Hello awesome folks! Today I have the pleasure of presenting to you a Commander deck built around an aquarium. I first built a 60-card deck around this concept for you 9 years ago here. In this brew I built a Zoo Commander deck and then rebuilt it into a Menagerie brew and Aquarium 60-card deck that was what I call the ''Extreme Theme" deck where you take a theme to its logical conclusion and only run cards in that theme even lands.

For example, inspired by those two brews I just built a deck called "The Arboretum" that envisions an Arboretum of cards like Plants, Fungi, and Treefolk with cards like Cultivate and Rootgrapple that make sense for ramp and removal, but not Beast Within and Kodama's Reach. Make sense? I also built a Bird and flying theme "The Aviary" for you that plays into the same space, but my goal with these two brews was to be able to win. The Arboretum runs the three Treefolk that have X/X with X your Forest type and we have closers like Multani and such there.

Then the Aviary runs a bunch of cheap Birds and token makers like Battle Screech and then pumpers like Favorable Winds, so it goes wide and up while the other goes tall and grounded. Both can win with the Red Zone while still having issues with cards that are flavorful but weaker, like Serra Aviary and Roots.

But this one seems the biggest challenge. How can I make a flavorful Aquarium that also plays into the power level of the three others and ideally be playable in a set of four with The Zoo, Aviary and Arboretum in a four play metagame. And who is going to be my leader? Chisei, Heart of Oceans? I also really like Kiora, who cares about deep sea stuff and adds ramp.

I have it:

This legendary Octopus is going to be our leader of our Aquarium! In my other two recent brews I had intelligent Shepherds running things like Multani and Kangee and then built around shepherding the Plants, Treefolk, Birds and Fungi in them like Wall of Blossoms and Suntail Hawk and such. Ready for this brew? Lorthos will require a big commitment to mana, but we get a three hit Commander Kill, so that has some game winning there that hopefully can play with the other three brews. Like my Azorius blue Bird deck with the generic card draw of Ponder and Think Twice, I am tossing them into this brew as well. (You ponder things here and then think anew about how cool life is under the sea).

Our Advisory Council has people on it like Octavia, Chisei, Kiora, Octavia, Charix, and loads more! Thassa is their God. I moved to the Baltimore area five years ago, and I have been to the local National Aquarium a few times since I moved here.

Sea Creatures of Note

Check out this Fish and Squid. The Barracuda is a 3/4 that gives everyone flash but nothing can be cast on your turn by your foe's even instants. They can flash on their own turns, and then you can flash at the end of a turn, untap, and then take your turn normally. This is both a Hate Bear and a Group Hug card in one Fish. Nice right? The Sand'y is a 4-drop 2/2 with Islandwalk and then you can tap it to taplock an opposing dork and it cannot untap if your Sand'y is tapped, so it can answer a powerful dork and then when a more powerful one arrives, you can untap and then taplock the new one. Great card synergy here!

Check out this Sponge and Octopus. The four-drop is a tiny 1/1 with flash. When it enters the battlefield, you can put +1/+1 counters on it equal to the biggest number of cards your foe drew that turn. Then when it dies you gain life equal to its power, which could be quite a bit here and there. The 10 drop is a nasty 8/8 with a flavorful ward 8. Octavia is in the Advisory Council, so tossing her in makes sense here. It's just two mana if you have or more instants and sorceries in our graveyard. We only have 13 in the deck, so that's unlikely, but just a beater with ward 8 of an 8/8 size is welcome here.

Check out this pair of crabs: Chromeshell Crab and King Crab. The morph Crab is a three-drop morph 5, so 8 mana total and then you can swap control of any dork you control with any dork a foe controls. We have a lot of lesser dorks that would love to trade up. Swap your Coral Eel for their Commander or Consecrated Sphinx. The King is a six-drop 4/5 with a two mana tap ability to bounce an opposing green dork on top of their library, which is pretty powerful given the massive number of green dorks played since the color is so heavily played here in Commander. It's a tempo loss of cards and a card loss since they have to draw it again.

Check out these two Anemones! The former is a four-drop 1/3 uncommon that will bounce a land to someone's hand on arrival to the battlefield, which will slow them down a turn and is a nice tempo addition. The latter is a 1/4 defender common for four mana that cannot swing but rocks evolve to rock the block defensively as you have loads of stuff with power greater than 1 to grow it over time into a big threat. Both can hold up and play defensive quite nicely.

Flavor

I added two cards just for flavor. The first is an sorcery that gives X dorks Islandwalk for the turn. Note that you can target a foe to Islandwalk a mutual opponent if this can be cast with flash with your Tidal Barracuda. Then the Reef is a two-drop enchantment that arrives with four polyp counters. You can tap a Blue dork you control and spend a mana and pull off a polyp to give a +0/+1 counter to a dork, preferably one you control, to help play keep away from your foes over time. This actually plays nicely with a subtheme we'll look at in the next section, and you sacrifice an Island to add two counters to this and then add them instant speed which can be a combat trick to save a blocking dork from a Giant Growth effect or just a bigger power.

