by Johnny Cycles, December 27, 2023
Love playing a traditional control deck full of counter magic, but harbor a secret love of aggressive strategies, too? Love aggressive strategies, but have a hitherto unexpressed longing to hold up mana for a hand full of counter magic? Think Wizards really needs to bridge the gap between draw-go control and aggressive creature archetypes? Want to leverage the raw and terrifying power of Magic’s monsters of the sea? Love all the value Planeswalkers bring to the table? That’s a lot, but this deck has it all! Read on to find out more!
Decklist – Mono Blue control with Urza, Lord High Artificer
| Urza, Lord High Artificer |
Creatures (9)
| Snapcaster Mage | |
| Cemetery Illuminator | |
| Spellseeker | |
| Consecrated Sphinx | |
| Torrential Gearhulk | |
| Hullbreaker Horror | |
| Scourge of Fleets | |
| Stormtide Leviathan | |
| Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger |
Planeswalkers (11)
Artifacts (13)
| Chrome Mox | |
| Mana Crypt | |
| Mishra’s Bauble | |
| Mox Opal | |
| Commander’s Plate | |
| Expedition Map | |
| Relic of Progenitus | |
| Shadowspear | |
| Soul-Guide Lantern | |
| Pithing Needle | |
| Sapphire Medallion |
| Coalition Relic | |
| The One Ring |
Enchantments (7)
| Frogify | |
| Search for Azcanta | |
| Imprisoned in the Moon | |
| Propaganda | |
| Rhystic Study | |
| Frozen Aether | |
| Shark Typhoon |
Instants (17)
| Brainstorm | |
| Mystical Tutor | |
| Counterspell | |
| Cyclonic Rift | |
| Mana Drain | |
| Archmage’s Charm | |
| Disallow | |
| Dissipate | |
| Fierce Guardianship | |
| Force of Negation | |
| Aetherize |
| Cryptic Command | |
| Aetherspouts | |
| Desertion | |
| Force of Will | |
| Spell Swindle | |
| Mystic Confluence |
Sorceries (5) with 1 mfdc
| Ponder | |
| Preordain | |
| Lórien Revealed | |
| River’s Rebuke | |
| Sea Gate Restoration |
Lands (39) with 1 mfdc
Academy Ruins
Fabled Passage
Flooded Strand
Ghost Quarter
Maze of Ith
Misty Rainforest
Mystic Sanctuary
Polluted Delta
Reliquary Tower
Rishadan Port
Rivendell
Scalding Tarn
Strip Mine
Urza’s Saga
Wasteland
Island (22)
Why Urza, Lord High Artificer?
Mono Blue has no shortage of powerful commanders to helm a control build. In fact, I’ve played two other commanders in a similar shell as this one. My first commander was Empress Galina, primarily because my wife’s name is Galina, but also because the card is a powerful (and annoying) commander. 5 mana for a fragile body in a deck that doesn’t run many creatures, however, meant she would nearly always get killed if we tapped out for her on turn 5. And, being a control deck, we never wanted to tap out on turn 5. Or ever, really. Furthermore, while she could disrupt our opponent’s strategies by stealing their commander, she didn’t do enough to further our gameplan in other ways.
My second commander was Thassa, God of the Sea. She fixed many of the issues with Empress Galina. The Sea Goddess comes down early enough that we can typically take a turn off without falling too far behind. And she is difficult to deal with, being an indestructible enchantment creature. Scrying each turn off of her static ability synergizes extremely well in a control build. She also fits the flavor of our finishers, which are largely sea monsters (I played more of these bombs with Thassa as my commander). If Urza, Lord High Artificer had never been printed, Thassa, God of the Sea would still be my commander.
So what makes Urza, Lord High Artificer the best commander for a mono Blue control deck? The answer is manifold. First, and most importantly, he almost always doubles our mana. Turning all of our artifacts into Mox Sapphires doesn’t just ramp us, it allows us to time travel. With 5 lands and 4 artifacts, we have the mana resources on turn 5 that others won’t until turn 9. Obviously, this is a huge advantage, but in a control deck, it is even more so.
control decks are known for their slow, grindy play style that entails a lot of draw, play a land, then pass the turn, otherwise known as draw-go. The control player is on the defense for most of the game until they can stabilize and stick a finisher with the mana for counter magic to protect it. This can easily take 10+ turns in formats much faster than Commander. All this time allows our opponent many turns to pressure our life total, play around our counter magic, or simply get lucky and stick a threat our answers don’t line up with. Urza, Lord High Artificer gets us to stabilization nearly twice as fast. The extra mana we get from our artifacts means we can cast our finishers on curve while still holding up counter magic. It almost doesn’t feel fair.
Further speeding up our game is the Construct creature token we get when Urza, Lord High Artificer enters the battlefield. This is the second reason to play Urza over any other mono Blue commander. It won’t be unusual for this Construct to be a 5/5. And while this might not seem like a big threat in the world of Commander, when a 5/5 on turn 3 or 4 comes down on an empty board and is backed up by counter magic, we can close out a game extremely quickly. And that’s not all. Every subsequent artifact we play reads in addition to its actual text, “Tap, add to your mana pool,” and “Constructs you control get +1/+1.”
Need…more…Constructs!
This aggressive strategy supported by the Construct Urza, Lord High Artificer brings with him is so effective, we also play Urza’s Saga and Karn, Scion of Urza to give us two other ways to make Constructs. Pumping our team of Constructs will often let us be the aggro deck, while still playing control spells. This dual, and contradictory, strategy is further supported by our choice of cheap artifacts, many of which either further pump our Constructs (Shadowspear and Commander’s Plate) or further hinder our opponent from executing their gameplan (Pithing Needle and Relic of Progenitus), all while still putting us ahead on mana.
Third, this aggressive start, both in having nearly twice as much mana as our opponent and in having legitimate attackers that come attached to our commander and other powerful cards, means we avoid another traditional pitfall of control decks: running out of answers before we stabilize. Control strategies have to play a healthy amount of card draw to ensure they always have that counter spell when it’s needed, or that sweeper to stop the bleeding. When we have our own fast and aggressive start, this need for a full grip of answers lessens considerably. You don’t need as many answers when you’re the one beating face.
Fourth, we get teammates. Planeswalkers are a control player’s dream, but are hard to play on curve as they are frequently too fragile without more support. Untapping with Urza, Lord High Artificer and a few artifacts means we will more often have the mana and the means to keep them alive until our next turn. There’s a reason Planeswalkers are the only other part of the game that can be attacked besides players (at least, until the recent printing of the Sieges). Once they’re on the battlefield, they do their own thing in concert with the cards in our hand. More specifically, they function as a repeatable advantage with no further mana investment, while also offering a legitimate clock. They are a powerful tool in any deck; they are super powered in this one.
