Be extremely subtle even to the point of formlessness. Be extremely mysterious even to the point of soundlessness. Thereby, you can be the director of the opponent’s fate.

--Sun Tzu


Since Kadena, Slinking Sorcerer release she has been adored by all. She's also been my absolute favorite and I've yet to meet one person who has disdain for her when I bring her to my local LGS, which says a lot. Below you'll find my history with this deck, why I built her, the variety of changes made over the month, a breakdown of the supporting cast of cards that surround our mysterious friends, some reasons why you may want to play her, and all the questions my friends asked me when I was making this particular build.

And if you have any questions, comments, or want to say hi feel free!

Kadena, Slinking Sorcerer was the first commander I truly fell in love with. I remember being in a ho-hum phase with edh. I had just finished, what I thought at the time, my favorite edh deck Ruric Thar, the Unbowed because when he was spoiled back in Gate Crash he was my favorite card. I loved RG, and especially Gruul since original Ravnica. I theory crafted, put on the shelf, resumed, had friends help, and on/off for years tinkered with him before Putting cash to paper and buying him. However, I hadn't realized how boring he was and how anti-stacks a player I was. Playing against my college friends he was perfect, he told all my friends that we're not here to play solitaire and watch you combo off. But when I left college and hung out with friends I made through work, his playstyle wasn't working. We were all there to have fun and play 50 tap lands and only play 7+ costed spells. So I eventually shelved him and i went looking for my next commander, all of which stayed virtual and proxied. Then i saw Faceless Menace at my local LGS one day and I was hooked. I bought the deck, sleeved it up, and overall had a great time against my friends who would always glance my way before they played anything due to not knowing specifically what I had facedown, often times being lamented with "I want to play X but he could havr z!". Every player either relied on me and my army of faceless 2/2s or played super cautiously. Morphs, while nothing new, had changed our table. We had gotten use to looking at players hands for interaction instead of etb creatures we all played. My fondest moment was someone played Emrakul, the Promised End In their Meren of Clan Nel Toth deck and decimated one of our friends. On my following turn I played Ixidron and we all laughed as his entire deck was turned off for a few turns since he had to figure out how to flip Meren back up since I wouldn't let him suicide it into me. Another moment was Chromeshell Crabing another players Worldspine Wurm which was met with lots of laughter.

So I went to work crafting, but had poor inital deck direction due to me trying to jam in every aspect of every Kadena deck i saw online, which would lead me to build a very diluted and inconsistent mess every time Like Ruric Thar, I shelved her and gave up, moving onto my next deck idea of General Ferrous Rokiric and playing him to great effect, but Kadena always lingered in my closet waiting.

After growing bored with Ferrous, and tired of borrowing my friends decks, I eventually decided my best way to approaching Kadena was to throw a cheap land base together and focus on the rest and the deck took off, I suddenly had inspiration and dove head first and made this deck. Something I'm super proud of, works like I imagined, and even trickier than before.

You may like Kadena, Slinking Sorcerer if you

  • Love playing mind games with your opponents because they won't know what face down creatures you have out and what they potentially do
  • Love having all your creatures be your main source of interaction
  • Love draw effects on commanders
  • Love theme decks

You may NOT like Kadena if

  • Don't enjoy theme decks
  • Want a more variable play style other than, play dude face down and pass
  • Want something you can tinker and upgrade long term since Morphs/Manifest are very one note/set specific
  • Want to play a GY Sultai commander

Q: Why are you running so many tap lands?

A: I wanted to build this deck on a budget and I also slightly suck at building mana bases over 2 colors. I built the best budget friendly base I could that also wouldn't eat into the deck and overlap in colors as much as possible. Alongside all of that, my play group isn't cEDH level. We all run tap lands to some effect so given the context this mana base fits in with the group.

Q: Why do you have so many pieces of ramp?

A: This deck is deceptively mana hungry, and importantly mana color intensive. If Kadena is out she alleviates a large chunk of this issue, but without her the deck struggles. You need the mana to pay morph costs and their flip costs and if you plan on bouncing/flashing on everyone's turns without her. Now cards like Primordial Mist and even Scroll of Fate turn excess rocks into dudes for kadena to draw off of in case you hit em late game.

