[Re:Commanders] Extus, the Indomitable

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Yatsufusa
Posts: 166
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Post by Yatsufusa » 2 years ago

"Red like roses fills my dreams and brings me to the place you rest.
White is cold and always yearning, burdened by a royal test.
Black the beast descends from shadows.
Yellow beauty burns gold."

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Introduction


Welcome to Extus, the Indomitable. I have to admit, amongst my eight decks, this is the one with the most identity crisis. For most part, it's an aggro deck (with equipment) that pivots towards combos in the late-game to wrap things up/when things go wrong.

If you have the luxury of listening to music whilst reading this thread, enjoy the appointed official song for Extus, the Indomitable: Red Like Roses.


Disclaimers

Same across all threads, skip ahead if you've read it elsewhere before)
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Extus, the Indomitable is part of Re:Commanders, a suite of eight decks I've established since 2015 with the intent to "retire" from the game/format, with its stability permitting me to bling my own decks out as my own vanity project. I've written out these guides roughly with the primer style guide, but they are not meant to be primers. In fact, my updates will be sporadic as in recent years I've had less and less time to play the game due to commitments.

Generally, Re:Commander decks / guides follow these rules:

High-Powered Cards – When I started Re:Commanders in 2015 I was already sitting on 11 years' of collection, including 4 years within the format that already assembled a structural skeleton for most of my decks. My decklists often contain a lot of high-powered, cEDH-worthy cards that can be easily deemed unaffordable to the random viewer seeing the guide at any given time, but I do not feel the need to feature budget options as those change with the times, as my focus on presenting the guide is to establish an understanding of what role does a card play in the deck, and the discerning player with the understanding should be able to find their own substitutes for that role within their own budget/collection/time. I merely used my own high-powered examples because I have it, nothing more. The game is just way too big (and getting bigger faster every year now) for me to cite random alternatives nowadays, especially with prices also randomizing on their own scales.

Personal Quirks - I have some small aesthetic quirks, the most common easy example being I don't play off-color fetchlands and I don't play ABUR duals because they can't be foiled. A lot of these small factors go a ways to lower the power level of my decks in small doses. I also try to diversify card options across decks, so while there are staples I play across all decks (mostly colorless artifacts and lands), I try to keep a variety of colored cards (and for those I don't I even try to get different art/frames to compensate) across my decks. If some colored staple feels missing, that's likely because it's housed in another deck in the suite I felt was just better for it (or I just lack it in my collection, I don't have everything, after all).

Personal Definition of "75%" – My personal definition on a "75%" deck is essentially a singular deck is flexible enough to perform on both casual and competitive tables. They aren't completely "just built to win" like cEDH decks, they're first built thematically, and then built with two distinct functions – first, a way to win within context of the theme, then secondly all decks usually have an infinite outlet (or at least a substantially huge wincon) or combo or some sort because I believe that a deck should always have a way to close the game when the primary plan/theme fails. Even a bland infinite combo used as a last resort is a better game-closer than you durdling an entire game playing Kingmaker/trying to lose last.

I don't shy away from tutors. This combined with the combo aspect does really ramp it up to feel close to cEDH levels (and almost certainly pubstomping in the wrong cases), but ultimately I built the deck for me, myself as the pilot. The Commander RC has a policy of "build casually, play competitively", but due to my wide-range meta (that can contain anywhere from new players to cEDH players depending on time), I adopted a custom formula – "Build enough to face competitive opponents but without abandoning the theme, then play accordingly to the table in question".

I'm aware some people feel like it's an insult to not "play at maximum" at a table, but I just don't see that way, I have a thematic way to (attempt to) win that's not too far above the casual table and my combos are now my last resort game-closers, something I actively want to avoid having seen purely-casual tables lack it and end up playing a game of too-much-politics-and-kingmaking-trying-to-lose-last compared to actual Magic played when thematic plans fall apart.

Deck History


For a full-blown history of the establishment of Re:Commanders as a whole, as well as anything the deck might have within its context, please refer to the central hub of the Re:Commanders here.
Deck History
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While I will not go at length because it's covered in the central hub, this deck does owe its existence to the crucial decision point I've made during the color division planning of Re:Commanders. At the point when I've established Animar, Soul of Elements, Karador, Ghost Chieftain and agreed to "downgrade" my zombies deck to UB, leaving me with either the choice of Jeskai or Mardu as my final tri-colored deck.

I've tried both Wedges before, having played Narset the Enlightened and Zurgo Helmsmasher (which I also converted to Alesha, who Smiles at Death briefly before I started Re: Commanders). For most part Narset was a pillowfort-control attempt and Zurgo was voltron, but Narset was a target for obvious reasons (and we didn't have much Commander choices back then, let alone Pramikon, Sky Rampart), so I diverted the control element to a short-lived Sen Triplets tryout and the pillowfort to the Mardu deck, which I had changed from Zurgo to Alesha because the straightforward voltron was boring me.

It didn't succeed. It was at this point I started planning for Re:Commanders, so my options were Mardu + Azorius + Mono-Red, or Jeskai + Rakdos + Mono-White. At this point I was already favoring the former because my initial idea for building around Ryusei, the Falling Star was taking hold. So it boiled down to a mess of control, pillowfort and aggro that I had to fit around either wedge+guild combination and whether it supported or overthrew the budding Ryusei idea.

