By all means, draw

Commander / EDH Control Discard UBR (Grixis)

GS10

Land (33)

• 1x Ancient Tomb
• 1x Blood Crypt
• 1x Bloodstained Mire
• 1x Bojuka Bog
• 1x Cabal Coffers
• 1x Command Tower
• 1x Flooded Strand
• 1x Geier Reach Sanitarium
• 8x Island
• 3x Mountain
• 1x Polluted Delta
• 1x Reliquary Tower
• 1x Scalding Tarn
• 1x Smoldering Marsh
• 1x Steam Vents
• 1x Sunken Hollow
• 4x Swamp
• 1x Terrain Generator
• 1x Tolaria West
• 1x Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
• 1x Watery Grave

Instant (11)

• 1x Arcane Denial
• 1x Counterspell
• 1x Cyclonic Rift
• 1x Disdainful Stroke
• 1x Doom Blade
• 1x Evacuation
• 1x Hero's Downfall
• 1x Murderous Cut
• 1x Reality Shift
• 1x Swan Song
• 1x Terminate

Artifact (16)

• 1x Chromatic Lantern
• 1x Dimir Signet
• 1x Elixir of Immortality
• 1x Font of Mythos
• 1x Gilded Lotus
• 1x Howling Mine
• 1x Izzet Signet
• 1x Lightning Greaves
• 1x Mindcrank
• 1x Rakdos Signet
• 1x Sol Ring
• 1x Talisman of Dominance
• 1x Talisman of Indulgence
• 1x Teferi's Puzzle Box
• 1x Temple Bell
• 1x Venser's Journal

Sorcery (14)

• 1x Damnation
• 1x Dark Deal
• 1x Exsanguinate
• 1x Minds Aglow
• 1x Molten Psyche
• 1x Past in Flames
• 1x Reforge the Soul
• 1x Vandalblast
• 1x Wheel of Fate
• 1x Wheel of Fortune
• 1x Whispering Madness
• 1x Windfall
• 1x Winds of Change
• 1x Yawgmoth's Will

Planeswalker (1)

• 1x Jace Beleren

Commander (1)

Enchantment (15)

• 1x Bloodchief Ascension
• 1x Breathstealer's Crypt
• 1x Curiosity
• 1x Dictate of Kruphix
• 1x Dissipation Field
• 1x Fevered Visions
• 1x Helm of the Ghastlord
• 1x Liliana's Caress
• 1x Megrim
• 1x Mind Over Matter
• 1x No Mercy
• 1x Price of Knowledge
• 1x Spiteful Visions
• 1x Underworld Dreams
• 1x Waste Not

Creature (9)

• 1x Baral, Chief of Compliance
• 1x Fate Unraveler
• 1x Goblin Electromancer
• 1x Guttersnipe
• 1x Jace's Archivist
• 1x Kami of the Crescent Moon
• 1x Master of the Feast
• 1x Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind
• 1x Thing in the Ice  ^Flip

---

This deck was made after a random general was given to me to build around. Each of us builds a deck around the random general we are given and then we play them without previous knowledge of our oponnents' generals. This was the first time we did this kind of challenge and I got lucky with Nekusar, which I was almost banned to play again due to its overwhelming power.

At the time I'm writing this primer, and for some time now, Nekusar, the Mindrazer is the 5th most popular general according to EDHRec. And there are a few reasons for it, firstly I believe because Nekusar allows for a very competitive build within a short budget, and then because it is easily upgradable in time. Nekusar is a double edged sword for your opponents, who will most likely take the card draw and accept that life loss as a fair trade (reason why Phyrexian Arena is so powerful and popular). That will most times lead them to perilous life totals, and your deck will be the one optimized to take advantage of that. Be aware, though, that this is a one trick horse. Once your opponents die to the incredible power of this deck, they will, most likely, turn against you with all they've got!

This particular build focus on getting the most out of Nekusar's ability and replicate it as much as possible, while taking incidental advantage from opponents discarding. I don't believe this is top tier competitive, but I think the fact that people would like Nekusar's effects to take place for a while, might lead them to underestimate it more often than not, making it stronger than he would naturally be if not for the greed of our opponents.

