Here's my second try at primer-writeage. This is a work in progress, and any thoughts are welcome! My last primer, Zedruu, was very much a community effort, and I hope this one can reach those heights as well. I've been playing this guy for a few months now with great success. Without further ado...
URGWho is Maelstrom Wanderer?URG
Maelstrom Wanderer is one of the five new commanders from the Planechase 2012 precons. Despite his "legendary" status, we haven't been given too much backstory to this monstrosity. We can speculate, however, that he was spawned from the Maelstrom of the plane of Alara, a churning vortex of mana where the five shards converged during the mending of the plane. From the mtgsalvation wiki:
"The Maelstrom is a chaotic storm of mana that was created in the Conflux, located at the point where the five Shards met. It was fueled by the war between those five worlds, a war that Nicol Bolas orchestrated. The elder dragon stepped into the center of the storm to regain his godlike powers of old, but was ultimately stopped by Ajani Goldmane."
No, really! It's as if you put Bloodbraid Elf in the copier, set it to "Commandersize", and Maelstrom Wanderer printed out. Lets break it down:
Mana Cost:5URG Maelstrom Wanderer is not a cheap commander. For 8 mana, you better get something that busts the game open in commander, and that's exactly what Maelstrom Wanderer does. Despite the steep cost, you can expect to cast the commander at least twice, maybe three times, over the course of a commander game, because of Maelstrom Wanderer's stellar color combo. URG is a fantastic combination in commander (our big Bloodbraid Elf has doubled in cost and added U into the mix). You get green ramp and blue draw to grease the wheels, and while red isn't an incredible color in commander, it gives us access to a wider variety of powerful cards than if we were straight UG. And, of course, the fatties are second to none.
Creature Type: Elemental
There are a number of cards that interact with the creature type Elemental. A friend of mine runs Horde of Notions, which allows you to CAST Maelstrom Wanderer from a graveyard, so you get the cascade effects. But, there isn't anything with a suitable power level in RUG to warrant inclusion.
Power/Toughness: 7/5 Maelstrom Wanderer has the magic commander power of 7, which means that he can take out a player in three hits, dealing exactly 21 commander damage. This is definitely a factor that a Maelstrom Wanderer deckbuilder could take advantage of. 5 toughness is big enough, but given the prevalence of 5+ power creatures in commander, it's likely that he won't escape unscathed. And look- his power/toughness has a similar ratio to our Bloodbraided friend!
Ability #1: Creatures you control have haste.
As our Bloodbraid Elf has grown in size and cost, so has the scope of her ability: now, ALL of your squad gains haste! Haste is a keyword that WOTC has been throwing around a lot more often, and its utility in commander is well-proven. When you never know if the creatures you cast will dodge the wrath and wheel around for an actual attack, haste lets you get in there for some surprise damage. Of course, this includes our commander, making him a sizable beater, if not one with a lack of evasion. It also grants haste to any creatures that you happen to…
Ability #2: Cascade
… Cascade into! Cascade is stupid. Drawing cards is good. Now imagine when you draw the cards, you never draw lands. Now imagine if instead of drawing the nonland card, you got to play it for free, right away. That's how dumb cascade is. It's a LITTLE more risky in commander, since you have a much broader mana curve, but still, cascading into a hasty creature and smashing is pretty cool.
SURPRISE ABILITY #3 CASCADE AGAIN LOL
You're not seeing double. Double cascade means you're virtually burying your opponent in card advantage and hasty beats. You get a second spell cost 7 or less for your trouble.
Put it all together, and you get a freight train of awesomeness. Maelstrom Wanderer is, with a little luck, the architect of some of the most insane plays in commander, some of which I'll detail below.
URGHelp Me Fivecolorjunk Should I Play Maelstrom Wanderer?URG
Maelstrom Wanderer is THE creature for turning an empty or unfavorable board state into an advantage. Nothing swings the game in your favor like a double cascade.
Like playing lots of creatures and beating down.