I haven’t even touched on Urza, Lord High Artificer‘s last ability, which gives us conditional card draw at instant speed and as many times as we have mana. And while hitting a creature or Planeswalker on our opponent’s turn or a counter spell on our own when we activate Urza, Lord High Artificer is a legitimate risk, we aren’t looking to abuse this part of all that text on the card. In all the games I’ve played with the deck, I’ve only used this ability a handful of times, many of which were basically just for fun and because I could. And in a moment of desperation, sometimes you get lucky and find the answer off the top.
Urza, Lord High Artificer is not just the best commander for mono Blue control, he is the most fun. If you haven’t tried him out yet, believe me when I say, playing Urza at the helm of a control deck like this will change how you see control. He has set a bar that no other mono Blue commander can come close to.
The Deck
Control decks can be divided roughly into five parts. First, counter magic. Preventing permanents from entering the battlefield is usually the most effective way to stay alive. I say usually only because of reanimation strategies that want to cheat big fatties in from the graveyard and so often will be happy something gets countered. Second, kill spells, both targeted and universal. It’s unrealistic to think we will counter everything our opponent casts. The seasoned control player knows how important their life total is as a resource. Allowing a powerful, but not game-altering or game-ending creature to resolve and swing in a few times before we deal with it can be the difference between winning and losing.
Third, card draw. No deck wants to run out of cards, but control decks need as many as possible to ensure they always have the right answer at the right time. Fourth, finishers. Regardless of strategy, we still have to kill our opponent, which means we either have to mill them out or win via combat. Of course, there’s always grinding our opponent’s will to live so far into the ground that they scoop, which does happen often enough when playing control, but we can’t reliably count on this. Finally, land drops. Yes, every deck needs lands to cast their spells, but control wants to make a land drop every single turn of the game.
Counter Magic
Being one of my favorite and most powerful decks, I’ve not shied away from playing the best and most efficient counter magic. Furthermore, not having access to a second color that has hard removal at its disposal means our counter spells carry more of the burden of keeping us alive. We have less ways to deal with a threat once it resolves, which means we need to stop it from resolving to begin with. Another factor in deciding to play the answers I have is that our sweepers only return permanents to their owner’s hand. This effect will usually keep us alive and buy us a couple of turns, but we want to have cheap counter spells ready to answer our opponent’s threats the second (or third) time around. Blue has no shortage of counter magic, much of which brings either flexibility or additional benefits or both. Let me know in the comments what your favorite answers are!
Archmage’s Charm – we more often than not will be using the counter or draw mode on this card. The last option, while perhaps not as impactful in Commander as in Modern, gives us the flexibility to steal an opponent’s mana rock if they (or us) are missing mana or a powerful utility card, like Land Tax, Esper Sentinel, or Mother of Runes. Many combo decks like Elves or Sacrifice also rely on 1-drops to execute their gameplan. In the right spot, this triple instant can wreck that plan.
Counterspell – it does what its name says…
Cryptic Command – a former Modern staple, this counter spell can do just about everything a control deck wants. It can draw us a card to keep us ahead on resources. It can tap all of our opponent’s creatures to buy us a turn to find more answers or let us swing in for lethal on our turn. It can bounce whatever problem permanent our opponent snuck in under our counter magic (or a land to put a mana-screwed opponent further behind). It can even bounce our own permanents, in case we want to get more value out of Mystic Sanctuary. And finally, of course, it counters a spell. We only get to pick two, of course, and typically we want the tried and true combo of counter-draw, but there will be times the other modes are life or death.
Desertion – what’s better than countering your opponent’s biggest, baddest, scariest creature? Yup, countering it and then stealing it. Talk about a back-breaking, salt-inducing play. The flavor text says it all: “First the insult, then the injury.”
Disallow – for more than Counterspell, we can target activated and triggered abilities. Stopping a Planeswalker ultimate is one dream to live with this card. Nerfing a fetch land is the greediest. I’m sure there are many more ways Disallow can ruin your opponent’s fun beyond a simple counter.
Dissipate – 3 mana for a Counterspell that exiles the card rather than letting it hit the graveyard may seem like too much. Maybe you’re thinking there are better, less mana intensive options. After all, staying alive is more important than exiling, right, and sometimes life and death hinge on the difference between 2 and 3. Or maybe that’s just my inner monologue every time I look through this deck to make room for the latest hotness. However, gameplay has time and time again underscored the power and annoyance of exiling the countered spell. Sometimes we hit something our opponent uses as bait because they have a way to recur it. Other times we nerf a spell with Flashback. Commander is full of ways and cards that abuse the graveyard. Dissipate gives us an answer to this attached to one of our answers. Two things for one is easy math, even for this former Russian literature professor.
Mana Drain – speaking of two things for one…countering a spell and getting the mana from that spell is almost as good as countering and stealing. That this effect is only makes this the best counter we have in our deck that we have to pay mana for. I cast Stormtide Leviathan off the extra mana from this on turn 4 once and never looked back
Fierce Guardianship – our first of 3 free counters. This one only targets noncreature spells and is free only if we have our commander out, which makes it really good at protecting said commander.
Force of Negation – the second, this one also targets noncreature spells and is free only on our opponent’s turn and comes at the cost of a blue card in our hand.
Force of Will – Magic’s premier free counter, this one comes at the cost of a blue card from hand and 1 life. However, the benefit is that it counters any spell. As you can tell by now, these free counters are only free insofar as they don’t require us to spend mana on them if their other conditions are met. Nothing’s really free…except this life lesson.
Mystic Confluence – this card has such great upside. 5 mana to draw 3 cards feels the best. 5 mana to counter a spell unless our opponent pays 9 feels the worst. The ability to bounce 3 creatures can function as a sweeper for us in the right spot
Spell Swindle with Urza out equals…
Spell Swindle – with our commander out, this card reads: “Counter target spell. Create X Mox Sapphires, where X is that spell’s converted mana cost.” Enough said.
Sweepers
Blue, of course, doesn’t have access to true sweepers, like Wrath of God or Damnation. What it does have are ways of bouncing creatures and nonland permanents back to their owner’s hand. The chief problem with most of these cards is they are universal, meaning all of our permanents will go back to our hand, as well. This is a nonbo with our Constructs and, usually, our Planeswalkers. For that reason, we are not able to play all of these effects, which means we only have 5 such sweepers. In theory, this seems like too few. However, in reality based on actual game play, this has not been a problem, as we are good at digging for answers, can amass our own army, and have enough other ways of stabilizing that we aren’t as reliant on sweepers to do the job for us. In fact, ever since I switched to Urza, Lord High Artificer as my commander, it is my opponent who more often needs a sweeper to stay alive.
