Great List! A buddy of mine runs a very similar shell here except his commander is Tuvasa the Sunlit. His main goal is to establish Solitary Confinement in tandem with his enchantresses to always have enough cards in hand to keep the confinement around! He plays Privileged Position Greater Auramancy and Sterling Grove to establish a soft lock for removal on his pieces. Eventually he will find and use cards like Idyllic Tutor and Enlightened Tutor to grab Helm of Obedience or Rest in Peace to mill us out. As far as a win-con goes, it is also not "efficient" as it only shoot one player. I would recommend solitary confinement though. That card can buy you a lot of time. Even though you cannot play cards like rhystic study I feel like you still draw enough cards to supplement it well! Hopefully this quick synopsis helps and if not, the deck looks incredibly solid here! Nice work!

3n3rgy2 thank you for the comment! I appreciate it!

I've thought about running Solitary Confinement, but in the end I've never actually gotten around to doing anything with it. As for Privileged Position, in my opinion the CMC is too high for this deck. As for Helm of Obedience, I'm not a particular fan of it due to it having an activated ability, and I'm trying to limit myself on artifacts and activated abilities. I'm even getting a Null Rod from a friend hopefully soon to add an additional source of hate against artifacts with activated abilities.

I appreciate the compliments about the deck! Honestly my favorite thing in Magic is fine-tuning decklists, and while I definitely think this deck needs some optimization (namely Living Plane in place of Nature's Revolt and Savannah in place of Scattered Groves just to name a few), I think it's pretty much as close to done as it's going to get without spending several thousand dollars on getting four to five cards.

Again, thank you!

Rightfully earned #1 position in numerous categories in my opinion! No tips nor comments from me.

I just have a question concerning the deck design (perhaps more in general, concerning low CMC cost EDH Commander decks):

How do you -land- :P on that specific land total? (Being 28 in this case.)

For when I see decks like these I always wonder how often you must get land screwed? Especially with a quite some no-colored mana providing lands on top of the low land count (Homeward Path, Stripmine, Reliquary Tower, ...).

And when do you keep your hand? When are u satsfied concerning the land count in your hand?

Thank you.

Willborn thank you for the comment!

Honestly really the only thing I look for in a starting hand land-wise is a green and a white source, whether that be through basics, nonbasics, or fetches. I've kept far too many two land hands and it's worked out mostly well for me. I'd say I'm satisfied with my hand 75% of the time. With the lower land count with not many backup sources of mana such as dorks and rocks, there is a greater chance of being mana-screwed. However, in my opinion the greatest part of running a low-CMC deck is you are still able to cast spells and you don't need to rely on getting to that fifth or sixth land drop; you're able to work with just three to four lands. The deck is designed to lock out opponents, meanwhile having the ability to constantly be playing two to three enchantments a turn, if not more. If every enchantment was four to five mana, we couldn't do that, however we're able to because 50% of the deck is less than two mana.

I will admit, I should probably look at replacing Ancient Tomb with either a basic or a fetch, as it honestly hasn't done much for me in the long run and there have been times where I wished it was a forest or a plains. However, I do love the utility having many of the lands you mentioned gives us. Deserted Temple pairs great with Serra's Sanctum and Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx. People in my playgroup do run troublesome lands such as Maze of Ith, Glacial Chasm, and even Dark Depths so being able to deal with them with ways such as Strip Mine and Wasteland is super nice. People also run Insurrection-esque cards, so being able to get your own stuff back is a must with Homeward Path. Emergence Zone is more niche, but it can allow us to flash in an enchantment that would screw someone over if we didn't cast it on our turn.

All in all, I suppose in the end it comes down to personal preference. I've been playing EDH with 30 or less lands for years at this point and it just feels natural to have a land count around 28 to 30, especially with lower CMC decks. If you want a higher land count, you could probably cut a few cards here or there in order to get to that point. However, 28 lands works for me just fine, so I roll with it.

Hopefully this answered your questions! If you have any more, feel free to ask.

I love the deck, and I'm wanting to build something similar. I'm just wondering what cuts you'd make for Burgeoning, Karmic Justice, Smothering Tithe, and Sylvan Library... possibly Solitary Confinement as well. I'm a little leary of SolCon in my meta, as Notion Thief seems to show up a bit often.

Hello KyleWynne22! Thank you for the comment!

