The goal of this deck was to create the most Timmy friendly combo deck possible. What resulted is a deck that can only be considered "combo" in the loosest of senses because the actual combo is simply generating to power Spawnsire of Ulamog and unload a 10 card sideboard full of eldrazi onto the battlefield. You don't actually win the game immediately. And with Prossh, Skyraider of Kher in the upcoming Commander 2013 product, who just happens to be in all the right colors, I thought I'd give this deck another shot with the dragon at the helm. The deck doesn't abuse any infinite combos. The fact is there are plenty of ways in Magic to generate infinite mana, but I didn't want or need infinite mana -- 20 mana will do just fine.
Part of the reason I was drawn to the spawnsire for Commander specifically is because players start at 40 life and it is a multiplayer format. In a regular game of Magic, if you were able to generate 20 mana then you might as well just drop a Fireball and end the game instead of messing with the spawnsire's ability at all. In a 1v1 format, if you burn one player for 20 points of damage, you win the game. In Commander, if you burn one player for 20 points of damage, the game is just getting started. With the spawnsire, there is now a reason to go this route over a random x-spell in this format.
The perfect colors and the perfect ability for this type of deck. He's a huge beater in the air and he brings along with him an army of kobolds to power Ashnod's Altar, Black Market, and Gaea's Cradle. This deck would not be possible in its current for with any other general and yet the deck doesn't rely on Prossh to win the game. Even if Prossh gets tucked, it has enough other token producers and even tutors to keep on going.
Prossh dominates the Kher region of Dominaria. Each day at dawn, he takes to the skies, tracking his prey and monitoring the lands he claims as his own. The sound of dragon wings in the distance sends many of his subjects into a panic, scrambling for shelter that can withstand his dragon fire. He levels entire villages just to punish a single hunter who strayed into his territory. Those who don't pay tribute to him are burned alive. Prossh is worshipped by the kobolds of the region, and some offer themselves to His Mighty Overlordship in hopes that he spares their kin. Prossh is a predatory machine, and the death of his "allies" just makes him stronger.
The point of the deck is to get Spawnsire of Ulamog online in a reasonable amount of turns. You just need 20 mana to open the floodgates and let the rest of the eldrazi to take over the world. Other than piling on ramp spells one after another over the course of many turns, there are basically 3 ways this deck can generate 20 mana quickly:
Ashnod's Altar - Beginning with Prossh, this deck is built to generate tons of token creatures to be sacrificed to the altar. With other mana acceleration, it really doesn't take that many creatures to generate the mana needed for the spawnsire.
Black Market - Without mana burn and in a multiplayer format, I love Black Market. If left unattended, it doesn't take long before the market can begin generating stupid amounts of mana.
Like I said in the introduction, there are many other ways of generating infinite mana in Magic, including with the Prossh & Food Chain two card combo, but I wasn't interested. Winning instantly through infinite combo is not I want to do and it's not what this deck is trying to do.
If you're like me, then you're a Johnny/Timmy at heart. This means that you love creature based decks with fun interactions that are much more durdley than they have any business being. You enjoy playing creatures that can beat down on their own as well as play well with others. This means you're more concerned with "doing something cool" than you are with actually winning a game -- but if you happen to win while you're at it, you'll be doing it with a smile. And as commander, Prossh fits the criteria for your needs... and yet, he's not even the focus of this particular deck.
The truth is that in this deck, Prossh is just a means to an end. Prossh is very powerful, but for the purposes of this deck, he simply acts as a very good enabler to generate the necessary mana to summon the spawnsire to open a portal for Ulamog & friends to unleash hell upon the battlefield. Prossh provides the necessary bodies and is of the appropriate colors to enable this deck to go over the top like no other deck has before -- stopping short of going infinite. Technically speaking, Prossh may be the "commander" of the deck, but he's actually quite low in the pecking order of things when it is all said and done.
Prossh is a great enabler to power the creature based mana the deck wants to produce, but he's not absolutely necessary for the deck to function. If not Prossh, then Kresh the Bloodbraided, Sek'Kuar, Deathkeeper, and Shattergang Brothers are somewhat on theme with triggered and activated abilities dealing with dying creatures. And Karrthus, Tyrant of Jund may be the king of all dragons, but with him leading the pack, he really leads the deck into a much different direction.
Prossh really is the perfect commander for what this deck wants to do and while there are other generals in the right colors, without the raw kobold generating ability that Prossh gives you, the other generals will inevitably take you in slightly different directions (away from the spawnsire and towards other ramp & sac strategies).
Birds of Paradise, Viridian Emissary - Standard ramp creatures. Emissary over Sakura-Tribe Elder just so it can be used with one of the deck's many sacrifice effects.
Viscera Seer, Reaper of the Wilds - Being a pseudo-combo deck, tutor effects are in high demand. These two creatures combined can net you a double scry per creature in this creature heavy deck.