It is worth pointing out that bouncing our opponent’s entire board, either just creatures or all nonland permanents, does not always mean we are swinging out on our turn and winning right then. It’s true we can close out the game this way, but more often than not we are using these spells to stay alive and give us time to stabilize. This stabilization takes many forms. Typically, after a sweeper like this, it will take our opponent 2-3 turns to rebuild and they won’t be able to recast everything the same turn. This gives us the chance either to hold up counter magic or stick a Planeswalker that can shut down a 1 or 2 threats for a turn while we gain advantage elsewhere.
Aetherspouts – this is one of our best sweepers, if not the second best after only Cyclonic Rift. Why? Our opponent’s creatures don’t go back to hand, but rather on the top or bottom of their library, which can send our opponent back to the Stone Age. The draw back? It’s only attacking creatures. Luckily, even the most cautious opponent will frequently send more creatures our way than they should when we have all of our mana open to play around some form of removal that isn’t this…
Aetherize – for less, all attacking creatures go back to their owner’s hand. Same drawback as Aetherspouts without the upside. Still, it does the job.
Cyclonic Rift – there’s a reason this card is still around $30, even after many reprintings. It offers an early game Time Walk and a late game “I win.” More than any other sweeper on this list, it is rare to cast this at full value and lose.
River’s Rebuke – a 6-mana sorcery is not ideal, but when it’s life or death…Also, since it hits all nonland permanents, our opponent will take even longer to rebuild, meaning we are likely to get several turns of reprieve out of this card.
Scourge of Fleets – a sweeper on a big body? Yes, please! One thing to be aware of, however, is we do play a lot of utility lands. I’ve been in the awkward spot of this 7-mana Kraken only bouncing creatures with 4, sometimes 3, toughness. Those games are usually not going my way already.
I usually save cards like these for my Flex Spots section, but I wanted to mention Fade Away here as it’s the closest thing Blue has to an actual sweeper. At its best, we cast it after our opponent floods the board with creatures or tokens, is tapped out, and doesn’t have a lot of land or random value artifacts and enchantments to sacrifice to keep around their best threats. For sure they will still keep around their best threat(s), but if we’re able to follow this up with a bounce spell or use our Planeswalkers to nullify the creatures that remain, then we’ve accomplished our task. At its worst, we cast it, our opponent sacrifices a bunch of land, then swings out for lethal on their turn. I’ve cast Fade Away in both situations… I eventually cut it, as it can punish us as much, if not more, than our opponent given how aggressive our starts can be with Urza, Lord High Artificer. If you’re looking for another sweeper effect for your mono Blue deck, try this one out and see how you like it.
Targeted Removal
Yes, even mono Blue has some targeted removal, though nothing like Terror or Doom Blade. Blue’s removal tends to do one of two things. It either exiles/destroys a creature or permanent and replaces it with a worse creature, or it enchants a creature or permanent and makes it into something worse. Many of our choices are at instant speed and only until end of turn, which can lead to some blowouts, but can also leave you with the problem creature on your next turn. I’ve chosen the targeted removal Blue has access to that is more permanent.
Frogify – losing all abilities is the crucial part of this text. Making Atraxa, Praetors’ Voice or Narset, Enlightened Master into a 1/1 may let you win in combat, but it doesn’t actually stop the abilities that do the most damage. Something like Asinine Antics is a powerful spell, but when your creatures keep their abilities, it is often supremely underwhelming. The drawback of Frogify, of course, is that it’s an enchantment and can be removed in numerous ways.
Imprisoned in the Moon – I love this card, even though I always consider cutting it for the new hotness. It has all the same benefits and drawbacks as Frogify, with the added bonus of being able to target lands and Planeswalkers. Cabal Coffers getting us down? Imprison it in the moon! Narset, Parter of Veils stopping our card draw? To the moon! Blood Artist draining you too much? We have a special place set aside for him on the moon!
It’s worth noting that if we target a commander with one of these two cards, our opponent doesn’t get to return their commander to the command zone to recast later. Instead, they’ll have to figure out a way to get rid of the enchantment if they ever want their commander back. If you’ve never cast an enchantment like this, then let me assure you, it’s super annoying and effective.
Card Draw
We wouldn’t be a control deck if we didn’t play an obnoxious number of ways to draw extra cards. Counting our commander, we play 26 such spells. That means nearly half of our nonland permanents draw us a card. If we account for the various tutor effects and cards like Snapcaster Mage that we play, which technically are not strictly card draw, we are over half. That’s a lot of snowballing card advantage. I won’t discuss each individual card here. Many of our Planeswalkers draw us cards and are discussed in their own section. Some of our counter magic also can draw us cards, as I mention in that part. Here, I will instead focus on the remaining card draw in the deck, many of which have the flexibility of doing more than just drawing us a card.
Yes, sometimes bigger isn’t better.
Cantrips
For those new to Magic, don’t overlook the power of these spells. In a format as grindy and bomb-filled as Commander, it can be tempting to look at these kinds of cards and think: “Eh, they’re underpowered. I’m sure I’ll make my land drops and if I don’t, I’ll have time.” Think of these cheap card-draw spells as the oil that makes the engine of our deck run. Without them, we can easily grind to a halt, or stumble too much to stabilize in time to turn the corner. Most decks want cards like these that help find answers or lands for a low mana investment. Control decks want them even more. Resist the urge to cut the 1-drop draw spell for that new full-art foil Enchanted Tales Omniscience you opened. When you’re stuck on mana and draw a 10-drop enchantment instead of a cantrip, your dreams of crushing your opponent with an avalanche of free spells will be shown for what it is: a win-more, losing strategy. I, uh, of course, am not speaking from experience or anything…
Brainstorm – an instant speed draw 3, put two back, please note that we get to put any 2 cards back. This is one of the main reasons we play fetch lands. Nothing is more painful than casting Brainstorm in search of a land, only to hit 3 big fatties with no shuffle effect. All said, we play 13 ways to shuffle our library, in part, to avoid such a scenario. I recently listened to a podcast that argued Brainstorm is overrated in Commander precisely because of the lack of consistent shuffle effects. This is a big drawback, but the risk-reward is still in favor of playing Brainstorm in our deck. I think the key is to look at it not as a way to find big threats or answers, but as a reason to keep a land-light hand, since our chances of finding lands off of Brainstorm are much greater than one of our big threats. In a land-heavy hand with no fetch lands and a Brainstorm as our only early action, I’d say take a mulligan.
