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Existential Dread

Commander / EDH Artifact Battlecruiser Combo Control Counterspell Eldrazi Infinite Combo Ramp

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Land (35)

Sorcery (4)

Artifact (28)

Instant (6)

Planeswalker (2)

Commander (1)

Commander: foil Kozilek, the Great Distortion

Creature (23)

Enchantment (1)

Sideboard

Artifact (4)

Planeswalker (1)

Maybeboard

Creature (1)

Existential Dread

Where will you be when the Eldrazi emerge? When Kozilek breaks your mind, Ulamog consumes your world, and Emrakul corrupts your body?

Existential Dread is a deck that revolves around beating people down and keeping their boards suppressed, hence the name. One fun part about this deck is that there's no wrong answer for your commander; I find a counterspell on a stick that refills your hand to be the best option, but have fun with it! Want to play someone that's just a big attacker? Use Rise of the Eldrazi Kozilek or Ulamog! Want your opponents to hate every fiber of your being the moment you tap out for mana? Oath of the Gatewatch Ulamog or Emrakul can do just that!

Regardless of the chosen commander, commander damage is a great option if combat damage would take too long. If you choose Emrakul or Kozilek, Eldrazi Conscription is a fantastic option for one-shot commander damage KOs, and at most two-shot KOs if you choose to run Ulamog. On top of that, it's also just a good way to turn anything on your board into a scary beatstick that will definitely get the ball rolling toward ending the game; I personally enjoy putting it on Reality Smasher because of the self-protection, Liberator, Urza's Battlethopter for the flavor of conscripting one of the two non-Eldrazi in the deck, or Breaker of Armies to make it tough enough to eat most boardstates and survive.

The early game of the deck is to focus on getting land drops and ramping as quickly as possible. Cards like Scroll Rack and Sensei's Divining Topfoil are meant to help even out the early game and make sure you hit the land drops as often as possible, as well as potentially fish for answers as a last resort or trade out an unfortunate hand in the later game. The goal of the deck isn't to have a splashy early game - if anything, if you can simply stabilize and slowly work your way up with unimposing lower-cost cards it works best in the later game. It's important to keep in mind that this deck functions similarly to an artifact deck: with a limited number of viable Eldrazi available, the next best option is a plethora of artifacts to support your board. Cards like Inventors' Fair and Buried Ruin are great options to grab important artifacts, and Kozilek, the Great Distortion is your primary means of keeping your board safe.

The goal of this deck is to ideally build one of the four infinite mana combos BEFORE COMBAT and use that mana to draw your deck with Staff of Domination. Ideally you need three things: Spawnsire of Ulamog to make infinite 0/1 Spawn, Forsaken Monument to turn all those Spawn into 2/3s, and haste via Crashing Drawbridge and Lightning Greaves if necessary (or, with Commander Masters, another safe option is to take an extra turn with all your Spawn using Rise of the Eldrazi). From there it's as simple as picking up enough cards to protect the combo with Kozilek and swinging to kill your opponents in combat. The less-ideal but perhaps more interesting way to win is simply to draw and drop all your big Eldrazi creatures and swing with them instead of tokens. You frequently won't have the Staff already available when you get your mana combo, which is why the deck runs sacrifice outlets like Ashnod's Altar and bounce effects like Sanctum of Eternity - if you keep casting what you can from your hand, you can keep replaying Kozilek to try and dig deeper for the Staff or the winning cards themselves.

It is also worth acknowledging that a deck like this doesn't have very many means of non-conditional early-game interaction and control until Kozilek hits the field, so I've taken care to include as many on-theme lower-CMC control/interaction elements to use when facing decks that are generally faster than this one (which is most) in the sideboard. The deck also runs on-flavor interaction pieces, like the more mana-expensive removal spells and the classic Warping Wail.

The deck has a lot of high-dollar cards, and as such is geared toward an upper-midrange power level where it's usually pretty strong and can sometimes power through cEDH games, though the latter is very inconsistent. I have luck playing it at both casual and competitive tables, though there are definitely some possible ways to tune the deck up.