Maelstrom Wanderer is creature centric. You could play lots of powerful spells, but you'd be losing out on all that hasty goodness.
Crushing your opponents under the weight of your massive card advantage.
If you're the type of player that needs to have a full hand and a full board to have a good time, look no further than this deck.
One of the big downsides of Maelstrom Wanderer is that one of blue's greatest abilities, countering spells, becomes a liability when most countermagic turns into dead cascades. This is going to be a ramp and beat down operation.
Want consistency
Even though you're getting consistent beats, you never really know what you're gonna get if you blindly cascade. If you like your games to play out in a prescribed way every game, this may not be your commander.
Want a fast deck
Even thought your mid to late game is unparalleled, the deck necessitates a ramp strategy early game that will leave you fairly open until you hit 8 mana. My build especially has a very steep mana curve, which allows me to avoid bad cascades. So long as you can handle being open in the early game, the deck promises power later on
URGStrategyURG
Ramp to 8, cast Maelstrom Wanderer, cascade twice and laugh like a pirate.
URGAdvanced StrategyURG
Ok, fine. We'll discuss some of the finer points of the deck.
THE PROBLEM WITH CASCADE
Despite its potential for huge upside, having a cascade-centric deck unfortunately causes us to build our deck a little differently than usual. Every card choice must be boiled down to a simple question: Do I ever want to cascade into this?
There are a few categories here.
ABSOLUTELY, GOD YES, EVERY DAMN TIME
Cards in this category are the broken parts of the deck. There are several downright busted plays off of a Maelstrom Wanderer. Palinchron, when cascaded into, will untap 7 lands and allow you to bust out another fatty, as will Time Spiral. Mass removal like Devastation Tidewill also elicit this type of reaction, since it clears the board for Maelstrom Wanderer. And while All is Dust is nice, imagine a Jokulhaups! Additionally, any time you cascade into a tutor like Mystical Tutor or Brutalizer Exarch first, you get to set up your next cascade, which is obviously dangerous.
SWEET, I LOVE THIS GUY/SPELL
Any fat 5, 6, or 7 mana creature means that you've cascaded well enough to be satisfied. Titans getting double activations with haste. Free Primordials. This is what the deck loves to do. Additionally, I wholeheartedly endorse creature-stealing effects like Mass Mutiny, Molten Primordial, and the incredibly powerful Blatant Thievery. These spells clear a path for a big, hasty combat step and are my personal favorite cascades.
I GUESS THIS IS ALRIGHT BUT I'M NOT HAPPY ABOUT IT
Every deck needs to run its answers and role players, so I try to keep them to a bare minimum. Like, I'm not going to NOT run Eternal Witness. But cascading into Eternal Witness isn't exactly my idea of a good cascade. Cascading into ramp isn't especially exciting, but since you need to run the ramp in order to, um, get to 8, it's a necessary speed bump. And really, cascading into ramp isn't the end of the world, since it sets up your next Maelstrom Wanderer cast. Draw is fine as well- necessary if unexciting. Clones are a little more variable as well, since you could cascade into them with nothing super good on the field worth copying, but in general they've tested well.
WHAT A WASTE OF 8 MANA
My goal in building this deck has been to avoid the kind of situations where I'm cascading into effects that are so small that they don't warrant the 8 mana investment. Like, Expedition Map is a fine card. But nobody wants to spend 8 mana cascading into Expedition Map! Cards like Whispersilk Cloak, which I used to run for gen damage beats, find themselves upgraded to fatter, splashier spells like Akroma's Memorial often.
This is where deckbuilding gets difficult. There is a spectrum of playability vs cascadability that all cards sit on. Acidic Slime and Flametongue Kavu are great examples. They've been part of the deck at various points. They're fine answers in any commander deck. But they've seen the hatchet as I try to streamline my deck into a beefier, meaner cascade machine. I try to make sure there are as many useable 4 and 5 mana spells as possible, so I don't completely shut off my early game. But the curve is bad intentionally: you get a better shot at cascading into splashier cards.
