What's going aroud here?

Hello, this is my combo centric Oona, Queen of the Fae commander deck with some control elements.

As I wanted to play more competitive, so I could adjust to other decks in my meta, I decided to make some kind of a combo deck. My local meta is more 75%-ish than fully competitive so budget builds have a brief chance to make their spot under the stage lights and also win. Being a student and living on a budget, it is neither really a priority or option for me to afford myself some really high end and expensive cards, so my decks are most always on a budget. Based on AlwaysSleepy's list and inspired by JohnnyCRO's primer on his Kefnet the Mindful draw-go control deck and with his help, I found myself a way of what kind of deck I want to play.

NOTE: This is a budget build, so let's not compare it to finished cEDH builds as it's not running any high end cards that find their spot in cEDH decks.

She may not be a top tier commander and there are definitelly better commander options - with adding a splash color the story would be kinda different.

In despite of that she is in great colors (read: the best), she's a mana sink and a wincon on her own. The fact she's beautiful is just a flavor bonus!

Who doesn't want to have a preety commander?

What you really want with this deck is to have a fast start and a good opening hand. I will point out again that it can be faster than this, but this is going for decks like this one, which has more budget mana rocks. Ramping out early gives as huge advantage upwards in the game because we won't even be that depentant on our lands, besides for interactions and cantrips, because we're comboing off from our artifacts.

Good opener is everything; what I always want to have in my opening hand is at least 2 lands of both colors, 2+ mana rocks and 2+ cantrip/draw spells, also a cheap counter spell wound't hurt so we can answer some early threats. The opening hand I'm going to keep really depends on the decks that I'm playing against at the moment - if I can afford myself a slower start and see a really good potential for snowballing to win in next few turns, then I'm keeping it!

Our main plan is to assemble our combo pieces to generate infinite mana so we can cast our commander to mill everyone out. We're starting to build up a combo since the very start of our game and try to finish it off as soon as possible.

Infinite mana combos

(Note: This combo requires one or more artifacts that produce at least 3 mana.)

  1. Cast Isochron Scepter and imprint Dramatic Reversal.

  2. Tap our artifacts to produce at least 3 mana and pay 2 of those mana to activate Isochron Scepter's ability to cast Dramatic Reversal.

  3. Dramatic Reversal resloves and untaps all of our nonland pernaments including Isochron Scepter itself.

  4. Repeat steps 2. and 3. untill you get amount of mana and cast triggers.

(Note: This combo requires 2 mana opened for Rings of Brigthearth's activation.)

  1. Tap Basalt Monolith to generate .

  2. Spend produced mana to activate Basalt Monolith's untap ability and put it on the stack.

  3. Generate two mana from any other source to activate Rings of Brighthearth's triggered ability which will then copy the untap ability from Basalt Monolith and put that copied ability on the stack.

  4. Let first untap ability resolve and tap Basalt Monolith in response to generate in response to the second untap ability which was previously copied with Rings of Brighthearth.

  5. Let the second untap ability resolve and again tap Basalt Monolith to generate more floating.

  6. Repeat steps 3. to 5.; using the mana generated by Basalt Monolith to pay for every next Rings of Brighthearth trigger after the first one.

Yes - there is a possibility of a turn one win; but it's only possible with a godlike hand which would be like: Swamp (or any land that can produce black mana), Dark Ritual, Sol Ring, Mana Vault, Dimir Signet (or even Fellwar Stone if we're going after a player who dropped an Island or a Swamp), Isochron Scepter, Dramatic Reversal.

So turn would look like this:

  1. Swamp for and then cast Dark Ritual ->

  2. Use to cast Sol Ring ->

  3. Sol Ring for and cast Mana Vault ->

  4. Use to cast Dimir Signet/Fellwar Stone ->

  5. Use to cast Isochron Scepter and imprint Dramatic Reversal ->

  6. Use to activate Isochron Scepter's ability and let it resolve.

  7. Repeat step 6. to generate infinite amount of and mana.

  8. Cast Oona and win.

_ Getting this hand as an opening one would be a really nice Christmas gift, so let's write to Santa and keep our fingers crossed for that !_

Closest to this I personaly got were few turn 2 wins and it still feels nice for us, but as I said it's really not that common for us to pull these kinds of hands. Some players in non-cEDH metas, like my own, hate playing against combo decks and most often they get salty and mad when somebody finishes off early or with a combo. Imagine what would happen if you toss it on turn one..

By tutoring ofcourse!

We're running a decent package of tutors that will get us what we want and/or need. (See tutor section in decklist.)

Most tutors are used to fetch the same pieces in 90% of our games, but there are few times where we adapt them to fit the situation we're in.

Most of the time paired with some kind of a draw effect and that's because we sometimes search for interaction spells and answers, rather than combo pieces.

  • Vampiric Tutor - Setting up a wanted topdeck is always nice. This one gets you anything you want for only and 2 life - it's a bargain!
  • Mystical Tutor - More restrictions than previous one, but still searches for relevant spells and combo pieces.
  • Lim-Dul's Vault - A tutor..really? Arghh..I know it's more of a filter, but in most cases it's used as a tutor. Some situations call for it to dig through a nice chunk of our library until we find what we actually need and it hurts us really bad, but it leads us there.

People know our game plans and they can sometimes guess where we're going so they are trying to slow us down by destorying/countering our mana rocks etc. These are a few backup plans that I use as my backup options.

Generating infinite mana with any of our 2 combos allows us to draw our entire deck with Sensei's Divining Top.

NOTE: Both of these combos give a really nice storm count from casting top as many times as possible.

