The Power Hungry Repack

Because they’ve been in print for a while now, many of the Commander 2013 decks have dropped in price. Lots of folks are buying a deck as their entry point
into Commander and then wondering what comes next.

In a recent article I wrote on Yisan, Justus Payme commented that a Next 100 of a Commander 2013 deck might be really helpful for newer players that are
trying to figure out what comes next. That was a good idea, but I decided to modify it slightly. We’ll do a repack instead. That’s where you take a
product, and remake it, retaining some of the old cards and identity. In order to push the concept, I decided to make this a budget oriented repack.

There are a lot of reasons why a Commander deck built around mostly new cards from a C13 deck might suit your needs. Perhaps a friend bought the deck and
handed you one of the legendary commanders from it. Perhaps you bought it, played with it, and liked some of the ideas, but you want to experiment with new
angles of attack. Maybe you just want some ideas for your regular jiggering of the deck.

So whatever your reasons, welcome to a wallet-friendly repack of the Power Hungry deck.

The Jund color combination is often about sacrificing creatures for effects. Both Rakdos and Golgari guilds in the first Ravnica Block ran sacrificing
cards for various effects. Look no further than guild legendary Savra, Queen of the Golgari and Lyzolda, the Blood Witch. All three Jund legendaries in
Power Hungry fit that theme (Prossh, Skyraider of Kher; Shattergang Brothers; Sek’Kuar Deathkeeper). So here are the rules for my Repack of Power Hungry
for you:

1). I have to use a similar Jund theme of creatures and death for various effects.

2). I cannot add a single card that is worth more than a dollar here at SCG.*

3). The majority of cards will be new – I won’t be changing out ten cards and calling it a completed project.

That should make this suitably interesting. Cheap options, fit the Power Hungry theme, and really push into the card stock of Magic’s history.

Ready?

Power Hungry Repack/Shattergang Brothers

Abe Sargent

Test deck on 08-04-2014

Commander

Creatures (32)

Lands (39)

I decided to keep Shattergang Brothers and let the other legendaries go. Other than that, most of the cards I retained were mana or fun cards rather than
engines. After all, if I kept Power Hungry’s strong sacrifice engines (see: Carnage Altar or Goblin Bombardment) and strong death-triggers (see: Foster or
Fecundity) then we would have just a bunch of new faces in the same seats. Showing how deep these colors can be with the triggers and engines is a vital
part of today’s column. We can still unearth cheap triggers that break the board (Dictate of Erebos) or have a lot of fun built in with things like Vicious
Shadows. Meanwhile, we still have tons of sacrificial causes to embolden the hearth-fires of kitchen tables around the Magic-scape.

Because I am running Shattergang McGee, I wanted to ensure that I had enough creatures, enchantments, or artifacts to toss into the fire. So I often dipped
into the non-creatures for things. Take a look at cards like Font of Return and Seal of Doom. They can linger on the board and either be used for killing
or recurring, but they also can just be tossed into a Shattergang eldritch ritual to force everyone else to sacrifice an enchantment too. The same is true
of stuff like Darksteel Citadel. Normally, I’d steer clear of an artifact land due to its vulnerablility, and I still don’t want to push towards things
like Vault of Whispers. But the Citadel can’t be easily killed, and you can send it to the scrapheap via some Shattergang love.

I loved the flexibility of cards that could do multiple sacrifices. For example, take Hammer of Purphoros. Sure it works here–giving haste and having the
potential to occasionally turn a land into a more useful creature–but note that the creature can be sacrificed as either a creature, forcing everyone else
to Innocent Blood, or as an enchantment. Basically, the Forge God’s Hammer can turn a land into fuel for two of our Commander’s triggers. And, if pressed
into service, it can light up nicely too as either an artifact or an enchantment. Bonehoard fits the theme as a Mortivore variant that cares about our
(hopefully) full graveyard, can see the germ token sacrificed to Shattergang while not losing any speed as nasty equipment, and can be artifact fuel. These
sorts of double and triple angles of attack really suggested themselves.

So you can find cards that interact deeply with the guys in Power Hungry without breaking the bank.

Let’s unpack some of the cards included above.

I felt that a deck that was sacrificing as a Jund theme needed four major angles of attack:

1). Ways to sacrifice stuff.

2). Ways to use death triggers for things.

3). Ways to make a lot of creatures for the fuel.

4). Ways to use the ever-swelling graveyard.

