Sauron and the Nazgul

[Dunadain]

So I recently tried to make a deck around Rukarumel, Biologist, turning all my creatures into wraiths and then putting counters on everything with Nazgûls. I didn't really enjoy the deck, though.

First of all, it was a five color deck, which I can't stand for some reason; keeping track of the mana base is a pain, and they all feel like they have no identity.

Second, Rukarumel, Biologist doesn't work on tokens (unless they are slivers), meaning the deck was never able to go wide enough for the Nazgûl to pay off. Usually there were only a handful of creatures to put the counters on.

Third, while it was reasonable to find a Nazgûl when you have 9 in a 99-card deck, it wasn't easy to get multiples, and they only really start to shine in multiples.

So, I am writing Rukarumel, Biologist off as a failure, if I ever revisit her (him? Them? It?) I think I'll take it a different route,

However, I'm determined to make the Nazgûl work. I've always found the cards that break the singleton format rule to be fun, in a gimmicky way, and Nazgûl is probably the best (maybe Dragon's Approach might be better).

So here are the commander options I'm looking at:

Ratadrabik of Urborg: would take the deck in a combo direction; your ring bearer makes a creature legendary, so Ratadrabik of Urborg + Nazgûl + a sac outlet is an infinite combo. On the one hand, being able to run nine copies of your combo card is quite neat, on the other hand, combo decks are lame.

Lord of the Nazgûl: this is probably the commander your "supposed" to play the Nazgûl with, which alone makes me not want to play it. Additionally, I don't think they fit as neatly as you might think. Sure Lord of the Nazgûl makes a bunch of wraiths to make sure you got bodies to put tokens on, but the tokens don't need any counters, they are already 3/3s with menace, which is pretty chunky, and once you get 9 of them, they turn into 9/9s with menace. The Nazgûl would probably be win more, and your deck would be better off cutting the Nazgûl for more cheap cantrips/protection.

Sauron, the Necromancer, also produces wraiths, but rather slowly, and still doesn't solve the problem of how do we get multiple Nazgûl out on the field

Finally, Sauron, the Dark Lord, which is the option I've decided to go with. He lets you churn through your deck pretty quickly so that you can keep finding more and more Nazgûl and other cards that have the ring tempt you.

I thought about making it a "changeling tribal" deck; Army is a creature type, so you can play a bunch of changelings, swing, and start wheeling away your deck. I have some misgivings with this plan, however, First of all, changelings just kind of suck, the best one out there is probably Changeling Outcast, but even that isn't all that impressive. Secondly, you have to deal combat damage to have the ring tempt you, meaning your creatures have to survive a turn cycle, and then they have to get through unblocked. Thirdly, getting multiple ring triggers off of combat damage isn't even that good. The triggers will go on the stack at the same time, meaning you won't get a chance to cast most of the cards you draw before you wheel them away again unless they are instants (Sauron, the Dark Lord's wheel ability is a may ability, so you can choose not to wheel if you like your cards, but again, what's the point of getting multiple triggers if you're not going to make use of them. Finally, having changelings makes the Amass Orcs 1 ability worse; whenever you amass, you only get to make a token if you have no armies currently, and generally, making a new token is better than putting a +1/+1 counter on an existing card.

So, instead of relying on combat to cause the ring to tempt us (though we'll certainly take advantage of our orc army when we get the chance), we'll use cards that cause the ring to tempt us, most importantly, the Nazgûl. Every time we play a Nazgûl we'll get the opportunity to wheel into more Nazgûl.

Additionally, we can always play Maskwood Nexus to make our Nazgûl into armies, that sounds like a good time.

I'm certainly going to be running Nexus of Fate so that we don't deck, but I'm curious to see how good Nazgûl beatdown will be, or if we are just gonna go straight for the combo kill every game.

Alright, enough theory crafting, Ima go brew something now then get back to y'all.

[yeti1069]

If you look at my Sauron list (in sig) there are some cards in there that would work well for your game plan. On-field or from grave reanimation will help once you start wheeling a ton.

