No worries, Disney hasn't acquired the "Akira" license.

Well, yet, at least.

Much of Kamigawa has changed in the seventeen years since our last visit. Back in 2005, Kamigawa was steeped in classic Japanese Feudalistic aesthetics. Samurai charged into battle without fear. Ogres summoned terrible Oni to sow chaos. And the veil between the mortal and spirit worlds grew thin, escalating a war that would stretch for twenty years before Michiko Konda, Truth Seeker and her 'sister' Kyodai, Soul of Kamigawa righted the sins of their fathers and gave birth to a new age. This period would be one of cooperation, with mortal and spirit working together. After centuries of kami magic coexisting alongside mortal technology, society has evolved into an entity molded by equal parts enchantment and industry. This was the vision, the dream Michiko and Kyodai envisioned for their injured home: Uniting once-opposed forces for the greater good.

A blessing for most citizens. But not all.

For all the progress made over the centuries, the rat-like Nezumi are still largely regarded as second-class citizens. Many view Nezumi as scheming and untrustworthy, and most especially those affiliated with the Okiba, a ninja-clan that goes back to ancient times (Okiba-Gang Shinobi). When Greasefang, Okiba Boss rose to power, she made her mission clear: Any Nezumi under her gang's care would protected. Respected. And if any harm were to befall them, fierce payback would be hammered out on the skull of whatever sorry soul started the trouble. Under Greasefang's command, a house of ninjas has turned to one of bikers, ever patrolling their territories around Towashi. Greasefang and her colleagues are often forced to improvise, working with junkyard scraps and whatever parts they can find to modify and repair their bikes. It's made the Okiba Nezumi master improvisers, experts at turning salvage into superior tech. Greasefang, Okiba Boss can restore entire busted vehicles from the scrapheap, getting them up and running in an instant.

And let me tell ya, it ain't all junk in that scrap pile. You'd be surprised what people throw away.

With Greasefang, Okiba Boss at the helm of our Commander deck, we want to make the most out of the graveyard, stockpiling it with useful vehicles and creatures to recur. It doesn't take many extra pieces alongside our Commander and a vehicle to assemble card-advantage engines. Making things even sweeter: If opponents are able to kill off parts of our plan, we've plenty of ways to get them right back. Let no scrap go unused. We may be running opponents over with cobbled-together tech, but doesn't that just add a neat post-apocalyptic charm? Just add some extra spikes and a mohawk, and suddenly that old hunk of junk is a bitchin' Mad Max battle cruiser!

Reckoner Bankbuster by Steve Prescott

Witness me!!!

Let's start by breaking down our Commander:

1. Greasefang, Okiba Boss is all about recurring Vehicles, quickly jumping in to pilot them across an opponent's face, then pitching them back into our hand for later use. Her 4-power stat for only three mana is pivotal, allowing Greasefang to crew any of our vehicles all on her own. We just need access to said vehicles, so getting them into the graveyard is Priority 1. For vehicles already in hand, especially expensive ones, discard outlets like Armix, Filigree Thrasher and Pointed Discussion become doubly useful. More straightforward tools like Corpse Churn, Bitter Revelation, and Ransack the Lab help us draw cards while filling the 'yard with vehicles. Tutors like Vile Entomber, Oriq Loremage, and Entomb let us select the best vehicle to handle a given situation. Parhelion II hits hard and fast, leaving boat loads of evasive damage behind. Smuggler's Copter and Reckoner Bankbuster keep our hands stocked with value. Conqueror's Galleon // Conqueror's Foothold even turns into ramp with utility after a single activation. Who says Orzhov can't have ramp?

2. Greasefang's biker gang is Nezumi-only on Kamigawa, but at the Commander table, she'll recruit a motley rabble of scoundrels to assist her in driving all these vehicles. She can pilot anything, but she can't pilot everything. Additional vehicles means we'll need additional bodies. Some, like Doomed Artisan, provide a steady stream of ever-growing pilots. Those sculptures may not be able to attack or block, but they can crew! Others, like King Macar, the Gold Cursed and Order of Whiteclay, are happy to tap themselves in order to crew a vehicle and untap for value later on. Finally, there's also troops like Aeronaut Admiral to simply enhance our vehicles upon climbing into the driver's seat.

3. With our general being able to resurrect a fallen vehicle each turn, and at no extra mana cost, our deck is able to take on an "Aristocrats" sub-theme for pure value. Cards like Priest of Yawgmoth can vastly accelerate our mana off a Greasefang-revived Parhelion II while also sending it back to the graveyard to recycle for another 8 mana the next turn. Well, after it's already attacked for a ton of damage, at least. Free angels! Other cards like Deadly Dispute and Morbid Curiousity work in the same fashion, drawing you cards as you recycle away vehicles each turn. Or you could start building bigger and bigger artifacts off of Oswald Fiddlebender.