THIS IS A DEAD CASCADE, CURSE YOU MARK ROSEWATER
There are a handful of cards that straight up don't work with cascade. I loves me some Clan Defiance. Nope, can't run it. Cascade into it and it sucks. Same goes for powerhouses like Genesis Wave and/or Blue Sun's Zenith. Most heartbreaking are the lack of useable counterspells. I've selected four counterspells that actually function, since they don't fizzle out when cascaded into. Spelljack actually can target, counter, and exile Maelstrom Wanderer for a second free cast and another pair of cascades. But you'll have to weed these awful dead cascades out of your list before shuffling up.
BUT WAIT FIVECOLORJUNK THIS COSTS 8+ IS THAT OKAY?
Sure, yeah. It's fine. Just don't expect to cast it for free. Your curve already sucks, so don't push it.
75% of the deck is really solid and close to my own but I would just like to offer up my own thoughts on some of the choices.
I think you could use the RUG signets in the deck. As two drops they really accelerate and fix us for those crucial early turns. Talisman of Impulse is also nice.
Not a fan of Mass Mutiny. Seems like a waste of a card when with MW we're getting 3 cards for the price of 1 so we should be way ahead of our opponents anyway. Mutiny is cute for a swing to blow out one player if there's 3+ players but it's kind of lame when it's down to 1v1 and an awful top deck.
For card draw I feel like FoF and Jace aren't up to what we should have in our decks to draw. Recurring Insight is just extremely sickening when cast and when it Rebounds it's almost always extreme value city.
Lastly Tezzeret seems really weak with the lack of particularly good targets. The best you get with him is Metamorph or Solemn, kind of boring.
Cards I would recommend:
Godo, Bandit Warlord His body is unimpressive but he tutors up and puts into play an Equipment card. Put in Batterskull to fetch and you turned your Maelstrom Wanderer into a 4 for 1. His built in ability can be pretty sick with Batterskull or the only other equipment I run. Sword of Feast and Famine.
Karn, Liberated Absolutely brutal cascade rip. Gets rid of the most annoying non-hexproof card on the table and forces your opponents to answer it. Much more threatening than JTMS.
Ruric Thar, the Unbowed Have only played him a few times so far but so far I'm a fan. He has a pretty beefy body on both sides and his vigilance and reach abilities actually complement the all-in nature of our deck since he gets to stick around for defense since we'll most likely be the target of the table once we cast MW. His built in ability also punishes anyone trying to blow him or your general up or even board wipe. Blue decks pretty much automatically eat at least 6 damage trying to deal with him and will only get even better with the legends rules change since cloning won't be an effective option.
Sylvan Library Helps set up our cascades late game while ensuring we hit our land or ramp spells in the early game. Can also pay life to draw extra cards if need be.
Nothing in this game is degenerate or completely dominant. They haven't banned anything in standard in a long, long time. Hell they should have banned affinity right away, but they didn't until boxed sales collapsed too. Hasbro had to come in and fire people.
I'll enjoy watching all the whiners eat crow monday.
looks like you're actually missing jokulhaups from your list, even though you mentioned it in strategy. and you're also missing devastation, the other 'haups.
or, did you take them out of the deck because everyone complained too much?
Mud ramp is far superior IMO. Far seek, Kadomas reach, sky shroud claim, and explosive vegetation all require green, and aren't too fun on cascades. We need to start ramping from the get go regardless of the color land in your opening hand. I can get behind fast bond, exploration, and burgeoning, but aside from that I feel like with land tutors you're not maximizing ramp potential. Tezzeret can really shine with some 3 rocks like mana vault, basalt monolith, Thran dynamo, and golded lotus. Goblin welder can also be fun as a restoration angel or to double down on the ramp. If nothing else they have enough presence to take answers off your main threats. Side note, maybe consider a tferi against blue. They tap out once and they can't counter again until he's gone. I am currently running a thassa too for the unblockability. Trip wire is fun against fast decks. I have shut down grand arbiter decks by keeping their lands tapped opening turns before they can play him. It's also nasty with a goblin welder Getting miracles off temporal mastery are pretty easy with mystical tutor, brainstorm, scroll rack, soothsaying, diving top (mp only). If you're going mp I would highly suggest oath of Druids + 1 eldrazi, which is also protection from mill. Chromatic lantern is good for color issues. If you go with the mud ramp phyrexian metamorph and sculpting steel are pretty nice. Hope this gives some ideas.
