Eternal Servitude - Myrkul, Lord of Bones [PRIMER]

Commander / EDH BGW (Abzan, Junk)

PolarisFluff

Mana/Cost Reduction (20)

• 1x Arcane Signet
• 1x Ashnod's Altar
• 1x Avacyn's Pilgrim
• 1x Birds of Paradise
• 1x Bloom Tender
• 1x Bolas's Citadel
• 1x Cultivate
• 1x Elves of Deep Shadow
• 1x Elvish Mystic
• 1x Fyndhorn Elves
• 1x Kodama's Reach
• 1x Llanowar Elves
• 1x Mirari's Wake
• 1x Nyxbloom Ancient
• 1x Phyrexian Altar
• 1x Sakura-Tribe Elder
• 1x Sanctum Weaver
• 1x Scroll of Fate
• 1x Sol Ring
• 1x The Great Henge

Draw (9)

• 1x Augur of Autumn
• 1x Eidolon of Blossoms
• 1x Moldervine Reclamation
• 1x Phyrexian Arena
• 1x Setessan Champion
• 1x Skullclamp
• 1x Sylvan Library
• 1x The Great Henge
• 1x Yawgmoth, Thran Physician

Tokens (8)

• 1x Anointed Procession
• 1x Archon of Sun's Grace
• 1x Avenger of Zendikar
• 1x Bastion of Remembrance
• 1x Chatterfang, Squirrel General
• 1x Parallel Lives
• 1x Scute Swarm
• 1x Second Harvest

Wipe (4)

• 1x Damn
• 1x Massacre Wurm
• 1x The Meathook Massacre
• 1x Vanquish the Horde

Land (34)

• 1x Bountiful Promenade
• 1x Brushland
• 1x Caves of Koilos
• 1x Command Tower
• 1x Exotic Orchard
• 7x Forest
• 1x Godless Shrine
• 1x Indatha Triome
• 1x Llanowar Wastes
• 1x Overgrown Tomb
• 5x Plains
• 1x Sandsteppe Citadel
• 7x Swamp
• 1x Temple Garden
• 1x Undergrowth Stadium
• 1x Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
• 1x Vault of Champions
• 1x Yavimaya, Cradle of Growth

Lifegain (10)

• 1x Archon of Sun's Grace
• 1x Bastion of Remembrance
• 1x Blood Artist
• 1x Cruel Celebrant
• 1x Kambal, Consul of Allocation
• 1x Moldervine Reclamation
• 1x Scavenging Ooze
• 1x The Great Henge
• 1x The Meathook Massacre
• 1x Zulaport Cutthroat

Sac (8)

• 1x Ashnod's Altar
• 1x Birthing Pod
• 1x Carrion Feeder
• 1x Fiend Artisan
• 1x Phyrexian Altar
• 1x Viscera Seer
• 1x Woe Strider
• 1x Yawgmoth, Thran Physician

Tutor (3)

• 1x Birthing Pod
• 1x Fiend Artisan
• 1x Sterling Grove

Commander (1)

STR (11)

• 1x Anguished Unmaking
• 1x Beast Within
• 1x Damn
• 1x Doomwake Giant
• 1x Druid of Purification
• 1x Feed the Swarm
• 1x Nature's Claim
• 1x Return to Nature
• 1x Scavenging Ooze
• 1x Swords to Plowshares
• 1x Yawgmoth, Thran Physician

Damage (8)

• 1x Bastion of Remembrance
• 1x Blood Artist
• 1x Cruel Celebrant
• 1x Kambal, Consul of Allocation
• 1x Massacre Wurm
• 1x Syr Konrad, the Grim
• 1x The Meathook Massacre
• 1x Zulaport Cutthroat

Utility (6)

• 1x Dauthi Voidwalker
• 1x Heroic Intervention
• 1x Mirage Mirror
• 1x Mother of Runes
• 1x Sterling Grove
• 1x Teferi's Protection

Anthem (1)

• 1x Mirari's Wake

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Note: This primer is still a work in progress.

"Fools fear death, the strong wield it. (Introduction)

Abzan has always been my favorite color combination from the moment I started playing, and my favorite strategies are pod and aristocrats. Imagine my surprise when this beast of a commander was dropped. Sitting at a daunting 7 mana, Myrkul, Lord of bones allows you to turn your dead creatures into enchantment tokens. This opens up a ton of building options and lots of safety for your board state. For this deck, I’ve decided to go a mixture of enchantments, pod, and aristocrats, which works surprisingly smoothly. Other options I could see are superfriends, lifegain, landfall, etc. Ultimately, Myrkul is very easy to figure out and is extremely versatile, in the best possible colors for his archetypes.

"I sunder the natural cycle, so that all may be preserved" (Gameplan)

This deck ultimately aims to out-value your opponents by creating hard to remove enchantments with good static effects. Aristocrat machines become very hard to disrupt when it is an enchantment, which dodges most forms of removal. We take advantage of the enchantments by including enchantress cards such as Setessan Champion. If you've played any kind of aristocrats deck, you should already be familiar with the basic concepts. Have a sacrifice outlet, have creatures that trigger when other creatures die (or enchantments ETB), create a bunch of sacrifice fodder, then sacrifice them. Another valid option is to go wide and swing with the massive amounts of tokens you may create.

