So last week, my buddy James (who made that awesome poster below) wrote me. “I have an idea for your next Convertible Commander,” he said.

“Check it out!”

Athreos, God of Passage ? Commander| Mark Wischkaemper

• Commander (1)
• 1 Athreos, God of Passage

• Creatures (29)
• 1 Akroma's Devoted
• 1 Atalya, Samite Master
• 1 Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim
• 1 Battletide Alchemist
• 1 Brass Herald
• 1 Burnished Hart
• 1 Butcher of Malakir
• 1 Bygone Bishop
• 1 Cabal Archon
• 1 Dark Supplicant
• 1 Devout Chaplain
• 1 Doomed Necromancer
• 1 Doubtless One
• 1 Ebonblade Reaper
• 1 Edgewalker
• 1 High Priest of Penance
• 1 Kor Sanctifiers
• 1 Magister of Worth
• 1 Matter Reshaper
• 1 Mikaeus, the Lunarch
• 1 Mirror Entity
• 1 Order of Whiteclay
• 1 Ravos, Soultender
• 1 Rotlung Reanimator
• 1 Scion of Darkness
• 1 Skirsdag High Priest
• 1 Soul of New Phyrexia
• 1 Tymna the Weaver
• 1 Underworld Coinsmith

• Planeswalkers (1)
• 1 Sorin, Solemn Visitor

• Sorceries (12)
• 1 Beacon of Unrest
• 1 Black Sun's Zenith
• 1 Crux of Fate
• 1 Day of Judgment
• 1 Decree of Pain
• 1 Descend upon the Sinful
• 1 Eliminate the Competition
• 1 Immortal Servitude
• 1 Merciless Eviction
• 1 Phyrexian Rebirth
• 1 Sublime Exhalation
• 1 Tragic Arrogance

• Enchantments (8)
• 1 Banishing Light
• 1 Dictate of Erebos
• 1 Dictate of Heliod
• 1 Fallen Ideal
• 1 Fanatical Devotion
• 1 Field of Souls
• 1 Oblivion Ring
• 1 Shared Triumph

• Artifacts (9)
• 1 Armillary Sphere
• 1 Ashnod's Altar
• 1 Obelisk of Urd
• 1 Orzhov Cluestone
• 1 Orzhov Signet
• 1 Sol Ring
• 1 Spear of Heliod
• 1 Thought Vessel
• 1 Wayfarer's Bauble

• Lands (40)
• 10 Swamp
• 12 Plains
• 1 Barren Moor
• 1 Command Tower
• 1 Forsaken Sanctuary
• 1 Ghost Quarter
• 1 Isolated Chapel
• 1 New Benalia
• 1 Orzhov Basilica
• 1 Orzhov Guildgate
• 1 Reliquary Tower
• 1 Scoured Barrens
• 1 Secluded Steppe
• 1 Shambling Vent
• 1 Starlit Sanctum
• 1 Tainted Field
• 1 Temple of Silence
• 1 Temple of the False God
• 1 Terramorphic Expanse
• 1 Westvale Abbey

Buy This Deck

At its heart, this deck is a clever control deck. The various pieces come together to create a board state difficult to manage while giving opponents a series of hard choices. With Athreos, our indestructible commander, on the battlefield, every creature of ours which dies gets returned to our hand . . .  unless one of our opponents pays three life. That may not seem like much, but having played against this deck several times, I can attest it can add up quickly.

We’re going to play several Wrath of God style effects. Crux of Fate, Phyrexian Rebirth, Tragic Arrogance, they all destroy all the creatures. Using them is great fun, because we then get to look at our opponents and ask “do you want to pay three life . . .  for each of my creatures?” Do keep in mind that Merciless Eviction, Descend upon the Sinful, and Black Sun's Zenith will all get rid of an online Athreos, so it might be worth it to try to get devotion below seven before firing off one of those.

We’ve got a few ways to win, but we have to stay alive for a while to get there. Westvale Abbey is definitely flipable (along with getting our creatures back or costing our opponents 15 life). Dark Supplicant (and a couple of friends) can search for Scion of Darkness, who does a pretty good Sun Titan imitation while beating people up. Skirsdag High Priest can get out of hand pretty quickly, and combined with Soul of New Phyrexia, it’ll really get nasty.

This deck is subtle and takes a lot of thought, and maybe some diplomacy, to make it work. The key to play is looking at the pieces drawn and figuring out how to survive with them. There are a number of fun interactions in this deck, and the cards drawn will dictate how they work out. Play out Athreos and go to town.

Then we’ve got our optionboard. We’re going to take our cheeky, challenging control deck and turn it into a cleric tribal build.

• Coat of Arms
• Ancestor's Prophet
• Custodi Soulbinders
• Dawnglare Invoker
• Eight-and-a-Half-Tails
• Frontline Medic
• Hanweir Militia Captain
• Heliod, God of the Sun
• Sun Titan
• Treasury Thrull
• Cathars' Crusade
• Faith's Reward
• Mortify
• Oblation
• Utter End
• Windbrisk Heights
• Death Grasp
• Exsanguinate
• Profane Prayers

This is a larger board than normal, but we’ve got a number of changes to make. We can take out all of the wrath effects. Additionally, we can pull Magister of Worth, Matter Reshaper, Underworld Coinsmith, Fanatical Devotion, Dictate of Erebos, Butcher of Malakir, Field of Souls, Fallen Ideal, Ashnod's Altar, and a Plains (for Windbrisk Heights. As James puts it, we’ll actually be attacking!).

We’re also going to switch commanders. In fact, we’ll move Athreos into the 98 and promote Ravos, Soultender and Tymna the Weaver to serve as our partner commanders.

We drop in some targeted removal to deal with specific problems, rather than the mass removal we had before. We won’t be able to get our stuff back quite as easily as with Athreos, but Ravos will get them back slowly. We can also use Treasury Thrull or Sun Titan to get most of our stuff back. Coat of Arms will buff up our clerics to huge levels with just a few of them on the ‘field. Cathars' Crusade, also, can buff them up pretty fast. Faith's Reward is a nice response to someone else’s wrath effect. Profane Prayers is even a nifty, cleric-specific kill spell!

This article is a bit different from how I normally do things. I tend to go through card by card and talk about specific inclusions. In this case, though, I’m leaving a lot more to your analysis of the deck. What did you think of this? I try to accommodate newer players with my columns, who might be helped by a better discussion of mana, answers and threats and might get lost with an article like this. I assume experienced players will just skip over the parts they don’t really need. Do you prefer a “deck list and get out of the way” approach, or do you prefer when I get into a deeper analysis? Please let me know in the comments! This is a good opportunity to let me know what you like, because it can help guide these columns.

This deck is a player’s deck. It’s challenging and clever, requiring a nimble approach to the game, because each hand will be different but can probably be used to leverage an advantage. When you want to take it down a notch, switch to the cleric build and suddenly it’s much more straightforward to play. It’s also nicely updateable; as new clerics become available in new sets, they can swap in just to try new things.

Now get out there and try something new.

Cost of main deck: $98.46

Cost of optionboard: $21.22

Total cost of both: $119.68