In the end support won, I decided to remerge the control with pillowfort into the Azorius deck, which would go on to be Yorion, Sky Nomad (details in its own thread) and have another go at aggro in Mardu. Would history been different if I had more Commander choices back then (Pramikon mainly)? Probably, but I already set its course (the intention of Re:Commanders was to minimize sweeping changes in my deck) and I'm not backing down from that.

I set Alesha as Commander once again and put combos in to compensate for the loss of the pillowfort (and to raise its otherwise unimpressive power-level), but for most part of its life (until even today), it arguably remains the most plain of my decks. When Commander Legends came out, I toyed with the idea of making it a modular Partner deck that could be led by any combination that makes the color identity, but it was short-lived as it was too much hassle to manage off-table (and due to world events I didn't actually even let it go on-table).

Recently, Extus, Oriq Overlord came out I honestly think he can lead the deck in a better direction. Alesha has honestly, been rather underwhelming and I mostly kept her because all the other new Commanders didn't feel like they would have led in a direction I wanted (and some were too clunky).

Commander Analysis


As I just said, Extus is a recent replacement for Alesha in the deck. Time will tell if he is the correct one to lead the deck in a direction that gives it more purpose, but on a first glance on his abilities I do feel as so.


Red like roses
fills my head with dreams and finds me.
Always closer
to the emptiness and sadness
that has come to take the place of you.

4-Mana 2/4 Double Strike

Having Double Strike means Extus effectively has 4 power in a vacuum, so a "4/4" as Commander than grows better because of Double Strike is at least a good headstart for someone who's taking over the reins of an aggro deck with an identity crisis.


Whenever you cast or copy an instant or sorcery spell, return target nonlegendary creature card from your graveyard to your hand.

For someone taking the reins over from Alesha, he sure has a similar ability, but the specifics are much, much different. His trigger condition is on casting/copying instants or sorceries as opposed to attacking, which leads to the potential of multiple triggers. Yes, it is possible to have Alesha trigger multiple times per turn with the typical multiple combat phase cards/combos, but I always felt the requirement of mana and the pay-off of bringing back a 2-power or lower creature (which basically required more mana to boost power for non-infinite plays) was just too much that it made Alesha felt like the auxiliary component of a generic combat-phase trick/combo, and one that cost too much. When Najeela, the Blade-Blossom took over my 5C deck, it also sealed any tiny interest I might have had in that direction as well.

The other main difference is that Alesha brought back 2-power or less creatures to the battlefield tapped and attacking while Extus only returns nonlegendary creatures to the hand. In a vacuum Alesha sounds better that way (and it does feel good when the right creatures can come back), but more often than not I felt there were a lot of "misses". The deck runs many small utility creatures that can be brought back, but they're either underwhelming to bring back or it was unsafe to bring them back (not every game guarantees Reconnaissance) and since I don't run multiple combat phases, it just feels even more so when you're locked to one trigger per turn cycle.
Extus brings them back to the hand, meaning I need to spend mana on them, but since a lot of them are cheap utility creatures (this deck has the lowest average mana value among the eight), I don't really feel like it's a detriment, more of a small price to pay for different conveniences.

As Extus inherits a largely-intact shell from Alesha, there are still quite some Legendary creatures in the deck that he can't return, but I intend to leave it to time to tell if these Legendaries earn their keep without being able to return via the Commander. In the same vein, the bulk of the deck's creatures are of 2-power or below to accommodate Alesha and some of the bigger-cost ones might find themselves on the treadmill as I can look more towards creatures with bigger power in those slots.




Every nightmare just discloses,
It's your blood that's red like roses.

Largely irrelevant for now, as I've not transited to really accommodate for it (and might not considering for most purposes Extus alone is sufficient as the Commander), but it still exists as an (expensive) option of removal. It's expense (exacerbated by Commander tax) and that the deck doesn't really combo in the wide-direction (or combos are pretty linear here) means it doesn't really have a place to play outside of maybe being an emergency one-use sacrifice outlet.


Alternate Commanders
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Alternate Commanders
I'll be blunt, as I said before over the years I didn't find the new Mardu alternatives to be particularly inspiring me in a direction, but I'll just leaves short blurts/categories should they interest you, but I will not emphasize on things I just felt didn't appeal to me.

Snapdax, Apex of the Hunt
From a voltron perspective probably the closest thing to Extus on the surface (with better power/toughness), with a mutate-removal option stapled on, but all-in-all I felt it was way to underwhelming that I was willing to stick with Alesha back then just for the reanimation utility, the same reason I replaced Zurgo with her in the first place. So yes, Zurgo Helmsmasher is also under this category.

Syr Gwyn, Hero of Ashvale
Too costly mana-wise for a Mardu Commander (Zurgo was already stretching the cost). If the deck was Knight-orientated (or the equip discount was not-tribal), I might have been tempted to try, but as it stands it costs too much for something in a narrow direction I'm not in. Under this category are all the non-relevant tribal/card-type decks from Edgar Markov to Ghen, Arcanum Weaver, as well as another category for the costly Commanders from Oros, the Avenger to Piru, the Volatile.

Queen Marchesa
Arguable the trickiest one for me to explain, as she's a popular Commander with many people (and for good reason), but if I had to put it, politics feels too much "control" for me and I assigned "aggro" tag for my Mardu deck. Sure, Queen Marchessa and Mardu could make for a slightly faster version of politics/control, but as someone who distinctively already divided the archetypes and colors, it's just an unfortunate case where I felt the overlap would unbalance the overall system I set up. I want the deck to aggro as much as it can, then just snap-into-combo should it fail at aggro (so at least it has a backup win condition and said condition is also fast) and a politics-orientated Commander/deck would not lead in that direction. Another commander in this category would be like Mathas, Fiend Seeker.