Ponder – a “fair” Brainstorm, this one is sorcery speed and only lets us look at the top 3 cards without the option of putting things back from our hand. However, it gives us a choice of shuffling or not. Those same 3 big fatties Brainstorm revealed? Shuffle them away and hope to draw a land off the top.
Preordain – another card that let’s us theoretically go 3 deep in our deck digging for answers.
Card Draw that Does Something Else
2-for-1s are the bread and butter of competitive Magic. These cards either straight up give us two things in a single card, or have the flexibility to do 1 of 2 things, both of which are relevant in the right spot.
Cemetery Illuminator – another card I eyeball hard when wanting to add a new card, I’ve yet to see this Spirit in action. This is one reason I’m reluctant to cut it. All that text, though, is the real reason I keep it in the 99. Graveyard hate plus conditional card draw on a 2/3 flier is quite a lot of value. It could be that reality will teach me otherwise and it will either just die or never exile a relevant spell, but I’m going to keep it in until I find out.
Consecrated Sphinx – 2 cards for every 1 our opponent draws is quite the going rate. Being a 4/6 flier gives us an okay finisher and a good blocker.
Lórien Revealed – flexibility is why this card is in the deck. Making land drops is always a priority for control decks, and the Islandcycling on this sorcery ensures we don’t miss one early, while the draw 3 for should guarantee that we don’t miss one late, while also finding more action.
Mishra’s Bauble – perfect knowledge of our opponent’s next draw can be life or death, assuming we have a Counterspell in hand to stop it. That and drawing a card are the 2 things Mishra’s Bauble does. Its synergies with Urza, Lord High Artificer and our Constructs are 2 more. That’s 4 things in 1 card!
Relic of Progenitus – every competitive Commander deck needs artifact hate, and this artifact is tutorable with Urza’s Saga, and synergizes with our commander the way all of our artifacts do. Being able to exile a card a turn from an opponent’s graveyard or exile all graveyards and draw a card means we have 5 things in 1 card!
Rhystic Study – we either get to draw a card or tax our opponent, but either way, we get to annoy them! That’s 3 things this card does!
Sea Gate Restoration – 7 mana is a lot when it could net us only a single card. However, it’s a free include since it’s the backside of a land.
Search for Azcanta – the enchantment side reads Surveil 1 and should set us up to find what we need. The card draw comes on the land side, Azcanta, The Sunken Ruin. 4 total mana to dig 4 cards deep isn’t a bad rate, though sometimes what we’ll really need is a land or creature. The chief reason we play this card, though, is for the front side. Getting this down on turn 2 puts us a step ahead of our opponent in finding answers or threats.
Shark Typhoon – what a card! It’s something straight of of Sharknado and that is awesome. This 6-mana enchantment has the flexibility to cycle it in the early game to draw us a card in search of a land or answers, or to hard cast it in the late game as one of our finishers. And it fits our sea monster subtheme!
Snapcaster Mage – a 2-for-1, this Human Wizard gives us card advantage while not literally drawing us a card, unless we use him to flash back one of our draw spells. The 2/1 body is a nice chump blocker to protect a Planeswalker for a turn.
Soul-Guide Lantern – a worse Relic of Progenitus in a lot of ways, we do get to exile all graveyards with no further mana investment, which will sometimes be very relevant.
The One Ring – buys us a whole turn to stabilize, while drawing us more and more cards each turn. The life loss could be relevant, but given our ability to have fast starts and close out games quickly, we should be able to navigate this draw back well enough.
Torrential Gearhulk – Snapcaster Mage on steroids, we can only target instants with this mythic Construct, but we don’t have to pay its mana cost. The 5/6 body is nothing to sneeze at either.
Sea Monsters
Give the people what they want!!!
And that’s giant sea monsters ruining our opponent’s fun and life total. What better way to flex our control muscles by tapping out for some of the biggest, the baddest, the most fearsome finishers in the multiverse? We have no fear of what our opponent can do once one of these fatties is on our side.
Okay, well, maybe a little fear, but these beasts of the deep ocean can immediately flip the script and make us the aggressor. These four finishers are what remain from the first version of the deck that featured many sea creatures. Despite my love of jank and playing what makes you happy, neither is the reason I’ve kept these particular sea monsters in this version of the deck, though they scratch both of those itches. No, these are legitimate top-end finishers for our deck that, per usual with any card we play in Commander, do more than one thing. In this case, each card does more than close out games extremely fast.
Hullbreaker Horror – this Kraken Horror does it all. We get to hold up our own counter magic until the end of our opponent’s turn, flash it in, and then start getting all that sweet, sweet value out of it once we untap. We typically first want to bounce a problematic permanent, ideally with a cantrip or cheap artifact. After that, we usually hold up any number of our instants, whether they be card draw, counter spells, or sweepers, to use to stop our opponent from whatever they want to do on their turn. So much of playing control is managing the board state, staying alive, and protecting our own threats. This card gives us the ability to do all of that as long as we have spells to cast. Our instant speed sweepers suddenly become counter spells. Our artifacts become bounce spells. Our Planeswalkers now all have, “, Return target nonland permanent to its owner’s hand. You may activate abilities of Planeswalkers you control twice.”
Scourge of Fleets – a 7-mana 6/6 is fairly underwhelming, but it’s all that other text that we care most about. Mono Blue doesn’t have true sweepers, but it is really good at bouncing our opponent’s creatures. We play many of these effects and I’ve played games where I’ve needed every one of them. Also, don’t underestimate that underwhelming 6/6 at closing out games once our opponent has to rebuild.
Shark Typhoon – who doesn’t want to play this card? Flying sharks inside a tornado works on so many levels. That, and it’s super busted in this deck. Once on the battlefield, all of our Planeswalkers enter the battlefield with a flying Shark token to protect them. Thank you! Shark Typhoon is also another way we can quickly go from defense to offense and close a game out in just a few short turns.
Stormtide Leviathan – 8 mana is a lot…unless we cast it off the mana we get from Mana Drain. Once again, what we care about most with this card is all that text. Shutting down attacks from all but flying or island-walk creatures means this card often stabilizes us all by itself. From there, we get to attack with an 8/8 while doing what control does – pulling ahead on cards and holding up counter magic.
Honorable Mention
Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger – not a sea monster, though all those tentacles sure look like it’s one. Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger costs a ton of mana, but since we are able to double up on our mana early, it is entirely possible we will cast this Eldrazi on turn 5 or 6. His cast trigger is often all we need to stabilize, even if our opponent has an answer.