Q: How do you win?

A: Value, control, recursion, and just pure 2/2 beats

Q: Why aren't you running some popular cards like Deathmist Raptor, Ixidor, Reality Sculptor, or even Ugin, the Ineffable?

A: They just didn't fit the deck too be honest. Ugin doesn't trigger Kadenas draw ability and having both Dream Chisel and Obscuring Aether gives me the same reduction benefit at less mana. For Deathmist Raptor, while he is commonly found on every deck list, I personally found he doesn't do anything to really impress me other than come back from the graveyard and have deathtouch. Ixidor, Reality Sculptor is just too much mana for an effect that, while cool on paper, doesn't really impact my game.

Q: Jesus man, so many spoiler updates. Will the deck ever be considered done?

A: Honestly? I don't think so. While morphs and manifest cards aren't exactly lining up for a reprint, or a new set in the future, the surrounding cast still is. I'm sure there will be better untap effects, counter spells, removal spells, draw spells, and so forth that the deck can use to always get better in smaller aspects.

Tempo. Tempo. Tempo.

Kadena thrives on it. But to be able to sow the seeds of it you need to have some established board state.

You don't want to play Kadena immediately if your hand only has 2 morphs in it and nothing else. You want to establish your mana base, mana rocks, and if you can a flash or bounce effect.

Kadena makes your morphs free to cast, but if you don't have the mana to flip up the tempo/value ends there.

Kadena always rewards you for being smart. It's super easy to just play all your morphs and draw a ton of cards, but not all morphs are relevant for all situations. If you can correctly guess your opponents actions and respond with a morph your opponent will be super cautious and then you can just slither in for the win.

Vraska the Unseen
In a perfect game, her -7 can win games.

Vivien Reid
+2/+2, Vigilance, Trample, and Indestructible is an amazing buff. Lots of work to get there, but when pulled off morphs become even more scarier

Thieving Amalgam -- This has won me so many games just based on the value alone. Depriving your opponents of resources and the possibility of casting their non-permanent cards in conjuction with Primordial Mist and makes a board wipe so painful for everyone.

Value -- In all my games the one thing I've consistently done is out value my friends into, and past, the mid game. When everyone has shifted into recovery/resource management to try for another swing at a win, I can easily recur all my morphs with Genesis, bounce them with Crystal Shard, or rest them with Ixidron. This deck has a lot of gas and can really go the distance when asked.

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Due to the expensive nature of these changes, this will be a slow roll. These will be replacing my Vivid Lands, Temples, and Bounce Lands.

DONE Shocks:
Breeding Pool
Overgrown Tomb
Watery Grave

DONE Check Lands That Need Basics:
Woodland Cemetery
Hinterland Harbor
Drowned Catacomb

DONE Battlebond Two or More Opponents:
Morphic Pool
Rejuvenating Springs
Undergrowth Stadium

DONE Tri-Lands
Opulent Palace
Zagoth Triome

DONE channel Lands
Otawara, Soaring City
Boseiju, Who Endures
Takenuma, Abandoned Mire

Breakdown Of Card Categories Show

Suggestions

Updates Add

Out:
1 Grazilaxx, Illithid Scholar

In:
1 Orochi Soul-Reaver

Updated History of Deck Changes and removed Grazilaxx, Illithid Scholar from Breakdown of Card Categories: Ways To Bounce Morphs To Hand and added Orochi Soul-Reaver to Breakdown of Card Categories: Manifest sections.

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96% Casual

Competitive

Date added 1 year
Last updated 2 days
Legality

This deck is Commander / EDH legal.

Rarity (main - side)

5 - 0 Mythic Rares

62 - 0 Rares

18 - 0 Uncommons

8 - 0 Commons

Cards 100
Avg. CMC 3.28
Tokens A Mysterious Creature, Assassin 1/1 B w/ Player Killer, Beast 3/3 G, Emblem Vivien Reid, Manifest 2/2 C, Morph 2/2 C, Saproling 1/1 G, Treasure
Folders Purchased EDH Decks, +1 Decks I Want to Emulate
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