Theme Analysis

Is Extus, the Indomitable a deck for you?
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With the knowledge of what Extus is capable of, now we explore what my build for the deck features in its themes to support the Commander (and vice versa). If the following themes (combined preferably) appeal to you, then this deck might be for you!

"Aggro – This deck was assigned the "Aggro" tag amongst my decks. Usually I would classify this under a negative under the rationale that "This isn't going to live up the general expectations of aggro because it runs a bit more like a midrange deck", but after years of playing the format, including the Zurgo Voltron stint, I've basically concluded that Aggro in the format, due to its nature, is either going to feel extremely underwhelming if you've built it in-line with the Aggro of other formats without the multiplayer support (which tend to be midrange-y), or it just turns out to be really boring even if you succeeded because chances you've outsped the interaction phase of the game, or you voltron'ed your way through, making it just a different mode of a "combo" (granted, harder to assemble and more satisfying the first few times, but it gets stale fast too). Hence, at the end of the day, I decided to tilt in favor of midrange, although this deck will still feature aggro aspects that can potentially be pulled off.

Equipment – Downsized as an effect of the Aggro-disclaimer I made above, but it's still there and includes a few "equipment-matters" cards around, the theme is just too fun to completely drop.

Interaction – Extus acts sort of like a conduit, being a good double-striker for Equipment strategies, but because his ability is straightforward, he generates "midrange" value of our removal, allowing you to return (nonlegendary) creatures back for casting sorceries & instants. This advantage is also applied for pretty much other nonpermanent spells, be it card draw or tutoring.

Sunforger – Already a popular choice in many equipment decks and a conduit in its own right, but together with Extus, they form a power circuit. Favoring power is a greater boost on a double-striker, and the ability to tutor-cast a wide variety of instant spells that would trigger the Commander is yet another delicious layer of synergy. I would usually reserve such a description in card choices, but for cards as "core" as this they straight up get up mentioned here – it's like reverse marketing, if you really like Sunforger as a card, I'd say Extus is one of the best Commanders you can pair with it to synergize pretty much all aspects of the card.


However, no deck can cover everything the game can offer and Extus does lack in multiple departments. Also, no deck comes completely without weaknesses. If missing any of these themes or having to deal with any of these weaknesses if a big red flag for you, this deck might not be for you.

Easy Battlecruiser – My favorite playstyle, but this deck is not it. You can build a creature up to match with battlecruisers in size with the theme, but this is not the deck you just mindlessly ramp/discount naturally huge creatures, this is the deck that you run the smaller creatures than arm them to make them bigger and it's a completely different ballpark when played out even if it sounds similar on paper.

Spellslinging – Yes, many of our interaction and draw come from nonpermanent spells and the Commander does not have a turn restriction, but ultimately we're not in the colors to toy with the stack as much as the typical spellslinger builds go and there's no real game-finishing payoff from slinging spells non-stop, just a slightly greater return from the Commander.

Removal - Yes, the deck's greatest strength of interaction is also its weaknesses. Spot removal usually cripple Voltron-like equipment builds, but the deck does run a tad wider than a pure Voltron to not just fold completely. Board wipes would negate that factor, but the deck runs a healthy amount of recursion, not the mention the Commander himself can do that. Grave-hate would deal with that, but assuming you're aren't piled on by every removal in the game, we're not entirely reliant on the graveyard like reanimation decks, more like utilizing it as an additional bonus. In short, we're a Jack-of-All-Trades, not completely devastated by specific removals, but simultaneously vulnerable to being crippled somewhat by literally every form, which is a form of weakness itself.

Decklist


Now you've had a solid idea of whether you would enjoy the Commander/deck, I present you the decklist of Extus, the Indomitable.

Extus, the Indomitable

Planeswalker (1)

Approximate Total Cost:

Card Choices


My deckbuilding process goes in this sequence: Ramp → Draw → Removal → PRO (Protection, Recursion, Others) → Manafixing Lands. There are some specific processes that are done within/in-between, but I'll get into detail when as I move through this guide.

Ramp
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Magic games are fun because you can cast things, and the ability to be able to cast more things as the game progresses is vital. It's tremendously less fun to watch someone cast a huge spell a couple of turns earlier or cast 2 more spells than you did in your turn in the same cycle, or you to exhaust all your mana getting something out while everyone else could afford to leave mana open so they could interact with the game and turn it in their favor. Ramp is the backbone that solves all that, the cornerstone of decks everywhere.

In general, I recommend at least 15 ramp sources, around 10 of which are fast, early-game options and the remainder could be slower or conditional ramp sources that hopefully synergize with the themes of the deck.

The Big Three
I don't even think I need to introduce/explain these three cards. As much as I love my diversity, I had to admit these three cards are also dubbed the "ubiquitous three" for me and exist in every one of my decks (and yes, you will see this exact section in every thread). They obviously account for 3 of the early ramp options of every deck hence.
I usually don't mention prices, but Mana Crypt is a standout I have to state due to my personal declaration of ubiquity here. As long as your meta isn't as high-powered as mine, you don't need Mana Crypt, you can replace it with a (basic) land. In fact, the overall land count in my decks could be said to be 1 below-average solely because Mana Crypt is powerful enough to justify it and you should put a land in-lieu of Crypt to get healthier numbers for a deck without one.

Fast Ramp
Fast ramp is defined by the ability to drop on turn 2 or earlier and have an immediate effect on casting spells.


