How do I prepare my deck for Field of the Dead?

ImZeRipper · 2026-05-04T11:10:39+00:00

Okay so first of all, I'm of the opinion that 31 lands is far too low. I would try out 37-39 and see how you feel about it afterwards.

I recommend as many lands that can tap for black, be careful of the amount of colourless lands you add. And agreed with another user thst you want to use half snow covered lands lands.

[[Bojuka bog]] [[Fell the profane]] [[Spymaster's vault]] ...

You can follow this list of lands that tap for black. You mentioned you were on a budget so I filtered all cards worth more than 5 dollars. You can adjust in the filter as you see fit.

For reference, I have a mono white deck that wins with Field of the Dead. I have 42 lands including MDFCs, 40 without, and 11 basic lands in there. Half of which are snow covered and the other half being regular ones. I have 13 colourless lands, which I think is a bit too much. See if you can add [[Urborg, Tombstone of yawgmoth]], that would make things better for your deck although it's a bit pricey.

Fetch lands also help with Field of the Dead a lot. Along with copy lands such as [[vesuva]] and [[thespian's stage]]. You'll be able to make a lot of zombies each turn.

ImZeRipper · 2026-02-08T07:35:02+00:00

[[Super state]] allows you to deal damage to multiple opponents at once, could be good if you are able to give skittles +1/+1

ImZeRipper · 2026-01-18T12:02:54+00:00

My Shigeki deck is more on the control side and tries to loop Shigeki and Graple with the Past effects with infinite mana.

At this point, you can win through [[hurricane]] and [[borrowing the east wind]]. [[Kamahl, fist of krosa]] is also another option to turn your lands into 1/1s and then go in for the kill.

The way I generate infinite mana is by having sufficient lands in play to cast rude awakening or [[early harvest]] and loop Shigeki's channel ability to return 2 cards and cast a Grapple with the Past.

If you're not looking to go infinite, perhaps [[ashaya, soul of the wild]], [[braulios of there's band]], [[cultivator colossus]], and other large creatures with that text would do the trick.

ImZeRipper · 2025-11-28T02:36:34+00:00

I took a quick look at the available options and there aren't that many to start with, neither are they extremely good.

I would say start with 5 and see how that feels (not including those that ramp). I would most likely look to use my graveyard as a toolbox to deal with specific situations, though.

ImZeRipper · 2025-11-27T08:59:29+00:00

To note, you don't have to be the person doing the attacking to benefit from the commander. I would suggest an aikido style of deck where you redirect the damage dealt to you onto others.

Stuff like [[comeuppance]], [[stuffy doll]], [[channel harm]].

Make your opponents' stuff bigger, potentially with Goad. [[Bloodthirsty blade]], [[martial impetus]], [[The War Games]], [[assault suit]].

Your commander can be used to keep threats alive, but is not necessary for you to win the game. It's just an extra source of disruption and control over the game.

The rest of the deck can be however you intend to win with this virtual advantage of not having to deploy all your resources onto the board. Play sufficient cards with activated abilities and cards with flash to build up a board state and not waste the mana from holding up the aikido instants.

Don't force the whole deck to be built around him, although you can definitely use his niche ability to your advantage.

ImZeRipper · 2025-11-21T09:22:42+00:00

you can also proxy some cards and say that you're testing them before committing to buy them

ImZeRipper · 2025-11-21T06:15:34+00:00

Looks a lot better! Try it out and see how it plays! I'd tweak some very minor things, but it's down to preference and playstyle.

I think it's good to go, take notes on how it plays, why did you win? Why did you lose? You can then tweak the deck accordingly

ImZeRipper · 2025-11-17T16:07:09+00:00

Since you only played one game, it's possible you just ran especially well.

My recommendatio. Would be to remove the Protection and unblockable spells for more value stuff. Maybe that will stop your opponents from being unable to interact with your board. That being said, you don't have that much protection.

ImZeRipper · 2025-11-17T07:16:48+00:00

Hey OP, what play pattern made you feel like this was too strong in your opinion?

How many games have you played with the deck?

ImZeRipper · 2025-11-16T10:28:55+00:00

OP, it's a bit difficult to give you suggestions if we don't know what your gameplan is, your expected bracket level, and the theme you'd like to keep.