1 Maelstrom Wanderer
Creatures
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
1 Rite of Replication
1 Body Double
1 Keiga, the Tide Star
1 Deadeye Navigator
1 Consecrated Sphinx
1 Frost Titan
1 Conquering Manticore
1 Inferno Titan
1 Etherium-Horn Sorcerer
1 Progenitor Mimic
1 Duplicant
1 Phyrexian Ingester
1 Palinchron
1 Sphinx of Uthuun
1 Chancellor of the Spires
1 Diluvian Primordial
1 Molten Primordial
1 Sylvan Primordial
1 Avenger of Zendikar
1 Moldgraf Monstrosity
1 Simic Sky Swallower
Creature Theft
1 Zealous Conscripts
1 Mass Mutiny
1 Treachery
1 Blatant Thievery
Countermagic
1 Venser, Shaper Savant
1 Glen Elendra Archmage
1 Cryptic Command
1 Spelljack
1 Chain Reaction
1 Devastation Tide
1 Evacuation
1 All is Dust
1 Kederekt Leviathan
Draw
1 Greater Good
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Future Sight
1 Time Spiral
Tutor
1 Worldly Tutor
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Tezzeret the Seeker
1 Brutalizer Exarch
1 Tooth and Nail
Miscellany
1 Scroll Rack
1 Crystal Shard
1 Akroma's Memorial
1 Eternal Witness
1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
Ramp
1 Sol Ring
1 Solemn Simulacrum
1 Gilded Lotus
1 Kodama's Reach
1 Cultivate
1 Explosive Vegetation
1 Skyshroud Claim
1 Boundless Realms
1 Krosan Tusker
Land
1 Command Tower
1 Transguild Promenade
1 Rupture Spire
1 Alchemist's Refuge
1 High Market
1 Reliquary Tower
1 Evolving Wilds
1 Terramorphic Expanse
1 Breeding Pool
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Hinterland Harbor
1 Flooded Grove
1 Simic Growth Chamber
1 Steam Vents
1 Sulfur Falls
1 Cascade Bluffs
1 Izzet Boilerworks
1 Stomping Ground
1 Rootbound Crag
1 Raging Ravine
1 Fire-Lit Thicket
1 Gruul Turf
1 Tolaria West
1 Halimar Depths
1 Vivid Creek
1 Vivid Grove
1 Vivid Crag
1 Shinka, the Bloodsoaked Keep
6 Forest
4 Island
2 Mountain
Here's my second try at primer-writeage. This is a work in progress, and any thoughts are welcome! My last primer, Zedruu, was very much a community effort, and I hope this one can reach those heights as well. I've been playing this guy for a few months now with great success. Without further ado...
Maelstrom Wanderer is one of the five new commanders from the Planechase 2012 precons. Despite his "legendary" status, we haven't been given too much backstory to this monstrosity. We can speculate, however, that he was spawned from the Maelstrom of the plane of Alara, a churning vortex of mana where the five shards converged during the mending of the plane. From the mtgsalvation wiki:
"The Maelstrom is a chaotic storm of mana that was created in the Conflux, located at the point where the five Shards met. It was fueled by the war between those five worlds, a war that Nicol Bolas orchestrated. The elder dragon stepped into the center of the storm to regain his godlike powers of old, but was ultimately stopped by Ajani Goldmane."
Maelstrom Wanderer is a really big Bloodbraid Elf.