Bloodghast, Squee, Goblin Nabob - These two creatures kind of fill the same role in that they are discard, recursion, and sacrifice friendly.
Fauna Shaman - One of the deck's pure nonland tutor effects. It can used to grab your big bombs (like Avenger of Zendikar or Spawnsire of Ulamog), it can be used to enable your graveyard creatures (like Anger or Genesis), or it can do both at the same time.
Wall of Blossoms - Straight value creature that cantrips and may help keep you alive.
Bone Shredder - A singleton ETB kill effect specifically included for Fauna Shaman to fetch. Also one of the deck's only flying creatures.
Eternal Witness - Regrowth on a stick. It should be noted that the actual Regrowth spell isn't in the list. In this creature based deck, Eternal Witness is actually much better than Regrowth.
Avenger of Zendikar - Other than Prossh, the avenger is your main token producer and possible win condition on its own.
Wood Elves, Nature's Lore, Skyshroud Claim - Additional ramp spells which I specifically chose for this deck because they all fetch for 'forest' lands and they enter the battlefield untapped.
Anger - One of the most important cards in the deck if you want that out-of-nowhere combo win. It should be noted that because red is only the splash color in the deck, there are only 6 mountains.
Genesis - Used for grindy match-ups and one way that threatens to keep Spawnsire of Ulamog in play even if it's dealt with multiple times before its ability is activated.
Su-Chi - Notably taking up the slot usually reserved for Solemn Simulacrum. Su-Chi gives you more mana immediately, giving this deck a more explosive feel whenever it goes off.
Sylvan Primordial - One of the deck's only ways of dealing with artifacts, enchantments, lands, and planeswalkers. He also ramps you even further to a ridiculous degree. He kind of does everything.
Spawnsire of Ulamog - Covered extensively in the Introduction. The entire deck is based around generating 20 mana to activate the spawnsire's ability and run over the entire table with a sideboard full of eldrazi.
Burnt Offering - For :1mana::symb::symg: you can cash in your first instance of Prossh into 8 additional kobold tokens. This is one of those cards that is never used in any format except under very special circumstances like with his general, in this deck, in this format. Can also be used to put you over the top and power out 20 mana for the spawnsire.
Crop Rotation - Mostly used to fetch Gaea's Cradle, but also sometimes used to find Phyrexian Tower or Kessig Wolf Run.
Firestorm - There are times when this deck just "goes off" in terms of card drawing either through Decree of Pain, Greater Good, or Skullclamp and with a single red mana, you can dump the majority of your hand and burn the entire board. And then there are other times when you can just Firestorm for value by dumping cards like Bloodghast, Squee, or additional lands fetched with Life from the Loam. Also a great graveyard enabler. Firestorm kind of does it all and it's one of those cards that both a great combo piece as well as spot removal for specific threats that keeps you interacting with the board state instead of just crossing your fingers.
Tragic Slip - This is my anti-Eldrazi tech. On theme with the morbid mechanic and is able to take down any of the eldrazi if they are stolen.
Artifact Mutation - In Commander, there are usually plenty of artifacts being played, even if they're just mana rocks. Sometimes you just need to generate some tokens to power some of your sacrifice effects.
Faithless Looting, Mulch, Grisly Salvage - In terms of cheap Jund colored card drawing, discarding, and graveyard enablers, these 3 spells are some of the best. I also hate getting mana screwed and each of these spells can help search for more land if needed.
Chaos Warp, Karn Liberated - These are my catch-all removal spells that you just kind of need in a game of Commander. Chaos Warp in particular was designed specifically as a red tuck effect which can really mess up some decks that are heavily dependent on their general. Karn Liberated on the other hand was chosen (over Beast Within) just because it provides a permanent threat in the face of Jokulhaups type spells and it also survives your own All is Dust when cast from the sideboard.
Life / Death, Dread Return, Cauldron Dance - These 3 cards represent the reanimator package in the deck. Dread Return is probably the most explosive of the 3 mostly because the deck is capable of self-milling tons of cards in a single turn thanks to Greater Good. With Greater Good and Dread Return, the deck can actually feel like a "combo deck" and just go off out of nowhere. The Life half of "Life / Death" can have a similar effect if you have Ashnod's Altar in play. And Cauldron Dance has always been one of my favorite cards ever since it was printed.
Burning Wish, Living Wish - I know some Commander players are anti-wishboard, but maybe they'll make an exception in this case? My sideboard isn't actually designed to be hold silver bullets for niche situations. Instead, I just jammed all the best cards with the sub-type "eldrazi" and will hope for the best whenever the spawnsire summons them. I don't even have a single land in the board for Living Wish to fetch in case of mana screw. Also note that All is Dust and Skittering Invasion are the only 2 legal targets for Burning Wish. The wishes aren't necessary for the deck to function but I figured that if I was going to have a sideboard, I might as well include the wishes for extra value.