4. Lastly, although we're mainly looking to fill the graveyard with vehicles, there's bound to be cold bodies tossed in, as well. Be they sent to the 'yard incidentally off a Ransack the Lab, sacrificed to fuel a Reckoner's Bargain, or simply fall victim to an opposing wrath, our creatures are likely to meet the grim reaper at some point. Greasefang, Okiba Boss may know her way around automotive necromancy, but flesh-and-blood buddies are a whole other story. And seeing as vehicles do little without someone to pilot them, it's in our best interests to ensure dead comrades don't stay dead for very long. As such, we round out our strategy with creature recursion like Teshar, Ancestors's Apostle, Agadeem's Awakening, and Order of Whiteclay, who's all too happy to tap itself to crew a vehicle so it can then use its untap ability.

In review, Greasefang, Okiba Boss offers a lot of funky potential for graveyard interaction and cheating expensive mana costs. Then doing it over and over again until everyone else is dead. There are plenty of ways to build various card-draw or mana-generating engines. What's really funny is how these engines can operate silently in the background as your revived vehicles continually bash-face each turn. It's like piloting a Control deck with an Aggro side-hustle!

Greasefang, Okiba Boss by Victor Adame Minguez

Greasefang's Scrapyard on Wheels | Commander | Matthew Lotti

• Commander (1)
• 1 Greasefang, Okiba Boss

• Creatures (19)
• 1 Aeronaut Admiral
• 1 Armix, Filigree Thrasher
• 1 Burnished Hart
• 1 Digsite Engineer
• 1 Doomed Artisan
• 1 Esper Sentinel
• 1 Fain, the Broker
• 1 Foundry Inspector
• 1 King Macar, the Gold-Cursed
• 1 Loyal Warhound
• 1 Order of Whiteclay
• 1 Oriq Loremage
• 1 Oswald Fiddlebender
• 1 Pain Seer
• 1 Priest of Yawgmoth
• 1 Sram, Senior Edificer
• 1 Sun Titan
• 1 Teshar, Ancestor's Apostle
• 1 Vile Entomber

• Instants (8)
• 1 Corpse Churn
• 1 Costly Plunder
• 1 Deadly Dispute
• 1 Deadly Rollick
• 1 Entomb
• 1 Inkshield
• 1 Malakir Rebirth // Malakir Mire
• 1 Reckoner's Bargain

• Sorceries (9)
• 1 Agadeem's Awakening // Agadeem, the Undercrypt
• 1 Bitter Revelation
• 1 Damn
• 1 Final Parting
• 1 Morbid Curiosity
• 1 Pointed Discussion
• 1 Ransack the Lab
• 1 Unmarked Grave
• 1 Vanquish the Horde

• Enchantments (3)
• 1 Born to Drive
• 1 Smothering Tithe
• 1 Underhanded Designs

• Artifacts (24)
• 1 Aerial Surveyor
• 1 Arcane Signet
• 1 Archaeomancer's Map
• 1 Conqueror's Galleon // Conqueror's Foothold
• 1 Crowded Crypt
• 1 Cultivator's Caravan
• 1 Daredevil Dragster
• 1 Mask of Memory
• 1 Mechtitan Core
• 1 Mind Stone
• 1 Mukotai Soulripper
• 1 Network Terminal
• 1 Orzhov Signet
• 1 Parhelion II
• 1 Peacewalker Colossus
• 1 Raiders' Karve
• 1 Reckoner Bankbuster
• 1 Skysovereign, Consul Flagship
• 1 Smuggler's Copter
• 1 Sol Ring
• 1 Surgehacker Mech
• 1 Talisman of Hierarchy
• 1 The Celestus
• 1 Weatherlight

• Lands (36)
• 7 Plains
• 9 Swamp
• 1 Ancient Tomb
• 1 Brightclimb Pathway // Grimclimb Pathway
• 1 Buried Ruin
• 1 Caves of Koilos
• 1 Command Tower
• 1 Eiganjo, Seat of the Empire
• 1 Fetid Heath
• 1 Geier Reach Sanitarium
• 1 Godless Shrine
• 1 Inventors' Fair
• 1 Isolated Chapel
• 1 Marsh Flats
• 1 Mech Hangar
• 1 Myriad Landscape
• 1 Shattered Sanctum
• 1 Silent Clearing
• 1 Tainted Field
• 1 Takenuma, Abandoned Mire
• 1 Urza's Saga
• 1 Vault of Champions

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Our general does the heavy-lifting when it comes to revival, so it's up to us to provide her with plenty of scrap to bring back. Our first order of business is to fill up the graveyard with potent vehicles, ideally using tutor effects to grab the best of the bunch, but also churning through card draw spells that pitch or discard cards as an added cost or effect. Once Greasefang has something spicy to work with, we can start bashing in for heavy vehicular damage whenever possible, but that's only our surface-level strategy. As our mechs introduce their steely fists to the faces of opponents, we'll be setting up card-advantage engines in the background, increasing overall threat density with each passing turn.

