Lazav, the Multifarious, Control and Shenanigans

Commander / EDH UB (Dimir)

kbrauner3005

Activation Cost Reduction (1)

• 1x Training Grounds

Card Draw (6)

• 1x Consecrated Sphinx
• 1x Fact or Fiction
• 1x Notion Thief
• 1x Pull from Tomorrow
• 1x Rhystic Study
• 1x Teferi's Ageless Insight

Evasion (4)

• 1x Dimir Infiltrator
• 1x Gingerbrute
• 1x Invisible Stalker
• 1x Nether Traitor

Land (38)

• 1x Bojuka Bog
• 1x Choked Estuary
• 1x Command Tower
• 1x Darkwater Catacombs
• 1x Dimir Guildgate
• 1x Dismal Backwater
• 1x Drowned Catacomb
• 1x Emergence Zone
• 1x Fetid Pools
• 1x Geier Reach Sanitarium
• 1x Ghost Quarter
• 1x Homeward Path
• 8x Island
• 1x Jwar Isle Refuge
• 1x Minamo, School at Water's Edge
• 1x Reliquary Tower
• 1x Rogue's Passage
• 1x Shizo, Death's Storehouse
• 1x Sunken Hollow
• 1x Sunken Ruins
• 7x Swamp
• 1x Tectonic Edge
• 1x Temple of Deceit
• 1x Underground River
• 1x Watery Grave

Other (11)

• 1x Ashiok, Dream Render
• 1x Consuming Aberration
• 1x Fallen Shinobi
• 1x Leyline of Anticipation
• 1x Lightning Greaves
• 1x Mission Briefing
• 1x Narset's Reversal
• 1x Rankle, Master of Pranks
• 1x Reanimate
• 1x Snapcaster Mage
• 1x Temporal Mastery

Protecting (3)

• 1x Glen Elendra Archmage
• 1x Kefnet the Mindful
• 1x Thassa, God of the Sea

Ramp (12)

• 1x Coldsteel Heart
• 1x Commander's Sphere
• 1x Dimir Locket
• 1x Dimir Signet
• 1x Dreamscape Artist
• 1x Fellwar Stone
• 1x Hedron Archive
• 1x Mind Stone
• 1x Solemn Simulacrum
• 1x Talisman of Dominance
• 1x Thran Dynamo
• 1x Worn Powerstone

Recursion (1)

• 1x The Scarab God

Removal (11)

• 1x Arcane Denial
• 1x Counterspell
• 1x Cyclonic Rift
• 1x Disallow
• 1x Evacuation
• 1x Muddle the Mixture
• 1x Negate
• 1x Reality Shift
• 1x Swan Song
• 1x Toxic Deluge
• 1x Unwind

Self Mill (1)

• 1x Search for Azcanta  ^Flip

Tutor (7)

• 1x Buried Alive
• 1x Demonic Tutor
• 1x Doom Whisperer
• 1x Entomb
• 1x Intuition
• 1x Lim-Dul's Vault
• 1x Vampiric Tutor

Win Condiotions (4)

• 1x Phage the Untouchable
• 1x Phyrexian Dreadnought
• 1x Syr Konrad, the Grim
• 1x Vector Asp

Commander (1)

---

Introduction

This deck is a control deck that uses Lazav, the Multifarious both as the main win condition of the deck and for shenanigans. I already had my first version of the deck ready for the Guilds of Ravnica prerelease and have been playing/testing quite a bid ever since. I quickly found a bunch of things in my first list I wanted to change. This list is my current version which I really like. That said I still do not think it is perfect. There are some cards I would like to cut, but don’t know what to include in their place. I will point out which cards I am talking about throughout this writing as I go through each category.

Win Condiotions

Let’s begin with the exiting part – how to kill our opponents.

Phage the Untouchable: A lot of people quickly realized that Lazav is very good with Phage. By turning Lazav into Phage we get around the whole “if you didn’t cast Phage from you hand” clause. Yes, it does cost a bid of mana, but we can simply wait until after blockers are declared and Lazav is unblocked.

Phyrexian Dreadnought: The other highly suggested creature to use is the all mighty Phyrexian Dreadnought. For just a single mana Lazav can turn into a 12/12 creature with Trample. That’s just 2 hits and the opponent is dead to commander damage. Just like Phage we don’t need to worry about the ETB clause of the Dreadnought because it does not enters the battlefield when Lazav turns into it. Simply casting it just to get it into the graveyard is a very viable option but it is card disadvantage that we would like to avoid. More on that later.

