Authour’s Note: This commander is brand new and of course this deck and Primer resource is as well. It’s only natural that the material contained within is a work-in-progress to be continually updated and tweaked as more experience is gathered.
Professional Analysis
Converted Mana Cost: Neo Kaalia’s cmc is WBR, which is an aggressively pushed cost for what otherwise is a 3/3 creature with two static abilities, and even more aggressively costed with an enters the battlefield effect stapled onto her that can generate card advantage. Without this effect, she is a very aggressive (but fair) commander, and with it, she is a force to be reckoned with.
Her Ability: The irony is not lost on me that Neo Kaalia’s power pales in comparison to the original’s. That’s to be expected however, as the original’s ability to circumvent mana costs is the single strongest trait a player can utilize in any given game of Magic. With that said, Neo Kaalia’s ability is still one worth pursuing as she can generate an up to plus three in terms of card advantage. In comparison to the original which needed a steady stream of extra cards to maintain it’s strategy, Neo Kaalia can get to the mid-game and even late just by virtue of it’s own ability keeping it fueled. This ability is not such an easy ability to manipulate however;
”When Kaalia, Zenith Seeker enters the battlefield, look at the top six cards of your library. You may reveal an Angel card, a Demon card, and/or a Dragon card from among them and put them into your hand. Put the rest on the bottom of your library in a random order.”
In the top six cards, we’re looking to be able to pick up half of those while shipping the rest to the bottom. That’s great, but the cards are specific – we need one angel, one demon, and one dragon specifically, we can’t just grab three angels and call it good! We also must be able to cast the cards, drawing extra cards we can’t utilize is an otherwise wasted resource. And since we don’t have a cheat mechanism built in to our commander, we must be weary of the mana curve of our deck. That’s not to say we have to exclusively curve out at four, of course, but we know that the higher the cost, the more weight those cards need to be able to pull in order to be worth a deck slot.
Other Commanders: I don’t believe there are any other commanders offering the niche Neo Kaalia is offering that she should be directly competing with other options you could choose. If you want Sneak Attack on a body, I’d recommend referring to my original Kaalia primer as this deck is far, far different from that.
Reasons you would enjoy this deck:
• You love playing with Miracles.
• You enjoy piloting a deck that can build longterm advantage from the beginning of the game.
• You love original Kaalia but are tired of your friends taking a ball bat to your knee caps.
Reasons you wouldn’t enjoy playing this deck:
• You prefer a shotgun blast to the face approach rather than an intrinsic value-over-time engine.
• You would rather beat everybody all at once and at the same time.
• You like decks that actually play more than one six plus converted mana cost card.
Incentivizing the Choice to play Kaalia, Zenith Seeker
So, if you’re reading this far, by now you must be wondering why you would ever pick this up when you could go Lab Man or Food Chain, or Flash Hulk or even just Eldrazi Sneak your way to victory. Hell, why would you pay retail on these angels, demons, and dragons when you could instead pay zero and get them with pseudo haste? The answer is because you don’t want to be obvious about what you’re doing in a multiplayer format.
Let’s be honest, when someone sits down at the table with a Tymna-Thrasios deck, you instantly know the tryhard alert went off around everyone. When original Kaalia sits down, you know she draws legitimate vile and malice from opponents that are afraid of the unknown. Meanwhile, our deck here can make use of a lot of “under the hood” style of optimizations. What does that mean, “under the hood”, right? What I mean by that is that this deck will be making use of a lot of basic card advantage theory to increase the average card quality you see in a given game. You know how you resolve a Brainstorm and then follow it up with a fetchland to create an Ancestral Recall? Yeah, those are the kinds of optimizations I'm talking about here. And here’s where the name for this deck comes into play (err...enters the battlefield :P).
Since our commander cares about our top deck, it’s not exactly a huge leap of logic to take on a miracle approach. Sensei’s Divining Top, Scroll Rack, in fact with the Rack especially you can generate immense card advantage with the commander by putting the angels, demons, and dragons from your hand back on top, drawing those new cards, and then blinking or otherwise resolving the commander again to draw those cards right back! And, as an added bonus there was probably some cards you didn’t care about that could get shipped to the bottom clear and out of your way! Then as an added benefit to go with all these top deck matters strategies, we can go back to “outplaying our opponent with Vampiric Tutor for Terminus to put them on tilt for the rest of the night!” That last sentence is obviously sarcasm, but the strategy is genuine. A one mana tutour to hard wipe all creatures to the bottom for also one mana when the two cards also fit well into our deck’s strategy anyway, is quite the potent game plan.
Scroll Rack & Sensei’s Divining Top: As outlined above, these are corre pieces to the deck’s miracles strategy, allowing me to cast powerful cards at an under-priced mana cost, as well as provide assistance in ensuring each Neo Kaalia trigger nets me as many usable cards as possible.
More to come with real time field play experience.
Hmmm. So I opted for the Krav/Regna package as they tutour each other and are found off the commander, while being not terribly over costed for the effect and a good sac outlet to help move through the deck. They also function just fine on their own without any further support. It was like a perfect storm thing. I'm not sure Emeria Angel is enough high iMPACT for the ninety-nine here (though angel of invention might be). I really don't think there's enough lifelink to proc resplendent angel consistently, although I did consider it pretty hard in the initial build. And if we're not gonna proc it, then it's just a 3/3 for three, which I'd rather have Emancipation Angel at that point since it resets our commander and is found off the commander.
While it's true Aurelia untaps exerted guys, is this a relevant thing? Or is it just win more? Typically I'm using Angel to blink Kaalia in fact I've never exerted it ever, and while Glorybringer would do a sweet impression of everyone's favourite red four drop, I question the validity of running a six drop to make our great five drop better than it already is, which is already pretty good. That said it does make for a better combat which speeds up our clock exponentially, and unlike in the original Kaalia, it both triggers off the first attack, and doesn't burn through our cards in hand. I think I'd like a swords package before I go in on Aurelia though.
I'd like to use Firemane Avenger too. I'm not sure how often battalion can proc, but I think this is just enough to stay under the radar and generating free Helixes is always pretty grand.
edit: Whoops, i missed the part about Sephara. I'm not even sure the deck wants her, tbh, but she is an Avacyn that can be alt casted in a deck that doesn't actually have a cheat mechanism, which isn't nothing. And she preorders for under $2 so if it doesn't work out with her, we can '86 her easy enough. Worth noting we have a fair amount of vigilance going on too, so we have a great < combat, post-combat here's a 7/7 lifelink that protects our whole board plan.
Hmmm. So I opted for the Krav/Regna package as they tutour each other and are found off the commander, while being not terribly over costed for the effect and a good sac outlet to help move through the deck. They also function just fine on their own without any further support. It was like a perfect storm thing. I'm not sure Emeria Angel is enough high iMPACT for the ninety-nine here (though angel of invention might be). I really don't think there's enough lifelink to proc resplendent angel consistently, although I did consider it pretty hard in the initial build. And if we're not gonna proc it, then it's just a 3/3 for three, which I'd rather have Emancipation Angel at that point since it resets our commander and is found off the commander.
While it's true Aurelia untaps exerted guys, is this a relevant thing? Or is it just win more? Typically I'm using Angel to blink Kaalia in fact I've never exerted it ever, and while Glorybringer would do a sweet impression of everyone's favourite red four drop, I question the validity of running a six drop to make our great five drop better than it already is, which is already pretty good. That said it does make for a better combat which speeds up our clock exponentially, and unlike in the original Kaalia, it both triggers off the first attack, and doesn't burn through our cards in hand. I think I'd like a swords package before I go in on Aurelia though.
I'd like to use Firemane Avenger too. I'm not sure how often battalion can proc, but I think this is just enough to stay under the radar and generating free Helixes is always pretty grand.
edit: Whoops, i missed the part about Sephara. I'm not even sure the deck wants her, tbh, but she is an Avacyn that can be alt casted in a deck that doesn't actually have a cheat mechanism, which isn't nothing. And she preorders for under $2 so if it doesn't work out with her, we can '86 her easy enough. Worth noting we have a fair amount of vigilance going on too, so we have a great < combat, post-combat here's a 7/7 lifelink that protects our whole board plan.
