Commander is defined by mana rocks.
Sol Ring. Talismans. Signets.
Tried, true, and often played.
Let’s explore lesser-played sources of mana and see what kinds of decks emerge. A tipping-off point for us to iterate on for future brews.
Mana in a Flash
Designed in the time of mana burn, Braid of Fire and Thran Turbine used to be dangerous inclusions. Today, we never run out of things to spend mana on under a more forgiving ruleset. As Magic evolves, Braid of Fire and Thran Turbine win big.
Limiting the mana to the upkeep can feel restricting, but with a little deckbuilding and help from the command zone, we can guarantee the mana benefit.
As a commander with flash, Annie Flash, the Veteran makes easy use of Thran Turbine and Braid of Fire’s mana benefit. Surrounded by cards with flash, cards that allow us to recast instants, and big instant speed X spells, we have a home for big upkeep mana.
For example, we can drop Dualcaster Mage during the upkeep to recast our Lightning Bolts, Cultivates, and Swords to Plowshares.
March of Reckless Joy soaks up all of our available upkeep mana and rewards us with value and card selection to keep our engines going.
And if we are really committed to the big instant speed mana game, Dwarven Catapult is a fun inclusion that currently has a .01% inclusion rate according to EDHREC data and is in zero decks with Annie Flash as commander.
When it comes to making jank almost work, we could be the first to do the most with the worst.
Instead of casting instants from our hand, what if we rolled the dice on the bottom of our library instead?
Grenzo, Dungeon Warden allows us to spend 2 mana to put the bottom of the library in our graveyard. Without added shenanigans, if we put a creature with two or less power in the graveyard, we put it in play instead.
A boatload of upkeep mana means half a boatload of free Grenzo activations.
Combo loves mana, and Grenzo is no different. If we are being unfair, we can use Barkform Harvester to stack the bottom of our library and set up infinite mana engines. For example, Workhorse gives us the four mana needed to put it back on the bottom of the library and cheat it back into play for infinite enters, leaves, and +1/+1 counter synergies.
If we prefer big to infinite, we can brew Big Mother Mouser alongside the infamous arcbound creatures from standard’s past.
From Minion to Mana
Minions are great, but sometimes can be repurposed for something greater.
Sacrifice, Metamorphosis, Burnt Offering, and Culling of the Weak all allow us to sacrifice a creature to gain either four mana or mana based on the creature’s casting cost.
Energy Tap does similar work, while leaving our creature in play to be sacrificed to another of the rituals.
Following this deckbuilding path leads us to Zombie Cutthroat and Scornful Egoist, two creatures that provide a high mana value creature in play for a relatively low cost, allowing us to make best use of Energy Tap and its kin.
With Kadena, Slinking Sorcerer in the command zone, we are spotted three mana for our first face down creature each turn. With High Fae Trickster or another flash enabler in play, we can cast four morph creatures and draw an additional four cards per turn cycle.
Spell-slinger morphs with big mana payoffs? Yes, please.
With the right colors, so much in play, and rituals at our disposal, Witherbloom, the Balancer alongside Doppelgang and Mass Manipulation will really test the upper limits of how we can have it all (or lose to Farewell).
Grave Shenanigans
Charmed Pendant is the kind of card with a best-case scenario that is so good that it makes me wish the worst-case scenarios did not exist. Best case, we mill Progenitus, get ten mana, shuffle Progenitus back into our deck, and hope to hit it again.
More realistically, we build our deck to hit Invoke Despair, Phyrexian Obliterator, and Temporal Extortion.
Realistically with our luck, we hit swamps and get nothing.
Traditionally, Charmed Pendant would lead toward a devotion-style build led by Erebos. But, with the recent printing of Baron Zemo, monoblack has a new face card.
With the Charmed Pendant filling our graveyard and casting our spells and Dawnhand Dissident controlling the top of our deck, Baron Zemo will have plenty to boast about.
As Charmed Pendant puts cards into our graveyard for mana, Titan’s Nest will take cards back out. All we need is a strong suite of self-mill and reliable payoffs.
So new that no one can yet reliably get a copy, Homer, the Hermit mills any and all players, fully stocking our graveyard for any shenanigans we might have in store.
And when shenanigan time arrives, Titan’s Nest can make sure that our hits are just right. With Sin, Spira’s Punishment, we can use Titan’s Nest to remove everything except for lands, ensuring that we repeatedly trigger our Homer.
Something like this: We remove everything except lands from our graveyard to cast Sin. Sin triggers, putting a land into play. Everyone mills two more cards, we exile anything that is not lands with our Titan’s Nest, and Sin triggers again.
With Teval, the Balanced Scale in play, each time we exile a card via Sin or the nest, we gain a 2/2 zombie druid. Or, we exile cards from our graveyard one-by-one on our opponent’s end step, leaving us with an army of Zombie Druids ready to wreak havoc against our opponents.
Cleanup Step
Ok, let’s face it. We all love mana rocks.
Time-tested and always there for us.
Even the ritualesque Pentad Prism is a solid commander staple.
Today, we explored three categories of mana and initiated five brews to take from here.
Yes, all of these decks will also benefit from the right collection of mana rocks. Even Baron Zemo with a Charmed Pendant won’t say no to an Arcane Signet and a Soul Stone, but a little mechanical flavor added to their fast mana will go a long way in encouraging a fun game night.
