by Johnny Cycles, May 16th, 2024

We’re continuing our Hydra theme this month with Zaxara, the Exemplary at the helm of a Sultai deck in Commander! Want a synergistic deck with CEDH potential? Love casting spells with in their mana cost? Dream of winning with Simic Ascendancy? Or of copying a massive Villainous Wealth? With Hydras, it can all be yours!

 

If you thought my interest in Hydras originated with Goldvein Hydra from Outlaws of Thunder Junction, you’re happily mistaken. When I got back into Magic in 2011, one of my first Standard decks played the unbeatable (ha) combo of Elgaud Shieldmate and Primordial Hydra, which you can read more about in last month’s Commander article. And while I didn’t win many games with my very first deck full of jank, Primordial Hydra sparked a love for the tribe that is going on 13 years now.

So when Wizards printed Polukranos, Unchained in Theros Beyond Death (2020), I immediately built a Hydra Tribal Commander deck. Up until that point, there were only a few legendary Hydras to choose from, none of which were that appealing to me. Ulasht, the Hate Seed was the first legendary Hydra and, honestly, I didn’t know it existed until writing this very sentence. Guildpact released in 2006, which was right in the middle of the decade or so I took off from playing Magic. It seems like a fun build-around with a Saproling theme.

Magic’s first three legendary Hydras.

The second legendary Hydra printed was Progenitus (Conflux 2009), which does give us access to every color to ensure we miss no busted Hydras. However, at 10 mana, I’m not sure Hydra Tribal is the deck for this bomb to shine.

Finally, there was Polukranos, World Eater, printed in Theros in 2013. And while I played this legendary Hydra in Standard and loved every time I resolved it, I didn’t find a Mono Green Hydra Tribal deck very appealing. It seemed too much like a straightforward Green Stompy deck. This didn’t interest me that much at the time, nor did it strike me as a very competitive form of that kind of deck.

But with the printing of Polukranos, Unchained and the addition of Black to the deck, I decided to give Hydra Tribal a shot. I built the deck and quickly realized how boring it was to play… There’s nothing wrong with playing big beaters (Green) backed up by removal (Black) and, in fact, one of my early Standard decks was essentially a Mono Green Go Big deck splashing Black for Underworld Connections and Abrupt Decay out of the sideboard. But in Commander, I already had at least one other Golgari deck and my Polukranos, Unchained deck felt like it was running the same support cards but with Hydras instead of Spiders.

Then Wizards printed Zaxara, the Exemplary, also in 2020, and everything changed. The addition of both Blue and matters took my Hydra Tribal deck from a humdrum pile of the usual suspects and transformed it into a synergistic, powerful, and janky thing of beauty. I’ve written about the impact, both positive and negative, Tribal Precons have had on Commander and I don’t always think Wizards gets it right. However, they nailed it with Zaxara, the Exemplary. The Nightmare Hydra is a fair card with a super high ceiling that elevates Hydra Tribal from a kitchen-table, fun Commander deck, to as powerful as you want to make it. And yes, that includes CEDH.

One of these is the strictly better counter….with Zaxara, the Exemplary at the helm!

Before I get to the decklist, I’ll just say that this deck has gone through several iterations, but always centered on Hydras. The support cards I’ve chosen have changed. At first, the deck used a lot of Planeswalkers to manage both the early game and problematic permanents, making it a grindy Superfriends deck with powerful creatures as top-end finishers. Over time I slowly cut many of the Planeswalkers for powerful enchantments and instant-speed interaction.

Honestly, both versions of the deck resembled Hydras plus whatever busted cards in Sultai colors I wanted to play more than a dedicated Hydra strategy looking to abuse Zaxara, the Exemplary‘s unique static ability. More specifically, my spells were almost entirely Hydras, while my interaction was what you would come to expect from Sultai (Counterspell, Assassin’s Trophy, etc.).

