It's been a long time since I've made a serious attempt at building a Naya aggro deck, but when I looked at today's commander I realized I needed to build a good old fashioned combat deck, and I wanted to make up for last week's mono-Blue "Start your Engines" Vnwxt, Verbose Host. That build ended up being a lower powered starting point than I was happy with, and by the time I had playtested it and figured out how I'd change it up, it was too late to really rework my column.

This is my first deck tech in the wake of last week's big Commander Brackets announcement. Going forwards I'm going to need to pay more attention to how many format staples and "game changers" I run in my lists. It's not uncommon for me to run three of them, and in Blue it's rare that I'm not running Cyclonic Rift, Rhystic Study, and Fierce Guardianship. I'm already in the habit of leaving out Sol Ring, and I may start leaving out game changers in my lower-powered lists entirely. If nothing else, that will make it easy to identify ways to upgrade the list if you're aiming for a higher-powered game.

Today's commander is a Human Warrior Cleric who is making her fifth appearance on a card, but only her first in three colors. Previous incarnations were always in red and Green, but Samut, the Driving Force, is adding White to her color palette.

Samut has first strike, vigilance, haste, and some pretty cool abilities. She has the Start Your Engines ability, which gives you (the player) a speed trait and lets you increase that speed up to a max speed of four. Creatures you control get +X/+0 where X is your speed, and noncreature spells you cast cost X less to cast where X is your speed. That's a lot to wrap your head around, and provides a number of different build paths.

The cost reduction for noncreature spells is tempting, but I'll need to be dealing damage to my opponents to get that cost reduction. I can only increase my speed once on my turn, and I have to deal damage to an opponent to do so. The +X/+0 anthem effect is going to help my creatures so I do want to be building an army.

I think this is ultimately going to be a relatively fair combat deck with a few powerful finishers. The first theme in the deck might not seem obvious at first, but once I explain it you'll understand.

Speed Matters

I want to get up to max speed so my creatures can all get +4/+0. That in itself won't win games, but combined with another finisher I should have a shot at getting a win through combat damage. My problem is simple. My commander costs six mana and I don't want to have to wait until Samut hits the field to start increasing my speed. Ideally I want to have already played a card with Start your Engines, and I want to already be pushing up towards max speed before I play my commander.

One of the best ways to start your engines is to play one of the lands that has that ability. They only tap for colorless mana, but they'll let me cast a 1 mana Gingerbrute and swing for a damage.

I'm running nearly every card I could find with start your engines, and not all of them are probably worth including. Burnout Bashtronaut certainly is. This 1/1 Goblin Warrior has menace and can come down on turn 1 if I've got land that can tap for Red. Most of the other creatures in this list cost more, but I'll always be happy to be able to start increasing my speed on turn one or two.

Start your engines found its way onto a pretty nice variety of cards. Point the Way is one of a handful of non-creature spells with start your engines. It can come down on turn 1 and on turn two I can hopefully start playing creatures so I can swing for damage on turn three. I can also sacrifice it to tutor some basic lands into play.

For one mana more, and in Red, I can play Kickoff Celebrations on turn two, swing with a creature I played on turn one, and once I'm at max speed I can sacrifice it to give my creatures (and vehicles) haste.

Perilous Snare is an artifact with an Oblivion Ring effect, and it can tap if I'm at max speed to put a +1/+1 counter on target creature or vehicle I control.

I'm even running Starting Column, Aetherdrift's version of Commander's Sphere. It taps to make a mana of any color and it can tap and sacrifice itself to draw two cards and discard one card. Naturally, it also lets me start my engines.

The Finish Line

This deck is full of creatures, to the point where I've gone out of my way to tie a lot of my removal to cards like Voracious Varmint, Caustic Caterpillar and Whiptongue Hydra. The reason for that is obvious - I'll be going to combat to try to win the game.

