Often, figuring out how to use a Commander is about thinking about each piece of what the Commander does. Where one person sees a 7/7, another sees a Human Soldier, and yet another sees a Commander in Selesnya () colors. Still another sees one ability, one more sees a different ability, and finally one sees a Commander which costs sevem mana. What I encourage you to do is see all of those parts. Take each one and walk it down a path of what you can do with it. Then go back to the beginning and do it again with some different ideas. We have a 7/7. That's a three-hit kill if we can get it through. Can we take extra Combat steps? Triple its damage? How about make it unblockable? Then walk it back. It's a 7/7. That's a good set of stats. Is this a good Voltron Commander? We're in Aura colors - perhaps there's an Auras-matter Voltron deck here, maybe with Enchantresses for card draw? If we can get it to 11/11 and stick Battle Mastery on it, then sneak it through with Rogue's Passage...

There are multiple decks in nearly every Commander, and today's (which I've described in the previous paragraph) is no exception. However, I decided to lean in to one particular part of the Commander and focus on that part. Let's take a look:

We have all these characteristics and two relevant abilities. He comes into play and we get to look at the top seven, then put any number of them into our Hand as long as they meet a set of criteria - being a Creature or a Land. Then, when she dies, we get to make a bunch of 1/1s. There are a lot of decks we could make out of this General, but I thought the fun thing to do would be to use her as card draw.

Torsten Creatures Only | Commander | Mark Wischkaemper

• Commander (1)
• 1 Torsten, Founder of Benalia

• Creatures (59)
• 1 Artisan of Kozilek
• 1 Auspicious Starrix
• 1 Bane of Progress
• 1 Banisher Priest
• 1 Beanstalk Giant
• 1 Brutalizer Exarch
• 1 Burnished Hart
• 1 Canoptek Wraith
• 1 Charming Prince
• 1 Cleanup Crew
• 1 Conduit of Ruin
• 1 Craterhoof Behemoth
• 1 Dawntreader Elk
• 1 Decimator of the Provinces
• 1 Deep Gnome Terramancer
• 1 Distinguished Conjurer
• 1 Doric, Nature's Warden
• 1 Druid of Purification
• 1 Druid of the Emerald Grove
• 1 Emiel the Blessed
• 1 Farhaven Elf
• 1 Fauna Shaman
• 1 Felidar Guardian
• 1 Gemrazer
• 1 Gilraen, Dunedain Protector
• 1 Glimmerpoint Stag
• 1 Greater Tanuki
• 1 Guardian of Ghirapur
• 1 Karametra, God of Harvests
• 1 Kodama of the East Tree
• 1 Kor Cartographer
• 1 Luminate Primordial
• 1 Migratory Greathorn
• 1 Neverwinter Dryad
• 1 Nissa, Vastwood Seer
• 1 Oashra Cultivator
• 1 Ondu Giant
• 1 Palace Jailer
• 1 Pathbreaker Ibex
• 1 Pegasus Guardian
• 1 Primeval Herald
• 1 Sporocyst
• 1 Vorinclex // The Grand Evolution
• 1 Realm Seekers
• 1 Recruiter of the Guard
• 1 Restoration Angel
• 1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
• 1 Sawtusk Demolisher
• 1 Silverglade Elemental
• 1 Solemn Simulacrum
• 1 Stonecloaker
• 1 Sunblast Angel
• 1 Topiary Stomper
• 1 Wakening Sun's Avatar
• 1 Wild Wanderer
• 1 Wispweaver Angel
• 1 Wood Elves
• 1 Yavimaya Dryad
• 1 Yisan, the Wanderer Bard

• Lands (40)
• 13 Forest
• 13 Plains
• 1 Ancient Ziggurat
• 1 Arctic Treeline
• 1 Canopy Vista
• 1 Castle Ardenvale
• 1 Castle Garenbrig
• 1 Command Tower
• 1 Gavony Township
• 1 Grasslands
• 1 Minas Tirith
• 1 Path of Ancestry
• 1 Radiant Grove
• 1 Reliquary Tower
• 1 Rogue's Passage
• 1 Scattered Groves

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Notice anything interesting? Every card in the deck is one we get to keep when Torsten enters the Battlefield.

