Commander Deck Of The Week: Riding With Greasefang, Okiba Boss

The artifact subtype Vehicle is relatively new in the history of Magic.  First appearing in 2016’s Kaladesh expansion, we got eleven Vehicles to play with, and one “Vehicle lord” you could choose as your commander to build a Vehicle-centric deck: Depala, Pilot Exemplar.  Thankfully, Depala also cared about Dwarf tribal and Kaladesh brought a bunch of new Dwarf cards, many with Vehicle synergies. 

The following year brought thirteen more Vehicles, most of them in the Kaladesh follow-up set Aether Revolt. There was one more potential commander printed then in Sram, Senior Edificer, but after that Vehicle fans didn’t get much support for a while. 

Then 2022 Happened!

Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty had a heavy Vehicle theme, and even had a Commander precon deck focused on Vehicles to further round out our options. Streets of New Capenna and its Commander offerings had some spicy new Vehicles, as did Commander Legends: Battle for Baldur’s Gate and Dominaria United. Unfinity even got in on the game with Clown Car. What more could Vehicle fans want?

Wizards of the Coast (WotC) wasn’t finished. Warhammer 40,000 Commander decks featured a whopping seven new Vehicles and two other cards that specifically mentioned Vehicles. Some The Brothers’ War booster packs featured one of thirteen legendary Transformers cards, all of which had a More Than Meets the Eye ability that let you cast it on the side where it’s a Vehicle.

Commander fans who want to build a Vehicle-heavy deck have a bunch of options now.  From the original Boros, we now have options in Azorius and even one in Orzhov, which is the deck that I myself have built and wanted to share with you today.  The card is so sweet, it’s even making waves in tournament formats by “reanimating” Parhelion II from the graveyard and smashing in for thirteen points of flying damage.  Do I smell a Rat?  You bet I do—it’s Greasefang, Okiba Boss!

Getting Greasy

I love that a deck built around Greasefang has a very Orzhov flavor that’s distinct from Boros or Azorius Vehicle decks, even though they’ll all run a lot of the same Vehicle cards. I definitely wanted to have some ways to execute the Parhelion II combo by putting it directly into the graveyard and then bringing back to the battlefield with Greasefang, but honestly I just like having Greasefang to bring back Vehicles that otherwise get destroyed on the battlefield.  Since The Brothers’ War brought a bunch of excellent artifacts to the Commander card pool, artifact destruction has gained in popularity, so having Greasefang available means that players may avoid pointing removal at your Vehicles, since you’ll be able to get them back with your commander’s ability.

Let’s dive in!  Or should I say, drive in!

Vehicle Shenanigans

The first batch of Vehicles I put in my deck, I call “shenanigans” because they do cool stuff over and above what the other Vehicles do.  Mechtitan Core is probably my favorite Vehicle just because I love the activated ability to create the Mechtitan token, a huge 10/10 creature with flying, vigilance, trample, lifelink and haste!  In a pinch, you can use that ability to save four other artifact creatures and/or Vehicles from mass removal, since when Mechtitan leaves the battlefield, all the exiled artifacts except for Mechtitan Core return to the battlefield. 

Surgehacker Mech and Skysovereign provide some additional ways to deal damage to creatures or planeswalkers, and Mysterious Limousine offers some interesting creature control options. I like using this to reset opponents’ “Voltron” creatures that might be loaded up with Equipment, Auras, or +1/+1 counters, though in a pinch you can use it to cycle through your own creatures or animated Vehicles that might have enters the battlefield triggers.

Peacewalker Colossus is quietly one of the best cards in the deck, letting you trade mana for crew costs, and is particularly awesome after a battlefield sweeper has killed all the creatures.

Other Vehicles

Here are some of the other Vehicles I’ve added to the mix. I particularly like what the Warhammer 40,000 Commander deck Vehicles bring to the table, especially Reaver Titan, which deals a whopping five damage to each opponent each time it attacks!  Its Void Shields ability protects it from a lot of commonly played artifact and creature removal.

Vehicles Matter

I love Mech Hanger, which gives us a backup to Peacewalker Colossus without costing us a nonland slot in the deck. I just recently added Sanwell, Avenger Ace to the deck but haven’t drawn it yet, so I’m not entirely sure if it’s worth its slot here.  I might want more artifact creatures to go with all the Vehicles to make its tapped trigger hit more often, but we’ll see.

Artifacts Matter

Slobad, Iron Goblin had me recall the existence of Priest of Yawgmoth, a lonely little common card that hasn’t seen print since Antiquities! What’s fun about Priest of Yawgmoth is that the black mana you get from sacrificing the artifact can be used for anything, not just artifacts like the new version of Slobad. 

Priest of Yawgmoth works great alongside Greasefang; you can use it precombat to get a big mana boost while putting a Vehicle in the graveyard for Greasefang’s trigger, or you can use it after combat to sacrifice the Vehicle that Greasefang reanimated, putting it back into the graveyard rather than putting it in your hand.  If it’s Parhelion II you’re sacrificing, that’s a whopping eight black mana you’re adding to your mana pool!