Vector Asp: Did I say it would take 2 hits with Phyrexian Dradnought to kill a player? Add Vector Asp to the mix and studently we have build out own Blightsteel Clossus for just 3 mana when Lazav is in play. Here it how it works: First we turn Lazav into Vector Asp. Then we activate Vector Asp to gain infect. This means that Lazav gainswill have infect until end of turn even if he stops being a Vector Asp. Now with infect we turn Lazav into Phyrexian Dradnought which can swing for lethal. And all this can be done at instant speed after blockers are declared. So, if Lazav is unblocked or even blocked by a 1 or 2 toughness creature, this combination is lethal. And even without the dreadnought, getting infect and then turning into another creature may still do the trick.

Mindshrieker and Psychatog: It is always hard to know exactly how many cards should be committed to winning the game. I found that the previous three mentioned was a little a low so I have included Mindshrieker and Psychatog which both serve the purpose of boosting Lazav’s power. Mindshrieker has the added option of self-milling which may help find some other crucial pieces for Lazav. If it is obvious that an opponent plays a deck with a high curve eg. Jodah, Archmage Eternal, it will probably be better to mill that player instead, when going for a kill. Psychatog has the added benefit of being a discard outlet. That way it is possible to make a surprise kill with Lazav without anything dangerous in the graveyard. After blockers are declared we can discard a threat like Phage or Phyrexian Dreadnought and turn into that threat before damage.

Evasion

Until now we have just assumed that Lazav will not be blocked when going for the kills. This is obviously rarely true since our graveyard is a “visible” zone meaning that our opponents probably will not be surprised that Lazav can make a lethal hit. To solve this problem some evasive creatures are included. With these we can turn Lazav into something that is a bid harder to block and then after no blockers are declared we turn Lazav into a more threatening creature.

Invisible Stalker: The first creature that comes to mind for most people when talking about evasive creatures in Invisible Stalker. Without knowing to much about standard I believe it was quite dominant back when it was standard legal. Not only will Invisible Stalker make Lazav unblockable it also adds protection in the form of Hexproof. This is by far the best of all the evasive creatures I have tested.

Nether Traitor: Shadow is basically equivalent to unlockable so looking though the creatures with shadow is a good idea when looking for evasive creatures. Nether Traitor adds haste to the mix which is more important that I first anticipated. I originally though that with creatures to protect Lazav like Invisible Stalker and more to be mentioned later, haste would not be that important. But obviously not every game will go as planned. If the graveyard is all set for a lethal hit, but Lazav himself is absent from the battlefield it can be crucial to have haste.

Dimir Infiltrator: Until now we have just assumed that getting cards into the graveyard will almost happen automatically which obviously is not true (even though cards are included to help with this). Dimir Infiltrator can get itself into the graveyard without losing card advantage and even choosing another 2 drop to replace itself with. Can you think of any good 2 drop? Cyclonic Rift springs to mind together with a lot of counter spells.

Baleful Strix: Flying is also a kind of evasion or though definitely worse then the previous mentioned options. Baleful Strix has the added benefit of replacing it self when played and having deathtouch will make most opponents think twice before attacking you. Some times simply the threat of Lazav turning into Baleful Strix and blocking will keep some opponents at bay without you having to invest any mana.

I want to add some concluding works to this section. There are A LOOOT of options for evasive creatures out there. In my first version of this deck I was running something like 6-8 evasive creatures. I found that it was way to many. They rarely do anything on their own and we only really need a single one in the graveyard. Everything after that is almost dead cards. I am currently down to the four evasive creatures mentioned but I still think this is to many. I think I would like to cut both Baleful Strix and Dimir Infiltrator. They are definitely not bad cards in this deck but I think I only want two cards in the evasive category and I value hexproof (Invisible Stalker) and haste (Nether Traitor) over deathtouch (Baleful Strix) and transmute (Dimir Infiltrator), but I will say that it is close!

Activation Cost Reduction

Alright, Lazav is truly multifarious, but all this shapeshifting can be quite mana expensive. A few cards can help us out here.

