First thing and most importantly, the commander is pronounced Edd-Rick or Ed-Drick. Not Ee-Drick. Admittedly, I have reached this conclusion because that is how I have always pronounced it, not because I am some educated linguist. Totally staying scientifically and objectively oriented here...
Also, I realize there are too many cards in the list currently. I need to trim two more but have been struggling to find what to cut. Likely will be one of the lower powered Flying Men, perhaps hypnotic siren.
I have been playing Edric, Spymaster of Trest for almost a decade now and he has and probably will always be my favorite commander. I have tried many variations of the deck over the years ranging from more casual builds to the cEDH style builds that you see before you now. Ed has been my go to cEDH deck probably for the past five years and I have spent that time refining and tweaking. I don't have any real results to tote for the deck outside of my single Commandfest event where Edric won me every 4 player game I participated in at the competitive pods with the exception of one game where I lost to Urza after a long counter war. I guess it would be something like a record of 5-1.
Edric is often considered a beginner or entry level deck to the format due to it being budget friendly and a large portion of your deck consists of cheap (mana-wise and money-wise) flying men. With this being said though, if you spend the time learning and tuning the deck, it can most definitely compete with the top tier commanders of the format. The deck itself is definitely greater than the sum of its parts.
Edric is a largely reactive deck, but would most accurately be described as a tempo deck. You want to flood the board with cheap and evasive threats that Edric turns into a CA engine and then control the game until you can start chaining time warps. The deck wants a very high density of counter spells and once the cards start rolling, you should be able to maintain a high enough quantity of counter spells in hand to be able to counter any relevant spells for the remainder of the game. After resolving Edric, your priority shifts from playing threats to holding up counter spells and interaction. You can keep playing some of your threats but never use so much Mana that you can't hold up every counter you have available.
Deck’s Game Plan and Typical Play Patterns:
When choosing opening hands, I am always looking specifically for acceleration out the door. Whether it’s fast mana, mana rocks or mana dorks, I want something that can accelerate my mana production which is typically the biggest resource bottleneck we run into. After that, we definitely want a threat or two and preferably some interaction. Seeing a Time Warp in your opener is never what you want to see as that card is going to rot in your hand for the next several turns.
As mentioned, turn one you want to start developing your board. You want to get mana and attackers out. A lot of times, the knee jerk reaction is to get Edric out ASAP, and while this is true to a certain extent, there are several things to be mindful of. If you have a Jeweled Lotus in your opener, it is probably correct jamming his immediately but we can’t neglect that he can definitely draw your opponent’s lots of cards too. Because of this, slow rolling him or developing your position first can be correct. Before casting Ed, I am counting how many available attackers I have, if they are mana dorks, do I want to attack more than I want to hold up mana (usually I do not), and how many cards will I draw this turn if I cast him now as opposed to waiting another turn to deploy more.
I find that once I have established 2 or 3 threats on board, I switch from prioritizing board development to holding back interaction. Edric is not particularly ‘scary’ in the early game, as even its most explosive starts really just means a quickly resolved Ed and a Flying Man or two. We can capitalize on this by being able to count on the table using more of their interaction to stop the explosive combo players, clearing the way for us in the late game and also allowing for us to stockpile interaction.
Deck Building Philosophies
-Mana Efficiency: I also want to address an aspect about the evasive creatures played in these decks as I seem to notice many players falling into this pitfall of more expensive and flashier creatures, including the cEDH database list. 2 mana evasive creatures are bad in this deck. Honestly, most 2 mana creatures as a whole are too weak for this deck unless they do something very powerful. I am talking cards like Invisible Stalker, Suspicious Stowaway
, Looter il-Kor These cards are powerful and do provide a modicum of redundancy if Edric is dealt with but their big issue is efficiency.
This segues me to a point which is mana cost/efficiency. Edric is never going to combo off turn one and win and out race in that sense many of the other fast combo decks of the format. Your ‘combo’ requires too many parts and critical mass to take the full on offense so by the nature of the beast we assume the reactive role. I am not here to debate whether reactive or proactive decks are stronger but it is important for one to identify what role their deck plays over the course of the game to capitalize on this. As it might go without saying, cEDH is an incredibly fast format. To combat this, we need to be incredibly disruptive, and we need to do so incredibly quickly. The best way to do this with the tools available to us is via counter magic. This deck leans hard into the free counter magic and interaction available to us to survive. You need to essentially think to yourself at all times that you need at a very minimum of two pieces of interaction available, again 2 at minimum, or you are just dead on board.
