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Tempus Necandi - Saskia EDH (Lingua Latina)

Commander / EDH Aggro BRGW Multiplayer Stompy

Archegos

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Creature (38)

Land (33)

Enchantment (4)

Commander (1)

Commander: foil Saskia the Unyielding

Instant (13)

Sorcery (8)

Artifact (3)

Maybeboard

Creature (3)

Enchantment (2)

Instant (1)

INTRODUCTION

Hello, everyone! This is "Time to Kill," a Saskia EDH deck. You may have noticed that this deck's name, and all of its cards, are in a different language. I love my Saskia deck. She's a commander I always wanted to make until I actually did, and I also really love the Latin language. When AFR released, I challenged myself to translate the entire set into Latin because of the different layers of nerd at play in a Latin translation of a Magic the Gathering set in the Dungeons & Dragons universe. I found the exercise a really challenging but fun puzzle, and so the last few days, I did the same for my Saskia deck. I made my translated cards on Magic Set Editor and then uploaded them as alters here on TappedOut. I hope you enjoy the deck, and this thing I did.

Let me know if you have any questions on the card choices, on the Latin choices, or any recommendations for either.

DECK TECH

This is a 4-color blue-less aggro commander deck that uses its commander, Saskia the Unyielding, to allow to defeat byour opponents faster. Her ability lets you attack into a player with a weaker board presence to hurt a second, OR lets you hit a single player extra hard. This deck lacks a way to flicker Saskia to reset her, but I find in testing that your opponents will give you plenty of opportunities to reset her via removal spells. This is not as detrimental to the game plan as you might think, since our commander is backed up by creatures who hit hard enough on their own. Saskia is at her best in a 1v1v1 meta (conveniently my own), but she's still a threat at the usual 4-player table.

RAMP

To cast our spells, we are running a variety of ways to accelerate our attack:

  • Avacyn's Pilgrim: A mana-fixing dork.
  • Birds of Paradise: As above, but better.
  • Bloom Tender: With Saskia the Unyielding in play, she taps for four mana of each of our colors. This is our best ramp card for switching from our setup to taking the offensive.
  • Deathrite Shaman: With plenty of fetches in the board, he is a second Birds with the added graveyard utility (and 1 power, which combos with our commander, of course).
  • Dockside Extortionist: Needs no introduction.
  • Elvish Mystic and Llanowar Elves: Tied for our worst mana dork. Opening hands with Forest and one of these is good for, say, Yisan, but not for us.
  • Faeburrow Elder: This is Bloom Tender #2, which can kick butt, unlike the frail elf.
  • Ignoble Hierarch: A great dork who taps for 3 of our colors AND can pump Saskia for value in a pinch.
  • Arcane Signet: A Birds of Paradise with haste that does not die to boardwipes.
  • Sol Ring: This might be controversial, but even though this ubiquitous artifact does not help us cast our commander the first time, it is exceptionally good at powering out the rest of our deck.
  • Farseek, Nature's Lore, Three Visits: These cards can easily fix our mana by grabbing a triome. The non-Farseek options can get untapped shocks as well.
  • Smothering Tithe: This is less so ramp and ore mana advantage. With this enchantment, you can punish your opponents for just playing the game by sending out bigger threats faster than you should be able to.

THREATS

  • Adeline, Resplendent Cathar: This new addition from Innistrad 3 goes big and wide together, a must for a multiplayer aggro deck. The 1/1s add up, especially with our commander, and, unchecked, Adeline is brutal when she connects with the opponent under the glare of Saskia's evil eye.
  • Anafenza, the Foremost: A good 1v1 rate with graveyard hate attached who buffs other threats. This is a meta call and a card that will likely be replaced over time (though I love Anafenza).
  • Aurelia, the Warleader: A key player in winning the game and a frequent target of Finale of Devastation. Taking extra combats with this deck is like taking extra turns.
  • Drana, Liberator of Malakir: Drana is more or less the black counterpart to Adeline. Play together for maximum fun.
  • Ghalta, Primal Hunger: A (French) Vanilla creature, but Ghalta's speed and power and built-in evasion shouldn't be underestimated.
  • Marisi, Breaker of the Coil: Marisi is a decent rate with an occasionally useful Silence effect for combat. Note that this effect does not apply to you, just to your opponents. This angry cat triggers whenever any of your creatures hit, so if you happen to hit with an evasive beater, like Dauthi Voidwalker, no matter how many creatures your opponents have, they'll be wide open next turn.
  • Oakhame Adversary: A deathtouchy Curious creature? Nice! Play only if you see a lot of green. He may have gotten worse with Wizards' recent uplifting of the other colors in EDH, notably red, but I'd still play him if the meta calls for it.
  • Samut, Voice of Dissent: Double strike good. The haste anthem is really nice.
  • Serra Ascendant: The best turn 1 creature in terms of damage output. Caution that we are not a lifegain deck, so this card can be pretty mediocre if drawn late.
  • Xenagos, God of Revels: Our Greek friend Ξέναγος is a haste outlet and damage doubler. He is also pretty hard to remove.

