Help me convert this out of date Brawl deck to Commander?
Commander Deck Help forum
Posted on Oct. 1, 2021, 9:40 p.m. by Vela
So I had this deck on Arena a while back and it was a ton of fun. Now that it's out of Brawl/Standard, I'd like to convert it to Commander and get it in paper. Only problem is, I'm not particularly knowledgeable on Commander, I just haven't been playing MTG long enough.
Here's the deck:
Kaya's Deathless Congregation
Brawl*
SCORE: 2 | 198 VIEWS
The point of the deck is to outlast the opponent. It's not meant to stall, rather it's meant to simply be capable of recovering from big swings and boardwipes more consistently. Kaya uses her Ghostform counters and her Emblem to quickly return as many dead creatures to the field as possible. Orah and Athreos help with this, too.
As a commander deck, I'd like to replace any card with one in the format that has a similar function but does it better or cheaper, while keeping the Angels/Clerics theme, and the lifelink/lifegain sustainability.
Please help me figure this out, cause commander is one of the most fun looking formats to me and I really wish I had a more complete understanding of the cards in the format to be able to know how to make proper decks.
Well I need Kaya's emblem to consistently return the important cards, Orah, Ashiok, Firja, Vito, Kaya herself, etc. And I need the ghostform tokens to keep from being defenseless after I use something like Doomskar or Ondu Inversion. I definitely want to keep Kaya as the Commander.
Liesa still seems useful though, and I do have to fill 40 more slots at least. It's definitely a good recommendation, just not as the Commander I think.
October 1, 2021 10:25 p.m. Edited.
You also have the option of using Athreos, God of Passage as your commander, because unfortunately Kaya is not a legal commander. The only planeswalker that are legal as commanders are the ones that specifically state they are on the card itself Commander works a little differently though, because there are traditionally more people at a table (4 people in a standard pod) lifegain doesnt mean quite the same thing as it does in brawl. Not saying it is bad, depending on the level youre playing at, doubling your starting life total can be really solid. Some options you could consider running alifegain list to win would be things like Approach of the Second Sun, Felidar Sovereign, and Aetherflux Reservoir. there are many other options as well, those are just the ones i would consider. Oloro, Ageless Ascetic is another very popular commander that deals with lifegain if that is the route you want to take. If you want to lean more heavily into the tribal side of things, especially with a focus in angels, I would consider Kaalia of the Vast. She is a really powerful commander. In the deck you tagged here, if you wanted to choose a commander from that list i would go with Firja, Judge of Valor. Selective card draw is really good in commander, and this one you should be able to trigger quite frequently. A phenomenal resource for any player new to the commander format is edhrec.com. This link should take you straight to the page for Firja, Judge of Valor as I threw it in the search bar before I tagged the link, that should give you an idea of what to expect from the site. I will be honest, Orzhov is generally outside my comfort zone, but you're welcome to tag me in anything you put together and I will happily take a look. Since you're building a 100 card singleton deck, I highly recommend having in the ballpark of:
10-12 Ramp of some kind Sol Ring, Arcane Signet, etc.
10ish Card Draw/Engines of some kind Mentor of the Meek, Mind's Eye, etc.
8-10 Pieces of Single target removal Swords to Plowshares, Path to Exile, etc.
3-5 Pieces of Board control Damnation, Wrath of God, Merciless Eviction, etc.
This will set your deck up to work consistently, and there are some card that will kind of fit multiple roles for you such as Magister of Worth and the like. I like to start by choosing my commander and working from there, but many people build the deck they want and then choose the best option from every viable commander they can. It is all personal preference. Let me know if anything I said doesnt make sense, or if you want me to clarify anything. Hope you decide to join us for the best format in the game.
October 1, 2021 10:29 p.m.
Oh damn, Kaya can't be commander? Why can she be a commander in Brawl but not EDH, then? I thought the only requirement was that the commander had to be a legendary creature.
Honestly if Kaya can't command, that ruins the whole deck. It's not Kaya's Deathless Congregation anymore, it's just some other Angel Cleric resurrection deck. That's not what I want. Using Kaya's emblem and ghostform counters to play through boardwipe after boardwipe is what the whole deck revolves around and was what made it fun.
October 1, 2021 10:36 p.m. Edited.