His is a mix of direct damage, life gain, reanimation, and blink. I disagree with some of his creature choices, but its curve of 3~5cc makes it easier to immediately putting Kaalia fetch to good use.
I'm right there with you that his threat suite is suspect, as well as his count being high. And there's too many high drops when it's not guaranteed you will see a cheat mechanism.
Still, that list is a valuable case study to examine.
I'm right there with you that his threat suite is suspect, as well as his count being high. And there's too many high drops when it's not guaranteed you will see a cheat mechanism.
Still, that list is a valuable case study to examine.
I've been testing Kaalia as a "draw spell" in command zone that benefits from blinks, much like Niv #4. If the deck's curve is low enough, one could play it like a Mardu aggro, then cast Kaalia to regain your hand and still have enough mana to drop threats right after. Scroll Rack (in your deck already) works quite well with Kaalia similar to Land Tax (Mardu has never been quick on lands).
I'm right there with you that his threat suite is suspect, as well as his count being high. And there's too many high drops when it's not guaranteed you will see a cheat mechanism.
Still, that list is a valuable case study to examine.
I've been testing Kaalia as a "draw spell" in command zone that benefits from blinks, much like Niv #4. If the deck's curve is low enough, one could play it like a Mardu aggro, then cast Kaalia to regain your hand and still have enough mana to drop threats right after. Scroll Rack (in your deck already) works quite well with Kaalia similar to Land Tax (Mardu has never been quick on lands).
Land Tax is a good call but I don't think we have enough basics for it? I'm on six, and that feels like an upper limit since I need to fix.
Do we really have enough good cyclers? We have to play threats as well, and a lot of these guys look really bad to cast. I suppose it would allow us to use Hollow One and maybe parlay into a sort of modern living end deck (keep scroll racking it on top until we could demonic dread or bituminous blast into it)? I feel like this is getting away from the deck itself though, but I may be mis-evaluating here.
Although perhaps Mortuary is a missed gem since we can stack the triggers post wrath with Kaalia on top, draw her, cast for three and get three threats.
Thought about it more, I'm playing Scroll Rack, Land Tax is obligatory. This is because you never play the extra lands, much like in Caw-Blade you never play the extraneous squadron hawks - they are the moving parts that lets you see all these extra cards.
Whoa. This is the very reason I almost put together rebel yell, not because it's good (it's not, it's mono-W, it's pretty trash), but these kinds of optimizations. I love this [nerdy] stuff, it's like turning your deck into a math equation. Says the math major, haha.
edit: I made those changes, including the uber tech Mortuary. Really loving the development thus far.
Land Tax is a good call but I don't think we have enough basics for it? I'm on six, and that feels like an upper limit since I need to fix.
Do we really have enough good cyclers? We have to play threats as well, and a lot of these guys look really bad to cast. I suppose it would allow us to use Hollow One and maybe parlay into a sort of modern living end deck (keep scroll racking it on top until we could demonic dread or bituminous blast into it)? I feel like this is getting away from the deck itself though, but I may be mis-evaluating here.
I think a good question to ask at this point is: What is Kaalia #2's direction, at least for this primer. Her versatility is what sets her apart from #1, but that also opens a lot of doors. Thus far we've decided that most tribal cards should be smaller and more castable, and aggro/midrange usually run out of steam unless there's a back up plan, like reanimation/blink, or hell, even a spellsling sub-type with Feather/Zada/Mirrorwing.
So things we're certain of:
1) Most creatures should be castable early on their own.
2) Some form of blinking/reanimation is needed. Maybe even sac outlets.
3) Library shenanigans maximizes Kaalia 2.0.
If we do the "cycling" route we could certain approach a reanimation path (with addition like Living Death, Patriarch's Bidding), and cards like Volrath's Dungeon suddenly has a huge benefit. We also have Angel of Serenity that could bring the cycling angel/dragon/demon back to hand for more cycling, and that's repeatable with some blink effects. The circle could go like this -> Kaalia fetches, cycle/discard/rack cards you don't need, reanimation to bring back.
Perhaps I should start a list on the EDH forum to categorize various shenanigans?
I'd avoid those two in particular due to their power level not matching the benefit by today's standard. I'd sooner uses Firemane Avenger. Blinding Angel perhaps? She could shut down other combat decks, though less useful against control.
Continuing from the other thread, perhaps Duelist Heritage would be a good compensation for Kaalia #2, given that most creatures will be smaller compare to #1. On the same topic, Archangel of Thune is a good creature buffer and works well with WotC's general direction for angel + life gain. [c]Always Watching[c] provides the defense and buff we need.
There's definitely a few walkers I'd love to support. Veil Liliana, Elspeth, Ajani of course, and Nahiri. I could find a justification for Tibalt too, but only if we add Heart of Kiran.
I made a couple of "stealth edits" too. Nameless Inversion and Crib Swap over Bolt and Terminate, since they are removal that Kaalia can fetch us.
How effective are Malfegor, Butcher of the Horde, Herald of Torment, and Master of the Feast? Malfy I can see its application via Kaalia's fetch, would Master of the Feast be a little to convenient for opponents? The other two are cheap beaters, I wonder if that's enough to warrant a spot.
I really like what you are doing here 3drinks! I'm writing up a more in depth response, but I just wanted to point out that Embodiment of Agonies could be a really efficient beater. It definitely fits more into my list because of the higher density of discard effects, but even for yours I think I would choose it over some of the other beaters you have. Herald of Torment particularly feels like it doesn't have enough impact. The combination of flying and deathtouch stand out as being strong. Reminiscent of Vampire Nighthawk.
How effective are Malfegor, Butcher of the Horde, Herald of Torment, and Master of the Feast? Malfy I can see its application via Kaalia's fetch, would Master of the Feast be a little to convenient for opponents? The other two are cheap beaters, I wonder if that's enough to warrant a spot.
Unlike in the original Kaalia, needing to cast our spells means I have to make concessions. Mana curve matters. But I need a clock too. So some high power low cost cards are a necessity. Yeah, I could opt for a Persecutor but at the four, I wanted something lower end and a three cmc 5/5 (or five drop aura that leaves a creature behind in a wrath) are better deals. Butcher is a good sac outlet that is a four mana 5 power which is doing more than Persecutor as well. I feel like having a CA generating commander gives me enough gas to utilize Malfegor as a wrath body that's fetchable (and two types so it can be my dragon or demon), just as I utilize Sunblast Angel. And the fact these all super benefit from my Heartless Summoning is just gravy.
I really like what you are doing here 3drinks! I'm writing up a more in depth response, but I just wanted to point out that Embodiment of Agonies could be a really efficient beater. It definitely fits more into my list because of the higher density of discard effects, but even for yours I think I would choose it over some of the other beaters you have. Herald of Torment particularly feels like it doesn't have enough impact. The combination of flying and deathtouch stand out as being strong. Reminiscent of Vampire Nighthawk.
I think the jury is still out on Embodiment of Agonies. He's a hard card to gauge in that he has a low floor and high ceiling, sorta like evaluating proliferate as a mechanic. I think it makes more sense in a deck where you're regularly dumping cards in the Yard, and this deck is not that, although Alesha would play it I'm sure. What deathtouch are you seeing? it's +3/+3, flying, and the one life loss. Being able to 2 for 1 your opponent is a great trick to have which is something the other choices can't boast of.
With the deathtouch I was referring to Embodiment of Agonies. Bad grammar on my part.
Can you elaborate on the "2 for 1" interaction you mentioned? I'm not following.
What are your thoughts on Rakdos, Lord of Riots? In my mind this can be a solid way to effectively trim down some of our costs. While that means we still shouldn't sleeve things like Reya Dawnbringer it means we should have a better chance at casting some of our 5cmc ADD twice per turn. It works better with perhaps a little burn of some kind, finding synergy with cards like Stormbreath Dragon or Demanding Dragon. Obviously since Rakdos is a demon, he's got bonus synergy with Kaalia. Generally, I feel that the more ADD we have that are efficient and have a significant impact on the battlefield, the better off we will be. Remember that Kaalia's ability means that anything that isn't an ADD is going to the bottom of our library.