The Walkers
One of the best and most fun parts of this is deck is the amount of Planeswalkers we get to play. Commander as a format is not as friendly to Planeswalkers as other formats since we have to protect them from 3 opponents, rather than just 1. Thus, the likelihood of untapping with these extremely powerful permanents is highly unlikely. Planeswalkers offer their controller a repeatable resource with no additional mana investment, as well as a finisher in their ultimates. For this reason, opponents in a traditional Commander game will go out of their way to kill a Planeswalker, even if its controller isn’t considered the biggest threat at the table. And while I typically play French or 2v2 Commander, protecting Planeswalkers is still not that easy given the power level of the format and the kinds of creatures people play. Many decks can either ignore a Walker and win, or play bombs of their own that make a Walker pale in comparison. I love Planeswalkers, but I tend to play them as support pieces that synergize with my deck’s game plan. Their ultimates give me an alternate win condition in the best of scenarios, rather than my primary win con.
Urza, Lord High Artificer in a control build changes all of this. First, we have the potential to be the aggressive deck by making huge Constructs early that can win in combat. This makes attacking down one or more of our Planeswalkers that much more difficult. Second, Urza is a must-answer commander, so if an opponent has a choice to use a kill spell on him or one of our Planeswalkers, they will almost always choose him. Third, his static ability that time warps us ahead of our opponent in regards to mana means we can cast our Walkers on curve while still holding up mana to keep them alive via counter magic or bounce spells.
Finally, we play a lot of fast mana that allows us to stick a 5-mana Planeswalker as early as turn 2. Many opponents won’t have cast a creature at this point, which means we are highly likely to untap with a powerful Walker on the battlefield. And while any deck can play fast mana, we are doubly incentivized to do so given the synergies artifacts have with our commander.
Planeswalkers are at their best in a control shell. Control as a strategy wants to draw and pass in order to hold up mana for its answers until the late game when it can stick a finisher with counter magic mana open to protect it. Planeswalkers allow the control player to gain an advantage each turn without having to tap any more mana and risk not being able to counter whatever nonsense their opponent tries to do. Furthermore, many Planeswalkers are designed specifically with control in mind. One mode deals with an opponent’s threat. A second mode draws cards. The ultimate wins the game. In our deck, we often will use a Planeswalker to stabilize, even if only for a turn, as we keep digging for whatever we need. If we have our fast mana and our opponent is not doing anything, we will almost always prefer to stick an early Walker over our commander. Otherwise, we want to get our commander down and start building an army of blockers, or use all of our extra mana to play multiple Planeswalkers and slowly pull ahead that way. For as many games as end via combat with sea monsters or Constructs, we grind out value with multiple activations of multiple Planeswalkers. As you will see, each either synergizes with our various angles of attack or with our game plan of managing the board until we can turn the corner and pull ahead.
Another great synergy playing Planeswalkers have with our control deck is they will often function as 1-turn Fogs. Rather than attack our life total, our opponent will frequently have to take a turn off to kill our Walker (or try to). This plays right into our overall strategy of stay alive until we can stabilize and turn the corner. Yes, we’re often sad when one of our Planeswalkers dies the turn after we cast it. And yes, that usually means we’ve cast an overcosted and worse Fact or Fiction (Jace, Architect of Thought) or Brainstorm (Jace, the Mind Sculptor), but when it buys us a turn to draw, play a land, and do our next big thing, then it’s worth it.
Enough preamble. Lets get to the good stuff!
Jace, Architect of Thought – perhaps it’s because I started playing Magic again about a year before this Jace was printed, but I have a special place in my heart for what many considered a far worse version than Jace, the Mind Sculptor. And, to be fair, this Jace is worse, but, to be fair again, it’s not a fair comparison. That’s a lot of fairs…Anyway, the reality is that Jace, Architect of Thought does a lot of what we want. His +1 can shut down go-wide strategies, while his -2 quickly puts us ahead on cards, while digging for whatever we need. I’ve never gotten to his -8; we almost always would prefer cards from our own deck using his -2 than race for his ultimate. And, by the time we get to that ultimate, most opponents scoop.
Jace, the Mind Sculptor – until the printing of Oko, Thief of Crowns, this Jace was considered the GOAT. He may still be. We will almost always first want to use his 0, but his -1 can keep the board clean long enough for us to stick some more Planeswalkers.
Jace, Unraveler of Secrets – another pet card of mine that I just can’t bring myself to cut, no matter how many times I’ve stared long and hard at it. But it’s not just because it’s a favorite of mine. The card has proven to be very powerful in this deck. 5 loyalty is a lot to deal with, even in Commander, while ticking him up draws us a card! Many Planeswalkers only draw us cards using their minus ability, so this feels extra powerful. His -2, particularly on a board where our opponent is counting on 1 or 2 creatures to do the heavy lifting/killing, can be the prick that eventually ends in our opponent’s death. His ultimate, which I’ve used on a number of occasions, makes playing Magic super annoying, not to mention really hard to win through.
Karn, Scion of Urza – this is another of my favorite Planeswalkers and perhaps an odd choice on first glance, as his first two modes function as a slow card-draw engine with the drawback that our opponent chooses the first card we draw off of him. Honestly, however, in actual game play, we don’t care which card we get the first time unless we’re dying the next turn. Worst case, opponent gives us a land to ensure we keep making our land drops, which is so crucial in a control deck (even in one like ours). Its Karn, Scion of Urza‘s -2 that makes this Planeswalker one of our most powerful. What’s better than 1 huge Construct? 2 more, obviously…Casting Karn after our commander when we have a few artifacts out is one of our fastest, most aggressive starts. The flavor win alone almost makes Karn, Scion of Urza an auto-include.
Tamiyo, the Moon Sage – another of my all-time favorite cards, her +1 is sneakily powerful. Cabal Coffers ruining your day? Tap that. Fast mana putting your opponent too far ahead? Tap that. A 5-color deck leaning too hard on a single land? Tap that. Krenko, Mob Boss about to go off? Tap that. I use Tamiyo, the Moon Sage, above all other Planeswalkers short of Ugin, the Spirit Dragon, to stabilize the board. I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve used her -2. I’ve probably gotten to her ultimate as many times, to be honest. She is a really, really powerful Planeswalker in this format.
Teferi, Temporal Pilgrim – one of two recently printed mono Blue Planeswalkers, this Teferi is from The Brothers’ War. He passes the eye test, with a respectable 0 and a -2 that can protect him. However, I’ve yet to have the chance to see him in action. What intrigues me and makes me think he has the potential to be busted is how Wizards has linked his abilities to us drawing cards. Both his loyalty and the Spirit creature tokens he makes grow with each card we draw. We have the potential to draw a lot of cards. Teferi, Temporal Pilgrim not only synergizes with the card-draw aspect of our deck, he also turns what is typically a conditional win condition into a absolute one.
