Alright gang! I'm going to do something I never ever do around these parts, and ask for some help.
My local store is doing a "random commander" night. It consisted of pulling a commander from a box, and then building a deck around it. I love the idea of the event and would really like to participate. Unfortunately I pulled kazarov, sengir pureblood and I'm having a lot of trouble actually getting the deck to DO anything.
There are a lot of things working against this one. His cost is very high, he's in colors that can't interact with enchantments, he has no built in way to protect himself, and he's very dependent on my opponents actually having creatures. Edhrec doesn't have much of an offering for ideas, and he's in no way a popular commander.
A few of the ideas I was kicking around were:
aether flash - it nails every creature that etb's, stops some combos, and does what the deck wants to do. i could potentially mix in repercussion or death pits of rath. this all feels really kind of... cute, and not very competitive.
He is pretty awful, the only things I can suggest is trying to use Pestilence style effects and then trying to win with a big Chandra's Ignition with all the tutors black has. The only real advantage Kazarov has is commander damage out of nowhere, but it generally requires a ridiculous amount of mana. You could also just use him for the colours and try to assemble a combo kill instead, like infinite mana into Exsanguinate or something.
Honestly, this is the place for Pestilence/Pyrohemia/Crypt Rats to help you go voltron.
To make sure your opponents have creatures, maybe use vsrchild, Raiders of varchild, tombstone stairwell, tempt with vengeance, goblin spymaster, Akroan Horse, and forbidden orchard to hand them out.
I would just say in all honesty just ignore your commander for the most part, if you actually want a competitive deck.
The thing that he is 7 mana, so he only going to represent late game. He also requires a lot of mana to activate his ability, so again late game type of stuff.
So I would build a destroy everything you can type deck that you'd find more helmed by Mogis, God of Slaughter normally. What you can do is look to just keep removing the board as much as you can, with the idea of going into the late game.
That way you can resolve Kazarov, Sengir Pureblood and actually have a shot at just removing whatever your opponents have left.
Braid of Fire is awesome for generating mana for Kazarov.
So if that makes sense don't really worry about the +1/+1 and going Voltron, as you're just going to fail time and time again. Somebody will have removal for the first attack. So then he cost 9 mana to cast, and good luck again. Instead you need to be patient and wait out everybody else removal, while clearing the board yourself until you have like 10+ lands in play.
Then you're really using the 3R ability to wipe out whats going on. It is possible to play some of the double damage cards like Angrath's Marauders or more risky Dictate of the Twin Gods. But that means he'll ping for 4 damage, which is more likely to kill as single shots.
You could look at Horobi, Death's Wail as a way of one shot creatures. Basilisk Collar can give Kazarov deathtouch for the same effect. But I'd be careful about playing cards too specifically around him, for the reasons I pointed out above. That is to say they will do nothing on their own, and 90% of the time, games will be played without him on the board. That is just science
I agree with darrenhabib, you could just build a pretty tight Rakdos deck with Kazarov there for colours. Building a deck around a high cmc Commander is a pretty terrible idea; the exception being when that high cmc commander is stupid powerful (e.g. Avacyn, Angel of Hope), and you have extra ramp to get them out early (e.g. Thran Dynamo, Gilded Lotus).
This is my attempt at a Kazarov hyper-budget deck (all cards <$1 TCGPlayer mid). It's not the strongest deck, but I think this is the most efficient way to build him. It works fairly well in more low powered metas. The general idea is to keep the board as empty as possible until you can start building up Kazarov, then start taking out people with something like Fling, Tainted Strike or Chandra's Ignition.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
My local store is doing a "random commander" night. It consisted of pulling a commander from a box, and then building a deck around it. I love the idea of the event and would really like to participate. Unfortunately I pulled kazarov, sengir pureblood and I'm having a lot of trouble actually getting the deck to DO anything.
There are a lot of things working against this one. His cost is very high, he's in colors that can't interact with enchantments, he has no built in way to protect himself, and he's very dependent on my opponents actually having creatures. Edhrec doesn't have much of an offering for ideas, and he's in no way a popular commander.
A few of the ideas I was kicking around were:
aether flash - it nails every creature that etb's, stops some combos, and does what the deck wants to do. i could potentially mix in repercussion or death pits of rath. this all feels really kind of... cute, and not very competitive.
I could also load up on things like volcanic fallout or crypt rats. subterranean spirit also falls into this grouping.
If I go the constant damage/board wipes route it should be fairly easy to give him haste though things like boots and anger
...but... honestly this card just sucks. i really don't see how it can compete in environments where someone pulled verdeloth the ancient and ayli eternal pilgrim
throw some ideas at me, prove me wrong, because at it stands I'll most likely be skipping this event as it'll be a waste of my money.