Another card that sticks out to me is Mox Amber. Because Kaalia is minimally costed we should be able to use the mox to effectively ramp into our ADD, playing a 5cmc creature on turn 4. The nature of Kaalia's ETB ability means that she isn't going to be attracting spot removal like a magnet, thereby further increasing the reliability of the mox. Even if Kaalia is not in play, we have a lot of other supportive legendary creatures in the deck.
The 2 for 1 of Herald of Torment's bestow effect. He makes something huge then when you wipe or otherwise spot kill the creature it's enchanting, you still have a 3/3 flyer which demands another answer. Or on it's own, it's still a body you can easily cast on it's own, which is a pretty great spot to have.
I think Rakdos 2.0 is a bit of a trap, he plays better as commander than in the ninety-nine. When I tested him out in original Kaalia where I could get around his cast requirement, I found him underwhelming as he does not reduce coloured costs. At best, yes, I did resolve a Razaketh for just BBB, but that felt like his real hard ceiling. He's much stronger when he's deploying Wurmcoils and Ulamogs for 0. Without him, I'm still going to struggle to get to my six plus drops, and that's why I always aire on the side of caution with respect and care to my mana curve.
We have eight legendaries that would turn on Mox Amber, and seven of those eight are four plus cmc. I don't believe this to be consistent enough at all to justify that mox.
The 2 for 1 of Herald of Torment's bestow effect. He makes something huge then when you wipe or otherwise spot kill the creature it's enchanting, you still have a 3/3 flyer which demands another answer. Or on it's own, it's still a body you can easily cast on it's own, which is a pretty great spot to have.
I could see this having more of an impact in 1v1 commander, but in mutliplayer I still feel that Herald lacks the power we are looking for. 2 for 1 isn't good enough in my experience. We can agree to disagree on that one I suppose
I think Rakdos 2.0 is a bit of a trap, he plays better as commander than in the ninety-nine. When I tested him out in original Kaalia where I could get around his cast requirement, I found him underwhelming as he does not reduce coloured costs. At best, yes, I did resolve a Razaketh for just BBB, but that felt like his real hard ceiling. He's much stronger when he's deploying Wurmcoils and Ulamogs for 0. Without him, I'm still going to struggle to get to my six plus drops, and that's why I always aire on the side of caution with respect and care to my mana curve.
I think one difference between Kaalia 1.0 and 2.0 is that we will have a much higher concentration of ADD in the deck with Zenith Seeker. At least we should if we are interested in making the most of her ability. We should have multiple ADD in our hand at any given time. In theory, Rakdos should allow us to play two 4-6cmc creatures in the same turn more reliably. Kaalia fills our hand, and Rakdos helps those ADD get onto the battlefield. If we are able to deal 4 damage to someone, instead of paying 7RRWW for Stormbreath Dragon and Sunblast Angel we are just paying RRWW allowing us to get those creatures out on the same turn. And I still feel that 6cmc creatures should be the exception to the rule. 5cmc and lower being the sweet spot. I agree that Rakdos can lend a false sense of security and we should still be leery of anything 6 cmc and over. Rakdos is there for a chance of increased efficiency, not to cheat huge creatures into play.
We have eight legendaries that would turn on Mox Amber, and seven of those eight are four plus cmc. I don't believe this to be consistent enough at all to justify that mox.
I feel that Kaalia alone justifies the mox. She is cheap and doesn't draw hate. She should stay in play. If she gets removed, we get another trigger. For a zero cost ramp (especially one of the cheaper ones), i think the risk is worth it. Again, this is probably something that needs to be tested.
Next, I would like to voice a few things I've been mulling over in my head:
Thematically, I strongly feel that this iteration of Kaalia demands a solid ETB theme to fully optimize the deck. Kaalia, Zenith Seeker by herself is actually pretty weak. You get one trigger off her, and you might be lucky to dig up 2 or at best 3 ADD. Because we are running the more efficiently costed ADD (and we can't reliably cheat them into play), none of these hits are going to be game winning. By themselves, they are good value but not enough to win. You need to consistently field smaller threats to build up to a win. And what happens when someone board wipes? Without proper support that can be devastating even with Kaalia's trigger. We can just keep digging up threats but we need to be prepared for that inevitability. For these reasons I think we need to maximize and abuse these smaller creatures to their fullest potential. That's where ETB support cards come in. To get an ETB trigger we either need to cast, blink, or reanimate. I will post my revised list soon, but this is the primary theme of the deck. Creatures entering the battlefield. Furthermore, I think we especially need reliable ways to trigger our commander's ability as many times as possible. Aside from blink, that means being able to sacrifice her and recast her from our command zone. While this gets more and more expensive, it does work. Victimize, Diabolic Intent and perhaps Ravenous Demon or Demonic Taskmaster might help fill this role.
Second, I think we should address the Worldgorger Dragon combo. Unlike with Kaalia 1.0, Kaalia 2.0 and Worldgorger Dragon can win us the game, allowing us to put all of our ADD into our hand with infinite mana at our disposal. If we don't have a game winning ETB ability already in play, that should be easy enough to make happen. You can also just cast something like Aurelia's Fury using the infinite mana. I think you could bring this list into cEDH territory if you wished, just building around this combo. But I think you and I both don't want to go that route. However, I am not opposed to at least having the combo in the deck and maindecking a few support cards for it because it is on theme. I guess I'd just like to hear an explanation for why you aren't using it because I think it can enable a consistent win and it combos directly with our commander.
Third, I've been thinking about what darrenhabib said in my thread about the land destruction package (it's like "holding a gun to your head") and after thinking it through I generally agree. I predict that things like Winter Orb, Armageddon, etc... will end up backfiring. Mostly because we aren't running a reliable way to circumvent mana costs like we did with Kaalia 1.0. We also aren't necessarily running any high cost ADD that can win the game on their own once in play. But we still need some lockdown, and I think an alternative lockdown strategy that actually has a lot of synergy with Zenith Seeker is global discard and hand hate, especially if we ourselves are running a reanimation package. I don't yet know exactly what this looks like but cards like Sire of Insanity are what I'm talking about.
Some individual card possibilities:
Bolas's Citadel might have some potential in this list, especially if you are going with the hand hate strategy. We just need a source of lifegain. At the very least this gets rid of top-decked lands which is nice with Kaalia. It just strikes me that we can have some issues getting access to our non-ADD spells in an efficient and synergistic way. I think this deck prefers ADD whenever possible but there are some cards that just need to be in here and are not ADD. I think Citadel also has some synergy with Scroll Rack and Sensei's Divining Top. Probably something worth exploring.
I feel that Land Tax is an auto-include, and I am glad to see you have put it in your list. This is easily the most efficient way to concentrate the deck into ADD hits for Kaalia when you consider that about 1/3 of the deck is lands. Crucible of Worlds is probably smart as well considering this fact, especially if one chooses the discard strategy or even land destruction route.
Why no Dragon Tempest? I guess I feel that without Kaalia 1.0 who circumvents the needs for haste, we actually need haste enables more than ever for this iteration. At least if you plan on attacking in a competitive manner.
Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon strikes me as being an efficiently costed card that can put players on a clock. Something that other 5cmc creatures have a hard time doing. Worth some consideration?
Late edit: Panharmonicon could be pretty broken in this deck. It works very well with Kaalia but will get more mileage the more ETB effects you run.
Welp, that pretty much exhausts my thoughts for now. Looking forward to your response.
I'll be replying here (there's a lot to cover here and I've similarly got a lot of thoughts), but can I move all this discussion over to @mtgnexus where I've established the primer too? Based on the downtime of this site this m.k morning, I've got a few doubts as to the validity of this site's staying power.
I could see this having more of an impact in 1v1 commander, but in mutliplayer I still feel that Herald lacks the power we are looking for. 2 for 1 isn't good enough in my experience. We can agree to disagree on that one I suppose Smile
Perhaps I'm too old school with respect to card advantage theory. A 2 for is a 2 for is a 2 for, demanding a removal after being wrathed in order for your board to be fully contained is a big deal. I don't really know what else to say, if making one of your cards worth two of your opponent's isn't "strong enough", whatever that means, then that might be an issue of higher than is reasonable expectations. Not everything can be Villis, Broker of Blood in power level now...