He's expensive, and we're running some other big Creatures, so we have our normal 40 Lands, but in addition we have several Creatures which get us more Lands when they do things. The idea is we'll get to seven mana on turn five or six, though it's interesting, because we're not actually ramping to Torsten. (Normally we ramp to our Commander! In this case, we don't always want to play our Commander first thing.)

Nope, Torsten is our only card draw. We don't need any more than that, because every time he ETBs we'll draw seven cards. That's a lot, and will keep our Hand filled pretty much whenever we need it. We have a number of ways to flicker him in and out of the Battlefield, in the event we need to draw yet another Hand, but truth be told in play-testing I never once needed to cast him more than a single time. The flickering will come in handy anyway.

We're ramping toward big Creatures. It turns out White and Green have some pretty big monsters which do some good work all on their own, so in addition to our little guys which get us Lands (frankly, some of them are not so little), we've also got some big guys like Sawtusk Demolisher and Greater Tanuki. The cool thing is nothing is here as just bulk: every Creature has some relevant ability. Greater Tanuki is an uncounterable ramp spell, and Sawtusk Demolisher can Mutate to be a Beast Within. Beanstalk Giant? Ramp. Artisan of Kozilek? Reanimation. We'll ramp up, dump our hand, then cast Torsten to refill and go at it again.

Our answers come exclusively from Creatures, of course, but we've got some good ones. Gemrazer is our Reclamation Sage, Luminate Primordial likes to be flickered, and Sunblast Angel and Wakening Sun's Avatar both wreck the board. Bane of Progress is tailor-made for our deck, and Banisher Priest is kind of our Oblivion Ring. One thing about Selesnya: it can solve problems, even if you're limited to only playing Creatures.

There are a couple of important differences between this deck and the decks I normally build for this column. The first is, this one doesn't shy away from tutoring; in fact, it wants to tutor. My most common target with Recruiter of the Guard is Fauna Shaman. Yisan, the Wanderer Bard can also get a little out of hand here, and in the most wonderful way - your opponents better not let you get to like six or seven Verse Counters on that guy! Between the Land searching and the Creature hunting, the deck is going to look for stuff. Conduit of Ruin will almost always get Decimator of the Provinces, but I can see a situation where it would go for Artisan of Kozilek.

Additionally, I worried less about price here. I don't think I've ever put Craterhoof Behemoth in a deck before, because it's just so silly how much it costs for an Overrun, but this deck wants it pretty badly. I felt similarly about other cards I might normally avoid to keep costs down. The deck is better for it, because sometimes there's only one card that does a specific thing, but there are alternatives. For example, Thunderfoot Baloth is a perfectly reasonable (and much cheaper) replacement for Craterhoof here, so if you're looking to save a bit of cash, feel free to make some budget swaps. The deck will still work great - turns out big monsters are good no matter how you dress them up.

In addition, the first idea was to flicker Torsten so I could draw all the cards. As such, I added things like Restoration Angel, Charming Prince, and Distinguished Conjurer. However, as I mentioned, it's unlikely you'll need to draw with him more than once or twice, which means you won't need to flicker him all over the place. Fortunately, it turns out flickering is good with other stuff, too. Like Luminate Primordial, anything that pulls a Land out of your deck, or, say, Craterhoof Behemoth. This deck makes so much mana, it's easy to imagine a situation where you play Craterhoof and flicker it on the same turn, meaning everything gets +X/+X twice. Same with Decimator of the Provinces. That said, even flickering Cleanup Crew and Realm Seekers is pretty great. Or Artisan of Kozilek. That's actually better. Flicker Artisan of Kozilek. Who needs friends?

Speaking of friends, there is a taxing version of this deck one could lean into. Gaddock Teeg and Thalia, Guardian of Thraben are both examples of the sort of thing to push that direction; punish people for playing noncreature spells as long as we're playing nothing but Creatures, right? Personally, if I were going to run it with my group, I'd run a version like the one up there. If I'm already going to be doing all that searching every turn, the least I can do is offer some variance to how the deck winds up. If my group were a little meaner, though, something that locks up the board a bit more might be just what I need!

Torsten is expensive and does a lot, and because of that he's only got 276 decks on EDHREC.com. There are probably "better" Selesnya Commanders, but I think people just aren't trying hard enough. Look at the whole card, consider all the various possibilities, and don't be afraid to try silly ideas. You might surprise yourself.

When's a time you thought outside the box to create a Commander deck? Let us know on socials!

Thanks for reading.