Tomorrow and Tomorrow: Lich Primer

Commander / EDH* WUB (Esper)

MissingNo1028

Land (34)

• 1x Cabal Coffers
• 1x Command Tower
• 1x Exotic Orchard
• 1x Fabled Passage
• 1x Field of the Dead
• 1x Flooded Strand
• 1x Glacial Fortress
• 1x Godless Shrine
• 1x Grimclimb Pathway  ^Flip
• 1x Hall of Heliod's Generosity
• 1x Hallowed Fountain
• 4x Island
• 1x Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
• 3x Plains
• 1x Polluted Delta
• 1x Prairie Stream
• 1x Reliquary Tower
• 1x Snow-Covered Island
• 1x Snow-Covered Plains
• 1x Snow-Covered Swamp
• 1x Sunken Hollow
• 5x Swamp
• 1x Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
• 1x Watery Grave
• 1x Windswept Heath

Sorcery (11)

• 1x Approach of the Second Sun
• 1x Demonic Tutor
• 1x Dread Summons
• 1x From Under the Floorboards
• 1x Grim Tutor
• 1x Idyllic Tutor
• 1x Merciless Eviction
• 1x Open the Vaults
• 1x Scheming Symmetry
• 1x Sea Gate Restoration  ^Flip
• 1x Sickening Dreams

Enchantment (20)

• 1x Anointed Procession
• 1x Greater Auramancy
• 1x Land Tax
• 1x Leyline of Anticipation
• 1x Lich
• 1x Lich's Mastery
• 1x Mystic Remora
• 1x Necromancer's Covenant
• 1x Nefarious Lich
• 1x Nine Lives
• 1x Phyrexian Unlife
• 1x Psychic Corrosion
• 1x Rhystic Study
• 1x Smothering Tithe
• 1x Solitary Confinement
• 1x Sphere of Safety
• 1x Teferi's Ageless Insight
• 1x Transcendence
• 1x Words of Worship
• 1x Zombie Infestation

Artifact (12)

• 1x Aetherflux Reservoir
• 1x Alhammarret's Archive
• 1x Arcane Signet
• 1x Azorius Signet
• 1x Chrome Mox
• 1x Dimir Signet
• 1x Ivory Tower
• 1x Nyx Lotus
• 1x Orzhov Signet
• 1x Phyrexian Altar
• 1x Sol Ring
• 1x Thought Vessel

Planeswalker (1)

• 1x Ashiok, Dream Render

Commander (1)

Creature (13)

• 1x Academy Rector
• 1x Agent of Erebos
• 1x Bone Miser
• 1x Confessor
• 1x Fallen Shinobi
• 1x Gray Merchant of Asphodel
• 1x Psychosis Crawler
• 1x Skirge Familiar
• 1x The Scarab God
• 1x Undead Alchemist
• 1x Wayward Servant
• 1x Weathered Wayfarer
• 1x Zur the Enchanter *f-etch*

Instant (8)

• 1x Ad Nauseam
• 1x Counterspell
• 1x Fierce Guardianship
• 1x Foil
• 1x Pact of Negation
• 1x Stifle
• 1x Tale's End
• 1x Teferi's Protection

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A Wizard's Guide to Lichdom

Phylactery Lich by Michael Komarck

Introduction And Goals

Ever since the printing of the very first Lich there has existed the temptation to forsake the mortal coil and become an undead sorcerer. This path is not taken lightly, however. By accepting undeath we can make ourselves incredibly powerful. Yet, we also make ourselves vulnerable. We gain the ability to laugh in the face of death, but, a Cyclonic Rift will spell our absolute end.

The key will be to build up our forces and ready our defenses before becoming a lich. We should have counterspells ready in hand, or multiple ways to cling to life even if we lose our Lichdom. The sections indicated here will focus on some key cards, card choices, and strategies for the deck.

Goals:

• Build up a Board State to play one of our Lich Cards onto
• Accumulate Knowledge by drawing Cards.
• Use our superior forces or spellcasting to destroy our opponents.

Varina, Lich Queen

To lead our forces we have chosen Varina, Lich Queen. Besides being an obvious win from a purely flavor point of view, all of her abilities provide things we want as a Lich. She can:

• Generate Tokens - Provides blockers to help protect us. And for Lich's Mastery Tokens can serve us as life lost fodder
• Draw / Discard Cards - The loot effect can help us find our key enchantments, and the discard effect fills our graveyard with fodder for Lich's Mastery and Nefarious Lich.
• Lifegain - The third part of Varina's ability gains us life which means we draw even more cards.

Having access to Esper gives us a great amount of protective spells in addition to lifegain, but as a Lich our main color will be Black.

Choice of Phylactery

The deck has three different options for which kind of Lich we become. We should only be using one at a time, as they tend not to play well together. For example, Lich prevents us from gaining life which means that Lich's Mastery won't trigger. But, at the same time, when we take damage we will have to sacrifice double the number of permanents. The three types of phylacteries we shall have access too are

• Lich's Mastery
• Pros
• Built-In Protection, Hexproof
• Huge Amount of Fodder Available (Cards in Hand, Cards in Graveyard, Permanents)
• Cannot lose the game by any means while we control it.
• Keep our life total and continue to gain life
• Cons
• Most expensive lich to cast (6cmc)
• Any life lost results in sacrifices
• Lich
• Pros
• 4 Mana to Cast
• Only sacrifices when we take damage (Can freely lose life.)
• Sets our Life Total to 0, which has advantages.
• Cons
• **Can only sacrifice nontoken permanents**
• Only prevents us from losing do to having 0 or less life.
• Vulnerable - And being at 0 life means we have two loss conditions if Lich is removed from the battlefield.
• Nefarious Lich
• Pros
• 4 Mana to Cast
• We keep our life total.
• Only triggers on damage dealt to us.
• Cards in graveyard act as our fodder, which Varina, Lich Queen provides a great number of.
• Cons
• Does not prevent us from losing the game in any way.
• Life gain is replaced by draw, so we cannot gain life.
• Vulnerable to Removal

The choice of which phylactery we wish to use depends on the state of the board and the cards we have available in hand. Some of our cards work better with one phylactery versus another, but, one of the nice things about Varina is that the cards that do not help us can simply be placed into the graveyard. For example, ad nauseum is a powerhouse when combined with Lich, but, will result in a great deal of pain if we attempt to use it with Lich's Mastery.