The anthem effect I get from my commander might be enough to help me win, but my hope is that if I combine it with something else I'll be able to put my alpha strike over the top to kill multiple players. As an example, I threw in Gahiji, Honored One so any creature attacking one of my opponents will get +2/+0 until end of turn, but if I'm at max speed mine will get +6/+0. That's not bad, but imagine the following cards with an extra +4/+0 tacked onto my damage total for every creature I control.

At max speed, Overwhelming Stampede will give me trample and at least another +6 power over and above the +4 I'm getting from Samut. Commander staple Beastmaster Ascension will turn my +4/+0 into +9/+5. If I've got nine or more creatures, Jetmir, Nexus of Revels will see my team get +7/+0, vigilance, trample and double strike!

I may not go as wide as a traditional Naya tokens deck, but if my creatures are starting out with an extra four power, these powerhouse finishers should work every bit as nicely as they would with a larger army.

Triumph of the Hordes will have my team get +5/+1, trample and infect. Both Moonshaker Cavalry and Craterhoof Behemoth will feel like I've got an extra four bodies in my army. Akroma's Will gives flying, vigilance, double strike, lifelink, indestructible, and protection from each color if I use it with my commander in play.

I am pretty comfortable with my finishers, but I have yet to see if this deck will give me a steady flow of creatures to let me really make the most out of them.

Early Results

I was able to play this list in my weekly Thursday night group. We play online in Tabletop Simulator. I was up against a pillowfort The Prismatic Bridge deck, a Black Panther, Wakandan King deck, and a Saheeli, the Sun's Brilliance deck.

I started out with four lands in hand, along with a Moonshaker Cavalry, a Blasphemous Act and a Caustic Caterpillar. In the early game I managed to keep drawing lands and as a result, managed to not really seem like much of a threat. The table's biggest concern was all of the Propaganda effects the Prismatic Bridge player kept playing out. We were all looking to go to combat, so that was going to be a problem if left unchecked.

I was able to play Caustic Caterpillar, enchant it with Lightwheel Enhancements, and get up to 4 speed pretty quickly. I was then able to get four lands out of Point the Way and also got lucky by drawing and playing Muraganda Raceway, which taps for 2 mana at max speed. My mana production wasn't going to be a problem, but getting enough creatures into play was a concern.

Early on, the Black Panther player had managed to get Arwen, Weaver of Hope into play and was pumping out 1/1 citizen tokens with three +1/+1 counters on each one. Arwen has your creatures enter with additional counters, so this was as much of a big threat as it was a huge flavor fail. I'm sure Arwen and King T'Challa would have gotten along fine, but I was very happy to play a Blasphemous Act and get some counterspell help from the Saheeli player to wipe the board of that growing problem.

Sometimes everything seems to fall together perfectly. This ended up being one of those games. I drew into Guardian Project and played a Camaraderie with only four creatures in play to draw into more really helpful cards.

The pivotal turn in this game didn't go as planned. I was able to play Jetmir, Nexus of Revels and follow it up with Moonshaker Cavalry with the goal of swinging and killing the Black Panther player, who had an equipment out that had been building him an army of 1/1 citizens. I had Teferi's Protection in hand so I figured I could swing for lethal on one player and then Tef-Pro to not die to the crackback from the Saheeli player, who had been abusing a Triplicate Titan to build up a small team of 3/3 artifact creatures over several turns.

The Black Panther player understandably did not want to die and cast Akroma's Will to make their army have lifelink, indestructible, protection, double strike and so on. I didn't want my creatures to die and my buffs were mostly +X/+0, so I instinctively cast Teferi's Protection to phase myself and my permanents out until my next turn.

It's not normal to use Teferi's Protection when you're attacking, and the guys were all a little taken aback and weren't even sure my lethal attack would now have failed. With all of my anthem effects, my three attackers all had something like +14 power and trample. Jetmir + Gahiji + Samut + Moonshaker was a serious boost, but they established that the Black Panther player wouldn't have died thanks to the lifelink.

