy Grotto

Favorite Combos

• Blanket of Night makes all of my mana producing lands swamps (Islands, Mountains, even non-basic lands), and when I have Crypt Ghast out this means I can tap each for two Black mana. It also makes (I think) all of my opponents’ lands swamps, which lets all of my zombies use the swampwalk ability granted by Zombie Master–which also applies to Ghostly Changeling, technically a zombie, a creature I can “pump up” for more damage.
  
• Ghoulcaller Gisa’s ability lets me sacrifice a creature and gain 2/2 zombie tokens equal to the creature’s power. So long, Lord of Tresserhorn. Hello, ten 2/2 zombie tokens in a single turn. I could then run those tokens through Ashnod’s Altar for 20 colorless mana for a big ol’ Fireball or Orcish Settlers for massive land destruction. Or, use these zombie tokens to power up Flesh Carver (he gets two +1/+1 counters for each creature).
• Erratic Portal and/or Nightshade Apprentice and creatures with “enters play” trigger abilities (Ghoulraiser, Grave Titan Gravedigger, Gray Merchant of Asphodel, Nekrataal, Overseer of the Damned, or Shriekmaw).
• Chariot of Victory and/or Power Matrix with Lord of Tresserhorn or creatures with “deals combat damage to a player” abilities (Raving Dead, Demon of the Wailing Agonies, Liliana’s Reaver).

Strengths

• Overrunning an opponent with zombie tokens and big creatures.
• Creature removal.
• Creature resurrection.
• Land destruction (Orcish Settlers, which I can resurrect and use again thanks to other spells).
• Buyback and reusable cards (ex: Ertai, Wizard Adept’s counterspell ability, Reassembling Skeleton¹ and Gravebane Zombie can be sacrificed and used again).
• Redundancy (ex: Chariot of Victory and Power Matrix, Breeding Pit and Nuisance Engine, Ghoulraiser and Gravedigger, Erratic Portal and Nightshade Apprentice, Demonic Tutor and Diabolic Tutor, Counterspell and Arcane Denial).
  
• “Affect all” cards, a must in multiplayer (ex: Siren of the Silent Song, Gray Merchant of Asphodel).

Final Thoughts

This is a fun deck to play, especially when I get any of the combos listed above. The idea behind Commander is to have a fun, casual game with plenty of interaction. This deck hits those points, I think.

I may remove Orcish Settlers, as massive land destruction might negate the “casual, fun” idea of Commander. But, we’ll see. I honestly have yet to play this deck in an actual multiplayer game, so the real field test has not happened yet. This deck performed well one-on-one, but Commander is meant to be played with three or more players.

I’m sure I’ll change several of the cards again, and soon, especially after another visit to a 20 cent uncommons box.

–

¹ A slot and role filled by Mortus Strider until I found a Reassembling Skeleton in a singles box after writing the first draft of this post. The hunt continues!