Trinkets and Baubles - Paid for in Blood (PDH) (EDH / Commander)

Pauper EDH is an alternative format that uses any uncommon creature as the commander, and the 99 are commons.

"Glittering gold, trinkets and baubles - paid for in blood."

This mono-red deck is built around Fathom Fleet Swordjack, hoarder of treasure & trinkets.

The game plan is straight forward, dump artifacts on the board and then swing in with Swordjack, once from the command zone and then once from the graveyard with encore, this time hitting all opponents.

Our main artifact engine is a ton of cantrip artifacts that draw a card as they enter the battlefield, we also run some monarch cards. I've decided to not run rummaging / pillaging as they're not card advantage (madness etc aside). Bonder's Ornament and Magnifying Glass are costly but gets the job done.

Mono-red has almost no access to protection for our commander, so timing when he's played is important. Once he's attacked it matters less if he dies, as that gives us access to the encore ability. We do have Whispersilk Cloak and plenty of sources of haste, so we don't play him & wait a turn to attack.

We run a ton of ramp as the commander tax is going to accumulate, and they all count for Swordjack's ability. Mind Stone & Commander's Sphere can be sacrificed in a pinch, but is better left on board.

For removal we run some artifact destruction and removal that scales with our ramp; Fireball and Rolling Thunder. We also have Circle of Flame and Swirling Sandstorm to help with decks that go wide.

Some notable artifacts are Tormod's Crypt and Relic of Progenitus for graveyard hate, Universal Solvent as emergency removal, treasures from Impulsive Pilferer, Brazen Freebooter and Rapacious Dragon. We also have some artifacts with decent bodies; Myr Enforcer, Scaretiller, One-Eyed Scarecrow, Guardians of Meletis and Custodian of the Trove.

Another artifact worth noting is Ancestral Statue which is important in case our commander gets Pacified or something similar, otherwise you can bounce a cantrip artifact for another draw.

Weaknesses of the deck are most of all the lack of protection for our commander, if he dies before he can attack he'll quickly become difficult to cast. Fortunately we can encore in between casts from the commander zone so it doesn't ramp up all that quickly. The game plan is very obvious so expect your opponents to hold some removal once you've amassed some artifacts. We're also a bit low on creatures so we're fairly open to attacks. Fortunately there's no Vandalblast or similar artifact sweepers but artifact removal is still a bummer, one card in particular: Gorilla Shaman is repeatable at instant speed.

If you have any thoughts or suggestions, I'd love to hear it!