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Make No Gravetide Image (cEDH Muldrotha Primer)

Commander / EDH* BUG (Sultai) Competitive Control Primer Stax

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Land (31)

Artifact (10)

Creature (20)

Enchantment (13)

Planeswalker (3)

Commander (1)

Commander: Muldrotha, the Gravetide

Instant (16)

Sorcery (6)

Muldrotha has some of the highest inevitability in the format. When compared to most rebuy effects, (Kess, Yawgmoth’s Will etc.) they have a tendency to exile the cards you play with them, or themselves. Muldrotha is one of very few cards that lets you access multiple cards from your graveyard without exiling them or itself.

BUG is an excellent colour combination, giving us access to Blue’s interaction, Black’s Tutors, and Green rounds out the package with ramp and other supporting effects.

This build also blends proactive and reactive interaction. Cards like Seal of Primordium and Aether Spellbomb force others to wait until they can safely combo through them, thus delaying your opponents without needing to be spent, but we have also slotted in 12 reactive instants, so it is never safe to assume we have nothing in hand.

The deck takes a while to get going, so while you can often present one or two pieces of interaction in the early game, you will never be able to stop a table full of fast combo decks. We are generally reliant on at least one other slow player at a table.

Our commander has a CMC of 6. If we look at commonly played competitive commanders, they tend to cluster between 2-4 CMC. At 5, there are a few, like General Tazri and Kraum, but neither of those decks are at all commander reliant. 6 only has Tasigur and Teferi, neither of which are truly 6 mana, Tasigur because of Delve and Teferi because he can immediately untap mana.

Lion's Eye Diamond (Hereafter referred to as LED) combos are inherently vulnerable, as pretty early on in the combo, we discard our hand, so we have to be sure we can either force our way through interaction or that there is no interaction forthcoming.
Generally considered to be turns one to three, this is where the fastest decks are looking to win. Ideally your opening hand has a 0 or 1-drop mana source (rock/dork), which you can play on turn one. Mystic Remora is also quite good, and Aether Spellbomb or Seal of Removal can be enough to get in the way of many fast combos (though not breakfast hulk, which this deck can have hard time answering).

On turns 2 and 3 you can either hold up mana the threaten one of our reactive instants, or try and lay out a hate piece to slow down your opponents, like Null Rod or Arcane Laboratory.

Turns 4-6 are when this deck really starts to come into its element. Mindslicer, Pernicious Deed or Zur's Weirding can really put a stranglehold on the game or set our opponents back long enough for us to cast Muldrotha. Depending on our hand, we can also try to win, though this usually requires a great deal of fast mana.

This is where the key threat assessment comes in, as we generally have 3 things we want to accomplish and mana for only 2. The 3 things are: Lay out proactive hate, hold up answers and develop towards our win. Evaluating which players at the table are stopped by which hate pieces, and playing accordingly is paramount.

Your primary focus here is not losing. Paying attention to which opponents might be threatening is a good idea, watch for accumulating cards in hand, casting tutors etc. Make sure you recast the right hate pieces, keep mana up to threaten responses and look for opportunities to combo or establish a lock. If you can recur Pernicious Deed every turn, or can maintain Zur's Weirding, you will almost certainly win.

For combo lines, visit the "Combo" Section

This is one of the trickiest aspects of this deck. We have already established that 6 mana is a lot. 3 Mana is a much nicer cost, yes? Well, with an LED in hand, you only need 3 mana to cast Muldrotha. Not only that, but you can immediately replay the LED, and use it to cast cards from your graveyard!

You know what card really, really sucks to cast? One with Nothing. One with nothing, pass sounds like just about the worst turn you can have early on in a game of EDH.

So which is it? A golden opportunity to speed yourself up by many turns? Or a trap that springs shut and destroys any hope of winning you may have had?

I don’t know. Some Primer, huh? Wait, wait no, come back. Maybe “I’m not sure” is a better answer. I do have some information to impart before you play this deck.