But as I continued jamming fun and powerful new and newly reprinted cards into the deck, it sort of fell apart. It was just a Midrange strategy that had a hard time keeping up with true synergistic decks. Using Vraska the Unseen to answer a single enchantment or creature before she dies in combat is extraordinarily underwhelming in Commander. Resolving Grave Pact with no way to abuse it is only so powerful.

The build you’ll see below has been revamped completely. I’ve prioritized spells beyond Hydras to include counter magic, removal, graveyard hate, card draw, and even tutors. This doesn’t mean each noncreature spell has in its casting cost, but we’ve increased the number to such an extent that we should be able to reliably trigger our commander several times a game. These extra 2- and 3-for-1s have greatly improved the deck.

Enough of all that for now! Here’s the deck:

Decklist – Sultai Hydra Tribal with Zaxara, the Exemplary

Zaxara, the Exemplary

Creatures (28)

Goldvein Hydra
Hungering Hydra
Mistcutter Hydra
Protean Hydra
Genesis Hydra
Hooded Hydra
Hydroid Krasis
Primordial Hydra
Scavenging Ooze
Steelbane Hydra
The Goose Mother
Vastwood Hydra

Voracious Hydra
Endurance
Grakmaw, Skyclave Ravager
Lifeblood Hydra
Scourge of Skola Vale
Spellseeker
Nylea, God of the Hunt
Polukranos, Unchained
Polukranos, World Eater

Ironscale Hydra
Kalonian Hydra
Phyrexian Hydra
Gargos, Vicious Watcher
Hydra Broodmaster
Ulvenwald Hydra
Vorinclex, Monstrous Raider

Artifacts (3)

The Ozolith
Elementalist’s Palette
The Great Henge

Enchantments (8)

Hardened Scales
Primal Rage
Simic Ascendancy
Branching Evolution
Garruk’s Uprising
Unbound Flourishing
Parallel Lives
Doubling Season

Instants (9)

Brainstorm
Clash of Wills
Condescend
Erebos’s Intervention
Syncopate
Abrupt Decay
Assassin’s Trophy
Cyclonic Rift
Logic Knot

Sorceries (13)

Ponder
Serum Visions
Farseek
Finale of Devastation
Sylvan Scrying
Curse of the Swine
Demonic Tutor
Nylea’s Intervention
Silver Scrutiny
Cultivate
Kodama’s Reach
Villainous Wealth
Damnation

Lands (38)

Boseiju, Who Endures
Breeding Pool
Castle Vantress
Command Tower
Fabled Passage
Field of Ruin
Hinterland Harbor
Lair of the Hydra
Misty Rainforest
Nurturing Peatland
Overgrown Tomb
Polluted Delta
Prismatic Vista
Temple of Deceit
Temple of Mystery
Undercity Sewers
Underground Mortuary
Undergrowth Stadium
Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
Verdant Catacombs
Wasteland
Waterlogged Grove
Watery Grave
Zagoth Triome
Forest (5)
Island (5)
Swamp (4)

Deck Tech

Primary Game Plan

In some ways, regardless of our changes, we’re still a Midrange deck looking to beat down with giant creatures. However, what makes this deck so much fun and synergistic is twofold. First, our commander incentivizes us to play spells, as each one we cast gives us a Hydra token. Second, many Hydras, including the tokens we make with Zaxara, the Exemplary, enter the battlefield with counters on them. Counters matter and abusing counters is another aspect of the deck that makes it so much fun. Backing these two game plans up are some powerful interaction and enablers.

Hydras with X in the Casting Cost

We play a total of 22 Hydras, 13 of which have in their casting cost. Honestly, this number feels a little low every time I count them up. However, despite Hydras making their first appearance all the way back in Alpha, there are only 65 Hydras in the game (Oracle). I’ll discuss other Hydras we could include at the end, but given how few total Hydras are available to us, it’s no wonder we don’t have more ones.

