Way back in the dark ages, when I was first getting into Commander (back then it was just "EDH," and it almost always involved explaining what it was), I just knew my first deck was going to be Mono-Black. It's been my favorite way to play Magic for most of my Magic-playing days (barring this period when I was 14 when I was all-Gruul [{R}{G}] all the time), so there was just no question. I happened to open up a copy of Anowon, the Ruin Sage, and it happened I was parting out my Standard Mono-Black Vampires list (there was something so cool about curving out to Vampire Nocturnus on four and Mind Sludge on five, then swinging for like 14 in the air). It seemed meant to be, and so it was: I made a Mono-Black Vampires EDH deck, looking to keep the board clear of everyone's Creatures except for mine.

Then we went back to Mirrodin and all hell broke loose.

Seriously. The Phyrexians invaded, Mirrans became corrupted, and we got the first glimpse of the new Praetors. At the prerelease, I made it my mission to come home with a copy of who would soon be my new Commander. (It was an easy mission. It was the Prerelease foil.)

The deck moved away from Vamps and became a straight-up Mono-Black reanimator deck, with huge mana, all the tutors I could play, and death to every Creature that hit the 'field... except for mine, of course. I played the deck for several years, and it elicited groans from every table it landed on. The groan came at the beginning if they'd seen the deck before, and at the end if they hadn't, but it always came. It was misery to play against, because even though it didn't always win, it slowed the game down to an absolute crawl. (Check out a recent article by Jason Alt to understand why this is terrible.)

I've since taken my girl apart, and I've moved toward playing decks (most of the time) which are more fun for the entire table. I don't regret it, but my heart remains with Sheoldred and that first Mono-Black list which terrorized my local shop for a few years.

All of this is a long way to say: I got spoiled. Sheoldred's abilities are insane: a free, life-less Reanimate every turn? Everyone else has to sacrifice a Creature every turn? On a massive, evasive body? (I mean, who doesn't play Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth in a Sheoldred build?) I say again: insane.

Which means as I explored my options for who to partner with Candlekeep Sage this week, it's a little hard to look at today's Commander and not be swayed by the thought "Sheoldred is just so much better." And that's proof, right there, that the Phyrexians are insidious and sow distrust among us, because today's choice is no slouch.

For less than half the cost of Sheoldred, we get... well, a small amount of her ability. We get Creatures back from the Graveyard. Granted, they go to our hand, not the Battlefield, but we can work with that. We don't get any board control, but Black is pretty good at that. And the best part is we get to partner with our Background, giving us some extra card advantage and, most importantly, access to another color. It's not big-mama Praetor, but I think we can make good use of our power here.

Viconia requires us to recast our Creatures from our hand, so rather than cheating in a massive Creature for free, we want to keep our mana costs really low so we can always recast whatever we get back. We also have some randomness applied to our returned Creature, which means we want to do our best to get value out of whatever we get back. Finally, we can think about what Creatures do when they're cast versus when they enter the Battlefield, and we can even leverage that difference in some nifty ways.

The first thing to point out is the land count. I'm practically the loudest guy on the interwebs shouting "40 lands or death!" from every high place I reach, but I like to point out there are times when we can adjust, and this is just such a time. In fact, it's really, really one of those times, because we're running 34 lands. That is shockingly low for one of my decks, and extremely risky, but we're playing a risky deck with a whole bunch of variables, and we can always mulligan. More than that, we're running zero mana rocks and only a couple of Creatures which actually help us with our mana. We're not ramping. We're not trying desperately to hit every land drop past three. So, we can run a leaner plan.

The important thing here, though, is this decision is being made very carefully. We have 17 cards with a mana cost higher than three (we have a few more than that, actually, but we're unlikely to actually cast them for that much) and none of them is necessary in the early game. We need three lands to function - that's it. We'll see plenty of cards and be able to dig around both to get that fourth land if we want it and make sure we have enough cards we can actually cast. Will we mana screw sometimes? Yup. I'd recommend using the mulligan aggressively until you see at least two lands (three is better); do that and you'll be fine.

Of course, when you draw enough cards, you can run fewer lands, so we are going to draw some cards. Unlike last week, where the Commander and the Background worked together for the whole game, Candlekeep is incidental card draw for us. Get it out and let it sit. Our Commander is likely to die a few times, and each time we'll get an extra couple of cards. The real engine is in our Creatures. We have cheap ones which give us a glimpse of things to come like Barrier of Bones, who not only lets us dig for, say, another land, but also lets us drop a Creature in the 'yard to get to the magic number of four, or Faerie Seer, who Scrys 2 on arrival then blocks a Dragon. We have Cloudkin Seer and Callous Bloodmage, both of whom draw us a card when they ETB, and Circuit Mender who draws when it leaves. We have Liliana's Standard Bearer, whom we can almost certainly make sure draws us at least one and often more than that, and Thorn of the Black Rose, who makes us the Monarch. Then we get Mulldrifter, which we Evoke for , draw two, then drop in the 'yard to get back again. Vulturous Aven, Stitched Assistant, and Fell Stinger all work similarly, except Exploit lets us choose what to send to death. Just remember a Creature can always Exploit itself! We have more card advantage among our many Creatures. Don't be afraid to use it to make sure you get the Lands you need, and don't be afraid to pitch Creatures into the 'yard if you wind up with too many. Smuggler's Copter is a great example of an excellent Creature for us, because it hits for 3, digs, and pitches to the 'yard to keep our engine running.