This opportunity has presented itself to me several times. I’ve gone for it most of the time. Most of the time, I do not get to untap with Muldrotha. Yet, most of those games, I actually won. Unfortunately, the ~15 times this has happened just isn’t a large enough sample. Am I just winning because having Lion’s Eye Diamond makes the deck so much more explosive when I do stick Muldrotha? Am I winning because people ignore me after I go down to 3 lands and no cards in hand?

Unfortunately, I can’t answer these questions, but as a general rule, if you think that A) Muldrotha will not resolve, B) Muldrotha will be removed at instant speed or C) You don’t have a good card to cast off the second LED, don’t do it. If you do have a good piece to cast after the fact, it may be worth it, but it comes down to reading the table, making a judgment about your likelihood to be punished and how easily you can recover from this. Your Mileage may vary.

The Muldrotha combo is as follows: Muldrotha, the Gravetide in Play, Lion's Eye Diamond, Phantasmal Image and Animate Dead/Necromancy in your hand or graveyard. Dance of Many can take the place of Phantasmal Image.

  1. Cast the LED
  2. Activate LED, adding
  3. Cast the Phantasmal Image. Have it enter as a copy of Muldrotha, the Gravetide and sacrifice the original to the Legend Rule, put it in your graveyard
  4. Cast the LED
  5. Activate LED, adding
  6. Cast Animate Dead, targeting Muldrotha, the Gravetide. Sacrifice the Phantasmal Image to the Legend Rule
  7. Repeat Steps 1-6 for infinite mana, storm and Gravestorm (With infinite and , you can make with the LED)

  8. Find an outlet

The outlets that actually make you win are:

  • Walking Ballista

  • Eternal Witness + Winds of Rebuke
  • Ashiok, Dream Render + a way to recur it.
  • Card: Bitter Ordeal

    • The cards that let you find a win after comboing are:

    and

    These all assume you have Muldrotha, the Gravetide in play and haven't used any of her casts.
    With outlet already:

    Phantasmal Image, Lion's Eye Diamond and Animate Dead

    Cost post Intuition:

    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    Without outlet already:

    Sidisi, Undead Vizier, Lion's Eye Diamond and Animate Dead

    LED for

    Animate Dead Sidisi

    Exploit Sidisi for Phantasmal Image

    Cast Phantasmal Image using the extra B and a U

    Cost to win post Intuition:

    With one other Creature and Razaketh, the Foulblooded in play (requires at least 2 Lands):

    1. Sacrifice the creature to Razaketh to get Life
    2. Cast Life
    3. Sacrifice one land to Razaketh to get Lion's Eye Diamond
    4. Cast LED
    5. Activate LED, adding
    6. Sacrifice another Land to Razaketh to get Phantasmal Image
    7. Cast Phantasmal Image, have it enter as a copy of Muldrotha
    8. Cast LED
    9. Activate LED, adding
    10. Sacrifice Phantasmal image to Razaketh to get Animate Dead
    11. Cast animate dead targeting Muldrotha
    12. Combo
    13. Sacrifice Phantasmal Image to get an outlet

    Cost to win post Razaketh: + 10 Life

    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    With 2 Creatures:

    1. Sacrifice one creature to Razaketh to get Lion's Eye Diamond
    2. Cast LED
    3. Activate LED, adding
    4. Sacrifice another creature to Razaketh to get Phantasmal Image
    5. Cast Phantasmal Image, have it enter as a copy of Muldrotha
    6. Cast LED
    7. Activate LED, adding
    8. Sacrifice Phantasmal image to Razaketh to get Animate Dead
    9. Cast animate dead targeting Muldrotha
    10. Combo
    11. Sacrifice Phantasmal Image to get an outlet

    Cost to win post Razaketh: + 8 Life

    Assuming Sidisi, Undead Vizier is entering play, and you have Muldrotha and have not used her Artifact or Enchantment casts

