Ave Maria - Nekusar

Commander / EDH Discard Group Slug Hive Mind Multiplayer UBR (Grixis)

BlazingIron

Lands (37)

• 1x Command Tower
• 1x Crumbling Necropolis
• 1x Dimir Guildgate
• 1x Dragonskull Summit
• 1x Evolving Wilds
• 7x Island
• 1x Izzet Boilerworks
• 1x Izzet Guildgate
• 9x Mountain
• 1x Rakdos Carnarium
• 1x Rakdos Guildgate
• 1x Seat of the Synod
• 9x Swamp
• 1x Temple of the False God
• 1x Terramorphic Expanse

Hug them to death (7)

• 1x Cerebral Vortex
• 1x Fevered Visions
• 1x Furnace of Rath
• 1x Torbran, Thane of Red Fell
• 1x Dictate of the Twin Gods
• 1x Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind
• 1x Toil / Trouble

The Nekusar effect (6)

• 1x Kederekt Parasite
• 1x Underworld Dreams
• 1x Fate Unraveler
• 1x Spiteful Visions
• 1x Ob Nixilis, the Hate-Twisted
• 1x Psychosis Crawler

Removal (5)

• 1x Terminate
• 1x Chaos Warp
• 1x Oblivion Stone
• 1x Incendiary Command
• 1x Ob Nixilis, the Hate-Twisted

Extra draw = extra hugs (10)

• 1x Burning Inquiry
• 1x Howling Mine
• 1x Stormfist Crusader
• 1x Cerebral Vortex
• 1x Dictate of Kruphix
• 1x Fevered Visions
• 1x Temple Bell
• 1x Seizan, Perverter of Truth
• 1x Forced Fruition
• 1x Toil / Trouble

Rock collection (9)

• 1x Everflowing Chalice
• 1x Sol Ring
• 1x Wayfarer's Bauble
• 1x Dimir Signet
• 1x Fellwar Stone
• 1x Fractured Powerstone
• 1x Izzet Signet
• 1x Rakdos Signet
• 1x Commander's Sphere

The almost Nekusar effect (7)

• 1x Bloodchief Ascension
• 1x Duskmantle Guildmage
• 1x Liliana's Caress
• 1x Glint-Horn Buccaneer
• 1x Megrim
• 1x Fell Specter
• 1x Syr Konrad, the Grim

Chaos is love, chaos is life (5)

• 1x Perplexing Chimera
• 1x Possibility Storm
• 1x Hive Mind
• 1x Knowledge Pool
• 1x Eye of the Storm

Commander (1)

Wheel (9)

• 1x Dark Deal
• 1x Jace's Archivist
• 1x Molten Psyche
• 1x Windfall
• 1x Wheel and Deal
• 1x Whispering Madness
• 1x Incendiary Command
• 1x Khorvath's Fury
• 1x Reforge the Soul

Useful thingies (7)

• 1x Waste Not
• 1x Mirage Mirror
• 1x Mirrormade
• 1x Propaganda
• 1x Stitch in Time
• 1x Diabolic Tutor
• 1x Ral Zarek

Mill...? Wait, wtf ? (2)

• 1x Mindcrank
• 1x Psychic Corrosion

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Ave Maria

Nekusar, the Mindrazer

6/10 - Focused

Greetings, and welcome to the realm of chaos ! This is a group slug deck with an interesting concept, being making your opponents lose by helping them.

You want to make everybody draw cards ! Everybody loves to draw, right ? ... Of course, nothing is free.

Why Nekusar ?

Nekusar is central to the deck, so you can't really replace him. Well, yes, maybe with partners like Ludevic, Necro-Alchemist + Tymna the Weaver so you gain a new color, but the price for efficiency is wandering further from fun. And since I want to keep a somewhat low power-level with this deck, I'll keep Nekusar. On the table, Nekusar is not an absolute must have since you have a lot of redundancy, but he is powerful, so don't hesitate to get him out as often as possible.