Synergy and Win Cons

Let's turn to that subtheme now. The Colony is a defender and a 1/4 body on two mana, and then you can tap it for two mana to mill equal to your defender count a dork. We actually have a few defenders here and there that just happen to fit our deck that we are running around, and that gives us a milling win-con. Then remember our defenders and high defenses, and polyp counters and we can block attacks that comes our way until we win with milling. The Piranhas is a 3/3 with defender (pretty sizeable), and that fits our defender and milling and keep away sub theme.

Let's turn to some synergies. We have a few dorks with Islandwalk or can be given it, but what if your foe doesn't have one? Enter Quicksilver Fountain! Many Aquariums have sculptures and fountains in a central plaza outside, and this can as well. These three drops will put a flood counter onto a non-Island land and turn it into an Island. Then when all lands are Islands, this will remove the counters and begin again. This is very strong with Islandwalkers since they are basically now unblockable.

Manta Ray is a three-drop 3/3 with Islandhome, so it cannot attack without your foe having an Island. Enter the Fountain, and if not, a 3/3 wall for three mana is fine at playing keep away. Nice pair!

As I mentioned before, Charix is on the Advisory Council, and thus we are adding this Crab to our deck. It has a nasty 17 defense to play keepaway and then play into blocking and surviving multiple attacks with your milling win cons. Or...you can just attack and spend three mana to turn it into a +X/-X where X is your Island count, so this can win very quickly. The Jellyfish is a four-drop 2/3 that mills a target foe of 1d6 cards on arrival to the battlefield. The art, name, and stuff are flavored for an Aquarium, so it's fine here.

Check out this pair of one-drop, 0-power uncommon Crabs with landfall. The Hedron one is a two toughness and landfalls one player of three cards. The Ruin one has three toughness and mills all your foes for three for its landfall trigger. In many Aquariums you have décor in their tanks, and this could be the case with these two with the Hedrons. They fit flavor text as well.

Answers

Let's turn to some answers. The 'date is the best mass bounce spell available in mono-Blue and it works quite ably here since it fits the flavor quite well. This six-mana sorcery bounces every critter that ain't Blue, and I am not running anything colorless here so that saves my team. The Crush is also a six-cost sorcery, this bounces every nonland and can surge for five mana If you cast something this turn. Since our leader is an 8/8 Octopus and this leaves behind, this is also a key flavor hit here. You might see other flavorful mass bounce spells here as well to reset the board.

We do have a few counters that are flavored in an Aquarium fashion. The instant is a one-cost that counters any spell that wasn't cast from a hand, like the Commander from a Command Zone. And you can cleave it for three mana to counter anything, and it's a flavor hit. The creature is a 5/4 Shark with a beefy on-curve 5/4 body that can counter artifact or dorks on arrival to the battlefield. That's a surprisingly large on theme body with flash and you can do a combat trick and surprise block and kill someone that just attacked you rather than countering, and it has two values in this brew.

Mirrorshell Crab is a beefy ward 3 creature and can channel for three mana to Mana Leak any ability or spell to counter it. You can drop this as a dork or as a Mana Leak whichever works for the situation. Tangle Kelp will enchant a dork and keep it from untapping if it attacked last turn, so it can attack every other turn. It taps the target when this arrives to the battlefield, so this can be used to tap a blocker and swing.

I have Thassa as my God in this brew since she is God of the Sea. Therefore, I added a few support spells like this instant duo. The Rebuff is a two-mana counter that counters any spell for mana equal to your devotion, and my Commander has triple Blue so that alone is a Mana Leak and can go higher.

Intervention comes with two options: the first is to dig X cards in your library and draw two. Then we can counter for mana twice your X and that's a double Mana Leak. Either side works well here in a deck that is looking to cast an 8-mana Commander.

Card Flow

Now let's turn to card draw. Most of my cards are obvious like the aforementioned Ponder and Think Twice. Check out this pair though. The rare is a five-cost sorcery that reveals cards from your library until you reveal three nonlands and draw them, so your foes will know what you revealed but you are guaranteed to draw gas and not lands, nice later on. The (once) common is a sorcery that will draw cards equal to the biggest mana cost among any permanent you control, so mana rocks, or dorks will both count. With an 8-mana Commander, that could easily be a refilling of your hand and midgame to draw 4 or 6 is nice. You gain a rush of knowledge when you visit an Aquarium.