Explore, Night's Whisper - Cards with effects that are kind of needed in any deck to help smooth out draws and mana at the beginning of the game. These two spells can easily be replaced with something on the level of Faithless Looting, Mulch, or Grisly Salvage if more of those type of spells are ever printed.
Wheel of Fortune - Card draw, discard, and graveyard enabling since 1993. Accept no substitute.
Increasing Ambition, Spider Spawning - Black flashback + Black Market is my tech against Jokulhaups type spells which have a hard time removing enchantments. Everything dies, Black Market gets loaded up with charge counters and you still have a lot of gas. And if there are enough charge counters, maybe Spawnsire of Ulamog is going to be one of your tutor targets?
Decree of Pain, Insurrection - Two of the best multiplayer game ending, card advantage spells ever printed and they both happen to fit the deck's theme perfectly. Decree of Pain draws you cards to help get to and fuel your combo and Insurrection gives you extra bodies to sacrifice to help get to and fuel your combo. Both spells allow you to sit back and let the board develop while having a back up plan if things get out of hand.
Goblin Bombardment - A permanent sac outlet for all your kobold tokens to help control and sculpt the board state.
Zombie Infestation - Like Firestorm, sometimes you just need the ability to dump excess cards. With Zombie Infestation, you also generate more tokens for more fuel.
Greater Good - One of the best draw & discard cards ever printed. Not uncommon for me to attack with Prossh and sacrifice all my kobolds, giving him +6/+0 (or more) and then sacrificing Prossh to Greater Good to draw 12+ cards, discard 3, and then replay Prossh to summon even more kobolds.
Black Market - Without mana burn, it suddenly becomes usable. In multiplayer, it then has the power to generate 20 mana all on its own (or even 30 mana if you want to cast and activate the spawnsire in the same turn).
Xenagos, the Reveler - Like Gaea's Cradle, Ashnod's Altar, Phyrexian Altar, and Black Market, Xenagos has the ability to generate a lot of creature based mana. An easy fit for the deck.
Skullclamp - One of the most broken cards ever printed and I always feel a little dirty when it can be used to clamp all the little kobold guys for unfair card advantage. I would not be surprised if this were ever banned from Commander one day. Until then...
Everflowing Chalice - A fine 2 drop mana rock, an occasional 4 drop Sol Ring, and sometimes a ridiculous artifact sink with 7+ charge counters ready to go.
Ashnod's Altar, Phyrexian Altar - More sac outlets for your many tokens and with the help of Prossh, one of the easiest ways of generating the mana needed for the deck.
Kessig Wolf Run, Lavaclaw Reaches - If the table has turned against you and if that table includes a very annoying control player who is determined to counter your every move, these 2 lands are a pretty good answer and alternate win condition in that situation. This deck generates lots of mana and both of these lands are perfect mana sinks for all that mana.
Kozilek, Butcher of Truth, Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre - Important to note that because the deck has a graveyard theme, it actually works out perfectly that these 2 are kept away from your library. You are never at risk of self-milling one of them away and then having to shuffle your entire graveyard into your library. Also, even though you still have good targets, Bribery is much less scary when it isn't summoning one of these 2 guys.
Food Chain - This was already covered earlier. I don't want to include any infinite mana loops in the deck, if possible.
Blood Artist - This could potentially gain me a lot of life and act as an alternative win condition. The problem is that with Spawnsire of Ulamog and Ashnod's Altar, you could spawn and sacrifice tokens infinitely. I'm aware that this could be used to put infinite charge counters on Black Market but... at least it doesn't win instantly?
Mana Echoes - Tempted to include, but I don't know if it's needed. The ability is semi-hard to trigger on the spot when needed. It's better fit for a straight up combo deck.
Death Wish, Ring of Ma'rûf - Interesting cards (and I'm a sucker for pre-4th edition sets), but they would just be very bad Living Wishes in most situations.
Grave Pact - A very good card and would probably make a lot of sense. I just don't feel like running it. I'd rather have the board develop and get a big Decree of Pain. Even better, I would rather have the board completely clogged and have Spawnsire of Ulamog bust it wide open and really show the power of the Eldrazi.
Purphoros, God of the Forge - Considered running the God as a straight up non-creature (that can be fetched with reanimation and Genesis). Decided not to run him for now.
As much as I try to avoid infinite combos, there are definitely a few to be found in the deck. Prossh + Ashnod's Altar + Phyrexian Altar is one of them which allows you to get infinite kobolds and/or infinite mana.
Prossh + Food Chain is a 2 card combo while Prossh + the altars is a 3 card combo which is much harder to assemble.
Food Chain exiles creatures while the altars sacrifice creatures. This is important because this deck's combo doesn't win instantly an with reanimation effects and cards like Spider Spawning it's important for the deck to be able to continue to function.
There are no Fireball or Exsanguinate type x-spells. The goal isn't to burn, it's to open a portal for the rest of the eldrazi.
The altars are in the deck for their sacrifice effects to produce mana. If there happens to be a possible infinite combo found within, then so be it.
