Dear Azami – Storming Eiganjo Castle

Konda, Lord of Eiganjo

Aaron Boyce

Test deck on 12-04-2011

Commander

Creatures (28)

• 1 Solemn Simulacrum
• 1 Glory
• 1 Commander Eesha
• 1 Weathered Wayfarer
• 1 Windborn Muse
• 1 Eternal Dragon
• 1 Dawn Elemental
• 1 Sundering Titan
• 1 Pristine Angel
• 1 Duplicant
• 1 Reveillark
• 1 Stonehewer Giant
• 1 Archon of Justice
• 1 Knight of the White Orchid
• 1 Baneslayer Angel
• 1 Emeria Angel
• 1 Felidar Sovereign
• 1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
• 1 Kor Cartographer
• 1 Kor Sanctifiers
• 1 World Queller
• 1 Stoneforge Mystic
• 1 Linvala, Keeper of Silence
• 1 Wall of Omens
• 1 Serra Ascendant
• 1 Sun Titan
• 1 Wurmcoil Engine
• 1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite

Planeswalkers (3)

• 1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
• 1 Gideon Jura
• 1 Elspeth Tirel

Lands (4)

• 1 Thawing Glaciers
• 1 Temple of the False God
• 1 Emeria, the Sky Ruin
• 1 Tectonic Edge

Spells (64)

• 1 Ghostly Prison
• 1 Wrath of God
• 35 Plains
• 1 Sol Ring
• 1 Aura of Silence
• 1 Catastrophe
• 1 Planar Portal
• 1 Decree of Justice
• 1 Beacon of Immortality
• 1 Loxodon Warhammer
• 1 Lightning Greaves
• 1 Mind's Eye
• 1 Tithe
• 1 Condemn
• 1 Evangelize
• 1 Return to Dust
• 1 Austere Command
• 1 Oblivion Ring
• 1 Martial Coup
• 1 Expedition Map
• 1 Luminarch Ascension
• 1 Marshal's Anthem
• 1 Eldrazi Conscription
• 1 Sword of Body and Mind
• 1 Argentum Armor
• 1 Mimic Vat
• 1 Phyrexian Rebirth
• 1 Sword of Feast and Famine
• 1 Caged Sun
• 1 Soul Snare

An indestructible Commander is an interesting angle to pursue, since it lets you jump all over mass removal effects and actually use them to prevent creatures from blocking. Sure, your commander only deals three damage and thus takes seven such swings in order to actually kill an opponent, but a little Equipment goes a long way to covering that problem. Konda seems almost too fair, so I don’t mind adding one truly nasty card to lock a game up, because Worldslayer desperately needs a good home and actually has one, for once, with the Lord of Eiganjo.

I strongly dislike ‘locks’ like this, but have to go with my gut here and say this is the ideal home for the card, and Commander is cutthroat enough most of the time that a combo that starts with a seven-mana 3/3 is not exactly a scary one, especially when you have to spend a lot of mana on an equipment card and then get that creature through unblocked as well. What I do like is the ability to play mass removal in a mid-range non-control deck in the sheer quantity that this allows, and how this can let you get through a grind by exhausting the opponent’s resources.

If there is one thing I like, in Commander, it’s grinding out a long fair game but coming out ahead, and that is the direction Konda asks to be taken in as I look at your deck. The focus then will be on negating a large number of the opponents’ cards with just one of yours, building a game-state with one creature but a fair amount of equipment, and keeping an eye on recursion to make sure you always have that one creature to work with. You say your playgroup is fairly competitive, so I’ll be trying to build in a bit more ability to keep up with tough games, and likewise can add in Worldslayer in good conscience… but will also be adding a few more tricks to help Konda connect with it, when you’ve put the pieces together but haven’t managed to connect yet.

Working first with your manabase, I wanted to add to it just a little and reduce the number of basic plains you’re working off of. The goal later on will be to make it easier to get lands on the cheap, so we’ll be shaving one right off the bat, but this will also make it easier to turn on Emeria, the Sky Ruin even with fewer basic plains to work with, so we can replace a few land slots with more interesting and complicated lands.