Let me explain. Experienced Magic players know how easy it is to lose to an opponent who never seems to run out of cards. When we’re down to 1 and the control player has 5 or 6, our chances of winning are slim. However, those same experienced Magic players can also tell you of times their control player had a full grip but didn’t have the right answer and then lost. Drawing more cards than your opponent doesn’t win you the game, the same as gaining infinite life technically doesn’t either. Teferi, Temporal Pilgrim turns all of our extra card draw into a clock, both by growing a creature to huge proportions and working towards a legitimate ultimate that clears our opponent’s board of all but lands. I can’t wait to see him in action!
Tezzeret, Artifice Master – synergizes extremely well with our commander and the cheap artifacts we play. Making a Thopter artifact creature token grows our Constructs, while his card draw is a 0 ability, which seems extremely pushed, given we can draw 2 cards with it if conditions are met. Those conditions are almost always met. 5 loyalty with no – ability until the ultimate means it will take a lot to kill this Planeswalker.
Tezzeret the Seeker – another busted Planeswalker with Urza, Lord High Artificer at the helm. His +1 lets us abuse our cheap mana rocks or swing out with giant Constructs and untap them to protect our life total or our Planeswalkers. His -X is extremely powerful. I used to play Oblivion Stone to give me a sweeper I could tutor up, but I realized that first, it is too slow when you really need a sweeper; second, it hurts me often as much as my opponent; and third, the deck doesn’t really need it. With the printing of The One Ring, we now have an even better target, though it does come at the cost of all Tezzeret the Seeker‘s starting loyalty. Otherwise, we have plenty of cheap utility artifacts to seek up. His ultimate is perhaps underwhelming, but consider that we get to it the turn after we play it and suddenly our clock has sped up considerably.
Vronos, Masked Inquisitor – I build each of my decks with little to no consultation of outside sources. I’ve never Googled Urza, Lord High Artificer Commander decks, for instance, nor looked at one on edhrec.com. As I discuss here, Commander is primarily about unique and fun deck building and game play and I enjoy building decks on my own. But then Wizards prints a card like this and I think, I must not be the only one playing a bunch of Planeswalkers in a mono Blue Urza deck…Each mode seems tailor-made for our deck. His +1, a first of its kind on a Planeswalker, addresses one chief issue with playing Planeswalkers in Commander, as I discuss above. His -2 is a pretty generic bounce effect found on many Blue Planeswalkers except for that key text, “For each opponent.” I expect no less from a new Planeswalker designed for a Commander premium set, but wow is it powerful. Finally, Vronos’ ultimate, while not game ending, synergizes beautifully with the cheap, efficient artifacts we play. Thank you for such a powerful card for our deck, Wizards, buy my creative deck-building pride is a bit dinged up now…
Will Kenrith – 6 mana is a lot for a Planeswalker and you may be thinking there are better choices for this slot. I don’t blame you if you’re skeptical of this choice, as this is another card that I stare at long and hard each time I want to add something new and different to the deck, say, like, Vronos, Masked Inquisitor. But each time I remember the games I’ve cast Will Kenrith. He is similar to Tamiyo, the Moon Sage in that his + is so powerful and flexible in Commander. There are so many powerful creatures and synergies built around creature abilities that shutting down our opponent’s two best is often enough for us to stabilize. Aurelia, the Warleader threatening lethal with double combat next turn? She’s a vanilla 0/3. Atraxa, Praetors’ Voice proliferating too much? She’s a vanilla 0/3. The list goes on and on. And even when our opponent’s creatures don’t do busted things, the +2 protects Will Kenrith and our other Walkers in combat. The -2 is equally powerful, even if we often don’t use it. Drawing 2 cards and reducing the mana cost of our most important spells by replenishes our resources and lets us do two things in a turn, or cast another Planeswalker while holding up counter magic.
Ugin, the Spirit Dragon – our ultimate reset button and oftentimes last resort, given how many Blue permanents we play. However, our most aggressive starts are typically artifact-centric, which means Ugin’s -X will often be a 1-sided sweeper that lets us swing in for lethal.
Artifacts
A deck looking to abuse Urza, Lord High Artificer‘s Constructs wants to play a lot of artifacts. A deck that plays as many Planeswalkers and mana-intensive fatties as we do wants to play a lot of cheap ramp. A control deck wants pieces to answer angles of attack that can prove difficult for its counter magic. Our choice of artifacts incorporates all of these wants.
Chrome Mox – going down a card for an extra mana a turn is worth it in the early game. Late game, we will either have enough cards that we won’t care about losing one, or Urza will make this a Mox Sapphire without us having to exile a card from our hand.
Coalition Relic – Wizards has printed better 3-mana mana rocks (not to mention 2-mana mana rocks), but I’m partial to this oldie. I like that we can play it on turn 3 and have access to 6 mana on turn 4, assuming we have a land to play. It may be strictly better to play Arcane Signet, but 6 mana on turn 4 is a siren song I can’t ignore in this deck.
Commander’s Plate – a cheap artifact we can use for mana with Urza out, or use to protect one of our finishers and close out the game extremely quickly. And in case you didn’t know, we can tap the Commander’s Plate for mana without tapping the creature it’s attached to. This is one of our most aggressive tutor targets with Urza’s Saga.
Expedition Map – another multi-use artifact in our deck. Early game, we can keep some shaky hands knowing we’ll fetch up something on turn 2. Late game, we can get whatever land we need in that moment, from Maze of Ith to Urza’s Saga. Anywhere in between, we can tap it for once Urza is on the battlefield.
Mana Crypt – turn 2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor seems okay. Any turn 2 Planeswalker is going to be a powerful play. One of our most aggressive starts will be a turn 2 Karn, Scion of Urza. There’s a reason fast mana is a staple in CEDH.
Mishra’s Bauble – another Mox Sapphire once our commander is out. The card draw is great for all the reasons drawing cards is.
Mox Opal – I feel like a broken record…another Mox Sapphire with Urza…blah, blah, blah…I probably don’t need to say anything here. Getting Metalcraft is not typically an issue.
Pithing Needle – one of those artifacts that gives us an answer once something has resolved.
Relic of Progenitus – ever countered a Gravecrawler? Or any zombie in a Zombie Tribal deck? It feels really, really bad. This artifact helps soothe that pain.
Shadowspear – another of our aggressive artifacts. Trample means our Constructs don’t get chump blocked. Lifelink means we don’t die as easy. The rest is gravy.
