How To Build A Retro Commander Deck

There is no one right way to build a commander deck, let alone an all retro commander deck, and I think the art from Recycle from Tempest by Phil Foglio captures that.  What one may find to be great, another may hate.  With that said, I would love to take some time to discuss how I go about brewing a commander deck using some of the best retro cards in commander.

Step 1: Choose your commander

According to Scryfall, there are currently 297 legendary creature cards that are in retro frames at the time of writing this. (Opposed to the 2,278 total legendary creatures that exist in Magic). This is one reason I enjoy the self imposed restriction of using retro cards!  It's so much less to keep up with.  I will usually search through these pages until I find something that suits my needs or sounds interesting.  

For help with scryfall, Go to Scryfall.com > Advance Search and enter these search criteria in their respective categories.  If you have certain colors in mind, you can go ahead and plug those in too and hit "Search with these options"

For the sake of this exercise, we are going to select Alesha, Who Smiles at Death.

Step 2: Deck Building Website

While it is certainly possible to build a deck without utilzing a deck building website, I find them extremely helpful.  The benefits are that they will typically count your color pips for each color and put them into a pie graph so you can line up your lands accordingly as well as calculate your mana curve.  Both of these tools will help to smooth out your deck to keep it performing the way you want it.  I've tried tappedout and archidekt and have heard great things about moxfield.  I find I like archidekt the most just because I enjoy the format of it.  Take a look at all three and see what suits your needs the best.  

Step 3: What Will I Be Doing?

Once I've gone to Archidekt and load in my commander, I sit and ask myself a series of questions..

What do I want to do with this deck?

Do I have any other decks like this?

How competitive do I want this deck to be / what group will I be playing this deck with?

What will my budget be?

What will this deck's weakness be?

How will I win?

For this deck, I'm going to want to reanimate creatures with power 2 or less by using Alesha's ability.  In order to do this successfully, I will have to get cards into the graveyard to be reanimated.  This is not a competitive commander, so this will be a casual deck.  I don't have a budget because of the way I collect my cards. (I have single copies of everything that I keep in a binder and pull out to put in a deck I will use for a while before taking back apart to build something new.) I could see this deck having issues with card draw, protecting the commander, and getting in safely for damage.  Non artifact ramp will also not be an option.  For winning, I think I will be able to out-value my opponents by being able to leverage my graveyard and potentially theirs.  I also know that Kiki-Jiki fits nicely with Alesha due to having a power of 2.  Perhaps I can combo for a win? 

Step 4: Add My Essentials

This is a 3-color commander.  If you're newer to the format, you can tell this by having three different color mana pips on the card.  The ones in the rules text are called hybrid mana symbols.  For the sake of color identity, you count both colors.  We can only select cards from these three colors. White-Black-Red.  I first go in and add placeholders into my deck building website for lands.

In general, I find 36-38 lands to be an appropriate amount of lands depending on curve or how mana hungry a commander is.  I will typically start out with 36 and see if I can get away with that number first, plus the math is always easy.  We will cover mana curve a little later!  I add in 12 plains, 12 swamps, and 12 mountains.

Next up is your mana rocks.  The first two are obvious, Sol Ring & Arcane Signet.  These two will even be ran in decks containing green.  Next, I add all of the signets and talismans.  That will take us to 8 rocks.  Alesha can be a little mana intensive since her ability that we are building the deck around will require 2 mana in any combination of (white white, white black, black black).  Because of this, I want to add a little more mana rocks.  My next go-to will be Fellwar Stone and Mind Stone or Thought Vessel.  I'm just going to stick with Fellwar Stone for now with the other two in mind, their inability to tap colored mana make them less desirable to me. For an article I did on mana rocks, you can click here.

After I have a placeholder in for lands, and my mana ramp in place, I will usually start to look at removal options.  When I first start this, I think "What is the worst thing someone could do to my deck?".  I tend to build some pretty commander centric decks, so I automatically go with "It would be really unfortunate if someone were to play a Darksteel Mutation or similar effect on my commander.".  So, I know I will want to add in enchantment removal.  Next up would be destroying blockers since I have to attack with my commander.  With that in mind, I will usually look to see what the colors I'm playing do best.  Removal is not the time to get cute and play strange cards.  I usually opt for between 5-10 cards with targeted removal and 2-3 board wipes.  My number of board wipes has increased as more cards have been printed with ward.  In these colors, the auto includes are Path to Exile and Swords to Plowshares for targeted removal.  I like Vandalblast and Damn as single target removal with upside.  I find a lot of value in being able to destroy every permanent type so I love Chaos Warp and Generous gift.  These will allow me to get rid of pesky enchantments or troublesome lands.  (If you're worried about what your opponent may flip with Chaos Warp or the 3/3 Elephant From Generous Gift, you're playing them wrong.  Hold up your removal until you absolutely need it.). Bedevil is another versatile removal spell.  In general, I like my removal spells to be as cheap as possible and will never pay more than 3 mana at Instant speed for a single target.  If they cost 3, they need to remove at least 3 permanent types.  The next thing I do is look to see if any creatures or other cards that fit uniquely into my strategy offer removal options.  In this case, there are several. 

