thrasios (EDH / Commander)

Deck Primer / Description

Tap 6[G]... and... Primer Time!

Ok, so this was supposed to be a budget list, but it got just a little out of hand... How can we bring it back down to budget? I have a few ideas.

Part 1: Budget 1.) if you buy the Yidris Maelstrom Wielder preconstructed commander deck in japanese from Walmart.com, you can get a few of the pieces that you need for much cheaper than buying them, and you can get a starter manabase for your four color deck!! this is a good investment of 37 dollars and you will get both commanders (Thrasios, Triton Hero and Vial-Smasher the Fierce) (33.97 and 13.99) as well as Sol Ring(4.23), Fellwar Stone (3.31), Rakdos Signet (1.54), Simic Signet (0.30), Chain of Vapor(3.97), Rakdos Charm (.54), Chaos Warp (2.36), Windfall (3.48), Evacuation (3.56), Burgeoning (12.12), and Chromatic Lantern (6.75). These cards add up to a value of $90.12, so you would save 50 dollars from doing this.

2.) In addition, the supplied landbase along with cards you already own from your current commander decks (such as the 5 color tribal land from the cat deck that can just be an untapped 5 color land in this deck) and a few budget lands such as the pain land cycle can make a cheap and effective four color manabase. This deck is specifically playing a lot of 2 mana mana rocks that make all colors of mana because the added fixing is so important in a 4 color deck. Notable lands from the Precon include: Ash Barrens, Exotic Orchard, Reliquary Tower, Shadowblood Ridge, Crumbling Necropolis and Opulent Palace, the last two being decent budget options that offer 3 colors of mana when you begin building the deck.

3.) Finally, there are some cards that you already own so you can subtract their price from the decks total. These include Birds of Paradise, Electrostatic Field, Curse of Bounty, Path of Ancestry, and Lightning Greaves, the last one could replace Crawlspace and be used to protect your commanders. The prices of these cards are 22 dollars (roughly). This leads you to having the rest of the cards in the deck cost roughly 150 dollars.

4.) Sean and I can definitely trade you some of the other parts of this list I know I have a copy of Veil of Summer, Isochron Scepter, and maybe a few others I can look for. hopefully, between the two of us, we can get this list below the 100 dollar mark for you, because it will definitely be a blast to play. now I guess I should get into how exactly the deck plays out...

Part 2: Gameplay/Strategy You are essentially a control deck with a combo finish. I will explain both of these functions below:

The Control -The magic number in cEDH is 2. Most of the biggest threats you face creature wise are actually fairly small, having only 2 toughness. Good examples of these are literally any mana dork in the game, most hate hatebears (Thalia, Guardian of Thraben, Collector Ouphe, etc.), and a bunch of good commanders like Mizzix of the Izmagnus, Najeela, the Blade Blossom, Marwyn, the Nurterer (albeit only for 1 turn), or Tymna the Weaver. The reason this is important is because your deck runs a lot of board wipes that kill creatures with 2 toughness like Pyroclasm and Flamesweep. You also have Starstorm and Fire Covenant to get rid of creatures with more toughness, along with individual removal and bounce spells. In addition to this, please note that your creatures are, for the most part, 3 or above toughness, so they will survive these wraths. Firebrand Archers and Gutternsipe are the only real exceptions to this, but you don't want to play them in the early game anyways.

-You also have a fairly serious amount of counter magic, spot removal, and bounce spells. These are more for once you have gotten control of the board. You use them to keep it empty while your card advantage and mana engine take over until you can win. For the early turns (turns 1 and 2), you want to be developing your mana by playing mana rocks and dorks or enchantments that get you mana to use. These are things like Curse of Bounty, Burgeoning, and Birds of Paradise. They will help you on turn three when you plan on wrathing the board to slow down any of the decks that are aiming to get ahead by use of mana dorks or hatebears. Finally, on your fourth turn of the game, you want to be setting up your own board. Consider dropping your Vial Smasher the Fierce or any other creature that deals damage when you cast a spell such as Electrostatic Field or Firebrand Archer, as well as attaching any enchantment with the same effect as Curiosity to it. This will be your main card advantage engine. Imagine you do this and leave 2 mana open as you pass the turn. Your opponent tries to cast something scary, so you respond with any counter spell or 1 mana removal spell such as Lightning Bolt to kill the creature, or Flusterstorm to counter their spell. If its a tutor, you can play Shadow of Doubt to shut down their searching. In addition to this, your creature will trigger, pinging each opponent for 1 damage, and then because they dealt damage their enchantment will trigger and you will draw 3 cards, hopefully more answers...

-From this point, you want to find your untap effects like Seedborn Muse and Wilderness Reclamation so you can both develop your board on your turn and counter or interact with your opponents board on their turn. This leads to a soft lock on the game, where on each opponents turn you counter or kill every threat they play, every time drawing three more cards to replenish your answers. So then how do you win?

The Combo -There is really only 1 infinite combo in this deck. That is using an Isochron Scepter imprinted with Dramatic Reversal to untap your artifacts (includeing the Isochron Scepter) and then as long as you have other artifacts that can tap for 3 mana combined, you can make infinite mana. If you only have artifacts that tap for 2 mana, you can get infinite cast triggers off of your creatures that deal a damage per cast like Guttersnipe.
-If you dont have a pinging creature, how do you win? You have 2 other spells that have the Buyback mechanic, which essentially means that you can cast them and then return them to your hand for an additional cost. Once you have infinite mana though, this cost doesnt really matter. These spells are Capsize and Whispers of the Muse. You can cast these spells with their buyback cost as many times as you want with infinite mana. --With Capsize this means you bounce every permanent your opponents control, and continue to bounce them as they play them on their turns. This will lead to them being unable to do anything, and you winning the game from something as simple as Thrasios, Triton Hero beats over 120 turns.
--With Whispers of the Muse, you can draw your deck one card at a time until you have a Laboratory Maniac and a bunch of counter spells in hand. Then just cast lab man and draw more cards with Whispers of the Muse until you draw from an empty library to win the game.

-Non-Infinite Combo: --in a really late game situation, with a Seedborn Muse in play and a lot of mana just sitting around, you can just cast and buyback Capsize a couple times on each players turn until you naturally lock all opponents out of the game. Just be careful to leave up counters in case someone tries to counter your capsize, you only have a few recursion spells.

I still believe this deck can work wonders on a budget, and I believe it is a unique and interesting playstyle that will suite your wants in a more reactive control deck with interesting interactions. It is one of the only cEDH decks that actively aims to win in the late game by simply out valuing every other player at the table. If you want to test it out before buying, I suggest proxying this exact build of this deck (with the lands from yidris precon) simply because you will never want to shell out the couple thousand for the more expensive version. I am completely fine with proxies, as long as you are testing with the intent to buy if you like it.

I CANNOT STRESS THIS ENOUGH you are not trying to win the game fast with this deck. So when you play it, don’t go for the combo until you are completely sure it’s safe.