Soul-Guide Lantern – see Relic of Progenitus…
Sapphire Medallion – the recent reprinting of this card encouraged me to pick up a copy. I haven’t got to see it in action much, but I can’t imagine it being bad in a mono Blue deck. With Urza out, it basically taps for .
The One Ring – this card could go in any deck and be good. Here, it does everything we are already trying to do: stay alive and draw cards. Its ETB buys us a whole turn, though it does nothing to protect our Planeswalkers, unfortunately. We do have ways of returning it to our hand if the life loss ever becomes an issue.
Prison Elements
This isn’t a Prison deck, though one could make the case that any control build falls under this category. However, we play a couple of cards that fall under the purview of this strategy. Don’t underestimate their power in a deck like ours. They do so much for our strategy, while immensely annoying our opponent, which is basically one of our alternate win conditions. I can’t say enough about how good these two cards are. If you’re playing control, you should be playing these cards.
Frozen Aether – nerfing haste can shut down entire strategies, while tapping artifacts and lands keeps our opponent from playing on curve. This gives us more time to find answers. According to edhrec.com, this card sees play in 1% of decks. Maybe people just don’t know it exists. It is an old card with only a single printing, until The List, which is how I discovered it.
Propaganda – another card I love. Is it better than Crawlspace? Ensnaring Bridge? Both have been in versions of this deck and the answer is yes, most definitely. The latter two are artifacts, which has obvious synergies with our deck, but they are universal. Given our potential for aggressive starts, they can just rot in our hand or help our opponent more than us. If we don’t have an aggressive start, then once we’ve stabilized, they can prevent us from closing out a game fast enough. Ensnaring Bridge, in particular, is a nonbo with our Constructs more often than not. Finally, the tax Propaganda imposes on our opponent will frequently make them choose between attacking or advancing their board. Both play into our strategy of slowing the game down and staying alive.
The Lands
We play 22 Islands and 5 fetch lands (those in our color plus Fabled Passage). The rest are utility lands. As usual, there is ample room for individualization here.
Academy Ruins – graveyard recursion isn’t just for Zombie decks! Getting back a Soul-Guide Lantern to hose said decks is a great use for this legendary land.
Ghost Quarter – every deck should play some land destruction. And since many games with a control deck go long, blowing up an opponent’s Cabal Coffers can be the difference between winning and losing. Of course, if we have our aggressive start, we’ll kill them dead before they get enough Swamps to abuse it.
Maze of Ith – the list of creatures that trigger upon doing damage is extremely long, but one of my favorites is Balefire Dragon. Magic is full of threats that do nasty things once they deal combat damage to a player. This land protects us against such shenanigans. It also does a fair job of protecting our life total. Just don’t make the mistake of counting Maze of Ith towards your mana sources in a 3-land hand.
Mystic Sanctuary – fetching up this Island to put a non-overloaded Cyclonic Rift on top of our deck can be game winning. Getting our best instant or sorcery otherwise is never bad. If it was worth playing once, it’s sure to be worth playing twice!
Reliquary Tower – no control deck wants to run out of cards and no control deck wants to discard to hand size. Check!
Rishadan Port – with all the mana we can make, it’s more than possible this land will keep our opponent from playing on curve indefinitely while not having the same impact on us. Stopping Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx from outpacing us or tapping down an opponent’s Maze of Ith is its usual function.
Rivendell – a new addition, I’ve yet to see this new legendary land in action. Scry 2 is a powerful effect for a control deck. When you need an answer, you need an answer, after all.
Strip Mine – more land destruction. It sets us back a land, too. Sometimes this is a problem.
Urza’s Saga – of all the utility lands, this one is our most powerful, as anyone who’s played Modern knows. Creating an army on its way to tutoring up whatever 0- or 1-mana artifact we need can win us the game by itself.
Wasteland – a strictly worse Strip Mine.
Flex Spots
Rather than provide a long list of potential cards by categories (counter magic, card draw, etc.), as I’ve done with some of my decks, I’ll talk a little bit about ways to tweak the deck in a more general way. Afterwards, though, I’ll give you a second decklist. This is my brother-in-law’s Urza, Lord High Artificer deck. He’s taken it in a very different direction. This will give you some idea just how much room for creativity and innovation there is with Urza as your commander.
First, if you’re looking to make some changes to my 99 above, there are ways you can tweak it and there are ways you can go in a direction all your own. If you’re looking to tweak the deck, I would trim a card or two from each of the categories I detail above. Will the deck really run less smoothly or be less interactive with one less cantrip or counter spell? That depends, of course, on whether you’re replacing the cantrip with Omniscience or with something like Witness Protection. Trimming a single card here and there can give you the necessary room for an entire subtheme or alternate win condition.
Maybe you really like making your play group salty and want to bring in more land destruction. Crucible of Worlds plus Field of Ruin, Demolition Field, and Volatile Fault will give you this.
Or perhaps you like the flexibility the Cycling mechanic brings you. There are whole decks built around this, but we could make room for a small package of cyclers that would also further our game plan of digging for answers and staying alive via chump blockers until we can turn the corner.
Here’s a single card that synergizes with any control-style deck. Yes, it’s fragile, but the upside of this Merfolk Wizard in a deck with 22 instants and sorceries is obvious. We would be incentivized to increase that number to get more value out of him, but even as is, getting a 2/2 flier for each of our counter spells or cantrips is an alternate win condition in and of itself.
If you want to make bigger changes than carving out room for a subtheme or switching out one of my counter spells for one of your preferred answers, then cutting the sea monsters and Planeswalkers is an easy way to free up a lot of space. Be careful, though. Doing this will fundamentally change the way the deck plays. The value the Planeswalkers give us is incredible, so you’ll need to make choices that either offer similar benefits (card draw, answers, finishers) or that do something totally different (see below for an example). The sea monsters are easy enough to replace, as Magic is full of big fatties and Blue has no shortage of powerful and hard-to-deal with creatures in the 6- and 7-mana slot.
Ideal Hand and Gameplay
This deck can play a traditional control-style game or a tried-and-true Aggro strategy, depending on the draw. This duality Urza, Lord High Artificer gives us is one reason the deck is so powerful, not to mention so much fun to play. An ideal hand would have the necessary cards to support one of these two angles of attack, but not both. In either, however, we want some of our fast mana, because, well, why else play it? 3 to 4 lands is acceptable, assuming the rest of our hand isn’t our finishers. We want to draw those in the mid- to late-game. A cantrip and a counter spell in our opening hand, plus a mana rock and a 4- or 5-mana Planeswalker, is always a welcome sight. Depending on the commander we are playing against, you’ll know if you really want graveyard hate or some of the Prison elements in your opening hand.