I'd considered The Dark Lord for a Nazgul commander, but ended up going with Smeagol (sig). I'm liking them there.

[Dunadain]

Behold! The fruits of my labor:

Decklist

DecklistCMCManaPricesChartsDraw 7

Commander(1)

1 Sauron, the Dark Lord

Army creator(3)

1 Arcane Adaptation

1 Conspiracy

1 Maskwood Nexus

Cheap ramp(10)

1 Cabal Ritual

1 Chrome Mox

1 Dark Ritual

1 Jeweled Lotus

1 Lotus Petal

1 Mana Crypt

1 Mana Vault

1 Mox Diamond

1 Sol Ring

1 Vessel of Volatility

Discardables(6)

1 Anger

1 Cling to Dust

1 From the Catacombs

1 Indulge // Excess

1 Quasiduplicate

1 Wonder

Infinite combo out(1)

1 Nexus of Fate

Lands(38)

1 Arcane Lighthouse

1 Arid Mesa

1 Badlands

1 Blood Crypt

1 Bloodstained Mire

1 Cephalid Coliseum

1 Command Beacon

1 Command Tower

1 Demolition Field

1 Flooded Strand

3 Island

1 Marsh Flats

1 Mines of Moria

1 Misty Rainforest

1 Mount Doom

3 Mountain

1 Mutavault

1 Otawara, Soaring City

1 Plaza of Heroes

1 Polluted Delta

1 Prismatic Vista

1 Scalding Tarn

1 Steam Vents

3 Swamp

1 Takenuma, Abandoned Mire

1 Underground Sea

1 Valakut Awakening

1 Verdant Catacombs

1 Volcanic Island

1 Watery Grave

1 Wooded Foothills

1 Xander's Lounge

Tutors(3)

1 Demonic Tutor

1 Imperial Seal

1 Vampiric Tutor

Value(5)

1 Black Market Connections

1 Reanimate

1 Mishra's Bauble

1 Urza's Bauble

1 Zombie Infestation

Wheels(21)

1 Bilbo, Retired Burglar

1 Birthday Escape

1 Call of the Ring

1 In the Darkness Bind Them

1 Inherited Envelope

9 Nazgûl

1 Ox of Agonas

1 Phyrexian Dragon Engine

1 Ranger's Firebrand

1 Rangers of Ithilien

1 Relentless Rohirrim

1 Sam's Desperate Rescue

1 Uruk-hai Berserker

interaction(12)

1 Chaos Warp

1 Deadly Rollick

1 Delayed Blast Fireball

1 Glen Elendra Archmage

1 Nihil Spellbomb

1 Orcish Bowmasters

1 Poison the Cup

1 Ravenform

1 Refuse // Cooperate

1 Saw It Coming

1 Sinister Concoction

1 Stratus Dancer

Approximate Total Cost:

I decided to go REALLY hard on the wheel ability. I kept the curve really low and I'm running a bunch of rituals and card-disadvantage spells because f*** it, I'm going to discard them anyways, might as well use them.

Cards like Mishra's Bauble are ways to "save" your cards before they get wheeled away.

Zombie Infestation let's you trade in any cards you can't play before wheeling for 1/2 of a zombie each.

There are 4 cards that we can run to turn all are creatures into armies (or wraiths if that's what the situation calls for): Arcane Adaptation, Maskwood Nexus, Conspiracy, and Xenograft. I decided not to run Xenograft because 6 is a tall order, but, honestly, it's probably correct to only run Maskwood Nexus and MAYBE Arcane Adaptation, but I really want to do the thing at least once with the deck, so I'm leaving them in for now.

I'm pretty happy with the interaction list I managed to put together. Interaction is usually best saved for when you need it, but wheeling effects encourage you to cast all of your spells as fast as possible, so I had to get creative. I'm still running a couple pf staples like Deadly Rollick and Chaos Warp, but I also found a bunch of interaction that can be "stored" outside of your hand for later.

The foretell mechanic, as much as I hate it, works wonders here, Delayed Blast Fireball, Ravenform, Poison the Cup, Saw It Coming can all be foretold and actually cast when you need them.