No, really! It's as if you put Bloodbraid Elf in the copier, set it to "Commandersize", and Maelstrom Wanderer printed out. Lets break it down:
Mana Cost: 5URG
Maelstrom Wanderer is not a cheap commander. For 8 mana, you better get something that busts the game open in commander, and that's exactly what Maelstrom Wanderer does. Despite the steep cost, you can expect to cast the commander at least twice, maybe three times, over the course of a commander game, because of Maelstrom Wanderer's stellar color combo. URG is a fantastic combination in commander (our big Bloodbraid Elf has doubled in cost and added U into the mix). You get green ramp and blue draw to grease the wheels, and while red isn't an incredible color in commander, it gives us access to a wider variety of powerful cards than if we were straight UG. And, of course, the fatties are second to none.
Creature Type: Elemental
There are a number of cards that interact with the creature type Elemental. A friend of mine runs Horde of Notions, which allows you to CAST Maelstrom Wanderer from a graveyard, so you get the cascade effects. But, there isn't anything with a suitable power level in RUG to warrant inclusion.
Power/Toughness: 7/5
Maelstrom Wanderer has the magic commander power of 7, which means that he can take out a player in three hits, dealing exactly 21 commander damage. This is definitely a factor that a Maelstrom Wanderer deckbuilder could take advantage of. 5 toughness is big enough, but given the prevalence of 5+ power creatures in commander, it's likely that he won't escape unscathed. And look- his power/toughness has a similar ratio to our Bloodbraided friend!
Ability #1: Creatures you control have haste.
As our Bloodbraid Elf has grown in size and cost, so has the scope of her ability: now, ALL of your squad gains haste! Haste is a keyword that WOTC has been throwing around a lot more often, and its utility in commander is well-proven. When you never know if the creatures you cast will dodge the wrath and wheel around for an actual attack, haste lets you get in there for some surprise damage. Of course, this includes our commander, making him a sizable beater, if not one with a lack of evasion. It also grants haste to any creatures that you happen to…
Ability #2: Cascade
… Cascade into! Cascade is stupid. Drawing cards is good. Now imagine when you draw the cards, you never draw lands. Now imagine if instead of drawing the nonland card, you got to play it for free, right away. That's how dumb cascade is. It's a LITTLE more risky in commander, since you have a much broader mana curve, but still, cascading into a hasty creature and smashing is pretty cool.
SURPRISE ABILITY #3 CASCADE AGAIN LOL
You're not seeing double. Double cascade means you're virtually burying your opponent in card advantage and hasty beats. You get a second spell cost 7 or less for your trouble.
Put it all together, and you get a freight train of awesomeness. Maelstrom Wanderer is, with a little luck, the architect of some of the most insane plays in commander, some of which I'll detail below.
You should probably avoid playing Maelstrom Wanderer if you…
Despite its potential for huge upside, having a cascade-centric deck unfortunately causes us to build our deck a little differently than usual. Every card choice must be boiled down to a simple question: Do I ever want to cascade into this?
There are a few categories here.
Cards in this category are the broken parts of the deck. There are several downright busted plays off of a Maelstrom Wanderer. Palinchron, when cascaded into, will untap 7 lands and allow you to bust out another fatty, as will Time Spiral. Mass removal like Devastation Tidewill also elicit this type of reaction, since it clears the board for Maelstrom Wanderer. And while All is Dust is nice, imagine a Jokulhaups! Additionally, any time you cascade into a tutor like Mystical Tutor or Brutalizer Exarch first, you get to set up your next cascade, which is obviously dangerous.
Any fat 5, 6, or 7 mana creature means that you've cascaded well enough to be satisfied. Titans getting double activations with haste. Free Primordials. This is what the deck loves to do. Additionally, I wholeheartedly endorse creature-stealing effects like Mass Mutiny, Molten Primordial, and the incredibly powerful Blatant Thievery. These spells clear a path for a big, hasty combat step and are my personal favorite cascades.
