How to Build an EDH Deck (EDH / Commander)

The strategies I use to try and build a EDH deck

Starting Motivations - what motivates me to start building a deck

• Top Down: starting out with a "big picture" for a deck, then finding groups of cards that make that big picture a reality

  • Usually consists of theme or flavor decks

• Bottom Up: starting out with smaller specific groups or types of cards, and mixing them together to build up to a coherent strategy

  • I think most types of decks fall in this category

Clarifying Question - questions I ask to help hash out the exactly what a deck look like

• What is the deck trying to do?

• What does its early, mid, and late game ideally look like?

  • Early game turns 1 to 3, usually

  • Mid game: turns 3 to 7

  • Late game: turns 7+

• How do you beat your opponents or achieve a "personal" victory?

• What power level are you playing with?

Card Groupings

• For consistency in any strategy, try to follow the 7x9, 8x8, or 9x7 rule - i.e. 7 groups of 9 cards, where each group fulfills a specific part of the deck.

• Try to have cards that fit into multiple groupings. This allows you to have fewer dead / situation specific cards and more cards that are "always useful".

  • Sword of Fire and Ice can be considered creature protection, card advantage, evasion, and even creature removal - all in one card. Oppose this to Doom Blade which only kills a creature.

• Try to have a grouping for each of the following:

  • Interaction and Protection - how you deal with your opponent's gameplans and how you prevent opponent's from interacting with your gameplay

    • Ex: Teferi's Protection for protection, Doom Blade for interaction

    • Cheap, general purpose counterspells like Negate or Counterspell fulfill both roles!

  • Mana Acceleration and Fixing - the more mana you have earlier in the game, the faster you should be able to carry out your gameplan, also helps get the colors you need

  • Card Advantage and Quality - EDH games go long, want to make sure you always have enough resources to keep yourself in the game

    • can you bounce back from an opponent's interaction and keep advancing your gameplan, can you deal with an opponent's gameplan without also stifling your own?

    • This falls into one of two categories - simply seeing more cards in your deck (raw card draw like Opportunity) or "screening" the cards you draw so the cards you do draw are on average better (top deck manipulation like Sensei's Divining Top)

  • Tutors - I consider them "flex" cards, allow you to find the right card at the right moment for a little more mana

    • I don't usually consider land based tutors like Farseek in this category - think more general purpose ones like Green Sun's Zenith or Demonic Tutor

    • Good rule of thumb: the more competitive and consistent the deck is, the more tutors you should have. For "typical" EDH decks, I recommend no more than 3-5 general purpose tutors.