Kaalia Not Required

Commander / EDH Angels Demons Dragons Primer RBW (Mardu) Reanimator

WickedlyRested AlwaysSleepy

Land (29)

• 1x Ancient Tomb
• 1x Arid Mesa
• 1x Badlands
• 1x Blood Crypt
• 1x Bloodstained Mire
• 1x Clifftop Retreat
• 1x Command Tower
• 1x Flooded Strand
• 1x Godless Shrine
• 1x Graven Cairns
• 1x Isolated Chapel
• 1x Luxury Suite
• 1x Marsh Flats
• 1x Mountain
• 1x Plains
• 1x Plateau
• 1x Polluted Delta
• 1x Reflecting Pool
• 1x Sacred Foundry
• 1x Scalding Tarn
• 1x Scrubland
• 1x Silent Clearing
• 1x Sunbaked Canyon
• 1x Swamp
• 1x Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
• 1x Verdant Catacombs
• 1x Volrath's Stronghold
• 1x Windswept Heath
• 1x Wooded Foothills

Instant (11)

• 1x Anguished Unmaking
• 1x Chaos Warp
• 1x Enlightened Tutor
• 1x Entomb
• 1x Kolaghan's Command
• 1x Mortify
• 1x Path to Exile
• 1x Rakdos Charm
• 1x Silence
• 1x Swords to Plowshares
• 1x Vampiric Tutor

Creature (23)

• 1x Akroma, Angel of Wrath
• 1x Angel of Despair
• 1x Angel of Serenity
• 1x Avacyn, Angel of Hope
• 1x Bogardan Hellkite
• 1x Dragon Mage
• 1x Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
• 1x Emeria Shepherd
• 1x Gisela, Blade of Goldnight
• 1x Grand Abolisher
• 1x Karmic Guide
• 1x Kokusho, the Evening Star
• 1x Leonin Relic-Warder
• 1x Linvala, Keeper of Silence
• 1x Loyal Retainers
• 1x Magus of the Wheel
• 1x Razaketh, the Foulblooded
• 1x Resolute Archangel
• 1x Rune-Scarred Demon
• 1x Serra Ascendant
• 1x Sun Titan
• 1x Vilis, Broker of Blood
• 1x Worldgorger Dragon

Artifact (13)

• 1x Arcane Signet
• 1x Boros Signet
• 1x Chrome Mox
• 1x Lightning Greaves
• 1x Mana Crypt
• 1x Mox Diamond
• 1x Orzhov Signet
• 1x Rakdos Signet
• 1x Sensei's Divining Top
• 1x Sol Ring
• 1x Talisman of Conviction
• 1x Talisman of Hierarchy
• 1x Talisman of Indulgence

Commander (1)

Sorcery (18)

• 1x Cathartic Reunion
• 1x Damnation
• 1x Demonic Tutor
• 1x Exhume
• 1x Faithless Looting
• 1x Gamble
• 1x Grim Tutor
• 1x Night's Whisper
• 1x Persist
• 1x Ransack the Lab
• 1x Read the Bones
• 1x Reanimate
• 1x Sign in Blood
• 1x Tormenting Voice
• 1x Toxic Deluge
• 1x Victimize
• 1x Wheel of Fortune
• 1x Wrath of God

Enchantment (5)

• 1x Animate Dead
• 1x Dance of the Dead
• 1x Necromancy
• 1x Sneak Attack
• 1x Underworld Breach

---

Sideboard

Sorcery (2)

• 1x Stitch Together
• 1x Vandalblast

---

Maybeboard

Enchantment (2)

• 1x Necropotence
• 1x Phyrexian Arena

Creature (1)

• 1x Dockside Extortionist

---

Any questions/ suggestions are greatly appreciated. Im trying to make this deck as good as it can be, while still being fun... well, fun for me anyway.

Background

Originally Kaalia started as your basic beat-down deck. She played all of the typical cards you'd expect of her: Expedite, Hall of the Bandit Lord, and even a Cloudshift to name a few. That all changed when my roommate at the time AlwaysSleepy built a mono- blue Vendilion Clique deck that consisted of ~40+ counter spells, and basically consisted of the word "No". It was at that time that I decided to make her leaner and meaner. Since then her average non-creature CMC has shrunk to less than 3, with anything larger being either broken (Sneak Attack) or a board wipe Wrath of God/Damnation, and a major part of her deck has shifted to strings of triggered abilities from things like Karmic Guide and Rune-Scarred Demon.