Tokens are heavily stressed in this deck, so we have included two token doublers; Parallel Lives and Anointed Procession. Not only do these double our creature tokens that we use as sacrifice fodder, they also double the enchantments that hit the field since they return as tokens. This means that when an Eidolon of Blossoms dies, it returns two copies and draws 4 cards (assuming you have a doubler).

We do want to get our commander out quickly, but he can draw a lot of removal. Make sure you have an established board state before you cast him, so you actually have things to do. An ideal opening hand has one or two mana dorks, as they ramp us quickly and can be sacrificed to be "reset", as enchantments do not have summoning sickness. Our best dork is Sanctum Weaver, followed by Bloom Tender.

After the dorks, our next priority is a sac outlet. There are plenty of these in the deck, so rarely will you not draw one. Even if we don't have anything else to do, if we get Myrkul out and have mana dorks we can sacrifice them to reset them and possibly get a bonus depending on the outlet.

Finally, assemble the death trigger cards like Zulaport Cutthroat. Sacrifice all of your creatures and win!

Since our creatures come back as enchantments, this deck has a couple things that can board wipe creatures, like Massacre Wurm, which can give everything -4/-4.

Remember, the deck doesn't require the commander to function. This is still an aristocrats deck. However, without the commander some of the enchantress cards will not function very well.

"All shall serve the true lord of the living and the dead!" (Winning)

The deck is pretty straight forward when it comes to winning. Make token, sac token. Alternatively, make token, swing with token. Don't forget you can also swing Myrkul, he has 7 power.

"Harvest the worthy, discard the chaff." (Card choice and tech)

The best token generators tend to be Avenger of Zendikar, Chatterfang, Squirrel General, and Scute Swarm. With avenger, you can get at least 14 plants by sacrificing him and having him come back as an enchantment. With a token doubler, he comes back twice making 42 plants, enough to kill with a zulaport effect. Scute swarm also goes crazy. You can sacrifice the original one and return as an enchantment to get tons of constellation triggers, since the scute swarm copies will also be enchantments.

Notable Card Choices:

Mana/Cost_Reduction:

• Sanctum Weaver: By far our best dork, and a great starter for pod.

• Bloom Tender: Our second best dork.

• Bolas's Citadel: Remember to play this before your land drop, as you can brick if you’ve already played a land and hit one on top.

• Scroll of Fate: This puts any card in your hand onto the battlefield as a creature. You can sacrifice it and it will return face-up. This works for any card, even artifacts (or instants/sorceries if you want for some reason).

Draw:

• Augur of Autumn: This is mostly an early game card, as one you start sacrificing your creatures they become enchantments and coven will no longer be active. It is still useful for seeing your next draw and getting lands off the top though.

• Setessan Champion: Though his constellation doesn’t mention himself, he will draw you a card when he re-enters as an enchantment.

• Skullclamp: Skullclamp

• Sylvan Library: Who could pass it up? Plus, helps get your life total down to give Myrkul indestructible.

• Yawgmoth, Thran Physician: This card is just so good for so many things. A sac outlet, a draw machine, removal. He even draws on token death.

Removal and Board Wipes:

My meta is not heavy on removal, so this deck is a bit lacking in the department. Nonetheless it has a pretty standard suite of removal for Abzan.

• Scavenging Ooze: Can shut down graveyard decks well and is hard to remove as an enchantment.

• Damn: A must have in Orzhov, both a wipe and spot removal.

• card:Meathook Massacre and Massacre Wurm: Multi-functional cards with a board wipe attached. Both also deal damage.

Damage:

• Massacre Wurm can deal exceptional damage when you have doublers out.

• Syr Konrad, the Grim: Triggers twice on our deaths! Once when the card enters the graveyard, then again when it is exiled and the enchantment is created.

Utility:

• Dauthi Voidwalker: Amazing card!! Shuts down graveyard decks, with the added bonus of getting two cards completely for free!

• Platinum Angel: This one is pretty self explanatory.

• Mirage Mirror: Since we don't run many things to drain our own life to give Myrkul indestructible, this can do the trick. As well as becoming a copy of a utility piece like a token doubler, you can also use it to turn Myrkul into an enchantment. Activate it becoming a copy of him. Due to the legend rule, sacrifice the original. The copy sees him die, exiles him, and creates a token copy of him. Then mirage mirror is sacrificed unless you respond to the trigger. This is also a great response to removal.

Date added	2 years
Last updated	2 years
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	11 - 0 Mythic Rares 42 - 0 Rares 14 - 0 Uncommons 14 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	3.03
Tokens	Beast 3/3 G, Copy Clone, Goat 0/1 W, Human Soldier 1/1 W, Insect 1/1 G, Manifest 2/2 C, Pegasus 2/2 W, Plant 0/1 G, Squirrel 1/1 G
Folders	Decks of Interest