The bread-and-butter mana rocks that cost 2 or less. All of them provide color fixing something a 3-colored deck without G would appreciate.

Mid Ramp
Mid-ramp refers to a specific group that essentially come online by turn 3 or later in a vacuum.


Loyal Warhound is the catch-up land ramp. There are arguments for Knight of the White Orchid being better, especially in an equipment deck, but I appreciate that the Warhound needs less colored mana (which may matter early-game) slightly more. You could potentially run both, but as the deck can land-ramp in other ways, there's a chance the redundancy might backfire since catch-up ramp is conditional (I didn't classify it as such due to color combination and because it's a one-of), and if you needed more you could recur it with Extus.

Extus is 4 mana, which makes 2-mana rocks much more vital and the higher-costed mana rocks slightly clunkier, but that doesn't mean the deck shouldn't run a few, ramp is still ramp and ramp is still king.

As the deck has a little equipment focus, Sword of the Animist gets a slot in the deck. It won't be the premier choice of equipment tutoring, but at least it serves as a reasonable backup choice. It also grants the ability to ramp out (basic) lands, something WBR severely lacks.

Conditional Ramp

Ashnod's Altar and Phyrexian Tower require a creature sacrifice to produce 2 mana, while Crypt Ghast and Cabal Coffers require swamps (especially Urborg to excel (or function). They're clunkier than even the straightforward higher-costed mana rocks, but have a higher potential/ceiling to excel. With the deck's focus on lower-costed mana rocks, these functionally share the auxiliary role with the "slower ramp" as well, but I made the distinction that they are conditional as I think it's a warning that should be there.
Goldhound is a poor Lotus Petal, but it comes with a body for equipment (and two abilities too), which makes it flexible enough for this deck.
Card Draw
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Ramp may be the cornerstone of a deck, but there's no point in having mana if there's nothing to cast. Card draw is the axle-grease that keeps the deck capable of building upon itself in a game.

Like with ramp, I recommend at least 15 sources of card draw. It may sound excessive, but I personally classify a huge range of card effects under its umbrella, including cantrips, discard-draw effects and wheel effects. To me, the filtering provided by such effects to get to the correct cards you want to be casting at any given time qualifies them under the primary objective of drawing.

That being said, card advantage is an important factor, especially in a multiplayer game and as such between all sources of draws I recommend at the very least about 8 (preferably 10) of your draws are capable of generating card advantage, be it directly (one-shot draw multiples, or strong straightforward draw engines) or indirectly (can be cast multiple times by itself, or generates synergy with the deck's theme to do so like an on-theme conditional engine).
As most cards primarily placed for their drawing abilities are pretty straightforward, I will not be explaining each of the common sections and the choices that fall under them.

Single-Use

Repeatable Draw

Tutors
Not quite card advantage, but I like to categorize tutors under the branch of card draw as it surrenders advantage for precision. Due to said precision I will explain my choices briefly.

There's a slight focus on Equipment tutors in the deck to support the theme and Sunforger itself is a conduit of equipment to nonpermanent spells. Demonic Tutor rounds up as a silver bullet.
Removal
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EDH games are not played in vacuum – as much as you're ramping, drawing cards and presenting threats, so are your opponents. Someone has to be faster than someone else in most games and it's unlikely you're always the fastest on board. The ability to dispose of threats that would otherwise end the game (or you from the game) should never be underestimated.

At the same time, there's only so much space you can afford for removal, especially having spent space for ramp and card draw and needing some for other utilities. I cannot you teach you the specifics as it differs game-to-game, but threat assessment is key skill in any EDH game, as it can easily seem that there are more threats than you have answers for, as there are three opponents. You need to identify which threats are the most dangerous to you, preferably as early as possible, but only dispose of them in a timely fashion, not necessarily as early as possible. If a threat has a chance to pose a bigger threat to another opponent, then it may be beneficial to either let it weaken said opponent first or let them notice the threat (even if it's blatant verbal politics) and spend their removal to get rid of a problem for you.

Removal is divided into two main catergories, Spot Removal, which are cards that remove usually one, but can be up to a few targets (and usually do use a targeting mechanic). The other is board-wipes, which refer to cards capable of removing an entire subset of cards (or almost) from every player (or opponent, but those usually cost more) in the game.

Counterspells for most part are almost always considered single-target removals, as the bulk of them are usually used to negate a singular threat before it manifests. There's some debate because there's an array of cards that exile entire graveyards, but I personally classify all grave hate to be single-target removal on the concept that most decks that don't rely on the graveyard as theme still do have some limited recursion options, and the reason one utilizes an entire graveyard exile is simply because the cards that perform them tend to be more cost-effective, and the real objective is usually a specific card. Sure, sometimes you hit a graveyard-reliant opponent and it feels like a boardwipe, but I don't feel that means I have to classify all cards that entire exile graveyards as wipes because they're opponent-dependent.

I recommend at least a minimum of 8 spot removals, with a reinforcement of 10-minimum if you're unsure about your threat assessment skills. Unless you have really good synergy with your removal options, generically around a cap of 12 spot removals should be ceiling, otherwise it'll pressure too little space for your utilities. Cover all your bases, make sure you have at least a way to get rid of graveyards and lands, as removals for those two are often overlooked while threats they present are no less dangerous than your usual culprits.

With board wipes my minimum recommendation is at least 3 and preferably 2 of those are capable of removing creatures, the most common permanent threat-type by nature of damage, but there should also be at least one option capable of handling artifacts and enchantments. Generally speaking mass land removal is socially frowned upon (especially if you're just going for walk-in games), so pay extra attention back to your spot removal to handle the notorious few problem-lands in the game.