The first few turns of this deck play out very similarly to any other green based ramp deck. You're hoping for a turn 1 Birds of Paradise or Sol Ring and a turn 2 signet or Sakura-Tribe Elder. You're looking to sit back and develop your mana and not caring as much about developing the board and putting on pressure (or defenses for that matter). If you don't get any ramp, if you can't develop your mana, Plan B is t develop your graveyard. And in this way, the deck plays out very similarly to some reanimator strategies. Faithless Looting, Mulch, and Grisly Salvage are all very strong turn 1 and 2 plays.
This deck may not be a traditional "combo" deck and yet the key to piloting it correctly is to treat is as if were one of those decks. The mid game is all about conserving resources so you can chain those resources into taking big multi-spell turns. In the meantime, you should be content to play a more passive game and be selective with your relatively small arsenal of removal spells. And as long as you're not under too much pressure, you should allow the board to develop.
While your big mid game threats are things like Thragtusk, Grave Titan, and Wurmcoil Engine, you should go into the game with no fear about playing Prossh early and often. With this deck you will have the mana to cast and recast Prossh from the command zone no matter how high his commander tax becomes. And because of the nature of his ETB ability, you often want his tax to rise as high as possible. In general, you want to play Prossh first and your other threats second. In the case of facing off a deck you know to have lots of tuck effects, then you can put on the breaks and hold off until you can get one of the deck's many sac effects online before playing the dragon.
There are 2 main reasons why when piloting this deck you are happy to let a creature heavy board develop and those reasons are named Decree of Pain and Insurrection. Yes, they're both a little overplayed when it comes to Commander games, but they're just that good. And in the case of this deck, both of them actually provide fuel for your end game in the form of card drawing and creatures to sacrifice.
The thing you have to realize most about this deck is that the eldrazi are the distraction that may or may not even be cast at all during the course of a game. I say they're a "distraction" because even before the game begins, you've already begun to flaunt your 10 card eldrazi sideboard in front of everyone, planting the eldrazi seed in the back of people's minds. What they should be much more afraid of, especially in the late game, is that Prossh probably threatens lethal commander damage every attack step.
Also, in this late game, you want to continue to develop your graveyard and continue to set up static sacrifice outlets, namely Goblin Bombardment and/or Greater Good and/or Ashnod's Altar. Goblin Bombardment will help you manage the board, Greater Good will dig through your entire library, and in super late game scenarios, Ashnod's Altar can be almost as broken as Channel. At this point in the game, your goal should be to dump Anger, Dread Return, and Spawnsire of Ulamog into your graveyard and just "go off."
Dumping your 10 card eldrazi sideboard onto the battlefield (preferably with Anger in the graveyard) can go over the top of just about anything in your path. It doesn't matter how big or how many creatures your opponents can gather together. Your creatures will be bigger and badder, beginning with It That Betrays, followed up with All is Dust, and ending with all the rest. It's as close to a "game ending" play without actually ending the game -- but you treat it as if it were one. And this is why I consider this deck to be a combo deck.
During the entire course of the game, instead of simply ramping, putting on pressure, and playing a mid-gamey dragon strategy, you should be more concerned with gathering sacrifice outlets and developing your graveyard in order to put yourself in the best position to eventually go off. You should play the game with the inevitability of an unbeatable play in the distance (even though it isn't actually unbeatable).
From what I understand, optional rules (including sideboards) are legal in Commander as long as everyone playing agrees to these rules before the game begins. If everyone does not agree, you can just swap these 3 cards with 3 of the eldrazi cards and just not bother with the sideboard. If you are normally opposed to sideboards and wishes in Commander, looking at my deck, would you make an exception in this case? Or would you just rather not play against any deck that uses any sideboard of any kind?
Optional rules for Commander
Sideboards
Rather than filling every deck with banal responses, it is preferable to allow some flexibility in the composition of a deck.
Players may bring a 10 card sideboard in addition to their 99 cards and 1 Commander.
After Commanders are announced, players have 3 minutes to make 1-for-1 substitutions to their deck.
Any cards not played as part of the deck may be retrieved by "wishes".
Reasoning:
Highly tuned threats piloted by skilled opponents mandate efficient answers. The minimum number of response cards required to ensure they are available in the early turns can easily overwhelm the majority of an EDH deck's building space.
Sideboards allow players to respond to the "best" strategies in a timely fashion . They should be strongly considered as a necessary defense against brokenness and degeneracy in an environment where no gentlemans agreement on style of play exists.
I think it's useful for the readers to now that at this moment, sideboards are illegals in the "Official" Commander format. However, I don't care playing against decks with sb and, if your playgroup allows them, I'm sure this deck is a lot of fun
I think it's useful for the readers to now that at this moment, sideboards are illegals in the "Official" Commander format. However, I don't care playing against decks with sb and, if your playgroup allows them, I'm sure this deck is a lot of fun
Really?
I looked it up before I began work on the deck. It's literally categorized under "optional rules" on the official commander site:
(Close the pop-up, click 'optional', then click 'sideboards'.)