Pro and cons

Pro :

• Making everybody draw means everybody will play their deck at high efficiency.
• Can pull out really powerful turns out of nowhere.
• CHAOS.

Cons :

• Making everybody draw means everybody will play their deck at high efficiency.
• Chaos will not always be your ally.

Early game

What you want at the begining of the game is to ramp by getting rocks on the field as fast as possible, while keeping your opponents at bay with a combinaison of politics and draw cards (like Howling Mine or Temple Bell ). Playing Nekusar early and while you don't have any other taxing effect is a good idea : even if the table will look at you and complain about losing life, say something like "Yes, you will lose life, but only one litte HP for each card. And Nekusar makes you draw another card per turn, so we're good, right ?" ; everybody loves to draw, so it's easy to keep Nekusar on the table if he's alone. Once you get them to lose 2 or 3 life each draw though, it will be way harder.

Hugging them to death

As I said before, nothing is free, and the price for your opponents to draw a bunch of cards will be their life. You have 5 cards that replicate the effect of Nekusar, plus 2 cards that makes you deal damage each time you draw cards (since you also are one player at the table, you will also draw a lot).
You also have 2 cards that doubles the damages and Torbran, Thane of Red Fell that can make the HP taxing a lot heavier.

You don't need every source of damage on the table to destroy your opponents, you need to make them draw a lot, and this is where the wheels comes in handy ; drawing seven cards out of nowhere and taking 7 or 14 damages in top of losing whatever was planned will draw some hate towards you, but hey, they can't hate you if they are dead.

Oh, and yeah, since wheels are making them discard (and since sometimes opponents will have to discard to hand size), you will also punish them for that. Cards like Liliana's Caress or Megrim can deal their share of damages, so don't underestimate them.

Mill ? Why ?

Yes, I know, this is useless, but you have 2 mill cards in the deck, Mindcrank and Psychic Corrosion . Why ?
One, it interacts sweetly with Syr Konrad, the Grim and Bloodchief Ascension , easily killing a whole table at once if your opponents aren't careful, meaning if they are they will have to spend ressources for on a secondary aspect of the deck.
Two, that kind of plan B is useful against decks that gain too much life for you to kill. With just this two cards and a ton of draw effects and wheels, you can mill out someone. Eventually. By the way, mill and discard synergies are the reason I'm not playing any wheel that makes the graveyard shuffle in it's owner library like Echo of Eons .

CHAOS

I like a game with it's share of chaos, so I added some of it ; it's not fully useless though, since most of it will protect you one way or another.
Perplexing Chimera , the card that nobody likes. This is purely a politic tool. I like to make a deal with the whole table like "I play the Chimera, so, either I can be awful with it, or each time someone play a spell, the Chimera HAVE to steal the spell". This deal is way easier to pull off having Homeward Path on the field, of course. Otherwise, a very effective defensive tool.
Possibility Storm , another hated card, and another layer of defense for you. Almost all your enchantements are terrifying, and almost all your sorceries are wheels ; while everybody is struggling to play properly, you just have to get Nekusar on the field, and playing sorceries and enchantements.
Knowledge Pool , super fun, and a reaaaaaally good interaction with Forced Fruition .
Eye of the Storm , a stupid way to end the game, so it's in. Helps you to wheel more than once, and clear the biggest threats of the board if a player put some removal in it.
The last, but not the least, Hive Mind is a super powerful card in the deck. Wheels will kill almost instantly, so in top of the chaos aspect, this is a really good card to run in this deck.

... Why 'Ave Maria' ? I'm so confused.

Because fo this song :

This is so much like a game with this deck. At first, everything is good, everybody is civilized... Then suddenly, Nekusar comes into action, wheels are spinning, plans are crumblings, hopes and dreams are taken away by some Chimera...
You know the story, now :)

Date added	4 years
Last updated	4 years
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	2 - 0 Mythic Rares 38 - 0 Rares 20 - 0 Uncommons 15 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	3.40
Tokens	Zombie 2/2 B