Blue in commander ?
Commander Deck Help forum
Posted on Feb. 18, 2017, 5:20 p.m. by BlueMagician
The reason i entered mtg is
I love blue cards, the artwork is amazing and i just love to control my opponents plays
My friend brought me into mtg and he had 2 dual deck (elspeth vs kiora and jace vs vraska)
I had the best time of my life using the blue decks and i would like to use it but i would like to know if it is a wise choice for a new player
Brainstorm and Djinn of Wishes are my favorite blue art. The foil Djinn of Wishes looks amazing. Contingency Plan is a great card. I play blue green in EDH so I can play cards like Eternal Dominion. Unsummon is the blue control cantrip, try to mess up their tempo by countering the next play with Counterspell. Stolen Identity is good if you use flying. Elite Arcanist
February 18, 2017 5:58 p.m.
Sideboard counter spells that are conditional e.g. Dispell
February 18, 2017 6:01 p.m.
Opifex You mention...you know...Brainstorm and you say Contigency Plan is a great card? :P
February 18, 2017 6:15 p.m.
BlueMagician, pick a legendary you like and work from there.
February 18, 2017 6:31 p.m.
I forgotten that this was commander haha, I was thinking casual format. Arcanis the Omnipotent, Uyo, Silent Prophet, Paradox Haze. Contingency Plan is better if you can retrieve or play cards from the grave (flashback snapcaster), if you go with Uyo Ghirapur Orrery is a must have and the ability to retrieve and copy it.
February 18, 2017 6:37 p.m.
I would suggest Talrand, Sky Summoner as a good first deck mono blue commander. He's fun and pretty straight forward imo.
February 18, 2017 6:44 p.m.
Blue in commander tends to gravitate pretty heavily toward combo-based strategies. I think the most universally accepted blue commander is probably Azami, Lady of Scrolls (Drawing massive amount of cards, amirite?).
With just a little tuning, she becomes pretty good. With tons of time and money, she becomes a little shy of the best commanders.
Other than combos, blue is a great supportive color because you get amazing draw, counters, and utility.
February 18, 2017 7 p.m.
buildingadeck says... #12
I would recommend a Teferi, Temporal Archmage stax list. It would be highly competitive, and it would be a very fun control deck. Azami is probably the second best mono-blue commander. Arcum Dagsson got a major boost with Paradox Engine if you want to play an artifacts based combo deck.
February 18, 2017 7:34 p.m.
BlueMagician says... #13
So i checked all the commander with blue in their identity and i would like to know which one of these commanders would be more suited for a control based deck
February 18, 2017 11:16 p.m.
buildingadeck says... #14
Derevi and Grand Arbiter are great Stax commanders. Derevi is better IMO.
Baral is rather untested, but he seems like a house, and I've heard good things.
None of them are as good as the ones we mentioned.
February 19, 2017 1:05 a.m.
Lazav, Dimir Mastermind best control commander hands down.
February 19, 2017 1:15 a.m.
Lazav counterspell, discard, control magic, mill, clone, and kill.
February 19, 2017 1:20 a.m.
buildingadeck says... #18
Tasigur and Leovold are better than Lasav by leagues.
February 19, 2017 1:30 a.m.
Reason I suggested Talrand, Sky Summoner is because you're basically running a deck full of counters and cantrips, things blue does well. You can run combos or just win with drakes, it's a fun time though either way. I'd check out edhrec if you are interested.
February 19, 2017 2:28 a.m.
Lazav = X+1. May the variance of mutual exclusivity be with you.
February 19, 2017 3:07 a.m.
As somebody who has played a fair amount of control decks in EDH, one thing I will say is that if you want to play control, you have to be good at threat analysis. You won't have enough counterspells and removal to shut down three players so you have to know what to counter and what ot let through to the keeper.
That being said, I would probably recommend either Rashmi, Eternities Crafter or Prime Speaker Zegana as good intor to control decks. Both of them can play big green beats strategies so you should have some of the bigger threats on hte board and your counterspells will be used defensively more than offensively to protect your stuff and shut down key plays by your opponents.
However if you'r edead set on playing a "proper" control deck, then you'll probably want to win via some sort of combo. Just be aware that some playgroups don't like combo decks, though I htink that frowning upon a specific archetype is short sighted and shows your inability to adapt. So for a combo deck, Azami, Lady of Scrolls or Derevi, Empyrial Tactician are the best bets.
Mill is generally a bad win condition (unless within a combo) as a lot of decks are designed to interact with the graveyard and you end up helping some decks rather than hindering them.
February 19, 2017 8:38 a.m.
BlueMagician says... #22
Thanks for the tips
I might go with Derevi, Empyrial Tactician with stuff like Winter Orb and Static Orb
Or Rashmi, Eternities Crafter for the big creature threats
February 19, 2017 9:29 a.m.
BlueMagician says... #24
I heard that going mono-colored is the worst idea in commander because of all the cards that gives protection against colors
February 19, 2017 4:19 p.m.
buildingadeck says... #25
That is absurdly false. Who cares about protection? There's no protection from Cyclonic Rift, or most mass removal
February 19, 2017 4:26 p.m.
BlueMagician: Not really. It doesn't come up often and you're much more likely to see a Linvala, Keeper of Silence than you are an Iona, Shield of Emeria. Plus Mono blue is one of the colours best equipped to deal with it as you have access to all those counter spells.
February 19, 2017 4:26 p.m.
BlueMagician says... #27
What is a prison deck ? I heard someone mentioned it at my lgs
February 19, 2017 4:36 p.m.
It's where you use lots of tax effects rather than stax effects. So cards like Propaganda where they don't do anything until somebody tries go attack you.
Generally these aren't as good because the don't shut down a player the same way as a stax deck does, so combo decks can usually still play through them relatively easily.
February 19, 2017 4:41 p.m.
Sure you can start with blue. But, I would advise against going mono-blue! Having one more colour broadens your options and adds extra paths for you to get to victory. Try going 2 colours at first. Green/Blue is a relatively powerful combination that allows big explosive plays and hard control.
February 19, 2017 5:16 p.m.
BlueMagician says... #31
I've been looking through the and i have few ideas but i can't decide which one would be the best option for my first deck
February 19, 2017 7:13 p.m.
BlueMagician says... #32
I'll try to figure it out and post my deck in here if you guys don't mind giving me a few more tips on the deck
February 19, 2017 7:15 p.m.
For a first deck I'd second Prime Speaker Zegana or Rashmi, Eternities Crafter.
February 20, 2017 10:19 a.m.
BlueMagician says... #34
I was given an opportunity to get a deck for free but i can't decide which of these 2 would be more control based deck
February 20, 2017 3:14 p.m.
Both are in esper colours so, both will be very control-y. I would go for Oloro as well, as he aims much more for the late game. Although Merieke can be fun with ways to untap her :p
February 20, 2017 5:37 p.m.
All commanders are great Control Magic, Soul Ransom, Domineering Will, Enslave...
Calliber says... #2
I started on blue, and yes you can do it, it's probably the harder of the 5 to start with since it utilizes more of the complex mechanics of the game in terms of the stack, steps, and timing....which is fine if you're open to learning the correct order of operations in magic and the timing restrictions.
February 18, 2017 5:46 p.m.