Optional rules for Commander
Sideboards
Rather than filling every deck with banal responses, it is preferable to allow some flexibility in the composition of a deck.
Players may bring a 10 card sideboard in addition to their 99 cards and 1 Commander.
After Commanders are announced, players have 3 minutes to make 1-for-1 substitutions to their deck.
Any cards not played as part of the deck may be retrieved by "wishes".
Reasoning:
Highly tuned threats piloted by skilled opponents mandate efficient answers. The minimum number of response cards required to ensure they are available in the early turns can easily overwhelm the majority of an EDH deck's building space.
Sideboards allow players to respond to the "best" strategies in a timely fashion . They should be strongly considered as a necessary defense against brokenness and degeneracy in an environment where no gentlemans agreement on style of play exists.
From what I understand, the rules make a point to make sure everyone else you're playing with is okay with your sideboard and if they are then it's completely legal?
(This is different than "house rules" which are just made up rules made legal in your play group.)
I've made many changes to the deck in the past 24 hours, including this little card that has been very good for me so far:
The biggest changes happened after play testing and realizing that Prossh is just the best 6 drop by a wide margin. It doesn't matter if removal is used immediately. You kind of want Prossh to die. But this means that as good as Grave Titan and Wurmcoil Engine are, they were just taking up space at 6cmc. Instead, I noticed a hole at 5 mana (after the ramp, before the big stuff) where I was struggling to find spells to cast so I made these changes:
I also cut a lot of sweeper effects in favor of more spot removal. The truth is that I would rather let the board develop and cast a huge Decree of Pain or Insurrection instead of constantly wiping the board. The truth is that it doesn't really matter how developed the board becomes when Spawnsire of Ulamog can literally go over the top of just about anything and everything:
There have been other changes, but I can't really remember all the substitutions.
Overall, I like the way the deck is shaping up. And in general, I like the changes because the more the deck moves away from the staples, the less it looks like a "3 color good stuff + Spawnsire of Ulamog" deck. I always get a little bored of 3 color good stuff decks.
Many more changes in the past 48 hours as I continue to tune the deck. These latest changes have to do with making the deck less rampy and more combo-y:
Less normal ramp and more combo ramp, more enablers (Firestorm, Zombie Infestation), and a lot of scry to help me search for the cards I need (Viscera Seer, Reaper of the Wilds).
The main reason for both Firestorm and Zombie Infestation is because Greater Good + Prossh is just ridiculous. Play Prossh, possibly with haste, sacrifice all your kobolds, swing for 11 commander damage and then sacrifice Prossh itself to the Greater Good to draw 11 and discard 8. From there you can re-cast Prossh for even more kobolds to pump him for even more power and sacrifice him to draw even more cards. And now those cards can be dumped to burn everything in sight or to spawn a ton of zombies.
Other Notes
Kessig Wolf Run + Ashnod's Altar + Prossh is kind of dumb. You basically threaten lethal, flying, trampling commander damage on every attack step. I guess this is kind of obvious, but maybe even more powerful in practice.
I'm really happy on how light the reanimator theme is working out so far. No new additions or subtractions. Life / Death, Dread Return, and Cauldron Dance along with Genesis in the bin feels like all the reanimation and recursion the deck needs. It's enough to fetch out a big threat (like Spawnsire of Ulamog), but it's not too reliant that the deck is completely neutered in the face of graveyard hate.
Here's another nice piece of tech I've found, tested, and am liking so far:
It's one of those cards that you never see anywhere else that just kind of works somehow with this commander, in this deck, in this format. It's basically used 2 ways:
If you draw Burnt Offering early in the game, for :1mana::symb::symg: you can sacrifice and buy back your first instance of Prossh and spawn 8 new kobold tokens. It's a sac outlet for Prossh himself and it generates nearly enough mana of nearly the correct types to play him out again. From there, abuse one of the deck's many sacrifice outlets (even Prossh himself).
If you draw Burnt Offering later on in the game, you can use this one mana spell to put you over the top to help activate the spawnsire's ability. At the cost of one of your 6 or 7 drops (or Prossh himself), it might be just enough mana.
This is another example of the deck skewing much more "combo-y" and less "rampy." As I keep on making changes, the deck is more interested in generating a lot more mana instantly instead of slightly less permanent mana over time.
Update
I've also been busy prettying up the OP and maybe get it ready to submit for primer status in a month's time (a month after Prossh has been released). I really like the deck and I think it works. I still have a lot to add in the "Card Option" section which I'll be filling in with notes for every single card choice.
37 colorless mana when you cast Prossh (the first time).
I actually cover Mana Echoes in the Card Option section. I thought about it and may still put it in. I'm just not sure the deck really needs it. It already produces a ton of mana already and the mana you get from Mana Echoes is good with only Prossh and Avenger of Zendikar and maybe a few others. But it's a ETB ability, not a sac ability so it's a little more conditional. I could be wrong.