For the following turn cycle, I was phased out and folks still attacked each other. They didn't know I had Craterhoof in hand. They did wonder if I had a flicker spell of some sort (I didn't) but when my turn came around they had chipped each other's life totals down far enough that I was able to finish the table off.

That final turn was nothing if not epic. My max speed was giving my noncreature spells a cost reduction of 4 mana, so I played a one-mana Nesting Bot, crew into Ezuri's Predation, and suddenly realized I no longer needed Craterhoof. I played Ezuri's Predation, wiped nearly everything, made 27 4/4 Beast tokens, and had the available mana to pay the pillowfort player's 7 mana tax so I could cleanly finish off the whole table in one attack.

I probably got lucky in a few spots with players not having mana up at the right time. I definitely think my odd decision to cast Teferi's Protection during my own combat probably was the pivotal play in the game, or at least it would have been if I had needed those extra bodies for a Craterhoof attack the turn after my Moonshaker Cavalry attack. At the time I couldn't figure out if I was making a brilliant big-brained play, or being a clumsy idiot who managed to win despite my own misplays.

The funny thing about this deck is that it felt like it played like a mid-to-high powered deck, but in our new bracket system it would only be a 2. It runs no Game Changers. Triumph of the Hordes? Craterhoof Behemoth? Teferi's Protection? Not Game Changers, apparently.

I don't mean to suggest that the new system is inadequate. It's just not really a great way to express power in this format. You can build overpowered decks in any bracket. In this game I was able to come out on top, but if I had drawn into additional cards with "start your engines" instead of so many of my finishers, the result would have been very different.

She Drives Me Crazy

It took a game for me to fully realize how busted Samut, the Driving Force really is. I probably could have won the game without her anthem effect, but saving a whopping four mana on my noncreature spells is just insane. Paying two mana for Camaraderie is nuts, even if I was only drawing four cards and gaining four life. Samut makes Harmonize feel not just playable but really good and I haven't put Harmonize into a deck in ages.

Just because a commander can be broken doesn't mean it should be. My build really leaned on those other finishers to win its first game, but I wouldn't want to be playing at that power level every week. I win my share of games already, and pushing the envelope all the time in a playgroup just leads to power creep and an unhealthy arms race if everyone isn't on board.

Samut, the Driving Force | Commander | Stephen Johnson

• Commander (1)
• 1 Samut, the Driving Force

• Creatures (31)
• 1 Alms Collector
• 1 Beast Whisperer
• 1 Birds of Paradise
• 1 Burnout Bashtronaut
• 1 Caustic Caterpillar
• 1 Craterhoof Behemoth
• 1 Druid of the Anima
• 1 Endrider Catalyzer
• 1 Endrider Spikespitter
• 1 Esper Sentinel
• 1 Gahiji, Honored One
• 1 Gingerbrute
• 1 Goblin Surveyor
• 1 Howlsquad Heavy
• 1 Jetmir, Nexus of Revels
• 1 Leonin Surveyor
• 1 Loxodon Surveyor
• 1 Mirror Entity
• 1 Moonshaker Cavalry
• 1 Nesting Bot
• 1 Odric, Lunarch Marshal
• 1 Poison Dart Frog
• 1 Pride of the Road
• 1 Reclamation Sage
• 1 Rocco, Cabaretti Caterer
• 1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
• 1 Spire Tracer
• 1 Swiftwing Assailant
• 1 Voracious Varmint
• 1 Walking Sarcophagus
• 1 Whiptongue Hydra

• Instants (11)
• 1 Akroma's Will
• 1 Beast Within
• 1 Chaos Warp
• 1 Constant Mists
• 1 Curious Herd
• 1 Heroic Intervention
• 1 Moment's Peace
• 1 Obscuring Haze
• 1 Path to Exile
• 1 Swords to Plowshares
• 1 Teferi's Protection

