The Evasive Maneuver deck, piloted by
Derevi, Empyrial Tactician
was the first pre-con Commander deck I bought, back when I was first beginning to get into Magic. I always tried making the deck have goofy hi-jinks based on tapping abilites, and it was, admittedly, a pretty terrible deck. It wasn't until I saw another person's
Derevi, Empyrial Tactician
deck that I realized that I was playing the deck all wrong. I didn't want to toy around with a few little dinky abilities of my own creatures, maybe making an extra squirrel or elf a turn, nabbing an extra mana or two from a land--I wanted to own the board. I wanted to control it all. I wanted my deck to be the gatekeeper of the battlefield. I wanted my opponents to sigh in defeat and hang their heads in resignation. I wanted stax.
The major theme of this deck is to make stuff either: a) not work, or b) cost too much. Cards like
Trinisphere
,
Aura of Silence
,
Vryn Wingmare
,
Lodestone Golem
, and
Grand Arbiter Augustin IV
all make different stuff (or all stuff) more expensive. This is super handy for stalling the game until a wincon is located, or the opponents quit in frustration. The deck is actually pretty good at locking down opponents by making things too costly. Some of the cards that prevent abilities from happening are
Hushwing Gryff
,
Torpor Orb
, and
Stony Silence
. These are great for stopping other creature and artifact ETBs from taking out important cards on the board. So now, removal spells are too costly, creature ETBs won't remove stuff, and the opponents are starting to sweat. Lastly, there are some cards in the deck that restrict casting other spells. Cards like
Gaddock Teeg
,
Void Winnower
, and
Ethersworn Canonist
. That's pretty much how it works in a nutshell. Make stuff too expensive, restrict the stuff that isn't, counter anything else that gets through!
After getting a decent boardstate set up, it is usually best to drop out a card like
Hokori, Dust Drinker
,
Winter Orb
,
Stasis
,
Rising Waters
, or
Static Orb
. After that, maximizing the amount of creatures who can deal combat damage is an important thing to focus on. Creatures like
Sun Quan, Lord of Wu
and the newly printed
Mirri, Weatherlight Duelist
are great for this.
Void Winnower
helps too in his own weird Eldrazi way. Once
Derevi, Empyrial Tactician
's combat trigger starts rolling in is where the fun begins. Every critter that lands a hit is a land that gets to be untapped, which is a huge advantage when opponents can only untap one or two lands. Another smart move to slow the game down early is to play
Green Sun's Zenith
and hunt for
Gaddock Teeg
. He's a good idea to get out early, since there are some other creatures in the deck that can bring him back if he dies too soon.
As for game-enders, there are a few in the deck, other than the opponents storming off to make their own crappy stax deck.
Sun Quan, Lord of Wu
/
Mirri, Weatherlight Duelist
,
True Conviction
and a few creatures can do the trick in just a few turns the old fashioned way.
Opposition
or
Glare of Subdual
work similarly, and can either prevent an opponent from using any creatures on their turn, or (
Opposition
only) all of an opponent's lands can be tapped on their upkeep step, which will pretty much kill their turn. Lastly,
Willbreaker
can be used in a roundabout way to win by using opponents' creatures against them.
Since most of the creatures in the deck serve a purpose, it is lacking on creature defenders. To make up for this, there are cards like
Propaganda
, and
Ghostly Prison
(considering
Norn's Annex
as well). These make it more expensive for the opponents to attack, which will piss them off even more, because they will want to attack. Other helpful cards to deter violence and wrath aimed poorly are
Michiko Konda, Truth Seeker
,
Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
,
Mirri, Weatherlight Duelist
(I love that card, it was made for this deck), and
Edric, Spymaster of Trest
(sorta). If a determined soul manages to take out one or more of the helpful critters on the field, I've put cards like
Sun Titan
,
Karmic Guide
, and
Eternal Witness
in the deck as a means of backup.
Karmic Guide
and
Eternal Witness
can also be usefully bounced by
Deadeye Navigator
to get more stuff back.
Overall, the deck is a pretty basic stax deck (short of running the
Smokestack
). It has some control in there to make sure none of the opponents' boardstates get out of hand. There aren't really many fancy combos, other than using
Deadeye Navigator
and {{INSERT ETB HERE}}, because I didn't think the deck really needed any of them, it seems to stand up okay without any major ones. I like control, I like telling my opponents no, I like having all of the fun, and that's what this deck is about. If there's anything I missing, or if anything seems like it doesn't fit, please say so! I'm always looking for more ideas!
Thanks for reading!
Edit 1: Dropped
Bane of Progress
and
Skullclamp
for
Laboratory Maniac
and
Mind Over Matter
.
