Tomer's Deck Updates: Commander Legends
Every time a set is released with a bunch of new cards, I wait a month or so until prices go down and then I do a round of updates to all my personal paper decks. Here is the Commander Legends update for all my current decks, including some brand new decks added to my arsenal:
New Deck: Toshiro Umezawa!
Toshiro Umezawa is the first of the new decks added to my personal collection in a very short span of time. I've written a primer on Toshiro in the past and more recently showcased him on an Abridged Gameplay episode, and my paper list is based on the one I played on stream.
Toshiro is a unique and powerful oldschool commander that lets you cast instant spells from your graveyard whenever opposing creatures die, essentially doubling the value of your instant spells. The deck is essentially Mono Black Control with a Spellslinger twist, running a ton of instants and controlling the board with removal spells like Snuff Out, Liliana's Triumph, and Force of Despair, drawing cards with Dark Bargain, Necrologia, and Wretched Confluence, generating a ton of mana with cards like Crypt Ghast, Cabal Coffers, and Nirkana Revenant, and eventually winning the game by stealing opposing creatures with Thrilling Encore or a giant X spell like Exsanguinate or Torment of Hailfire.
My deck is definitely a work in progress as it's freshly assembled and I haven't been in a rush to buy a bunch of cards that I didn't already own. I still want to add a Thespian's Stage and maaaybe Vesuva to copy Cabal Coffers.
CMR Update
As for Commander Legends, I jumped on two cards: War Room is a great utility land in the deck, perfect in a Draw-Go like this one and though it taps for colorless it's a lot less painful than Castle Locthwain. I'm also happy for a reprint of Thought Vessel, a premium 2cmc mana rock that is now only $2.
One of the best tutors in the format, Vampiric Tutor, got a much-needed reprint and it's even better in Toshiro since it's instant. However, $50 is still too much for me so I'm holding off for now. Opposition Agent is another fantastic inclusion in the deck but I'm reluctant to pay $20 for it.
| In | Out |
| War Room | Swamp |
| Thought Vessel | Charcoal Diamond |
New Deck: Purphoros, Bronze-Blooded!
From the ashes of my dismantled Xenagos, God of Revels deck emerged two new brews: my Gargos, Vicious Warden deck inherited a bunch of the Green cards, while my Red cards eventually became this Purphoros, Bronze-Blooded list. Just like the Toshiro deck, I wrote a primer on Purphoros and more recently did an Abridged Gameplay video that I enjoyed so much that I ended up finishing my paper deck. My personal version is based on the one I played on stream but with a heavier emphasis on Dragon Tribal because I just so happened to have all the dragons that I wanted in my collection.
Purphoros is a Mono Red Stompy deck that uses the commander to fling huge hastey beaters at our opponents faces. Some of our beatsticks blow up stuff, like Balefire Dragon, Drakuseth, Maw of Flames, and Steel Hellkite, others refill our hand like Sandstone Oracle, Knollspine Dragon, and Dragon Mage, and some specialize in just murdering our opponents, like Terror of Mount Velus, Lathliss, Dragon Queen, and Angrath's Marauders. The deck is super explosive and aggressive. I love it!
CMR Update
There are a lot of interesting upgrades from CMR but the one that excites me the most has to be Port Razer: taking up to three extra combats per turn is insane! Purphoros gives it haste, and while it does need a clear path to hit a player, so many of my creatures come with creature removal that I don't think it'll be a problem getting max value out of Razer. I'm happy to pick up another War Room and Thought Vessel in this deck as well, and I'm interested in playtesting Bladegriff Prototype as extra removal and Alena, Kessig Trapper as unconventional ramp. I've been very unimpressed with Phyrexian Triniform so I'm leaving it out.
| In | Out |
| Port Razer | Ilharg, the Raze-Boar |
| Alena, Kessig Trapper | Golden Guardian |
| Bladegriff Prototype | Mogg Salvage |
| Thought Vessel | Guardian Idol |
| War Room | Mountain |
New Deck: Chandrafriends!