The Crab draws you a card when it deals combat damage to a player, which is nice. And then you can bestow it on your Commander to turn it into an 11/11 which will kill in two turns not three of Commander Damage and then draw cards, and then when it dies you keep the Crab around for another go around the bin. The Octopus is a three-drop 2/2 with flash and mutate, and we don't have any Humans in this deck so anything is mutate-able. When you deal damage to a combat player, you also draw a card. I love flashing this EOT when a foe just attacked all opening themselves up then untap, and attack them for a card. It's a very strong addition to our Aquarium.

Mana, Rocks, and Lands

Check out this pair of mana rocks! The Diamond is strong here, and the Crystal is a four-drop that taps for two and you can sacrifice it for two mana, tap, and then exile your foes' graveyards and draw a card. You can do this to draw a card after your mana is set or in response to the massive recursion and graveyard (ab)use at the Commander table. Love it loads in response to a Patriarch's Bidding or with an opposing Academy Ruins reloads a Mindslaver. It's very strong! Why are these two mana rocks here in an Aquarium deck? As we looked at with the Aviary, I am envisioning a gift shop where you can buy things to take away, and then we are tossing in things that could be taken away only, like Arcane Signet, Prismatic Lens and Mind Stone.

The Commons arrives tapped and then bounces a land on arrival to the battlefield, which slows you down but gives you more mana from your lands for tapping your Commander. I also have Coral Atoll that bounces an Island and taps for two. I am envisioning a central Commons area for you to relax, shop, and eat just like the National Aquarium here in Baltimore has. The Depths also arrive tapped, tap for Blue, and then you can get a free sorting of the top three cards of your library on arrival to the battlefield.

I definitely see Lonely Sandbars at Aquariums as places for fish and crustaceans to hang out, and this one taps for blue and cycles for one if your land is set. Sapphire Medallion is also purchasable at the gift shop and drops your many blue things by a generic mana each which is brilliant card flow over time.

The Ruins taps for colorless and can reload a destroyed or channeled artifact like the Mirrorshell Crab and then the self-sacrificing for cards Mind Stone and Crystal. It's on flavor since it's underwater and just like the Ruin Crab will add that exploration theme of having underwater places to explore for your Fish and Crabs.

Let's review my decklist!

Sea Aquarium | Commander | Abe Sargent

• Commander (1)
• 1 Lorthos, the Tidemaker

• Creatures (35)
• 1 Charix, the Raging Isle
• 1 Chromeshell Crab
• 1 Coral Barrier
• 1 Coral Colony
• 1 Coral Eel
• 1 Clinging Anemone
• 1 Great Whale
• 1 Gulf Squid
• 1 Hammerhead Shark
• 1 Hedron Crab
• 1 King Crab
• 1 Man-o'-War
• 1 Manta Ray
• 1 Mirrorshell Crab
• 1 Moat Piranhas
• 1 Numbing Jellyfish
• 1 Octavia, Living Thesis
• 1 Octoprophet
• 1 Ruin Crab
• 1 Sand Squid
• 1 Sea-Dasher Octopus
• 1 Sealock Monster
• 1 Sigiled Starfish
• 1 Skyclave Squid
• 1 Sky-Eel School
• 1 Spined Megalodon
• 1 Spiny Starfish
• 1 Thassa's Emissary
• 1 Thassa, God of the Sea
• 1 Tidal Barracuda
• 1 Thought Sponge
• 1 Vivid Flying Fish
• 1 Voracious Greatshark
• 1 Walking Sponge
• 1 Windrider Eel

• Instants (5)
• 1 Submerge
• 1 Thassa's Intervention
• 1 Thassa's Rebuff
• 1 Think Twice
• 1 Wash Away

• Sorceries (8)
• 1 Crush of Tentacles
• 1 Fathom Trawl
• 1 Inundate
• 1 Part Water
• 1 Ponder
• 1 River's Rebuke
• 1 Rush of Knowledge
• 1 Thassa's Bounty

• Enchantments (3)
• 1 Coral Reef
• 1 Flood
• 1 Tangle Kelp

• Artifacts (9)
• 1 Arcane Signet
• 1 Mind Stone
• 1 Prismatic Lens
• 1 Quicksilver Fountain
• 1 Sapphire Medallion
• 1 Sisay's Ring
• 1 Sky Diamond
• 1 Stonespeaker Crystal
• 1 Thought Vessel

• Lands (39)
• 1 Academy Ruins
• 1 Coral Atoll
• 1 Guildless Commons
• 1 Halimar Depths
• 1 Lonely Sandbar
• 34 Island

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And there we go! Other cards you could add are Thassa's Oracle, Bident of Thassa, Retreat to Coralhelm, maybe High Tide, Tidal Influence, Tidal Surge, Tidal Wave, or high-toughness Crabs like Ancient Crab to hold the fort while you mill! What did you think of my deck? Anything in here that is missing? Just let me know and have an awesome-tastic day!