Sometimes it's time to move on to something new. And because the fashion that was in when I was 11 is now back, it's clear that everything old is new again, so I think it's time to do something old that's going to be new. When I first started writing for CoolStuffInc, I went around the color wheel, building a Commander deck for each color and color combination available. I think it's time to do that again. Last time, we used a strict budget to keep everything affordable. This time, the brakes are off. No budget. Let's do this.

I like Commander. One of the things I like is how flexible we can be with deck-building, because we don't necessarily have to build to win. We can build to tell a story, because we like a theme or tribe, or just use the cards we've got to hang with a group of friends. But sometimes it's fun to pick a strong commander and build to her strengths; minimal themes, just good cards, making a good game. The nice thing about a commander like Sephara is she pushes us into a theme at least a little automatically. Assuming we want to use her secondary casting ability, we want fliers, and we probably want at least a few cheap ones. Let's start with the mana and work from there.

We almost always run 40 lands here in my columns, and we're going to run 40 lands here. Mono-color decks are nice because we can run more utility in our mana base, so we've got Emeria, the Sky Ruin, Foundry of the Consuls, and Rogue's Passage, to name a few. We can cycle a few of our lands if we draw them late. Mostly we want to hit our drops for the first five or six turns, because if we have to hard-cast our commander we'd like to get there sooner rather than later. Alternately, we want to start casting creatures quickly so we can get her out faster. We've also got a few rocks to help us along; not a ton, though. One in the first few turns would be helpful.

We're going to beat down our opponents with fliers. This is a red zone deck for sure. So we want to keep the fliers coming, which means we have to try to keep card parity in a color which doesn't like to draw cards very much. We've got Bygone Bishop, which helps, but mostly we're going to do this by making tokens and the occasional returning of things to the battlefield. If we look at each card that makes two tokens as two cards and each one that makes three as three cards, we can start to keep up. This is actually an important thing to remember in general: card draw is just one subset of card advantage. Drawing an extra card is one of the most obvious ways of gaining an advantage, but if we're making more cards than we're spending (say, getting two tokens for one card) or spending fewer cards than our opponents (if we cast Wrath of God, for example, when we have only one creature and they have 12, we've spent two cards to their 12, which is a 1:6 ratio of card advantage). When we're in a draw-disadvantaged color combination like Mono-White, it's worth it to find other ways to catch up.

In part we're conservative with removal because we're actually running a trick. Rally of Wings will surprise the heck out of someone blocking your 3/3 with a 4/4 token. Plus you'll probably be swinging with more things, so you'll hit for a bunch of extra damage. It's our only one, but they don't know that. With some tricky play you can convince the table you've got it and push through all kinds of damage.

We've got other fun things, too. Smothering Tithe will certainly gain us some Treasure. Spirit Bonds will help us make more dudes, plus it'll protect our Angels nicely. Luminarch Ascension is always great, especially early when no one is doing damage. A few pieces of Equipment can make our commander a serious threat, as Haunted Cloak and Forebear's Blade both give her Trample. Moonsilver Spear makes it so any of our team can summon Angels. And Serra the Benevolent is here to watch over her feathered friends and us, since that emblem shouldn't be hard to get.

Sephara, Sky's Blade | Commander | Mark Wischkaemper

• Commander (1)
• 1 Sephara, Sky's Blade

• Creatures (33)
• 1 Aegis Angel
• 1 Angel of Finality
• 1 Angel of Jubilation
• 1 Angel of Vitality
• 1 Angelic Skirmisher
• 1 Aven Mindcensor
• 1 Belfry Spirit
• 1 Bishop of Wings
• 1 Boreas Charger
• 1 Bruna, the Fading Light
• 1 Bygone Bishop
• 1 Celestial Crusader
• 1 Emeria Angel
• 1 Emeria Shepherd
• 1 Geist-Honored Monk
• 1 Gisela, the Broken Blade
• 1 Hanged Executioner
• 1 Healer's Hawk
• 1 Kinjalli's Sunwing
• 1 Loyal Pegasus
• 1 Lyra Dawnbringer
• 1 Magus of the Moat
• 1 Pilgrim's Eye
• 1 Resplendent Angel
• 1 Rustwing Falcon
• 1 Segovian Angel
• 1 Selfless Spirit
• 1 Serra Ascendant
• 1 Skyscanner
• 1 Sunblast Angel
• 1 Tomik, Distinguished Advokist
• 1 Topplegeist
• 1 Windborn Muse

• Planeswalkers (1)
• 1 Serra the Benevolent

• Instants (6)
• 1 Benevolent Offering
• 1 Generous Gift
• 1 Path to Exile
• 1 Rally of Wings
• 1 Return to Dust
• 1 Swords to Plowshares

• Sorceries (6)
• 1 Battle Screech
• 1 Cleansing Nova
• 1 Fumigate
• 1 Spectral Procession
• 1 Triplicate Spirits
• 1 Winds of Abandon

• Enchantments (3)
• 1 Luminarch Ascension
• 1 Smothering Tithe
• 1 Spirit Bonds

• Artifacts (10)
• 1 Endless Atlas
• 1 Forebear's Blade
• 1 Haunted Cloak
• 1 Marble Diamond
• 1 Mind Stone
• 1 Moonsilver Spear
• 1 Pearl Medallion
• 1 Sol Ring
• 1 Spear of Heliod
• 1 Thunder Totem

• Lands (40)
• 26 Plains
• 1 Arch of Orazca
• 1 Drifting Meadow
• 1 Emeria, the Sky Ruin
• 1 Foundry of the Consuls
• 1 Homeward Path
• 1 Karoo
• 1 Mistveil Plains
• 1 Myriad Landscape
• 1 New Benalia
• 1 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
• 1 Rogue's Passage
• 1 Secluded Steppe
• 1 Seraph Sanctuary
• 1 Temple of the False God

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That should be a pretty solid, if very fair, list. We'll come out swinging early and often, and our commander will probably enter the fray much earlier than a 7/7 should, though she'll do it on her own terms, not with some sneaky trick. Just make sure to sandbag that removal for when we really need it.

Any thoughts on how to build Sephara? Any cards I missed you think should be included? While I'm asking questions, any suggestions for upcoming mono-colored decks? Blue is next!

One more thing I'm going to try to do every article. Most of the time I consider multiple ideas before settling on one, so I'm going to share the runner-up when I've got one. This week, it was Evra, Halcyon Witness. I thought there might be potential for a very cool deck that gained life and powered her out early, then clocked opponents for lethal in one hit. A bit of a glass cannon (or, my preferred phrase, a "handgun from Ikea"), but could be quite fun to put together. A bit like Phage, the Untouchable, without the absurd tap dance one must do to cast one's own commander.

See you next time! Thanks for reading.