What started as a meme Abridged Gameplay video about jamming all Commander-legal Chandra planeswalkers into the same deck ended up being surprisingly powerful and fun to play! Seriously, check out the video, I honestly couldn't believe how functional this pile of Chandras ended up being! I liked the deck so much that, you guessed it, I built a paper version. Now this deck is way pricier than something I'd usually build, but I had most of the expensive cards already so I just bought the remaining Chandras that I needed and I was pretty much done.
This is a Chandra Superfriends deck. It runs every single version of Chandra that is legal in Commander, plus a bunch of other planeswalkers for good measure. Heck, even Tibalt, the Fiend-Blooded is here, because I wanted to show off my white-borded version of it. The idea is to ramp out our planeswalkers as quickly as possible, ticking them up while controlling the board. We have a lot of great planeswalker support like Chandra's Regulator, Rings of Brighthearth, and The Chain Veil. Most of our Chandras burn stuff, so we make them burn hotter with cards like Fiery Emancipation, Chandra's Incinerator, and Torbran, Thane of Red Fell. We win by burning out our opponents. This is basically the Burn version of Superfriends.
CMR Update
The biggest thing CMR brings to the deck is that sweet Rings of Brighthearth reprint, which slashed the price of a once $70 card down to just $8. Other spice includes Wheel of Misfortune for card draw, Jeska's Will for ramp and draw, Thought Vessel for ramp and War Room as extra draw.
| In | Out |
| Rings of Brighthearth | Repeated Reverberation |
| Jeska's Will | Seething Song |
$50 Gargos
While the vast majority of Gargos, Vicious Watcher decks focus on the commander's mana discount to build a Hydra Tribal deck, I found that the commander is far more powerful if you ignore that and focus on its incredible fight trigger, which I've covered in my Budget Gargos article. The idea is to use mana-efficient targeted spells like Warriors' Lesson and Invigorate to trigger Gargos, nom-nom'ing all opposing creatures while smashing in with your 8/7 commander. It's essentially a Mono Green Control deck, locking out your opponents from keeping creatures on the battlefield as you quickly KO them with commander damage. Since all the key cards are dirt cheap the deck ends up dominating even on an extremely low budget. I was honestly surprised as to how effective the strategy can be, considering it revolves around a 6cmc commander with no inherent protection, but Green's amazing ramp (Karametra's Acolyte) and protection (Vines of Vastwood) makes the deck way too consistent, and it's ended up being one of my most powerful decks despite being my cheapest.
I've set a personal goal of keeping this Gargos deck under $50. Every time I update the deck, I make adjustments not just to upgrade it, but to also lower the price if it's gone over the limit.
CMR Update
No new CMR cards caught my eye for Gargos, but I'm happy to see a reprint of Fyndhorn Elves! This card was cut from a previous build as its price crept up, but the CMR reprint at common has tanked the price back down so I can re-add it.
| In | Out |
| Fyndhorn Elves | Elvish Pioneer |
$50 Siona
Siona, Captain of the Pyleas is my strongest dollar for dollar deck. Just like Gargos, I challenge myself by keeping Siona at just $50 and trying to make it the most optimized possible at that price point, though I do have a sideboard to boost its power with more expensive cards if I'm playing at a higher power table.
Siona is a Combo deck, looking to generate infinite Soldier tokens thanks to the primary combo Siona, Captain of the Pyleas + Shielded by Faith or the secondary combo Siona, Captain of the Pyleas + Reins of the Vinesteed + either Altar of Dementia or Blasting Station for infinite damage / mill. These combos are uniquely suited to a low budget because one part of our combo is in our command zone and the other is an aura which can easily be tutored up by a bunch of budget-friendly cards: Heliod's Pilgrim, Auratouched Mage, Boonweaver Giant, Open the Armory, Three Dreams, and Pattern of Rebirth. Our combo can be assembled very quickly and consistently even at a low budget. But even without our insta-win combos, the rest of the deck is a powerful well-rounded Enchantress / Aura deck that can win via a token army (Archon of Sun's Grace) or even single creature beatdown (Ancestral Mask). I've written about the deck, played it on Commander Clash, and most recently covered it with abridged gameplay.
CMR Update
The good news is that a bunch of cards that I was already running have been reprinted in CMR, like Open the Armory and Winds of Rath, preventing the overall price from creeping over $50. The bad news is there's nothing new to pick up, so no changes this time.