I’ve got around fifteen creatures with mana value three or less, and a ton of artifacts that count as historic, so Teshar, Ancestor’s Apostle provides decent recursive value.

Stock the Graveyard

Even though Parhelion II isn’t enough of a game-winning combo to go full-blown into stocking the graveyard, there is still enough value to be had with Greasefang’s triggered ability that I wanted some ways to get Vehicles into the graveyard.  I’m particularly excited about Argentum Masticore, since it’s an artifact creature for artifact synergies, and when you discard a card, you basically turn that card into a zero-mana destruction spell for a problematic nonland permanent.

I also really like Necron Monolith’s mini-milling on attack, which could mill a Vehicle for Greasefang, and if not, it could mill a creature or two and make some 2/2 Necron Warrior tokens.

Graveyard Recursion

I’ve added a few more cards to bring back cards from the graveyard, with the biggest being Brilliant Restoration, which gives us a recovery mechanism for a global destruction of all artifacts. Sun Titan is an excellent slow and steady value grind, while Imperial Recovery Unit is like a mini-Sun Titan in Vehicle form, which is perfect even if it brings the creature or Vehicle to hand rather than the battlefield.

Card Draw

Any good Commander deck needs a good bit of card draw, so I’ve added a fair amount here.  I like having it in creature form, like Midnight Reaper and Fell Stinger, so my card draw can also crew Vehicles. Mighty Servant of Leuk-o has been surprisingly good to me as an enormous 6/6 trampler that is often drawing two cards when it deals combat damage.

Monumental Corruption is a powerful new card draw spell from Phyrexia: All Will Be One Commander that can be turned around and used to kill an opponent if they’re at a low enough life!  This card has me thinking about adding some artifact lands to the deck; what do you think?

Removal

Removal is another important part of any Commander deck, and Orzhov has plenty of fantastic options. You might note the lack of Damnation, but I’d rather play with the more flexible cards like Damn and Path of Peril that Orzhov has access to.  I also slid Cathar Commando into the list for artifact or enchantment removal; as a three-power creature, it can crew a lot of the Vehicles, and since it has flash, it could even provide a surprise crew where an opponent thought they could attack me freely.  And since it sacrifices to destroy something, it’s pretty easy to return to the battlefield to use multiple times.

Interaction

Since so many Vehicles are large, I like Vault of the Archangel as a way to gain a bunch of extra life. Stonecloaker joins the graveyard control crew as a fun card that can enter the battlefield at flash speed and tap to crew a Vehicle before you return it to your hand to possibly do that again, maybe even on the same turn!

Mana Ramp

If there’s one thing I’m a little nervous about, it’s the small amount of mana ramp; however, I’m already overextending into mass artifact removal and didn’t want to add a bunch of mana rocks to make it even worse.  I do have a Darksteel Ingot waiting on the sidelines in case one of the newer cards doesn’t perform to my liking.

Spice

Drumbellower showing up in Neon Dynasty Commander shows that WotC loves Vehicle players and wants us to be happy.  One of the big drawbacks in playing a Vehicle deck is that you have to tap creatures to crew Vehicles, which can leave you more defenseless than you’d like on opponents’ turns, and Drumbellower helps with that.  Its two power can even help crew along the way!

Then there’s Halo Fountain, and looky there: you’ve got to tap at least one creature to crew a Vehicle, and when it attacks, it will often also be a tapped creature.  Halo Fountain loves having tapped creatures!  While I don’t think we’ll ever get to the point of having fifteen tapped creatures and Vehicles for the win condition (much less five white mana to activate it at the same time), the other abilities should be useful every turn, especially since you can tap a creature you just cast to crew.

Teleportation Circle is the last bit of spice I added to the deck. Looking past all the creatures and artifacts that have enters-the-battlefield triggers you can use again, you can stack triggers in such a way that the Vehicle Greasefang brings back from the graveyard can blink and remain on the battlefield rather than coming back to your hand.

The Deck

Okay, here is the full decklist:

Here are the deck stats from our friends at Archidekt:

What must-have cards might I have missed including in this deck?  Which is your favorite commander for a Vehicle deck?

Talk to Me

Do me a solid and follow me on Twitter!  I run polls and get conversations started about Commander all the time, so get in on the fun!  You can also find my LinkTree on my profile page there with links to all my content.

I’d also love it if you followed my Twitch channel TheCompleteCommander, where I do Commander, Brawl and sometimes other Magic-related streams when I can.  If you can’t join me live, the videos are available on demand for a few weeks on Twitch, but I also upload them to my YouTube channel.  You can also find the lists for my paper decks over on Archidekt if you want to dig into how I put together my own decks and brews. 

And lastly, I just want to say: let us love each other and stay healthy and happy.