This is where we come back to efficiency and it’s importance in this deck. As mentioned, this deck leans hard on the zero mana interaction, but following that, it plays probably more one mana counter spells than any other deck in the format. In this right here is why mana efficiency in your threats is so important. Often the difference between Nightveil Sprite and Zephyr Sprite is another piece of interaction being held up during a turn cycle. Less mana means more threats more quickly, and then you are able to continue to develop your board slowly while still maximizing the amount of interaction you’re holding up. I have tried all of these two mana variants and even Erayo, Soratami Ascendant
looked worse than a Flying Men almost always. A similar philosophy goes for counter spells that cost more than 2 but I have a found a couple being acceptable as they are hard counters and help maintain the critical mass of interaction the deck needs. There are definitely several powerful 2 drops I include in my list that undoubtedly spit in the face of the logic I just used but so it goes.
-Slightly lower density of Flying Men: first, I want to define what I mean by flying men: a one Mana flying or otherwise evasive creature. While it is super important to establish a board of evasive threats, drawing five flying men off of a swing sucks and feels really bad. Seeing a hand full of fliers and no interaction is a recipe to losing. The largest weakness of the deck is the quantity of 'bad' cards, ie the flying men. If you watch gameplay videos of the deck, if the deck falters it is because the player seems to only be hitting these little threats and no way to protect themselves or combo off. Because of this, I have trimmed on numbers of these 'bad' cards as much as possible. In reality, having two evasive threats and Edric is a powerful enough engine to lock up the board while slowly adding to the board as opposed to trying to get a larger board presence. Additionally, I have tried to trim as much of the non-evasive creatures and more expensive (two Mana and higher) creatures to reduce the chances of 'bad' draws off of Ed.
-Lower quantity of time warps: a lot of Ed lists I see, including the database deck list run as many time warps as possible. I think this is a mistake. While the deck does get to absolutely abuse extra turns, an excessive amount hurts your draws, creates awkward opening hands, and increases your average cmc unnecessarily. A lot of people fall into the mental trap of "time warps are very powerful in this deck and I win by chaining time warps together. I should play lots of time warps." In all honesty, if you chain even just two warps together or even only take one extra turn, you should be drawing enough cards to keep your hand fully stocked with enough counter magic and secure a powerful enough position to lock up the game. From a functionality standpoint, there is a little difference between resolving another warp and passing the turn with enough Mana and counters to prevent any relevant spells from resolving on your opponent's side. The beauty of Edric is how quickly the deck establishes a powerful and dominating board position. You move so quickly that letting your opponent's develop their board somewhat and selectively is a minimal threat to your position. Once you embrace this logic, you are able to cut down on warps and increase your suite of counter magic which allows for better opening hands, better tools to protect your threats as a tempo deck wants to do, and better draws early on before you have the Mana to cast a warp. While there are less Warps than usual, the deck plays 4 ‘rebuy’ effects, Reclaim, Noxious Revival, Regrowth, and Mystic Sanctuary. These still allow for you to continue chaining warps and keeping the turns going while providing more useful early game spells than a 5 mana sorcery. These 4 effects are also why we only run Warps that do not exile themselves.
Notable Matchups:
Najeela: Najeela is probably the single biggest reason NOT to play Edric. Najeela has lots of creature combo pieces and lots of attackers that can also capitalize on Edric’s ability. Honestly, I am running both Pongify and Rapid Hybridization as a concession to this match up and having solid answers to slowing down their board development.
RBx: While not its own identifiable archetype, two cards this deck hates are Fire Covenant and Mayhem Devil. Fire Covenant can very efficiently wipe our board and Mayhem Devil can just mow down our board state with all of our 1/1s. The matchup varies depending on the other colors and their commander but these cards are both cards someone needs to be cognizant of in the matchup. The Devil is yet another reason for the extra creature removal in the list.