Before I get to each one, I’ll say two things here that are both relevant and crucial to each of these Hydras. First, their synergy with Zaxara, the Exemplary makes each of these creatures a 2-for-1. And, since Zaxara’s static ability is a cast trigger, even if our opponent counters our spell, we still get a Hydra out of it. Second, each of these Hydras enter the battlefield with counters on it, which synergizes with our various ways of abusing counters. As you read what each one does, keep these added benefits in mind, as they are essential to the synergies, power, and reach of the deck.

Goldvein Hydra – a new, superpowered mythic from Outlaws of Thunder Junction, this Hydra has three key words and leaves Treasure tokens behind when it dies. It’s in the running for best Green mythic creature of all time, in my mind. Shots fired, Questing Beast!
Hungering Hydra – following one of our best is one of our more unimpressive Hydras, and yet it’s very powerful in its own way. It’s great on defense, and it makes blocking problematic for our opponent. Do they take the hit or grow the beast? Finally, we play several ways to give our Hydras trample, which means there will be times when limiting the number of blockers to one will be game ending.
Mistcutter Hydra – another less-than-impressive Hydra on first glance, this card has a lot going for it. Haste can steal us games out of nowhere, particularly in combination with The Ozolith (more on this later). Protection from Blue in a format dominated by Blue means an early Mistcutter Hydra can literally go the distance against some decks.

Want to see Mistcutter Hydra in action in Modern? Check out my Hydra Tribal deck here!

Protean Hydra – an oldie first printed in 2010, this Hydra grows with each combat survived. It also allows for potential shenanigans with moving counters around our creatures. And while we aren’t looking to do this in our current build, it is a fun and possibly powerful new wrinkle. Furthermore, Wizards has recently printed a Commander Precon in which counters play a big role, so this strategy has gotten some exciting new tools.
Genesis Hydra – a Commander all-star (at least in Big Green decks), this Hydra is a 2-for-1 all by itself. Be warned, however, that its ETB ability does not synergize well with our permanents. For the least risk and highest reward, cast Genesis Hydra with equaling .

Hooded Hydra – Morph is pretty low on my list of powerful mechanics, but we’re not really interested in that aspect of this Snake Hydra. Replacing itself with 1/1 green Snake tokens is strictly better than simply dying, like most creatures, even if they are largely underwhelming. However, we do play both Doubling Season and Parallel Lives, which make Hooded Hydra‘s demise twice as powerful!
Hydroid Krasis – I had already mostly quit playing Standard when Hydroid Krasis was printed, but it warmed my heart to see a Hydra getting some serious play. And what’s not to like about this card? It’s got three creature types, two key words, and three ETB effects! And the art is incredible! I can’t wait to try this in a Simic Hydra Tribal deck in Modern.

Primordial Hydra – behold the card that started my Hydra love affair! I’m not even sure I’d put this in my top 5 best Hydras…or possibly even my top 10. Sure, it has game-ending inevitability, which counts for something. But unless we have a ton of mana to sink in to it, our opponent will have at least one turn to find an answer before it gains trample and several more before it becomes lethal. Still, put yourself in the shoes of a person playing Magic in the 90s seeing this card for the first time. It’s power and stats are unbelievable!
Steelbane Hydra – an answer for artifacts and enchantments, though at a high cost. At least we don’t have to tap it to activate its ability.

The Goose Mother – a fairy-tale rendition of Hydroid Krasis, we get Food tokens that can be turned into either cards or life, rather than simply drawing cards and gaining life on ETB. It’s not a bad card, by any means, and how can you play a Hydra Tribal deck without it?
Vastwood Hydra – another okay Hydra superpowered by our commander. Its death trigger can be very relevant, particularly if we have The Ozolith and some other creatures out, or it can be a nonfactor in the face of a sweeper.
Voracious Hydra – its flexibility to function as removal makes this Hydra one of our best draws. Trample should not be overlooked either, as there are games where we have giant Hydras, but our opponent can chump block for days with 1/1 tokens of some non-Hydra sort…
Lifeblood Hydra – what a card! We just established how important trample is for a deck like ours, plus we get the spell value, plus we gain life and draw cards when it dies! Playing Lifeblood Hydra into a non-exile sweeper feels like we’ve already won the game. That art though…not sure I like having a depiction of a Hydra getting its heads cut off in my Hydra Tribal deck. Feels like a bit of a betrayal…

