Over the past couple of years, I've been having a wonderful time talking about Classic Commander decks. It's both provided a great way to look into the ways I once played the game many years ago while simultaneously providing a restriction to allow for some interesting decks. It's a great nostalgia trip for someone like me who was actually there playing the format during that time. Given the deluge of products and Commander-focused creations, it seems many others are feeling the same way. Yesterday, the official Commander Rules Committee Twitter account posted the following:

Since so many folks have asked about PreDH, there's a channel dedicated to it now on the RC Discord server. The rules/card legality are pinned: https://t.co/4HKrNgncd6

— Commander Rules Committee (@mtgcommander) February 21, 2023

This is about as close to an officialization of a sub-format for Commander as you can get. Not even cEDH has gotten a dedicated channel, nor something like Pauper Commander either. Notable figures such as Brian David-Marshall, Sheldon Menery, and The Professor have been championing it a little bit at a time here and there. All three actually joined together on The Professor's Shuffle Up and Play YouTube series to show off the format alongside Ced Senpai of One More Mana. Since then, it's gotten enough traction to get the Commander RC Discord to officialize it and allow for more direct discussion and gameplay there.

By total coincidence, I was gearing up to write an all-new Classic Commander article based on a list I had been saving for a while. After the wild ride that was MagicCon Philadelphia, it seemed like a great time to break it out. This week, I'm talking about the Exodus classic Ertai, Wizard Adept.

There're about fifteen characters that have multiple legendary creatures in the PreDH pool and Ertai happens to be one of those lucky few. I've already discussed his character and his other PreDH legal card Ertai, the Corrupted in a previous article, so I highly recommend checking that out if you want to know more. It just seems fitting to go back to the Ertai well again given he's returned once more in the recent Phyrexia storyline courtesy of Sheoldred in Dominaria United. While he's still as evil a monster as he ever was, we're going to go back to when he was just an idiot student from Tolaria that annoyed Barrin so much, he was sent to accompany the travels of the Weatherlight.

Let's check out what this deck has to offer!

Classic Ertai | PreDH | Paige Smith

• Commander (1)
• 1 Ertai, Wizard Adept

• Creatures (17)
• 1 Aeon Chronicler
• 1 Azami, Lady of Scrolls
• 1 Draining Whelk
• 1 Duplicant
• 1 Enclave Cryptologist
• 1 Glen Elendra Archmage
• 1 Guile
• 1 Jushi Apprentice
• 1 Lullmage Mentor
• 1 Meloku the Clouded Mirror
• 1 Mulldrifter
• 1 Solemn Simulacrum
• 1 Sower of Temptation
• 1 Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir
• 1 Thada Adel, Acquisitor
• 1 Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre
• 1 Venser, Shaper Savant

• Planeswalkers (1)
• 1 Jace Beleren

• Instants (14)
• 1 Blue Sun's Zenith
• 1 Counterspell
• 1 Cryptic Command
• 1 Desertion
• 1 Dismiss
• 1 Dissipate
• 1 Ertai's Meddling
• 1 Evacuation
• 1 Exclude
• 1 Forbid
• 1 Mana Drain
• 1 Negate
• 1 Pongify
• 1 Remand

• Sorceries (6)
• 1 Ancestral Vision
• 1 Blatant Thievery
• 1 Deep Analysis
• 1 Inundate
• 1 Ponder
• 1 Preordain

• Enchantments (6)
• 1 Control Magic
• 1 Frozen Aether
• 1 Future Sight
• 1 Propaganda
• 1 Rhystic Study
• 1 Training Grounds

• Artifacts (17)
• 1 Caged Sun
• 1 Coldsteel Heart
• 1 Crawlspace
• 1 Elixir of Immortality
• 1 Erratic Portal
• 1 Everflowing Chalice
• 1 Gilded Lotus
• 1 Lightning Greaves
• 1 Mind Stone
• 1 Mindslaver
• 1 Nevinyrral's Disk
• 1 Oblivion Stone
• 1 Pristine Talisman
• 1 Sapphire Medallion
• 1 Sky Diamond
• 1 Sphinx-Bone Wand
• 1 Umbral Mantle

• Lands (38)
• 24 Island
• 1 Academy Ruins
• 1 Blasted Landscape
• 1 Boseiju, Who Shelters All
• 1 Faerie Conclave
• 1 Ghost Quarter
• 1 Halimar Depths
• 1 Lonely Sandbar
• 1 Minamo, School at Water's Edge
• 1 Mishra's Factory
• 1 Mutavault
• 1 Reliquary Tower
• 1 Riptide Laboratory
• 1 Terrain Generator
• 1 Wasteland

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Much like his more Phyrexianized PreDH-legal counterpart, Ertai, Wizard Adept loves to play a mean game of control. Unlike his compleated form, however, this one is of a far more no-frills sort. Whereas Ertai, the Corrupted relies on you sacrificing cards over and over in order to counter stuff, this one is much more akin to straight up Counterspell on a stick. It may cost a little more to utilize at four mana over two, but it's an admittedly small price to pay to be able to do it over and over again.