Overview

Most Kaalia lists are centered around Kaalia, often cramming any angel, demon or dragon into a deck, along with a myriad of protection and haste effects to try and use kaalia as fast and often as possible. This deck gives Kaalia the back seat, exchanging the flavor of a commander led deck for a generally more powerful one, not tied to Kaalia directly. While she definitely can help get creatures into play, shes not our main strategy. This deck focuses on card draw in the form of looting and Wheel of Fortune effects in order to see as many cards as possible while discarding reanimation targets. The end goal is to either lock down the board with giant angels and bash face, or to combo off with the Worldgorger Dragon combo.

Lands

The land base in this deck is divided pretty much evenly between the colors, as far as card choices go I try to stay away from lands that enter tapped. There are only 29 lands in this list due to the high number of mana rocks, as well as the fact that other than creatures that can be cheated in using Kaalia of the Vast and/ or reanimator abilities all other cards cost 3 or less with the exceptions of Wrath of God, Damnation, and Sneak Attack.

Mana Rocks

Mana rocks chosen for this list are all 2 CMC or less; most are net positive, the ones that aren't are net -1, meaning that they essentially only cost one mana which can lead to some very explosive starts.

Combo / Synergy

In addition to using giant board breaking creatures like Iona, Shield of Emeria, Akroma, Angel of Wrath, and Avacyn, Angel of Hope this deck has a few combos/ synergies up its sleeve. The Worldgorger Dragon combo is the only infinite combo in this deck. By combining Worldgorger Dragon with Animate Dead, Dance with the Dead, or Necromancy you can blink your whole board infinitely and drain the board with Bogardan Hellkite, or utilizing enter the battlefield triggers like Rune-Scarred Demon to tutor your deck. Be careful, as this combo has the potential to wipe you're entire board if someone responds to its ETB trigger by removing it. Inversely, if you go off with this combo, and can't kill the board at instant speed, and don't have another creature to target with the reanimation enchantment, then the game will end in a draw due to the fact that the loop can't break itself. This can be used to your advantage if you don't mind being a bit spikey, by politicking your way through, "Either I'm going to win, or nobody is."

Worldgorger Dragon also has synergy with Sneak Attack in order it mitigate board wipes of all kinds, even Cyclonic Rift.

There are also great synergies in the deck including Razaketh, the Foulblooded+Leonin Relic-Warder: you can sac any creature for the relic warder, then sac the warder for Animate Dead, Dance of the Dead, or Necromancy for as many tutors as your life can pay for (just sac the warder in response to the enchantments LTB trigger).

You can also combine Emeria Shepherd + any fetchland to reanimate any non-land permanent at instant speed. This can be especially efficient by chaining triggered abilities: use Emeria Shepherd to get back Karmic Guide into Sun Titan into Animate Dead into anything else to rebuild your board. The best part being that its immune to traditional counter-magic.

Creatures

The Heavenly Host:

Angels are a core creature type of this deck, along with Demons, and Dragons. Angels comprise some of the most fearsome and powerful creatures in Magic, and represent the vanguard of this deck.

Akroma, Angel of Wrath : The only white creature ever printed with haste, she's a beater with a side helping of keyword soup.

Angel of Despair: Removal on a stick, and as such can turn your reanimate spells and abilities into removal spells. Be careful with her in a Worldgorger loop, as her trigger is NOT a "may" ability.

Angel of Serenity: A good utility creature that can be used for a myriad of things. She's a decent piece of temporary removal, she can be saced in response to her ETB trigger to permanently exile things, she can also be used to save some of your creatures from board wipe by using Sneak Attack in response to it. There's also synergy with your ETB creatures.

Avacyn, Angel of Hope: Makes life very difficult for your opponents. She's an 8/8 indestructible Angel that makes your board indestructible. I'm gonna be honest, I've still got a bone to pick with Sorin Markov for Anguished Unmaking her, I mean I get it, but still...