Seven basic Plains get the cut here, and we return six lands in their place while leaving a slot for another card. Three of these lands will tap for white—Drifting Meadow, Secluded Steppe, and Mistveil Plains—while the other three will be utility lands that only provide colorless. Those three are Winding Canyons—what can I say, one of my favorite lands in the format and there should be no surprises to see it sneak into yet another deck—plus Strip Mine for a bit of added utility and Kor Haven to assist in your defense. If you have a copy of Vesuva already, another Plains can be cut for it and potentially assist in being able to break up Urborg/Coffers or even give you a second copy of Emeria online. I’m already going to be adding enough buck to your deck for the bang it gets that the suggestion isn’t as important to me, and similarly, your deck could shave six more basic lands for Windswept Heath, Flooded Strand, Arid Mesa, Marsh Flats, Evolving Wilds, and Terramorphic Expanse if you have access to those plus a Crucible of Worlds.

Without those very expensive additions, however, we’ll focus first on cuts to take out of the deck, and after we’ve added your replacement spells we’ll check how friendly or unfriendly the ‘creature’ game is going to be for you in the first place. Last, then, we’ll see where we can make additional improvements to your creature base, for those grind-y games the deck wants to play.

Unsurprisingly to you, or perhaps ‘at your suggestion’ if you prefer, all three of your least-beloved cards in the deck are going to get cut. What may surprise you more is that some of my least favorite cards here are going to be cut as well, like Beacon of Immortality, because I expect more than just some lifegain for that much mana and a card.

Cuts:

Aura of Silence — While the ‘hoser’ side is appreciated, the Disenchant effect will be replaced with more global sweeper effects instead, and becomes less important.

Eldrazi Conscription — I just don’t believe in this card in your deck, and would rather see another equipment card working the same slot instead. There are so many ways to spend this much mana and have it go very badly wrong, when it even resolves at all.

Soul Snare — Too situational, when you could have an instant-speed card that is more reliable instead.

Beacon of Immortality — Lifegain, bah humbug.

Catastrophe — Assuming you ever use this to blow up lands at all, I’m unhappy with this in-concept, and have replaced that aspect entirely with the Worldslayer side of the deck that at least has the good graces of finishing the game quickly from there. As a Wrath effect, you can do better, and will.

Decree of Justice — Too ‘good stuff’ and not enough good-for-your-deck stuff. Cut for something that will do what you want to do better instead.

Evangelize — Not as good as pure mass removal.

Gideon Jura — Not actually that high-impact in Commander, as I know from my continuing efforts to jam him in Commander and get anything even close to the impact he makes in Standard out of the deal.

Elspeth Tirel — A solid Planeswalker that still isn’t as good as Gideon Jura, and is too low-impact to be worth the cost. As a Wrath effect, you can do better yet again.

Commander Eesha — Good at wearing equipment, not that great at anything else besides blocking. Mass removal is better than blocking anyway, so we’ll look for a substitution.

Dawn Elemental — As good at blocking as Commander Eesha, but still not quite what this deck wants to be doing.

Kor Cartographer — Not enough bang for the buck. Cut for a cheaper effect that will help ramp your mana more effectively, and can even make a friend or two while you’re at it.

Kor Sanctifiers — To be replaced with Devout Witness, which should help with the elements of removal you’re looking for by upgrading it to repeatable but instant-speed.

Pristine Angel — Without actually that many instants in your deck, Pristine Angel is blocked too easily, and is just a seven-mana 4/4 flier.

Argentum Armor — Too expensive for not enough impact; for that level of expense you can try and just hit everything at the same time, which is Worldslayer’s job.

Planar Portal — Too much mana for not enough effect, when you could leverage a cheaper card to bigger benefit.

Sword of Body and Mind — Not actually very high-impact in Commander.

Sundering Titan — Another ‘good stuff’ card that doesn’t actually do very much good for you, another easy cut and replacement for a cheaper effect.

Additions:

Worldslayer — Is it ‘too cute’ to work? Sure, some of the time it’s just a not-very-good card. Without your commander holding this particular sword you don’t even want it at all, and one disenchant effect is enough to spoil an awful lot of work. One blocker from each player or any Maze of Ith anywhere likewise counteracts any possibility, which was part of the argument behind adding a second Strip Mine effect. But after you get past those negatives, if it’s a trick you pull off once it’s a trick that will take the game over entirely and end it quickly, and you can add a few other support cards to pull off making it work.

Scroll Rack — The ‘upgrade’ to Planar Portal, especially alongside some of the other cards that will follow that either fill your hand or repeatedly shuffle. High-power card selection that can turn things like Weathered Wayfarer into pure card advantage and improve your draw.

Relic of Progenitus — A little bit of graveyard hate, to deal with a few sides of the game that white is typically not very good at. Graveyard recursion is a big aspect of commander, and while you do have some cards that utilize your graveyard as an active zone, it’s not nearly as important to you as it will be to them. A cheap cantrip that covers that base very well indeed is worth adding.

