Commander Deck Tech: Raphael, Fiendish Savior
There are plenty of brewing choices still left from Commander Legends: Battle for Baldur's Gate. This week I continue on with another dual color Commander in Raphael, Fiendish Savior. I haven't had a full on Demon or Devil deck before and this pretty much combines both. We also get a few other Creature subtypes with bonuses in Imps and Tieflings.
Raphael is a 3BR Devil Noble that gives all your other Demons, Devils, Imps, and Tieflings +1/+1 and lifelink. At the beginning of each end step, if a Creature card was put into your graveyard from anywhere this turn, create a 1/1 red Devil Creature token with “When this Creature dies, it deals 1 damage to any target.”
This build mainly focuses on being a tribal like Devil and Demon deck. Our Commander Raphael gives us the ability to make free Devils usually on your turn, but sometimes also on your opponents turns as well. The 1/1 Devils aren't fantastic, but if Raphael is in play then they're 2/2s with lifelink that deal 1 damage when they die, so they end up being a lot better than one might think. We'll add in support to maximize that 1 damage, and also the ability to sacrifice Creatures to do certain things within the build.
Our sacrifice outlets consist of: Phyrexian Tower, Westvale Abbey, Skullclamp, Goblin Bombardment, Deadly Dispute, Dread Return, Razaketh, the Foulblooded, and Hidetsugu, Devouring Chaos. At first I had 2-3 more sacrifice outlets for the deck, but ended up cutting them to help add room for more lands. This deck does run quite a bit of higher casting cost Demon Creatures so we have to stay on top of the mana base.
To help out in that light we also have ways to cheat in a high casting cost Demon into play with things like: Faithless Looting plus Shadowgrange Archfiend, Faithless Looting plus Reanimate + any Creature, and Faithless Looting plus Dread Return + any Creature. I feel like Faithless Looting is one of the best cards to have in your opening hand with this build.
We needed to add bonuses to when your Creatures and Devils die and most of that support comes from within the tribe, but some do not. Here is a list of cards within the final build that add to death triggers or enter the battlefield triggers: The Meathook Massacre, Dictate of Erebos, Black Market, Witty Roastmaster, Spiteful Prankster, Mayhem Devil, Kardur, Doomscourge, Harvester of Souls, and Fiendish Duo. At one point I also had Zulaport Cutthroat within the build, but it got cut from not matching tribal requirements. However, I feel that it might be added back in at a later date after some playtesting. The thing that makes you want it is the life gain, but we have lifegain from Raphael and The Meathook Massacre. If you can't decide, do a coin flip!
One area that may end up lacking is the mana acceleration area. I only ended up running a few accelerator lands in Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx, Phyrexian Tower, and Temple of the False God. There is also the support of: Jet Medallion, Sol Ring, and Arcane Signet. You could always find room for an Ancient Tomb, and other 2cc and 3cc artifact rocks. I was more focused on wanting to keep a lot of my high end Creature Demon's while still being somewhat efficient.
One fantastic card within this build is Liliana's Contract, which not only lets you draw 4 cards for 4 life, but can potentially win you the game on your upkeep. We also added a few Planeswalkers to help add tribal flavor and the ability to make more Devils. We are running: Zariel Archduke of Avernus, Ob Nixilis the Adversary, and Valki, God of Lies // Tibalt, Cosmic Imposter. I really like Valki as a multi use card which can be used to hit a card from each opponent's hand, or a late game powerful Planeswalker.
Removal must be within the deck so we have several cards that destroy Artifacts, spot removal, and mass removal. For Artifact destruction we have: Rakdos Charm, Vandalblast, and Torch Fiend. For spot removal we have: Terminate, Infernal Grasp, Hurl through Hell, Bedevil, Feed the Swarm, and Dreadbore. Last but not least we have board wipes which consists of: The Meathook Massacre, Blasphemous Act, Burn Down the House, and Damnation. With all the spot removal and varying types of removal this deck should be very versatile. I think it will end up performing better in 4 player games vs 2 player games, and also will be better vs Creature or aggro decks.
I saved the best for last, which is all the spicy Tribal Creatures which I think will have the biggest impact on making your opponents salty. These are my top Creature picks for a Raphael Commander build: Rakdos, the Showstopper, Wildfire Devils, Zurzoth Chaos Rider, Lorcan, Warlock Collector, Master of Cruelties, Fiendish Duo, Orcus Prince of Undeath, Rakshasa Debaser, and Karlach Fury of Avernus.
There are plenty of other fantastic Creatures for a Raphael build, there are plenty of others within the deck, and even some I cut just do to mana base and mana curve restrictions. Another great one for this build that I cut out is Demonlord Belzenlok. The only reason why I ended up cutting the card was due to having too many 6 cmc drops in the deck. Also you run into the slim chance he triggers too many times and ends up killing you from doing too much damage from multiple triggers.
Hopefully this gives you some great ideas for building your own Raphael deck. One thing I noticed when building this deck is that it's fairly inexpensive. It's rare that I build a deck that only has an estimated value of $400-$500 but this one does just that. By substituting a few of the lands and a few of the higher end cards within this deck I'm sure you could get it down to the $200-$300 range and it still would be a fun, and competitive deck to play with.
I hope you are as excited as me to play a Red Black Demon Devil Commander deck!
Until Next Time,