Like with draw, the removal effects themselves are straightforward, with my emphasis already done on ensuring you have the diversity to deal with threats of varying natures being the actual important factor. Hence, I'm not explaining my specific choices in each deck and substitutes for this section are arguably the easiest to look for with any collection.

Spot Removal



Board Wipes

PRO (Protection, Recusion & Others)
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With three pillars of any EDH deck settled, we move on to slightly less important parts (no part can be considered unimportant because an EDH deck is supposed to be a machine with all its part working in sync ideally). Protection & Recursion can be said to be two sides of a same coin, under a function of keeping other parts of deck intact so those could perform their duties. Basically the opposite of removal, the attempt to keep your threats intact (or returning/reusing them after they got disposed).

Protection & Recusion

Protection is pro-active and prevents a card of yours from either be removed, or at least it helps by hindering your opponents from doing so (so effects that grant shroud or hexproof qualify). This prevents the card from leaving the battlefield or get countered, so it's less vulnerable to grave hate options, but in exchange, protection requires timing and mana left open and can be tricky to maneuver, even more so than threat assessment. Some counterspells can function as protection, but for simplicity's sake I just classified them under removal due to my processing order, but take note if you already run counterspells they might be pulling double-duty as Protection.

Recursion, as I said, is the opposite of the same coin. It doesn't prevent the destruction, but bringing something back from the graveyard to the hand, deck or battlefield means there's no real timing restriction outside your own personal urgency. Likewise, it's vulnerable to gravehate, which is arguably the #1 factor that would provide a sense of timing urgency.

While they're distinct enough that I have to provide paragraphs establishing their roles, Protection and Recursion could be said to be one tier below the three pillars of deckbuilding (ramp, card draw & removal), as it's theoretically possible for a deck to just ignore it altogether and operate on "If it's gone, it's gone" principle) and still reasonably perform well if it's other components are settled well. This cannot be said for the three pillars (which would visibly affect performance significantly more if they were missing).

That being said, it definitely never hurts to have some countermeasures of your own against removals, especially if your deck's themes and/or combos are heavily reliant on one card with poor redundancies/substitutes. There's no real "guide number", but I'd recommend around 5 in total, divided any way you want between the two sub-types. Most preferably your choices have synergy with your Commander of deck theme, even if it means going all-in with one and ignoring another.

Protection

Recursion
Others
Actually more accurately referred to as Utility (but PRO sounded much better than PRU), this is the "last" section you fill in. But wait, isn't mana-fixing lands after this? Yes, which is why you need to do one thing before you starting filling this "last" section, which is to clarify your numbers.
Walls of Text, but Critical to Deckbuilding
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At this point you need to tabulate the total number of cards already in your deck. Then you need to determine the number of lands you need in your deck. It may feel like a contradiction to think how many lands you need before you got all your non-lands in to determine your mana curve/intensity, but blindly going in more-often results in people loving to stuff it to the gills only to find out they only have space left for 20 lands (which is a big NO-NO), which is why this guide even focuses on establishing numbers for all your three pillars and PR before moving to this Utility section, which is probably the most "fun" part of deckbuilding.

If you completely have no idea of what your mana curve/intensity would look like, the general recommendation for total land count is to be at 38 lands. If it's not your first time building a deck and you could sort of mentally preview your curve to be much lower than the average, there's an argument for cutting down up to 2 lands, and if you're running Mana Crypt like me, you could safely reduce the count by 1. That makes the absolute minimum land count 35 and even then you really must anticipate/know your mana curve accurately.

On the opposite path, if you know you're putting too much weight, you might want to up to count by a couple at most, and even then 40 lands does put you at a risk of land-bloating that I would whether recommend you keep a tight rein on both the 38 land count and the "calorie intake" of your card choices instead. The only exception is if your deck is a lands-matter deck, and assuming it's a main theme of the deck, the numbers are skewed to around 40-minimum-to-45-maximum with no real average. There are some other decks out there that really delve deep into the theme with 50+ lands that do work, but I don't specialize in that and will not elaborate further (and 99-land decks are their own thing).

Let's say you took the 38-land assumption (no Crypt) and booted up on the minimum/average recommended suggestions I made (15 ramp, 15 draw, 13 removal and 5 PRs). That brings the total to 86 cards. Not counting the Commander (and I'm assuming no Partners), that leaves a whooping total of 13 spaces left for your utility, "fun" stuff. Sounds incredibly small, sad and not enough space for all the awesome ideas you had for your deck but now can't fit in.

It'll be tempting to start trimming cards from the prior sections, but please do not, for that is the most common temptation newer/casual players fall for, only to find out their deck doesn't churn along because the pillars that keep the deck (including the "fun" parts) running just aren't up to the task.

But, now is the time to restore a bit of hope. It's time to check back on the cards already in the deck and see how many lands are already residing there. Did you use Ancient Tomb as ramp? Did you let War Room smooth out your draws? Did you file Buried Ruin under recursion because you didn't want to waste a spell slot to get back one important but not numerous artifact in the deck? Everyone land you already used counts under the land total, which means you free one more space for your utility fun.

But what happens if you found out you didn't have that many lands that helped you free up space? Then I'd recommend you start looking up for those lands to take over some of your nonland choices in these categories to create that space. The secret to a well-oiled EDH deck that has space for its luxury plays is the one that finds the most land openings to fill in the pillars of its own oiling, not just cutting the pillars off for luxuries that no pillars are around left to support.