Sword of Light and Shadow, Sword of Fire and Ice — Yes, that is a lot of buck for your bang, but both are major Commander staples that will earn their keep time and again. Sword of Light and Shadow is for those grind-y games and can help recover board position after your numerous Wrath effects, while Sword of Fire and Ice is there for card draw and high impact. Between the three swords you have all five colors of protection, to help leverage Konda getting across for damage with benefits, and can potentially help sneak in that one critical Worldslayer hit.

Yes, you could stick with the new swords only and have Sword of Body and Mind plus Sword of War and Peace, and none of these swords are ‘bad.’ However, these are just so far ahead of the others that they are worth it, and add new strategic dimensions entirely. If you have to choose only one, Sword of Light and Shadow plus Sword of War and Peace still covers many of the same needs even if it doesn’t grant protection from blue… but the recursive effect of Sword of Light and Shadow is the most impactful side of the equipment game you could be playing given your deck’s strategy.

Land Tax — Low cost, a pile of card advantage and a great way to make sure you don’t miss land drops. Add it to Scroll Rack and the game becomes very hard to lose, as you will naturally draw the same number of cards as three opponents normally do each turn, plus one to get ahead with.

Oath of Lieges — Another way to make sure your basic Plains count doesn’t suffer, and that a player ramping away doesn’t take over the game entirely. I keep hearing that Primeval Titan is unbeatable even if you kill it immediately, and it’s true it is very good, but with cards like Oath of Lieges to help an entire table play catch-up when one person ramps, the game should never run too far away in the first place.

Swords to Plowshares, Path to Exile — High impact removal at the lowest cost possible, and with the highest impact at the right speed. Condemn is good for tucking an opposing commander, but Path and Plow are for handling nasty Eldrazi problems or the surprise Blightsteel Colossus predicament as well as routine problem-solving. I dislike too much spot removal in Commander, actually, but think with the existing focus on sweepers a little pinpoint removal will go a long way.

Akroma’s Vengeance, Planar Cleansing — Board-wiping Wraths that handle not just the creatures in play but every other problem that ails ye. Planar Cleansing even has the good manners of nailing enemy Planeswalkers, which gives you another way to control those outside of the attack phase.

Day of Judgment — Yes, it’s just a boring Wrath. Boring Wraths, however, do interesting things with Konda as your commander, earning it a slot.

Enlightened Tutor — With solid artifacts and enchantments to look for, both with equipment and things like Land Tax, Enlightened Tutor will earn a lot of mileage for you. One plains plus one Enlightened Tutor is actually a good opening hand in your deck thanks to the ability to get Land Tax and right back into the game, and with other key winners like Mind’s Eye on the list of targets it has a very high impact.

Reverent Mantra — Free spells are good, and Reverent Mantra can sneak through a Konda hit with Worldslayer or even just generate a little tempo by saving a key threat after you’ve tapped out for it.

We have now just five slots left for creatures, and a fairly hostile environment for them to play in. We still want to have access to some artifact and enchantment removal, but otherwise are trying to focus on using these remaining slots to defend your major threats once they’re in play, or otherwise fit into the Wrath plan / provide some more cardboard to work with after you yourself have been Wrathing. With that in mind, then, the following five completed the deck:

Twilight Shepherd — Between the Persist and the comes-into-play effect, Twilight Shepherd helps you keep a relevant threat in play between your own wrath effects and those your opponents will be packing.

Devoted Caretaker — Helps to protect your creatures and your equipment from removal. Decent protection at a low cost, to keep threats on the table and prevent the opponents from breaking up equipment-powered attacks.

Eight-and-a-half-Tails — Another solid way to sneak Konda across the battlefield, as well as protect equipment from destruction that would break up your attack. A cheap threat that can control the board with just a little mana, either on offense or defense.

Devout Witness — Repeating artifact or enchantment kill, stapled to a Spellshaper. Unlike Kor Sanctifiers, this is able to work at instant speed, and while it can be prevented from working in the first place by removal the tradeoff is covered by the increased ability to remove permanents of this sort from the board en mass in the first place.

Myojin of Cleansing Fire — Another solid Wrath effect, as well as another indestructible attacker to work with the equipment + Wraths side of the deck.