Noncreature Spells with X in the Casting Cost

We play 10 noncreature spells with in their casting cost. They can be divided into several categories, but, what they all have in common is they come with an X/X Hydra token with Zaxara, the Exemplary on the battlefield. And while some of these spells are outclassed in head-to-head comparisons with other cards, when we add in the token we get, our choices come out on top every time!

Counter Magic

Clash of Wills – a card from Magic Origins I’d honestly forgotten about until I found an FNM promo in my collection one day, this is our first of four Counterspells. And since this is the first one, I may as well go ahead and get the brutal truth out of the way: these are some of our weakest spell cards and we would frequently prefer to have the hard counter for than the Hydra token we get from this group of answers.

Why? Because unless we’re casting these early or to target a big bomb, it usually requires all of our mana to actually successfully counter something. On more than one occasion I’ve been faced with the choice of doing nothing so as to keep all my mana up for a card like Clash of Wills, or risk not being able to counter what my opponent does on their turn because I’ve used some of my mana to advance my board. This is not a good place to be. However, the silver lining is that even if our opponent can pay for , we still get the Hydra if Zaxara, the Exemplary is out.

Condescend – a strictly better Clash of Wills. Casting this early just to slow down our opponent and set up our draws is often worth it, even if we don’t get a Hydra out of the deal.
Logic Knot – even costing an additional , Logic Knot is better than Clash of Wills since we can use our graveyard to help put out of range of our opponent’s resources.
Syncopate – the spell we counter is exiled, making this card also strictly better than Clash of Wills…I guess that card is just not very good. Vanilla, is the correct word, to be fair.

Card Draw

There are quite a few card draw spells with in their casting cost, some of which we’ve played in earlier versions of the deck. I’ve chosen only one for the current build.

Silver Scrutiny – I like the flexibility this card offers us. If we have counter magic in hand, we can hold it up, then cast this for to pull ahead on resources. Or, in the late game, we can refill our hand completely, while netting a big Hydra.

Removal

Curse of the Swine – what an amazing card! If only it were an instant…I feel like if this card was printed today, it would be. Either way, Curse of the Swine is a poor wizard’s Cyclonic Rift in a lot of ways. More often than not, it functions as a game-ending sweeper, even if the opponent gets Boars out of the deal. But beyond being a 1-sided sweeper, exiling is such a powerful effect in Commander that even using it to get rid of a single difficult-to-answer creature can be worth it.
Erebos’s Intervention – our first of the Intervention cycle from Theros: Beyond Death, we get to choose one of two modes. The first is relevant here and is another way to deal with indestructible creatures. The lifegain is also not nothing.
Nylea’s Intervention – another potential 1-sided sweeper against the right decks (looking at you Angels and Dragons…), since Hydras don’t typically fly. Which is also a reason we want answers to fliers.

Graveyard Hate

Erebos’s Intervention – at instant speed, this card gives us a tool to nerf reanimation strategies with their trigger on the stack.

Tutors

Finale of Devastation – a conditional tutor that comes with the added bonus of doubling as a finisher in the right spot.
Nylea’s Intervention – reading just the first mode of this card makes me think it’s woefully underplayed in Commander (in 1% of decks according to edhrec.com). Anyone who’s played Commander for even a short while knows how important lands are to a deck’s synergies, power, and win rate that go beyond simply enabling us to cast our spells. There are so many relevant utility lands we can fetch up with Nylea’s Intervention, and we aren’t even a deck looking to abuse landfall triggers or loop Wasteland effects from our graveyard. That doesn’t mean we don’t have some good targets for this card.

Just a few of the utility lands we can tutor up with Nylea’s Intervention.