The Biker Gang: Our band of hooligans falls into three camps: those that help us fill the graveyard, those that synergize with vehicles, and those that operate our sacrifice-engines. Bear in mind, there's plenty of cross-over between these roles. Some creatures can actually do all three!

When it comes to filling the graveyard, both Vile Entomber and Oriq Loremage provide Entomb-style graveyard tutors. The entomber's deathtouch allows it to hold the fort as a blocker, while the loremage can tutor up vehicles turn after turn. Armix, Filigree Thrasher requires you to have a vehicle in hand before it can pitch it to the graveyard, but he'll reward you with a removal spell for your troubles.

Once vehicles begin showing up on the battlefield, either via Greasefang, Okiba Boss's recursion or simply playing them the old-fashioned way, we'll need to provide pilots. For sheer numbers, Doomed Artisan and Digsite Engineer provide a steady stream of bodies with the potential to grow much bigger over time. Sculptures and Constructs are mainly intended to crew, but once enough of them amass, they can easily become an offensive force in their own right. Just make sure to feed your Doomed Artisan to a Costly Plunder first. Other pilots like Pain Seer, Order of Whiteclay, and King Macar, the Gold-Cursed take full advantage of crew costs without the risk of dying in combat, allowing you to untap with them each turn for full effect. Finally, a lone Aeronaut Admiral has donned the official Okiba leather jacket so he can graft wings onto all their fancy bikes.

As planes, trains, and automobiles begin making their way out of our graveyards, we'll want to do more with them than simply drive over our opponents. Greasefang's recycling of our vehicles allows cards like Priest of Yawgmoth to generate huge swaths of mana each turn, Oswald Fiddlebender to tutor up bigger vehicles from our library, and Fain, the Broker to starting making creatures or handing out counters. If we opt not to immediately sacrifice a returned vehicle and instead allow it to return to our hand, creatures like Sram, Senior Edificer and Teshar, Ancestor's Apostle will reward us for it later. Note that 2/3rds of our deck's creatures are 3 mana or less, giving Teshar (in addition to Order of Whiteclay and Sun Titan) plenty of targets to resurrect.

Speaking of creatures to resurrect, utility troops such as Burnished Hart and Loyal Warhound make great recursion targets. The hart even has the decency to dispose of itself for you, handing out lands in the process. How nice of him. With all the vehicles in this deck, the presence of Foundry Inspector should come as no surprise. As for Esper Sentinel, the sheer card advantage he can generate, combined with a smaller and easily-revived body, makes him an easy include.

The Scrap Pile: The gang's assembled. Now it's time to see what junk can be salvaged into monstrous machines! Final Parting, Entomb, and Unmarked Grave provide additional graveyard tutors, fetching up the most relevant vehicle for Greasefang, Okiba Boss to revive. In addition, cards like Corpse Churn, Ransack the Lab, and Bitter Revelation sift through the top cards of our deck, letting us keep a valuable creature or removal spell while pitching a vehicle. In addition, Mask of Memory and Pointed Discussion provide vehicular discard while drawing us more cards. Our aristocratic side sees us sleeve up Deadly Dispute, Morbid Curiosity, Costly Plunder, and Reckoner's Bargain. These are best used once the Greasefang-recursion is already underway, but if you're still on the hunt for vehicles, there's enough recursion in the deck to warrant sacrificing an early creature to get the engines started.

In terms of automotive selection, we've a car for all tastes. For pure offensive capabilities, it's hard to go wrong with Parhelion II, especially considering it'll leave behind 8-power worth of evasive angels after each swing. The Boros Mothership also makes a great sacrifice target, letting you get around ever having to cast it for the whopping 8-mana by just recurring it over and over. If opposing armies are looking dangerous, choices like Skysovereign, Consul Flagship and Surgehacker Mech provide repeatable removal. Perhaps you'd prefer to expand your real-estate? Can I interest you in our 2022 Conqueror's Galleon // Conqueror's Foothold, which will conveniently ramp you into a nifty utility land after a single attack? Other mana-providing options include Cultivator's Caravan, Raider's Karve, and Aerial Surveyor.

You may be the sort of customer in the market for simple, traditional card draw. Nothing wrong with that. Weatherlight, Smuggler's Copter, Reckoner Bankbuster, and Daredevil Dragster all work towards card advantage. That sleek little Mukotai Soulripper in the corner also does wonders as a sacrifice enabler. Heck, you could simply take em' all and let Peacewalker Colossus make you an entire army of Autobots!

Or perhaps you like to dream big...