Stratus Dancer, Glen Elendra Archmage, Sinister Concoction, and Nihil Spellbomb are interaction that can sit on the board until you need them. Glen Elendra Archmage is particularly nasty if you have a Maskwood Nexus down, as you can use Sauron, the Dark Lord to "reset" her counters.

I really despise both morph and foretell, but they actually have some pretty neat synergies in this deck, so I withdraw at least some of my animosity towards them.

Mount Doom is also a board wipe that can hang out on the board until needed.

When I started brewing this deck, I figured it would be an unoriginal wheels solitaire deck that I'd play once and promise my playgroup I'd never play again. But I'm starting to think this might be a bit more unique then your average wheel deck. Rather than casting a bunch of wheels to get a bunch of triggers and storming out the table, It's playing a bunch of "wheels" that also add to the board, and eventually winning through combat. Additionally, unlike most wheel spinning decks, it's full of interaction. Finally, unlike most wheel decks it's not wheeling your opponents, negatng any long-term planning they want to do or, even worse, putting them to hell bent with Notion theif.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to act like I'm the good guy here, I still put Nexus of Fate in the deck, so I'll happily combo off if given the chance, but I'm hoping it won't be as bad as your average Nekusar, the Mindrazer/ Xyris, the Writhing Storm deck as it interacts with your opponents and let's your opponents interact with you on the board.

[yeti1069]

I can't believe I didn't think about foretell cards! This is a perfect deck to go heavy on foretell! Dream Devourer would probably be an excellent fit here! I definitely need to make some adjustments! That said, I have felt like my varying abilities to get stuff back or cast from the graveyard have been sufficient to keep chugging along. Saw it Coming is going in as soon as I can find my copy.

Sinister Concoction looks awful, even if you're committed to wheeling constantly. You might find Retribution of the Ancients to be very effective in your deck--you'll have PLENTY of +1/+1 counters to spread around.

The Ozolith will likely also be a good fit--your Nazgul and army will die/get bounced occasionally, so you may as well funnel that power into something new! It kind of nonbos with Retribution (above), but is fantastic otherwise!

For onboard abilities, I have really been liking Vat of Rebirth, Altar of Bhaal // Bone Offering, and The Reaver Cleaver.

Haunting Voyage seems tailor-made for your deck.

I don't think you need the otherwise-vanilla ETB: tempt creatures. I'm running far fewer tempt cards than you are (0 Nazgul) and find that I'm often cycling through my head pretty steadily. Don't overlook Elrond, Lord of Rivendell--2 creatures ETBing in a turn = tempt. If you have a sac outlet (I recommend at least a couple) you can sacrifice your army in response to a cast, ETB the new army, and do that again if your opponent casts a 2nd spell on a turn. It's kind of like Mangara, the Diplomat, except it becomes mini-wheel whenever an opponent casts their second spell in a turn, if you want to.

[Dunadain]

I can't believe I didn't think about foretell cards! This is a perfect deck to go heavy on foretell! Dream Devourer would probably be an excellent fit here! I definitely need to make some adjustments! That said, I have felt like my varying abilities to get stuff back or cast from the graveyard have been sufficient to keep chugging along. Saw it Coming is going in as soon as I can find my copy.

Sinister Concoction looks awful, even if you're committed to wheeling constantly. You might find Retribution of the Ancients to be very effective in your deck--you'll have PLENTY of +1/+1 counters to spread around.

The Ozolith will likely also be a good fit--your Nazgul and army will die/get bounced occasionally, so you may as well funnel that power into something new! It kind of nonbos with Retribution (above), but is fantastic otherwise!

For onboard abilities, I have really been liking Vat of Rebirth, Altar of Bhaal // Bone Offering, and The Reaver Cleaver.

Haunting Voyage seems tailor-made for your deck.