Emeria Shepherd: A rather new addition, even though this deck only has 29 lands she gets used fairly often, her ability to get back non-land permanents instead of just creatures makes her incredibly potent. Plus the ability to reanimate things without casting spells that can be countered is nice.

Gisela, Blade of Goldnight: Effectively doubles your damage output while shielding you, she's arguably one of Boros' best cards.

Iona, Shield of Emeria: A potentially extremely powerful card depending on the table you're sitting at, she has the ability to lock out mono colored opponents if you're feeling a bit spikey, otherwise you can name the most common color at the table to "fairly" affect the whole board. Note she draws a lot of hate, so be prepared to defend yourself.

Karmic Guide: The quintessential card of this deck, I wish there were other cards that do what she does. She even sacs herself to be reanimated again, turning the temporary reanimation of your reanimation enchantments into permanent reanimation.

Linvala, Keeper of Silence: Very good at stopping other creature strategies: she completely shuts down mana dorks, and stops creatures like Yisan, the Wanderer Bard and Prime Speaker Vannifar from functioning.

Resolute Archangel: A fairly polarizing card, people I meet either love her or hate her. Personally I like her for her ability to completely recover after a huge Necropotence draw, shes also good to have if you're using the Razaketh, the Foulblooded + Leonin Relic-Warder synergy, she can also come in handy just from the amount of hate you draw by playing this deck.

Serra Ascendant: While not technically an angel, she might as well be. At her best she's a 6/6 lifelink flyer for . At her worst she's a cheap creature you can sac to Razaketh, the Foulblooded, or Victimize.

### The Demonic Horde:

While not much of a horde per se, these two demons are without a doubt the most powerful and useful Demons that are legal in EDH. I would love to have Griselbrand in here, but alas it was not meant to be.

Razaketh, the Foulblooded: Acts as the grease in this engine, makes everything we try to do run that much smoother, he's almost a one card combo.

Rune-Scarred Demon: Basically Razaketh, the Foulblooded's little brother, capable of turning reanimation spells and abilities into tutors.

### The Draconic Geniuses:

Not to be confused with Niv-Mizzet, Dracogenius, these Dragons each fill a pivotal role in this deck.

Bogardan Hellkite: In the Worldgorger Dragon combo he acts as the finisher, repeatedly flickering to deal infinite damage to your opponents.

Dragon Mage: Repeatable Wheel of Fortune on a stick.

Kokusho, the Evening Star: In addition to being a good value card on its own, it can also be used (with some help) as an alternate to Bogardan Hellkite in the Worldgorger Dragon combo with Karmic Guide to reanimate it each cycle, and Razaketh, the Foulblooded as a sac outlet you can drain the whole board infinitely.

Worldgorger Dragon: See Combo/ Synergy section.

### The Motley Crew:

The rest of the creatures are for utility, helping to fill out the deck to keep things running smoothly.

Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite : She's a good reanimation target that can pseudo-board wipe, but honestly shes a place holder for when WOTC prints another great Angel, Demon, or Dragon.

Grand Abolisher : Great protection allowing your turns to be your own, with no interference, the only thing he doesn't stop is triggered abilities of opponents.

Leonin Relic-Warder : See synergies with Razaketh, the Foulblooded, he can also be used as removal in a pinch.

Loyal Retainers :With the number of legendary creatures in this deck this one's a no-brainer.

Magus of the Wheel : Wheel on a stick, can be used politically to gain favor, or after a Demonic Tutor-like effect.

Sun Titan : Good for ramping fetchlands, and retrieving lost reanimation enchantments, as well as reanimating utility creatures.

Protection

Cards like Lightning Greaves, Silence, and Grand Abolisher are used to protect the combo. Just be careful with Lightning Greaves as shroud has been known to stop you from targeting your own creatures on the off chance that you need to.

Removal

The removal suite in this deck was designed with a similar philosophy as the mana ricks: cheep and broad. all single target removal spells are under 3 CMC with the ones above 2 CMC being capable of hitting multiple different types of potentially problematic permanents. The only removal spells above 3 CMC being Wrath of God and Damnation, as board wipes.

Date added	5 years
Last updated	2 years
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	19 - 0 Mythic Rares 47 - 0 Rares 21 - 2 Uncommons 9 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	3.25
Folders	Mardu