The Greatest | Aristocrats Primer

Commander / EDH Aristocrats BGW (Abzan, Junk) Combo Multiplayer Primer

TheFanatic

Land (32)

• 1x Bloodstained Mire
• 1x Blooming Marsh
• 1x Bountiful Promenade
• 1x Brushland
• 1x Caves of Koilos
• 1x City of Brass
• 1x Command Tower
• 1x Exotic Orchard
• 1x Flooded Strand
• 1x Forbidden Orchard
• 3x Forest
• 1x Godless Shrine
• 1x Isolated Chapel
• 1x Llanowar Wastes
• 1x Mana Confluence
• 1x Marsh Flats
• 1x Overgrown Tomb
• 1x Phyrexian Tower
• 1x Plains
• 1x Polluted Delta
• 1x Razorverge Thicket
• 1x Reflecting Pool
• 1x Sunpetal Grove
• 1x Swamp
• 1x Temple Garden
• 1x Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
• 1x Verdant Catacombs
• 1x Windswept Heath
• 1x Wooded Foothills
• 1x Woodland Cemetery

Sac Outlet (4)

• 1x Altar of Dementia
• 1x Carrion Feeder
• 1x Cartel Aristocrat
• 1x Viscera Seer

Card Advantage (3)

• 1x Dark Confidant
• 1x Skullclamp
• 1x Sylvan Library

Hate Bear (3)

• 1x Aven Mindcensor
• 1x Deathrite Shaman
• 1x Scavenging Ooze

Tutor (17)

• 1x Altar of Bone
• 1x Birthing Pod
• 1x Buried Alive
• 1x Demonic Tutor
• 1x Diabolic Intent
• 1x Eladamri's Call
• 1x Eldritch Evolution
• 1x Enlightened Tutor
• 1x Entomb
• 1x Fauna Shaman
• 1x Green Sun's Zenith
• 1x Recruiter of the Guard
• 1x Survival of the Fittest
• 1x Sylvan Tutor
• 1x Vampiric Tutor
• 1x Worldly Tutor
• 1x Yisan, the Wanderer Bard

Ramp (12)

• 1x Arbor Elf
• 1x Avacyn's Pilgrim
• 1x Birds of Paradise
• 1x Bloom Tender
• 1x Boreal Druid
• 1x Deathrite Shaman
• 1x Elves of Deep Shadow
• 1x Elvish Mystic
• 1x Fyndhorn Elves
• 1x Llanowar Elves
• 1x Priest of Titania
• 1x Sol Ring

Removal (11)

• 1x Abrupt Decay
• 1x Assassin's Trophy
• 1x Caustic Caterpillar
• 1x Leonin Relic-Warder
• 1x Nature's Claim
• 1x Path to Exile
• 1x Plaguecrafter
• 1x Qasali Pridemage
• 1x Ravenous Chupacabra
• 1x Reclamation Sage
• 1x Swords to Plowshares

Commanders (2)

Recursion (11)

• 1x Animate Dead
• 1x Eternal Witness
• 1x Karmic Guide
• 1x Life / Death
• 1x Necromancy
• 1x Reanimate
• 1x Regrowth
• 1x Renegade Rallier
• 1x Reveillark
• 1x Saffi Eriksdotter
• 1x Unearth

Utility (4)

• 1x Bitterblossom
• 1x Felidar Guardian
• 1x Knight of Autumn
• 1x Noxious Revival

Win Condition (3)

• 1x Altar of Dementia
• 1x Blood Artist
• 1x Zulaport Cutthroat

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Maybeboard

Recursion (5)

• 1x Dance of the Dead
• 1x Rally the Ancestors
• 1x Return to the Ranks
• 1x Tortured Existence
• 1x Victimize

Other (1)

• 1x Cruel Celebrant

Ramp (1)

• 1x Chrome Mox

Removal (1)

• 1x Fiend Hunter

Sac Outlet (4)

• 1x Bloodthrone Vampire
• 1x Dross Hopper
• 1x Phyrexian Altar
• 1x Spawning Pit

Hate Bear (2)

• 1x Linvala, Keeper of Silence
• 1x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben

Tutor (1)

• 1x Chord of Calling

Card Advantage (3)

• 1x Grim Haruspex
• 1x Mindblade Render
• 1x Sensei's Divining Top

Fodder (2)

• 1x Bloodghast
• 1x Voice of Resurgence

Utility (1)

• 1x Liliana, Heretical Healer  ^Flip

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Why The Aristocrats?

The Aristocrats is a storied archetype in Magic history. The namesake deck was created by Sam Black for Pro Tour Gatecrash in 2013 and is named after Cartel Aristocrat and Falkenrath Aristocrat . If you want more info about the deck's history, you can find it here.

I started playing Magic right around the time The Aristocrats became a deck, and the core principle of sacrificing small creatures for overwhelming value fits perfectly with my play style. This is the most recent result of my efforts to make the archetype work in Commander/EDH. Some of my past efforts include:

• 2Powerful | Alesha Combo
• deck:the-aristokats
• Why So Shirei-ous?

