Last week, I talked about Lands. Specifically, I went deep on how I choose which Lands and how many I run in a deck. Today, I'd like to do something similar, but I want to talk about ramp.

This past summer, I wrote a whole article on how much ramp is right for your deck. I'm not alone, either; there are a number of articles out there about this topic, with a variety of answers to go with all those articles. Some people tell you to always run Sol Ring. Others tell you it's a killer of fun.

But I think it's more helpful, ultimately, to show you how I think; once you get inside my brain on how to choose your ramp, you can make your own decisions. However, in order to do that, I needed something specific: I needed a Commander who needs to ramp in some particular way, so I can show you my process.

I have a basic strategy, which I laid out in my Top Five Deck-Building Tips for Beginners. Read the whole article - it's great for anyone who builds Commander decks, even veterans - but the gist is simple: always ramp, and run 8 mana ramp spells if your Commander costs three or less. If your Commander costs four or five, run nine ramp spells, and if it's six or more run 10. That's it.

But that's for a beginner. This is a starting point, if you're building your first few decks and are trying to figure out why something's not working. This strategy will work; it's not always correct.

Some decks don't need to ramp at all. A control deck which reliably draws three cards a turn and runs 45 Lands can probably skip ramp altogether in favor of more interaction. A deck filled with nothing but 1- and 2-drops, similarly, can just skip ramp. Others need to ramp really, really hard, like my Vaevictis Asmadi, the Dire deck, which runs 40 Lands and 20 ramp spells, for a total of 60 mana sources. 8 - 10 is a starting point and nothing more.

So, let's talk about how to think about ramp. And in so doing, let's build around a Creature with - no joke - 15 decks on EDHREC.com.

Don't look too closely. If you do, you'll realize why this card has so few decks. She's... well, she's just not that good. We get a 4/4 for 5 mana in Selesnya (). She creates a Monster Role token which we can only attach to something else, and gives other Enchanted Creatures +1/+1. So, she cares about Enchantments and Enchanted Creatures in colors which are good for that, but she doesn't do it particularly well. We get no card draw and no real card advantage (that Role token is iffy at best), just a specific anthem effect which requires we have a bunch of Enchanted Creatures.

However, this is the perfect case study for a very specific ramp need. Here's the plan:

Turn one: Tapped Land, preferably with both colors.

Turn two: Play a Creature! We have 25 Creatures in the deck, and 21 of them cost 2 mana or less. Most of them care about Enchantments, too, so they'll help us with the rest of our gameplan.

Turn three: Ramp, either with a Cultivate-style spell, a mana rock, or an Enchantment.

Turn four: Play Syr Armont.

Turn five: Play some gigantic Aura on our little Creature (which isn't so little anymore) and attack for 11.

This means our ramp wants to cost us 3 mana. Let's talk it through.

(Just to keep in order of how we do things around here, we are running 40 Lands. The mana base is fine. It probably could do with a few more duals, but it should work okay.)

When I think about ramp - which I do every time I build a deck - I start with a series of questions.

Question 1: why am I ramping? Am I ramping to keep up? Get ahead? Because I have some specific purpose for my ramp?

Question 2: what brand of ramp am I running? (This is mostly related to color.) Do I have access to Green? If so, am I willing to commit to heavy-enough Green to go with Green-based Land fetch?

Question 3: How important is it my ramp provide me with a color or multiple colors?

Question 1 puts the whole thing in perspective. Do I even need to ramp? Am I putting Sol Ring in because I'm supposed to, or because my deck can actually use it? Sol Ring is incredibly powerful... on turn one or even turn two. After that, its value goes down pretty far; yes, even later in the game it still nets you extra mana the turn it comes down, but when was the last time you were really excited to draw Sol Ring on turn nine? Sol Ring is particularly awesome if I have a four-drop Commander which costs, say, . I play an Island, Sol Ring, then next turn drop a Swamp and my 4-drop is in play on turn two.

However, that's God-hand thinking, and building to the perfect hand is a trap. Most of the time you're not going to get the perfect hand: it's why we build in redundancy and card draw and answers. My theory on Sol Ring (and ramp in general, for that matter) is either we want it all the time or we should work around it, because if it means 10% of our deck is dead after our opening hand, it's probably not worth it. (Also, Sol Ring is a 1-drop, and most ramp really starts on turn two, so I think it's better to think in terms of what we can reliably get, rather than luckily starting with one of 99 cards.)

So, let's say I'm building around a 5-drop Commander who really needs to be on the 'field before I can start doing my thing. If that's the case, it's unlikely I want to wait until turn five to get my Commander out, which means I need some ramp. Now, for the sake of discussion let's talk about two-mana ramp and three-mana ramp, but please understand when I have access to Rampant Growths and Cultivates I will use them over mana rocks barring some really specific reason (like my deck cares about Artifacts). For our purposes right now, however, Rampant Growth and Arcane Signet function the same way - they cost 2 mana and jump us ahead by 1 mana.

For my five-mana Commander, I need to consider what else I'm doing. Where is the rest of my curve? Am I playing utility Creatures at 3 mana, like Thalia, Heretic Cathar? Am I playing out Equipment at a variety of costs between two and five? Am I just trying to get my Commander out so I can start playing huge fatties? If I have a bunch of 3-drops I want to play, I want my ramp to hit before that, so I want two-mana ramp (and probably Sol Ring). If I've got a mix of Equipment to play out, I want a mix of ramp as well, so I can do my best to hit my curve and spend my mana each turn; two-mana Equipment, three-mana rock, five-mana Commander. If I'm ramping, I want the most mana for my buck, so now I'm looking at Worn Powerstones and possibly even Hedron Archives, skipping the possibility of getting my Commander early in order to get more mana for bigger stuff. That's also a time to do two-mana ramp, because if we get lucky we can play two spells on turn three, but it's also a reason for Cultivates (when they're available) because that guarantees a Land drop the next turn in addition to ramping.