Stax: Stax can be efficient at slowing us down but it is typically advantageous for us when games go longer. Our mana acceleration is diversified fairly well between rocks and dorks so hate towards one or the other isn’t too bad. The Rule of Law affects make counter wars awkward, but again, the Pongify and Rapid Hybridization help us deal with pesky hate bears like Archon of Emeria and Drannith Magistrate. We typically aren’t generating a very high storm count but it is important to be able to interact to protect your warps. It is worth noting, that Blood Pod can be a tough matchup with their creature density at times.
Combo: We are fairly well situated against most all in combo decks with our relatively high density of interaction and counter magic. Our shields are typically down on turn 1 or 2 where shenanigans can sneak by but after deploying Edric, we are playing with our shields and mana up.
Notable Card Inclusions:
-Endurance: Turns out endurance is insane. Another free piece of interaction that can stop a win or combo while also on an efficient body. While not evasive, it has a big enough butt that it will probably connect.
-Boreal Druid: I had been on the fence with this card for a long time. This decks is very color symbol intensive, but it turns out that any and all efficient ramp, especially ramp that can attack is worth including. I know a lot of people thought it was incorrect not to include it and they were right. I was wrong. Boreal druid back in.
-Jolrael, Mwonvuli Recluse: Here is another addition that needs some justification. Jolrael does a couple powerful things for the deck. First, it is a cheap attacker that produces additional attackers easily and consistently. It’s small enough to get more evasion from Tetsuko but the second big reason to play this is that it gives the deck more inevitability that the deck would otherwise get from Nexus of Fate. Nexus lets you churn through your whole deck and ideally put yourself in a position where it’s the only card in your library and you just cast infinite Nexi (see notable exclusions for reasoning on not including the card). Jolrael gives you a different piece of endgame inevitability. The deck wants to start chaining time warps but it sure doesn’t kill very quickly with our field of 1/1s. Even after resolving Notorious Throng several times, sometime you just need more power on the table which is where Jolrael shines. The fact that she provides inevitability while being decent in the early game warrants a spot.
-Chain of Vapor: Another one I came back around on too. I shied away from it as you don’t really want Edric getting bounced but it’s versatility outweighs it’s potential downside. As mentioned, Najeela is the deck we are most worried about and having another out to their commander is nice.
-Esior, Wardwing Familiar: Esior is essentially what we always wanted Eladamri to be. Way easier to cast, has evasion, and most importantly, makes our commander that much more resilient.
-Jeweled Lotus: fast mana is fast mana. Most of the time we are losing one of the 3 mana but even then, the explosive mana acceleration is huge. The cEDH Decklist Database list doesn’t play it which kind of astounds me.
-Elvish Spirit Guide and Lotus Petal: these two are auto includes for me. These cards allow for more explosive starts, jamming Ed before your opponents have the resources to fight over him as well as being essentially free later on. If the deck is functioning properly, you end up drawing a ton of extra cards per turn and since you really want to hold up Mana for interaction you quite regularly are discarding several cards during clean up so turning the excess cards into additional Mana to deploy more threats or hold up more interaction is very powerful.
-Kira, Great Glass-Spinner: Kira has always been very solid for me. A bit on the spendy side mana-wise but she has evasion and protects Edric as well as herself. Comparable to Eladamri who I do not play but I find her to fit much more in line to how I want the deck to play. It is not uncommon to actually play out Kira before Ed to give him more protection or to draw out a counter.
-The Flying Men as a whole: the one Mana evasive flyers have several points they need to meet before meeting the bar. First priority, cards that provide interaction, provide card selection/draw or just have a considerable upside on top of evasion. Cards like Mausoleum Wanderer, Siren Stormtamer, and Spectral Sailor. Second, requirement is faerie type. Being able to maximize value from Spellstutter Sprite is huge and worth sacrificing 'can't be blocked' for flying. Thirdly, flying men who cannot be blocked must be rogues to be able to turn on prowl. Lastly, play all evasive creatures that are warriors, wizards and clerics for the party mechanic on Concerted Defense. We already have a ton of rogues available between Edric and the team so playing as many of the evasive warriors and wizards as possible. Right now, for me that means cutting slither blade or triton shorestalker for mist-cloaked herald. This can make hands with cavern of souls a hair awkward sometimes since we are declaring rogue with it 90 percent of the time but I think it is worth maximizing concerted defense which has proven for me to be very solid.