Commander Choice

I chose Tymna the Weaver and Sidar Kondo of Jamuraa for their strong synergy with the deck. While they don't directly contribute to the gameplan of sacrificing creatures for value, Tymna turns our small creatures into a powerful draw engine so we never run out of gas and Sidar gives evasion so our creatures can get through board stalls.

The typical commander for this style of deck in Abzan is Ghave, Guru of Spores , but I wanted to keep the deck's mana curve as low as possible for the sake of efficiency and to enable a low land count. The draw power provided by Tymna and Sidar combined is also pretty nuts.

Win Conditions

To generate infinite death triggers in this deck, this deck aims to assemble one of the following two card combinations:

Two Recursion Creatures

These combos require a sacrifice outlet to be effective. Once you have one, you can generate an arbitrary number of triggers for "dies" or "leaves the battlefield" triggers.

• Renegade Rallier + Saffi Eriksdotter

• Reveillark + Saffi Eriksdotter

• Karmic Guide + Saffi Eriksdotter

• Karmic Guide + Reveillark

Leonin Relic-Warder + Reanimation Enchantment

This combo does not require a sacrifice outlet to generate infinite "dies" triggers, but it can still make use of one. You just need Leonin Relic-Warder in your grave and a reanimation enchantment such as Animate Dead in hand.

• Animate Dead + Leonin Relic-Warder

• Dance of the Dead + Leonin Relic-Warder

• Leonin Relic-Warder + Necromancy

If your sacrifice outlet is Altar of Dementia , you can mill out your opponents as long as they don't have an eldrazi titan-style shuffle effect. You can fight through this with a Scavenging Ooze or a Deathrite Shaman , though.

Blood Artist or Zulaport Cutthroat will also win the game if you have one of the above combos set up, since you can trigger their "whenever a creature dies" abilities an arbitrary number of times.

Notable Inclusions

• Aven Mindcensor : Though it doesn't directly contribute to the aristocrats game plan, Mindcensor prevents opponents from tutoring effectively and has evasion for Tymna.

• Buried Alive : This is almost a win condition unto itself, allowing us to stack our graveyard with one of the combos mentioned above.

• Eldritch Evolution : We can't use this to assemble a Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker combo or anything quite that powerful, but Karmic Guide or Reveillark is always a huge swing in our favor.

• Felidar Guardian : This is a fantastic 4-drop for use with our Birthing Pod lines. We can Pod a 3-drop in to Felidar Guardian , and use Guardian to flicker Pod. We can then Pod the Guardian for a Karmic Guide , getting back Felidar Guardian . Guardian flickers Pod again, allowing us to Pod for Reveillark . At this point, a sacrifice outlet will allow us to get infinite ETB and death triggers because we have assembled the Karmic Guide + Reveillark combo.

• Green Sun's Zenith : Can't tutor many of the creatures in our deck, but the key targets are Eternal Witness , Saffi Eriksdotter , and Renegade Rallier .

• Recruiter of the Guard : Tutors most of the creatures in the deck and is easy to recur. A solid line: Recruiter for Saffi Eriksdotter , cast Saffi, sac Saffi targeting Recruiter, sac Recruiter to anything, get Renegade Rallier with the next Recruiter trigger, cast Renegade Rallier bringing back Saffi. Combo assembled using 1 card and 8 mana (that's a lot, but not unachievable given the dorks in this deck).

• Renegade Rallier : Part of a combo with Saffi Eriksdotter , but can also recur most of the deck. Very powerful.

• Saffi Eriksdotter : Not just a combo piece. Can be used to grind out value with any of our ETB/LTB creatures.

• Scavenging Ooze : Doesn't directly contribute to our game plan, but it's a powerful hate bear.

Notable Exclusions

• Mox Diamond , Mana Crypt , Imperial Seal : I have at least one copy of each of these cards, but they are in my more competitive decks. If you want to add them in here, feel free. They would all be great.

• Protean Hulk : Yes, this deck would just be better as a Protean Hulk deck, but this is not a competitive deck. I pull it out when I want to play Aristocrats.

• Razaketh, the Foulblooded : I don't have a way to win immediately with this card without Lion's Eye Diamond in the list, and drawing it feels really bad.

If you appreciate the work I've put into the primer, +1 to help spread the love.

Date added	5 years
Last updated	3 years
Exclude colors	UR
Key combos	Renegade Rallier + Saffi Eriksdotter Karmic Guide + Reveillark Animate Dead + Leonin Relic-Warder Leonin Relic-Warder + Necromancy Dance of the Dead + Leonin Relic-Warder Reveillark + Saffi Eriksdotter Karmic Guide + Saffi Eriksdotter
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	6 - 0 Mythic Rares 53 - 0 Rares 22 - 0 Uncommons 14 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	2.01
Tokens	Faerie Rogue 1/1 B, Spirit 1/1 C
Folders	Current Commander Lists, Decks to build, Suggestions, Ideas