Budget(ish) Niv-Mizzet / Tibor & Lumia
Niv-Mizzet will always hold a special place in my heart. When I first got into Commander (2011) I was enamored with Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind. I loved everything about the card: drawing cards to deal damage was right up my ally, I love dragons, and I especially love the Izzet guild, both in terms of aesthetics and mechanics. But I never built a Niv-Mizzet deck because my group already had a Niv player and I didn't want to overlap my commander choice with someone else.
Fast forward many years later and we get Niv-Mizzet, Parun. This one is basically a straight upgrade to the original version, enabling the same combos but also safe from countermagic and draws cards off instants/sorceries. What's not to love? So I jumped on this version, writing a primer on it.
This is a pretty straightforward Combo deck: Niv-Mizzet, Parun + Curiosity / Tandem Lookout / Ophidian Eye is infinite damage and infinite draw. Our secondary combo is Isochron Scepter imprinting Dramatic Reversal plus mana rocks that tap for at least 2 mana for infinite mana and infinite instant casts, which again is infinite damage/draw with Niv-Mizzet, Parun. Easy peasy win. The rest of the deck is a Spellslinger list full of card draw and removal, plus secondary win conditions like a giant army from Talrand, Sky Summoner and The Locust God.
CMR Update
There are a few goodies that I could pick up from CMR but likely won't for various reasons:
- Hullbreacher is an extremely powerful card made even more powerful in a deck with wheels like this one. Casting Windfall with Hullbreacher on the battlefield wipes out all opposing hands while netting a ton of treasure. But this play is too mean for my deck, and in fact I was planning to take out Narset, Parter of Veils for the same reason.
- Jeweled Lotus is fantastic in this deck. It pays for half the cost of Niv-Mizzet, Parun, the most important card in the deck. Not only can this enable a Niv-Mizzet three turns earlier, but it could even let me cast Niv plus have countermagic backup if I draw it later in the game. However, I don't really care to power up my deck that much, and certainly don't feel like spending $72 to do so.
- Mana Drain's reprint has significantly lowered the price of the card, but $60 is still too high for me to justify it.
However, there are a few cards that I will be picking up:
- Training Center is a sweet new staple land for any UR deck. Having a copy is great and I'll always use it in any UR deck I make.
- Thought Vessel doesn't tap U/R, which is a big deal in a deck whose most important card costs UUURRR, but its effect is powerful and it enters untapped.
- Wheel of Misfortune is interesting. I think it's worse than Windfall and (obviously) Wheel of Fortune, but it seems like a solid third wheel.
| In | Out |
| Wheel of Misfortune | Narset, Parter of Veils |
| Thought Vessel | Fire Diamond |
| Training Center | Mountain |
Tibor & Lumia Swap
My Izzet deck also has a Tibor and Lumia sideboard package which swaps out Niv-Mizzet's combo pieces and puts Niv-Mizzet, Parun into the 99, swapping in Tibor and Lumia as the commander and a couple of T&L staples instead. I make this swap if I'm playing in a lower power playgroup or I just feel like playing a different style of Izzet Spellslinger. Just a few quick swaps makes the deck feel totally different to play while avoiding the hassle of building a brand new deck.
| In | Out |
|---|---|
|
Niv-Mizzet, Parun (into 99) |
|
| Wonder | Ral, Storm Conduit |
Evil Zedruu
Zedruu the Greathearted is the very first Commander deck I've ever owned. I bought the Political Puppets precon back in 2011 and have been tinkering with the deck ever since. Zedruu was love at first sight for me, stirring up nostalgic glee of when I was a little kid sleeving up a proxy version of a deck called Trix, a Standard all-star back in ancient times that revolved around Donate'ing Illusions of Grandeur to your opponent and winning when they can no longer pay the cumulative upkeep and lose 20 life.