Dramatic Reversal + Isochron Scepter + Sensei's Divining Top

  1. Generate mana with Isochron Scepter and Dramatic Reversal.

  2. Sensei's Divining Top to activate it's second ability, put it on the stack and holy priority.

  3. Activate Isochron Scepter's ability to cast Dramatic Reversal to untap top and let it resolve.

  4. Sensei's Divining Top to activate it's second ability and put it on the stack of previous one.

  5. Last activated ability resolves; you draw a card and Sensei's Divining Top goes on top of your library.

  6. Now first ability resolves; you draw a card which is in this case Sensei's Divining Top, but it doesn't go back on the top of the library because it's not in play at the moment.

  7. Repeat steps 2. to 6.

Basalt Monolith + Rings of Brightheath + Sensei's Divining Top

  1. Generate mana with Basalt Monolith and Rings of Brighthearth.

  2. Sensei's Divining Top to activate it's second ability, put it on the stack and holy priority.

  3. Pay and copy the top's activated ability with Rings of Brighthearth.

  4. Copied ability resolves; you draw a card and Sensei's Divining Top goes on top of your library.

  5. Now the original ability resolves, you draw a card which is in this case Sensei's Divining Top, but it doesn't go back on the top of the library because it's not in play at the moment.

  6. Repeat steps 2. to 5.

Since I currently do not own Jace, Vryn's Prodigy  and can't really afford Candelabra of Tawnos, I'm trying my best to make High Tide more efficient in this build to go in my favor. I'm also perfectly aware of Palinchron being one of the best combos for High Tide out there, but he requires more lands than we usually have on battlefield when we're trying to go off because we are more on artifact-centric theme.

Untap effects: Frantic Search and Snap. Cards like Unwind and Rewind are also to be considered as untappers because of their secondary effects, but they are way to situational so I'd rather run any more efficient counterspell in that cmc range.

_ You're telling me that we are gonna try to storm off even with those high cmc spells?_ - Yes, it happened and it will happen again!

Not all of our spells are high on cmc bar, therefore we're trying to storm off by hand if we don't get that Isochron Scepter + Dramatic Reversal + any 2 mana producing rocks combination. Yes, including Paradox Engine would make this so much easier but if we don't rocks to untap wouldn't it be just dead on the spot? And let's face it - if they've managed to remove our mana rocks, they can get rid of Paradox Engine aswell.

Going by hand isn't great, but in situations where we have a ton of card draw spells and filters can be really on point, because Mind's Desire just enables us to dig even more inside of our deck and find another combo pieces to assemble the win eventually!

Say cheese..? - I know, it's not an actual wincon itself, but it can get to one after resolving.

Notion Thief + Windfall /response to opponents wheel effect = if this resolves you better try to win, because most probably, everyone is coming at you - talking from experience.

Doomsday

As I didn't like the idea of Doomsday being another wincon in the deck, guess what - I've changed my mind! The deck had some major changes, we're not on artifact build anymore rather on Doomsday/Storm centric build. I had a lot of time to test some of the cards with other commander like Kess, Dissident Mage or Zur the Enchanter which are in 3 colors and I saw that I don't really need that 3rd splashy color to execute what I want so here we are.

Depending on the situation, the piles may vary, but most of the time it will look the same; I suggest you take a look at the Doomsday primer for EDH which really has all the things you are looking for (http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/the-edh-doomsday-primer/).

Disclaimer: Cards used in this build are cards that are available within my budget or previously owned. I'm perfectly aware of some cards either not being good enough or some cards missing, but I used my resources to make a perfect build for my situation and liking.

Suggestions

Updates Add

IN: Ad Nauseam, Doomsday and friends OUT: Mind’s Desire, Basalt Monolith + Rings od Brighthearth combo

TESTING: Chrome Mox over Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth (Adds to storm, fast mana and since I had no issuses with fixing what so ever, Urborg isn’t doing anything for me - feels like a swamp everytime.)

I’m currently tossing between Oona and Kess consitantly; Oona has one color less so it’s easier to adjust for some things, but to be honest, it’s not of a problem in Kess either.

IN:

Ad Nauseam - Avg. cmc of the deck is low so it allows us to run it.

Doomsday and friends - By friends I mean whole package of cantrips and enabler to make it work; wincon shows it’s consistency over testing and it earned it’s place in the deck for sure! (Still testing out Demonic Consultation.)

OUT:

Mind’s Desire - Slaps my face on Ad Nauseam and isn’t doing good for me.

Monolith/Rings combo - Just because. There are so many pieces required to execute this comboand it doesn’t even provide us colored mana for Oona. Dragging out all off your resources just to try and assemble this just exhausting if we son’t manage to do it. Taking these out automaticly dragged some cards out with themselves and freed me slots for some other cards. Don’t get me wrong, combo is great if you don’t have any other options, but I’ll rather spend tutors trying to assemble one wincon and protection for it. One infinite mana combo is just enough!

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Casual

95% Competitive

Top Ranked
  • Achieved #28 position overall 5 years ago
Date added 6 years
Last updated 2 years
Exclude colors WRG
Splash colors RG
Key combos
Legality

This deck is Commander / EDH legal.

Rarity (main - side)

11 - 0 Mythic Rares

48 - 0 Rares

21 - 0 Uncommons

16 - 0 Commons

Cards 100
Avg. CMC 1.93
Tokens Bird 2/2 U, Elemental 4/4 UR, Emblem Jace, Vryn's Prodigy, Faerie Rogue 1/1 UB, Frog Lizard 3/3 G, Manifest 2/2 C, Spirit 1/1 C
Folders Deck ideas, Faes, EDH, Potential decks, mill, WANT, Ideas, Deck Ideas
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