Commander Deck Tech: Ashcoat of the Shadow Swarm
This week I skimmed across the Jumpstart 2022 legendary Creatures and found an interesting Legend in Ashcoat of the Shadow Swarm. It's a Rat that costs 3B for a 3/4 that when it attacks or blocks, other Rats get +X/+X for each Rat you control. So in a sense it's got a built in Coat of Arms when attacking or blocking for your Rat tribe. It also has a really cool ability that says during your end step you can mill four cards, if you do, return up to two Rat Creature cards from your graveyard to your hand. Note that the Rats returned to your hand do not have to be the cards milled, but could have already been in your graveyard.
With two fantastic abilities I decided it was time to build another Rat tribal deck with this amazing Commander. Rats can be very annoying and most aren't too expensive, so if you're under a budget this deck is for you! I will note that until this deck is playtested a bit I'd consider this more of a casual Commander deck.
Starting off with mana acceleration we have: Dark Ritual, Jet Medallion, Charcoal Diamond, Arcane Signet, and Sol Ring. We also have some more situational acceleration in Herald's Horn and Bontu's Monument.
We also need to get some extra card drawing since we will be discarding cards to our Rats, as well as needing plenty of gas to not fizzle out. Our card advantage cards are: Phyrexian Arena, Vanquisher's Banner, Skullclamp, Pact of the Serpent, Species Specialist, Gix, Yawgmoth Praetor, and Nashi, Moon Sage's Scion. Some of these are condition dependent but for the most part I see great chances of gaining some card advantage from them.
The other really annoying thing that Rats do is pester the hell out of your opponents. The most traditional or old school Rat that was known for doing this was Ravenous Rats. We play these little 1/1 Rats and make your opponent(s) discard cards. We get to get the Rats back with our Commander and a few other cards that are in the deck. Eventually we run your opponent out of cards and they are just top decking the rest of the game. With our card advantage spells we can gain the upper hand while stacking cards in our hand and your opponent(s) eventually get left with nothing. The other Rats that will help annoy your opponents with discarding are: Burglar Rat, Nezumi Bone-Reader, Nezumi Shortfang, Rotting Rats, Locust Miser, and Okiba-Gang Shinobi.
No Black deck or Commander deck is complete without some sort of spot removal; this deck runs seven spot removal spells total. The spells consist of Deadly Rollick, Baleful Mastery, Hero's Downfall, Infernal Grasp, Go for the Throat, Defile, and Feed the Swarm.
We also run four board wipe spells which aren't necessarily that bad for our Rats when we want to be replaying them or recasting them for card disadvantage for the opponents. Not only do the board wipes get us back in the game if we are behind, but they get us ahead from the card advantage it creates. The board wipes consist of: Damnation, The Meathook Massacre, Kindred Dominance, and Patriarch's Bidding.
At first I was running a Badmoon within the deck but it got cut due to too many cards within the list. It could also give advantages to the opponent's Creatures as it's all Black Creatures and not just yours. The deck does run four anthem type effects for our Rats in: Vanquisher's Banner, Coat of Arms, Haunted One, and Metallic Mimic. There are definitely a few other anthem type Creatures and Enchantments you can play but I don't feel that more than four is necessary.
The simplest part of the deck and probable one of the most affordable is the mana base. We are running 31 swamps, Cabal Coffers, Swarmyard, and Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx. I did several test hands to see what the hands looked like and overall most hands with two to three mana looked like great keepers. You can also take the deck to the next step if you want too. You could add more expensive cards like Mana Crypt and Jeweled Lotus among others to push the mana acceleration even further.
Overall this tribe looks like a blast to play and as time progresses each tribe will most definitely get stronger. We are getting some amazing reprints for Commander in Dominaria Remastered. I know it's hard with wallet fatigue from the massive influx of sets being released but definitely don't sleep on this set. I hope you are able to get some great additions for your Commander decks.
Hopefully this Ashcoat of the Shadow Swarm deck gives you some new ideas for your own Rat tribal deck!
Until Next Time,
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