Sorry to bring back an oldish thread, I just love this deck idea! I think the point of mana echoes is like this "O I have a mana echoes in my hand? I should just cast it and the moment I get eldrazi in my hand all I have to do is play my general and I win." I am considering adding the Eldrazi as just an additional win con to my Prossh, I run all the altars and what not for big maan to cast large X spells, but Eldrazi just seem like soo much more fun! I just need to get ahold of them. I see your point about food chain and I may go ahead and remove it from my own deck for the simple point that it just really is not that much fun to play.
Couldn't you just take out the Phyrexian Altar to fully dismantle all the infinite combos in your deck? I know this is an older thread but this is EDH and it's still a WICKED concept.
Also, if OP is still rocking out, I'd like to ask why there aren't more tutor effects for Spawnshire of Ulamog like Green Sun's Zenith.
Table of Contents
Introduction
The goal of this deck was to create the most Timmy friendly combo deck possible. What resulted is a deck that can only be considered "combo" in the loosest of senses because the actual combo is simply generating to power Spawnsire of Ulamog and unload a 10 card sideboard full of eldrazi onto the battlefield. You don't actually win the game immediately. And with Prossh, Skyraider of Kher in the upcoming Commander 2013 product, who just happens to be in all the right colors, I thought I'd give this deck another shot with the dragon at the helm. The deck doesn't abuse any infinite combos. The fact is there are plenty of ways in Magic to generate infinite mana, but I didn't want or need infinite mana -- 20 mana will do just fine.
Part of the reason I was drawn to the spawnsire for Commander specifically is because players start at 40 life and it is a multiplayer format. In a regular game of Magic, if you were able to generate 20 mana then you might as well just drop a Fireball and end the game instead of messing with the spawnsire's ability at all. In a 1v1 format, if you burn one player for 20 points of damage, you win the game. In Commander, if you burn one player for 20 points of damage, the game is just getting started. With the spawnsire, there is now a reason to go this route over a random x-spell in this format.
Prossh, Skyraider of Kher
The perfect colors and the perfect ability for this type of deck. He's a huge beater in the air and he brings along with him an army of kobolds to power Ashnod's Altar, Black Market, and Gaea's Cradle. This deck would not be possible in its current for with any other general and yet the deck doesn't rely on Prossh to win the game. Even if Prossh gets tucked, it has enough other token producers and even tutors to keep on going.
The "Combo"
The point of the deck is to get Spawnsire of Ulamog online in a reasonable amount of turns. You just need 20 mana to open the floodgates and let the rest of the eldrazi to take over the world. Other than piling on ramp spells one after another over the course of many turns, there are basically 3 ways this deck can generate 20 mana quickly:
Why play this commander?
If you're like me, then you're a Johnny/Timmy at heart. This means that you love creature based decks with fun interactions that are much more durdley than they have any business being. You enjoy playing creatures that can beat down on their own as well as play well with others. This means you're more concerned with "doing something cool" than you are with actually winning a game -- but if you happen to win while you're at it, you'll be doing it with a smile. And as commander, Prossh fits the criteria for your needs... and yet, he's not even the focus of this particular deck.
The truth is that in this deck, Prossh is just a means to an end. Prossh is very powerful, but for the purposes of this deck, he simply acts as a very good enabler to generate the necessary mana to summon the spawnsire to open a portal for Ulamog & friends to unleash hell upon the battlefield. Prossh provides the necessary bodies and is of the appropriate colors to enable this deck to go over the top like no other deck has before -- stopping short of going infinite. Technically speaking, Prossh may be the "commander" of the deck, but he's actually quite low in the pecking order of things when it is all said and done.
Also, kobolds.
Why not play this commander?
Prossh is a great enabler to power the creature based mana the deck wants to produce, but he's not absolutely necessary for the deck to function. If not Prossh, then Kresh the Bloodbraided, Sek'Kuar, Deathkeeper, and Shattergang Brothers are somewhat on theme with triggered and activated abilities dealing with dying creatures. And Karrthus, Tyrant of Jund may be the king of all dragons, but with him leading the pack, he really leads the deck into a much different direction.
Prossh really is the perfect commander for what this deck wants to do and while there are other generals in the right colors, without the raw kobold generating ability that Prossh gives you, the other generals will inevitably take you in slightly different directions (away from the spawnsire and towards other ramp & sac strategies).
Also, no kobolds.