-Time Warp suite: I only play 4 warps which I imagine is a rather contentious point. The three five Mana warps, Time Warp, Capture of Jingzhou, Temporal Manipulation and lastly, notorious throng. In conjunction with the warps, the deck plays Regrowth, Reclaim, Noxious Revival and Mystic Sanctuary to re-buy the warps. I have been unimpressed with the six Mana warps as a whole. Temporal Mastery is a card I have recently cut. It is spectacular paired with mystical tutor but terrible in the opener and a lack luster warp for its standard non-miracle cost. The fact it exiles itself too and cannot be rebought hurts. Temporal Trespass is another one I have been unimpressed with. Yes, it's ceiling of 3 Mana is great but it is typically much more than that. The extra blue bip is also hard in that it is an extra Mana not available to protect the warp.
-Commandeer: commandeer never ceases to amaze me. It is a free counter spell that has a huge ceiling. The 2 card pitch is harder but as mentioned, the card disadvantage is rarely an issue and most definitely worth it for another piece of zero Mana interaction. Foil is another similar card that I had loved but as the Mana base has improved the island density has dropped and the consistency of the card also dropped. Cruel Ultimatum is my favorite spell I have commandeered but admittedly wasn't at a top tier cEDH table.
-Tetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive: Tetsuko is one of those pesky 2 mana creatures I was referring to earlier. The reason Tetsuko is worth is including, is that it can break through walls of blockers in the air and it gives your many dorks evasion which again is clutch once you hit the late game and your opponents have some dorks of their own clogging up the ground.
-Daze: similar reasoning to commandeer. Lower cost and the one Mana can really surprise people and is great in counter wars. Loses effectiveness later in the game but I still always seem to find a pinch point where I can capitalize on it.
-Spell Snare: spell snare is perhaps a pet card of mine but it has always been something I end up being very happy to have in hand. It hits Underworld Breach, Dockside Extortionist, the two Mana counterspells, Assassin's Trophy, Demonic Tutor, Pyroclasm, Thassa's Oracle, Drannith Magistrate, Isochron Scepter, Tainted Pact amongst many others.
U and G Channel Lands: What do I even need to say here? All of the sudden my deck just has more answers to things without having to cut anything other than suboptimal lands.
-Notable exclusions:
-Null Rod: Definitely a powerful stax piece that might be worth including, as I find ouphe a worthy addition but the big difference is that ouphe attacks. Rod is awesome but its kind of the wrong axis that this deck wants to be operating on.
-Mox Amber: Mox amber is almost there in the deck, but I feel like we are just a couple worthy legendary 1 drop creatures away before it is worth adding. Just give my legendary flying men you cowards! At the moment, it does provide an extra mana to protect Ed once he resolves but I really want it to be able to also help ramp out Ed. Not there yet.
-Phantasmal Image: Phimage is obviously a powerful card but in this deck, the ceiling is entirely dependent on what your opponent has to offer. I am hard pressed to think of single creature in my deck that I would happily make a phimage of. Obviously, it is great if your opponents have just resolved a dockside but I find in most situations it isn’t doing the trick for me.
-Oakhame Adversary: This one is probably worth it depending on your meta. Provides redundancy and is good by itself. The biggest hold back is that it is conditionally 2 mana, and even at 2, I am awfully critical of 2 mana creatures.
-Snapcaster Mage: Snapcaster is another one that is right on the line. It is a lot of value on a flash threat that can also function as an additional piece of interaction but the mage has no means of evasion. The lack of evasion plus the fact that snap plus flashback interaction is going to cost you at least 3 mana means it is a little too inefficient to make the cut at this time.
-Autumn's Veil: I thought this was too niche for the longest time but in practice, it is just a green REB. Or we can always use it like a silence to protect our extra turn spells. While power and efficient, it moves from on and off the bench frequently as one of our weaker interactive spells.
-Allosaurus Shepherd: I had been testing the card in the deck as it is the new jumpstart hotness but the card felt underwhelming. It was wonderful if it's in your opener or if you draw it before you can jam Edric but it feels very lackluster any time afterwards. Edric is really the only green spell that it is critical to resolve. The late game turn elves into dinos is a powerful secondary ability but it feels unnecessary for the cost a vast majority of the time.
