Emry Stax/Combo - Tuned EDH

Commander / EDH Artifact Combo Infinite Combo Mono-Blue Stax

DoctorFireFarts

Lands (35)

• 1x Academy Ruins
• 1x Arch of Orazca
• 1x Blinkmoth Nexus
• 1x Buried Ruin
• 1x Castle Vantress
• 1x Darksteel Citadel
• 1x Detection Tower
• 1x Flooded Strand
• 1x Ghost Quarter
• 1x Inventors' Fair
• 14x Island
• 1x Minamo, School at Water's Edge
• 1x Misty Rainforest
• 1x Mystic Sanctuary
• 1x Phyrexia's Core
• 1x Polluted Delta
• 1x Prismatic Vista
• 1x Scalding Tarn
• 1x Scavenger Grounds
• 1x Seat of the Synod
• 1x Strip Mine
• 1x Tectonic Edge

Cost Reducers (5)

• 1x Etherium Sculptor
• 1x Foundry Inspector
• 1x Helm of Awakening
• 1x Jhoira's Familiar
• 1x Semblance Anvil

Counter Spells (5)

• 1x Narset's Reversal
• 1x Negate
• 1x Pact of Negation
• 1x Spell Pierce
• 1x Swan Song

Combo Pieces (11)

• 1x Aetherflux Reservoir
• 1x Chakram Retriever
• 1x Grinding Station
• 1x Jace, Wielder of Mysteries
• 1x Junk Diver
• 1x Krark-Clan Ironworks
• 1x Laboratory Maniac
• 1x Mirran Spy
• 1x Myr Retriever
• 1x Scrap Trawler
• 1x Workshop Assistant

Eggs/Utility (9)

• 1x Lotus Petal
• 1x Mishra's Bauble
• 1x Mox Amber
• 1x Mox Opal
• 1x Ornithopter
• 1x Phyrexian Walker
• 1x Tormod's Crypt
• 1x Urza's Bauble
• 1x Welding Jar

Stax (7)

• 1x Defense Grid
• 1x Ensnaring Bridge
• 1x Rhystic Study
• 1x Smokestack
• 1x Static Orb
• 1x Tangle Wire
• 1x Winter Orb

Mana Rocks (5)

• 1x Commander's Sphere
• 1x Darksteel Ingot
• 1x Gilded Lotus
• 1x Mana Vault
• 1x Sol Ring

Commander (1)

Card Draw (9)

• 1x Aether Spellbomb
• 1x Alchemist's Vial
• 1x Chromatic Sphere
• 1x Chromatic Star
• 1x Conjurer's Bauble
• 1x Golden Egg
• 1x Ichor Wellspring
• 1x Mind Stone
• 1x Vedalken Archmage

Utility (9)

• 1x Arcbound Ravager
• 1x Extruder
• 1x Mystic Forge
• 1x Sai, Master Thopterist
• 1x Sensei's Divining Top
• 1x Shimmer Myr
• 1x Spellskite
• 1x Spine of Ish Sah
• 1x Tezzeret the Seeker

Tutors (4)

• 1x Fabricate
• 1x Kuldotha Forgemaster
• 1x Mystical Tutor
• 1x Whir of Invention

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This is my Emry deck as it stands, but I am open to suggestions as I continuously tune it based on experience. The deck is aimed to be "sweaty but no cEDH", in that it has the potential to combo off as early as turn 2, but the chances are extremely slim and I am not running most of the major (expensive) cEDH staples like LED and Mana Vault/Crypt.

The goal of the deck is simply to go infinite through a variety of combos which I will list below, all of which involve graveyard recursion, but not all of them involve Emry herself. In order to control the board while we search for our puzzle pieces, however, we have a variety of Stax pieces that we can make very one-sided with access to a sac outlet. We do this by playing out our stax, then saccing them before our untap phase, and then replaying them with Emry. This is particularly nice when recurring Tangle Wire since it will always have 4 fade counters on it. Pair that with a Static Orb and your opponents will likely not be doing much of anything at all for a while.

Why Not Just Play Urza?

The answer is a combination of reasons, but the main ones are as follows:

Arch Enemy Effect

Urza tends to draw a lot of hate in my meta, as people have seen how he can suddenly just take over the table with mana advantage and an outlet for infinite. He has become a "kill on site" commander, and draws most attacks and interaction from the other 3 players

Stax Synergy With Emry

While Urza is able to tap down your Static Orb and make some other stax pieces one-sided, I find that Emry being able to recur a stax piece that you sac before your untap step is a bit more effective when things are not fully going your way. Not to mention the stronger synergy with Tangle Wire allowing you to always have 4 fade counters on it, so if you are able to accrue mana you can lock everyone else out of the game with a Winter orb or Static Orb keeping things tapped, and then Tangle Wire tapping down the remaining permanents.