Deck List
1 Prossh, Skyraider of Kher
Creatures
1 Birds of Paradise
1 Viscera Seer
1 Bloodghast
1 Fauna Shaman
1 Viridian Emissary
1 Wall of Blossoms
1 Bone Shredder
1 Eternal Witness
1 Sprouting Thrinax
1 Squee, Goblin Nabob
1 Wood Elves
1 Anger
1 Reaper of the Wilds
1 Su-Chi
1 Genesis
1 Thragtusk
1 Grave Titan
1 Wurmcoil Engine
1 Avenger of Zendikar
1 Sylvan Primordial
1 Spawnsire of Ulamog
Instants
1 Burnt Offering
1 Crop Rotation
1 Firestorm
1 Tragic Slip
1 Artifact Mutation
1 Grisly Salvage
1 Chaos Warp
1 Cauldron Dance
Sorceries
1 Faithless Looting
1 Burning Wish
1 Explore
1 Life from the Loam
1 Living Wish
1 Mulch
1 Nature's Lore
1 Night's Whisper
1 Wheel of Fortune
1 Dread Return
1 Skyshroud Claim
1 Increasing Ambition
1 Mass Mutiny
1 Spider Spawning
1 Decree of Pain
1 Insurrection
1 Life / Death
1 Goblin Bombardment
1 Zombie Infestation
1 Necromancy
1 Greater Good
1 Black Market
Planeswalkers
1 Xenagos, the Reveler
1 Karn Liberated
Equipment
1 Skullclamp
Other Artifacts
1 Everflowing Chalice
1 Sol Ring
1 Golgari Signet
1 Gruul Signet
1 Rakdos Signet
1 Ashnod's Altar
1 Phyrexian Altar
Nonbasic Land
1 Badlands
1 Bayou
1 Blood Crypt
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Command Tower
1 Gaea's Cradle
1 Kessig Wolf Run
1 Lavaclaw Reaches
1 Opal Palace
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Phyrexian Tower
1 Raging Ravine
1 Savage Lands
1 Stomping Ground
1 Taiga
1 Temple of the False God
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Wooded Foothills
Basic Land
12 Forest
2 Mountain
6 Swamp
1 All is Dust
1 Artisan of Kozilek
1 Eldrazi Conscription
1 Hand of Emrakul
1 It That Betrays
1 Kozilek, Butcher of Truth
1 Pathrazer of Ulamog
1 Skittering Invasion
1 Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre
1 Ulamog's Crusher
Card Options
Omissions
Infinite Combos?
As much as I try to avoid infinite combos, there are definitely a few to be found in the deck. Prossh + Ashnod's Altar + Phyrexian Altar is one of them which allows you to get infinite kobolds and/or infinite mana.
Strategy
The first few turns of this deck play out very similarly to any other green based ramp deck. You're hoping for a turn 1 Birds of Paradise or Sol Ring and a turn 2 signet or Sakura-Tribe Elder. You're looking to sit back and develop your mana and not caring as much about developing the board and putting on pressure (or defenses for that matter). If you don't get any ramp, if you can't develop your mana, Plan B is t develop your graveyard. And in this way, the deck plays out very similarly to some reanimator strategies. Faithless Looting, Mulch, and Grisly Salvage are all very strong turn 1 and 2 plays.
Mid Game
This deck may not be a traditional "combo" deck and yet the key to piloting it correctly is to treat is as if were one of those decks. The mid game is all about conserving resources so you can chain those resources into taking big multi-spell turns. In the meantime, you should be content to play a more passive game and be selective with your relatively small arsenal of removal spells. And as long as you're not under too much pressure, you should allow the board to develop.
While your big mid game threats are things like Thragtusk, Grave Titan, and Wurmcoil Engine, you should go into the game with no fear about playing Prossh early and often. With this deck you will have the mana to cast and recast Prossh from the command zone no matter how high his commander tax becomes. And because of the nature of his ETB ability, you often want his tax to rise as high as possible. In general, you want to play Prossh first and your other threats second. In the case of facing off a deck you know to have lots of tuck effects, then you can put on the breaks and hold off until you can get one of the deck's many sac effects online before playing the dragon.
Late Game
There are 2 main reasons why when piloting this deck you are happy to let a creature heavy board develop and those reasons are named Decree of Pain and Insurrection. Yes, they're both a little overplayed when it comes to Commander games, but they're just that good. And in the case of this deck, both of them actually provide fuel for your end game in the form of card drawing and creatures to sacrifice.
The thing you have to realize most about this deck is that the eldrazi are the distraction that may or may not even be cast at all during the course of a game. I say they're a "distraction" because even before the game begins, you've already begun to flaunt your 10 card eldrazi sideboard in front of everyone, planting the eldrazi seed in the back of people's minds. What they should be much more afraid of, especially in the late game, is that Prossh probably threatens lethal commander damage every attack step.
Also, in this late game, you want to continue to develop your graveyard and continue to set up static sacrifice outlets, namely Goblin Bombardment and/or Greater Good and/or Ashnod's Altar. Goblin Bombardment will help you manage the board, Greater Good will dig through your entire library, and in super late game scenarios, Ashnod's Altar can be almost as broken as Channel. At this point in the game, your goal should be to dump Anger, Dread Return, and Spawnsire of Ulamog into your graveyard and just "go off."
