The Death of Marshal Ney by Jean-Leon Gerome (1868). Wanted Scoundrels by Volkan Baga.

There are few sweeter words in our game than "draw a card," though for years I didn't fully appreciate how much they mattered. Those three words helped to drive my decision of what deck to build this week. In preparing for this week's column I was looking over some of the Jumpstart legendary cards I had opened up over the past few weeks.

I pulled a Muxus, Goblin Grandee, but I don't think I'd wind up doing anything new or interesting around him. Goblins can be fun, and I might eventually build Muxus, but I don't feel like there are that many interesting directions to take a Muxus deck.

I also opened Kels, Fight Fixer. That card has our magic words on it, but seems to lean heavily towards the kind of forced-sacrifice and combo build that I always think will be fun, but result in me feeling bad when I play it. Earlier this year I built Nethroi, Apex of Death and then felt terrible when I shut down my opponents' ability to maintain a boardstate. I like winning, but I just don't like making my friends miserable in the process. Also, the talented Jason Alt also recently wrote a column about Kels and I doubt I'd be able to top it. You can read his treatment of Kels, Fight Fixer here.

The third Jumpstart legendary I pulled out of a booster happens to also have our magic words on it. I've built a handful of green decks recently, including Renata, Called to the Hunt and The Questing Beast, and have a Multani, Maro-Sorcerer build that I am quite fond of. This last Jumpstart green legendary isn't really green - it's got a Gruul color identity and has some abilities that might play well off of some of the things I've been doing with my other green decks.

Meet Neyith of the Dire Hunt.

Fight is a great mechanic for removal and removal is really important in Commander. Forcing creatures to block is also a potentially very powerful mechanic, though you have to be careful with it. A potentially crushing alpha strike thanks to a well-placed Taunting Elf can turn into a blowout loss if your opponents are clever enough to run basic creature removal in their decks and use it to mess with your attack.

Running ways to make sure your opponents' creatures all must block one of your attackers will likely kill that creature and should let you get the rest of your creatures through their defenses. That works great in my Multani, Maro-Sorcerer deck where Multani is often a lethal and hard-to-remove threat. In this deck I'm less likely to have a Prized Unicorn do much more than draw me a card if Neyith is on the field. It probably won't help me swing for lethal and my opponents won't even be down a creature unless I found a way to give it deathtouch.

If I'm not loving the idea of building this deck around Taunting Elves, I think that means I'm going to lean pretty heavily into the fight mechanic. I've never built a "fight club" deck before - or if I did, I'm not telling you about it - so let's dig into this odd form of creature removal.

Fight Synergy

Deathtouch is a powerful ability, and plays well with the fight mechanic. If my 1/1 deathtouch Moss Viper fights your Consecrated Sphinx, they might both die, but it's hard to not see that as a win for team Fight Club. With a deck built around card draw and removal, it's hard not to imagine that there's some potential here to build a decent semi-competitive deck.

I've always been fond of a short list of cheap green deathtouch dorks and a bunch of them make an appearance in today's list. Moss Viper, Deadly Recluse and Thornweald Archer are great early drops that can help keep your opponents' attackers at bay. The latter two have reach, so they can even solve the problem of keeping flyers from attacking you. If you make it into the late game these guys are cheap to play and you can use them as removal if you draw into a Savage Punch or have the mana to use Neyith's force an opponent to block a creature you're attacking with.

Acidic Slime is a removal all-star and if I'm able to use it to fight, I can squeeze even more value out of it. I came perilously close to building Ooze Tribal for today's list until I came to my senses and realized Ooze Tribal might be a mess of goofy fun but wouldn't really help bring out Neyith's potential as a commander. Rhonas the Indomitable is a great example of why. If fighting deathtouch creatures is good, fighting with indestructible deathtouch creatures is great! Rhonas the Indomitable is definitely not an Ooze.

It wasn't just Acidic Slime that put that Ooze Tribal idea into my head. If I can get down a Predator Ooze relatively early, it could be a pretty sweet member of the Fight Club by the mid-to-late game.

Fighting with indestructible creatures is great, but what if I told you that fighting with a zero-power creature would make for some great synergy? Stuffy Doll is indestructible and when it enters the battlefield I'll get to name a player. When Stuffy Doll is dealt damage, it deals that much damage to that player. If Bob has a 64/64 Hydra, I can play Stuffy Doll, have it fight the Hydra and say sayonara to Bob because he'll be taking 64 points of damage. If Neyith is out, I'll even get to draw a card as a cherry on top of that sweet, sweet play.