I think one difference between Kaalia 1.0 and 2.0 is that we will have a much higher concentration of ADD in the deck with Zenith Seeker. At least we should if we are interested in making the most of her ability. We should have multiple ADD in our hand at any given time. In theory, Rakdos should allow us to play two 4-6cmc creatures in the same turn more reliably. Kaalia fills our hand, and Rakdos helps those ADD get onto the battlefield. If we are able to deal 4 damage to someone, instead of paying 7RRWW for Stormbreath Dragon and Sunblast Angel we are just paying RRWW allowing us to get those creatures out on the same turn. And I still feel that 6cmc creatures should be the exception to the rule. 5cmc and lower being the sweet spot. I agree that Rakdos can lend a false sense of security and we should still be leery of anything 6 cmc and over. Rakdos is there for a chance of increased efficiency, not to cheat huge creatures into play.
I think I see the issue though. You're looking into a magical christmasland experience where we play out our hand every turn and then refill every turn. I do not think this strategy is reasonable, nor is it supportable. The better (re: simpler) plan is less likely to botch when all you have to do is keep playing a threat or interaction and not run out of resources. There's a lot of ways to accumulate the value to climb into the mid to late game and even to protect yourself, than to dump your hand. Just because you can cast more threats, doesn't mean you need to. Angels, Demons, and Dragons are powerful creatures, how many do you need to deploy to the board? Are you trying to end the game in one swing, because if so you're better off with a combo or some type of one-shot application, rather than playing a bunch of threats.
I feel that Kaalia alone justifies the mox. She is cheap and doesn't draw hate. She should stay in play. If she gets removed, we get another trigger. For a zero cost ramp (especially one of the cheaper ones), i think the risk is worth it. Again, this is probably something that needs to be tested.
I don't think we can justify a card based on the existence of one other card, and call it ramp when it needs that card in order to perform it's role. That's the definition of a win-more card, and you'd be far better off with Mox Diamond (we need a higher land count), or Chrome Mox (which I think could slot in, albeit while conflicting with the rest of our other rocks). Mox Opal demands more artifact tribute, though goes in the same style of deck as Mox Tantalite (welder decks, which typically show up in Opal decks as cross synergy). With Mox AMber here, we're getting a mana off a three drop, four drop, and five drop which is the same range at which you'd be playing high end rocks that provide 2+ mana... Does this make sense?
Next, I would like to voice a few things I've been mulling over in my head:
Thematically, I strongly feel that this iteration of Kaalia demands a solid ETB theme to fully optimize the deck. Kaalia, Zenith Seeker by herself is actually pretty weak. You get one trigger off her, and you might be lucky to dig up 2 or at best 3 ADD. Because we are running the more efficiently costed ADD (and we can't reliably cheat them into play), none of these hits are going to be game winning. By themselves, they are good value but not enough to win. You need to consistently field smaller threats to build up to a win. And what happens when someone board wipes? Without proper support that can be devastating even with Kaalia's trigger. We can just keep digging up threats but we need to be prepared for that inevitability. For these reasons I think we need to maximize and abuse these smaller creatures to their fullest potential. That's where ETB support cards come in. To get an ETB trigger we either need to cast, blink, or reanimate. I will post my revised list soon, but this is the primary theme of the deck. Creatures entering the battlefield. Furthermore, I think we especially need reliable ways to trigger our commander's ability as many times as possible. Aside from blink, that means being able to sacrifice her and recast her from our command zone. While this gets more and more expensive, it does work. Victimize, Diabolic Intent and perhaps Ravenous Demon or Demonic Taskmaster might help fill this role.
Second, I think we should address the Worldgorger Dragon combo. Unlike with Kaalia 1.0, Kaalia 2.0 and Worldgorger Dragon can win us the game, allowing us to put all of our ADD into our hand with infinite mana at our disposal. If we don't have a game winning ETB ability already in play, that should be easy enough to make happen. You can also just cast something like Aurelia's Fury using the infinite mana. I think you could bring this list into cEDH territory if you wished, just building around this combo. But I think you and I both don't want to go that route. However, I am not opposed to at least having the combo in the deck and maindecking a few support cards for it because it is on theme. I guess I'd just like to hear an explanation for why you aren't using it because I think it can enable a consistent win and it combos directly with our commander.
Third, I've been thinking about what darrenhabib said in my thread about the land destruction package (it's like "holding a gun to your head") and after thinking it through I generally agree. I predict that things like Winter Orb, Armageddon, etc... will end up backfiring. Mostly because we aren't running a reliable way to circumvent mana costs like we did with Kaalia 1.0. We also aren't necessarily running any high cost ADD that can win the game on their own once in play. But we still need some lockdown, and I think an alternative lockdown strategy that actually has a lot of synergy with Zenith Seeker is global discard and hand hate, especially if we ourselves are running a reanimation package. I don't yet know exactly what this looks like but cards like Sire of Insanity are what I'm talking about.
Thematically? Is that the word you're intending here? Because I'm not building to a deck theme, I'm building to function as efficiency. Constraining yourself to a theme is to limit the maximum efficiency with which you allow yourself to brew with, it's a creative boundary, an imaginary restriction one places on themselves to create an artificial cap on their potential power level. Now, if we're talking function, then I recognize the commander has an effect that triggers on entering the battlefield, but I don't think that means we should over-commit to the idea of this. Panharmonicon may be a great card, but how many other ETB effects are we amplifying? Now, how many ETB effects are we amplifying that have a real effect in multiples (Dragon Tempest is a great card, but it also doesn't do anything in multiples, unless you played a dragon...which is our smallest creature type count). Of course it's nice to be able to use our commander's effect multiple times though, especially without paying commander tax, and to that end I believe Eldrazi Displacer is the stronger choice (which is in the deck).
That said, I did miss Diabolic Intent, I knew I was missing a tutour, and that's the one. I can't really play this one in the original since I care about keeping her alive, but this one is fine. That belongs here.
There's a case to be made for a couple more reanimation cards, or maybe at least just Victimize to add to the already robust suite. I'm not sure Ravenous Demon has a home though as it's only good with Kaalia online and otherwise locks us out of keeping her. This sounds win-more, but I won't throw the stamp down on that distinction yet.
WGD is a combo. Surely, but is a combo really good with a deck if it doesn't do anything otherwise for the deck? WGD itself doesn't even work well with the commander's ability since we never want to draw it, meaning we're on a strict Entomb/Buried Alive/Faithless Looting plan. This was the conclusion I came to when I added this combo into the Contract version of original Kaalia; it was clunky, and unsynergistic to the rest of the deck's game plan, even with the few cards it took to assemble. That's why I've walked away from my attempts at shoehorning it in to everything.
If we must pursue such an avenue, I'd wager a guess that Torment of Hailfire is stronger by it's virtue of being one card and it gives us a strong post-combat play that in future games, will make opponents think twice about how they block in the late game (especially about what appears to be "questionable attacks" on our part). This serves it's intended purpose, but additionally serves the purpose of acting as a bluff mechanism "do we have it or not?"
Now, to the "disruption stones" (wow, I like that nickname). Are we opposed to them because of the social pariah casuals will attempt to turn us into for playing these "unfun" cards, or are we legitimately at odds using these versus our strategy? Is it because these cards have recently spiked in price (static orb for example hitting over $20 USD) Because what I see is a deck that deceptively swims under the radar with an under-the-curve average cmc by comparison to the a-typical commander deck (a meta feature of my brews, "next level building" I call it) you expect to encounter. This has the effect of being able to squeeze more mana economy out of your deck under a disruption stone than the rest of the table while also being not as phased by an opposing disruption stone. At the very least, we're already breaking the symmetry of Static Orb just by our commander having vigilance (and we completely blow it out with Angelic Field Marshal). I don't agree with the idea that these cards aren't one card combos (winter orb too, we play enough rocks that, in conjunction with our lower average curve, that we can still function reasonably well while they are struggling to cope with it).
Bolas's Citadel: I find this is the new shiny toy that everyone wants to throw into every list but...why? We have a CA generator in the CZ. We are paying six up front and won't make that back until casting, on average, two threats. The third threat will usually be where we've made our investment back, and that's going to cost us about eleven to twelve life, three cards deep. This is all assuming we don't get stuck with a land clump on top (we still can't play extra lands through this), which would make for this wierd awkward moment.
