The National Library of Elkia

Commander / EDH* Combo Control Infinite Combo Mono-Blue

toastySmorc

Instant (36)

• 1x Arcane Denial
• 1x Brainstorm
• 1x Capsize
• 1x Counterspell
• 1x Cryptic Command
• 1x Cyclonic Rift
• 1x Daze
• 1x Desertion
• 1x Dig Through Time
• 1x Disallow
• 1x Disdainful Stroke
• 1x Disrupting Shoal
• 1x Dissolve
• 1x Dramatic Reversal
• 1x Essence Scatter
• 1x Evacuation
• 1x Fact or Fiction
• 1x Foil
• 1x Forbid
• 1x Force of Will
• 1x High Tide
• 1x Hinder
• 1x Logic Knot
• 1x Mana Leak
• 1x Mental Misstep
• 1x Muddle the Mixture
• 1x Mystical Tutor
• 1x Negate
• 1x Overwhelming Denial
• 1x Rapid Hybridization
• 1x Reality Shift
• 1x Rewind
• 1x Swan Song
• 1x Syncopate
• 1x Whir of Invention
• 1x Wizard's Retort

Creature (9)

• 1x Baral, Chief of Compliance
• 1x Galecaster Colossus
• 1x Kheru Spellsnatcher
• 1x Patron Wizard
• 1x Sower of Temptation
• 1x Thassa's Oracle
• 1x Trinket Mage
• 1x Vedalken Aethermage
• 1x Walking Ballista

Enchantment (8)

• 1x Arcane Laboratory
• 1x Counterbalance
• 1x Hesitation
• 1x Imprisoned in the Moon
• 1x Leyline of Anticipation
• 1x Metallurgic Summonings
• 1x Mind Over Matter
• 1x Standstill

Land (33)

• 1x Inventors' Fair
• 29x Island
• 1x Mystic Sanctuary
• 1x Prismatic Vista
• 1x Reliquary Tower

Planeswalker (2)

• 1x Narset, Parter of Veils
• 1x Tezzeret the Seeker

Commander (1)

Artifact (6)

• 1x Arcane Signet
• 1x Gilded Lotus
• 1x Isochron Scepter
• 1x Sensei's Divining Top
• 1x Sol Ring
• 1x Thran Dynamo

Sorcery (5)

• 1x Fabricate
• 1x Merchant Scroll
• 1x Ponder
• 1x Wash Out
• 1x Windfall

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Maybeboard

Enchantment (5)

• 1x Arcane Laboratory
• 1x As Foretold
• 1x Hesitation
• 1x Rhystic Study
• 1x Standstill

Land (1)

• 1x Myriad Landscape

Sorcery (1)

• 1x Wash Out

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The ultimate mid-power control deck, able to be the answer to every possible threat that you will encounter at this powerful. Packing 20+ counterspells and more pieces of interaction, and lead at the helm by ~Jibril~ Azami, as the ultimate source of card advantage.

FORCE OF WILL NOT OBLIGATORY I DONT EVEN OWN IT I JUST PROXIED IT T_T

Introduction

This is the list I use to combat my friend's turn-3-Selvala, Heart of the Wilds deck, named so because the game is over on turn 3 if not dealt with (a rare example of cedh efficiency at a casual price point). This specific list is tooled to significantly slow down the early game by reliably having a counterspell on 2, or a way to interact with a resolved Selvala by turn 2. The deck has a lot of redundancy due to the 20+ counterspells, allowing for significant modular alterations to fit your own meta/boogeyman deck.

How to play this deck

Short version: Counter the important shit. Stall until you find your wincons. Long version: Like any control deck, the difficulty is knowing what threats you should be saving your interaction for. This is made harder by the fact that edh is a very varied format, so it required extensive knowledge of popular decks and their mechanics/engines. So this is good to have in your back pocket against a powerful list that you play against a lot, and understand the ins and outs of. The issue is that before you play your Azami, you are heavily disadvantaged in that you can't trade 1 for 1 with everything they do, so therefore it's important to know what form of disruption will be the most impactful (ie: knowing what is the correct thing to counter). You turn the corner when you play Azami, and that tends to be your most vulnerable turn as you will not have the resources to win a counterspell war, yet most of the time you want to do this on turn 5, hence you must play the first 5 turns with this goal in mind.

