A Moonlit Night at Sea by Ivan Konstantinovich Aivazovsky (1885).

Deathbloom Thallid by Mike Burns.

This week's Commanderruminations is the next is my series of articles looking at how I'd build around the new legendary creatures coming out of Guilds of Ravnica. Last week I took a look at Izoni, Thousand-Eyed and the week before I built a deck around Emmara, Soul of the Accord. Both were fun deck-building projects, but I didn't feel like either one was a commander that would easily be turned into a real powerhouse of a deck.

This week I'm excited build around what I think could be a much deadlier general, Lazav, the Multifarious. You may recognize the name, as this is the second Lazav we've had the chance to play with. Lazav, Dimir Mastermind showed up in Gatecrash and gave us new and interesting ways to turn our commander into a copy of another creature. The new Lazav may lack hexproof, but his approach to impersonating the dead is no less compelling.

The new Lazav (on the left) costs a mere . He has 1 power, 3 toughness and when he enters the battlefield you "surveil 1", which means you look at the top card of your library and you may choose to put it into your graveyard. It's like Scry, but instead of putting cards on the bottom of your library they go to your graveyard instead.

Lazav also let you pay X to turn him into a copy of target creature card in your graveyard with converted mana cost X, except its name remains Lazav, the Multifarious, it's legendary in addition to its other types and it "has this ability".

For reference, the old Lazav (above, on the right) was stronger and tougher, had hexproof and would let you turn him into a copy of an opponent's creature as it entered the graveyard. Old Lazav scales to the power of your opponents' decks by relying upon their creatures to power your strategy.

These two Lazavs lend themselves to very different kinds of decks, though both will benefit from a mill strategy. While old Lazav wants you to mill other players or play lots of removal, new Lazav is going to rely on your ability to put your own creatures into your graveyard.

Choosing Our Approach

The fact that the new Lazav only costs makes him one of those rare legendary creatures who is cheap enough to potentially be viable in competitive play. The question is whether we can find a clever and efficient enough way to clear tables or kill opponents with him.

We will have to fill up our graveyard with creatures to target, we'll have to protect our graveyard and we'll have to protect our commander.

I was deep into the process of preparing this week's article when I saw fellow CSI writer Jason Alt post his take on Lazav, the Multifarious in his article "Being Nefarious Isn't Enough". If you haven't read it yet, it's definitely worth a look.

I noticed a bit of overlap in our approaches. We're both running Sol Ring, even though it's unlikely to help us get Lazav out any earlier at the start of the game. We're both fans of self-mill staples like Mirror-Mad Phantasm and Traumatize, we both can't resist running Laboratory Maniac and Necrotic Ooze. Where his list pushes more toward Necrotic Ooze shenanigans and the ability to make lots of mana, I'm aiming for a leaner, faster build.

I'm cutting corners, I'm minimizing costs and I'm going to lean on infect - a lot. We're getting ahead of ourselves though - let's deal with some necessities first. We need to fill up our graveyard or Lazav isn't going to be doing much of anything.

Filling Our Graveyard

Like Jason Alt, I'm leaning on Mirror-Mad Phantasm, which lets us shuffle him into our graveyard and then mill ourselves until we find him again. We're also both running Traumatize, which puts half of our library into our graveyard. They're reliable ways to self-mill, but I'm running even more cards to fill up my yard.

I'm also running Tunnel Vision, which is the kind of card I love. You get to name a card in your library and then you mill yourself until you reach the named card. The target card could be on top of your library, on the bottom of your library or anywhere in between.

Forgotten Creation is a Zombie Horror who lets you discard your hand and draw that many cards at the beginning of your upkeep. Since you want key cards available in your graveyard for Lazav to target, having a personal Windfall each turn should work well. Speaking of Windfall, we'll run that too, as it's more than earned its place in the pantheon of iconic cards in Magic.