Now that we have our single target removal spells, we can move onto our board wipes. I'm going to go ahead and count Damn & Vandalblast as a board wipe as well as a single target removal spell, see what I did there!   After those two, I want to add one more creature board wipe.  In these colors we have several options and they're all great.  Austere Command, Living Death, Blasphemous Act, or Toxic Deluge.  I'm going to pick Toxic Deluge because of the low mana value and the ability to get rid of indestructible creatures.  Any of those three would have been a great choice though.  

It's crazy how many card slots we have already filled.  Next, we need help getting to all of these important card types.  Card draw is what will get us there.  I'm going to be honest, drawing cards is not as easy when you limit yourself to retro cards.  It's gotten a lot better but it is nowhere near what you can do when you don't have this restriction.  To help out, I'm going to head back to scryfall.  We will follow the same "old" criteria as before, but instead of "legendary" and "creature", we will do this.

That search will pull up 233 cards to choose from.  Now, not all of them will be anything like what we want but it's a great start.  In addition to this resource, we can go to EDHREC and search by using the following and selecting Alesha.  EDHREC will have a number of filters you can select from, the easiest being Price: Low or High.  As you play around on that website though, you will find plenty more. In addition to card draw per se, I also include card selection spells, tutors, and cards that put cards into the grave (in this situation).  Basically, things that help us see more cards to play with!  I'm going to attach below several different varieties of ways to accomplish this that I will put into this deck.  

You'll notice all of these cards have a low casting cost, 3 are creatures that have a power of 2 or less, and three of them put cards into the graveyard to synergize with Alesha.  Ragavan & Deadly Dispute also have the benefit of providing us with treasure tokens to ramp us.  The more you start to look at cards, the more you see you can get cards that accomplish things from several of our categories. For a list of cards that put things directly into the graveyard, you can check out the post I made about black cards by clicking here.

Now what about opponents removal?  You've got to protect your game because they're trying to stop it.  I usually pack 2-3 protection spells (sometimes a lot more depending on how much I commit to the board).  In this case, 2-3 should suffice since most things, I can get back fairly easy.  In the case of Alesha, we also need to protect her in combat. Here are some good examples we could use. 

Maze of Ith and Reconnaissance requires an intimate knowledge of the rules of combat in commander.  During the Combat Phase, there are five steps.  In between each of these steps, priority will pass around the table.

1. Beginning of Combat - Any triggers or abilities that happen at the beginning of combat occur.
2. Declare Attackers - You declare all attacks on all opponents at once.
3. Declare Blockers - All blocks are declared at once from all opponents.
4. Combat Damage - All damage happens at the same time (exception for first strike, at which point first strike damage would occur first then all subsequent damage occurs)
5. End of Combat - Abilities that trigger at end of combat occur.  

Special note: A creature is considered attacking throughout the whole combat phase after Step 2: Declare Attackers.  So, with Maze of Ith or Reconnaissance, you can pull creatures out of combat after the combat damage has occurred.  These both may be used at any other step during combat to remove an attacker as well.

Also, remember MAZE OF ITH DOES NOT COUNT TOWARDS YOUR LAND SLOTS, IT'S A SPELL.

Step 5: Add Your Win Condition

Before filling out the rest of the deck, I first add in my wincon.  That way, I will know I have accounted for all of the important facets that make the deck do what I wanted it to do.  This deck is going to try and win with an infinite combo. Kiki-Jiki + (Zealous Conscripts or Restoration Angel).

Step 6: Add Synergy Pieces

In this deck, synergy pieces are any creature that can return to the battlefield from an Alesha activation, put things into the graveyard, reanimate things from the graveyard, or sacrifice outlets.  I have also included a slight aristocrat theme to get value from when things die.

To help you find creatures that will synergize well with Alesha, we can go back to scryfall.  

Here are some examples of cards that help our strategy work.  There are plenty more options that you can choose.

Step 7: Correcting Mana Base

When figuring out your mana base, take a look at this part of your deck building website.  These are great tools and the whole reason I like to use a deck building website!