Nekusar wants everyone to draw, getting everyone to draw a lot of cards is both our politics and our way to weaponize our general. Ideally we want some steady sources of card draw on the battlefield along with Nekusar, and then keep forcing our opponents to cycle their hands away. Sure, we are giving them a world of potential answers in the process, but we are taking advantage from it as well and forcing them to pitch their hands frequently forces them out of any long term plans they might be holding on to.

Steady Card Draw

These are permanents that affect either the whole table or our opponents, making everyone draw more cards each turn. These are the better options to scale up Nekusar's power. Our opponents might enjoy drawing a bunch of cards per turn, but Nekusar will punish them harder and harder as our engine grows stronger.

Howling Mine is the card that often is used as a synonym to drawing an additional card per turn so pretty easy inclusion

Dictate of Kruphix is funcionally the same, allowing us to be the first player to benefit from it, if we flash it on the last end step before our turn. Not sure we want that in Nekusar, but added versatility never hurts.

Font of Mythos functions as double Howling Mine. Just this and Nekusar means 4 damage per turn even without playing anything else. Perfect fit in this deck.

Teferi's Puzzle Box is a Winds of Change at each draw step, I expect this to draw a lot more hate than the aforementioned cards, but the way it works with Nekusar is too powerful to pass.

Fevered Visions is brilliant making everyone draw and punishing big hand sizes which tends to be a frequent scenario. This is one of our overperformers.

Master of the Feast is our biggest beater appart from Awoken Horror   , it's no secret we are not looking to win on the red zone, but a 5/5 flyer for 3 that has perfect synergy with our general is hard to say no to.

Kami of the Crescent Moon is yet another Howling Mine, just on a much more frail body. Still worth running since it's hard for opponents to spend resources killing something that is giving them some kind of advantage.

Jace Beleren isn't an assured card draw per turn like the previous cards, but we will mostly be using it's plus ability, so I count him among our steady card draw engine.

Temple Bell is essentially one additional plus activation from Jace, but we can do it just before our turn, denying our opponents that one extra card on their own main phases. It is not a world of difference with all this card draw, but it certainly doesn't hurt. It is also one of our win conditions.

Wheel Effects

Again, having our opponents draw cards is how we weaponize Nekusar, but on the other hand, letting them keep those inflated hands for too long will let them find too many answers and plan accordingly in the long run. We don't want that so we need to keep them in fear of losing their window of opportunity and therefore use their resources in more of an hurry. This is why our wheel effects are probably the best cards in our deck, outside of our game winners (and sometimes, they are game winners too).

Wheel of Fortune is the namesake card. Not much to be said here.

Wheel of Fate has a cheap suspend cost and lets us plan ahead, optimizing our mana to cast whatever we need before we pitch our hand.

Windfall, Whispering Madness and Dark Deal all follow similar patterns, changing slightly based on number of cards in hand.

Winds of Change is our cheapest wheel effect, still great, the one downside is the fact that it doesn't discard, since we have some ways to punish opponents for discarding too and some ways to recurr our graveyard.

Molten Psyche does double duty, wheeling and then dealing extra damage based on the number of cards drawn before, more frequently than not. Again, doesn't discard, but it is punishing enough as is.

Reforge the Soul is yet another plain Wheel effect with a different ability printed on it, sometimes it will be cheaper based on its miracle cost, other times more expensive than a regular wheel, but we don't mind the extra cost for yet another wheel effect.

Jace's Archivist is a Windfall on a body. Frail, yes, but repeatable, HELL YES!

You'll get hurt if you keep drawing like that

Nekusar is our mission statement, per say. He is what the deck does. But as soon as people start fearing their life totals, he will be heavily targeted to a point where we might not be able to keep casting him. So we need redundancy and additional ways that scale up with his ability to weaponize card draw.

Underworld Dreams is basically half of Nekusar on an enchantment, very relevant if Nekusar starts drawing hate and gets to expensive to keep recasting.

Fate Unraveler and Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind are Underworld Dreams on bodies. Niv Mizzet is also one of our alternative win conditinons.