We have card draw, land destruction, a creature land, a way to filter our draws, and an answer to artifacts and enchantments as legitimately good targets for Nylea’s Intervention. And, if I can find an extra copy, we need to add Bojuka Bog and its graveyard hate to this list.

Finishers

Finale of Devastation – it’s not Craterhoof Behemoth, but when equals 10, it should function as a 1-sided boardwipe or kill our opponent dead.
Villainous Wealth – another conditional finisher, there’s no guarantee we get anything worth stealing from our opponent’s deck, but it is highly likely we will. And highly entertaining. And highly annoying…for our opponent.

All said, we play 22 spells with in their casting cost. That’s a third of our nonland cards. If you think that number is kind of low, there are many other options from which you can choose. Otherwise, we have plenty of ways to trigger Zaxara, the Exemplary‘s static ability. And since that ability very specifically says we “put X +1/+1 counters” on the Hydra token we make, we want ways to abuse +1/+1 counters.

+1/+1 Counters Shenanigans

We play 14 cards that care about +1/+1 counters one way or another. These are in addition to the Hydras listed above, which also have counters put on them, and the Hydra tokens we make with Zaxara, the Exemplary. When we add all of those in to this list, we have a whole bunch of ways to put counters on creatures, abuse putting counters on creatures, and straight up win the game for putting counters on creatures.

Branching Evolution – the first enchantment that doubles the number of +1/+1 counters we put on creatures. It’s pretty busted in this deck.
Doubling Season – the second such enchantment, it also doubles our token generation, which is even more busted with Zaxara, the Exemplary. A single spell where equals 5 gives us two 10/10 Hydra tokens with Doubling Season on the battlefield.
Hardened Scales – only adds a single +1/+1 counter to our creatures, but at , it’s a cheap investment that can add a lot of incremental value to our deck over the course of a game.

Grakmaw, Skyclave Ravager – the first of our creatures in this section, we get to put the counters on it on ETB, which will trigger our support cards like Doubling Season and Hardened Scales. We get to put a counter on it when something else with a counter on it dies, again triggering our support pieces. And finally, it replaces itself. Not bad value for a 3 drop.
Ironscale Hydra – surviving combat only grows this Hydra…and that flavor text is pretty good too. I don’t imagine this otherwise vanilla 5/5 will grow too much since it only gets a single +1/+1 counter on it no matter how much damage it survives, but it synergizes with our gameplan.
Polukranos, Unchained – a 4-mana 6/6? Seems pretty deec, even before the rest of the textbox. It also gives us some removal and something to recur from our graveyard.
Scavenging Ooze – one of our few non-Hydra creatures, this Commander staple gives us some graveyard hate, a little bit of lifegain, and synergizes with our +1/+1 counters shenanigans.
Scourge of Skola Vale – it enters with 2 +1/+1 counters, which can trigger our support pieces that care about that, but the real payoff is trample plus it’s sacrifice ability. On the right boardstate, we can either move counters over from The Ozolith to get through chump blockers or sacrifice our biggest creature (or a big Hydra token) to help make blocking problematic for our opponent.

Simic Ascendancy – our oops, I won the game, card, I think we have one of the better set-ups to abuse this enchantment. Between our commander putting counters on the Hydras we make, our Hydras, and The Ozolith, we are uniquely positioned to get 20 counters on Simic Ascendancy with a quickness. But that’s not all! For the low, low cost of , we get to put a counter on a creature we control and trigger both it and all our other shenanigans. Even having lived the dream of winning with this once, I don’t think I’m going to cut it. It’s too powerful, too synergistic, and too much fun!
The Great Henge – a Commander staple that triggers many of our support pieces.
The Ozolith – what a great card! As I’ve said before, it puts our opponent in the unenviable position of choosing to block/kill one of our creatures and die to the next one, or not to block/kill one of our creatures and die to it instead. And that’s exactly where we want to be!