I know this is kind of a shitty answer, but I would say the cards you ask for are very situational and meta-dependent.

• Burgeoning - I will be completely honest, I do not really like this card because we only run 28 lands in the deck. The only reason I'd ever really consider it would be because it's a 1cmc enchantment. It would be a different story if we were running say, 36 lands in the deck as you're more likely to be able to make use of it.
• Karmic Justice - Another card I'm rather iffy on. The main reason I don't particularly care for it is because most of the removal in my meta is creature based, such as Swords to Plowshares, Deadly Rollick, Unsummon, or Rapid Hybridization. You might could get away with cutting Manglehorn for it, as all it does is really add redundancy to the artifact hate we already run, such as Stony Silence and Collector Ouphe.
• Smothering Tithe - The main reason I don't run this is we run a bunch of things that shut down the activated abilities of artifacts, such as Collector Ouphe, Stony Silence, Root Maze, and I'm even considering adding a Null Rod for even more redundancy. All of these do not allow the treasure tokens to be used. If you absolutely wanted to use Smothering Tithe, I'd say probably _maybe_ replace one of the aforementioned anti-artifact cards, but we generate enough mana with things like Sanctum Weaver or even Cryptolith Rite I feel as if Smothering Tithe is completely unnecessary.
• Sylvan Library - This is probably the easiest of the bunch you asked about for me to justify including. I'd cut Ground Seal, as really the only reason I run it is due to the fact it draws a card itself upon ETB. The graveyard hate is negligible, as we run Rest in Peace for that. Really only reason I don't run it is due to the fact I don't have one and can't be bothered to go track one down.

Hopefully this answered your questions! If you have any more, or need help building your list, feel free to ask!

That wasn't a shitty answer. That would have been just telling me not to run them and leaving it at that. You have solid reasoning behind your input, which I appreciate. I own a Library, so I don't have to worry about tracking one down. The other 3 I own, but you make valid points as to where they don't really fit into the deck. There are really only 5 cards that I have to find a true swap for, being Wheel of Sun and Moon, Survival of the Fittest, Greater Auramancy, Deserted Temple, and Serra's Sanctum, as all of them are difficult to find for me or simply outside of my budget. Once again, thank you for your response!

KyleWynne22 if that's the case, you could probably get away just fine with cutting the Survival of the Fittest for Sylvan Library. Of the others you mentioned, the only one of them that I'd say is most needed is the Serra's Sanctum, but then again it's price alone is more than the other three combined. Wheel of Sun and Moon is super nice, but something like Library of Leng is a really budget substitute; only real reason we run Wheel over it is because Wheel is an enchantment. Greater Auramancy just provides additional redundancy that Sterling Grove provides, and you're probably fine with most cards in the maybeboard as a substitute. Deserted Temple you could probably just throw in another basic land. Really it's only purpose is to untap Serra's Sanctum and Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx.

I know I already said you could replace the Survival of the Fittest with Sylvan Library, but another option is Congregation at Dawn, as it's a more direct tutor.

How do you feel on Regrowth versus Bala Ged Recovery? How often are you using Regrowth? Is the one mana a big difference versus a possible extra green source?

KyleWynne22 I admit, I don't use Regrowth all that often, as half the time I exile my own graveyard with Rest in Peace or stop all interaction with Ground Seal, however, I do think it deserves a place in the deck just for the sake of having the chance to recur things.

As for Regrowth vs. Bala Ged Recovery  ^Flip, it does the exact same thing as Regrowth but for one more mana as you said. I think the point of interest for the card is the fact it can be a land, but I despise lands that enter tapped. If you look at the mana base for the deck, nearly all the lands either enter untapped or have a condition for entering untapped. The only reason Scattered Groves is in the deck is because it can be fetched for and I can cycle it if I need to draw a card. The fact that Bala Ged Recovery  ^Flip is a simply worse Regrowth or a simply worse Forest makes me dismiss the card completely.

There seems to be a misunderstanding of card interactions in your "Noteworthy Interactions" section. You say that Greater Auramancy + Sterling Grove prevents Cloudstone Curio from activating since you can't target using Cloudstone's ability, but its ability doesn't require you to target anything so it should work fine.

MrDigdigdig Sorry for getting back to you so late!

Oh wow. I did not know that. After you brought it to my attention, I went to the Magic Judge IRC chat and asked because I was still skeptical, but you're right. Thanks a ton!