Supporting Spells: Additional removal comes in the form of Vanquish the Horde, Deadly Rollick, and the amazingly-flexible Damn. Because our engines can take some time to set up, Inkshield does plenty of work protecting us while making a bunch of Inkling tokens serve as backup blockers or pilots. I'm also a huge fan of the modal lands from Zendikar Rising, with Malakir Rebirth // Malakir Mire and Agadeem's Awakening // Agadeem, the Undercrypt both offering useful effects for very little opportunity cost.

Mana Support and Rocks: When it comes to our mana rocks, many of the usual suspects are in attendance: Sol Ring, Arcane Signet, Orzhov Signet, Talisman of Hierarchy, etc. That said, there are a few more unique options that fit the themes of our deck. For example, The Celestus and Network Terminal both provide a looting effect, helping us pitch vehicles to the graveyard while drawing into gas. Crowded Crypt can provide a ton of smelly zombies, the decay of which is of little concern when they're sitting in a driver's seat. Even our vehicles get in on the action, with the aforementioned Cultivator's Caravan acting as a mana rock on its own, and Aerial Surveyor keeping us at pace with opposing ramp.

Finishing off with lands, our Orzhov build includes the standard Marsh Flats, Godless Shrine, Command Tower, Vault of Champions, etc. More specific to our plans are the likes of Inventors' Fair as an additional tutor, Mech Hangar to assist in crewing vehicles, Eiganjo, Seat of the Empire as no-opportunity cost removal, Takenuma, Abandoned Mire and Geier Reach Sanitarium to stock our graveyard, and Urza's Saga for Constructs and a free Sol Ring.

Reckoner's Bargain by Justine Cruz

Who's up for a rousing talk about finances?

Budget Options: Magic: The Gathering is expensive. No question about it, especially with the myriad of alt-arts, etchings, foils, Secret Lairs, and whatever upcoming devilry Wizards of the Coast no doubt has in store for us. But if Greasefang, Okiba Boss can be resourceful enough to reassemble Parhelion II out of scraps, then dammit, we can find inventive alternatives to pricier options. Here are some budget substitutes for players who'd rather not break the bank on cardboard. All cards over $20 will be noted and recommended for swap-outs. If anything seems interesting, regardless of price tag, give them a roll in the main! Creativity is an oft-forgotten cornerstone of Commander. One of the aspects that makes it special. Mix and match card choices to your heart's content!

Creatures: Esper Sentinel: $25.99

Starting off on a good foot, folks. Our sole budget-busting creature is a powerful one, but also one our deck loses no synergy by cutting. We've ample options available for replacement. The classic Solemn Simulacrum fits, especially considering the sacrifice factor. This also makes Scrap Trawler a solid option. Scaretiller provides another useful tap effect to combine with crewing vehicles, and works especially well with Inventor's Fair and Urza's Saga. Rebbec, Architect of Ascension can offer both offensive and defensive capabilities via her protection, allowing your vehicles to potentially go unblocked while shielded from some forms of targeted removal. Lastly, if you just want to have fun, there's always the flavorful Giant Ox + Colossal Plow combo.

Supporting Spells: Smothering Tithe: $39.99, Entomb: $35.99, Deadly Rollick: $32.99

No surprises with these cuts. Each card is supremely powerful and/or efficient for what it does. I'm less torn about Smothering Tithe and Deadly Rollick, as numerous mana rocks (Thought Vessel, Everflowing Chalice, etc.) and targeted removal (Swords to Plowshares, Vanishing Verse, etc.) fill the void without too much pain.

The loss of Entomb hurts, though, as it serves a vital function in our strategy. There are few options as efficient, but one mechanic that could help out is Surveil. Cards like Sinister Starfish, Price of Fame, and even the mighty Doom Whisperer all help dig for cards to pitch while improving our draws over the game.

Mana Options: Ancient Tomb: $60.00, Urza's Saga: $45.00, Marsh Flats: $27.99

Wrapping things up with lands, we've two directions to explore. If it's additional White/Black mana we desire, plenty of budget options like Temple of Silence, Shambling Vent, and Shineshadow Snarl easily fill the void. If we'd rather replace expensive land with utility options, I'd recommend looking into Castle Locthwain, Blast Zone, Ghost Quarter, or Vault of the Archangel.

Takenuma, Abandoned Mire by Nao Miyoshi

I hope you enjoyed riding along with Greasefang and her pack of troublemakers. If ever you feel like giving Aristocratic-Vehicles a go at your Commander table, I'm sure the ride will be a wild one. There's always something fun to reassemble from that scrapheap. And really, how often do you get the opportunity to assemble Voltron out of trash? Sure, it might need a coat of paint and one of those pine tree air fresheners, but it still ought pack an epic punch!

Thanks for reading, and may you never run outta gas.

-Matt-

@Intrepid_Tautog