-Baral, Chief of Compliance: I understand the pros of the card. Functional ramp plus upside with the many many counters in the deck. The issues with the card for me though are that first, he only ramps with colorless Mana. The deck is very Mana/bip hungry and often the cost reduction isn't particularly relevant. Second, no evasion which is huge, and something I try to avoid as much as possible.
-Eladamri, Lord of Leaves: another card I keep flip flopping on. In some senses, it feels like a cheaper Kira but I have sided against it for a couple reasons. The double green can be tough. The Mana for this deck continues to improve but in the meantime, the double green and no evasion doesn't make up for the conditional evasion and shroud. Again, this card is close to making it.
-Nexus of Fate: another warp that I had been flip flopping on. More expensive than the other warps but it is a means of setting up a soft lock of sorts when drawing through your deck. With this being said, I have found it to be unnecessary. If you have gotten to the point where you have drawn your deck or are drawing enough cards that that is a concern, you are winning that game. You should be able to build enough Mana and counters before drawing the whole deck and once your hand is stacked, just stop drawing excessively and counter everything.
-Narset's Reversall: another close one for me. Powerful spell which can be a potent counter and synergizes well with our own warps but I have not been convinced of it just yet.
-Force Spike: a one Mana counterspell. Has done some work for me in the past but it is one of the weaker counter spells that is often included. It is comparable to daze but the difference between zero Mana and one Mana is huge.
-Malevolent Hermit
: This card does a lot of things this deck wants to do but is relatively expensive. Could be worth including but right now isn’t worth it. I definitely need to try it out before coming to a final decision but as of right now I haven’t been able to identify something worth cutting.
-Coastal Piracy, Bident of Thassa, Reconnaissance Mission, Toski, Bearer of Secrets: I have tried these cards before and they always feel clunky. They shine as a back up to Edric in case he ends up eating lots of removal but for the most part, they end up sitting in your hand not being cast because it isn't worth letting your shields down. Reconnaissance mission is the strongest if the bunch as the cycling helps prevent it from doing nothing in your hand but even then, I feel they don't make the cut. Toski is close since it is a resilient attacker as well but again, ultimately not worth it.
-Autumn's Veil: another powerful piece of one Mana interaction. In the end though, it is essentially just a one Mana counter almost specifically for fighting other counters, which honestly might make it worth it. With that being said, it often can be clunky and a little too narrow. Recently swapped the card out for mystical dispute which has been doing more work for me.
-Maraleaf Pixie: Pixie hits multiple boxes in this deck. First, it flies and it is relatively cheap. Second, it is a Mana dork that can tap for green or blue which is actually huge for this deck as it's super hungry for Mana bips, and especially blue for counters. Thirdly, it is a faerie which is a relevant creature type for Spellstutter Sprite support. I was playing it for a bit, and while it is never a ‘bad’ card, it definitely doesn’t feel like an optimal card.
-Ice-Fang Coatl: as mentioned, flash flyers are great in this deck. I have tried playing around with several of the two Mana evasive flash threats such as scryb rangers, Faerie Duelist and Dimensional Infiltrator but ice-fang is definitely the best. Cantripping is very solid and the snow deathtouch definitely is not irrelevant. With that being said, again, the two mana makes it a bit lack luster and again doesn’t feel optimal. Also, cutting it means you don’t have to run snow basics which really opens up your options for pretty basic lands. You know, important things.
-Brazen Borrower: Versatile and does a lot of things the deck wants to do but ended up cutting it for efficiency’s sake. I was running it over Chain of Vapor for a minute but Chain is definitely the more optimal choice.
-Hinterland Harbor and Flooded Grove: while good fixing, both are bit awkward in 1 land hands or on turn one with only colorless available. Swapped for more islands to help with daze and mystic sanctuary consistency.
-Unified Will: commonly played in lists and I have played with it a bit myself but is one of the weaker two Mana counters. A little too fragile for the two Mana in a deck that really wants cheaper interaction.
While I have spent many an hour piloting this deck and fine tuning it based off my own experience, I would love to hear other people's thoughts and see your lists. I believe the database deck list is a good starting point but definitely not the most optimized list.