Unbound Flourishing – this is how you get to cast Villainous Wealth twice! Question: even without the obvious synergies with our deck, would we need to include it simply for the synergies between its art and our deck?
Vorinclex, Monstrous Raider – a card that does it all for us! It doubles the counters on our Hydras, while nerfing our opponent’s counter shenanigans. It has both trample and haste, which are both highly relevant in a deck like ours. And finally, it synergizes extremely well with Phyrexian Hydra, allowing us to 1-shot our opponent.

Kalonian Hydra – I once traded a Cryptic Command for a Kalonian Hydra back when it was first printed. It was a fair trade at the time. Soon after, though, Cryptic held its value, while Kalonian Hydra‘s tanked. Now, however, I’ve gotten the better of the exchange, with the mythic Hydra costing about $5 more than the former Modern staple. I tell you this because you don’t need me explaining how powerful and busted this card is in our deck…

Other Hydras

As you can see above, not all of our Hydras have in their mana cost. Even if it were possible to include only such Hydras in our deck, I wouldn’t want to. There are too many powerful options that synergize with our deck outside of spells, as you can see with a card like Kalonian Hydra. I won’t rehash the five Hydras discussed in the Counters section above, but including these, we play 10 Hydras without in their casting cost.

Gargos, Vicious Watcher – 6 mana is a lot for a creature, so we better get a lot of value out of it. Honestly, I’m on the fence on Gargos, particularly as can be hard to get in time to cast this Hydra on curve. But an 8/7 with vigilance is respectable for 6 mana. Its cost reduction does count towards our spells, and this is where Gargos has a chance to shine in our deck. With the right support pieces out, we can cast multiple Hydras with equaling or from a mana investment standpoint, but or with Gargos, Vicious Watcher on the battlefield. With Zaxara, the Exemplary out, this would give us a total of four 5/5 or 6/6 Hydras. A turn like that can pull us ahead pretty quickly. The rest of Gargos’s textbox is far from irrelevant and can insulate us from spot removal or control magic, for example. That’s right, control magic, as in:

Hydra Broodmaster – another 6-mana Hydra, I love this card, despite it being very mana intensive. A 7/7 for 6 is slightly above curve, but we’re mostly interested in its monstrosity ability. Hydra Broodmaster can make an army all on her own. I also have fond memories of playing her in Standard and making a bunch of baby Hydras for the win. Powerful and flavorful!
Polukranos, World Eater – another Hydra with monstrosity, this former Standard powerhouse is great as an early threat and as a mana sink in the late game.

Phyrexian Hydra – now we’re talking! 5 mana for a 7/7 is the kind of rate we like to see. Infect gives us another angle of attack. I actually won a game this way against my brother-in-law who was playing, wait for it, an Infect deck… The irony!
Ulvenwald Hydra – a powerful option for several reasons. With reach, it gives us some protection against fliers. It scales up with our lands, the best of which it tutors up on ETB. 6 mana is a lot, but our goal is to flood the board with big beaters and this one gets bigger with each turn (in theory) and finds us a utility land along the way!

Support Cards

I’ll divide these into two categories: creature and noncreature. This is where I’d look first if you wanted to make changes or make room for other Hydras or some pet cards.

Creatures

Endurance – instant speed graveyard hate can be the difference between winning and losing.
Nylea, God of the Hunt – in our deck primarily to give our Hydras trample, the rest is gravy (and powerful).
Scavenging Ooze – graveyard hate that synergizes with our counters shenanigans. The lifegain can be a pretty big deal, too, sometimes.
Spellseeker – a holdover from when part of the deck was full of Sultai good stuff. Still, being able to fetch up a timely Cyclonic Rift, Assassin’s Trophy, or Demonic Tutor can be all we need to secure the win.
Vorinclex, Monstrous Raider – as discussed above, a great threat that synergizes with our strategy, while hosing our opponent’s same strategy.

Noncreatures

Garruk’s Uprising – both card draw and trample is exactly what we want in a support card in this spot.
Parallel Lives – doubles up our Hydra tokens.
Primal Rage – more trample enabling… Trample is kind of a big deal for us.