    1. Sidisi Enters the battlefield
    2. Exploit Sidisi to get Animate Dead
    3. Cast Animate Dead targeting Sidisi
    4. Exploit Sidisi to get Lion's Eye Diamond
    5. Cast LED
    6. Activate LED, adding
    7. Cast LED
    8. Activate LED, adding
    9. Cast Animate Dead targeting Sidisi
    10. Exploit Sidisi to get Phantasmal Image
    11. Cast Phantasmal Image, copying Muldrotha
    12. Combo
    13. Cast Sidisi
    14. Exploit Sidisi to get an outlet

    Cost to win post Sidisi:

    This card can't be countered, which means it is worth it to attempt to cast in the late game, and protects itself while drawing cards, and presents a very real clock, particularly when attacking with Muldrotha
    This card can completely lock out opponents from any relevant draws, and provided we can cast Muldrotha after it lands we can easily break parity.
    Despite our inability to combo through Null Rod, we run it because we are a slow stax deck, with reasonably limited mana rocks (we aren't running Signets or Talismans), and lots of mana dorks, so this can slow down out opponents and will generally hurt them much more than it hurts us.
    With the advent of Thassa's oracle, I'm trying this out again. It's often difficult to set up, but oracle is just so obscene to try and deal with that preemptively taking it out may be worth it. We'll see
    Actually lets us dig very quickly while still being a useful land (as opposed to something like Bazaar of Baghdad), and when played from the yard isn't card disadvantage, so if we are topdecking, we essentially replace our draw with a Forbidden Alchemy
    The only cards I really want to skullclamp are Eternal Witness, Spellseeker and Glen Elendra Archmage. Because Muldrotha provides so much value, it is usually more effecient to use mana dorks for mana rather than spend a recast after clamping them.
    Not an all in combo deck, we would much rather leave a couple mana open for a real counterspell than essentially skip our next turn to pay for pact.
    Not as good as Sinister Concoction for a few reasons:

    1. Extra mana to use.
    2. Anti-synergy with Null Rod and Energy Flux
    3. Nonblack restriction is quite relevant with the number of Tymnas running around.
    Soul-Guide Lantern, while costing an extra mana, is also a wincon and we don't need two of these effects.
    A la Mulldrifter, Vessel of Nascency etc.:

    Most of these are two slow, and with the frequency of Stax effects like Rule of Law or Damping Sphere, I would always rather draw a relevant card.

    Take too long to come online, as they really only get value after Muldrotha comes out.
    Cards like Grisly Salvage, Gather the pack etc. Same reasoning RE the permanent based effects, I don't want to be spending my turn on them through a rule of law, and I already have enough type diversity that whiffing is a real concern.
    Only really started well off of a few cards, if I don't have a 3 or 4 drop, it is abysmally slow.
    This doesn't efficiently find a combo and most creatures I would want to get cost 3+, so this is just too much mana invested.
    Basically, playing them post Muldrotha is simply too slow, but playing them Pre-Muldrotha guarantees you will never actually cast Muldrotha to break parity on them.
    TBA!
    Muldrotha has been described as:

    • "Pubstomp garbage, tier 3 or 4 at best"

    It has been said that:

    • "Literally anything Muldrotha does, Tasigur does better at any stage of the game"

    Cockatrice Tournament Winner and r/CompetitiveEDH Mentor AstralCodex's response to the deck was as follows:

    • "The final pod is Me, [Player 2], [Player 3] and some Muldrotha guy. I'm... real confused about the Muldrotha guy"
    v4 --> v5

    Removed

    • Defense Grid
    • Urza's Bauble
    • Palinchron
    • Telepathy
    • Exploration
    • Dispel

    Added

    • Arbor Elf
    • Llanowar Elves
    • Elvish Mystic
    • Energy Flux
    • Zur's Weirding
    • Transmute Artifact

    v5 --> v5.1

    Removed

    • Buried Alive

    Added

    • Energy Flux
    v5.1 --> v6

    Removed

    • Devoted Druid
    • Elves of Deep Shadow
    • Oracle of Mul Daya
    • Gilded Drake
    • Lim-Dul's Vault
    • Rhystic Study