Land Tax: So, I don't play this to hit my land drops, so much as Scroll Rack fodder. And since we don't over-rely on lands on the board, we can generally rely on hitting our triggers to keep the extra cards coming. Similarly, your perseption of my justification to Crucible isn't entirely correct. It's not becaus eof MLD or discard, it's because I've built a deck with ten dang fetchlands, two canopy lands, and two wasteland effects. I love to crucifetch, and there is a lot of virtual CA in the mana base. I hope the way I brew decks is becoming ever-so-apparent by this point.
Dragon Tempest: This is a good point, and I think it'd be worth including, although I'm thinking I prefer Anger and an Entomb...which would also bring me to Haakon, Stromgald Scourge (I already have nameless inversion and crib swap as removals Kaalia can fetch, and Haakon lets me machine gun key threats)...
Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon: You'd think so, but on his own, Skithiryx is still a three turn clock. And it doesn't work with the rest of our clock...I think he's a swing and a miss here, to my estimation.
Hey! Any chance we can get an update on card choice? Has anything from ELD or THB made the cut here?
Also - could you share a budget-friendly version of this deck? It looks cool to play, and I'm for sure interested in Kaalia, but I'm definitely not going to be able to acquire all of the cards in this list.
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Authour’s Note: This commander is brand new and of course this deck and Primer resource is as well. It’s only natural that the material contained within is a work-in-progress to be continually updated and tweaked as more experience is gathered.
Converted Mana Cost: Neo Kaalia’s cmc is WBR, which is an aggressively pushed cost for what otherwise is a 3/3 creature with two static abilities, and even more aggressively costed with an enters the battlefield effect stapled onto her that can generate card advantage. Without this effect, she is a very aggressive (but fair) commander, and with it, she is a force to be reckoned with.
Her Ability: The irony is not lost on me that Neo Kaalia’s power pales in comparison to the original’s. That’s to be expected however, as the original’s ability to circumvent mana costs is the single strongest trait a player can utilize in any given game of Magic. With that said, Neo Kaalia’s ability is still one worth pursuing as she can generate an up to plus three in terms of card advantage. In comparison to the original which needed a steady stream of extra cards to maintain it’s strategy, Neo Kaalia can get to the mid-game and even late just by virtue of it’s own ability keeping it fueled. This ability is not such an easy ability to manipulate however;
”When Kaalia, Zenith Seeker enters the battlefield, look at the top six cards of your library. You may reveal an Angel card, a Demon card, and/or a Dragon card from among them and put them into your hand. Put the rest on the bottom of your library in a random order.”
In the top six cards, we’re looking to be able to pick up half of those while shipping the rest to the bottom. That’s great, but the cards are specific – we need one angel, one demon, and one dragon specifically, we can’t just grab three angels and call it good! We also must be able to cast the cards, drawing extra cards we can’t utilize is an otherwise wasted resource. And since we don’t have a cheat mechanism built in to our commander, we must be weary of the mana curve of our deck. That’s not to say we have to exclusively curve out at four, of course, but we know that the higher the cost, the more weight those cards need to be able to pull in order to be worth a deck slot.
Other Commanders: I don’t believe there are any other commanders offering the niche Neo Kaalia is offering that she should be directly competing with other options you could choose. If you want Sneak Attack on a body, I’d recommend referring to my original Kaalia primer as this deck is far, far different from that.
Reasons you would enjoy this deck:
• You love playing with Miracles.
• You enjoy piloting a deck that can build longterm advantage from the beginning of the game.
• You love original Kaalia but are tired of your friends taking a ball bat to your knee caps.
Reasons you wouldn’t enjoy playing this deck:
• You prefer a shotgun blast to the face approach rather than an intrinsic value-over-time engine.
• You would rather beat everybody all at once and at the same time.
• You like decks that actually play more than one six plus converted mana cost card.
So, if you’re reading this far, by now you must be wondering why you would ever pick this up when you could go Lab Man or Food Chain, or Flash Hulk or even just Eldrazi Sneak your way to victory. Hell, why would you pay retail on these angels, demons, and dragons when you could instead pay zero and get them with pseudo haste? The answer is because you don’t want to be obvious about what you’re doing in a multiplayer format.
Let’s be honest, when someone sits down at the table with a Tymna-Thrasios deck, you instantly know the tryhard alert went off around everyone. When original Kaalia sits down, you know she draws legitimate vile and malice from opponents that are afraid of the unknown. Meanwhile, our deck here can make use of a lot of “under the hood” style of optimizations. What does that mean, “under the hood”, right? What I mean by that is that this deck will be making use of a lot of basic card advantage theory to increase the average card quality you see in a given game. You know how you resolve a Brainstorm and then follow it up with a fetchland to create an Ancestral Recall? Yeah, those are the kinds of optimizations I'm talking about here. And here’s where the name for this deck comes into play (err...enters the battlefield :P).
Since our commander cares about our top deck, it’s not exactly a huge leap of logic to take on a miracle approach. Sensei’s Divining Top, Scroll Rack, in fact with the Rack especially you can generate immense card advantage with the commander by putting the angels, demons, and dragons from your hand back on top, drawing those new cards, and then blinking or otherwise resolving the commander again to draw those cards right back! And, as an added bonus there was probably some cards you didn’t care about that could get shipped to the bottom clear and out of your way! Then as an added benefit to go with all these top deck matters strategies, we can go back to “outplaying our opponent with Vampiric Tutor for Terminus to put them on tilt for the rest of the night!” That last sentence is obviously sarcasm, but the strategy is genuine. A one mana tutour to hard wipe all creatures to the bottom for also one mana when the two cards also fit well into our deck’s strategy anyway, is quite the potent game plan.
1 Kaalia, Zenith Seeker
1x Ancient Tomb
1x Arid Mesa
1x Badlands
1x Blood Crypt
1x Bloodstained Mire
1x Cavern of Souls
1x City of Brass
1x Command Tower
1x Fetid Heath
1x Flooded Strand
1x Godless Shrine
1x Graven Cairns
1x Mana Confluence
1x Marsh Flats
1x Plateau
1x Polluted Delta
1x Prismatic Vista
1x Reflecting Pool
1x Rugged Prairie
1x Sacred Foundry
1x Scalding Tarn
1x Scrubland
1x Silent Clearing
1x Smoldering Marsh
2x Snow-Covered Mountain
2x Snow-Covered Plains
2x Snow-Covered Swamp
1x Strip Mine
1x Sunbaked Canyon
1x Verdant Catacombs
1x Wasteland
1x Windswept Heath
1x Wooded Foothills
1x Heartless Summoning
1x Land Tax
1x Moat
1x Mortuary
1x Necromancy
1x Alms Collector
1x Angel of Condemnation
1x Angel of Finality
1x Angelic Field Marshal
1x Archangel Avacyn
1x Bloodgift Demon
1x Butcher of the Horde
1x Demon of Dark Schemes
1x Desolation Angel
1x Doom Whisperer
1x Eldrazi Displacer
1x Gisela, the Broken Blade
1x Glorybringer
1x Herald of Torment
1x Krav, the Unredeemed
1x Linvala, Keeper of Silence
1x Malfegor
1x Master of the Feast
1x Regna, the Redeemer
1x Restoration Angel
1x Sephara, Sky's Blade
1x Serra Avenger
1x Stormbreath Dragon
1x Sunblast Angel
1x Whitemane Lion
1x Crib Swap
1x Enlightened Tutor
1x Generous Gift
1x Nameless Inversion
1x Swords to Plowshares
1x Unexpectedly Absent
1x Vampiric Tutor
1x Entreat the Angels
1x Entreat the Dead
1x Gamble
1x Grim Tutor
1x Imperial Seal
1x Living Death
1x Night's Whisper
1x Reanimate
1x Terminus
1x Toxic Deluge
1x Unburial Rites
1x Vindicate
1x Arcum's Astrolabe
1x Crucible of Worlds
1x Lightning Greaves
1x Mana Crypt
1x Scroll Rack
1x Sensei's Divining Top
1x Sol Ring
1x Static Orb
1x Talisman of Conviction
1x Talisman of Hierarchy
1x Talisman of Indulgence
1x Winter Orb
Deck stats for those that don't want to calculate those on their own: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/miraculous-kaalia/
Alpha changes: -1 Armageddon, Ravages of War, Angelic Overseer, Lightning Bolt, Terminate
+1 Static Orb, Land Tax, Mortuary, Nameless Inversion, Crib Swap
Alpha: Firemane Avenger, Radiant, Archangel, Emancipation Angel, Angel of Invention/Emeria Angel, Astral Slide package
Scroll Rack & Sensei’s Divining Top: As outlined above, these are corre pieces to the deck’s miracles strategy, allowing me to cast powerful cards at an under-priced mana cost, as well as provide assistance in ensuring each Neo Kaalia trigger nets me as many usable cards as possible.