When it's done you should have around 15 to 20 open spaces for your utilities/fun (I actually have less because I usually go a couple above the recommended minimum for my pillars). It can still feel "little", especially for newer players, but at this point I just have to say that's the sacrifice it takes to be able to get what you consider fun up-and-running in a 99-card deck format with so much variance, it certainly isn't just 60+ cards of fun and lands. That's why like how you find lands in your pillar card-choices to make space, it's in your best interests to find nonland cards in those sections as well that synergize better with your themes, so that your pillars are also fun to play with as well.
Another small beacon of light to look forward to, there are lands that are utility and/or fun, and like with all lands before them, they fall under the land total quota, so they don't eat up your remaining spaces. That Treetop Village that isn't really protection but just small utility? Doesn't eat up your remaining establish space.

One very important thing to note when distinguishing if a land actually falls under the land total. I do not consider lands that are incapable of producing mana by themselves in a vacuum to one, if they're in for a non mana-fixing reason (which is why I count those last) and can't produce mana on their own, they're functionally like 0-mana "non-land" cards in a way. Maze of Ith strikes as the most common example (and no, even if you run Yavimaya, Cradle of Growth in the deck it doesn't just reverse this classification in the deckbuilding process, which usually favor in-a-vacuum status.
With the importance of juggling numbers in this section finally out of the way, let's briefly go through my miscellaneous card choices.
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Core/Combo

As I said, Re:Commanders decks are almost always built with combo-ways to close the games in case the primary win condition style is rendered unachievable, hence the pieces for these combos are usually my first priority in filling out my utility spaces. As I have a section dedicated to explaining the combos, I'll leave this part as short as possible.

Equipment & Support

Bloodforged Battle-Axe is a fun piece of tech, being 2 easily-equipped equipment for when it matters, even if double strike is redundant for the Commander.
Blade of the Oni is a pretty flexible card, being either a good voltron body or equipment for smaller creatures.
Kemba, Kha Regent is a fun way to generate board presence / sacrificial fodder on-theme.
Sword of Once and Future has relevant protections and can recur spells.
Nahiri, the Lithomancer is just my choice amongst the Nahiri planeswalkers as potentially trying for a Stoneforged Blade can be fun and she can return equipment from the graveyard, but you could potentially just run your favorite verion(s) of Nahiri and most of them work fine on varying levels of potency in the deck.


Other Utility

Shizo, Death's Storehouse is a way to grant Extus (or other Legendaries) evasion while Vault of the Archangel grants deathtouch (potent with first/double strike) and lifelink to your whole board.
Reverberate was too flexible for me to just classify it as removal, but as Magecraft also triggers on copying spells, I couldn't resist not having at least one card that can do that.
Invoke Calmity is under testing, but has potential for good payouts considering the structure of the deck.
Color-Fixing Lands
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At this point you should be done with all your nonland cards, and with some lands slots already taken up, you should roughly have about 30 land slots left in a multicolored deck, or substantially less (around 25) for a monocolored deck. Mono-colored decks pretty much don't need color fixing, so it's basically all basic lands filling the remainder. For multicolored decks though, now is the time to get your color-fixing options in, so you can reasonably produce the colored mana for your needs at any stage of the game.

I seldom talk about budget alternatives (be it high or low), but lands are among one of the more-commonly spoken of topics when discussing about budgets, so I'm supplying some alternatives here.

"Fetchlands" Package

I don't run off-color fetches solely for aesthetic purposes and also don't run ABUR duals because of price reasons (and also aesthetic reasons of they can't be foiled), so that leaves me with a simple fetch-shock combination.

I have a strict policy for as little mana-fixing lands that only enter the battlefield tapped as possible for my decks, but for my 3-colored decks, an exception is extended to lands that can produce all three colors. Savai Triome is fetchable and the premier of ETBT lands I permit.

For those with a higher budget/min-maxing, you can go up to 9 fetchlands (with sole exception of Misty Rainforest), but you'll likely need to include the ABUR duals over my other dual land choices to supplement the large amount of basic land-types you'll be searching (although I guess anyone planning to run 9 fetches in a tri-colored deck should already know that).

For those with a much lower budget, you can sub-in the fetches with the likes of Terramorphic Expanse, Evolving Wilds or even Fabled Passage, which also means you can replace the shocklands with other dual alternatives I'll list in the later section.

Tri-Lands

Lands that provide all three colors. As I've said, this is where I permit ETBT lands. For those with a higher budget/less decks, you can also run other lands that provide mana of any color like City of Brass or Mana Confluence, or lands like Reflecting Pool. I personally felt there were enough duals that work well enough in a three-color deck to not have to get these cards (my only copies of such cards go to my 5C deck), especially when I have so many decks.

Unconditional Lands

Lands that provide two colors and unconditionally enter the battlefield untapped, but have other costs involved. I personally chose the painlands, but depending on availability/affordability one can consider the Pathways (Blightstep Pathway), but you're locked into a color after the initial choice (and hence I consider them inferior especially for decks three-colors or more, they're okay for two-colored decks). Another option are the Horizon lands (Silent Clearing), they're like painlands, can be sacrificed to draw a card, but cannot produce colorless mana (without losing life). I personally don't use them because the cycle is incomplete but they're pretty solid stand-ins for those with mixed collections and don't mind as much.