To this end, Ertai, Wizard Adept plays far more how you'd expect the cocky Tolarian student to play a game of Magic: full old-school Draw-Go style. This list is no slouch when it comes to both card draw and countermagic. There's a handful of solid one-shot draw effects such as Ponder, Preordain, and Deep Analysis, but what really helps fuel your plays are the more repeatable options. Cards like Enclave Cryptologist, Jushi Apprentice, Rhystic Study, and Azami, Lady of Scrolls each help keep the flow of cards chugging right along, meaning you get many more options to help control the board.

These options might include the many counterspells that the deck has in its arsenal. Yes, of course basic Counterspell is in here. So too are other accessible counters like Dismiss, Negate, Dissipate, and Exclude. You also have bigger options such as Cryptic Command and Mana Drain, as well as a handful of repeatable options in Glen Elendra Archmage and Forbid. With the help of these spells and the commander, you can also easily get enough creatures to make some real liberal use of Zendikar classic Lullmage Mentor. With all of these, there's even a monstrous payoff in the form of Guile, which can let you just take the spells for yourself instead.

Guile isn't the only way to steal your opponent's stuff, though. Blatant Thievery will, as the name implies, happily take possession of each of your opponents' best permanents. Even if you don't have Guile down, that's fine, because Desertion offers you a rock solid one-shot way to take down opposing spells and claim them as your own. In a pinch you can also use Control Magic and Sower of Temptation to take control of individual creatures. Thada Adel, Acquisitor happily steals artifacts from your opponents too. Even the lists featuring a minimal amount of artifacts are likely to have a handful of rocks to spare, meaning you're almost always bound to hit at least something.

If you want to go all in on your thievery, you can even use Mindslaver to take control of players themselves - something that can end games with the aid of Academy Ruins. As with any great control deck, there are a couple of great ways to close out your games once you've established proper control. Meloku the Clouded Mirror is a truly classic control finisher, allowing you to repeatedly bounce lands to craft a small army of flying tokens to slowly whittle away opponents' life totals as you shut them out of the game. Sphinx-Bone Wand also puts in a lot of work, using the deck's many instants and sorceries to deal significant points of damage. If all else fails, you can always use a good old fashioned Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre to plow through your opponents and simply bludgeon them to death.

Finally, there're some oddball control options. A couple notable ones are ways to slow your opponents down. Being the control deck at the table means players will be gunning for you. Utilizing a well-placed Crawlspace, Propaganda, and/or Frozen Aether can make it that much harder for your opponents to take you out. There's even a handful of interesting board wipe options in the form of Nevinyrral's Disk, Oblivion Stone, Evacuation, and Inundate - something of a surprise given the list is Mono-Blue. While there isn't much explicit removal, both Duplicant and Erratic Portal can deal with creatures in small bursts, and the latter can help you get extra value from cards like Solemn Simulacrum and Mulldrifter.

What I think is most interesting to mention is the amount of cards I actually cut from the original pool I put together for this list. I ended up taking out over forty cards! Many of these were great ones too, such as Willbender, Echo Mage, Phyrexian Metamorph, Acquire and Bribery, Morphling, Time Warp, Consecrated Sphinx, and Mirari to name a few. Going through I realized I even missed a few potentially obvious choices like Mnemonic Wall and either Pemmin's Aura or Freed from the Real (although Umbral Mantle did make the cut to allow for multiple Ertai activations per turn).

What this signifies is that there's no shortage of great Mono-Blue Control options to build it the way you want. All I did was make as all-in of a build as I could to fit the idea of what Ertai is trying to represent. For some people, though, this might be a bit much, and might feel a bit too suffocating for their playgroup. If that's the case, there's plenty of excellent cards to choose from and tone it down a bit. Simply use this as a blueprint and I've no doubt you'll be able to cultivate a list that's perfect for having a great time at your next Commander night. Just remember that you always have the power at your disposal to tell your opponents, "no."

Paige Smith

Twitter: @TheMaverickGal

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