Theory of the Early Game and Mulliganing

This is the most difficult part of the game. Since you don't have the explosive ramp options green provides, nor can you afford to waste early turns developing your own mana through your own ramp. Of course, this is specific to my own playgroup, where the critical turn is 2/3. If your critical turn is later, then it would make more sense to remove counterspells for more 2 mana mana rocks. Mulliganing: The crux is to form a hand that allows you to have an answer for the critical turn, and an answer for any protection that they may have. Example: Selvala comes down on turn 2 after a turn 1 accelerant. So you need to have a 2 mana counterspell on 2, or 3 mana kill spell on 3. However, you can delay the clock by countering the accelerant. Therefore, mulligan decisions is a matter of: how far can I delay the critical turn, and will I be able to interact with it.

In terms of back up, it's important to have a back up just in case the main means of interaction gets neutralised with the protection. In the Selvala example, I would have at least one more counterspell to stop a Phyrexian Dreadnought into 12 mana, or a Natural Order into a Vorinclex. In a more general sense, if the critical turn is the establishment of an engine, then this decision involves how much explicit impact it will have , and adjusting the cards you require accordingly during mulliganing.

Oh yea, and remember there are other people at the table. While this deck has the most consistent performance in 1v1s or 1v2s (I mean 3 player games, but they often degrade into an archenemy game against the blue deck because MtG players are logical like that), you can partly rely on other players interacting if they have any kind of threat assessment/ if they have played against the deck before. In this case, you may be more inclined to keep a more development-heavy hand.

Theory of the Midgame

Midgame is defined (with this deck) as when you have successfully stuck an Azami. This is when you start drawing 2 cards a turn, and you become more able to deal with multiple threats within one turn cycle. In fact, a board state with Azami, Baral and a third wizard is an easy win even against two decks of similar power levels, and is usually what I try to go for. Playing Azami is a difficult choice, and I usually tend to do so after a counterspell war, or there has been significant interaction, like a board wipe. Usually, this has minimal impact on your board state since you'll have only lands, but for other players, who have invested a lot more into the first few turns, they will have fewer resources, and are more than likely to develop their own boards instead. Of course, if you know that board clears or counterspell wars are uncommon, it's correct to just run it out on turn 5, given you know for a fact that no opponent will be able to win next turn as well. Generally it's correct to just turn 5 it...

Heaven's Strike(Combos and Where to Find Them).

They should be pretty obvious but here they are. Dramatic Reversal + Isochron Scepter and any 3+ mana rocks. This is the bread and butter of this deck- very readily tutorable and cheap, allowing for protection to support it.

Azami, Lady of Scrolls + Mind Over Matter . Chew through your entire library and win with Thassa's Oracle, or to find the other win con.

Walking Ballista is the infinite mana outlet of choice, so if you're suspecting interaction in that department I would recommend going down the Thassa's Oracle line with Mind Over Matter.

Library Security (Locks and taxes)

- The Countertop lock Counterbalance + Sensei's Divining Top : In a game against more streamlined decks such as storm or spellslinger, this lock can straight up cripple them as their mana costs line up well against ours.

• Forbid: my favourite 1 card lock. In the late game, Azami can enable you to recur Forbid a stupid number of times- hence the gameplan is to trade 2 cards for 1, but your cards are worth far less than theirs in this equation.

-Patron Wizard: can be oppressive in the early game as threat of activation delays the critical turn. This works similarly to Galecaster Colossus, and resolution of the latter in the mid-late game can prevent down any meaningful contribution to the board.

Top Ranked	Achieved #43 position overall 4 years ago Achieved #28 position in Commander / EDH 4 years ago Achieved #1 position in Commander / EDH Combo 4 years ago Achieved #1 position in Commander / EDH Control 4 years ago
Date added	4 years
Last updated	4 years
Key combos	Azami, Lady of Scrolls + Mind Over Matter Counterbalance + Sensei's Divining Top Dramatic Reversal + Isochron Scepter
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	3 - 0 Mythic Rares 28 - 0 Rares 20 - 0 Uncommons 20 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	2.87
Tokens	Bird 2/2 U, Construct */* C, Frog Lizard 3/3 G, Manifest 2/2 C, Morph 2/2 C
Folders	commander, EDH Brain Food, others decks