More to come with real time field play experience.
Coming soon with real time field play experience.
Steel Sabotage'ng Orbs of Mellowness since 2011.
Given Krav, the Unredeemed and Sephara, Sky's Blade, how do you feel about cards like Emeria Angel that could generate flyers? Resplendent Angel is cheap and aggressive enough to go into this deck while providing support for Regna, the Redeemer. I believe Aurelia, the Warleader would untap Angel of Condemnation and Glorybringer after you exert them?
Shu Yun, the Silent Tempest WUR Voltron Control
Temmet, Vizier of Naktamun WU Unblockable Mirror Trickery
Ra's al Ghul (Sidar Kondo) and Face-Down Ninjas
Brudiclad, Token Engineer
Vaevictis (VV2) the Dire Lantern
Rona, Disciple of Gix
Tiana the Auror
Hallar
Ulrich the Politician
Zur the Rebel
Scorpion, Locust, Scarab, Egyptian Gods
O-Kagachi, Mathas, Mairsil
"Non-Tribal" Tribal Generals, Eggs
Hmmm. So I opted for the Krav/Regna package as they tutour each other and are found off the commander, while being not terribly over costed for the effect and a good sac outlet to help move through the deck. They also function just fine on their own without any further support. It was like a perfect storm thing. I'm not sure Emeria Angel is enough high iMPACT for the ninety-nine here (though angel of invention might be). I really don't think there's enough lifelink to proc resplendent angel consistently, although I did consider it pretty hard in the initial build. And if we're not gonna proc it, then it's just a 3/3 for three, which I'd rather have Emancipation Angel at that point since it resets our commander and is found off the commander.
While it's true Aurelia untaps exerted guys, is this a relevant thing? Or is it just win more? Typically I'm using Angel to blink Kaalia in fact I've never exerted it ever, and while Glorybringer would do a sweet impression of everyone's favourite red four drop, I question the validity of running a six drop to make our great five drop better than it already is, which is already pretty good. That said it does make for a better combat which speeds up our clock exponentially, and unlike in the original Kaalia, it both triggers off the first attack, and doesn't burn through our cards in hand. I think I'd like a swords package before I go in on Aurelia though.
I'd like to use Firemane Avenger too. I'm not sure how often battalion can proc, but I think this is just enough to stay under the radar and generating free Helixes is always pretty grand.
edit: Whoops, i missed the part about Sephara. I'm not even sure the deck wants her, tbh, but she is an Avacyn that can be alt casted in a deck that doesn't actually have a cheat mechanism, which isn't nothing. And she preorders for under $2 so if it doesn't work out with her, we can '86 her easy enough. Worth noting we have a fair amount of vigilance going on too, so we have a great < combat, post-combat here's a 7/7 lifelink that protects our whole board plan.
Steel Sabotage'ng Orbs of Mellowness since 2011.
The first deck I look at was by RJGiel: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/as-above-so-below-kaalia-zenith-seeker/
His is a mix of direct damage, life gain, reanimation, and blink. I disagree with some of his creature choices, but its curve of 3~5cc makes it easier to immediately putting Kaalia fetch to good use.
Shu Yun, the Silent Tempest WUR Voltron Control
Temmet, Vizier of Naktamun WU Unblockable Mirror Trickery
Ra's al Ghul (Sidar Kondo) and Face-Down Ninjas
Brudiclad, Token Engineer
Vaevictis (VV2) the Dire Lantern
Rona, Disciple of Gix
Tiana the Auror
Hallar
Ulrich the Politician
Zur the Rebel
Scorpion, Locust, Scarab, Egyptian Gods
O-Kagachi, Mathas, Mairsil
"Non-Tribal" Tribal Generals, Eggs
Still, that list is a valuable case study to examine.
Steel Sabotage'ng Orbs of Mellowness since 2011.
I've been testing Kaalia as a "draw spell" in command zone that benefits from blinks, much like Niv #4. If the deck's curve is low enough, one could play it like a Mardu aggro, then cast Kaalia to regain your hand and still have enough mana to drop threats right after. Scroll Rack (in your deck already) works quite well with Kaalia similar to Land Tax (Mardu has never been quick on lands).
What do you think of Astral Slide/Astral Drift in Kaalia? I mentioned in my thread that some lists I saw has a discard/cycling theme using Angel of the God-Pharaoh, Winged Shepherd, Eternal Dragon, and Archefiend of Ifnir, uses blink on Kaalia and other ETB creatures being the main attraction, playing political and handling offensive creatures being next.
Shu Yun, the Silent Tempest WUR Voltron Control
Temmet, Vizier of Naktamun WU Unblockable Mirror Trickery
Ra's al Ghul (Sidar Kondo) and Face-Down Ninjas
Brudiclad, Token Engineer
Vaevictis (VV2) the Dire Lantern
Rona, Disciple of Gix
Tiana the Auror
Hallar
Ulrich the Politician
Zur the Rebel
Scorpion, Locust, Scarab, Egyptian Gods
O-Kagachi, Mathas, Mairsil
"Non-Tribal" Tribal Generals, Eggs
Land Tax is a good call but I don't think we have enough basics for it? I'm on six, and that feels like an upper limit since I need to fix.
Do we really have enough good cyclers? We have to play threats as well, and a lot of these guys look really bad to cast. I suppose it would allow us to use Hollow One and maybe parlay into a sort of modern living end deck (keep scroll racking it on top until we could demonic dread or bituminous blast into it)? I feel like this is getting away from the deck itself though, but I may be mis-evaluating here.
What do we think of the aggressive cost echo creatures? Herald of Serra, Lightning Dragon? And I suspect Radiant, Archangel may be stronger here than I wrote her off to be (surely it's better than Angelic Overseer in most cases).
Steel Sabotage'ng Orbs of Mellowness since 2011.
Steel Sabotage'ng Orbs of Mellowness since 2011.
Whoa. This is the very reason I almost put together rebel yell, not because it's good (it's not, it's mono-W, it's pretty trash), but these kinds of optimizations. I love this [nerdy] stuff, it's like turning your deck into a math equation. Says the math major, haha.
edit: I made those changes, including the uber tech Mortuary. Really loving the development thus far.
Steel Sabotage'ng Orbs of Mellowness since 2011.
I think a good question to ask at this point is: What is Kaalia #2's direction, at least for this primer. Her versatility is what sets her apart from #1, but that also opens a lot of doors. Thus far we've decided that most tribal cards should be smaller and more castable, and aggro/midrange usually run out of steam unless there's a back up plan, like reanimation/blink, or hell, even a spellsling sub-type with Feather/Zada/Mirrorwing.
So things we're certain of:
1) Most creatures should be castable early on their own.
2) Some form of blinking/reanimation is needed. Maybe even sac outlets.
3) Library shenanigans maximizes Kaalia 2.0.
If we do the "cycling" route we could certain approach a reanimation path (with addition like Living Death, Patriarch's Bidding), and cards like Volrath's Dungeon suddenly has a huge benefit. We also have Angel of Serenity that could bring the cycling angel/dragon/demon back to hand for more cycling, and that's repeatable with some blink effects. The circle could go like this -> Kaalia fetches, cycle/discard/rack cards you don't need, reanimation to bring back.
Perhaps I should start a list on the EDH forum to categorize various shenanigans?
I'd avoid those two in particular due to their power level not matching the benefit by today's standard. I'd sooner uses Firemane Avenger. Blinding Angel perhaps? She could shut down other combat decks, though less useful against control.
Continuing from the other thread, perhaps Duelist Heritage would be a good compensation for Kaalia #2, given that most creatures will be smaller compare to #1. On the same topic, Archangel of Thune is a good creature buffer and works well with WotC's general direction for angel + life gain. [c]Always Watching[c] provides the defense and buff we need.