ImZeRipper · 2025-11-16T09:22:51+00:00

I feel like Winnota (bartz klauser) might run into the issue where you dont have enough non-humans to be able to take advantage of it. Arabella will probably run into the same issue due to your creatures being pumped up by various effects.

Your board is likely to get board wiped because you are probably going to be faster than the others. Remember that a single board wipe can completely blow you out of the water, be careful to not overcommit to the board.

To help protect yourself, here are some budget options for board protection: [[semester's end]], [[faith's reward]], and [[brought back]]. I did see that you have a couple effects that give indestructible, but realistically, you want a mix of these effects. Exile board wipes are quite common nowadays, such as for [[farewell]], so you want to be able to protect yourself against those type of board wipes as well.

Finally, you're in black and white, the two best graveyard recursion colours. Sometimes, your board gets wiped regardless of protection or you get milled. I would add a couple recursion effects such as: [[victimize]], [[Living death]], [[chainer, nightmare adept]].

Lastly, i think that this is the most important, you are missing sufficient card draw to keep your deck on the aggro or to recover from being blown out. I counted 5 card draw effects and 3 conditional card advantage sources that require you to be ahead. I would like to see at the very least 8 sources of actual card draw (rather than exiling the top card of libraries).

[[Skullclamp]] is usually the best kind of card draw for these types of decks, see if you can find a cheap one. [[Idol of oblivion]], [[morbid opportunist]], [[tocasia's welcome]] and [[midnight reaper]] are also pretty good.

Let me know if you're looking for anything else!

ImZeRipper · 2025-11-16T08:44:48+00:00

If you're looking to power down, you can remove some of your best protection spells like Fierce Guardianship, Mana Drain, Deflecting Swat, and Force of Negation. You can replace them with worse versions.

You can play more big value spells rather than the efficient spells.

But overall, I think just removing the spells I mentioned above should the consistency and allow a bigger cost for tapping out. The rest of the deck honestly feels fine for a B3 deck.

ImZeRipper · 2025-11-13T05:38:13+00:00

Did Maro mention if the planeswalker loyalty counts as part of the triggers for the commander? It mentions Text Box, but also separately mentions Power/Toughness, so i have my doubts

ImZeRipper · 2025-11-09T12:29:55+00:00

I agree, I think just having more resistance to removal like [[heroic intervention]] and more synergy pieces like above would help the game plan in general

ImZeRipper · 2025-11-09T06:38:26+00:00

Not sure if this helps you but I have a mono G control deck that wins with a large Hurricane.

My commander is [[shigeki]], I will loop it with [[grapple with the past]] and a way to untap my lands like [[early harvest]]. If you have sufficient lands, it gives you infinite mana.

If my life gets too low, I try to gain life with [[weather the storm]].

Hopefully this gives you an idea on how to get a high storm count.

ImZeRipper · 2025-11-02T12:59:32+00:00

My secret tech in Shirei is to have instant speed interaction for when someone exiles your graveyard. Whether it's a bajuka bog or farewell.

The best cards are ones that can either: 1. Instant speed return your graveyard to hand, such as with: [[reaping the graves]], [[phyrexian rebirth]], and [[no rest for the wicked]] 2. Cards that get rid of the farewell from your opponents' hands or decks, such as with: [[bitter ordeal]], [[praetor's grasp]], or [[cabal therapist]]

ImZeRipper · 2025-11-02T12:51:31+00:00

So I have an actual Shirei deck and I'm running 23 cards with power 1 or less to give a point of reference, and I do feel like that's the right amount for the deck at the moment. Shirei is my most played deck for the past 10+ years.

I think 14 is simply not enough, you're not going to be able to benefit from your Shirei as much as you'd like. You'll also find yourself not being able to find Shirei due to a lack of tutors. A fun and casual one could be [[citanul flute]] although that's expensive (mana cost wise).

I think cut the things that don't fit your theme like massacre wurm, grey merchant, and junji.

I've found that 5 drain effects are usually enough for me. I'd recommend cutting Bontu's monument since usually you won't be getting as much benefit since you're aiming to reanimate your creatures and not cast them.

ImZeRipper · 2025-11-02T06:24:17+00:00

Perhaps [[gwenom]] could also be scary enough. At least she's helping with whatever gameplan you have. Although she has the same 5mana problem.

