Improvements? Kaalia of the vast - multiplayer and 1v1
Commander Deck Help forum
Posted on Sept. 11, 2016, 8:11 p.m. by McKz
Hello, so im looking for any improvements or upgrades that can be made to my deck. price is no issue unless its like $200+ for a card The Queens general
Hey McKz, I took a look at your list and you're on the path to a really cool deck. But I have some general questions about how you want it to operate and a few of the cards that you might want to replace and or cut.
What is sort of the main strategy, or strategies, behind your kaalia deck? I can see you're trying to work in some multi attack synergies and a voltron package, which is sweet and super strong. Have you considered running Blade of Selves and a few of the equipment tutors like Steelshaper's Gift, Open the Armory, or Stoneforge Mystic? Blade of selves could be super strong with your theme, multiplying the damage from at least one creature by the number of opponents. Additionally, it allows for things like sacrificing multiple copies of Kokusho, the Evening Star or Yosei, the Morning Star for insane value. On the flipside, increasing the number of the equipment tutors will be able to help you more readily find your key equipment to protect kaalia or combo out with.
Additionally, if you're going the equipment combo route have you tried out Yosei, the Morning Star? Yosei in conjunction with a sacrifice outlet like Phyrexian Tower and a way to get it back to your hand like Sword of Light and Shadow or Phyrexian Reclamation can yield some disgusting results. Additionally it would combo with the a fore mentioned Blade of Selves as a way to lock out at least one opponent from the game.
Finally, taking a look over your deck there are some cards you might want to sub out. Darksteel Ingot, while strong in some builds, can often be problematic in kaalia because its 3 cmc interferes with your early ability to play out a sword or some other piece of protection. I'd opt in favor of cutting it, ideally for a mox or the other famous artifact with mana in its name, but if budget is a concern Talisman of Indulgence would work fine too.
On a similar vein I am not a fan of Mask of Avacyn or even so much Champion's Helm in kaalia. In my experience I found that while those artifacts are strong, because of their cmc and equip cost, they will actually slow you down more than if you just played out kaalia and waited a turn to swing. I'd recommend switching them out with either one of the cards talked about above or something like Grand Abolisher, which has the added benefit of protecting all of your other creatures too.
September 12, 2016 4 p.m.
Additionally here's a link to my kaalia deck Kaalia the Killer. It plays fundamentally different than the way you're looking to run yours, reanimate combo vs attack step combo, but you might get some ideas from there.
Also you might want to check out Spirits deck Kaalia, the Purifier EDH for a completely different take on aggressive combo kaalia.
September 12, 2016 4:08 p.m.
So Splashy, I have a couple of concerns with blade of selves and that is im running too mamy legendary creatures just for it to give me value off of one its likr if I was to stick in layline of the void and helm of obidiance sure its a win con but its not good with the majority of the deck, yosei ill add but im not to sure what to take out as I believe ive already removef what yourve said
September 12, 2016 6:50 p.m.
That's where the tutors come into play McKz :)
Tutors are effectively second copies of multiple cards in your deck, at the same time. It's not about what Blade of Selvescombos with, it's about what that tutor in your hand combos best with. If you have a creature in play that would better combo with some other equipment or some other enchantment then you want to go for that other choice. But if you have one that combos with the blade, then you go for that :)
1/3 of your kaalia targets are legendary and only 6 of those are nonbos with Blade of Selves. So effectively it can be used on more than 2/3 of your creature targets.
How you build the deck is up to you. There's no right way to build kaalia, contrary what some other folks out there might say. It's all about what works best for you. I just think that Kokusho, the Evening Star + Blade of Selves + Aggravated Assault is a disgusting alternative if you don't have Sword of Feast and Famine and Hellkite Charger in play :)
rockleemyhero says... #2
Summoning Splashy - this dude has hecka experience with every in and out of Kaalia
September 11, 2016 8:41 p.m.