Spiteful Visions is a full Nekusar on an enchantment. The reason why I count it in the damaging part of the plan is because this card hurts us for drawing as well, so the relevant part in it is the damage dealt and not so much the extra card. We accept that trade, granted that we can lower our opponents' life totals faster than our own. Redundancy is key here.

Venser's Journal lets us have as many cards in hand as we want and gains us back life based on hand size. We have a few cards that punish our life total too, so lifegain while not being our way to victory is an important factor to weigh in to stay alive for long enough to win the game.

Discard Synergy

Since we need to make our opponents discard a lot, and they'll probably run over their maximum hand size naturally too, a few ways to take advantage from all that discard are yet another way we can profit from this strategy. I'll go over both the cards that care about opponents discarding cards and additional permanents that will make them discard or punish them for not doing so.

Bloodchief Ascension is straight up one of our win conditions and one of the ways we can regain some life otherwise. Auto include in this deck.

Breathstealer's Crypt is one of my favorite cards in here. We run very few creatures and sometimes we won't even need them, so it doesn't hurt us badly, but it heavily punishes creature decks, keeping them in check. Love this card.

Price of Knowledge might seem like a non-bo, giving unlimited hand size to everyone, but then again, if you are not discarding, you are losing life to it, if you are discarding, you are losing life to something else.

Waste Not is INSANE. The one way you can understand how strong this card is, is by playing it or against it. Probably the best argument for me to include Laboratory Maniac, but I'm counting on Elixir of Immortality to keep me from decking myself out rather than the frail Maniac to get me out of having no cards to draw.

Liliana's Caress and Megrim plain and simply scale up with all the damage on card draw.

• And last but not least, since we are discarding cards as well, we have a backup plan that allows us to play those cards in the bin: Past in Flames and Yawgmoth's Will are insane in terms of provided advantage, we get new cards, its almost if we didn't even had to discard anything to get those cards and we even get to use them again if we want to.

Since the deck is almost creatureless, we'll need a respectable suite of control spells. Ranging from a handfull of countermagic to mass removal and spot removal, this takes up a big chunk of the deck, granting me enough answers against more aggressive decks.

Countermagic

Our countermagic package helps us protect our plans while keeping major threats off the board. Also, there are some pesky cards that Grixis colors are not very well prepared to deal with and that end up being very relevant in the EDH panorama, countering is our best way to deal with those.

To start with, as usual, the card that names the effect: Counterspell . No introduction needed, a staple and an auto include here.

Arcane Denial is almost better than Counterspell here and that's saying a lot. We want our opponents to draw cards, so Arcane Denial's downside is a perk for us. If our opponents chose not to draw, then we got a less mana intensive Counterspell that drew us a card. There is no way to pass on that.

Disdainful Stroke is a metagame choice. Knowing my playgroup I feel that most decks will try to win with some dumb high CMC spells, so Disdainful Stroke is yet another easy inclusion to disrupt their best spells.

Swan Song is one of the cheapest hard counterspells in the game and personally the bird token doesn't scare me given all the removal we pack. The restrictions aren't that worrying on this since most times we will be countering enchantments or instants with this.

Removal

Probably the biggest chunk of the control cards consists of hard removal. Board Wipes and Targeted Removal are vital here since we run so few creatures. We need to keep all the boards in check so these are the cards that help us doing so.

Mass Removal

Damnation is likely the most popular board wipe in Magic and had been one of the most called for cards for years before its recent reprint. There's a good reason for that popularity and since we're not on white, Damnation is simply put our best board wipe

Cyclonic Rift is, according to EDH Rec, the second most played card in all EDH Decks posted online and for good reason, versatile instant speed board wipe (or as close as blue gets it), I can't think of a reason not to play it in any EDH deck running blue.

Evacuation again at instant speed, the fact that it removes all creatures doesn't hurt us too much since we run few, and holding onto it until we are in fact getting attacked is pretty relevant IMO. It's a personal choice to run this over something like Crux of Fate, Life's Finale or Decree of Pain but my reasoning is that instant speed board wipes in this deck give us a huge edge over the opposition. Board wipe if you are the target, lay low if people are leaving you alone, let them kill each other and reap the benefits.