And remember, every card added clocks in at a buck or less here at SCG.*

I’ve discussed a lot of these already, but let’s peer closer into each of these areas:

Sacrificing? Yup! I wanted some mana-free ways to sacrifice stuff in case I needed to do it quickly. Guys like Phyrexian Plaguelord joined Altar of
Dementia to assist in this (in fact, you might want to Altar yourself sometimes). Want to force a discard or six? Look no further than the manaless
sacrificing of Sadistic Hypnotist. As long as you are doing it in your main phase, you can easily churn a few creatures into significant card advantage.
And, of course, we also have some other engines here too. For one mana a pop, Perilous Forays will turn dorks into lands. Attrition will kill stuff that
might not be easily taken out with a Shattergang Edict. You can toss stuff to Mind Slash, Scorched Rusalka, or Krovikan Horror.

We want to use these deaths to manage more than just the sacrifice ability. Let’s get some triggers in there! Obviously, not everything can be a Dictate of
Erebos/Butcher of Malakir. But we still have lots of options here. First of all, we have a few creatures that accelerate growth as others die. Rockslide
Elemental or Scavenger Drake are great examples of this. Death becomes growth. We also have stuff like Rage Thrower and Harvester of Souls just running
around and getting fun triggers for damage and cards, respectively. Want to draw more cards? Deathreap Ritual and Dark Prophecy are here! Want to deal out
more damage? Vicious Shadows to the rescue! Look at Falkenrath Noble and Reaper of the Wilds for more in the damage/card drawing oeuvre with life loss and
scry. But the best triggers might be making more creatures, so we can sacrifice even more stuff! Golgari Germination, Pawn of Ulamog, and Ogre Slumlord are
going to keep up the pressure!

By the way, did you notice a small sub-sub-theme? We can steal stuff to sacrifice for our engines of death via cards like Zealous Conscripts, Molten
Primordial, and Grab the Reins. Steal them, smash with them, and then sacrifice them! Can you imagine how much fun it would be to steal someone’s creature,
smash them with it, and then sacrifice it to Shattergang Brothers, forcing them to sacrifice another creature on top of the one they just lost?

Only fuel makes fires hot. So if you want to impress the table with the sacrificing and triggers, you need to have some good fuel. What would work? Well,
obviously, tokens is the place to start. So we have stuff like Tempt with Vengeance (retained from Power Hungry), Hornet Nest, and Necrogenesis (which will
also fight against graveyard crap in other ‘yards.) And tokens aren’t all either! I wanted some ways to use and reuse creatures. In went Reassembling
Skeleton to pop right out whenever you have the two mana and the need. It basically adds 1B to the cost of your sacrifice outlets to use them over and over
again. In goes reusable stuff like Tuktuk or Murderous Redcap. I added some more cards to shore up our recycling via stuff such as Gleancrawler or Nim
Deathmantle who could bring back stuff that just died.

And then I saw a need for using this growing graveyard. We’ve discussed entrants like Bonehoard or Font of Return, but Twilight’s Call seemed like a great
choice for the deck. Bring it all back baby! In jumped Grim Return and Tempt with Immortality. We’ve added a sprig of reanimation to keep things real. I
also added a bit of fight to the deck to supplement Necrogenesis with Bojuka Bog and Nihil Spellbomb.

Finally, we wrapped up the deck with creature-oriented things where possible, such as mana-making (Farhaven Elf or Manaweft Sliver) and removal
(Reclamation Sage or Acidic Slime). I felt we should have as many creatures as possible in order to increase our chances of using them nastily. With so
many ways to either make creatures (or to be a creature), Soul of the Harvest seemed a wonderful late addition to the party to help shore up some card
drawing weaknesses. And with that, the deck began to finish up with a few cards here and there plus an increased consideration of lands. At the end, we had
our deck, all ready to go.

The result is a deck that’s just as synergetic as Power Hungry with a lot of tricks under the sleeve but with few duplicated cards. Every addition was on
the cheap. And sure, we could add in pricier additions like Skullclamp, Living Death, or Bloodghast right into the deck. In could go more reanimation
(Dread Return), splashier stuff (Insurrection) and more. I’d love mana rocks like Chromatic Lantern. But you know what? This deck works. And that’s enough.

*- Note that the prices are as of the writing and editing of this deck. Prices may shift after being written, and even from the point of publication until
you read this. Still, they should reflect cheap stuff even if they rise a bit in the meantime.

Creatures (32)

Lands (39)

Spells (29)