UTILITY

  • Breena, the Demagogue: A group-hug effect whose symmetry is broken by our commander. Breena can also get us cards. Her evasion also helps with getting in for damage for creatures like Marisi, Breaker of the Coil.
  • Dauthi Voidwalker: A hard graveyard-hate piece who cannot be blocked and can be cracked to cast your opponent's busted spells. He costs 2 double black pips, which is a real cost, but he adds so much to the deck that I think he oughtta be run.
  • Esper Sentinel: Infamously draws cards. This is not close to being the best Esper Sentinel deck because we have little synergy with him, but he is still a strong card.
  • Ohran Frostfang: Deathtouch + card draw. Make your opponents do some uncomfortable calculations.
  • Professional Face-Breaker: Converts damage into stored mana/fixing that can be converted into card advantage.
  • Queen Marchesa: Sets up the monarchy, is tricky to block, and generates tokens to be blessed by our commander and other damage bonuses.
  • Saryth, Viper's Fang: She gives (some) of our attackers deathtouch and our vigilance attackers hexproof, and her final ability allows for some shenanigans.
  • Silverblade Paladin: Double strike is very useful, but I think SVP's days in the deck are numbered due to power creep.
  • Thalia, Heretic Cathar: She slows everyone else down and provides a decent body.
  • Tireless Tracker: What she lacks in tires, she makes up for in drawing cards and getting bigger. Tracker is better in a lands deck and could be replaced with better draw/tutoring.
  • Toski, Bearer of Secrets: Another mass curiosity effect helps refill us when we've gotten the board going.
  • Tymna the Weaver: The cEDH all-star is here to draw us cards. She gets better the more people you're playing with, and she may be too mid in a 3 person meta.

PROTECTION

  • Grand Abolisher: This card is just so annoying that I had to run it. However, Destiny Spinner is in contention for this spot because I do face a significant amount of permission, and Abolisher is at his best in a deck trying to combo out. I think it's close, but for now I got everyone's favorite bear that WotC won't reprint.
  • Guardian of Faith: A creature that can save our board. Do note that phased-out creatures only return once it gets back to your turn, so if you use this on Opponent 1's turn, you do leave yourself open to Opponent 2 and so on until you untap.
  • Mother of Runes: Untap with Mom, and she's got your back. Definitely worse in multiplayer, but the protection at the rate you get is hard to beat.
  • Deflecting Swat: This card is absurdly powerful and can outright win close games.
  • Flawless Maneuver: This card is great insurance. One of the reasons we pack as much ramp as we do is so that we can keep replaying Saskia if our opponents try to hate her out so that free spells like Flawless Maneuver and Deflecting Swat are always online.
  • Pyroblast and Red Elemental Blast: Use these if you need to keep nasty blue mages down. This deck very much does NOT enjoy Cyclonic Rift, and so we pack these. Note that since our commander (and deck) lack lots of card filtering, so these have a real deck-building cost if you run up against non-blue players.
  • Teferi's Protection: A Flawless Maneuver that is never free but covers EVERYTHING. See the caveat re: Guardian of Faith.
  • Rhythm of the Wilds: Protection from counterspells.

FINISHERS

Language Notes

This is my first commander deck to fully translate into Latin, a little project I've worked on this past week. Magic translation is very fun for me due to the mechanical nature of the writing. Each rule you've figured out speeds up the process.

WIP

Long Marks I prefer to read and write Latin with long marks over long vowels, like the second i in Saskia's title here, immītis. Long vowels are very important in Latin, and some words are entirely different based on the length of a vowel (famously, malum _ means "bad" but _mālum means "apple"). Long marks were not available in the card font, so they do not appear on the cards. This is annoying and slows down comprehension, but it is true that a lot of Latin found in the wild lacks these marks, even though they are so helpful.

Key Words I decided to regularize Magic key words into clear nouns. For most key words, this was not a change: Vigilance -> Vigilantia, Haste -> Festinatio. Indestructible is weird in English because creatures "have indestructible," NOT "are indestructible." To convey this, I used the noun "Indelebitas" ("Indestructibility"), which is probably what should be anyway.

Subtypes Each subtype is its own noun. A Human Soldier, like our commander Saskia, is a Homo Miles, both a Human and a Soldier, unlike the more natural thing to do in Latin, making "Human" the adjective Humanus. (Note that in English, the word "human" can be either a noun or adjective based on use.) For the sake of space, I have not put a conjunction linking the nouns, like Homo et Miles. This seems unnecessary. I have followed this principle with the subtypes of lands as well. Supertypes are adjectives: Fabularis,-e for "Legendary," Nivalis,-e for "Snow," and Simplex for "Basic."

Adjective Order In English, adjectives tend to go before the noun: Bloodstained Mire. Latin is often stereotyped of being the reverse - noun then adjective - but this is not really the case. The order is flexible. I often go noun-adjective, but I go noun-adjective when it sounds better. For example, Bloodstained Mire is switched: Caenum "Mire" Cruentatum "Bloodstained," while Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite's title is Grandis Coenobita, to emphasize her grandeur.

