Dusting Off My Evil Laugh

Publish date: 2024-08-17

Of the several new Standard brews I’ve been working on, the two I wanted to play most were the Villainous Wealth and morph decks, with Villainous Wealth
holding a slight edge simply because of the fun factor. Some of you may recall I did a first draft of the deck when I wrote my column First Thoughts on Khans of Tarkir. Here’s what the deck
looked like then:

Creatures (24)

Lands (13)

Spells (23)

This build used Font of Fertility and Wooded Foothills to reset the top of your library and give you more selection with Courser of Kruphix. Bow of Nylea
may look a little odd, but it was mainly there to be a harder-to-kill source of green devotion and provide a multi-dimensional use for extra mana.

By the time last Friday rolled around, I had made some changes to the deck. First off, I wanted to squeeze in some ways to interact with my opponent
outside of whatever I plundered from their deck with Villainous Wealth. I added in Sultai Charm and Murderous Cut, but I eventually moved the Charms to the
sideboard. Since I was playing Hooded Hydra, I thought it might be worthwhile to add Rattleclaw Mystic to the deck to enable some morph shenanigans, and so
Sylvan Caryatid hit the showers. Also, Hornet Queen had been getting a lot of good press in the new metagame so I made some room for a couple copies of
her. Here’s the deck as I took it to Friday Night Magic:

Creatures (25)

Lands (18)

Spells (17)

I figured Aggro would be out in force which is why I devoted nearly half my sideboard to helping with that matchup. I also realized that I’d be pretty sunk
if an Anger of Gods resolved so Negates in the sideboard would hopefully help there.

There was a huge turnout to Richmond Comix with 43 people ready to battle in the new Standard. I’m pleased to report I went 4-0 with the deck, sweeping two
of my matches 2-0. I will say this build is far from perfect, but I can definitely affirm that Villainous Wealth is an incredibly powerful card that is
very much worth building around, especially in a metagame where counterspells aren’t being played much.

In the first round I played against a pleasant young man who was playing a black/white constellation deck chock full of enchantments including bestow
creatures. He played Thoughtseize and Hero’s Downfall to disrupt my plans somewhat, but his constellation deck needed time to develop and that gave me time
to ramp into Villainous Wealth. One game, after the second Villainous Wealth I cast, I had so many of his white and black permanents that I could use
Voyaging Satyr with Nykthos to fuel enough black and white mana to drain him with Underworld Coinsmith, but instead I just swarmed him with a bunch of his
own creatures.

The second round I squared off against Rabble Red. I had a fast ramp start in the first game and he had no removal for my early creatures, so even though I
took a beating, I was able to fire off a Villainous Wealth for five cards and snagged a Rabblemaster, a Firedrinker Satyr, a random 2/2 creature, and a
burn spell for his Rabblemaster. The burn spell he drew off the top had to nuke my Rabblemaster, and when he attacked I was able to chump and kill
everything. Firedrinker Satyr isn’t exactly the kind of chump blocker I was hoping for, but it was worth the life hit to kill one of his attackers. So
basically Villainous Wealth functioned as a Mind Twist/Plague Wind, and I was able to put the game away with my green creatures. Game 2 I got a turn 3
Hornet Nest, but he played a Frenzied Goblin that neutered it as a blocker and was pretty much able to whittle me down pretty fast. The last game I was
able to accelerate into a fast Polukranos, which he unloaded his burn to kill, so when I drew the next one it ended up killing all his dudes and smashing
his life totals.

The third round I squared off against a Sultai deck built around Sidisi, Brood Tyrant. We spent the early rounds doing what our deck do-him filling his
graveyard, me mana-ramping and then dropping a Polukranos. He kills it with a Hero’s Downfall. I play another one. He plays a Sagu Mauler and then enchants
it with a bestowed Nighthowler so it’s gigantic. He swings in, not realizing that I actually have so much mana I can monstrous Polukranos (killing a random
Satyr Wayfinder) and can block and trade with his Mauler.

Of course, that leaves me facing down a pretty big Nighthowler, but I rip a third Polukranos like a champion and stop him for a second. He then rips a Whip
of Erebos and I know I’m in pretty big trouble. Sidisi shows up at some point, which I kill with Polukranos, but the Whip starts sending big beats with
lifelink my way, burning through the Polukranos I have on the board and the fourth one that I draw. He’s at 71 life and has just enchanted another Sagu
Mauler with Nighthowler, and I’m in big, big trouble.