Because we don't necessarily care about the quantity of card in our graveyard, it makes sense to also play ways to put specific cards into the bin. Corpse Connoisseur will let you bury a creature and it has unearth for so you can do it again if this 3/3 Zombie Wizard happens to die. We're also running Entomb so we can tutor up and bury a creature and Buried Alive so we can line up three creatures to drop into the grave.

While it's all well and good to load up your library, there's no worse feeling than seeing all that work get exiled away when some 1-drops a Bojuka Bog and names you as the target player. For that reason I'm including Witchbane Orb and Orbs of Warding, both of which will give you hexproof. If they can't target you they'll have to rely on spells and abilities that exile all players graveyards. It's not foolproof, but having hexproof is safer than running a graveyard deck without any protection at all.

The Basic Plan

Lazav, the Multifarious allows us to make him a copy of target creature in our graveyard. What that means is that we're going to mill ourselves and then we're going to use those bodies as a toolbox to let us respond to pretty much anything our opponents can throw at us short of an overloaded Cyclonic Rift.

That those creatures need to be as cheap as possible. We want to be able to pay 1 to give our commander hexproof or unblockable. We want to pay 3 to give him indestructible. We want to be as cheap as possible because there will be times when we need to combine a series of Lazav activations to allow us to execute our plan.

That plan is to find a way to make Lazav unblockable when we attack, make him have infect when we're doing combat damage, and to make sure he's big enough to be lethal when those infect counters get put onto an opponent.

I've got other plans as well, but that's the main thrust of this build - sneaky infect kills. Let's look at how we'll make all that happen.

Getting Damage Through

While there are lots of unblockable creatures, we're looking to keep mana costs as low as possible. You can't get much lower than 1 CMC.

For one mana, these three creatures will let Lazav be unblockable. That's about as cheap as we can get, but if we want to pay a little more we can get a little more.

DImir Infiltrator is a 2-drop unblockable creature with Transmute. For you can discard him and search your library for another 2-drop. You want him in the graveyard anyways, and he'll let you tutor up Dimir Signet, Dreamscape Artist, Lightning Greaves, Swiftfoot Boots, Nim Deathmantle or any of a number of infect creatures. If there's a hydra on the battlefield, you might even want to grab Fate Transfer.

Invisible Stalker and Slippery Scoundrel both bring hexproof to the party, though the latter will require you to have the "city's blessing", which means you must control 10 or more permanents.

Hitting Harder

Making Lazav unblockable and giving him hexproof are the important, but it won't do you much good to just guarantee you can hit opponents for a few points of commander damage. You need to pump up that damage.

The aforementioned Fate Transfer is a fantastic way to give Lazav +1/+1 counters, but you may be at the mercy of your opponents. Some games you may only be able to steal a handful of +1/+1 counters and in other games you might be able to grab enough to turn a 1/1 hexproof unblockable Lazav into a lethal hit that will leave your opponents digging for a boardwipe.

Endless Scream is a wonderful old aura that has what might be my favorite type of counters - SCREAM counters. I kid you not. You pay X and a Black mana to put X scream counters onto the enchanted creature and it gets +1/+0 for each scream counter. The third option shown above is an old Skithyrix staple - Hatred. For and the payment of X life you get to give target creature +X/+0 until end of turn.

We'll also be running a pair of equipments that will double up the damage we're dealing. Fireshrieker and Inquisitor's Flail will both do that, the former by giving double strike and the latter simply by doubling all damage done by (and to) the equipped creature.

Doubling our damage from 1 to 2 won't scare anyone, so we definitely want to run lots of ways to pump Lazav. If we have extra bodies cluttering up the battlefield and Carrion Feeder in the yard we can pay 1 to make Lazav a copy of him and then sacrifice creatures to put +1/+1 counters on Lazav. Creatures make for nice blockers but there will be times where we want them in the graveyard anyways.

If Psychatog is in the yard we can pay 3 to make Lazav into Psychatog and then both discard cards and exile cards from our graveyard to give him +1/+1 until end of turn. If that seems like an extreme measure to resort to for some extra damage, Slithering Shade might be more up your alley. If Lazav is a copy of Slithering Shade, you can just pay to give him +1/+1 until end of turn. Those boosts will affect Lazav even if he changes into something more interesting later in the turn.