    Added

    • Mikaeus, the Unhallowed
    • Viscera Seer
    • Protean Hulk
    • Body Double
    • Flash
    • Imperial Seal

    v6 --> v6.1

    Added

    • Demonic Tutor

    Removed

    • Mana Vortex
    v6.1 --> v7

    Added

    • Mana Vortex
    • Windfall
    • Life from the Loam
    • Nezahal, Primal Tide
    • Phyrexian Scriptures Experimental

    Removed

    • Body Double
    • Flash
    • Imperial Seal
    • Protean Hulk
    • Sphere of Resistance

    v7 --> v7.1

    Added

    • Razaketh, the Foulblooded

    Removed

    • Deadeye Navigator
    v7.1 --> v8

    Added

    • Imperial Seal
    • Reanimate
    • Cavern of Souls
    • Phyrexian Tower
    • Fyndhorn Elves
    • Spellseeker
    • Gilded Drake
    • Tasigur, the Golden Fang
    • City of Brass

    Removed

    • Mikaeus, the Unhallowed
    • Viscera Seer
    • Phyrexian Scriptures
    • Secrets of the Dead
    • Forest
    • Gaea's Cradle
    • Transmute Artifact
    • Smokestack
    • Flooded Grove
    v8 --> v9

    Added

    • Life//Death
    • Caustic Caterpillar
    • Sinister Concoction
    • Sylvan Safekeeper
    • Massacre

    Removed

    • Birthing Pod
    • Reanimate
    • Tasigur, the Golden Fang
    • River Kelpie
    • Scrabbling Claws

    v9 --> v9.1

    Added

    • Gaea's Cradle

    Removed

    • Sylvan Safekeeper

    v9.1 --> v9.2

    Added

    • Siren Stormtamer
    • Contamination

    Removed

    • Mana Vortex
    • Liliana of the Veil

    v9.2 --> v9.3

    Added

    • Expedition Map
    • Priest of Titania

    Removed

    • Siren Stormtamer
    • Imperial Seal

    v9.3 --> v9.4

    Added

    • Assassin's Trophy

    Removed

    • Manglehorn

    v9.4 --> v9.5

    Added

    • Dance of Many

    Removed

    • Mental Misstep

    v9 --> v10.0

    Added

    • Karn, the Great Creator
    • Tamiyo, Collector of Tales
    • Narset, Parter of Veils
    • Ashiok, Dream Render
    • Blast Zone

    Removed

    • Bitter Ordeal
    • Mindslicer
    • Glen Elendra Archmage
    • Sinister Concotion
    • Scavenger Grounds

    v10.0 --> v10.1

    Added

    • Narset's Reversal
    • Island

    Removed

    • Delay
    • City of Brass

    v10.1 --> v10.2

    Added

    • Collector Ouphe
    • Veil of Summer
    • Mistcaller
    • Nurturing Peatland
    • Waterlogged Grove

    Removed

    • Arcane Laboratory
    • Contamination
    • Narset's Reversal
    • Blast Zone
    • Mana Confluence

    v10.2 --> v10.3

    Added

    • Survival of the Fittest

    Removed

    • Energy Flux

    v10.3 --> v10.4

    Added

    • Soul-Guide Lantern
    • Bitter Ordeal

    Removed

    • Null Rod
    • Nihil Spellbomb

    Suggestions

    Updates Add

    Walk This Way! — May 13, 2019
    Edit

    With the release of WAR, we got a whole new Genre of Planeswalker. The typical Mediocre +1/2, Impactful -(2-4), Game-ending -(6-9) model has been abandoned.

    Many new walkers have been pushed precisely because they don't have that "answer me or lose" ult. The static abilities are also incredibly powerful. The typical issue of walkers in muldrotha, the often-awkward numbers involved in killing themselves made them rarely worth it.

    I've been testing with 4 of the new walkers. I doubt they will all make the cut at the end of the day, but I'll lay out what I'm testing, what I cut for it, and why.