Putting it all together, you have a bit of a controlling stance in a non-control deck, which controls the board only enough to get its own attacks through. Why prevent creatures from blocking, when you can just kill them indiscriminately? The focus is on getting through the early turns and building up some cards to work with while the manabase develops on the cheap, then using the middle span of the game to exhaust the opponents of their relevant cards by wiping the board time and time again. Meanwhile, the threats you are using are augmented by cards you aren’t focusing on killing, to expand their immediate impact. For those opponents who aren’t playing fair there are tricks like Strip Mine + Sun Titan, and at the extreme end Worldslayer to reset the board entirely or actually just close out the game attached to Konda himself.

The final decklist is as follows:

Konda, Lord of Eiganjo

Sean McKeown

Test deck on 12-04-2011

Commander

Creatures (27)

• 1 Eight-and-a-Half-Tails
• 1 Solemn Simulacrum
• 1 Myojin of Cleansing Fire
• 1 Devoted Caretaker
• 1 Glory
• 1 Weathered Wayfarer
• 1 Windborn Muse
• 1 Eternal Dragon
• 1 Duplicant
• 1 Devout Witness
• 1 Reveillark
• 1 Stonehewer Giant
• 1 Twilight Shepherd
• 1 Archon of Justice
• 1 Knight of the White Orchid
• 1 Baneslayer Angel
• 1 Emeria Angel
• 1 Felidar Sovereign
• 1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
• 1 World Queller
• 1 Stoneforge Mystic
• 1 Linvala, Keeper of Silence
• 1 Wall of Omens
• 1 Serra Ascendant
• 1 Sun Titan
• 1 Wurmcoil Engine
• 1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite

Planeswalkers (1)

• 1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant

Lands (10)

• 1 Strip Mine
• 1 Thawing Glaciers
• 1 Kor Haven
• 1 Drifting Meadow
• 1 Temple of the False God
• 1 Secluded Steppe
• 1 Winding Canyons
• 1 Mistveil Plains
• 1 Emeria, the Sky Ruin
• 1 Tectonic Edge

Spells (61)

• 1 Ghostly Prison
• 1 Wrath of God
• 28 Plains
• 1 Enlightened Tutor
• 1 Scroll Rack
• 1 Swords to Plowshares
• 1 Land Tax
• 1 Sol Ring
• 1 Akroma's Vengeance
• 1 Sword of Light and Shadow
• 1 Sword of Fire and Ice
• 1 Loxodon Warhammer
• 1 Lightning Greaves
• 1 Worldslayer
• 1 Mind's Eye
• 1 Tithe
• 1 Oath of Lieges
• 1 Reverent Mantra
• 1 Condemn
• 1 Return to Dust
• 1 Austere Command
• 1 Oblivion Ring
• 1 Relic of Progenitus
• 1 Martial Coup
• 1 Path to Exile
• 1 Planar Cleansing
• 1 Day of Judgment
• 1 Expedition Map
• 1 Luminarch Ascension
• 1 Marshal's Anthem
• 1 Mimic Vat
• 1 Phyrexian Rebirth
• 1 Sword of Feast and Famine
• 1 Caged Sun

As always, for your participation in this week’s Dear Azami, you will find in your email box a $20 coupon to the Star City Games online store, to potentially help pay for any replacements and substitutions you might want to make. The cards I suggested for addition to the deck have the following prices, for your consideration:

I’m ‘over’ my need to not talk about Black decks anymore, and am back to having fun with Commander with goofy decks when I am not busy being politically active at Occupy Wall Street down at Zuccotti Park. StarCityGames.com has a Black Friday / Cyber Monday Sale still happening right now that is great for both Legacy players and Commander players, and I for one have taken the opportunity to increase my Revised dual land count in hopes of eventually being able to put down a real-life copy of my online Animar deck and see how it stands up to tough fights in the real world. Feel free to partake if you are so inclined, and if anyone wants to send me a Christmas present I am only missing Tundra, Savannah, and Underground Sea from my stock of duals for Commander… not that anyone will, but hey, you never know.

In the meantime, I’m happy to take whatever anyone wants to send me for next week without worrying about color restrictions. And am looking forward to seeing what new and interesting concoctions are floating around out there, after all, protesting is hard and I could use a good laugh these days!

— Sean McKeown

Want to submit a deck for consideration to Dear Azami? We’re always accepting deck submission to consider for use in a future article, like The Sack’s Godo, Bandit Warlord deck or StÃ¥le’s Karador, Ghost Chieftan deck. Only one deck submission will be chosen per article, but being selected for the next edition of Dear Azami includes not just deck advice but also a $20 coupon to the StarCityGames.com Store!

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