by Taylor Ruble  

Spoiler season is always an exciting time for the Magic: the Gathering community. This is especially true for those of us that indulge in Commander. While everyone else is looking for that Standard staple or Legacy diamond in the rough, we are holding our breath for that 7/7 Kraken with a sweet “enters the battlefield” (ETB) ability for our mono-blue-ramp-monstrosity, or for another lord that pumps angels for our full-foil-tribal-angels-project. New Legends in particular make our hearts beat a little faster as we try to gauge their worthiness to lead our troops to battle. Currently Magic 2015 (M15) is slowly being revealed, but we already have one new Legendary Creature to brainstorm around: Jalira, Master Polymorphist. Jalira is a 2/2 Human Wizard. He costs 3  and has “3 , , Sacrifice another creature: Reveal cards from the top of your library until you reveal a non-legendary creature card. Put that card onto the battlefield and the rest on the bottom of your library in a random order.” Yep, looks like a winner to me. You are in blue and you only have to play a few win conitions in the deck, so the rest can be control. I was inspired immediately to build around him. Since he costs four, and you’re in the wrong color to build ramp, I don’t think you want to be rushing him out as fast as possible. Instead, I imagine waiting until you have a few counters in hand, and a lot of mana on the field to try to cast him. Since he has “tap” in his activation cost, you are going to have to wait a turn to use him anyway. The deck will need to have a control type shell with your typical blue Commander good stuff. It will need some assortment of non-legendary creatures to cheat into play with his ability, and easily accessible fodder to sacrifice to accomplish this goal. In theory it could be a fairly powerful and consistent deck. The first things you want to choose are your targets. What do you want to “polymorph” into? It probably isn’t wise to only play one creature in case it doesn’t last long, but you also don’t really need too many. I am sure Blightsteel Colossus is on the tip of most people’s tongues. It isn’t Legendary. It is indestructible. It wins games. Perfect. Ulamog, The Infinite Gyre would have been great, but it is Legendary. A creature that is similar to Ulamog, but non-legendary, is It that Betrays. In my opinion, It that Betrays is one of the most powerful haymakers you have access to in blue. Or, you could pick something that has a nice ETB ability: Kederekt Leviathan would work. Staples like Consecrated Sphinx are quality inclusions as well. Now that we’ve assembled our targets, we need to figure out how to enable and exploit his ability. There are a few options that I see. The first and most obvious is Legendary creatures. Additionally you could make tokens to sacrifice, or maybe sacrifice some manlands. But the most attractive option in my eyes is sacrificing your opponent’s creatures. I mean, who doesn’t want to turn their enemy’s general into a Blightsteel? Besides, you don’t want to be playing a large number of cards whose only purpose is to be sacrificed. The deck would hardly be able to function without the general in play. If you are going to play manlands, token generators, or Legends, they should be good on their own even if you don’t have access to Jalira at that moment. Now, blue has no shortage of “Mind Control” effects, but the key is to find reusable ones. Enter Vedalken Shackles and friends. Imagine, on their end step, stealing your opponent’s general, sacking it for a Consecrated Sphinx, passing the turn to yourself, stealing another commander, and sacking it for a Blightsteel! It is going to be a lot of fun once we get the combo going! Other good kidnappers are Helm of Possession, Chamber of Manipulation and Empress Galina. Galina even has the benefit of being a Legend herself so you aren’t cascading into her instead of one of your win conditions! Before we get to the control package we need to add a few more pieces that interact well with our strategy. We will need Strip Mine type effects to keep Homeward Path at bay. Also, we should include a combo or two just in case our primary plan isn’t working too well. I used a few infinite mana and infinite draw combos just to be safe. To make my steal-and-sacrifice plan work even without my general in play, Ashnod’s Altar and Phyrexian Altar are strong inclusions as sacrifice outlets. Voltaic Key and Copy Artifact are nice with Vedalken Shackles when you have the mana. Swiftfoot Boots and Lightning Greaves are really just Blightsteel‘s best friend so they make the cut as well. On to the control shell! Card draw, tutors, taking extra turns, Counterspells, bounce; you name it, blue has it. I won’t bore you with the details since these are really flexible spots anyway. However, the Legends we can use as control pieces are really interesting! You want to include some non-win condition creatures to block with and to gain card advantage, but you don’t really want to be polymorphing into them. I ended up picking seven of the blue Legends. Arcanis the Omnipotent and Azami, Lady of Scrolls for card draw. Ertai, Wizard Adept, Venser, Shaper Savant, and Kaho, Minamo Historian for control. Finally, add Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir for good measure. We already discussed Empress Galina who rounds out the seven. You even get the added benefit of having a small tribal wizards theme going which helps out cards like Cavern of Souls. When it is all said and done, it was hard to narrow all the good options down to 99 inclusions, but I did it. Keep in mind that this is just my version: I am sure you would find cards to include that I hadn’t even thought of. Also, this list assumes you have infinite cash to blow (which none of us do, but it’s no fun to brainstorm on a budget). Here is my finished list:

One of the things I really like about this general is the fact that it lets you play with some weird cards that you never would have included otherwise. I would never include Chamber of Manipulation or Domestication in another Commander deck. That’s what is so much fun about Commander. Finding niche cards that fit your deck just right. I can’t wait to see what else M15 has in store for us. Have fun diving into spoiler season and never stop brainstorming.