Resilience

If your KCI gets removed while piloting Urza, you may be struggling to get it back onto the battlefield before someone else can exile your graveyard. Having the ability to recur an artifact stapled to your commander is a huge saving grace in these situations and prevents the necessity of Academy Ruins or Buried Ruin bring in your hand. It's also incredibly useful when just trying to control the board. Someone might be able to answer your Ensnaring Bridge the first time around, but if you have a sac outlet or they can't exile it in the first place, the bridge is here to stay.

The Combos

There are a variety of ways to combo off in this deck, but just about every single method will require the use of your graveyard which means you should hold up countermagic for things like Rest in Peace. Single target graveyard wipes can be worked around with a Scrap Trawler or Shimmer Myr allowing you to get an important piece out of the yard in response to the graveyard hate, but static effects pose a much bigger problem since our only source of permanent removal comes from Spine of Ish Sah.

Sac, Recur, Repeat

One of the primary ways we are going to combo off in this deck is by using Scrap Trawler to recur artifacts that we are sacrificing to any of our sacrifice outlets which are as follows:

Arcbound Ravager

Krark-Clan Ironworks

Extruder

Grinding Station

Phyrexia's Core works in certain circumstances as a way to sac a Stax piece, but is not used for combo.

With Scrap Trawler out, and either enough mana rocks to have a net positive mana effect (i.e. saccing sol ring after floating two mana, returning Mox Amber/Opal floating one blue mana), or enough cost reducers to make it possible to infinitely recur the loop, we can typically either draw through our deck until we find a win condition, use Grinding Station to mill everyone else out, or hit everyone with our favorite death star, Aetherflux Reservoir. Scrap trawler is not necessary as long as we can cast 2 different recursion creatures such as My Retriever and Junk Diver effectively enough, but it is preferred for this route.

Tap, Untap, Tap, Untap...

Using an effect such as Chakram Retriever or Mirran Spy and any artifact that we can repeatedly cast, we can hit everyone with Aetherflux reservoir quickly. This is part of how we achieve the fabled There are a few other ways we can utilize untapping Emry to combo off, so goldfishing with this deck really helps in discovering all of the lines (for instance, using Corridor Monitor with a cost reducer and mana from Chromatic Star or a Moxen and Scrap Trawler recurring the pieces).

Thopters Under The Bridge

One of my favorite ways to win is to lock down the board with stax and an Ensnaring Bridge preventing all combat, and then finding a way to loop enough artifacts or just cast them fairly with a Sai, Master Thopterist on the battlefield. Then just draw your first card for the turn and swing with your thopters under the bridge before playing whatever card your drew.

Just Gonna Send It

The last resort for a combo win if you don't think you can fairly out-value the table and there is something stopping your combo loop such as a Rest in Peace, is to build up a high enough storm count with Aetherflux Reservoir, cost reducers/mana rocks, and Mystic Forge. This is not a guarantee since you can hit multiple non-artifacts in a row and/or lands, but being able to exile the top card (twice if you sac the forge and replay it with Emry) and shuffle the deck with land hate and fetch lands makes this a more viable out than you would think.

All in all, these combos are just an outline of the potential lines you can take. If you have ever played or seen someone play with the car KCI, you understand how convoluted the lines can be. Practice makes perfect, and the more you goldfish this deck the more you will recognize when a line opens up for you and how to sequence your plays in order to effectively get there.

The Turn 2 Win

There are a few different ways that this can be pulled off, but here is a nifty example of how it can go down without relying on a top-deck: https://imgur.com/a/sRB5h00#djLKBXX (copy and paste, hyperlinking is not working for some reason)

I am currently still in the tuning phase of building this deck, but have really enjoyed playing it so far. The single-color aspect of deck building allows this deck to more easily breach into cEDH territory without the need for Dual Lands, so once I get around to it I may consider adding in all of the most important cEDH mana rocks to get those final percentage points.

Any help or suggestions are greatly appreciated since this is my first attempt at brewing an artifact combo deck. I'm sure there are some obvious things and opportunities that I'm missing, so I really want to get the community's eyes on this one.

Date added	4 years
Last updated	4 years
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	3 - 0 Mythic Rares 40 - 0 Rares 24 - 0 Uncommons 19 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	2.32
Tokens	Bird 2/2 U, City's Blessing, Thopter 1/1 C
Folders	EDH