I've done a lot of things over the years as a Magic player. With 24 years of play under my belt, I think you'd be hard pressed to find ways I haven't played the game more than I have. Most people know me for either my Pauper or Commander content, but I've spent my fair share of time playing many other things as well. I've spent my time playing numerous casual variants, built my own cubes, and attended local Legacy events for years while they were still going on. Heck, even now, I've been jumping in heavily to Explorer MTG Arena where you can often catch me on the ladder vying for that sweet, sweet mythic ranking.

Today, however, I'd like to talk a little about my time with Standard and how it influenced this week's decklist. I've talked in the past about the number of different decks I've played in Standards past and how they've influenced my preferences and play styles over the years. Elves, Affinity, Underworld Dreams, Heartless Summoning, Tempered Steel, and more were all decks that I adored many years ago. For many of these, I've built decks that honored those past archetypes and strategies because they meant something to me then and I wanted to try eternalizing them in a chill and casual environment to play with friends.

Of all these past decks, one of my absolute favorites was without a doubt Hazoret Red. By this point, I was no stranger to aggro strategies, having played many over time - including Mono-Red ones. This is where I really kicked things into high gear, though, and grinded heavily to prepare for larger paper events. Soon after, a friend lent me a copy to take to Grand Prix Seattle 2018. Going in with no byes, I was able to get an undefeated record with it on day one. I may have fizzled out pretty rough with a 2-5 run on day two, but it still made for one of the most exciting events I've ever played in. That event - alongside many others from that season - made me fall in love with the deck, and especially its namesake card, Hazoret the Fervent.

Like many well-loved cards from past Standards, Hazoret hasn't really been able to make her mark on the game as much as she used to. That is until March of the Machine came out and we got the new team up legendary creatures, including one featuring Djeru and Hazoret. I was super excited to see my favorite jackal-headed goddess back in action, but didn't think much of the card at first. That is, until I played it in a draft recently on Arena.

Like many people, I've gotten absolutely hooked on March of the Machine Limited as of late. I played three drafts at CommandFest Orlando a few weeks ago and immediately knew I wanted more. After that weekend, I was chomping at the bit to get to play it that Tuesday and I immediately couldn't stop jamming draft after draft. Then, in one draft, I opened a copy of Djeru and Hazoret and decided to go in on it and try Boros for a change. In my third pack, I not only was passed a second copy of this powerful legend, but also a copy of Etali, Primal Conqueror // Etali, Primal Sickness. I thought this was just a decent deck with a couple really sweet bombs. Then, I attacked with Djeru and Hazoret and flipped over Etali, and it hit me just how awesome that felt.

Based on this feeling - as well as my love for Hazoret in the past - I felt compelled to make a new list around this duo. It's not very reflective of Hazoret Red necessarily the way I made decks explicitly themed around, say, Tempered Steel or Heartless Summoning in the past. However, it still provides a pretty epic experience all the same. Ready to check out the list? Here you go!

Djeru and Hazoret's Freebies | Commander | Paige Smith

• Commander (1)
• 1 Djeru and Hazoret

• Creatures (31)
• 1 Adeline, Resplendent Cathar
• 1 Akroma, Angel of Fury
• 1 Anafenza, Kin-Tree Spirit
• 1 Arni Metalbrow
• 1 Aurelia, the Warleader
• 1 Avacyn, Angel of Hope
• 1 Basandra, Battle Seraph
• 1 Cadric, Soul Kindler
• 1 Captain Lannery Storm
• 1 Delina, Wild Mage
• 1 Etali, Primal Storm // Etali, Primal Sickness
• 1 Feldon of the Third Path
• 1 Gerrard, Weatherlight Hero
• 1 Gisela, Blade of Goldnight
• 1 Hazoret the Fervent
• 1 Hofri Ghostforge
• 1 Ilharg, the Raze-Boar
• 1 Isamaru, Hound of Konda
• 1 Karlach, Fury of Avernus
• 1 Karmic Guide
• 1 Kozilek, Butcher of Truth
• 1 Loran of the Third Path
• 1 Pia Nalaar, Consul of Revival
• 1 Reya Dawnbringer
• 1 Skrelv, Defector Mite
• 1 Solphim, Mayhem Dominus
• 1 Syr Carah, the Bold
• 1 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
• 1 Thalia, Heretic Cathar
• 1 Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre
• 1 Yoshimaru, Ever Faithful

• Instants (7)
• 1 Abrade
• 1 Generous Gift
• 1 Path to Exile
• 1 Return to Dust
• 1 Swords to Plowshares
• 1 Thrill of Possibility
• 1 Unbreakable Formation

• Sorceries (6)
• 1 Faithless Looting
• 1 Jaya's Immolating Inferno
• 1 Reckless Impulse
• 1 Urza's Ruinous Blast
• 1 Wrath of God
• 1 Wrenn's Resolve

• Enchantments (4)
• 1 Day of Destiny
• 1 Passionate Archaeologist
• 1 Reconnaissance
• 1 Sneak Attack

• Artifacts (13)
• 1 Arcane Signet
• 1 Boros Signet
• 1 Fellwar Stone
• 1 Hazoret's Monument
• 1 Helm of the Host
• 1 Heroes' Podium
• 1 Lightning Greaves
• 1 Mind Stone
• 1 Relic of Legends
• 1 Sol Ring
• 1 Strionic Resonator
• 1 Swiftfoot Boots
• 1 Talisman of Conviction