I rip Villainous Wealth off the top and hit his deck for eleven cards. I get a Whip and a Nighthowler to call my own, along with a Sidisi, a Nyx Weaver,
two Sylvan Caryatids, an Elvish Mystic, and a See the Unwritten which digs up a Courser of Kruphix and a Voyaging Satyr from my own deck. I pass the turn
back to him.

His Sagu Mauler is gigantic and his life total is unassailable, but he draws his card and passes the turn. Now that I’ve got a Nighthowler and a Whip maybe
he’s not sure he can kill me outright with the attack-I have to admit I’m not sure whether he can or not either, so I’m glad he didn’t swing and force me
to figure it all out. At the end of his turn, I check my now very complicated board to see if I’ve got anything to do at the end of the turn, but I’m
pretty much all tapped out from that Villainous Wealth. I then look at the Nyx Weaver, and get an idea. I look over at his library. It’s actually pretty
low from his self-milling and my Villainous Wealth. “How many cards are left in your library?” I ask him. He counts out his deck and there are less than
twenty cards. During my turn I sacrifice the Nyx Weaver to get back Villainous Wealth, and with my newfound mana ramp I’m able to Villainous Wealth for
nineteen and remove his library from the game, which earns the concession.

Wow! What an epic game! Sadly, the second game is quite anti-climactic. My opponent has to mulligan and keeps a land-light hand, while I’ve got mana ramp
into an early Polukranos that pretty quickly takes over the game and ends things fast. We play a third game for fun (and I think my opponent is having a
tough time believing he’s losing to a Villainous Wealth deck), and I beat him after casting Villainous Wealth for eight cards.

I’m feeling pretty good about my deck going into the final round, where I get matched up against Mono-Green Devotion. He’s got mana ramp into pretty big
game himself so the haymakers fly back and forth and we take it to three games, but ultimately the huge advantage I’m able to leverage from Villainous
Wealth puts two of the games in my win column.

The deck is certainly still rough around the edges, but there’s a lot of promise here. For one thing, I’m convinced that green mana ramp into Villainous
Wealth is one of the most powerful things you can do in Standard, and in a metagame dominated by midrange it seems like there should be room for it to
thrive. I’m definitely going to keep working on the deck going forward and hope to have it crafted into a pretty potent weapon for the Starcitygames.com
Open here in Richmond next month.

If you’re interested in giving this a whirl, keep in mind how Villainous Wealth works. From the Khans of Tarkir FAQ:

Villainous Wealth

{X}{B}{G}{U}

Sorcery

Target opponent exiles the top X cards of his or her library. You may cast any number of nonland cards with converted mana cost X or less from among
them without paying their mana costs.

* You cast the cards one at a time as Villainous Wealth is resolving, choosing modes, targets, and so on. The last card you cast will be the first one
to resolve. Ignore timing restrictions based on the cards’ types. Other timing restrictions, such as “Cast [this card] only during combat,” must be
followed.

* Because you’re already casting the cards using an alternative cost (by casting them without paying their mana costs), you can’t pay any other
alternative costs for the cards, including casting them face down using the morph ability. You can pay additional costs, such as kicker costs. If the
cards have any mandatory additional costs, you must pay those.

* If a card has {X} in its mana cost, you must choose 0 as the value for X when casting it.

* Any cards you don’t cast this way will remain in exile.

Mo’ Mana

So I know for sure I want to be casting Villainous Wealth in the new Standard, but I’m not entirely sure what the best ramp configuration is yet. I thought
it might be wise to really look at all the options we have available to us.

The big daddy of big mana. Nykthos is the jet fuel that lets you do really degenerate things. The trick, of course, is getting enough devotion on the board
to stick around long enough to set that fuel on fire.

The tap-for-mana crew. Elvish Mystic and Sylvan Caryatid are the gold standards of non-land ramp. Rattleclaw Mystic wasn’t bad, but it died way too often
for me to ever consider it as a replacement for Sylvan Caryatid again. The artifacts listed here technically help you ramp but they don’t contribute
towards devotion so I think they’re non-starters. I might actually be interested in Karametra’s Acolyte since having a four toughness is quite helpful.

The untap lands crew. Kiora’s Follower is a better card than Voyaging Satyr, but the Follower is a much more difficult card to cast. If I end up heavier
blue over black I might give it a whirl. Nissa is sweet, but there likely won’t be four Forests in play to untap, and the last thing I’d want to do is
animate a land and have it get killed right before I can cast Villainous Wealth.

Putting extra lands directly into play can sometimes be more reliable than counting on keeping creatures in play turn after turn. The permanents on this
list are better if we’re sticking with the Nykthos plan, but if we decided to move away from that then some of these could be part of the plan. I love
Kiora, but she suffers from being pretty terrible against Mantis Rider.

