Commander Class: How to Build a Commander Deck
Hello, and welcome to commander class, this is an introductory course into the process I take when building a commander deck.
Since I am new to Flipside Gaming I would like to get started by sharing a little bit about myself. My name is Sean Cabral and I reside in the middle of Kansas. I started collecting and playing MTG back in 1994, but I did skip the Mirrodin and Kamigawa blocks. When it comes to MTG most people will align as a player, collector, or investor. I am an oddity and really belong in all 3 categories. I've played competitively for years attending the Junior Super Series, Pro Tour Qualifiers, Grand Prix's, and Magic Fests. If you are in the Midwest and have played for a long time, chances are high that we have played, or you've heard my name a time or two. I buy at least a case of most new release sets, and sometimes will make larger speculative buys. About 5 years ago I decided to get into graded magic cards and it has been amazing! I have bought and sold cards and collections as a side hustle since 2003. For fun I enjoy playing commander games with friends, and I cannot wait to get back into a competitive Magic Fest event!
I want to start off my first article with how I go about making a commander deck. Now this is not the best way, the right way, or the wrong way. Moreover this is just how I go about making a commander deck and I hope you can take something away for when it comes time to build your next deck.
To start, you should decide what card is going to be your commander. In most cases this could be a new release legendary creature, or a legendary card you've been wanting to make a deck with. I usually always pick my commander first, but this is not to say you can't switch it up later with a commander with the same color identity
After you have decided on your commander and color identity you should take into account what level of play you intend to use the deck. (Is this deck going to be competitive or casual?) In a casual deck you might put less powerful cards, and maybe add no instant-win combo's. In a competitive deck you might go all out, acquiring or adding all the top tier synergy cards for the commander you chose. For me, I will usually build my more competitive decks from the ground up, whereas if I'm going for casual I just use one of the pre-constructed commander decks from over the years.
That is one thing that Wizards of the Coast does right! They provide a good value for your money on the pre-constructed commander deck products. Yes some of them are better than others, and yes some of the years are better than others. Overall they all provide a good value for your money and the cards you get. Ideally I recommend new commander players just buy a pre-constructed deck that fits your style of play best.
I decided to select a tribal commander for competitive play for this article. My tribe is goblins and my commander is Krenko, Mob Boss. This will be an easier build due to the commander only having a red color identity. Since we know the color of the deck we need to do some brainstorming on what the deck is going to do. Krenko taps to make goblins based on the number of goblins in play. (Our goal is to take out our opponents out as fast as we can.) We will do this by creating as many goblins as fast as we can and over running our opponents before they can wipe or wrath the board.
Selecting cards to put in the deck can be the trickiest and most time consuming part of building a commander deck. Yes you can go through all your cards for hours and pull out every good goblin you find. Depending on the size of your collection you could very well end up with 400 cards then have to narrow it down to about 60 cards that finally make it into the deck. One of the tools that has saved me both a ton of time and energy is edhrec.com. The search bar they have allows you to put in your commander. Then you will see other people and suggested cards for a 99 card list for that particular commander searched. It will break down the cards into: (High Synergy Cards, Top Cards, Creatures, Instants, Sorceries, Utility Artifacts, Enchantments, Planes Walkers, Utility Lands, and Mana Artifacts.) It also gives an average breakdown of what percentage of each card type is in the average Krenko deck. The charts will also recommend a mana curve or how many of each card at any particular casting cost. I always use edhrec when building a commander deck from the ground up. I also recommend having about 40% of your deck mana which breaks down to 39.6 cards. For a Krenko deck I would recommend 34 to 36 lands because most of your spells are going to be a smaller casting cost. Another great resource for helping build a mana base is manacalculator.com. Most of the time I calculate a perfect mana base with a pen, paper, and a calculator. (I plan on explaining this in a future article.)