One big one that comes to mind is simply swapping the commander to Kozilek, Butcher of Truth. Rather than the frantic digging that The Great Distortion requires you to do for your Staff, Butcher of Truth will draw you cards regardless of your current hand size if you have a repeatable sacrifice outlet (at the cost of losing your discard-counterspell interaction), making him far more consistent when it comes to your winning combo. It also means you can pretty freely cut some of the cards that benefit strictly The Great Distortion, like Lion's Eye Diamond, and replace it with something more geared toward faster play like Jeweled Lotus or another interaction/stax piece. The sideboard includes a handful of potential includes for higher-power play, to cut less-effective cards like some of the more top-heavy Eldrazi..

  • Crucible of Worlds, while typically included in Green/Golgari decks that care a whole lot more about consistent landfall and self-mill to better enable more land drops from the graveyard, also does some very heavy lifting in this deck too. On top of enabling repeated value out of self-sacrificing cards like City of Traitors and Urza's Saga if you don't have land drop in-hand for the turn, it also greatly lessens the drawback of Scorched Ruins by letting you simply replay whatever lands you had to sacrifice for it.
  • Lion's Eye Diamond is an odd include, in essence behaving similar to a Jeweled Lotus combined with a self-Wheel of Fortune (if Kozilek, the Great Distortion is your commander). In addition to offering that unique benefit, it can also allow you to discard a shuffle titan on demand if you need to protect your graveyard. And, finally, in testing this deck the constraint of the deck is drawing into a payoff once you get infinite mana. Since most of the time after infinite mana you need to dig for something like Staff of Domination by killing and recasting Kozilek to continuously draw cards, this plan hits a dead end once you get a hand full of 7 lands that you can't cast or play - LED lets you discard your hand and keep digging significantly deeper with Kozilek. Plus, as an additional bonus, discarding your hand usually gives Emrakul, the Promised End a hefty casting cost discount if you want her in the command zone instead.