If we dipped into red Xenagos can give a nice rush of mana that plays nicely with a Nykthos-devotion strategy, but he also suffers from Mantis Rider-itis.
Sure, you can +1 him the turn you cast him but considering you’ve already spent four mana to cast him you’re likely not getting a whole lot in the deal.
Ideally you’d want to make a 2/2 the turn you cast him but then he’s within easy Mantis range.

These auras let you build your own Nykthos if you don’t draw a Nykthos, and also add devotion for when you actually do draw Nykthos. I also really loved
the color-fixing these auras provided.

They don’t help with devotion, but they are quite nice for acceleration and color-fixing. Meteorite is one of those cards that you’d really love to play on
flavor alone, if only it cost one less mana or did one more point of damage…

It’s nice to remember that Generator Servant’s mana can be used for non-creature spells too. These sorts of temporary mana boosts work perfectly with a
card like Villainous Wealth which translate to a larger card-advantage engine the more mana you can pump into it. If we were dipping into red I’d
definitely consider these cards.

How dangerous is this card? In a world of Polukranos on Polukranos violence this could either break things in your favor (letting you kill the opposing
Polukranos) or make you extremely sad when your opponent rips his Polukranos the turn after you play it. I’ve cast Villainous Wealth for five cards and
it’s paid off, but once you drop this you’re probably throwing Wealths for a minimum of seven, which is devastating. Not to mention this provides two
points of green devotion. It’s a high-risk card that’s mitigated by its flash ability, and once you cast a big enough Villainous Wealth it doesn’t matter
that you’re doubling your opponent’s mana because you’ve likely already won the game.

These oddball black mana-producing cards are included here for completeness sake, though since Villainous Wealth is Sultai I could see Gild being a not-bad
card to kill something that Murderous Cut couldn’t somehow handle while also providing some fuel for Wealth.

While not acceleration or color-fixing, we’d be remiss if we didn’t put this in the list since it tends to let you make your land drops more frequently and
more lands is part of the plan. Can combine nicely with Kiora to actually accelerate land drops off the top of your deck, and it can obviously be useful in
conjunction with fetchlands to reset the top of your deck when you’re looking for a specific card like Villainous Wealth.

After my successful pilot run with the deck and thinking about all my mana options, I’ve decided this is what I’m bringing to the next Friday Night Magic:

Creatures (22)

Lands (18)

Spells (20)

Every time I drew the boarded-in Sultai Charms I was very happy with them and have decided I want them in the maindeck, and I want more of them. It’s good
creature kill for a host of creatures, it can bump off problematic enchantments and artifacts… it’s nice to have a way to interact with your opponent
outside of Polukranos and Villainous Wealth spells. If nothing else it’ll allow you to dig deeper to find Villainous Wealth. Murderous Cut was also an
all-star whenever I drew it and is particularly nice in this deck because of the mana ramp, making it easier to cast without delve if I didn’t have
anything else I wanted to do with the mana. I had two before and am glad to squeeze in a third.

For supplemental mana I think I’m going to try a few copies of Karametra’s Acolyte since it should be superior to Market Festival most of the time. Part of
me wants to lean a little heavier on blue mana and run Kiora’s Follower instead of Voyaging Satyr so I can either double-up on Nykthos or Acolyte, but I’m
not sure if that’s the right move. Also I’m going to go ahead, dive in and run Dictate of Karametra. I think the rewards in this deck outweigh the risks
enough to give it a whirl. We’ll see if my choices leave me battered and bruised by the end of the night!

So there you have it-Villainous Wealth! I’m curious to hear what you think of the deck, and especially from those who’ve given the card a try. Were you as
impressed with the card I was? Are there other angles to explore? And if you give the deck a try, make sure to dust off your evil laugh while you twirl
your moustache…

MHU-HA-HA-HA-HHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!

New to Commander?

If you’re just curious about the format, building your first deck, or trying to take your Commander deck up a notch, here are some handy links:

My current Commander decks
(and links to decklists):

• Mishra, Artificer Prodigy (Possibility Storm Shenanigans)

• Yisan, the Wanderer Bard (All-in Yisan)

• Selvala, Explorer Returned (Everyone Draws Lots!)

• Grenzo, Dungeon Warden (Cleaning Out the Cellar)

• Karona, False God (God Pack)

• Child of Alara (Land Ho!)

• Doran, the Siege Tower (All My Faves in One Deck!)

• Karador, Ghost Chieftain (my Magic Online deck)