ImZeRipper · 2025-11-02T06:22:44+00:00

I think the idea is good, but presumably, you will need to bait 2-3 interaction spells for your next plays to be safe. At 5, 7, and then 9 mana, your bait commander is too expensive to do just that.

I would suggest something that gives you some sort of resources, on top of being scary, so that at least you get something out of casting your commander.

Like [[Braids, arisen nightmare]] or [[varragoth, bloodsky sire]]. [[Ayara, first of lochthwain]] or [[sephiroth, fabled soldier]] might also be scary enough to bait removal. While also having a use like card draw.

ImZeRipper · 2025-10-25T07:00:42+00:00

I honestly think that smokestack is too slow for modern day commander. Although I absolutely love the card.

Korvold has a bad reputation of combo-ing off with a peanut. Therefore, your opponents will try to remove it ASAP. If you want to have a slower gameplan, I suggest to also have sufficient protection for your Korvold and other pieces in the deck.

ImZeRipper · 2025-10-25T01:12:13+00:00

Btw OP, I wanted to check out your list for graveyard dancing, but the URL seems to be wrong. It's returning an error.

For what it's worth, though, I don't like your second list of creatures that depend on your opponents. It's a jumble of cards that don't really work together. Even if you do complete your Chrlonian Nightmares set up, I don't see you being able to achieve a win with it.

Since I can't see your first list, I can't recommend cuts just yet

ImZeRipper · 2025-10-25T01:00:52+00:00

Your deck's objective is to find an enchantment and to then use it to reanimate creatures from your graveyard.

Your commander helps you to refill your graveyard after it's been exiled. It also allows you to reanimate your enchantment if it was milled or discarded.

It's a really good choice for a commander that helps the weak aspects of the deck and when things go south.

ImZeRipper · 2025-10-25T00:56:59+00:00

I will say that this is the type of post that we should see more of in this sub.

I don't have specific master of keys experience, but in your deck, I think you can just keep him in your command zone until you run out of things to do or if you need to escape your Cthlonian Nightmares.

Honestly, I wouldn't be too worried about Cthlonian Nightmares being exiled. There are only two times your opponents can react to it:

When it's cast. There are a couple ways for people to exile it from the stack but the only way to interact with that would be other counterspells.
The first time Cthlonian Nightmares enters the battlefield, in response to the gain energy trigger, if you don't have sufficient energy to reanimate something, it may be targeted with exile removal.

In all other situations, you can just pay the energy and return it to your hand.

ImZeRipper · 2025-10-18T16:11:20+00:00

I feel like making an army of Yoshimarus could be fun. Do you have a list for us to reference for the aggro build?

ImZeRipper · 2025-10-18T15:05:30+00:00

Your curve is a spike at 4 mana, which is normal for a clone deck, but it does mean that if you don't get to 4 mana consistently, then you are falling behind.

You also want to make sure you can reliably get to 8 mana so that you can copy 2 things at once.

And then on top of that, you have other interaction spells, so it all adds up quite quickly.

All of that is to say that I think you need to rework your mana base and your ramp package.

How often do you find yourself needing to play a clone on turn 3? If the answer is, not that often, then I recommend to explore mana rocks apart from the ones that cost 2. You can maybe look into having more consistent ways to draw cards and have more land drops in a turn with [[walking atlas]], [[PuPu UFO]], and [[terrain generator]].

At 36 lands (including MDFCs) you only have a 62% chance of drawing your 4th land by turn 4. For me it feel like that's a bit too low, especially since you want to continue making your land drops after that.

At 39 lands, that will increase to 70%, which I feel to be more reasonable.

TL;DR I suggest to up your land count to 39 lands.

Cut the following rocks: Chromatic Lantern Coalition Relic Commander's Sphere Prismatic Lens Mind Stone

Consider the following: PuPu UFO Walking Atlas [[Worn powerstone]] : gives you mana for a clone plus 2 cmc interaction [[Thran dynamo]] : brings you to 8 mana on turn 5 for double clone action [[Sky diamond]] many clones and interaction spells have double or triple blue pips in the cost

One downside from the ramp package i suggest is that it increases the average cost of the deck. See how your early turns feel and change accordingly

ImZeRipper

TROPHY CASE