Conditional Lands

Lands that provide two colors unconditionally but need a condition to enter the battlefield untapped. While in a vacuum, unconditional untapped lands are "better", I find in practice there are enough easy-to-meet conditional untapped lands that you don't really need those to be the majority.

As EDH is a multiplayer format (mostly), the Battlebond duals are pretty much the unparalleled choices, but for those who play more 1v1 games, they might not the lands of choice. Between the basic lands and shocklands (with the fetch package), checklands are also among the duals with the easiest untapped conditions to meet. If you run a wider fetch package (more fetches and/or ABUR duals), these lands might be of even greater priority than the Battlebond duals.

Alternatives include the SOI Lands/Snarls (Foreboding Ruins, Shineshadow Snarl), which are like checklands, but require the basic land type to be in (and revealed from) your hand, which makes them marginally worse than the checklands, but it's not a condition hard to meet either.


Dependent Lands

Alone, the filterlands are unimpressive, only capable of producing colorless mana, but when combined with outside sources that can produced their colored mana, they becomes incredibly flexible, capable of turning mana of one color into two of another even. They're not necessary in 3-colored decks (and especially if you run the full-blown fetchland-dual package, you'd probably don't have the space for them), but realistically the chances of "bricking" when you only run 3 filters when you have colored mana sources from lands and mana rocks are abysmally low that the flexibility they provide is definitely worth their addition, although I wouldn't fault folks who don't have them replace these slots with duals from the above categories that they have instead.

I consider the Guild Karoos (Rakdos Carnarium) under the same category, but the fact they enter the battlefield tapped means I do not recommend them as replacements generally (I only consider them acceptable in 2C decks). Those on a real tight budget can consider them, but note there's a substantial drop in power/flexibility if you do so. Shadowblood Ridge alone I would still recommend over a Guild Karoo, but the cycle is incomplete (and I don't like those) plus it itself hasn't seen meaningful reprint for quite some time.


Others


I wasn't dreaming when they told me you were gone,
I was wide awake and feeling that they had to be wrong.
How could you leave me when you swore that you would stay?
Now I'm trapped inside a nightmare every single f'ing day.

Instantly fix all of your B mana problems. I'm of the opinion any three-color deck with B should just run Urborg because it's just that impactful (even slightly moreso than Yavimaya, Cradle of Growth for G, as G at least has much more ways to fix mana naturally and especially moreso for decks with B but not G like this deck). Just a note it affects all lands, including your opponents', but as I said, outside of niche cases, the advantages it provides for a 3C deck usually surpasses potential backlash.

These are my choices for color-fixing lands, and we'll round the rest of the deck with Basic Lands. Every deck should always run some Basic Lands to "passively" combat nonbasic land-hate, especially the stax ones. As a general rule of thumb I calculate the mana symbols in all casting costs and non-mana abilities to have a rough gauge to determine how to divide the colors among my Basic Lands, with a cap that I should at least run 2 of each land type for coverage even if one color is played so little the formula results in recommending only 1 Basic.


Piloting the Deck

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I'm not going in-depth into this section (partially because I haven't had many actual games myself), but if you've established an understanding of how each card in the deck works, I don't think I need to overtly dictate specifically how any of my decks should play out in a game. Bluntly speaking, you need to ramp and set up draws as early as possible, and your starting hand should revolve around that set-up. General threat assessment usually means don't waste your removal on early "threats" that aren't lethal or overtly crippling (unless someone's super-aggro), you'll need to juggle around the mid-game and if you've resourcefully saved them could afford to be a little trigger happy nearer to the end-game.

Mulligan & Early Game (T1-T4)

This deck has a low mana curve and an initial aggro plan, but ramp is no less important to it than for other decks, more mana means the ability to cast more spells / draw more cards later on the game and the reliance on sorcery/instant spells in the game means you want that flexibility down the road.

While getting the Extus out early isn't absolutely vital, he still works well as a voltron Commander, so getting him out as early as possible to lay down some damage (or even knock someone out via Commander damage) is a viable option. Generally you should have a stronger board presence than other decks, so it might be advisable to save removal for later parts of the game. Trading often costs less for you than others due to equipment staying and the amount of recursion in the deck, including Extus.

Mid-Game (T5-7/8)

Chances are you didn't manage to knock anyone out or even substantially reduce multiple life totals due to the nature of the format, but at this point should be your big shot of attempting to finish that job before having to resort to the combos. Your opponents should have generally ramped already and are setting up for their strategies and wins, so it's a matter of using the removal correctly. An aggro deck needs emphasis on threat assessment and some political moves (it'll be even better to convince an opponent to use their resources to stop another's strategy/combo) if it wants to successfully get some more damage in the mid-game (in by itself is also a good political bartering point you can offer).

At the same time, one should also be prepared the pure-aggro plan to not succeed and more focus on hand-sculpting to assemble the deck's combos to be able to close the game should slowly start being a priority. This is why ramp is also important for the deck in the early game, so you could be multi-tasking all the things required in the mid-game effectively.

Late-Game (T8+)

Unless you're playing with a new group, your opponents should also know the deck will resort for a combo finish if the aggro-plan doesn't pan out in the game. Like in the mid-game, careful threat assessment and political plays are the way to try to pull off a combo-finish without letting opponents complete theirs.

Some bigger risks might need to be taken, like disposing of your own combo piece(s) and convincing opponents you can't recur it in time whilst you either can or can rummage fast enough through the deck to do so. As an aggro deck, your standing power is usually weaker than others in the late-game and makes you the easier player to "just knock out" when other opponents are also planning their routes to finish the game. It's up to correct timed plays to make sure your opponents think twice before considering to knock you out.