Training Grounds and Heartstone: The mana cost of having Lazav shapeshift depends on which creature he wants to imitate. In the case of Phage which has a CMC of 7 it will cost 7 Mana for Lazav to shapeshift into Phage. With Training Grounds and Heartstone this cost will be reduced which is especially powerful when shapeshifting multiple times between untap steps. Let’s say we are trying to kill someone. First, we turn into Invisible Stalker and attack. No blockers are declared, and we then turn into Phage. Now the opponent casts Path to Exile targeting Lazav as Phage. We might then want to turn back into Invisible Stalker, let the Path resolve and then turn back into Phage. Without any cost reduction this would cost 18 mana (22 for Invisible Stalker + 27 for Phage) with Heartstone this cost would be reduced by 4 (1 per activation) to a total of 14. Still expensive but more reasonable. With Training Grounds the cost would be reduced by an additional 2 (1 more for each Phage activation but no reduction for Invisible Stalker because the cost can not be reduced to less than 1) to a total of 12 mana, and with both Training Grounds and Heartstone out the total cost would be reduced by an additional 2 to a total of 10. Now that is much more reasonable reasonable.

Honorable mentioning - Unwinding Clock: As I pointed out in the beginning of the Training Grounds and Heartstone discussion the main issue is shapeshifting multiple times between untap steps. With Unwinding Clock at least our mana rocks will untap during each players untap step. This probably does require some more mana rocks in the deck and you might want to include Darksteel Citadel, Vault of Whispers and Seat of the Synod. I found that Training Grounds and Heartstone was sufficient to deal with the multiple shapeshifting issue. Additionally the extra mana rock was a bid awkward when not drawing the Unwinding Clock.

Protecting

Hopefully it has become obvious by now that Lazav is the center of this decks strategy. As a result, some creatures which allow for protecting Lazav are included.

Cavern Harpy: The only way to literally dodge anything is to leave the battlefield all together. Sometimes this does defeat the purpose, but by returning Lazav to our hand, commander tax is avoided and sometimes it is relevant to make the spell/ability that targets Lazav fizzle, eg. to avoid a Mind Control effect. Previously I mentioned the importance of having haste when discussing Nether Traitor, which become even better when running Cavern Harpy.

Yahenni, Undying Partisan: Speaking of haste, Yahenni both serve as protection in the form of indestructability (does require another creature in play) while also having haste and even with the possibility of adding +1/+1 counters to Lazav.

Glen Elendra Archmage: Speaking of +1/+1 counters, having the possibility of gaining persist with Glen Elendra Archmage will also protect Lazav from most removal. And playing around with +1/+1 counters from Yahenni and -1/-1 counters from persist, it is possible to keep Lazav protected for a long time.

Kefnet the Mindful: Unconditional indestructability is sometimes what is needed. And Kefnet’s last ability can become quite relevant if we manage to have Training Grounds and/or Heartstone in play at the same time.

Erebos, God of the Dead: Now this one is very spicy. Having Lazav turning into Erebos while having a devotion to black below 5 will result in Lazav turning into a non-creature enchantment! That will dodge most spells and abilities. It does have one flaw though. Turning Lazav into Erebos for protection during combat while having a devotion to black below 5 will remove Lazav from combat. This has proven to be an issue from time to time. Thassa, God of the Sea and Phenax, God of Deception can do the same trick (with the same issue). Phenax is probably the worst since I has the highest CMC. The mill can be relevant, both for self-milling and for pseudo-countering tutors like Enlightened Tutor, Mystical Tutor, Vampiric Tutor etc. But I do not believe it makes up for the higher CMC. Thassa is probably the best since it is the cheapest of the three, but I must be honest, I don’t own a Thassa so I have not had a chance to test it yet. Both Thassa and Erebos have relevant abilities and it might even be reasonable to run both in the deck. Protection cards can have the same issue as evasion cards – They can be redundant in multiples resulting in being dead cards. However most of the protective cards have relevant abilities besides from protection and they do protect from different types of removal which is why I feel better about running 5 protective cards, while only want to run 2 evasive cards.

Ramp

There isn’t much to say about the purpose of ramp. It is important, powerful and all decks run some ramp in one form or another. I do want to talk about a few cards that does get to shine in this Lazav deck.

