Sasaya (EDH / Commander)

Strategy

This is a very commander-centric deck. The goal is to play and flip [[Sasaya, Orochi Ascendant]], generate a bunch of mana, and play [[Cultivator Colossus]] with at least six lands in play. "But that doesn't even win the game" you're probably saying. Yeah, you're right.

The deck sections explain the gameplan pretty well, but more details are below.

Quick Maths

[[Sasaya, Orochi Ascendant]] squares your mana. Below is a quick table demonstrating how much mana you can generate after playing the commander. This is assuming you just make your land play every turn and then cast and flip the commander right away.

Turn                      1  2  3  4  5  6  7
Mana Available After Flip x  x  0  4  10 18 28

Of course, you will often need to cast and flip the commander before playing your land in order to meet the condition. Depending on what is in your hand when you go for the flip, you may need to wait another turn. 10 mana is a lot, and it will let you cast many of the tutors followed by [[Cultivator Colossus]]. 18 mana is enough to do anything.

Of course there are other situations, like when you have [[Scrying Sheets]] and 5 [[Snow-Covered Forest]]s in play. You will end up with 15 mana instead if you use the [[Scrying Sheets]] to pay for casting the commander.

Step 0

Playing lands is essential to Magic, but sometimes it's better to hold them in hand in order to get to seven.

• [[Reliquary Tower]] is great because the hand size limit often gets in the way.
• [[Jungle Basin]] and [[Guildless Commons]] yield a land play while still developing mana. However, they reduce the potency of the combo because you will control fewer lands with the same name. I think it's worth it.
• [[Dryad Arbor]] can be found with [[Green Sun's Zenith]] for ramp, although I'm considering removing it.
• [[Scrying Sheets]] is excellent at adding more lands to hand, especially with so many snow lands in the deck.

Step 1

You played some lands. Now what?

Always be mindful of how many lands you have in hand because you are going to need seven. The cards in this section help you maintain a large hand size. Your hand will naturally trend towards nonland cards if you play a land every turn, so these are set up to be 2-for-1's that will keep you in range of seven lands in hand as long as possible.

Step 2

Ramping normally is not the primary game plan here, but these cards allow some hands to just forget about the commander and ramp up to a lot of mana. Sometimes this can be beneficial, especially if you have ways to get even more lands into your hand.

Step 3

When it comes time to play [[Sasaya, Orochi Ascendant]], it can be killed. However, if someone targets it in response to the flip ability activation, you can just activate again and flip it again. They need to use a spell that can destroy both creatures and enchantments. Those spells do exist, so there are a couple protection spells in this section to help with keeping [[Sasaya, Orochi Ascendant]] or [[Sasaya's Essence]] alive.

Also remember that once the commander's flip ability resolves, you can safely play a land without getting the enchantment interacted with because playing a land is a special action that does not use the stack. So normally after your draw step you have some lands in play, seven lands in hand, and one tutor or payoff in hand. You first cast [[Sasaya, Orochi Ascendant]], then flip, then play a land, then use your finisher.

Step 4

All these tutors are set up to grab [[Cultivator Colossus]]. The only weird one is [[Woodland Bellower]], which tutors for [[Fierce Empath]], which tutors for [[Cultivator Colossus]].

Step 5

Bae.

Step 6

Now that you've done the thing you can die happy. Oh right, you can also use one or more of these cards to try to win the game.

Step 7

There are a few generic removal spells here just to make sure the game doesn't get too out of hand. But realistically with this all-in combo deck you're not going to benefit much from reactive spells. But it doesn't hurt to use these to buy some time when setting up your hand isn't going well.