Remember, ultimately in a typical 4-player game where there can only be 1 winner, the odds are stacked against each player individually and the war of attrition is just a matter of who's the lucky one who managed to get his beatdown/combo down at the right moment when the other three exhausted all their immediate resources.

Combo Strategies


Karmiclark
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One of the classic combos, sacrifice Reveillark to bring back Karmic Guide and another creature, which lets Karmic Guide bring back Reveillark, then sacrifice Karmic Guide (and the other creature), followed by Reveillark to repeat the cycle. It's possible to create a limited version of the combo by using sacrifice outlets that require mana, for those who don't have cutthroat metas.

With Goblin Bombardment you can even bypass the need for death trigger cards, since Bombardment effectively functions as one (barring corner cases like damage prevention).

With Ashnod's Altar, one can generate enough colorless mana to finish the game with the likes of Debt of the Deathless (or Exsanguinate/Torment of Hailfire), also bypassing the need for a death trigger.
Relic Loop
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Cast one of the reanimate auras targeting Relic-Warder, then have Relic-Warder target the aura, this kills the Relic-Wader (triggering death trigger) and brings back the aura, which allows you to target the Relic-Warder again.

Unlike with the Reveillark/Karmic Guide combo, you can't use a sacrifice outlet to subvert the need of a death trigger card, since the two cards in the combo have to target each other otherwise the chain breaks, although you can kick-start it with a sacrifice outlet by playing Relic-Warder targeting the aura already on another creature, then sacrificing the Relic-Warder, which does give you more leeway to use the auras as plain reanimate tech without losing its combo potential.

Closing


This brings us to the end of this guide for Extus, the Indomitable. Not the strongest of my decks, especially with its identity crisis, but I suppose it does have at least a skeleton of the aggro deck of the suite in there. Unlike most of my other decks, this one hasn't particularly found most of its core components clicking together as well, but at the very least the ideological skeletal plan has withstood the test of time.
Someone has to the weakest un-innovative link in the suite and if I'd wager a guess this deck would be it (Freyalise at least has a restriction innovation, even if in practice it's probably weaker due to less color support). I won't deny this deck stayed somewhat stubbornly because my color balance has more or less been cast in stone (and changing that balance would probably lead to another deck or more having similar problems anyway).

Flavor

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Well, this is no primer, so instead of giving credits, I'm just going to the customized flavortown for the deck. (Actually the real reason is I sort of just absorbed random tidbits over the decades and can't remember all the specific sources I got, some I simply kept/forgot in my brain until years later, only randomly recalling the tidbit when I come up or have to refine my ideas/decks).

Time to admit it, subconsciously Mardu won the fight for the last tri-colored deck was because of flavor. If the deck's title and quotes aren't obvious enough, this deck is themed after the webshow RWBY (at least superficially). I found it amusing that if you substitute gold (multicolor) for yellow, essentially the show means the color combination of Mardu. Even the show says "Yellow beauty burns gold."

Tarkir didn't actually come out until over a year after RWBY premiered, but I was still pretty on board its rising wave then. It was a reason why I was so enthusiastic about building a Mardu deck when Tarkir came out (alongside Jeskai as both had commanders I didn't consider personally fun beforehand whilst the other three Clans didn't prevail over their precursor options). It was the equipment Boros deck I wanted but with B to cover its weaknesses. It helped that RWBY could be argued to feature a lot of awesome (even if realistically impractical) weapons, especially when the early seasons didn't establish its characters and world-building as much as the later ones due to its start-up nature.

Sadly, in early 2015, the show's creator, Monty Oum, passed on. I won't deny that was also a huge factor (I would go on to start planning and establishing Re:Commanders and its color balance only later in that year) that cemented favoritism of the Mardu choice over the other three (Jeskai, Esper & Grixis) that I wanted the deck loosely built around arguably his final legacy to be cemented into this suite plan I was building up. Of course, it helped immensely I could afford to "compromise" on the results of this decision (having to run a UW, UB and mono-R decks) by "color reducing" my Grixis and Jeskai decks and appointing my first MTG card (Ryusei) as Commander.

Sure, it entered a partial identity crisis faith ever since I didn't want a straight-up voltron build, but I'm proud in a selfish way I preserved my decision to maintain the deck for legacy reasons even if functionally it could do a lot better.


"I believe that the human spirit is indomitable.
If you endeavor to achieve, it will happen given enough resolve.
It may not be immediate, and often your greater dreams are something you will not achieve within your own lifetime.
The effort you put forth to anything transcends yourself, for there is no futility even in death."
-Monty Oum


RWBY has great songs (honestly they carried the early wonkier seasons of the show), to the point that not only does the main character's song (Red Like Roses) serve as the theme song, all songs it shares with each other deck in the suite is also a RWBY song I thought fit for both decks in some aspect.

Links to each song are below, and disclaimer that it's safer to assume every link is NSFW than vice-versa so make sure you're in your safest environment before pressing any links.

(Theme Song) Red Like Roses
(Song with Najeela) This Will Be The Day
(Song with Freyalise) Ignite
(Song with Yorion) This Life is Mine
(Song with Ryusei) Armed and Ready
(Song with Karador) All Things Must Die
(Song with Animar) Lusus Naturae
(Song with Grimgrin) When It Falls
If you enjoyed this [Re:Commanders] thread and would like to see another one, feel free to visit either the main [Re:Commanders] hub or any of the other [Re:Commanders] threads linked below

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