As far as curve goes, you will notice a nice curve in our graph!  You do not want to be too heavy on low or high drops.  Too many low drops and you will not be able to hang in the late game as your cards will be under powered.  Too many high drops and you will not be able to play in the early game.  You will get stuck with cards in your hand as you wait to hit those land drops.  I like to have a curve very similar to what we wound up with here.  One thing to note, in archidekt you can change the mana value of cards in your deck.  Examples where this may matter would be Blasphemous Act.  You never actually play it for nine mana and it usually only costs one.  Go ahead and change that to only costing one.  But, it goes the opposite way as well... if you find yourself apprehensive to cast a Vandalblast on a single artifact and would rather wait to overload it for five mana to destroy all of your opponents artifacts, you should change that to five and so on.  You want the most accurate representation of what you will be doing when you are building your deck.   You will notice the chart also says (Avg mana value: 2.56).. I try and keep my average mana value between 2.5-3.5.  The more competitive your pod or the deck you want to play, err on the side of a lower average.  If you are in a super casual pod, you may want to go higher.  

Mana bases usually account for a large portion of the price of my deck.  Because of the way I play where I only have one deck at a time, I buy singles of everything.  It is easy for me to assemble any deck and play it for a while before disassembling it and moving on.  If you are someone who loves to Tinker, I highly suggest starting this early in your magic career.  It will save you tons of money in the end while allowing you to play with some fantastic cards.

I have made three posts so far about your mana base and will attach them for reference.

• This article discusses making a basic mana base that focuses on hitting your color pips.
• In this article, we discuss utility lands.
• Last but not least, building a mana base on a budget.

Step 8: Cut Down To 100 Cards

This is my least favorite and hardest part of building a deck for me!  You've just spent all of this time exploring EDHREC & Scryfall and finding new treasures you're excited to try out.. only problem is there are 50 to many cards!  This is how I make my cuts.

1. Pull out tutors 
2. Chop out your highest mana values
3. Remove cards that are "win more"
4. Is this card fun to play against? Cut it!
5. How situational is this card? Give it the axe

It's imperative that you have discipline when you're doing this phase of deck building.  This is why I like to do all of my essentials first when building to be a reminder of how important I get these key components in the deck.  That means they need to stay.  I always do my pulls from the cards I add in Step 6. Do not cut mana unless you have played the deck at least 10-15 times, if anything I find myself cutting cards to add lands.  Also, if you have a card that is a pet card and it makes you happy, please do not pull that card.  Commander is a format where you get to express yourself with the cards you curate for your decks.  It's such an awesome feeling when someone asks to read the card you played because they don't know what it does and then takes a picture of it or googles it to remind themselves later.  

Step 8 literally never ends.  Once you get it down to 100 cards, you can goldfish the deck (shuffle and play against an invisible opponent) to see how it works.  Do you find yourself having not enough mana to play the things you want?  How's your card draw?  What turn do you get to do "the thing"?  Commander games typically end around turns 7-10, are you happy with what you could do by then?  Many deck building websites have it so you can goldfish your deck straight from the website! It may take some getting used to but it's definitely worth it.  

Things I Didn't Do

There is nothing wrong with these cards, but I think for the group I would play this deck with they may be a hint too strong.  Here are the reasons for not playing them.

• Silence is a great card, especially for the turn you are going for the win.  I would hold it up until that moment.  
• Grave Pact feels REALLY bad to play against.  I like to take opponents time into consideration when playing.  I only get to play for a few hours each month, and sometimes twice a month.  
• Retribution of the Meek honestly should have gone in instead of Toxic Deluge.  It would be more of a one sided board wipe which I'm always in favor of to break parity.  
• Living Death is a great card and would go perfectly in this deck.  The only downfall to it is that it's not an easy card to explain what is happening.  I think every time I play it, doesn't matter if it is at a LGS, convention, or friend's house I have to explain it.  

The Thing I Did Do...

Just because I didn't choose to play the cards I mentioned above doesn't mean I'm a saint.  This two card combo is so fun when it works.  To be honest, this is the reason I chose to build an Alesha deck.  The way it works is you attack with Alesha, with your ability on the stack, you play Entomb and put Master of Cruelties into the graveyard.  Activate Alesha's ability, Master of Cruelties will enter the battlefield tapped and attacking.  Because it came in after attacks were declared, Alesha is allowed to attack with it still.  If Master of Cruelties is not blocked, the ability will go off making an opponents life total become 1.  After this, Alesha will deal her first strike damage, killing your opponent.