The Rest

As I’ve mentioned, earlier iterations of this deck played both more Planeswalkers and more good stuff cards in Sultai colors. And while I’ve cut back on many of these in favor of additional Hydras and spells, there are still some powerful cards that remain from those earlier builds. And I don’t have plans on cutting them any time soon, as they are largely facilitators and answers.

However, this is another segment of cards that allows for a lot of personalization, innovation, and creativity, as well as moving up and down the power level scale. Do we need 1-mana cantrips and 2-mana removal spells? Do we need a sweeper like Damnation? Or ramp like Farseek? They certainly help smooth out our draws, provide us with answers to problematic cards, and give our deck some catch-up-ability.

I’ve divided these facilitators into four groups: ramp/mana fixing, card draw, answers, and tutors. I won’t discuss each card in detail, as most are widely played or familiar.

Ramp/Mana Fixing

Most Commander decks should play some ramp. 3-color decks looking to cast giant spells definitely should.

Cultivate
Elementalist’s Palette – a mana rock seemingly specifically designed for our deck. This 3-mana artifact was actually printed for the 2021 Commaner Prismari Precon deck featuring Zaffai, Thunder Conductor as its commander. What’s so odd is that Precon has a total of two spells in it… Still, we’re happy this card exists. Is it more mana efficient than Sol Ring or Arcane Signet? No. Does it have greater upside in our deck than those two? Yes. Is it more synergistic in a Hydra build? Most definitely. Is it more flavorful? Probably not.

Wonder why you don’t see Sol Ring in any of my Commander decks? Read this.

Farseek
Kodama’s Reach
Nylea’s Intervention – I’ve already waxed poetic about this card’s power and potential, but in case you skipped that section, the relevant part of this spell for us is: “search your library for up to X land cards”. That’s any lands. And yes, this doesn’t count as ramp but it does let us get the colors we need to cast our spells or the utility lands we need to hose our opponent’s game plan.
Sylvan Scrying
The Great Henge

Is a strictly worse card worth playing over a strictly better one simply because it’s shiny and has cool art?

Card Draw

Brainstorm – if you aren’t playing fetch lands, I’d cut this cantrip for something similar.
Ponder
Serum Visions – this should probably be Preordain, but I have the shiny, alternate art Serum Visions and can’t find my copies of Preordain…

Answers

Abrupt Decay
Assassin’s Trophy
Cyclonic Rift
Damnation

Tutors

Demonic Tutor
Finale of Devastation

Flex Spots

I’ve foreshadowed this section pretty heavily, so it should come as no surprise when I say look to the sections Support Cards and The Rest for places to make changes. Doing so will leave the Hydra Tribal aspect of the deck intact, as well as most of its fun and powerful synergies.

However, another place you can look to make significant changes is in the noncreature spells. Yes, they’re an important part of our strategy and pull us ahead in games, but is Clash of Wills better than Mana Drain? Is Erebos’s Intervention better than Mutilate? Making such changes would move the deck closer to CEDH, but at the cost of some of what makes Hydra Tribal with Zaxara, the Exemplary unique.

Finally, there are plenty of spells out there that I haven’t included here. There are also other ways to abuse counters. These are places you can expand and play your favorite cards or ones you consider better options for your meta.

Here’s a list of the some of the cards that have been in versions of this deck before:

Herald of Secret Streams – who needs trample when we can make our creatures unblockable? It’s a Merfolk, however, which conflicts with my tribal purity…
Change of Plans – card filtering and sweeper protection? Yes!
Multiple Choice – a cantrip that scales up in power. This could be a good substitute for Serum Visions or Brainstorm.

Exponential Growth – a game-ending play in the right spot.
Biomass Mutation – arguably a better version of Exponential Growth, but both should be game over if done correctly.
Open Into Wonder – another spell that could easily find a home in the 99… Making our team unblockable and drawing cards? In a normal Commander game, this card is great at killing one opponent and setting you up to kill the next one. In French Commander, the first part of the text should be enough to be game over.