Dreamscape Artist: Discard outlets is not something I have prioritized in this deck because most of the cards are perfectly fine to simply cast and let the opponents deal. But of cause having a discard outlet attached to another relevant ability is great. Ramping in blue is a rare sight in the first place, yet Dreamscape Artist fits right into to this deck. I also would like to point out that the ability of Dreamscape Artist put the land into play untapped and as a result the effective cost of the activating ability is only 1. With Heartstone it is “free” and with Training Grounds it even produces 1 mana.

Burnished Hart: Most people seem to avoid running Burnished Hart. I really like it in any non-green deck really. And if it is easily recurred by the deck, I think it’s a great inclusion. I do not expect to recur Burnished Hart in this deck but it is possible. Havengul Lich can cast it from the graveyard, but it is expensive and having to do so during our own turn seems unlikely as a control deck. The Scarab God is another more reasonable possibility. Using some excess mana in the end step before our turn to Eternalize Burnished Hart seems likely to occur. This will result in burnished hart getting exiled to it will only work once. The final option which is a bid spicy is to use Burnished Hart as a sac outlet for Lazav. It will cost 6 mana (assuming no help from Heartstone or Training Grounds) which is a bid but if someone is about to remove Lazav anyway, or even try to Mind Control him, and the mana is available, this is a very nice possibility.

The rest of the ramp is simple mana rocks. Due to personal preference I tent to run the rocks that can sac themselves for card draw due to the amount of Bane of Progress, Vandalblast etc. that is being played in my meta.

Removal

As this deck is meant to be a reactive deck, I am using a lot of card slots on different kinds of removal. Both mass revomal, spot removal and counter spells are in this category. I will not go though all the cards but I will point out some of the oddities.

King Macar, the Gold-Cursed: No this is not a personal pet card or trying to be a meme. I genuinely believe this card has a home in this deck. Laval will almost always be in play and often attack during our turn. As a reactive deck we will try to keep mana open for whatever might happen during our opponents turn. Sometimes, mana will go unspent by the end step before our turn. This is a great opportunity turn have Lazav transform into King Macar for some free spot removal when we untap and it doesn’t even cost a card. I also want to point out one of the utility lands in this deck which ended up winning a game once due to the interaction with King Macar and Lazav. The land is Minamo, School at Water's Edge. Lazav will usually be tapped during our opponent turn due to having attacked in our own. If someone tries to swing at us we can turn Lazav into King Macar and then untap Lazav with Minamo for instant speed spot removal which does not cost a card. This can either be used as surprise to remove a big threat or it can be used politically. We simply point out what will happen if someone is going to attack us which might encourage the opponents to attack each other instead. This is comparable to the Maze of Ith issue where no one ends up attacking into the Maze and as a result the Maze gets to much value without even being used. But this is even more powerful because the player that is going to pull the trigger and make us use Minamo will lose their creature, in contrast to the Maze where their creature is simply untapped.

Cyclonic Rift and Evacuation: I want my removal to be instant speed when possible. It can be hard to get for mass removal spells, but Evacuation fulfills this role. Well Cyclonic Rift does as well, but there is no way I will ever play a blue deck without the Rift unless it gets banned.

Decree of Pain: I am a big fan of Decree of Pain. Yes, it is expensive, but the added card draw can simply be game winning and something that is often overlooked is the option for cycling it. I may find this more appealing then most because I have had it become very relevant multiple times. In my meta, some people like to try and set up the Deadeye Navigator + Mystic Snake lock. By cycling Decree of Pain, we get to kill the snake since this is an activated ability and not a spell being cast denying them the option of blink the snake and counter the threat of ending the lock.

Languish and Toxic Deluge: These have the advantages of being able to take down Indestructible creatures. Additionally, we can make Lazav survive these sweepers by transforming him into something too big to die.

Damnation is probably a good inclusion but I do not own one. If I were to include it, I would probably a spot removal spell or counter spell instead of one of these mass removals. Lazav can still dodge Damnation but it will require something more specific like Erebos, God of the Dead, Kefnet the Mindful or The Scarab God.

The rest is either spot removal and counter spells, all instants. There was no deeper consideration behind these besides from personal preference and a few I had laying around and wanted to try. I have been pleased with all of these.

Almost done. The final parts will be added when I find the time to finish them. The description does cover all the important parts.

Date added	5 years
Last updated	1 year
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	10 - 0 Mythic Rares 38 - 0 Rares 22 - 0 Uncommons 14 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	2.87
Tokens	Bird 2/2 U, Copy Clone, Manifest 2/2 C
Folders	decks, CMDR