This is a really cool deck and one that I might make in paper because it looks like a fun deck to play. Do you have any recommendations for a more budget-friendly version? I'm fine with spending money on the cards that are crucial but some of the cards are just out of my price range (mostly the mana rocks, lands, and Chains of Mephistopheles ).

Sorry for double post forgot tutors in list of expensive cards.

@FeeshSquad, Well, that's sort of rough. Basically the stuff that makes this deck competitive is the expensive rocks (otherwise you have bad ramp) and the expensive tutors (otherwise the deck isn't consistent), but you don't really need Chains, that's just a decent interactive piece. If you really want to you can run worse rocks ( Mind Stone , Charcoal Diamond , Worn Powerstone , Thran Dynamo , Gilded Lotus , etc), and actually worse tutors too (like Diabolic Tutor , Final Parting , Increasing Ambition ). It'll probably be ok as a bigger mana deck, if you use a lot of rocks that tap for 2+ mana. ALthough, if you are going to spend money on cards that are really strong in EDH, Mana Crypt is probably the strongest card you can buy.

I suggest substituting Stranglehold for chains of meph. It's very strong and only slightly worse since it costs 4 instead of 2.

@mmcgeach First of all I must congratulate you for making such an amazing and fun looking competitive viable deck.

However, I really feel like there are a lot of dead draws in the deck and, at the same time, Rakdos' limited array of interactive options can really hurt you when facing fast combo decks.

I think that a more stall-ish approach would be more suited, since Xantcha on her own can beat resourceless opponents.

Take it with a grain of salt as I'm not that proficient of a player, yet I'd like to hear your thoughts on the matter. Once again, thank you for the amazing deck

@maff98, Well, first of all, thank you for the complements. Xantcha has inherent synergy with a storm plan since all the rituals cycle and spinning your wheels to make a lot of mana is a lot better when you can just use that mana to draw cards and kill people simultaneously. So the deck is based on mana + cards + Xantcha. Storm isn't compatible with a stax plan, so that's why I didn't go that route. The deck isn't as bad as it looks. It does a lot of things and has a lot of powerful cards. Try it!

If you're looking for stax tho, and want to beat your opponents down even while you stop them from doing anything, check out my other deck, The Great Radhaggro!

@mmcgeach Thank you for the fast reply!

I can definitely see that Paradox and stall can't coexist, so that makes sense.

It's just that I struggle to see what are the upsides that this deck brings to the table when compared to the likes of a fellow Rakdos commander, Doomsday Grenzo (Clay Puppington's list).

Does Xantcha have any edges over Grenzo's compact and well defined gameplan?

Thank you in advance

Woops, I meant stax not stall

@maff98 Yes, in my opinion Xantcha has every edge over a fragile linear combo deck like grenzo doomsday. First, you're not dependent on resolving doomsday. Next, you have more than one path to victory. Then, you also have significant interaction for what your opponents are doing. Fourth, you don't become less favored as the game goes on, you actually become more favored. Finally, don't you get bored of the same combo every game?

Xantcha is definitely not for people that like linear, predictable games. There's a lot of different strategies that offer a huge variety of game plans: storm, combo, stax, combat, attrition, general damage, and politics. It's unique. And what's really amazing is the deck can shift between these modes pretty easily over the course of a game.

@mmcgeach I'm not trying to be rude or anything, but your answer was vague at best.

Grenzo doesn't rely on Doomsday, rather it has the luxury of running it as a means to win faster. You can still assemble your combo manually just like you are doing and the deck has 3 different win conditions, making it just as resilient, since the combos are two card ones.

Sure, Aven Mincensor can pretty much just ruin your match if used while you're casting Doomsday, but the same can occur if someone kills WGD while you're comboing off.

When it comes to stax I don't really see it here. You do have board wipes, which have a purpose as a means of killing opposing mana dorks and neutralizing potential Xantcha blockers, but what are your options beyond that? Sire is not cheap, so assuming that it is online every single time would be foolish assumption. (There's also spot removal, but Grenzo also runs that)

Chains, EE and Leyline of the Void are honestly the only reliable stax effects that you have on your deck.

In my opinion this deck is better than Grenzo in prolonged matches, but that's the only edge that it has.

If you have a different opinion, I'd like to understand why, other than the uniqueness that Xantcha offers.

(I'm not here to criticize your deck, I'm simply trying to assess what deck to purchase, so I apologize if I came off rude, that definitely wasn't my intent)

Hey there! I’ve been playing a slightly more budget version of the deck and having a lot of fun; it’s a sweet build!

I was curious what your thought process is behind abrade. It’s pretty much the only single target removal spell in the deck, and I’m wondering how good it is compared with all the pyroclasm and mass shatter effects available? Has it proven it’s worth in your opinion?

@maff98 Ok. Well, Grenzo is a linear fast combo deck, but it's not blue or green, so that means it has consistency problems and can't interact well with other decks, and also can't defend its own combo well against interaction from other decks. Linear fast combo decks typically include a lot of dead combo cards that you actively don't want to draw. This makes them less consistent and less reliable than decks that don't. Xantcha doesn't have these problems to the same extent since it's not all in on one plan. There's a lot of different ways to get to a win, and while it's still Red-Black, so Xantcha can't really defend her own combos any better than Grenzo, Xantcha has backup plans that are extremely good. The kiki-jiki combo is one of my least favorite and easily disrupted; by basically any counterspell or removal, or any creature hate that prevents attacks or activations. While the WGD combo in Xantcha is also fragile, it's way faster, and can win the game at instant speed, which enables you to more easily play around your opponents' interaction.