I don't mind adding some PWs for support. Sorin, Lord of Innistrad, Sorin, Vengeful Bloodlord, and Sorin, Grim Nemesis have the versatility Kaalia would appreciate. Ajani Vengean goes with your taxing idea.
Shu Yun, the Silent Tempest WUR Voltron Control
Temmet, Vizier of Naktamun WU Unblockable Mirror Trickery
Ra's al Ghul (Sidar Kondo) and Face-Down Ninjas
Brudiclad, Token Engineer
Vaevictis (VV2) the Dire Lantern
Rona, Disciple of Gix
Tiana the Auror
Hallar
Ulrich the Politician
Zur the Rebel
Scorpion, Locust, Scarab, Egyptian Gods
O-Kagachi, Mathas, Mairsil
"Non-Tribal" Tribal Generals, Eggs
I made a couple of "stealth edits" too. Nameless Inversion and Crib Swap over Bolt and Terminate, since they are removal that Kaalia can fetch us.
Steel Sabotage'ng Orbs of Mellowness since 2011.
Shu Yun, the Silent Tempest WUR Voltron Control
Temmet, Vizier of Naktamun WU Unblockable Mirror Trickery
Ra's al Ghul (Sidar Kondo) and Face-Down Ninjas
Brudiclad, Token Engineer
Vaevictis (VV2) the Dire Lantern
Rona, Disciple of Gix
Tiana the Auror
Hallar
Ulrich the Politician
Zur the Rebel
Scorpion, Locust, Scarab, Egyptian Gods
O-Kagachi, Mathas, Mairsil
"Non-Tribal" Tribal Generals, Eggs
Unlike in the original Kaalia, needing to cast our spells means I have to make concessions. Mana curve matters. But I need a clock too. So some high power low cost cards are a necessity. Yeah, I could opt for a Persecutor but at the four, I wanted something lower end and a three cmc 5/5 (or five drop aura that leaves a creature behind in a wrath) are better deals. Butcher is a good sac outlet that is a four mana 5 power which is doing more than Persecutor as well. I feel like having a CA generating commander gives me enough gas to utilize Malfegor as a wrath body that's fetchable (and two types so it can be my dragon or demon), just as I utilize Sunblast Angel. And the fact these all super benefit from my Heartless Summoning is just gravy.
I think the jury is still out on Embodiment of Agonies. He's a hard card to gauge in that he has a low floor and high ceiling, sorta like evaluating proliferate as a mechanic. I think it makes more sense in a deck where you're regularly dumping cards in the Yard, and this deck is not that, although Alesha would play it I'm sure. What deathtouch are you seeing? it's +3/+3, flying, and the one life loss. Being able to 2 for 1 your opponent is a great trick to have which is something the other choices can't boast of.
Steel Sabotage'ng Orbs of Mellowness since 2011.
With the deathtouch I was referring to Embodiment of Agonies. Bad grammar on my part.
Can you elaborate on the "2 for 1" interaction you mentioned? I'm not following.
What are your thoughts on Rakdos, Lord of Riots? In my mind this can be a solid way to effectively trim down some of our costs. While that means we still shouldn't sleeve things like Reya Dawnbringer it means we should have a better chance at casting some of our 5cmc ADD twice per turn. It works better with perhaps a little burn of some kind, finding synergy with cards like Stormbreath Dragon or Demanding Dragon. Obviously since Rakdos is a demon, he's got bonus synergy with Kaalia. Generally, I feel that the more ADD we have that are efficient and have a significant impact on the battlefield, the better off we will be. Remember that Kaalia's ability means that anything that isn't an ADD is going to the bottom of our library.
Another card that sticks out to me is Mox Amber. Because Kaalia is minimally costed we should be able to use the mox to effectively ramp into our ADD, playing a 5cmc creature on turn 4. The nature of Kaalia's ETB ability means that she isn't going to be attracting spot removal like a magnet, thereby further increasing the reliability of the mox. Even if Kaalia is not in play, we have a lot of other supportive legendary creatures in the deck.
I think Rakdos 2.0 is a bit of a trap, he plays better as commander than in the ninety-nine. When I tested him out in original Kaalia where I could get around his cast requirement, I found him underwhelming as he does not reduce coloured costs. At best, yes, I did resolve a Razaketh for just BBB, but that felt like his real hard ceiling. He's much stronger when he's deploying Wurmcoils and Ulamogs for 0. Without him, I'm still going to struggle to get to my six plus drops, and that's why I always aire on the side of caution with respect and care to my mana curve.
We have eight legendaries that would turn on Mox Amber, and seven of those eight are four plus cmc. I don't believe this to be consistent enough at all to justify that mox.
Steel Sabotage'ng Orbs of Mellowness since 2011.
I could see this having more of an impact in 1v1 commander, but in mutliplayer I still feel that Herald lacks the power we are looking for. 2 for 1 isn't good enough in my experience. We can agree to disagree on that one I suppose
I think one difference between Kaalia 1.0 and 2.0 is that we will have a much higher concentration of ADD in the deck with Zenith Seeker. At least we should if we are interested in making the most of her ability. We should have multiple ADD in our hand at any given time. In theory, Rakdos should allow us to play two 4-6cmc creatures in the same turn more reliably. Kaalia fills our hand, and Rakdos helps those ADD get onto the battlefield. If we are able to deal 4 damage to someone, instead of paying 7RRWW for Stormbreath Dragon and Sunblast Angel we are just paying RRWW allowing us to get those creatures out on the same turn. And I still feel that 6cmc creatures should be the exception to the rule. 5cmc and lower being the sweet spot. I agree that Rakdos can lend a false sense of security and we should still be leery of anything 6 cmc and over. Rakdos is there for a chance of increased efficiency, not to cheat huge creatures into play.
I feel that Kaalia alone justifies the mox. She is cheap and doesn't draw hate. She should stay in play. If she gets removed, we get another trigger. For a zero cost ramp (especially one of the cheaper ones), i think the risk is worth it. Again, this is probably something that needs to be tested.
Next, I would like to voice a few things I've been mulling over in my head:
Thematically, I strongly feel that this iteration of Kaalia demands a solid ETB theme to fully optimize the deck. Kaalia, Zenith Seeker by herself is actually pretty weak. You get one trigger off her, and you might be lucky to dig up 2 or at best 3 ADD. Because we are running the more efficiently costed ADD (and we can't reliably cheat them into play), none of these hits are going to be game winning. By themselves, they are good value but not enough to win. You need to consistently field smaller threats to build up to a win. And what happens when someone board wipes? Without proper support that can be devastating even with Kaalia's trigger. We can just keep digging up threats but we need to be prepared for that inevitability. For these reasons I think we need to maximize and abuse these smaller creatures to their fullest potential. That's where ETB support cards come in. To get an ETB trigger we either need to cast, blink, or reanimate. I will post my revised list soon, but this is the primary theme of the deck. Creatures entering the battlefield. Furthermore, I think we especially need reliable ways to trigger our commander's ability as many times as possible. Aside from blink, that means being able to sacrifice her and recast her from our command zone. While this gets more and more expensive, it does work. Victimize, Diabolic Intent and perhaps Ravenous Demon or Demonic Taskmaster might help fill this role.
Second, I think we should address the Worldgorger Dragon combo. Unlike with Kaalia 1.0, Kaalia 2.0 and Worldgorger Dragon can win us the game, allowing us to put all of our ADD into our hand with infinite mana at our disposal. If we don't have a game winning ETB ability already in play, that should be easy enough to make happen. You can also just cast something like Aurelia's Fury using the infinite mana. I think you could bring this list into cEDH territory if you wished, just building around this combo. But I think you and I both don't want to go that route. However, I am not opposed to at least having the combo in the deck and maindecking a few support cards for it because it is on theme. I guess I'd just like to hear an explanation for why you aren't using it because I think it can enable a consistent win and it combos directly with our commander.