What we don't have are any particularly large threats. We have a bunch of small Creatures with small effects. Anyone who, for example, casts Praetor's Grasp on us is likely to be disappointed and end up grabbing our Mulldrifter or something, because there's just nothing all that great here. We'll win by chipping in damage when we can and staying alive when we can't. Draw cards, kill problems, and let the table fight it out.

The fun thing is if a Creature doesn't draw us cards or otherwise help smooth our draws, it probably kills something. We have the full suite of Fleshbag Marauder-style cards here; drop 'em, sac 'em to themselves, and watch the 'field get a lot smaller. Then get 'em back and sac 'em again. Should work great. When more targeted removal is called for, we have Nekrataal and its big brother, Ravenous Chupacabra. Shriekmaw works for Terror mana. Night Incarnate is a mini board wipe, clearing the 'field of smaller Tokens and Creatures. Hex Parasite has fallen a bit out of favor, but it kills opposing Planeswalkers dead and handles a lot of other random problems, too. We also have a couple of more traditional Wrath of God effects, though given our low mana count, this was a rare place where I felt Bontu's Last Reckoning was actually worth it. It'll cost us a turn, but at least we can play it early if someone pops off.

The final thing a group of our Creatures does is make Tokens when they come into play. We have Amass like Gleaming Overseer, regular ol' Tokens like Whirler Rogue, and some particularly synergistic ones like Tormod, the Desecrator. While we're on that, we've got a few more things some Creatures can do. Doomed Necromancer allows us to choose which Creature we get back. Gonti, Lord of Luxury gives us access to our opponents' cards. Lazav, the Multifarious lets us copy something in our 'yard, which is great if we want a second Tormod ability. Skullport Merchant makes Treasures. Tainted Adversary lets us use extra mana to dump Creatures onto the 'field. And Thieving Skydiver lets us steal a mana rock early and an Eldrazi Monument later; either way, it's going to be great to draw or recover.

Candlekeep Viconia | Commander | Mark Wischkaemper

• Commander (1)
• 1 Viconia, Drow Apostate

• Background (1)
• 1 Candlekeep Sage

• Creatures (57)
• 1 Aven Eternal
• 1 Aviation Pioneer
• 1 Azure Fleet Admiral
• 1 Baleful Strix
• 1 Barrier of Bones
• 1 Big Game Hunter
• 1 Bone Shredder
• 1 Callous Bloodmage
• 1 Chain Devil
• 1 Champion of Wits
• 1 Circuit Mender
• 1 Cloudkin Seer
• 1 Demon's Disciple
• 1 Dimir Informant
• 1 Disciple of Bolas
• 1 Doomed Necromancer
• 1 Eldrazi Skyspawner
• 1 Faerie Seer
• 1 Farfinder
• 1 Fell Stinger
• 1 Fleshbag Marauder
• 1 Gleaming Overseer
• 1 Gonti, Lord of Luxury
• 1 Gravelighter
• 1 Hex Parasite
• 1 Lazav, the Multifarious
• 1 Lazotep Reaver
• 1 Liliana's Standard Bearer
• 1 Master of Death
• 1 Merciless Executioner
• 1 Merfolk Traders
• 1 Mulldrifter
• 1 Nekrataal
• 1 Night Incarnate
• 1 Omenspeaker
• 1 Owl Familiar
• 1 Pilgrim's Eye
• 1 Plaguecrafter
• 1 Ravenous Chupacabra
• 1 Ruthless Technomancer
• 1 Sage's Row Savant
• 1 Shriekmaw
• 1 Silver Raven
• 1 Skittering Surveyor
• 1 Skull Skaab
• 1 Skullport Merchant
• 1 Slithermuse
• 1 Slum Reaper
• 1 Solemn Simulacrum
• 1 Stitched Assistant
• 1 Tainted Adversary
• 1 Thieving Skydiver
• 1 Thorn of the Black Rose
• 1 Tormod, the Desecrator
• 1 Vizier of the Scorpion
• 1 Vulturous Aven
• 1 Whirler Rogue

• Instants (2)
• 1 Deadly Dispute
• 1 Reckoner's Bargain

• Sorceries (2)
• 1 Bontu's Last Reckoning
• 1 Crux of Fate

• Artifacts (3)
• 1 Desecrated Tomb
• 1 Key to the City
• 1 Smuggler's Copter

• Lands (34)
• 4 Island
• 6 Swamp
• 1 Blighted Cataract
• 1 Blighted Fen
• 1 Castle Locthwain
• 1 Castle Vantress
• 1 Choked Estuary
• 1 Command Tower
• 1 Creeping Tar Pit
• 1 Crypt of Agadeem
• 1 Dismal Backwater
• 1 Drowned Catacomb
• 1 Encroaching Wastes
• 1 Evolving Wilds
• 1 Field of Ruin
• 1 Haunted Fengraf
• 1 High Market
• 1 Jwar Isle Refuge
• 1 Memorial to Folly
• 1 Memorial to Genius
• 1 Mistvault Bridge
• 1 Rogue's Passage
• 1 Sunken Hollow
• 1 Tainted Isle
• 1 Temple of Deceit
• 1 Terramorphic Expanse

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The goal is pretty simple here. We're going to play out a couple of lands and a couple of cheap Creatures, then get Viconia (and hopefully Candlekeep) in play. From there, we keep dumping Creatures on the board, attacking and blocking like crazy, filling up our 'yard and cycling through whatever we get back. Draw cards, kill stuff, chip in damage, and have a blast. If it works well, everyone will be interested to see which random Creature will head back to your hand, and it's guaranteed to be more fun for your opponents than Shoeldred!

Thanks for reading.