• Lands (38)
• 9 Mountain
• 9 Plains
• 1 Battlefield Forge
• 1 Castle Ardenvale
• 1 Castle Embereth
• 1 Clifftop Retreat
• 1 Command Tower
• 1 Furycalm Snarl
• 1 Hanweir Battlements
• 1 Kher Keep
• 1 Kor Haven
• 1 Maze of Ith
• 1 Myriad Landscape
• 1 Needleverge Pathway // Pillarverge Pathway
• 1 Path of Ancestry
• 1 Rogue's Passage
• 1 Rugged Prairie
• 1 Sacred Foundry
• 1 Slayers' Stronghold
• 1 Spectator Seating
• 1 Sundown Pass
• 1 Windbrisk Heights

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Nothing says "I'm here to have a good time" quite like a deck that cheats as many big creatures onto the battlefield as possible. Sneak and Show decks? Reanimator lists? Polymorph strategies? Oh yeah, you know what it's all about. It's all about getting down those giant creatures and ruining your opponents' days. It's even better when you get to do it in a "spin the wheel" sort of manner where you have no clue what you're going to hit. With no shortage of big legendary creatures to utilize, this is a deck that can add some serious tension. You never know if you're going to hit something small like an Isamaru or something monstrous like an Ulamog.

The range in creature sizes is an absolute must here. You can't just rely on playing with a ton of giant creatures and hoping to stick the landing by utilizing Djeru and Hazoret. If you simply loaded up your deck with eldrazi titans, Akroma and Avacyn variants, and similar, you'd often find yourself with a lot of massive creatures stuck in your hand with no way to play them. Djeru and Hazoret isn't Kaalia of the Vast, after all. Yes, you get to play these big creatures for free, but if they end up in your hand in the first couple turns, you're going to find that they're just going to sit there. In many games, you'll never even be able to cast them because of their heavy mana costs. As a result of this, there needs to be a good healthy mix of small creatures to big ones.

Thankfully, there's a lot of great legendary creatures at lower mana costs. There's no shortage of options at the middle grounds of four and five-mana value creatures. At three and lower, though, your choices become much more limited. Despite these limitations, there are still some really rock solid creatures to work with. Captain Lannery Storm gets you treasures to help get to your big spells, Loran of the Third Path is both removal and card advantage, and Adeline, Resplendent Cathar allows you to get a few small creatures on the board early where you might typically lack them. Both Thalias slow your opponents' roll, allowing you to build momentum, and Skrelv, Defector Mite provides you excellent spot protection when needed. I even got to slip in a pair of new March of the Machine: The Aftermath cards in Arni Metalbrow and Pia Nalaar, Consul of Revival because both are pretty low to the ground and work well in a deck like this! It might feel unexciting to hit some of these over an Avacyn, Angel of Hope, but I'm of the opinion that free cards are still free cards!

The name of the game here is to get your big legends out quick, though, so I've included a few extra contingencies to help get the ball rolling. For one, I used a lot more mana rocks than I typically do in most of my lists. I'm often not the biggest fan and don't end up using a ton of them, but here you want to ditch as many cards as possible to get the haste online for Djeru and Hazoret. You can also use cards like Reckless Impulse and Wrenn's Resolve to act as card advantage while removing cards from your hand to turn your commander online. If worst comes to worse, you can slap on a pair of Swiftfoot Boots or Lightning Greaves and still get in fast either way.

Utilizing your commander isn't the only way to cheat out creatures, though. In tried and true fashion, I've included a couple ways to sneak creatures into play. Chief among them is the aptly named Sneak Attack and also a legend in his own right Ilharg, the Raze-Boar. Given that the deck has some reasonable discard options in the form of Faithless Looting, Hazoret's Monument, and Thrill of Possibility as ways to filter out your big, uncastable creatures, I added in a handful of reanimator options too. Reya Dawnbringer is obviously the top of the heap here, but being a nine-mana monstrosity herself, we have to rely on other measures instead. The two main ones are Karmic Guide - which gets back a creature outright - and Feldon of the Third Path for a more temporary solution.

While there's no shortage of sweet effects thanks to many legends being awesome like that, there's also a handful of additional utility options at play here. The heavy legends focus actually allows for a set of unique cards that don't get much time in the sun. Here, those include Urza's Ruinous Blast and Jaya's Immolating Inferno - both uncastable without a legend in play - and Heroes' Podium and Day of Destiny. There's also Delina, Wild Mage; Helm of the Host, and Cadric, Soul Kindler to enable you to get additional copies of legends onto the battlefield while avoiding that pesky legend rule in the process. Last but not least, I want to point out the very unique card of Passionate Archaeologist. Normally I'd consider this to be a fairly unremarkable card, but given how this commander casts spells from exile like nobody's business, the damage this card deals gets out of hand extremely fast.

The end result is a deck you can build easily, plays fairly straight-forward, and does big splashy things like nobody's business. It's even a deck that you can acquire fairly affordably! This list here is $400, but there's also a handful of fairly pricey cards here like Avacyn and the eldrazi titans. While it may not be as optimal, you can easily swap in a budget friendly Zetalpa or Akroma and have just as much fun, meaning you can build this on your budget and how you want to customize it. Regardless of how you build it, though, it's bound to make for a great time at your next Commander night. All I know is that personally, I love that Wizards keeps bringing back these old favorites, and I can't wait to see which ones they come back to next.

Paige Smith

Twitter: @TheMaverickGal

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