Every deck needs to run its answers and role players, so I try to keep them to a bare minimum. Like, I'm not going to NOT run Eternal Witness. But cascading into Eternal Witness isn't exactly my idea of a good cascade. Cascading into ramp isn't especially exciting, but since you need to run the ramp in order to, um, get to 8, it's a necessary speed bump. And really, cascading into ramp isn't the end of the world, since it sets up your next Maelstrom Wanderer cast. Draw is fine as well- necessary if unexciting. Clones are a little more variable as well, since you could cascade into them with nothing super good on the field worth copying, but in general they've tested well.
My goal in building this deck has been to avoid the kind of situations where I'm cascading into effects that are so small that they don't warrant the 8 mana investment. Like, Expedition Map is a fine card. But nobody wants to spend 8 mana cascading into Expedition Map! Cards like Whispersilk Cloak, which I used to run for gen damage beats, find themselves upgraded to fatter, splashier spells like Akroma's Memorial often.
This is where deckbuilding gets difficult. There is a spectrum of playability vs cascadability that all cards sit on. Acidic Slime and Flametongue Kavu are great examples. They've been part of the deck at various points. They're fine answers in any commander deck. But they've seen the hatchet as I try to streamline my deck into a beefier, meaner cascade machine. I try to make sure there are as many useable 4 and 5 mana spells as possible, so I don't completely shut off my early game. But the curve is bad intentionally: you get a better shot at cascading into splashier cards.
There are a handful of cards that straight up don't work with cascade. I loves me some Clan Defiance. Nope, can't run it. Cascade into it and it sucks. Same goes for powerhouses like Genesis Wave and/or Blue Sun's Zenith. Most heartbreaking are the lack of useable counterspells. I've selected four counterspells that actually function, since they don't fizzle out when cascaded into. Spelljack actually can target, counter, and exile Maelstrom Wanderer for a second free cast and another pair of cascades. But you'll have to weed these awful dead cascades out of your list before shuffling up.
Sure, yeah. It's fine. Just don't expect to cast it for free. Your curve already sucks, so don't push it.
I'll throw in a few reccomendations:
Food chain, allows you to recast MW if you have some extra mana floating around.
Mind's Desire, really fun to cascade into
Soothsaying, stack your deck before cascading
Ghostly Flicker, won't allow you to cascade again, but most of your creatures have nifty ETB effects
I think you could use the RUG signets in the deck. As two drops they really accelerate and fix us for those crucial early turns. Talisman of Impulse is also nice.
Not a fan of Mass Mutiny. Seems like a waste of a card when with MW we're getting 3 cards for the price of 1 so we should be way ahead of our opponents anyway. Mutiny is cute for a swing to blow out one player if there's 3+ players but it's kind of lame when it's down to 1v1 and an awful top deck.
For card draw I feel like FoF and Jace aren't up to what we should have in our decks to draw. Recurring Insight is just extremely sickening when cast and when it Rebounds it's almost always extreme value city.
Lastly Tezzeret seems really weak with the lack of particularly good targets. The best you get with him is Metamorph or Solemn, kind of boring.
Cards I would recommend:
Godo, Bandit Warlord His body is unimpressive but he tutors up and puts into play an Equipment card. Put in Batterskull to fetch and you turned your Maelstrom Wanderer into a 4 for 1. His built in ability can be pretty sick with Batterskull or the only other equipment I run. Sword of Feast and Famine.
Karn, Liberated Absolutely brutal cascade rip. Gets rid of the most annoying non-hexproof card on the table and forces your opponents to answer it. Much more threatening than JTMS.
Ruric Thar, the Unbowed Have only played him a few times so far but so far I'm a fan. He has a pretty beefy body on both sides and his vigilance and reach abilities actually complement the all-in nature of our deck since he gets to stick around for defense since we'll most likely be the target of the table once we cast MW. His built in ability also punishes anyone trying to blow him or your general up or even board wipe. Blue decks pretty much automatically eat at least 6 damage trying to deal with him and will only get even better with the legends rules change since cloning won't be an effective option.
Sylvan Library Helps set up our cascades late game while ensuring we hit our land or ramp spells in the early game. Can also pay life to draw extra cards if need be.
Who's eating crow?
or, did you take them out of the deck because everyone complained too much?