Asymptotic | $50 Budget

Commander / EDH Budget RUW (Jeskai, America) Spellslinger

mosscreatures

Land (40)

• 1x Ash Barrens
• 1x Azorius Chancery
• 1x Barbarian Ring
• 1x Boros Garrison
• 1x Celestial Colonnade
• 1x Cephalid Coliseum
• 1x Clifftop Retreat
• 1x Command Tower
• 1x Evolving Wilds
• 1x Faerie Conclave
• 1x Ferrous Lake
• 1x Forbidding Watchtower
• 1x Ghitu Encampment
• 1x Glacial Fortress
• 6x Island
• 1x Izzet Boilerworks
• 4x Mountain
• 1x Mystic Monastery
• 1x Needle Spires
• 1x Nomad Stadium
• 1x Perilous Landscape
• 4x Plains
• 1x Promising Vein
• 1x Shire Terrace
• 1x Skycloud Expanse
• 1x Sulfur Falls
• 1x Sunscorched Divide
• 1x Terramorphic Expanse
• 1x Wandering Fumarole

Planeswalker (4)

• 1x Rowan, Scholar of Sparks  ^Flip
• 1x Saheeli Rai
• 1x Chandra, Torch of Defiance
• 1x Ral, Storm Conduit

Instant (21)

• 1x Brainstorm
• 1x Consider
• 1x Opt
• 1x Peek
• 1x Reaping the Rewards
• 1x Counterspell
• 1x Dawn Charm
• 1x Dovin's Veto
• 1x Echoing Truth
• 1x Glamerdye
• 1x Mandate of Peace
• 1x Negate
• 1x Tolarian Winds
• 1x Unsubstantiate
• 1x View from Above
• 1x Generous Gift
• 1x Pulse of the Grid
• 1x Stroke of Midnight
• 1x Wear / Tear
• 1x Wipe Away
• 1x Return to Dust

Creature (10)

• 1x Coruscation Mage
• 1x Electrostatic Field
• 1x Erebor Flamesmith
• 1x Firebrand Archer
• 1x Kessig Flamebreather
• 1x Firespitter Whelp
• 1x Gelectrode
• 1x Guttersnipe
• 1x Kykar, Wind's Fury
• 1x Talrand, Sky Summoner

Enchantment (3)

• 1x Artist's Talent
• 1x Fiery Inscription
• 1x Jace's Sanctum

Commander (1)

Sorcery (14)

• 1x Flame Jab
• 1x Mystic Speculation
• 1x Ponder
• 1x Preordain
• 1x Serum Visions
• 1x Sleight of Hand
• 1x Not Forgotten
• 1x Shreds of Sanity
• 1x Windfall
• 1x Past in Flames
• 1x Pull from the Deep
• 1x Reconstruct History
• 1x Tragic Arrogance
• 1x Austere Command

Artifact (7)

• 1x Tormod's Crypt
• 1x Crook of Condemnation
• 1x Bosium Strip
• 1x Commander's Sphere
• 1x Jeskai Banner
• 1x Letter of Acceptance
• 1x Raugrin Crystal

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Maybeboard

Creature (2)

• 1x Third Path Iconoclast
• 1x Young Pyromancer

Enchantment (1)

• 1x Hidden Retreat

Sorcery (1)

• 1x Mana Severance

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The Way has no beginning and no end. It is simply the path.

This was constructed for an EDH deck-building challenge. The first element of the challenge was generating three random commanders (we used 's Random Commander button). I received the following:

• Elsha of the Infinite
• Sapling of Colfenor
• Pharika, God of Affliction

While I tend to lean towards Golgari, I felt that this challenge encouraged working outside of my comfort zone. Sapling of Colfenor was tempting, as I love Lorwyn and Shadowmoor, and it would be interesting to try and manipulate the top of the deck in Black and Green. Pharika, God of Affliction was also compelling, as I love playing with the graveyard. But Elsha of the Infinite posed a more difficult deck for me to personally build, as I tend to play a lot of creatures, so with it I went.

The next aspect of the challenge was a $50 budget, so I was also going to be working with a limited toolkit of cards. This budget is reflected in the lowest cost of all cards in the deck; my preferred printings are used here for my own satisfaction.

After dithering around with ideas for an artifact shenanigans, enchantress voltron, and anything in-between, I eventually realized that I would always need to split my attention between those noncreature permanents and the instants and sorceries I would need to use for interaction. So, I settled on spellslinger for my main strategy.

From there, I separated out payoffs from the cantrips and repeatable instants and sorceries, though given my unfamiliarity with the archetype I included fairly arbitrary numbers of each. That would be the main aspect of feedback I need here, as I am not used to playing decks with a high density of cantrip effects that may lower the numbers needed for variables like interaction.

Elsha of the Infinite's own abilities also mean that I need to be keenly aware of the ratio between my noncreature spells and my creatures and lands. Nearly all spellslinger payoffs are on creatures, so I need some amount of them, but too many causes Elsha of the Infinite to brick more than I would like. Similarly, each land on the top of my library is a roadblock, but too few and I won't be able to hit my land drops each turn. That is really important if I want to keep momentum with the powerful mana other strategies have access to. The $50 budget is especially influential here. Given the quality of lands I have access to, I need to err on the side of caution so that I don't end up lacking one of my three colors. Even then, I am on the lower end of my comfort area for lands.

40 being on the low end may seem a bit strange in EDH, but I have been convinced by recent viewing of Rebell's "THIS is how many lands you SHOULD be playing in Commander" video and subsequent viewing of Frank Karsten's article "What's an Optimal Mana Curve and Land/Ramp Count for Commander?". I am using a slightly different metric to calculate my manabases, however. Rather than looking at how many lands I would draw by turn three, I only look at how many lands I would have in my opening hand. My rationale is that, when evaluating whether or not to mulligan, you don't think about what you could draw, but what you are working with in that opening seven cards. So, to calculate my optimal land count, I use a hypergeometric calculator to calculate the likelihood of having three lands in my opening hand, then take P(X<3) and raise it to the second power. This is to take into account the free mulligan you receive in EDH. That number is then subtracted from 1. The result is the probability that my opening hand, with a free mulligan, has at least three lands in it.

Using that formula, I find that 42 lands is what I am most comfortable with, but I needed to cut two lands from this deck, resulting in only 40 lands. Calculating that, we arrive at an approximate 83.5% chance to have three lands in one of my two opening hands. It's still pretty good, which is why I was okay with cutting two lands, but the 86.9% chance that 42 lands provides is, obviously, better. Nevertheless, it remains to be seen whether cutting the lands was a mistake.

I hope that you have an wonderful day! That is, if you even read all the way down to here, or if it's even daytime for you. I would understand on both counts. Those who aren't reading this should still have a wonderful, albeit unknowingly granted, day (or night!).

Date added	2 days
Last updated	2 days
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	5 - 0 Mythic Rares 21 - 0 Rares 31 - 0 Uncommons 29 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	2.55
Tokens	Copy Clone, Copy Clone, Coruscation Mage 1/1 R, Drake 2/2 U, Elemental 4/4 UR, Elephant 3-3 G, Elephant 3-3 G, Emblem Chandra, Torch of Defiance, Emblem Rowan, Scholar of Sparks, Human 1/1 W, Human 1/1 W, Spirit 1/1 W, Spirit 1/1 W, The Ring, The Ring Tempts You