I don't think you need the otherwise-vanilla ETB: tempt creatures. I'm running far fewer tempt cards than you are (0 Nazgul) and find that I'm often cycling through my head pretty steadily. Don't overlook Elrond, Lord of Rivendell--2 creatures ETBing in a turn = tempt. If you have a sac outlet (I recommend at least a couple) you can sacrifice your army in response to a cast, ETB the new army, and do that again if your opponent casts a 2nd spell on a turn. It's kind of like Mangara, the Diplomat, except it becomes mini-wheel whenever an opponent casts their second spell in a turn, if you want to.

Sinister Concoction is awful, but I'm determined to find a deck it works in XD

yeah, forgot about Ozolith, the Shattered Spire, good call.

I've goldfished a couple times and I'm inclined to agree, too many tempt cards at the moment.

I don't really want to go the sac outlet route though.

[yeti1069]

I get not wanting to go the sacrifice route. I was really resisting it, and even now only have 4: Gollum, Patient Plotter (considering cutting this since I don't make good use of it often), Yawgmoth, Thran Physician, Goblin Bombardment, and Ayara, Widow of the Realm // Ayara, Furnace Queen (considering cutting this since I've had a few games where I had it in hand, but never bothered to cast it), and only 2 of those are repeatable as needed. I will say that an added benefit, albeit small in your list more heavily populated with creatures than mine, is you can sac a tapped army in response to spell to have a blocker up.

Soothing of Sméagol and One Ring to Rule Them All have both been good tempters for me. Soothing is instant speed, which is rare for the mechanic, and is only slightly over-costed for the effect, while ORtRTA packs a lot into one card: the mill may or may not be relevant (and you can choose a small power creature if you're not interested in big mill), then the board wipe is decent at both mopping up big boards and forcing players to delay playing out some creatures for a turn. The final chapter can sometimes be very relevant/lethal.

Looking forward to seeing some gameplay from you on this one.

[yeti1069]

Mount Doom is also a board wipe that can hang out on the board until needed.

I'm not seeing any legendary artifacts in your list to sacrifice to Mount Doom. At the very least, you could add a couple artifact creatures that you can make your ring-bearer for this.

[Dunadain]

Mount Doom is also a board wipe that can hang out on the board until needed.

I'm not seeing any legendary artifacts in your list to sacrifice to Mount Doom. At the very least, you could add a couple artifact creatures that you can make your ring-bearer for this.

I am the big dumb, lol. For some reason I thought you could sacrifice a legendary artifact OR creature, lmao.

[Dunadain]

Alright, I got one game in. The deck was slightly modified from @yeti1069's suggestions, here's the actual list i played:

https://www.moxfield.com/decks/H9_s-ATfMEqyZbKK8uinQw

THIS DECK %$#%! Holy smokes, I knew that this was going to be fairly high-power, but man, the table was forced to try to board wipe nearly every turn and it still wasn't enough.

Admittedly, I drew Maskwood Nexus on the first wheel, couple that with consistently having 1-3 Nazgûl out, and all of my creatures were monsters, I killed someone with a 20/20 bird from Swan Song.

There' something very messed up about playing a Nazgûl, putting 3 +1/+1 counters on your entire table, then drawing 4 cards, lol.

Not to toot my own horn, but Saw It Coming and Stratus Dancer worked exactly as I intended, allowing me to wheel away while still holding up counter magic.

cards like Lotus Petal and Vessel of Volatility were great, even after ramping into my commander, as I could always wheel to make up for lost card advantage.


I countered 2 wipes and 2 wipes resolved during the game, but Sauron, the Dark Lord had drawn me so many cards that I was still ahead after the wipes.

The messed up part was that I didn't even care too much about the wipes because I knew I still had Nexus of Fate in reserve, though, tbh, if every game the deck pumps out this much power, you probably don't need it.

I think I'll keep it around, as it succeeded in being a slightly more interesting wheel deck, but it's too high-power for most groups I play in.

[yeti1069]

Sounds like a great game! I'm trying to figure out cuts to work in some of the foretell/on-board interaction pieces.

I don't know what the rest of your playgroup looks like, but your mana base + rocks look fairly high-powered. If you're looking to dial it back a bit, that may be the place to do it.