So we know our commander, and we have 99 cards left. For simplicity we are going to dedicate 34 cards to land slots (which we are not selecting yet.) That means we need to pull or find 65 non-land cards for this deck. I want to have lots of creatures, and highly synergistic creatures that go well with goblins and goblin acceleration. We should put a high value on any goblin creatures that add buffs to our other goblins. The most important ability for the deck is by being able to give your creatures haste. The All-Star MVP for any goblin deck is Goblin Recruiter as it allows you to search up and stack your deck with goblins. It can lead to some powerful combinations that can end the game in a matter of turns. Be careful not to make the mistake of stacking your deck with goblins and not having sufficient mana in play or in your hand for future turns though.
Ok so we have our All-Star MVP, but what about the dream team?
A 1 drop with the ability to drop a free goblin every turn
Another 1 drop with the powerful ability to sac any goblin for 1 red mana. This can help get your Krenko, Mob Boss out turns earlier, and has won me tons of games!
What can I say? it's a goblin that tutors for a goblin!
One of the best synergy goblins in the game. Makes your goblins cost less while also giving them haste.
One of the better synergies with krenko is giving him haste so he can make hasty goblin tokens immediately. This has haste, gives haste, and also buffs all your other goblins to a minimum of 2/2.
The original gangster - Boosts goblins +1+1 and gives them the insane ability to mountainwalk. Watch out goats!
The real hidden gem. Yea he costs 4cmc but he again boosts all your goblins +1+1 and gives them the utility ability to be a sac outlet to blow up all your opponents sol rings and mana vaults!
Just like it sounds! he always brings a gang. If you stacked your deck with Goblin Recruiter this has the ability to enter the battlefield: Reveal and draw 4 cards.
Known as the combo goblin this is an instant win if you have a handy Zealous Conscripts. Great at copying a lord or siege-gang to get tons of value!
Have we noticed a trend here? a gang of goblins, with another sac outlet to do damage. Wrapping up we have the new top dog:
Ok so this card costs a little bit more than your average goblin, but he can potentially put the top 6 cards of your library into play. Be sure to stack your deck with Goblin Recruiter before playing this one. This is a potential game ender depending what stage of a game you are at and the board state.
There are tons of other goblins that can be played but we really want to focus on annoyance and brutality. Hey, isn't that what goblins are known for? Since this is a more competitive deck we want to be able to deal with different situations, and increase the brutality or quickness of the deck. Mana acceleration or mana reduction is great for any mono colored deck. I recommend: Sol Ring, Mana Crypt, Mana Vault, Grim Monolith, Ruby Medallion, and that new card Jeweled Lotus.
We have some creatures, lands, and mana acceleration. We need to round out any deck with more artifacts, instants, sorceries, and enchantments. I selected quite a bit of stuff that was recommended on edhrec, but you can also use several other tools and websites to make a mock deck list online.
So I've got my online deck list, but chances are I don't own all the cards I actually want to run in the deck. I scour my collection and pull all the cards from my list and check them off the deck list. Almost all of the time when I make a deck this way I do not own all the cards. I suggest trading with your friends for some of the cards you need for the deck. After that I will just buy the remaining cards via my local game store, eBay, or another online retailer. Also make sure you have at least a 100 card sleeves for your deck ahead of time. I prefer to start every new commander deck with a fresh set of ultra-pro's but there are plenty of products out there. I will generally sleeve up everything I have for the deck, and as cards come in I will add them to the deck sleeved. I also will put my commander in a regular soft sleeve and top loader. It helps me find my commander easier, and also helps conserve 1 card sleeve for a backup. This isn't always the best way to do it, but just something I've done since I started playing commander. After this has all been completed its time to shuffle up and play! As you play your deck you'll learn what works, and what does not. I recommend tweaking your deck every 10-20 games as you'll learn as you play. After 40-50 games you should have a solid competitive commander deck that you know inside and out!
1) Choose a Commander
2) Decide whether you want to build a competitive or casual deck
3) Determine what your deck is going to do, or how you will crush your enemies.
4) Start building a deck list online
5) Select your All-Star's / MVP's / Dream Team
6) Add cards with utility and synergy
7) Develop your mana base
8) Acquire and sleeve up your cards
9) Play and make changes
I hope this article gave you some great ideas on a process for your next commander deck build. I am looking forward to a follow-up to the Krenko, Mob Boss commander deck build. If you made it this far please do me a favor by dropping me a question or comment below!