There's one card that Lazav, the Multifarious has caused to really spike in price. That card is Phyrexian Dreadnought. This 1-drop 12/12 has a serious ETB trigger - you have to sacrifice creatures with total power of 12 or more or he gets sacrificed. That means for 1 mana you can play him, put him into your graveyard and then have him available as a way to make Lazav a 12/12 for 1 mana. That's a one-shot kill if he's got infect or if you've found a way to double his damage output.

Spread the Disease

We've got ways to pump Lazav up and we've got ways to make him hit for a ton of damage, but is it realistic for this commander to be aiming to deal 21 commander damage to each of our opponents to win the game? Maybe, if we're in a slower meta, but I'm inclined to have us cut a few corners and make things easier.

For the alarmingly low cost of 2 mana, we can go from needing to do 21 commander damage with Lazav to needing to do 10 infect damage. Many groups use higher numbers for their infect count, but the official rule is that if you get 10 poison counters you are out of the game.

The problem is that you have to combine your activations and effects carefully. When you make contact with your opponent's face, you don't lose any power when you pay that final Lazav activation and turn him into a 2-drop with infect.

There are ways around this timing restriction. As a copy of the 5-drop Pestilent Souleater you can pay or 2 life to give Lazav infect until end of turn. If he's a copy of the 1-drop Vector Asp you can pay to do the same thing. That means if you can do this and then turn him into a copy of Phyrexian Dreadnought prior to the combat damage step, you're probably going to be killing someone.

If your opponents don't see any infect creatures in your graveyard or on the battlefield, that doesn't mean they're safe. With the 1-drop instant Tainted Strike you can give target creature +1/+0 and infect until end of turn. It doesn't have to be your commander and it doesn't even have to be your own creature if you really, really want someone out of the game.

More Shenanigans

We've got a plan on how to kill our opponents, but I'm not going to wrap up a decklist without going into some of the more interesting tricks this deck has up its sleeve.

With three open mana and one of the above three creatures in our graveyard we'll be poised to survive many boardwipes our opponents might throw at us. If we can enter our turn with Lazav still being a copy of one of these indestructible creatures we can start off the turn with our own Damnation and probably still have mana left over for combat tricks and Lazav activations.

If our opponents are planning on drawing lots of cards we have ways to try to make them pay. If they're going to mill themselves or they just draw and have a lot of cards to discard, Duskmantle Guildmage might come in handy. If he's in the yard and we've left enough mana open, we can turn Lazav into Duskmantle Guildmage and pay so they take a point of damage for each card put into a graveyard this turn.

Making Lazav a copy of Notion Thief will let us stop an opponent from drawing cards beyond the first card they draw. For each of those cards they would have drawn, we will draw one instead. For the hefty price of 6 mana, if Consecrated Sphinx is in our graveyard, Lazav can impersonate it and let us draw 2 cards for each one card our opponents would draw.

It wouldn't be a Commanderruminations column without a silly and implausible combo to try to go after, so here's a way to take infinite turns.

With Wormfang Manta in the Graveyard, we pay 7 mana to make Lazav a copy of it. Then we Sacrifice Lazav to Ashnod's Altar, Carrion Feeder, or Viscera Seer and pay four mana to return Lazav to the field with Nim Deathmantle. We'll take an extra turn after this one and if we want to we'll do it again. All you need is to have all the pieces in place and the ability to generate enough mana.

A Little Surveillance

The last major thing worth mentioning is the inclusion of a number of new cards with the surveil keyword. I could see a strong argument for dropping these out and adding in more card draw or counterspell support. Surveil will let you scry but instead of putting the card on the bottom of your library you put it into your graveyard instead.

Surveil is a fantastic fit for Lazav, but I'm unconvinced that it's strong enough to go into what I hope could eventually be a fairly competitive deck. Getting this build to those lofty heights of power and consistency would require the addition of tutors and a much more streamlined decklist than I've presented here, so for now I'm embracing this new keyword even if it does wind up being weaker than running a cEDH tutor suite.