• Sorceries (8)
• 1 Blasphemous Act
• 1 Camaraderie
• 1 Ezuri's Predation
• 1 Overwhelming Stampede
• 1 Rampant Growth
• 1 Rishkar's Expertise
• 1 Shamanic Revelation
• 1 Triumph of the Hordes

• Enchantments (6)
• 1 Beastmaster Ascension
• 1 Guardian Project
• 1 Kickoff Celebrations
• 1 Lightwheel Enhancements
• 1 Outpace Oblivion
• 1 Point the Way

• Artifacts (5)
• 1 Arcane Signet
• 1 Perilous Snare
• 1 Racers' Scoreboard
• 1 Starting Column
• 1 The Great Henge

• Lands (38)
• 7 Forest
• 7 Mountain
• 7 Plains
• 1 Access Tunnel
• 1 Amonkhet Raceway
• 1 Arid Mesa
• 1 Avishkar Raceway
• 1 Bountiful Promenade
• 1 Command Tower
• 1 Exotic Orchard
• 1 Jungle Shrine
• 1 Muraganda Raceway
• 1 Rogue's Passage
• 1 Sacred Foundry
• 1 Spectator Seating
• 1 Spire Garden
• 1 Stomping Ground
• 1 Temple Garden
• 1 Windswept Heath
• 1 Wooded Foothills

Buy This Deck Export text

You might think this deck is a bracket 2 deck in our new system because it doesn't include any game changers, you'd be wrong. The brackets are something of a power level rating, but they are also something else. Brackets 1 through 5 can be mapped to power levels, but they really represent an understanding of how you are building your decks. Adding Gaea's Cradle, Jeska's Will, and Smothering Tithe to this list might make it stronger, but this list is going to get more out of Craterhoof Behemoth, Moonshaker Cavalry, and Jetmir, Nexus of Revels.

If you did want to power this list up, I think you could do one of two things - if not both. Adding more creature tutors, Tooth and Nail, and Avenger of Zendikar would give this deck an even more emphatic alpha strike. I like decks that don't always aim for the exact same game ending play, but Tooth and Nail into Craterhoof / Avenger is a classic for a reason. The other thing you might do is add in more card draw that takes advantage of Samut's cost reduction. I did fine in my game, but playing cheap or free noncreature spells is incredibly powerful and I didn't really build this list to abuse that abilitiy.

To power this list down I think you would take some of the most impactful finishers and replace them with "fairer" cards. Craterhoof and Moonshaker Cavalry could be replaced by End-Raze Forerunners and Great Oak Guardian. Just removing cards that cost more than a certain amount and replacing them with more budget-friendly cards will go a long way towards bringing your power down. I wouldn't suggest having Samut be your only wincon, but there are lots of cards that can work well to close out games in a lower powered meta so you're playing fair and folks won't think you're pubstomping.

Final Thoughts

I still don't love the feel of Aetherdrift, but I did enjoy building and playing this list. Winning usually feels good, and this deck did win its first game. That doesn't mean I'm now gung-ho about starting my engines and getting up to max speed in Magic: the Gathering. It's a square peg and a round hole for me, and I know I'm not alone.

Not every deck I build and write about is going to be able to hang at mid and high-powered tables. Many in recent months have been aimed at low-powered play, with odd combinations of themes and not enough efficient ways to win games. It would be easy to skim one of those columns and assume I have no idea what I'm doing as a deckbuilder. This week it was nice to be able to lean into powerful wincons, focus on some new mechanics, and build a deck that proved to be able to get the job done.

One game sample sizes are just that - a snapshot of one moment in a deck's potentially long lifespan. I probably won't build this in paper, but if I did I expect it would absolutely win its fair share of games. It might even be too much for some playgroups. Not everyone runs ways to survive the kind of alpha strikes this deck is able to send across a table. There's a reason I love Constant Mists and Moment's Peace and it's not just because of their groovy old card frames. I've won a few games over the years thanks to a well-timed fog and an overzealous opponent who didn't leave up any blockers.

That's all I've got for today. Thanks for reading and I'll see you next week!