B̶e̶i̶n̶g̶ a̶ c̶o̶l̶o̶r̶l̶e̶s̶s̶ d̶e̶c̶k̶, i̶t̶ r̶e̶l̶i̶e̶s̶ h̶e̶a̶v̶i̶l̶y̶ o̶n̶ a̶r̶t̶i̶f̶a̶c̶t̶ r̶a̶m̶p̶, t̶h̶o̶u̶g̶h̶ t̶h̶a̶t̶ d̶o̶e̶s̶n̶'t̶ n̶e̶c̶e̶s̶s̶a̶r̶i̶l̶y̶ m̶e̶a̶n̶ t̶h̶a̶t̶ t̶h̶e̶ d̶e̶c̶k̶ n̶e̶e̶d̶s̶ t̶o̶ b̶e̶ s̶l̶o̶w̶. W̶i̶t̶h̶ a̶ p̶e̶r̶f̶e̶c̶t̶ h̶a̶n̶d̶, t̶h̶e̶ d̶e̶c̶k̶ c̶o̶u̶l̶d̶ a̶l̶m̶o̶s̶t̶ c̶e̶r̶t̶a̶i̶n̶l̶y̶ w̶i̶n̶ o̶n̶ t̶u̶r̶n̶ o̶n̶e̶ u̶n̶l̶e̶s̶s̶ a̶n̶ o̶p̶p̶o̶n̶e̶n̶t̶ h̶a̶s̶ s̶o̶m̶e̶ s̶h̶e̶n̶a̶n̶i̶g̶a̶n̶s̶ o̶f̶ t̶h̶e̶i̶r̶ o̶w̶n̶:̶ i̶n̶ y̶o̶u̶r̶ h̶a̶n̶d̶ w̶h̶e̶n̶ y̶o̶u̶ s̶t̶a̶r̶t̶ y̶o̶u̶r̶ f̶i̶r̶s̶t̶ t̶u̶r̶n̶, y̶o̶u̶ n̶e̶e̶d̶ 7̶ c̶a̶r̶d̶s̶, t̶h̶e̶ 8̶t̶h̶ c̶a̶r̶d̶ c̶a̶n̶ b̶e̶ a̶n̶y̶t̶h̶i̶n̶g̶. T̶o̶ s̶t̶a̶r̶t̶... [̶[̶A̶n̶c̶i̶e̶n̶t̶ T̶o̶m̶b̶]̶]̶, [̶[̶C̶i̶t̶y̶ o̶f̶ T̶r̶a̶i̶t̶o̶r̶s̶]̶]̶, o̶r̶ [̶[̶C̶r̶y̶s̶t̶a̶l̶ V̶e̶i̶n̶]̶]̶ *̶*̶(̶C̶a̶r̶d̶ 1̶)̶*̶*̶ -̶ o̶n̶e̶ o̶f̶ t̶h̶e̶ l̶a̶n̶d̶s̶ t̶h̶a̶t̶ c̶a̶n̶ p̶r̶o̶d̶u̶c̶e̶ t̶w̶o̶ m̶a̶n̶a̶ o̶n̶ t̶u̶r̶n̶ 1̶ i̶s̶ e̶s̶s̶e̶n̶t̶i̶a̶l̶, a̶s̶ y̶o̶u̶'l̶l̶ u̶s̶e̶ t̶h̶o̶s̶e̶ t̶w̶o̶ m̶a̶n̶a̶ t̶o̶ c̶a̶s̶t̶ [̶[̶S̶o̶l̶ R̶i̶n̶g̶]̶]̶ *̶*̶(̶2̶)̶*̶*̶ a̶n̶d̶ [̶[̶M̶a̶n̶a̶ V̶a̶u̶l̶t̶]̶]̶ *̶*̶(̶3̶)̶*̶*̶. T̶a̶p̶ t̶h̶o̶s̶e̶ f̶o̶r̶ 5̶ m̶a̶n̶a̶ t̶o̶ d̶r̶o̶p̶ h̶a̶l̶f̶ o̶f̶ y̶o̶u̶r̶ i̶n̶f̶i̶n̶i̶t̶e̶ m̶a̶n̶a̶ c̶o̶m̶b̶o̶, [̶[̶F̶o̶r̶s̶a̶k̶e̶n̶ M̶o̶n̶u̶m̶e̶n̶t̶]̶]̶ *̶*̶(̶4̶)̶*̶*̶. W̶i̶t̶h̶ t̶h̶a̶t̶ i̶n̶ p̶l̶a̶y̶, y̶o̶u̶ n̶e̶e̶d̶ [̶[̶M̶a̶n̶a̶ C̶r̶y̶p̶t̶]̶]̶ *̶*̶(̶5̶)̶*̶*̶, d̶r̶o̶p̶ t̶h̶a̶t̶ t̶o̶ g̶a̶i̶n̶ 2̶ l̶i̶f̶e̶ a̶n̶d̶ u̶s̶e̶ t̶h̶e̶ t̶h̶r̶e̶e̶ m̶a̶n̶a̶ i̶t̶ p̶r̶o̶d̶u̶c̶e̶s̶ f̶r̶o̶m̶ t̶h̶e̶ M̶o̶n̶u̶m̶e̶n̶t̶ t̶o̶ c̶a̶s̶t̶ t̶h̶e̶ [̶[̶B̶a̶s̶a̶l̶t̶ M̶o̶n̶o̶l̶i̶t̶h̶]̶]̶ *̶*̶(̶6̶)̶*̶*̶. W̶i̶t̶h̶ t̶h̶e̶ i̶n̶f̶i̶n̶i̶t̶e̶ m̶a̶n̶a̶ c̶o̶m̶b̶o̶ o̶n̶l̶i̶n̶e̶, y̶o̶u̶r̶ f̶i̶n̶a̶l̶ c̶a̶r̶d̶ n̶e̶e̶d̶s̶ t̶o̶ b̶e̶ [̶[̶S̶t̶a̶f̶f̶ o̶f̶ D̶o̶m̶i̶n̶a̶t̶i̶o̶n̶]̶]̶ *̶*̶(̶7̶)̶*̶*̶ t̶o̶ g̶u̶a̶r̶a̶n̶t̶e̶e̶ d̶r̶a̶w̶i̶n̶g̶ i̶n̶t̶o̶ t̶h̶e̶ w̶i̶n̶ c̶o̶m̶b̶o̶ m̶e̶n̶t̶i̶o̶n̶e̶d̶ a̶b̶o̶v̶e̶;̶ y̶o̶u̶ c̶a̶n̶ a̶l̶w̶a̶y̶s̶ a̶t̶t̶e̶m̶p̶t̶ t̶o̶ c̶a̶s̶t̶, k̶i̶l̶l̶/b̶o̶u̶n̶c̶e̶, a̶n̶d̶ r̶e̶c̶a̶s̶t̶ K̶o̶z̶i̶l̶e̶k̶ i̶f̶ y̶o̶u̶ n̶e̶e̶d̶ t̶o̶ t̶r̶y̶ a̶n̶d̶ d̶r̶a̶w̶ i̶n̶t̶o̶ t̶h̶e̶ S̶t̶a̶f̶f̶ _̶t̶h̶o̶u̶g̶h̶ t̶h̶a̶t̶'s̶ v̶e̶r̶y̶ i̶n̶c̶o̶n̶s̶i̶s̶t̶e̶n̶t̶_̶. T̶h̶e̶ c̶o̶m̶b̶o̶ a̶l̶s̶o̶ w̶o̶r̶k̶s̶ w̶i̶t̶h̶ o̶t̶h̶e̶r̶ d̶r̶a̶w̶ c̶o̶m̶b̶o̶s̶, b̶u̶t̶ e̶a̶c̶h̶ o̶f̶ t̶h̶o̶s̶e̶ r̶e̶q̶u̶i̶r̶e̶ t̶w̶o̶ c̶a̶r̶d̶s̶ s̶o̶ y̶o̶u̶'d̶ n̶e̶e̶d̶ t̶h̶e̶ p̶e̶r̶f̶e̶c̶t̶ o̶p̶e̶n̶i̶n̶g̶ h̶a̶n̶d̶ p̶l̶u̶s̶ t̶h̶e̶ p̶e̶r̶f̶e̶c̶t̶ t̶o̶p̶-̶d̶e̶c̶k̶ (̶[̶[̶S̶e̶n̶s̶e̶i̶'s̶ D̶i̶v̶i̶n̶i̶n̶g̶ T̶o̶p̶]̶]̶ a̶n̶d̶ [̶[̶M̶y̶s̶t̶i̶c̶ F̶o̶r̶g̶e̶]̶]̶/[̶[̶R̶i̶n̶g̶s̶ o̶f̶ B̶r̶i̶g̶h̶t̶h̶e̶a̶r̶t̶h̶]̶]̶)̶. I̶f̶ t̶h̶i̶s̶ c̶a̶l̶c̶u̶l̶a̶t̶o̶r̶ I̶ f̶o̶u̶n̶d̶ i̶s̶ c̶o̶r̶r̶e̶c̶t̶, t̶h̶e̶n̶ t̶h̶e̶ o̶d̶d̶s̶ o̶f̶ t̶h̶e̶ p̶e̶r̶f̶e̶c̶t̶ o̶p̶e̶n̶i̶n̶g̶ h̶a̶n̶d̶ w̶i̶t̶h̶ S̶t̶a̶f̶f̶ i̶s̶ o̶n̶l̶y̶ o̶n̶e̶ i̶n̶ 6̶2̶7̶,1̶0̶9̶,3̶8̶7̶.3̶8̶5̶, s̶o̶ g̶o̶o̶d̶ l̶u̶c̶k̶!̶

They took my mana rock, so now Ulamog, the Defiler will make it everyone else's problem...

This decklist has no sideboard full of big Eldrazi intentionally. This is a deck I play in-person and my local LGS doesn't support the optional sideboard for Commander, so I haven't put one together. Spawnsire of Ulamog is primarily used for generating Eldrazi Spawn with the way I play the deck, but anyone is welcome to use this decklist for themselves and make their own sideboard of whatever they like.

P.S.: R.I.P. Emrakul, the Aeons Torn, gone but not forgotten.

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99% Casual

Competitive

Top Ranked
Date added 4 years
Last updated 1 month
Exclude colors WUBRG
Key combos
Legality

This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)

18 - 1 Mythic Rares

56 - 4 Rares

18 - 0 Uncommons

5 - 0 Commons
Cards 100
Avg. CMC 5.25
Tokens Construct 0/0 C, Eldrazi 10/10 C, Eldrazi Scion 1/1 C, Eldrazi Spawn 0/1 C, Spirit 2/2 C, Zombie 2/2 B
Folders Fun Decks, Commander, drazi, EDH Wishlist, Fun stuff, EDH, Eldrazi, commander decks i may want, ideas, need to build in paper
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