Proper Nouns Names are tricky. Latin is a heavily inflected language, meaning its words change form to convey meaning. For this reason, when you add a non-Latin name to a sentence, it can be hard to understand what role it has, since it lacks these important endings. With names that happened to end like a Latin noun, such as the -a in Saskia and Akroma, I treated the word like a native Latin word with changing endings. (Note that I did NOT change the Ks to Cs and thereby kept the foreign feel to the names). Other names I kept identical and used prepositions in place of case endings: Teferi remains Teferi, instead of, say, Teferius, and "of Teferi" is "de Teferi" rather than "Teferii." A couple names I changed to clarify pronunciation, like Breena -> Brina, as the "ee" would be a little perplexing to Latin speakers. I Latinized "Avacyn" to "Avacyna," but this may have been a mistake.

Nomenclature To translate the concept of "tapping," I used the verb carpo, -ere, found in the famous proverb Carpe diem! This verb literally means "to pluck, harvest," and I thought it apt to communicate the idea of tapping a land for its resources. To translate "untap," I meant with dirigo, -ere, meaning "to straighten, arrange." Here, I opted for the physical action of untapping one's cards because of the additional military connotation of the verb - arranging one's troops for battle.

The Sol Ring Exception

Sol Ring is the one card in the deck that features a completely non-Latin word. I wanted to evoke the same ancient and mysterious vibe the card has from its Latin name in English (sol is the Latin word for sun). So, I opted to go with the Etruscan word for sun, usil, here in its genitive form usilus. I think this pairs well with the flavor text and lore around Sol Ring and avoids some of the awkwardness around a card with a Latin word in its name. This may disappoint people who are looking for linguistic purity or feel disappointed that a card they thought they could predict is weird, but I think it's cool.

Successes

  1. I'm really happy with Saskia's name. To translate "unyielding" I went with immitis, from in- "not" and mitis "mellow, mild." "Not mild" may seem a little weak when put into English, but this is a pretty badass title. Vergil gives it to Achilles at the start of his Aeneid when he is mentioned as the slayer of the protagonists, the exiled Trojans. The idea is really more like "cruel, unrelenting."
  2. Some cards sound great in Latin. Bloodstained Mire being the alliterative Caenum Cruentatum is excellent. Urbs Orichalca (City of Brass) is close to my heart as well.
  3. I made Tireless Tracker's name enormous: Investigatrix Indefatigabilis. A female follower-of-tracks who cannot be fatigued. What a mouthful for an iconic card.
  4. Dockside Extortionist's name has some wordplay to it. The Latin word moles (here molis) means basically a big pile of stuff, a mass, a heap. It has specialized meaning of being a dock, since they'd be built on natural rock formations, or ships and goods would pile up there, or maybe both. So his name both can mean where he is doing the extortion and suggests as well all the treasures he is amassing. What a happy coincidence.
  5. I was able to keep the alliteration of lifelink in Latin: vinculum vitae. Ooo, that sounds nice!

Problems

I'm pretty happy with my translation work here, minus a few typos. However, there are a couple things I'm shaky on, and maybe you, humble reader who may have a background in the Latin language, can help me:

  1. Searching. It is really common in Latin to look for something, and there's plenty of words that convey this. In Magic, with ramp spells and tutors especially, we must search a place for a specific card. At least in my experience, this does not often come up in the Latin language. I've opted for scrutor, -ari + accusative + dative of purpose ("to search thoroughly" + "a place" + "for something"). I am not sure if this is proper Latinitas, but at the moment it makes the most sense to me.

  2. Cycling. I have just used a noun (from Greek, same as ours) for it. To my knowledge, there is no Latin verb derived from cyclus _or the native Latin word _circus, and if it can be made, I'm not sure how I'd make it. It's also possible that the best way to convey this mechanic is something else, like abicere "to throw away, to sell cheaply." YMMV

Typos to fix:

New Additions

  • Sigarda's Vanguard: A surprise creature with amazing utility on offense and defense. This replaces Aurelia, the Warleader as a similar card that's much easier to cast.
  • Karlach, Fury of Avernus: She is replacing Silverblade Paladin as a super version of a similar effect, giving first strike and more combats.
  • Sower of Discord: Saskia's text by another name smells as sweet. This big boy is replacing Anafenza, the Foremost as a way to push through damage and close the game. Unlike damage-doubling enchantments, he comes with a sizable, evasive body.
  • Thunderfoot Baloth: Another way to push through damage. The Baloth is unfortunately commander-dependent but makes our board terrifying, especially in conjunction with Adeline, Resplendent Cathar and doubling/double strike effects.
  • Winota, Joiner of Forces: This deck is not optimized for Winota. The card is in theory ridiculous and can help us keep up momentum as the aggro deck by pulling out our dangerous humans.

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96% Casual

Competitive

Revision 2 See all

(3 years ago)

-1 Anafenza, the Foremost main
-1 Aurelia, the Warleader main
-1 God-Eternal Rhonas main
+1 Karlach, Fury of Avernus main
-1 Silverblade Paladin main
-1 Smothering Tithe main
+1 Sower of Discord main