My Zedruu deck has gone through so many different iterations throughout the years. It started as a traditional Donate deck, then was a Lifegain deck, an Enduring Ideal combo deck, Coin Flip, even briefly Goat Tribal, but I always came back to that original design of just giving away bad stuff to my opponents while stealing their good stuff. We give away our permanents with Zedruu the Greathearted or we swap them for better stuff with cards like Puca's Mischief, Role Reversal, and Sudden Substitution. The permanents we give away are either mean, like Illusions of Grandeur and Pyromancer's Swath, or neutral, like Akroan Horse and Vedalken Plotter. We can even get back the permanents we've traded with cards like Homeward Path, Leave // Chance, Venser, the Sojourner, and Brand.
The deck wins the game by stealing our opponents' best threats, overwhelming the board with a token army, or most stylishly by casting Fractured Identity on Nine Lives and respond to its leave the battlefield trigger by casting Patrician's Scorn, killing our opponents before we would lose the game.
CMR Update
It's bling Zedruu time! Foil etched Zedruu! My girl is so SHINY!
Other than that, there's not much in CMR I'm interested in for Zedruu. Wrong Turn is an obviously sweet choice, but my deck is already loaded with ways to move around opposing creatures that work better with Zedruu's ability. It's worth trying out but I'm not convinced I need it. Training Center and Spectator Seating are both solid options too though I'm not in a hurry to upgrade the lands. Maybe Sphinx of the Second Sun as a ridiculous win-more for double Zedruu triggers? I dunno. Shiny Zedruu is what I care about!
| In | Out |
|---|---|
| SHINY Zedruu! | Not Shiny Zedruu |
| Training Center | Sulfur Falls |
| Spectator Seating | Clifftop Retreat |
Tribal Tribal
Tribal decks are built around a single tribe. But what if we built a deck that was all tribes at once? This was the challenge I set for myself when building Everything Tribal aka Tribal Tribal: the idea is that by using changelings (ex. Universal Automaton) which are all creature types at all times, we can mix and match any tribal support cards together to create incredibly unique and interesting decks. The end result is the Budget Commander article that I'm most proud of creating. I spent so many hours researching all the tribal support cards out there, figuring out my preferred ratio of changelings to tribal payoffs, and finding which tribal mixes work best to create a cohesive game plan. It took a lot of time and effort but I think it was worth it.
In the article I highlighted two different builds of Tribal Tribal. The first is a deck built around tap/untap shenanigans, using powerful tap abilities like Gilt-Leaf Archdruid and Lin Sivvi, Defiant Hero and untapping them with cards like Myr Galvanizer and Merrow Commerce for extra value. The second is a Combat Trigger deck, looking to give your attackers evasion (Cloudshredder Sliver) and double strike (Sylvia Brightspear) and then rewarding combat damage with cards like Yuriko, the Tiger's Shadow and Notorious Throng.
My personal list is an updated Combat Trigger version. The deck has grown more powerful over time, swapping Morophon, the Boundless into the 99 and replacing it with The Ur-Dragon, whose eminence ability means all our changelings cost 1 less to cast. On top of winning through combat damage we've also got a powerful recursion engine with Haakon, Stromgald Scourge which lets us cast our changelings / Knights from the graveyard but more importantly our changeling tribal instants like Crib Swap or give our creatures infinite power with Blades of Velis Vel + Morophon, the Boundless. There's also infinite token combo with Turntimber Ranger + Arcane Adaptation naming Ally, or winning on our upkeep with Liliana's Contract.
The deck can pull off incredibly powerful and flashy turns. However, it's also inconsistent, which is by design. I found that I could make the deck way more consistent by adding a bunch more tutors and focusing on a specific tribe and combo -- cough cough Slivers cough -- but that defeats the purpose of building this style of deck. By keeping it less focused and not leaning too much on any specific tribe, it's weaker than my tuned budget brews but nonetheless it's my current favorite deck to play.
CMR Updates
CMR has a terrific gift for a deck led by The Ur-Dragon: Hellkite Courser! While the commander is used largely for its powerful eminence ability, casting him is also very strong, but the 9cmc is prohibitively high; about half my games I don't ever cast the commander, and usually when I do it's killed within the turn cycle. Courser lets us cheat our commander into play for a turn which is more than enough, plus since it's a Dragon it only costs 5 mana to cast! It's so so good and I can't wait to cast it!