I've kind of already answered question 2. If I have access to Green, I'm running Land fetch over rocks, almost always. Want an exception? We're getting to one.

Finally, question 3 requires you to consider the needs of your deck. Are you running Rafiq of the Many? Sol Ring kind of sucks; I'd rather have Arcane Signet. doesn't help me as much as does if I don't have a Plains, when my Commander is . A mono-color deck can probably handle Ebony Fly better than a four-color one. Use your judgment.

So, what about Syr Armont? Well, we're going to play a Creature on turn two and ramp on turn three. Why insist on three-mana ramp over two? Because three-mana ramp can get you more value over time. A Commander's Sphere can be sacrificed later for a card; Arcane Signet can't. In 99% of cases, the extra mana we save from casting Arcane Signet instead of Commander's Sphere will be wasted, I'd rather spend the extra mana now and get a card later. Lots of three-mana ramp is this way; Cultivate is better than Rampant Growth over time, because of the guaranteed drop. Cultivator's Caravan is better than a Talisman over time, because it doesn't cost you life and can turn into an actual threat. Nature's Embrace is a three-mana Enchantment which can either buff a creature or ramp. We get value from paying more, so in this case, we will. This way, we use our mana fully each turn, and we have something we can do later to help ourselves.

The rest of the deck is just fun. We have a bunch of Enchantresses which help us draw cards when we cast our Enchantments, and almost all of them are 2 mana. We have a solid bunch of Auras which have massive effects; Eldrazi Conscription is amazing, of course, but this is a deck which can honestly run Colossification. It should be a hoot.

We have a stack of Enchantments which deal with problem permanents (basically a bunch of Oblivion Rings), and one board wipe which only kills non-Enchanted Creatures (good ol' Winds of Rath). This deck should run decently and be fun to play, both with and against. It'd be a decent sword in a game of Emperor, actually, because of how quickly it comes out of the gate and how hard it hits.

Syr Armont, the Redeemer | Commander | Mark Wischkaemper

• Commander (1)
• 1 Syr Armont, the Redeemer

• Creatures (24)
• 1 Argothian Enchantress
• 1 Composer of Spring
• 1 Dawnhart Geist
• 1 Destiny Spinner
• 1 Elvish Archivist
• 1 Flutterfox
• 1 Generous Visitor
• 1 Hero of Iroas
• 1 Jukai Naturalist
• 1 Kor Spiritdancer
• 1 Leafcrown Dryad
• 1 Mesa Enchantress
• 1 Nessian Wanderer
• 1 Qasali Pridemage
• 1 Regal Bunnicorn
• 1 Satyr Enchanter
• 1 Slumbering Keepguard
• 1 Spellbook Vendor
• 1 Sram, Senior Edificer
• 1 Sythis, Harvest's Hand
• 1 Tanglespan Lookout
• 1 Timber Paladin
• 1 Transcendent Envoy
• 1 Unassuming Sage

• Sorceries (4)
• 1 Cultivate
• 1 Kodama's Reach
• 1 Return from the Wilds
• 1 Winds of Rath

• Enchantments (24)
• 1 Banishing Light
• 1 Cast Out
• 1 Celestial Mantle
• 1 Chains of Custody
• 1 Colossification
• 1 Eldrazi Conscription
• 1 Epic Proportions
• 1 Giant Inheritance
• 1 Grasp of Fate
• 1 In the Trenches
• 1 Indrik Umbra
• 1 Mammoth Umbra
• 1 Mantle of the Ancients
• 1 Mythic Proportions
• 1 Nature's Embrace
• 1 Oblivion Ring
• 1 Pollenbright Wings
• 1 Prodigious Growth
• 1 Quarantine Field
• 1 Seal from Existence
• 1 Shape of the Wiitigo
• 1 Spectra Ward
• 1 Verdant Embrace
• 1 Wurmweaver Coil

• Artifacts (7)
• 1 Bonder's Ornament
• 1 Commander's Sphere
• 1 Cultivator's Caravan
• 1 Fountain of Ichor
• 1 Lantern of Revealing
• 1 Patriar's Seal
• 1 Skyclave Relic

• Lands (40)
• 14 Forest
• 14 Plains
• 1 Arctic Treeline
• 1 Blossoming Sands
• 1 Botanical Plaza
• 1 Canopy Vista
• 1 Command Tower
• 1 Fortified Village
• 1 Gavony Township
• 1 Graypelt Refuge
• 1 Radiant Grove
• 1 Rogue's Passage
• 1 Selesnya Sanctuary
• 1 Temple of Plenty

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The point, really, is to think about ramp holistically rather than just "run the most efficient ramp there is". Sol Ring, Arcane Signet: these cards are good for a reason. It doesn't mean they're always correct. If your deck is mostly 1- and 2-drops in terms of action, Sol Ring and Arcane Signet just get in your way! Wouldn't you rather play one of the cards which actually does what your deck is supposed to do? Similarly, if you're not ramping, and ramping doesn't help you, why are you running Sol Ring? Think about what ramp you need, and where you need it to be in your curve, and build to that. That Bonder's Ornament will be surprisingly useful when you find yourself needing an answer in a couple of turns.

What do you think? Am I off my rocker? On to something? Sound off on socials, write an article in response, whatever, but let me know what you think. I'd love to hear what you have to say.

Thanks for reading.