Third, I've been thinking about what darrenhabib said in my thread about the land destruction package (it's like "holding a gun to your head") and after thinking it through I generally agree. I predict that things like Winter Orb, Armageddon, etc... will end up backfiring. Mostly because we aren't running a reliable way to circumvent mana costs like we did with Kaalia 1.0. We also aren't necessarily running any high cost ADD that can win the game on their own once in play. But we still need some lockdown, and I think an alternative lockdown strategy that actually has a lot of synergy with Zenith Seeker is global discard and hand hate, especially if we ourselves are running a reanimation package. I don't yet know exactly what this looks like but cards like Sire of Insanity are what I'm talking about.
Some individual card possibilities:
Bolas's Citadel might have some potential in this list, especially if you are going with the hand hate strategy. We just need a source of lifegain. At the very least this gets rid of top-decked lands which is nice with Kaalia. It just strikes me that we can have some issues getting access to our non-ADD spells in an efficient and synergistic way. I think this deck prefers ADD whenever possible but there are some cards that just need to be in here and are not ADD. I think Citadel also has some synergy with Scroll Rack and Sensei's Divining Top. Probably something worth exploring.
I feel that Land Tax is an auto-include, and I am glad to see you have put it in your list. This is easily the most efficient way to concentrate the deck into ADD hits for Kaalia when you consider that about 1/3 of the deck is lands. Crucible of Worlds is probably smart as well considering this fact, especially if one chooses the discard strategy or even land destruction route.
Why no Dragon Tempest? I guess I feel that without Kaalia 1.0 who circumvents the needs for haste, we actually need haste enables more than ever for this iteration. At least if you plan on attacking in a competitive manner.
Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon strikes me as being an efficiently costed card that can put players on a clock. Something that other 5cmc creatures have a hard time doing. Worth some consideration?
Late edit: Panharmonicon could be pretty broken in this deck. It works very well with Kaalia but will get more mileage the more ETB effects you run.
Welp, that pretty much exhausts my thoughts for now. Looking forward to your response.
https://www.mtgnexus.com/viewtopic.php?f=35&t=318
Steel Sabotage'ng Orbs of Mellowness since 2011.
Perhaps I'm too old school with respect to card advantage theory. A 2 for is a 2 for is a 2 for, demanding a removal after being wrathed in order for your board to be fully contained is a big deal. I don't really know what else to say, if making one of your cards worth two of your opponent's isn't "strong enough", whatever that means, then that might be an issue of higher than is reasonable expectations. Not everything can be Villis, Broker of Blood in power level now...
I think I see the issue though. You're looking into a magical christmasland experience where we play out our hand every turn and then refill every turn. I do not think this strategy is reasonable, nor is it supportable. The better (re: simpler) plan is less likely to botch when all you have to do is keep playing a threat or interaction and not run out of resources. There's a lot of ways to accumulate the value to climb into the mid to late game and even to protect yourself, than to dump your hand. Just because you can cast more threats, doesn't mean you need to. Angels, Demons, and Dragons are powerful creatures, how many do you need to deploy to the board? Are you trying to end the game in one swing, because if so you're better off with a combo or some type of one-shot application, rather than playing a bunch of threats.
I don't think we can justify a card based on the existence of one other card, and call it ramp when it needs that card in order to perform it's role. That's the definition of a win-more card, and you'd be far better off with Mox Diamond (we need a higher land count), or Chrome Mox (which I think could slot in, albeit while conflicting with the rest of our other rocks). Mox Opal demands more artifact tribute, though goes in the same style of deck as Mox Tantalite (welder decks, which typically show up in Opal decks as cross synergy). With Mox AMber here, we're getting a mana off a three drop, four drop, and five drop which is the same range at which you'd be playing high end rocks that provide 2+ mana... Does this make sense?
Thematically? Is that the word you're intending here? Because I'm not building to a deck theme, I'm building to function as efficiency. Constraining yourself to a theme is to limit the maximum efficiency with which you allow yourself to brew with, it's a creative boundary, an imaginary restriction one places on themselves to create an artificial cap on their potential power level. Now, if we're talking function, then I recognize the commander has an effect that triggers on entering the battlefield, but I don't think that means we should over-commit to the idea of this. Panharmonicon may be a great card, but how many other ETB effects are we amplifying? Now, how many ETB effects are we amplifying that have a real effect in multiples (Dragon Tempest is a great card, but it also doesn't do anything in multiples, unless you played a dragon...which is our smallest creature type count). Of course it's nice to be able to use our commander's effect multiple times though, especially without paying commander tax, and to that end I believe Eldrazi Displacer is the stronger choice (which is in the deck).
That said, I did miss Diabolic Intent, I knew I was missing a tutour, and that's the one. I can't really play this one in the original since I care about keeping her alive, but this one is fine. That belongs here.
There's a case to be made for a couple more reanimation cards, or maybe at least just Victimize to add to the already robust suite. I'm not sure Ravenous Demon has a home though as it's only good with Kaalia online and otherwise locks us out of keeping her. This sounds win-more, but I won't throw the stamp down on that distinction yet.
WGD is a combo. Surely, but is a combo really good with a deck if it doesn't do anything otherwise for the deck? WGD itself doesn't even work well with the commander's ability since we never want to draw it, meaning we're on a strict Entomb/Buried Alive/Faithless Looting plan. This was the conclusion I came to when I added this combo into the Contract version of original Kaalia; it was clunky, and unsynergistic to the rest of the deck's game plan, even with the few cards it took to assemble. That's why I've walked away from my attempts at shoehorning it in to everything.
If we must pursue such an avenue, I'd wager a guess that Torment of Hailfire is stronger by it's virtue of being one card and it gives us a strong post-combat play that in future games, will make opponents think twice about how they block in the late game (especially about what appears to be "questionable attacks" on our part). This serves it's intended purpose, but additionally serves the purpose of acting as a bluff mechanism "do we have it or not?"
Now, to the "disruption stones" (wow, I like that nickname). Are we opposed to them because of the social pariah casuals will attempt to turn us into for playing these "unfun" cards, or are we legitimately at odds using these versus our strategy? Is it because these cards have recently spiked in price (static orb for example hitting over $20 USD) Because what I see is a deck that deceptively swims under the radar with an under-the-curve average cmc by comparison to the a-typical commander deck (a meta feature of my brews, "next level building" I call it) you expect to encounter. This has the effect of being able to squeeze more mana economy out of your deck under a disruption stone than the rest of the table while also being not as phased by an opposing disruption stone. At the very least, we're already breaking the symmetry of Static Orb just by our commander having vigilance (and we completely blow it out with Angelic Field Marshal). I don't agree with the idea that these cards aren't one card combos (winter orb too, we play enough rocks that, in conjunction with our lower average curve, that we can still function reasonably well while they are struggling to cope with it).
Sire of Insanity belongs in this deck. Full stop, I can't believe I left him out. He's perfect, especially under our Heartless Summoning.
Bolas's Citadel: I find this is the new shiny toy that everyone wants to throw into every list but...why? We have a CA generator in the CZ. We are paying six up front and won't make that back until casting, on average, two threats. The third threat will usually be where we've made our investment back, and that's going to cost us about eleven to twelve life, three cards deep. This is all assuming we don't get stuck with a land clump on top (we still can't play extra lands through this), which would make for this wierd awkward moment.
Land Tax: So, I don't play this to hit my land drops, so much as Scroll Rack fodder. And since we don't over-rely on lands on the board, we can generally rely on hitting our triggers to keep the extra cards coming. Similarly, your perseption of my justification to Crucible isn't entirely correct. It's not becaus eof MLD or discard, it's because I've built a deck with ten dang fetchlands, two canopy lands, and two wasteland effects. I love to crucifetch, and there is a lot of virtual CA in the mana base. I hope the way I brew decks is becoming ever-so-apparent by this point.
Dragon Tempest: This is a good point, and I think it'd be worth including, although I'm thinking I prefer Anger and an Entomb...which would also bring me to Haakon, Stromgald Scourge (I already have nameless inversion and crib swap as removals Kaalia can fetch, and Haakon lets me machine gun key threats)...
Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon: You'd think so, but on his own, Skithiryx is still a three turn clock. And it doesn't work with the rest of our clock...I think he's a swing and a miss here, to my estimation.
Steel Sabotage'ng Orbs of Mellowness since 2011.
Also - could you share a budget-friendly version of this deck? It looks cool to play, and I'm for sure interested in Kaalia, but I'm definitely not going to be able to acquire all of the cards in this list.