Is the event 1v1 or multiplayer?
To make sure your opponents have creatures, maybe use vsrchild, Raiders of varchild, tombstone stairwell, tempt with vengeance, goblin spymaster, Akroan Horse, and forbidden orchard to hand them out.
Group hug to voltron in the blink of an eye
The thing that he is 7 mana, so he only going to represent late game. He also requires a lot of mana to activate his ability, so again late game type of stuff.
So I would build a destroy everything you can type deck that you'd find more helmed by Mogis, God of Slaughter normally. What you can do is look to just keep removing the board as much as you can, with the idea of going into the late game.
That way you can resolve Kazarov, Sengir Pureblood and actually have a shot at just removing whatever your opponents have left.
So you'd pack in all the mass creature removal in red and black. Things like Toxic Deluge, Bontu's Last Reckoning, Fire Covenant, Last One Standing, Damnation, Blasphemous Act, Decree of Pain.
You'd also play what's available as far as all permanent removal, so Nevinyrral's Disk, Oblivion Stone, All Is Dust, Ugin, the Spirit Dragon.
Then when everyone is bleed dry you can evoke the Kazarov, Sengir Pureblood with Pestilence/Pyrohemia/Crypt Rats as cards that you probably held onto.
Braid of Fire is awesome for generating mana for Kazarov.
So if that makes sense don't really worry about the +1/+1 and going Voltron, as you're just going to fail time and time again. Somebody will have removal for the first attack. So then he cost 9 mana to cast, and good luck again. Instead you need to be patient and wait out everybody else removal, while clearing the board yourself until you have like 10+ lands in play.
Then you're really using the 3R ability to wipe out whats going on. It is possible to play some of the double damage cards like Angrath's Marauders or more risky Dictate of the Twin Gods. But that means he'll ping for 4 damage, which is more likely to kill as single shots.
You could look at Horobi, Death's Wail as a way of one shot creatures.
Basilisk Collar can give Kazarov deathtouch for the same effect. But I'd be careful about playing cards too specifically around him, for the reasons I pointed out above. That is to say they will do nothing on their own, and 90% of the time, games will be played without him on the board. That is just science
Cabal Coffers and Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth. Make sure you play Expedition Map.
Niv-Mizzet Reborn
Feather, the Redeemed
Estrid, the Masked
Teshar
Tymna/Ravos
Najeela, Blade-Blossom
Firesong & Sunspeaker
Zur the Enchanter
Lazav, the Multifarious
Ishai+Reyhan
Click images for decks->
-Prime Speaker Vannifar
---------------------Will & Rowan Kenrith
I agree with darrenhabib, you could just build a pretty tight Rakdos deck with Kazarov there for colours. Building a deck around a high cmc Commander is a pretty terrible idea; the exception being when that high cmc commander is stupid powerful (e.g. Avacyn, Angel of Hope), and you have extra ramp to get them out early (e.g. Thran Dynamo, Gilded Lotus).
I would suggest you build a Mogis, God of Slaughter, Rakdos, Lord of Riots or Vial Smasher the Fierce deck, and just swap in Kazarov as the Commander. There are some great suggestions here for cards that work well with Kazarov when he's out, but as you probably won't cast Kazarov very often, don't dilute the deck too much with these cards.
Be conservative, build a solid deck, don't over-focus on Commander synergy when your Commander is bad.
There are a lot of cards that create tokens, by the way. Some are mentioned above, but there is also Hunted Dragon,
Varchild, Betrayer of Kjeldor, Dowsing Dagger. Xantcha, Sleeper Agent. Tombstone Stairwell.
8.RG Green Devotion Ramp/Combo 9.UR Draw Triggers 10.WUR Group stalling 11.WUR Voltron Spellslinger 12.WB Sacrificial Shenanigans
13.BR Creatureless Panharmonicon 14.BR Pingers and Eldrazi 15.URG Untapped Cascading
16.Reyhan, last of the Abzan's WUBG +1/+1 Counter Craziness 17.WUBRG Dragons aka Why did I make this?
Building: The Gitrog Monster lands, Glissa the Traitor stax, Muldrotha, the Gravetide Planeswalker Combo, Kydele, Chosen of Kruphix + Sidar Kondo of Jamuraa Clues, and Tribal Scarecrow Planeswalkers
I have real difficulty building decks that arent oriented around the commander, where youve chosen it just for the colors. This guy is just. So. Bad.
ill poat aomething a bit later and see how it tests but i have zero hope that itll be fun, or competitive