Anyway, Xantcha should be a superior choice to Grenzo Doomsday in any pod where there's decks with interaction. (And to be clear, most top-tier decks have a lot of interaction.) I think you'd only want to play Grenzo over Xantcha into a pod of other non-interactive combo decks, where basically the only way each deck has to win is to go off before anyone else. And even then, if it's a pod of green-based combo decks Xantcha's many pyroclasms make that a decently favorable matchup. Anyway, I don't think pods of all uninteractive combo decks are that common; and I also don't think they're that interesting to actually play in; but if you're in a tournament or whatever you can't really choose your opponents.

Oh, when I say "Xantcha can do Stax," I just mean reanimating Sire Of Insanity which is a pretty powerful stax/prison-style play. If you can do it turn 1 or 2, you basically always want to make that play; it's extremely strong against almost all decks.

But, the decks are very different playstyles. As I've said, I'm not a fan of the uninteractive linear combo decks (I get bored of them), but if it's what you like, that's ok!

mmcgeach I actually overlooked the existence of reanimating spells that allow you to cheat into play your big bombs quite earlier.

Also, the fact that you can win at instant speed is very notable.

Thank you for the enlightening reply!

@thebeetle2000: Yeah, I like Abrade . It's super versatile. There's a lot of artifact that you want to kill and also some creatures. Particularly there's a lot of stax artifacts you want to get rid of, and also some stax bears, too. And sometimes you can snipe someone's combo piece.

mmcgeach Have you considered constructing an "official" budget version? It seems like most of the "core" of the list is relatively cheap, and switching out for a couple of cheaper tutors and wipes and basically all the mana rocks could build a "cedh" list in around $300? I'm going to try to throw something together, but I was curious if you had one.

@whatthehellhaveidone OK! Preliminary budget version at : Budget Competitive Xantcha.

Also updated the main description with a budget section.

@whatthehellhaveidone OK! Preliminary budget version at : Budget Competitive Xantcha.

Also updated the main description with a budget section.

fyi "Grier Reach Sanitarium" is misspelled should be "Geier Reach Sanitarium"

mmcgeach sorry to bother you again, but you said that in your playgroup there is a Gitrog player and, because of its size, I'd assume that it would be hard to deal with it without comboing off.

With that said, would you consider any of the following spot removal cards? Dark Betrayal | Hero's Demise | Terminate

I'd also like to hear your thoughts on Smelt .

Thank you in advance!

@newrise : Re: "Grier Reach Sanitarium" - I think it's actually more nuanced than that and different versions of the card actually spell the name differently. But, I think you're right I need to change it. Thanks!

@maff98 : Re: Gitrog. Well, that's why cards like Damnation , Toxic Deluge , and Fire Covenant are good. And sometimes you get them with a turn-1 EE for 1. Typically I like to give Xantcha to the Gitrog player, in the hope that they decide to attack one person for 11. So in that sense, you don't strictly have to stop Gitrog to get on the with the Plan of Xantcha. But, actually killing Gitrog is typically one of the best ways to slow down that deck (apart from Leyline of the Void ), so if it is a major presence in your meta then adding a terminate or something seems ok. Although, I don't like it a whole lot cause they usually get to ramp enough that replaying Gitrog isn't hard. A whole-board wipe is usually a lot more effective. Also Blood Moon is extremely effective against Gitrog. But, yeah, that deck is very good and there's like 5 or 6 cards we have that are effective, so you have to tutor for one of them early.

Smelt seems weak. I think i'd prefer Rakdos Charm ? I'm not sure.

Been playing this deck for 2 weeks not and I've really been enjoying it. It is slower than I would like, but is so much fun to play. If you set down at a casual table other players will feel like they have a chance against it unlike many other cEDH decks. In a cEDH pod, only got to play 2 real cEDH pods so far, it is slow on the scale of hackball, but can def pull out the win by slowing the others down. Surly tho with the right hand you could do it earlier.

@newrise: Oh man, yes, this deck is slow! I sort of love it, too. Had a couple games last week where the pyroclasms and board wipes were very good, slowed everything down but had a hard time navigating opposing stax elements. Took about 90 minutes to get to a win. :) Anyway, glad you like it!

@mmcgeach My best win so far was a fast paced game where a guy was killing everyone with draw damage which was helping me find answers, but really hurt. I helped him kill everyone including me with wheel effects and my commander, but I got Sire Of Insanity out early so everyone was top decking answers. Everyone was dead and it was just him and I. He was at 6 and I was at 6. On my turn I had to draw and take 2 damage per draw and he had me drawing an extra card on upkeep. I top decked a Demonic Tutor and slowly went through my deck to find and answer. I found Fiery Confluence and killed em with it, but without that top deck it was over.

I'll say it again this deck can grind with the best of em and puts out interesting "stax" to slow the game down. I love it.