WWBD - What Would Bolas Do?

Commander / EDH Combo Control Spellslinger Superfriends UBR (Grixis) Vorthos

Cde0

Land (35)

• 1x Ancient Tomb
• 1x Blackcleave Cliffs
• 1x Blood Crypt
• 1x Bloodstained Mire
• 1x Command Beacon
• 1x Command Tower
• 1x Crumbling Necropolis
• 1x Darkslick Shores
• 1x Dragonskull Summit
• 1x Drowned Catacomb
• 1x Fabled Passage
• 1x Inventors' Fair
• 1x Island
• 1x Luxury Suite
• 1x Morphic Pool
• 1x Mountain
• 1x Polluted Delta
• 1x Prismatic Vista
• 1x Reflecting Pool
• 1x Reliquary Tower
• 1x Scalding Tarn
• 1x Scavenger Grounds
• 1x Seat of the Synod
• 1x Shivan Reef
• 1x Spirebluff Canal
• 1x Steam Vents
• 1x Sulfur Falls
• 1x Sulfurous Springs
• 1x Swamp
• 1x Training Center
• 1x Underground River
• 1x Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
• 1x Vault of Whispers
• 1x Volrath's Stronghold
• 1x Watery Grave

Sorcery (16)

• 1x Blasphemous Act
• 1x Bribery
• 1x Command the Dreadhorde
• 1x Crux of Fate
• 1x Damnation
• 1x Deliver Unto Evil
• 1x Demonic Tutor
• 1x Expropriate
• 1x Feed the Swarm
• 1x Grim Tutor
• 1x Hour of Devastation
• 1x Scheming Symmetry
• 1x The Elderspell
• 1x Torment of Hailfire
• 1x Toxic Deluge
• 1x Vandalblast

Artifact (14)

• 1x Aetherflux Reservoir
• 1x Arcane Signet
• 1x Bolas's Citadel
• 1x Dimir Signet
• 1x Fellwar Stone
• 1x Izzet Signet
• 1x Mana Vault
• 1x Rakdos Signet
• 1x Sensei's Divining Top
• 1x Sol Ring
• 1x Talisman of Creativity
• 1x Talisman of Dominance
• 1x Talisman of Indulgence
• 1x Thought Vessel

Creature (6)

• 1x Consecrated Sphinx
• 1x Dockside Extortionist
• 1x Notion Thief
• 1x Opposition Agent
• 1x Phantasmal Image
• 1x The Locust God

Commander (1)

 ^Flip

Instant (15)

• 1x Arcane Denial
• 1x Baleful Mastery
• 1x Bedevil
• 1x Chaos Warp
• 1x Counterspell
• 1x Countersquall
• 1x Cyclonic Rift
• 1x Deadly Rollick
• 1x Fierce Guardianship
• 1x Hurl Through Hell
• 1x Mana Drain
• 1x Mystical Tutor
• 1x Negate
• 1x Swan Song
• 1x Vampiric Tutor

Enchantment (7)

• 1x In Bolas's Clutches
• 1x Mystic Remora
• 1x Propaganda
• 1x Revel in Riches
• 1x Rhystic Study
• 1x The Eldest Reborn
• 1x Treachery

Planeswalker (6)

• 1x Liliana, Dreadhorde General
• 1x Nicol Bolas, Dragon-God
• 1x Nicol Bolas, God-Pharaoh
• 1x Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker
• 1x Tezzeret, Master of the Bridge
• 1x Tezzeret the Seeker

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At last! Finally I have achieved the perfect balance of delicious flavor and raw, villainous power!

Basically I tried to build a relatively high-powered and truly villainous deck that would be faithful to the character and story of Nicol Bolas, playing cards that are in his arsenal or at least in his wheelhouse. I kind of think of it as a Role Playing deck, where you as the decks pilot are playing the character of Nicol Bolas. How does Bolas enact his plans? He manipulates the plans and actions of his opponents, he destroys what he can't seize hold of, and then he brings together a collection of strange artifacts to bring about his endgame. And that's exactly what we're going to do.

The plan here is to ramp into the sort of powerful spells that do the types of things that Nicol Bolas is known for: spells like Expropriate and Torment of Hailfire; spells in the style of Cruel Ultimatum (though better suited for multiplayer) that can cripple our opponents while greatly increasing our relative position. These are the sort of cards that define Bolas's style of magic, and the Grixis shard as whole. We want to make our opponents discard, reanimate and seize control of their creatures, planeswalkers, and permanents, and lay waste to their board state. We want to overpower them with card advantage, planeswalkers of our own (Bolas and his henchmen: Liliana and Tezzeret), and God-Eternals and Forgotten Gods, reminding them that there is always a greater power.

More often than not the deck plays control and ramps, draws tons of cards, then whittles down our opponents, attacking their hands, countering the spells, and devastating their board states, then casts a crippling if not fatal Torment of Hailfire for the win. This is the grindy, control-deck line of play.

Alternatively we can play the deck as a combo deck, making use of the totally on-flavor combo Aetherflux Reservoir + Bolas's Citadel + Sensei's Divining Top for a storm win. From there we can easily storm off by activating the draw ability of the Top over and over, drawing our deck, and casting Top from the top of our library, triggering the Reservoir again and again to gain boatloads of life that can then be weaponized against against our opponents.

Since our commander transforms into a planeswalker in the form of Nicol Bolas, the Arisen   there's a solid planeswalker suite as well. The previously mentioned henchmen, as well as all of the Bolas planeswalkers (except for the egregiously bad Planeswalker Deck one, Nicol Bolas, the Deceiver). Nicol Bolas, Dragon-God shines in this deck, being able to make bigger pluses from the other planeswalkers in the deck (including our commander), not to mention our opponents planeswalkers. He's not hard to ultimate at all, making it another strong win condition.

WATCH ME TALK ABOUT BOLAS LORE & WHY NICOL BOLAS IS AWESOME:

If you like the deck then please +1 or face the wrath of the Tyrant of Worlds.

Check out all of my EDH decks and give a +1:

• Clockside Magda [cEDH] - cEDH mono-red artifact combo!
• WWBD - What Would Bolas Do? - Bolas themed Grixis control!
• The Hoard of the Dragon Queen - Five color dragons!
• Dungeon of the Necromancer - Esper venture reanimator!
• Welcome to Jurassic Park! - Dinosaur tribal with Gishath!
• Long May She Reign - Mardu pillow fort!
• Bruvac Petitioners - Mono-blue mill!
• Army of the Einir - Golgari elves!
• Tovolar's Wild Hunt - Werewolves!
• Sigarda, Champion of Humanity - Selesnya Human Tribal!

Top Ranked	Achieved #26 position overall 5 years ago Achieved #19 position in Commander / EDH 5 years ago Achieved #1 position in Commander / EDH Control 5 years ago Achieved #1 position in Commander / EDH Cruel Control 5 years ago
Date added	6 years
Last updated	2 years
Key combos	Aetherflux Reservoir + Bolas's Citadel + Sensei's Divining Top
Legality	This deck is not Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	15 - 0 Mythic Rares 57 - 0 Rares 17 - 0 Uncommons 8 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	3.40
Tokens	Bird 2/2 U, Insect 1/1 UR, Treasure, Zombie 2/2 B
Folders	Commander, Commander, Future Possible Decks, BOAS IDEIAS, Archenemy Idea, Vorthos, Gorgon's Eye, Cool Deck Ideas, Fun stuff, Commander decks