One creature that might not seem like a natural fit for Neyith is Stonehoof Chieftain. Fighting with indestructible creatures is something we'll really want to do because they ought to survive combat. That Moss Viper won't survive many fights, but if I attacked with it and used Stonehoof Chieftain to make it indestructible, I can fight that little 1/1 deathtouch dork in my second main phase and it will live to fight another day.

Fight Spells & Effects

This deck isn't running every fight spell ever printed. I did my best to trim away the higher CMC ones and added in a few creatures that would allow me to get some extra fights in. Every fight will draw me a card so it's something I want to be doing a lot.

I've got a few creatures that will fight when they enter the battlefield. Ravager Wurm, Scab-Clan Giant, Foe-Razer Regent and Voracious Hydra all let us get an extra fight trigger when they join the party. Gruul Ragebeast will force us to have every creature we control fight an opponent's creature when our creature enters the battlefield. That might backfire in some games, but it should provide a steady stream of cards with Neyith on the field.

Apex Altisaur should be renamed Apex All-star-tisaur because it's going to have the potential to draw us a boatload of cards. If we've got an opponent with a bunch of 1/1 creatures we could have it run through 9 fights, draw 9 cards and still have this lofty Dinosaur survive. You might think it's too expensive, but do you know what else we can do with 9 mana? We can cast Triumph of the Hordes on our next turn to give our creatures infect and then hit Apex Altisaur with Chandra's Ignition to kill the table. Want a wincon? There's a wincon.

I'm also running a "slot" of fight spells to make sure I've got my key mechanic available to me as often as possible.

I couldn't build this deck without the bear-punchiest of fight cards, Savage Punch, and its hilarious follow-up, Epic Confrontation. Prey Upon and Go for Blood also find a place in today's list, though sorceries aren't the best of answers. Removal on your turn is still interaction, and I couldn't build this list without a little bear-punching.

The best fight spells are probably the ones that can be cast at instant speed. Pit Fight, Ancient Animus and Pounce should do work in this deck and could provide for some flexible combat interaction if I'm swinging into a blocker that otherwise might have lived. Setessan Tactics is particularly good, as I can get multiple fight triggers and draw multiple cards.

Even at sorcery speed, Ezuri's Predation is likely to be another all-star. Even if they all die from fighting when they enter play, I'll be drawing a ton of cards. This is where my Heroic Intervention will come in handy, as my tablemates will do everything in their power to remove Neyith and deny me those triggers. Hexproof will keep Neyith safe and Indestructibility will come in handy for helping all those Beasts to survive their fights.

Power Matters

It's worth noting that card draw isn't the only trick up Neyith's sleeve. At the beginning of combat on my turn, for 3 mana I can double target creature's power until end of turn and it must be blocked this turn if able.

If that sounds familiar, you might be thinking of the Gruul Theros God, Xenagos, God of Revels. He also lets us double the power and toughness of one of our creatures. That might not sound like much, but a creature like Cultivator of Blades can turn quadruple power into a pretty serious attack. This 1/1 can be a 3/3 if you choose to put +1/+1 counters on it when it enters the battlefield. If you quadruple its power at the beginning of combat you'll be giving your other attacking creatures +12/+12 when it attacks. Pathbreaker Ibex does it one better. It's a 3/3 but it will give your team +X/+X where X is the greatest power among creatures you control. That Apex Altisaur is a 10/10, so it's worth keeping around for later use.

Not only is it fun to give your team +20/+20 or +40/+40 when you go to attack, it's also fun to draw a ridiculous number of cards. Return of the Wildspeaker will draw me cards equal to the greatest power among non-Human creatures I control. Those power boosts last until end of turn, so we should be able to get an attack in and then draw cards in our second main phase. Life's Legacy and Greater Good are also in the list and do much the same thing at the cost of sacrificing the creature.

You might not want to sacrifice a nontoken creature but if you've got Rite of the Raging Storm, you should have a 5/1 red Elemental creature token named Lightning Rager available as sac fodder. It might not live through combat, but if you can double (or quadruple) its power and get it through to your second main phase you could be drawing 10 or even 20 cards! If you can get Death's Presence onto the field, any of your creatures that die will leave behind +1/+1 counters equal to their power. This plays well with fight mechanics, though you will want a steady stream of creatures flowing onto the battlefield.