Cards that support our aggressive starts: Urza’s Saga, Commander’s Plate, Shadowspear, Karn, Scion of Urza, and any of our mana artifacts.
Cards that support our control strategy: any of our cantrips plus any of our counter spells. A bounce spell is also ideal in this kind of hand.
No matter the start, however, we want to make our land drops every turn until the end of the game. We can never have too much mana, even with all the extra mana we can make with our artifacts once Urza, Lord High Artificer is on the battlefield. Obviously, we don’t want to flood so much we never draw any action, but we really don’t want to be stuck on mana. Playing a Planeswalker while still holding up mana for counter magic is often the difference between winning and losing.
Weaknesses
Being a mono Blue deck means we don’t have hard sweepers to resolved permanents, which is the bread and butter of most control strategies. There will be games when we just can’t keep up with the pressure from our opponent, no matter how many bounce spells we cast. Our own potential for an aggressive start and ability to flood the board with giant Constructs is one of our best weapons against aggressive creature strategies if we can’t leverage our bounce spells effectively. Otherwise, our opponent will be able to attack down our Planeswalkers and life total too quickly for us to stabilize and turn the corner.
In other games, an early Cavern of Souls from a tribal deck or an Allosaurus Shepherd in a mono Green one will leave us with a hand full of dead counter magic. Without a timely bounce spell or Wasteland effect, we can die before we get anything going on our end. Being able to pivot from a control deck to an Aggro one gives us one way of fighting back against such a start. Sticking a turn 4 Stormtide Leviathan also works, which is how I survived my opponent playing Allosaurus Shepherd on turn 1, followed by many, many creatures, none of whom had flying.
Finally, there will be games when we don’t get any fast mana or have early interaction. Typically, we will mulligan hands without one, if not both, of these, but sometimes cantrips don’t find what you need and the single counter spell in our hand can only do so much. Drawing our finishers or Planeswalkers when we’re digging for cheap answers can be painful. On the flip side, not drawing a finisher soon enough can end us, as well. All decks can lose to variance and ours is no exception.
A Different Direction – Mono Blue Artifacts with Urza, Lord High Artificer
by Dan Fuerst
| Urza, Lord High Artificer |
Creatures (24)
| Etherium Sculptor | |
| Spellskite | |
| The Reality Chip | |
| Vedalken Engineer | |
| Foundry Inspector | |
| Master of Etherium | |
| Palladium Myr | |
| Shimmer Myr | |
| Treasure Mage | |
| Arcum Dagsson |
| Triplicate Titan | |
| Mycosynth Golem | |
| Darksteel Colossus |
Artifacts (13)
| Mox Opal | |
| Commander’s Plate | |
| Liquimetal Torque | |
| Mind Stone | |
| Sapphire Medallion | |
| Commander’s Sphere | |
| Nettlecyst | |
| Skyclave Relic | |
| Mystic Forge | |
| Unwinding Clock |
| Kaldra Compleat | |
| Darksteel Forge | |
| Portal to Phyrexia |
Enchantments (4)
| Witness Protection | |
| Artificer Class | |
| Kasmina’s Transmutation | |
| Thopter Spy Network |
Instants (14)
| An Offer You Can’t Refuse | |
| Disrupt | |
| Pongify | |
| Rapid Hybridization | |
| Spell Pierce | |
| Swan Song | |
| Counterspell | |
| Disdainful Stroke | |
| Disruption Protocol | |
| Negate |
| Disallow | |
| Metallic Rebuke | |
| Saw It Coming | |
| Cryptic Command |
Sorceries (9)
| Silver Scrutiny | |
| Fabricate | |
| Ravenform | |
| Asinine Antics | |
| Deep Analysis | |
| One with the Machine | |
| Wash Out | |
| Tidings | |
| All is Dust |
Lands (36)
Academy Ruins
Arcane Lighthouse
Buried Ruin
Darksteel Citadel
Guildless Commons
Homeward Path
Inventors’ Fair
Mishra’s Factory
Mishra’s Foundry
Seat of the Synod
Tomb of the Spirit Dragon
Urza’s Saga
Island (24)
As you can see, this is a much more artifact-centric build (30 total, including lands and creatures) that really wants to maximize the power of Urza, Lord High Artificer‘s static ability and the synergies between the chosen artifacts themselves. The deck still plays traditional mono Blue control elements, such as counter magic, card draw, and removal, but many are attached to or synergize with artifacts in some way. Card draw like Thought Monitor, Thopter Spy Network, and One with the Machine; sweepers like Wash Out and All is Dust; and even some counter magic, like Disruption Protocol and Metallic Rebuke all either contribute to or benefit from the artifact plan of the deck.
And rather than leverage Planeswalkers and sweepers into the late-game when the sea monsters come down, this build is looking to start aggressive or ramp into its finishers via cost reduction or cheating them into play with cards like Master Transmuter and Arcum Dagsson. Master of Etherium into Urza, Lord High Artificer plus 2 or 3 other cheap artifacts can put a lot of pressure on an opponent. Similarly, a turn 5 Triplicate Titan or Darksteel Colossus can end games extremely quickly.
I won’t analyze each card, but there is plenty of room for creativity with this build, as well as places to increase the power level. Blightsteel Colossus is an obvious inclusion, but Dan plays that card in his Infect deck and so has left it out of this one. Cityscape Leveler would be a good addition that can answer problematic permanents. Some of the counter magic skews towards narrower targets for a cheaper mana investment. This allows the deck to play a more tempo-style strategy, but can also leave you with the wrong answers more frequently.
All that being said, I’ve lost to the deck enough times to know its power level as is. I’ve also played an earlier version of it once and it is really fun.
Cards that I don’t play in my version but should think about are Wash Out and Witness Protection. The former is another 4-mana bounce spell in the right spot, while the latter is a strict upgrade from Frogify.
Conclusion
Regardless of build, Urza, Lord High Artificer is an extremely powerful commander. He allows us to play two opposing strategies in one deck in a way in which both actually synergize with the other. Our early, aggressive starts come on the back of artifact Constructs and equipment, all of which tap for mana to fuel our control strategy. It really, honestly feels unfair in many match-ups. If you like playing control, this is the deck for you. If you like playing aggro, this is the deck for you. And, if you’re like me and have favored one over the other but secretly wondered how the other half lives, then this is the deck for you!
As always, thanks for reading! What kind of build do you prefer with Urza, Lord High Artificer? Which big artifact bombs should my brother-in-law include? Which cheap artifacts am I forgetting? What are your preferred finishers in a mono Blue deck like this one? Have you figured out a way to abuse Urza’s spin-the-wheel ability? Let me know in the comments!