Overall, I believe our best available phylactery is Lich's Mastery. The ability to turn any card in hand or graveyard to our advantage makes it incredibly resilient and powerful.

There are a few Lich-type effects that didn't end up in this deck.

Lich's Mirror As much as I love the look and feel of this card, it is just impractical to think that starting the game fresh against three opponents is anything other than a momentary stall. I can't imagine dropping this for five mana would ever pay off.

Lich's Tomb Only prevents us from not losing the game for having 0 or less life, and has the drawback of Lich's Mastery. Doesn't provide us the benefit of our other choices of being able to draw cards.

The Undead

All masters of necromancy require servants to see to their whims. While our main focus is upon powerful spells and enchantments, we have a few key creatures to see to our needs and support us.

Our main force will be served by the bulk of zombie tokens generated from either Varina, Lich Queen, Dread Summons, Zombie Infestation, or From Under the Floorboards. Having zombies is important for us because they help fuel Varina's ability, as well as serving us as sacrificial fodder for our Lich's Mastery payments.

Every undead army needs commanders though. We have a few key zombies that provide us with a vital utility.

Undead Alchemist is an all-star. Milling our opponents out is a potential win condition of the deck, and he turns mill into even more zombies generated.

Agent of Erebos With the number of enchantments we run, he will make sure that no one benefits from their graveyards.

Gray Merchant of Asphodel and Wayward Servant both have the potential to gain us life, which will draw us more cards.

Fallen Shinobi We can never underestimate the value of stealing knowledge from our adversaries and turning it against them.

A Lich's Servants

A lich's dark power draws aid from all corners of the multiverse. Chief among those serving our strategy are

Confessor Turning our discard into card draw will quickly end the game and our opponents. With Confessor alone we can wind up working our way through our entire deck with ease. This also works on the discard phase, so we can filter through our deck until we have the perfect seven card hand.

Skirge Familiar One thing we shall have a lot of in this deck is cards in hand. Turning that knowledge into a physical resource we can use will serve us well.

Zur the Enchanter Though Zur cannot grab any of our lich effects, he can take a number of powerhouse enchantments and place htem onto the battlefield. Very viable for any situation.

Our Spellbook

Because of the nature of our deck, most of our interaction needs to be with the stack. We need to be able to stop threats to our phylactery before they can be allowed on the battlefield. We run a wide variety of counterspells in order to do just that. Most valuable to us is perhaps Pact of Negation. Assuming we have Lich's Mastery on the battlefield, we won't even need to pay the upkeep cost. Likewise, Intervention Pact can turn what would be a huge blow against us into card draw.

Angel's Grace and Tale's End can serve us at the most dire hour and keep our bodies alive even when Lichdom is taken away from us.

Ad Nauseam serves us well with the older Lich, allowing us to safely navigate our entire deck.

When we have decided to finish toying with our enemies and end things, Approach of the Second Sun shall do. When we cast it, we gain seven life. As a Lich, that shall draw us seven cards, and with any luck we can cast it again right then and there.

Enchantments

WIP

Eternal Life

Though our primary means of escaping death shall be through our phylactery, we shall have some backups at hand.

Platinum Angel and Gideon of the Trials can prevent us from losing the game even if our phylactery is taken away.

Nine Lives will protect us from nine instances of damage before vanishing. If we are using Lich's Mastery, we won't even care about when it goes away. Lich, however, will still see us losing the game.

Solitary Confinement We have no issues drawing cards. Solitary Confinement protects us from any and all direct interaction an opponent might throw at us. As long as we have some way to continue gaining life, we can feed it indefinitely.

Phyrexian Unlife Phyrexian Unlife can protect us from life lost when we have reached 0 life. With Lich's Mastery, we will not have to sacrifice any permanents and poison counters will not kill us.

Acquiring Knowledge

WIP Words of Wisdom

Transcendence

Changes to the Tome

10/11/2020

Lands: -2 Swamps

-2 Plains

-Scavenger Grounds

+Fabled Passage

+Gimclimb Pathway / BrightClimb Pathway

+Windswept Heath

Enchantments:

-Curse of Disturbance

-Endless Ranks of the Dead

-Omniscience

-Propaganda

-Second Chance

+Anointed Procession

+Leyline of Anticipation

+Mystic Remora

+Teferi's Ageless Insight

Artifacts:

+Chrome Mox

Instants:

-Angel's Grace

-Force of Negation

-Intervention Pact

+Fierce Guardianship

+Pact of Negation

+Stifle

Sorceries:

+Open the Vaults

+Scheming Symmetry

+Seagate Restoration

+Sickening Dreams

Creatures:

-Dimir Houseguard

-Dreamscape Artist

-Platinum Angel

-Twilight Prophet

+Bone Miser

+Scarab God

Planeswalkers:

-Gideon of the Trials

+Ashiok, Dream Render

Under Construction: Lich at Work

Steve Prescott

Date added	4 years
Last updated	4 years
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	10 - 0 Mythic Rares 54 - 0 Rares 16 - 0 Uncommons 5 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	3.33
Tokens	Copy Clone, Treasure, Zombie 2/2 B