    Karn, the Great Creator: Another Null Rod is great, particularly because we can actually combo through this one! He can also buy back the LED, meaning we now have redundancy against all 3 pieces being exiled! (Anim/Necro, Phant/Dance, LED/Karn). Popping moxen and crypts is also really fun, and his absurdly high loyalty means he might survive a turn cycle before we deploy something to protect him.

    Ashiok, Dream Render: Search hate is great, repeatable grave hate is a nice bonus, and, we can target ourselves with the -1 to fuel the bin. Hybrid cost makes Ashiok easy to recast without taking us off colours we need for interaction.

    Narset, Parter of Veils: I mean.... screw Tymna, right? Add that to a double Impulse and low CMC, she cements our card advantage off of Muldrotha in the long game, and really makes opponents lives difficult in the short term. UU is a pretty serious downside, as this deck has pretty diverse colour requirements, so it might be a struggle to card her and hold a counterspell, for example.

    Tamiyo, Collector of Tales: Whew lad. This card does everything we want for this deck. The +1 is situation card advantage, particularly with some sort of Topdeck manipulation. It fuels the yard even if you whiff. The -3 is beautiful. It lets us buy back all the non-permanents we milled, and along with the starting loyalty of 5, the +1, -3, -3 to cycle her means we can actually be buying back a non-permanent card every turn. Her passive is easily the worst of the 4, but you will definitely catch someone out when they cast a Wheel without reading her fully. Her cost is very high and she has no real immediate impact, but in grindier, controlier metas, I'd consider actively tutoring for her.

    Other Changes: Blast Zone is replacing Scavenger Grounds as we want to be able to answer Breakfast without crippling ourselves.

    Things that aren't going in: Kaya's Ghostform. While this card opens up a whole new realm of possibilities for the combo (including Food Chain), we don't run sac outlets, and the list would need so many changes to move towards a sac-outlet oriented build. I may work in this as an alternate build, but for now, no Ghostform.

    Cuts:

    I haven't decided what will be coming out and what will be staying, so I'll provide a summary of some of my considerations

    Expedition Mapfoil: This one comes in and out as a Meta call. Sometimes it's literally worth tutoring to find Cavern of Souls, then Command Beacon and with all the tech lands (and expecially the new Blast Zone)

    Glen Elendra Archmage: This card is really slow, and doesn't function as the double Negate you might wish for when comboing, because people can respond to the persist trigger. While it has won me games, it has also sat in my hand a LOT.

    Sinister Concoction: The requirements are just a little too steep for what it does, particularly the discard hurts.

    Mindslicer: I've actually been using this a lot recently, I seem to frequently draw Slicer or Tower, and then tutoring for the other half is very easy. I've found it doesn't actually win me that game nearly as often as I might hope, particularly when Tymna players can easily be drawing 3 cards a cycle.

    Bitter Ordeal: The non-infinite Bitter Ordeals are cute and infrequent, and the addition of Karn means that I can get back the ballista from exile, and recurring Ashiok also lets us exile libraries to win.

    Life / Death: I'm too cowardly for "miminum resource" Razaketh Lines, particularly with no Pact of Negation in the deck, so I rarely use the Life half, and "bad reanimate" is not a card I want in this "not reanimator" deck.

    Nezahal, Primal Tide: I don't know what it is about this card, but I seem to not-infrequently lose with this guy in play and 12+ cards in hand. Maybe it's the way I pilot or I am too aggressive about casting him with little mana held up, but it's not working for me. YMMV

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    Casual

    95% Competitive

    Revision 15 See all

    (4 years ago)

    +1 Jeweled Lotus main
    -1 Legacy's Allure main
    Top Ranked
    Date added 6 years
    Last updated 4 years
    Legality

    This deck is not Commander / EDH legal.
    Rarity (main - side)

    13 - 0 Mythic Rares

    49 - 0 Rares

    17 - 0 Uncommons

    14 - 0 Commons
    Cards 100
    Avg. CMC 2.07
    Tokens Bird 2/2 U, Copy Clone
    Folders cEDH, cEDH, edh, edh, Commander, cEDH, cEDH, Stax Ideas, yeet, Chromatic
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