EDH uses the rules put forth by a separate entity known as the Rules Committee, they are not governed by WotC. WotC wants Planeswalkers at the helms of decks, but as of right now, the Rules Committee has decided to keep it Creatures only. Many play groups will let you "Rule 0" having a Planeswalker in the command zone, but unfortunately it is not technically legal for the generic rule set.
October 1, 2021 10:41 p.m.
Ah. Well I suppose I'll still try to build the deck for the kitchen table and play it with Rule 0 whenever I can until Rules Committee comes around to what the people want.
October 1, 2021 10:46 p.m.
Oh, don't hold your breath, this month alone they banned literally the most popular commander of all time in Golos, Tireless Pilgrim...not sure if they listen to the people or not...
October 1, 2021 10:50 p.m.
Grubbernaut says... #9
What's your budget, and what sort of ultimate power level are you looking for?
In b/w, you'll definitely want to rock all your mana rocks. Orzhov Signet, Arcane Signet, Fellwar Stone, Talisman of Hierarchy, and some number of colorless, depending on your build/preference, like Mind Stone, Everflowing Chalice, definitely Sol Ring, possibly Wayfarer's Bauble, etc.
I would strongly recommend getting a "backup" commander, in case the playgroup won't allow a walker - I personally loathe walkers as commanders, so it'd be a bad night to show up and be told they don't want to play. On that note, Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim is a great Cleric commander.
The things to focus your budget on, overall, will be card draw, ramp, and removal; most of the non-cEDH "engine" cards won't cost that much, but things like sweepers, good targeted removal, and good card draw definitely will. And, of course, the good tutors are very expensive. You can also make a reasonably-budget reanimator list that'll work well, which will let you abuse something like Vilis, Broker of Blood.
The best all-encompassing resource will be looking at existing lists on here, edhrec, or similar.
Cheers!
October 1, 2021 11:20 p.m.
I don't think I want to go too expensive, especially considering the chance people just won't let me play it, and I could revise it again if/when a Rule 0 day pops up at my LGS or the commander rule allows walkers. Maybe $200 or so, the current list is roughly $60-80. And yeah, I definitely should add the stones and engines, I think I knew about them but until you mentioned it it hadn't crossed my mind.
October 1, 2021 11:47 p.m. Edited.
(Unrelated: At some point I really wanna make a meme deck that's just 50 Relentless Rats and Marrow-Gnawer plus lands. But that's a topic for another day.)
October 1, 2021 11:56 p.m. Edited.
You say that, Rat tribal can actually be oddly terrifying if sone correctly. I have played against that deck and I assure you it was not a meme. Pack Rat and some other goodies make that deck surprisingly good
October 2, 2021 12:03 a.m.
Oh yeah, Rat Tribal itself isn't a meme, but 50 Relentless Rats and nothing else definitely would be.
October 2, 2021 12:06 a.m.
But yeah, it's pretty late for me now, so I'm gonna play some video games until I get tired. Tomorrow I'll put together a prototype list for Kaya and when I think I have it sorted I'll let you know so you can roast me for it.
October 2, 2021 12:08 a.m.
I can see why you would like having exile and recursion on a stick in the command zone but you will be fine putting kaya in deck and run Ravos, Soultender you don't have to partner
but there is some good partners like Tymna the Weaver for card draw
and Sengir, the Dark Baron so that when you combo one player out it can cause a chain reaction removing the rest of your opponents
October 2, 2021 7:35 a.m.
You could check out the Oathbreaker format, not particularly popular but maybe your playgroup would make those instead of commander decks. Plays similar to Brawl, plus you get to pick an instant or sorcery spell to put in the command zone with your Planeswalker as commander
October 3, 2021 10:42 p.m.
Well, I did absolutely nothing for about 8 months and then over the last couple days I finally put together a list for this. It's probably not as good as it could be, but that's mainly down to my lack of card knowledge, and trying to keep it budget and angel/cleric themed.
Kaya's Deathless Congregation - Commander
Commander / EDH
25 VIEWS
NinjaBunny01 says... #2
May I suggest using Liesa, Forgotten Archangel as your commander. It seems to fit the idea of resiliency your going for (at least creature based)
October 1, 2021 9:51 p.m. Edited.