Beyond that, CMR also brings a tribe that focuses on combat: Pirates. I'm a big fan of Malcolm, Keen-Eyed Navigator here for tribal ramp and Coercive Recruiter can clear out potential blockers while yoinking them for more damage, or Merchant Raiders to avoid retaliation. There's also a Three Visits reprint which is great in any deck with Forest dual lands like Murmuring Bosk.
I'm just testing Courser and Malcolm for now and may add the others later.
| In | Out |
|---|---|
| Hellkite Courser | Tazri, Beacon of Unity |
| Malcolm, Keen-Eyed Navigator | Gemhide Sliver |
6 CMC Tribal
Of all the decks in my arsenal, 6 CMC Tribal is the weirdest. It started as a meme deck for a meme week in Commander Clash, CMC Tribal, where each of us built a deck with each nonland card being the same cmc. While the rest of the crew stuck with low cmcs, I went big and dived into 6 cmc. The deck was swiftly crushed, but I was so intrigued with the concept that I went back to refine it, spending literally hours researching and optimizing 6 CMC Tribal, math'ing out the correct amount of lands, cyclers, ways to cheat on mana cost, and the best win conditions.
The end result was my 6 CMC Tribal article/video, which I feel is one of my best pieces of content. Despite the restriction, the deck is actively advancing its game plan right on turn 1. We're running a bunch of cycling cards and fetchlands to quickly fill out our graveyard with cards that will fuel various cards, like delving with Tasigur, the Golden Fang and ultimately culminating in one of our best win conditions, Twilight's Call, to make a game-winning army.
We also have a bunch of spells that we can cast for less than six mana. Cards like Avatar of Growth and Curtains' Call cost less based on the number of opponents, split cards like Reason // Believe can be cast either side for less mana, we have ways to cheat out multiple 6cmc spells with cards like Selvala's Stampede, etc. We even have cheeky ramp options like Myriad Landscape and Shefet Monitor to get us casting spells earlier than turn 6. Eventually we win with big beaters or Triskelion + Mikaeus, the Unhallowed combo.
It's a silly control deck and the weakest deck in my arsenal but I love it and love that people enjoy playing against it.
CMR Update
There's actually a few goodies for the 6 CMC deck in this set! The strongest by far is Kodama of the East Tree, letting us quickly dump our hand of 6CMC permanents / lands. As powerful as it is here this is probably the fariest use of Kodama you'll ever see. Feast of Succession is an excellent board wipe that won't kill most of our creatures. Rakshasa Debaser is a bit slow, but if we can get it into the graveyard to encore consistently it might be worth it.
| In | Out |
| Feast of Succession | Reign of the Pit |
| Kodama of the East Tree | Reason // Believe |
Semi-CEDH Edric
Edric, Spymaster of Trest is one of my oldest decks. Like most decks in my personal collection, Edric started as one of my budget articles that I ended up liking so much that I bought a copy for myself. The deck was under $50 when I bought it and the closest thing I've got to a true CEDH deck. I almost never play CEDH though and Edric is way too strong for my playgroups so I only bring out Edric for a game or two each year. So despite being one of my oldest decks, it's also my least-played deck, so I have little motivation to ever upgrade it.
CMR Updates
While I'm reluctant to update the deck, I'll be picking up a Rejuvenating Springs: it's a staple in all Simic decks and I'll use it elsewhere too. Other than that, Hullbreacher is probably a good choice in CEDH, as is Mana Drain, but I'm loathe to spend around $100 upgrading a deck I play so infrequently so I'm holding off for now.
| In | Out |
| Rejuvenating Springs | Island |
Coming Soon!
Those are all my fully assembled decks. Ironically, my Commander collection swelled during the year where I can't play much paper decks at all. However there are three more decks coming down the pipeline, slowly because holy crap I got enough already:
- Moonfolk Tribal based on my budget article.
- Selenia, Dark Angel based on my budget article.
- And of course, KALDRA, which I've finally decided to pull the trigger and build after Akiri, Fearless Voyager was released. I've made the poor financial decision to bling this deck out through so it's taking a while to assemble as I patiently pick up cards through trades and sales.
And that's all I got for now! Hope you enjoyed this peek into my personal collection. Thanks for reading and I'll be back with another update once Kaldheim is released!