Awoken Horror   is kind of another instant speed board wipe, since you can flip Thing in the Ice   with an instant, but it is cheap to play and easy to manage in a spell heavy deck like this. I really like this card and it surprises me not to see it in EDH more often.

Targeted Removal

Terminate is our best removal spell here. Cheap instant speed removal, there is no reason not to play it.

Murderous Cut is a close second, since we will almost always play it for just with lots in our graveyard to delve.

Reality Shift is, like Thing in the Ice  , a card I think people underestimate or forget about. This is almost Path to Exile power level, in blue! Sure it costs one more mana and leaves a creature behind, but what's a Manifest token when you probably just dealt with a huge threat, even an indestructible one? Love this card and had to include it.

Doom Blade cheap and effective, that's what we are looking for.

Hero's Downfall instant speed removal spell that deals with Planeswalkers (in fact one of our only ways to deal with those), is a card that I believe should be in a lot more decks.

Here be Dragons

This is the "Prison" part of the deck. These cards aren't your traditional Ghostly Prison / Propaganda type of permanents, since being almost creatureless, opponents won't mind paying extra and killing us since we will most times be defenseless. Even though these are few, their importance in the deck makes them deserve their own category. Meant to disencourage players from hitting us, or at least leave us for last, these are just 3 permanents that will help us stay alive for long enough to eventually win.

No Mercy is as clear as a "Stay Away" sign can be. If our opponents are willing to hit us, they will lose their creatures. It's a big stop sign for the table and if someone wants to disregard it will probably become an easier target for the rest of the table.

Dissipation Field is similar in what it does, only it ruins tempo rather than destroying creatures. Against fast reanimator decks this might be better than No Mercy, otherwise, this is just an additional way to make people stay away from our red zone.

Finally, this card is a happy synergy with the last two: Mindcrank mills everyone while they are hitting each other, so it is yet another good reason for your opponents to hit each other rather than you. Drawing this many cards there will be times where they will be at higher life totals than cards in deck so Mindcrank provides opponents an alternate way to win, while helps keeping our deck with more cards than the opposision, since decking out should be something to worry about while playing this deck.

At this point you have probably found out how the deck is meant to win in a regular match. Punish everybody for drawing, make everybody draw a bunch. That's plan A, but if that somehow is too slow, or someone finds a way to disrupt your strategy, a few creatures and Exsanguinate will help speeding things up.

Master of the Feast and Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind are heavy beaters in their own, while Guttersnipe will deal respectable ammounts of damage on its own.

We also run a few 2-card combos that we will likely draw into with our card draw engine and these will end the game on the spot most likely.

Niv Mizzet Infinite Draw

• Curiosity + Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind

Draw as many cards as you want, dealing everyone equal ammounts of damage. This might not be enough if you are almost decking out, so yet another reason to run Elixir of Immortality and probably another argument for the inclusion of Laboratory Maniac. Since I am not focusing on combo with this build, I opted it out.

Mind Over Matter Infinite Draw

• Mind Over Matter + Niv Mizzet Firemind / Temple Bell

Again, infinite card draw. Niv Mizzet wins by its damage clause, Temple Bell requires Nekusar or any similar effect. Just keep discarding whatever you don't need to Mind Over Matter to untap whatever one you're using to draw your entire deck.

Mindcrank Insta-Mill

• Bloodchief Ascension + Mindcrank

Once the Ascension is turned on, it will deal damage each time your opponents lose something, and Mindcrank will make them mill twice, activating Bloodchief Ascension twice. Everyone decks out, and you end up with a huge life total.

Bear in mind that if you aren't winning with the mill combo and your deck is getting thiner, you might need Elixir of Immortality to be able to win on one of the infinite draw combos.

Date added	7 years
Last updated	6 years
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	3 - 0 Mythic Rares 49 - 0 Rares 22 - 0 Uncommons 11 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	2.92
Tokens	Bird 2/2 U, Manifest 2/2 C, Zombie 2/2 B
Folders	Developing EDH Decks, interesting, Draw Punisher