Body of Research – I’m sure I’m not the only person who saw this card and immediately wanted to play it in Commander. I never got to live the dream of casting this with Simic Ascendancy out before I cut it. It definitely feels like a 6-mana, color restrictive, win-more card.
Pull from Tomorrow
Finale of Revelation

Other Hydras

There are several Hydras that should be considered for the 99 but that I don’t currently own or am not including for other reasons. Here they are:

Benevolent Hydra – a Hardened Scales attached to an Hydra spell? Yeah, this needs to find a home in our deck, but I don’t currently own a copy.
Hydra Omnivore – another one I don’t have in my collection, but that should be in the 99.
Khalni Hydra – made a brief appearance in an earlier version, but felt like a win-more with too many hoops.
Managorger Hydra – I’m on the fence about this one. It synergizes well with our counters shenanigans and comes down early enough to matter, but I’ve tried to make room for as many spell Hydras as possible. Still, as I write this, I’m leaning towards finding a spot for it.

Neverwinter Hydra – I love everything about this card and am sorely tempted to open the Commander Precon it appears in rather than wait on my copy to become available online.
Whiptongue Hydra – a powerful answer to fliers that synergizes with our deck, I play this Hydra in my Mono Green Elf deck of all places. So much for tribal purity…
Wren’s Run Hydra – another Hydra that can come down early. It has reach, which is a bonus, and gives us some instant-speed trickeration with its reinforce mechanic.

Ideal Hand and Game Play

Some variation of the above seven cards would be a great opening hand. We have card draw, ramp, a threat, and a combo piece. Of course, we don’t have any interaction, but you can’t have it all! Our main goal is to make it to turn 5 when we can untap with our commander down and cast our first large spell. With that in mind, we want our opening 7 cards to have lands and things we can do to set us up for the mid- to late-game. Counter magic or kill spells are great. Cantrips and ramp spells are also good. What we don’t want to see are a lot of 5- and 6-drop Hydras in our opening 7.

Ours is not an overly complicated deck or strategy. We are looking to commit a whole bunch of big fatties to the battlefield and win through combat. And while we have answers and interaction, we will just as often manage our opponent’s boardstate by attacking and forcing blocks. We are a midrange deck that plays a largely fair game (Simic Ascendancy aside). Thus, we want to pressure our opponent’s life total early and often to keep them on the back foot and unable to execute their game plan.

Weaknesses

As a midrange, fair deck we are susceptible to sweepers. I’ve cut all the protection spells I’ve played over the years in favor of more Hydras and less reactive cards. However, it’s not a bad idea to make room for something like Fierce Guardianship or Heroic Intervention. I’ve played Change of Plans in the deck before and would recommend it over the above two for its synergies with Zaxara, the Exemplary.

We have counter magic and graveyard hate, so we have some answers to unfair and combo decks, but since we are more of a grindy deck, it’s possible our one answer won’t be enough to protect us against an unfair strategy. Look to the Flex Spots section for ideas on where to make room for cards to help against your meta.

Overall, I’ve tried to make room for cards that can deal with a wide range of decks. My answers are sometimes not the most optimal in favor of flavor or synergy, so this would be a place to make changes if you want to increase the power level of the deck.

Conclusion

Hydra Tribal in Commander is as fun as Hydra Tribal in Modern! In fact, it’s probably more fun, since we get to do more busted things. Zaxara, the Exemplary is the perfect commander for a Hydra Tribal deck! The Nightmare Hydra has a unique static ability that is fun to build around with lots of room for innovation and creativity. If you are looking for a Midrange, creature-based deck that cares about tokens and counters without losing access to things like counter magic and sweepers, this is the deck for you!

As always, thanks for reading and watching! Do you have a Hydra Tribal deck? Who is your commander? What cards am I overlooking? Let me know in the comments are at johnnycycles16@gmail.com!