The Decklist

I'm pretty sure Neyith of the Dire Hunt is going to be the go-to fight Commander from this point on. It's hard to imagine a better option coming along any time soon, as card draw is just so powerful of an ability to tack onto a creature that you always have available in the command zone. I don't yet know how good this deck will be, but I'm optimistic that it can be a pretty serious semi-competitive build. I don't see this ever being able to push into fringe cEDH territory, even with fast mana, tutors and another wincon or two, but I could be wrong.

Neyith Fight Club | Commander | Stephen Johnson

• Commander (1)
• 1 Neyith of the Dire Hunt

• Creatures (29)
• 1 Acidic Slime
• 1 Apex Altisaur
• 1 Bellowing Elk
• 1 Brash Taunter
• 1 Cultivator of Blades
• 1 Deadly Recluse
• 1 Dockside Extortionist
• 1 Foe-Razer Regent
• 1 Grand Warlord Radha
• 1 Gruul Ragebeast
• 1 Kogla, the Titan Ape
• 1 Mina and Denn, Wildborn
• 1 Moss Viper
• 1 Pathbreaker Ibex
• 1 Predator Ooze
• 1 Ravager Wurm
• 1 Rhonas the Indomitable
• 1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
• 1 Scab-Clan Giant
• 1 Sedge Scorpion
• 1 Seedborn Muse
• 1 Stonehoof Chieftain
• 1 Solemn Simulacrum
• 1 Stuffy Doll
• 1 Temur Sabertooth
• 1 Thornweald Archer
• 1 Voracious Hydra
• 1 Questing Beast
• 1 Xenagos, God of Revels

• Instants (10)
• 1 Ancient Animus
• 1 Chaos Warp
• 1 Heroic Intervention
• 1 Krosan Grip
• 1 Natural State
• 1 Nature's Claim
• 1 Pit Fight
• 1 Pounce
• 1 Return of the Wildspeaker
• 1 Setessan Tactics

• Sorceries (13)
• 1 Broken Bond
• 1 Chandra's Ignition
• 1 Cultivate
• 1 Epic Confrontation
• 1 Ezuri's Predation
• 1 Go for Blood
• 1 Kodama's Reach
• 1 Life's Legacy
• 1 Prey Upon
• 1 Rampant Growth
• 1 Savage Punch
• 1 Triumph of the Hordes
• 1 Vandalblast

• Enchantments (4)
• 1 Burgeoning
• 1 Death's Presence
• 1 Greater Good
• 1 Rite of the Raging Storm

• Artifacts (8)
• 1 Arcane Signet
• 1 Darksteel Plate
• 1 Glaring Spotlight
• 1 Gorgon's Head
• 1 Gruul Signet
• 1 Sol Ring
• 1 Thought Vessel
• 1 Shadowspear

• Lands (35)
• 15 Forest
• 9 Mountain
• 1 Cinder Glade
• 1 Command Tower
• 1 Game Trail
• 1 Gruul Turf
• 1 Homeward Path
• 1 Karplusan Forest
• 1 Reliquary Tower
• 1 Rogue's Passage
• 1 Spinerock Knoll
• 1 Stomping Ground
• 1 Wooded Foothills

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It's worth noting that I didn't quite follow my own advice from last week, but I'll still maintain that it's good advice. I almost added in Boundless Realms to provide for a nice big-mana play, but I left it out. What I put in should more than make up for its absence. Dockside Extortionist and Temur Sabertooth combine to make infinite treasures and with infinite mana and a deck full of indestructible creatures I should be able to wipe away my opponents' creatures if not win the game outright.

Final Thoughts

As excited as I was to pick up a copy (or two) of Winota, Joiner of Forces at my LGS this week, I might be equally excited to build her and move on to building this list in paper. Interaction is incredibly important to playing competitively and I think this list could be a really interactive and really entertaining deck to play at casual and semi-competitive tables.

I haven't built or played a lot of fight-intensive Commander decks so this is where I turn to you, faithful readers (or should I say... "ruminators"?) and ask what you'd do differently. Would you add in those Prized Unicorns and Taunting Elves that I touched upon at the start of today's column? Is there a fight card I've slept on? Have you also lived the dream of hitting a huge creature with infect and Chandra's Ignition to kill the table? Inquiring minds want to know...

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