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MMM: Marchesa's Magic Mafia (Budget)

Commander / EDH UBR (Grixis)

Stompbob


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The goal I had in mind when making this list was to create a budget-friendly deck that could best represent my playing style, which considers more important to be able to keep the level of fun and "style" high at every game rather than aiming for the victory. I wanted a deck held together by a theme, a story, and at the same time able to make explosive turns that could take opponents off guard. My choice therefore fell on Marchesa, the Black Rose: in addition to having an ability that can safeguard my creatures, it combines well with the wizards tribal that I really like. Initially I thought of choosing Inalla, Archmage Ritualist as commander, but her ability, even if interesting, did not satisfy my style of play. Marchesa instead allows to give a revive and graveyard related tone to the deck, which I appreciate most. Inalla remains however in the 99, in fact the deck, as you probably have already noticed, is an upgrade of the preconstructed deck "Arcane Wizardry". The mana base, however, is practically unchanged, due to the budget. I only changed the vivid lands (because there is nothing more annoying than playing dice on the lands) with other lands that I had in my collection, including Watery Grave, which is not very budget but because I didn't use it I couldn't leave it out (the same is for Rhystic Study).

The goal of this deck is therefore to stay low to the ground for the first few turns, trying to fill the graveyard with istants, sorceries and creatures, and then reuse them to surprise the opponents. The win conditions of this deck are mainly two:

  • Galecaster Colossus, which can control the battlefield while being protected by our commander;
  • Flayer of the Hatebound, who is not a magician, but together with our commander's ability it will be removable only by an exile effect, and will allow us to use this last ability in a damage source.This card works very well with Living Death, giving us the opportunity to end the game in a stylish way.   The strongest card in this deck is definitely Buried Alive: by using it we are able to semi-tutor the cards discussed before, and if copied or casted several times it can fill our graveyard very quickly.

Naru Meha, Master Wizard is one of my favorite cards in the deck: it has a lord effect, and allows us to copy the spells we cast at a balanced mana cost. I decided not to include blink-effect cards like Ghostly Flicker, simply because infinite combos are interesting, but they don't drive me crazy.

And that's it! I listed all the cards that I removed from the original preconstructed deck, plus all the cards that I tested but didn't make the cut.

Feel free to give me advice on what to add to this deck, especially regarding the manabase, or which upgrades you would prioritize in a less budget-friendly build.

Yeah, Cyclonic Rift, I know hahahahah

Consider upvoting if you liked the deck tech! See you on the next one ;)

Post Scriptum:

"MMM". Why? Sounded cool. Why Mafia? Well, a group of wizards that you thought was dead but in reality it is not because it had planned everything from the beginning makes me think of mobsters. In grixis colors? Yeah, definitely mafia.

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Comments

95% Casual

Competitive

Date added 4 years
Last updated 4 years
Legality

This deck is Commander / EDH legal.

Rarity (main - side)

6 - 0 Mythic Rares

31 - 0 Rares

25 - 0 Uncommons

16 - 0 Commons

Cards 100
Avg. CMC 3.65
Tokens Copy Clone, Human Wizard 1/1 U, Manifest 2/2 C
Folders good
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