End Game
Dumping your 10 card eldrazi sideboard onto the battlefield (preferably with Anger in the graveyard) can go over the top of just about anything in your path. It doesn't matter how big or how many creatures your opponents can gather together. Your creatures will be bigger and badder, beginning with It That Betrays, followed up with All is Dust, and ending with all the rest. It's as close to a "game ending" play without actually ending the game -- but you treat it as if it were one. And this is why I consider this deck to be a combo deck.
During the entire course of the game, instead of simply ramping, putting on pressure, and playing a mid-gamey dragon strategy, you should be more concerned with gathering sacrifice outlets and developing your graveyard in order to put yourself in the best position to eventually go off. You should play the game with the inevitability of an unbeatable play in the distance (even though it isn't actually unbeatable).
Sideboard?
From what I understand, optional rules (including sideboards) are legal in Commander as long as everyone playing agrees to these rules before the game begins. If everyone does not agree, you can just swap these 3 cards with 3 of the eldrazi cards and just not bother with the sideboard. If you are normally opposed to sideboards and wishes in Commander, looking at my deck, would you make an exception in this case? Or would you just rather not play against any deck that uses any sideboard of any kind?
Source: http://mtgcommander.net/rules.php
Substitutions
Thread | Draft
Really?
I looked it up before I began work on the deck. It's literally categorized under "optional rules" on the official commander site:
http://mtgcommander.net/rules.php
(Close the pop-up, click 'optional', then click 'sideboards'.)
From what I understand, the rules make a point to make sure everyone else you're playing with is okay with your sideboard and if they are then it's completely legal?
(This is different than "house rules" which are just made up rules made legal in your play group.)
Thread | Draft
The biggest changes happened after play testing and realizing that Prossh is just the best 6 drop by a wide margin. It doesn't matter if removal is used immediately. You kind of want Prossh to die. But this means that as good as Grave Titan and Wurmcoil Engine are, they were just taking up space at 6cmc. Instead, I noticed a hole at 5 mana (after the ramp, before the big stuff) where I was struggling to find spells to cast so I made these changes:
-1 Grave Titan
-1 Wurmcoil Engine
+1 Phyrexian Plaguelord
+1 Deranged Hermit
The deck was really weak to fliers. It still is, but is a little better after I made these changes:
-1 Terastodon
-1 Army of the Damned
+1 Sylvan Primordial
+1 Spider Spawning
I also cut a lot of sweeper effects in favor of more spot removal. The truth is that I would rather let the board develop and cast a huge Decree of Pain or Insurrection instead of constantly wiping the board. The truth is that it doesn't really matter how developed the board becomes when Spawnsire of Ulamog can literally go over the top of just about anything and everything:
-1 Damnation
+1 Flesh / Blood
Also, got a little tired of tried-and-true staples and wanted more graveyard interaction:
-1 Regrowth
-1 Demonic Tutor
+1 Nostalgic Dreams
+1 Increasing Ambition
There have been other changes, but I can't really remember all the substitutions.
Overall, I like the way the deck is shaping up. And in general, I like the changes because the more the deck moves away from the staples, the less it looks like a "3 color good stuff + Spawnsire of Ulamog" deck. I always get a little bored of 3 color good stuff decks.
Thread | Draft
Many more changes in the past 48 hours as I continue to tune the deck. These latest changes have to do with making the deck less rampy and more combo-y:
-1 Coalition Relic
-1 Thran Dynamo
-1 Gilded Lotus
-1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
-1 Solemn Simulacrum
+1 Phyrexian Altar
+1 Skyshroud Claim
+1 Sprouting Thrinax
+1 Viridian Emissary
+1 Su-Chi
-1 Nostalgic Dreams
+1 Firestorm
-1 Rancor
+1 Zombie Infestation
And other changes which I forget which I swapped out:
+1 Viscera Seer
+1 Reaper of the Wilds
Notes
Other Notes
Thread | Draft
Here's another nice piece of tech I've found, tested, and am liking so far:
It's one of those cards that you never see anywhere else that just kind of works somehow with this commander, in this deck, in this format. It's basically used 2 ways:
This is another example of the deck skewing much more "combo-y" and less "rampy." As I keep on making changes, the deck is more interested in generating a lot more mana instantly instead of slightly less permanent mana over time.
Update
I've also been busy prettying up the OP and maybe get it ready to submit for primer status in a month's time (a month after Prossh has been released). I really like the deck and I think it works. I still have a lot to add in the "Card Option" section which I'll be filling in with notes for every single card choice.
Thread | Draft
I actually cover Mana Echoes in the Card Option section. I thought about it and may still put it in. I'm just not sure the deck really needs it. It already produces a ton of mana already and the mana you get from Mana Echoes is good with only Prossh and Avenger of Zendikar and maybe a few others. But it's a ETB ability, not a sac ability so it's a little more conditional. I could be wrong.
Thread | Draft
Also, if OP is still rocking out, I'd like to ask why there aren't more tutor effects for Spawnshire of Ulamog like Green Sun's Zenith.
Modern: Eldrazi CB,