Zada

Commander / EDH

Ayvee

Sorcery (25)

• 1x Dragon Fodder
• 1x Empty the Warrens
• 1x Faithless Looting
• 1x Fiery Gambit
• 1x Goblin Rally
• 1x Heat Shimmer
• 1x Hordeling Outburst
• 1x Indomitable Creativity
• 1x Inner Fire
• 1x Kari Zev's Expertise
• 1x Krenko's Command
• 1x Magmatic Insight
• 1x Make Mischief
• 1x Mana Geyser
• 1x Mizzix's Mastery
• 1x Molten Birth
• 1x Past in Flames
• 1x Renegade Tactics
• 1x Shreds of Sanity
• 1x Spark of Creativity
• 1x Tempt with Vengeance
• 1x Tormenting Voice
• 1x Twinflame
• 1x Wild Guess
• 1x Winds of Change

Artifact (6)

• 1x Aetherflux Reservoir
• 1x Aligned Hedron Network
• 1x Helm of Awakening
• 1x Ruby Medallion
• 1x Skullclamp
• 1x Sol Ring

Instant (17)

• 1x Accelerate
• 1x Battle Hymn
• 1x Blades of Velis Vel
• 1x Blazing Shoal
• 1x Boiling Blood
• 1x Borrowed Hostility
• 1x Brightstone Ritual
• 1x Brute Strength
• 1x Crimson Wisps
• 1x Desperate Ritual
• 1x Downhill Charge
• 1x Expedite
• 1x Otherworldly Outburst
• 1x Seething Song
• 1x Stun
• 1x Temur Battle Rage
• 1x Titan's Strength

Land (33)

• 1x Arcane Lighthouse
• 1x Blighted Gorge
• 1x Evolving Wilds
• 1x Forgotten Cave
• 1x Foundry of the Consuls
• 1x Kher Keep
• 1x Looming Spires
• 22x Mountain
• 1x Reliquary Tower
• 1x Spawning Bed
• 1x Terramorphic Expanse
• 1x Zoetic Cavern

Commander (1)

Creature (15)

• 1x Beetleback Chief
• 1x Chancellor of the Forge
• 1x Charmbreaker Devils
• 1x Dualcaster Mage
• 1x Emrakul's Hatcher
• 1x Goblin Warchief
• 1x Guttersnipe
• 1x Iron Myr
• 1x Krenko, Mob Boss
• 1x Mogg War Marshal
• 1x Pia and Kiran Nalaar
• 1x Reckless Bushwhacker
• 1x Siege-Gang Commander
• 1x Treasonous Ogre
• 1x Young Pyromancer

Enchantment (3)

• 1x Blood Moon
• 1x Possibility Storm
• 1x Price of Glory

---

As soon as I decided to build an EDH deck for each colour combination, I knew that my mono-red one was going to be Zada, Hedron Grinder. I remember being very excited when she was spoiled, and very disappointed by her inability to be played in Standard at the time.

As a Commander, however, she really shines. Throwing a pile of seemingly bad cards together and winning on turn 5 or 6 with them feels just great - as long as nobody interacts with you. The thing about that, though, is that often nobody will. People who haven't played against Zada before think she's just going to be a janky do-nothing deck. She doesn't draw the kind of hate a Krenko deck will and kill just as fast, but usually has to set up for a few turns. However, again, Zada + 5 goblins doesn't look scary, but that can be enough to overkill every other player in a 4 or 5 player game.

Some cool synergies I just have to mention. Some of these are obvious, others are less so:

Fiery Gambit: Once you have 15 or so creatures, you can fire this off. Some people don't realise that this card has just one target, which means it can be cast on Zada and copies to your team. Flip for each creature until you get all three heads (or until you fail for Zada - you want to keep her) and you'll be drawing a bunch of cards, gaining mana and dealing a bunch of damage to all your opponents at the low, low cost of one random goblin for each 9 cards.

Kari Zev's Expertise: Target Zada, cast everything that costs 1 or less in your hand for free. You can also draw more cards to cast with your Expertise copies.

Possibility Storm: Target Zada with a spell with Possibility Storm in play. Zada get's to copy the spell to all of your creatures, then Possibility goes and gets a new one. Hopefully, one which synergizes with Zada. Added benefit of synergising with your Storm cards - it doubles your storm count while in play and the Storm keyword interacts in the same way as Zada's trigger. Meanwhile, your opponents can't do anything they want to do.

Blades of Velis Vel: Turn everything into Goblins. Other creature types too, but many of our cards care about Goblins being in play, and not all of our tokens are going to be Gobos. Important to maximise Krenko, Mob Boss and Brightstone Ritual, but has other synergies too.

Blazing Shoal + Desperate Ritual : I've already discussed Brightstone Ritual - gaining a mana for each creature with have in play is nice. But splicing Desperate Ritual onto Blazing Shoal gives us three mana for each creature. The pieces aren't always going to come together in such a way that you get to do this - you might draw neither, or none. Or have to Desperate Ritual early in your combo turn to keep going. But Shoal still gives you an extra Storm count for zero mana and helps in games where you win by attacking, and the Ritual still nets you one or two mana whenever you cast it. Both worth playing by themselves and ridiculous when together. 10/10, would make 90 mana again.

Date added	6 years
Last updated	6 years
Key combos	Blazing Shoal + Desperate Ritual
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	2 - 0 Mythic Rares 20 - 0 Rares 23 - 0 Uncommons 33 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	2.73
Tokens	Copy Clone, Devil 1/1 R, Eldrazi Horror 3/2 C, Eldrazi Scion 1/1 C, Eldrazi Spawn 0/1 C, Elemental 1/1 R, Elemental 1/1 R w/ Haste, Goblin 1/1 R, Kobolds of Kher Keep 0/1 R, Morph 2/2 C, Thopter 1/1 C
Folders	EDH Project