The other problem with surveil is that a lot of the creatures with surveil have it as an enter-the-battlefield trigger. That makes sense, but more often than not Lazav will be turning into creatures in the graveyard and that won't give us an ETB surveil trigger.

Lazav himself has surveil 1, which triggers when he enters the battlefield. As our commander, we may have to cast him more than once, so that qualifies as a repeatable source of surveil triggers, even if our goal is not to see our commander leave the battlefield. Doom Whisperer is an even nicer source of repeatable surveillance. This 6/6 Nightmare Demon costs , has flying and trample, and it lets you pay 2 life to surveil 2.

We also have surveil tacked onto a variety of spells that every deck should be running. Price of Fame is an instant-speed removal spell that costs but costs only if it targets a legendary creature. When it resolves we get to surveil 2.

Notion Rain is a sorcery that costs , lets you surveil 2 and then draw 2 cards. It will then do 2 damage to you for your trouble. Sinister Sabotage is a counterspell with surveil 1. Thought Erasure is a bit of hand hate. This sorcery costs UB and lets you have an opponent reveal their hand. You get to force that player to discard the card of your choice and then you surveil 1.

I suspect a competitive Lazav, the Multifarious list will have few surveil creatures and lots of counterspells and tutors, but most of us aren't playing cEDH. If this list proves to be fun and effective we'll keep that in mind for future improvements.

Future Upgrades

In addition to running tutors and counterspells, I think future upgrades might involve the addition of cards with the scry keyword. While you might think scry isn't as good as surveil, it will let us put a card on the bottom of our library, turning Tunnel Vision into a pure wincon. We'd scry, Tunnel Vision to the named card, turn Lazav into a copy of Laboratory Maniac and find a way to force ourselves to draw a card. Wham, bam, thank you Ma'am.

I'm less familiar with the mana flavors of Necrotic Ooze combos, but I am running "Nooze" and a future upgrade might well involve building those into the mix and having that be the main thrust of the deck.

The Decklist

Here's the list I was able to put together. It's a mix of cards I've got and cards I would order if I were to build this in paper. I hope you consider this as a starting point and make it your own, because I'm confident you can improve upon it and give it your own personal touch. That means including cards you love and dropping out ones that don't make sense to you.

Lazav, the Multifarious | Commander | Stephen Johnson

• Commander (1)
• 1 Lazav, the Multifarious

• Creatures (39)
• 1 Alloy Myr
• 1 Blighted Agent
• 1 Carrion Feeder
• 1 Consecrated Sphinx
• 1 Corpse Connoisseur
• 1 Darksteel Myr
• 1 Dimir Infiltrator
• 1 Doom Whisperer
• 1 Dreamscape Artist
• 1 Duskmantle Guildmage
• 1 Flensermite
• 1 Forgotten Creation
• 1 Gudul Lurker
• 1 Ichorclaw Myr
• 1 Invisible Stalker
• 1 Kefnet the Mindful
• 1 Laboratory Maniac
• 1 Lazav, Dimir Mastermind
• 1 Leaden Myr
• 1 Mirror-Mad Phantasm
• 1 Mist-Cloaked Herald
• 1 Necropede
• 1 Necrotic Ooze
• 1 Notion Thief
• 1 Pestilent Souleater
• 1 Phyrexian Dreadnought
• 1 Plague Myr
• 1 Plague Stinger
• 1 Psychatog
• 1 Silver Myr
• 1 Slippery Scoundrel
• 1 Slithering Shade
• 1 Thassa, God of the Sea
• 1 Trespassing Souleater
• 1 Triton Shorestalker
• 1 Vampire Nighthawk
• 1 Vector Asp
• 1 Viscera Seer
• 1 Wormfang Manta

• Instants (6)
• 1 Entomb
• 1 Fate Transfer
• 1 Hatred
• 1 Price of Fame
• 1 Sinister Sabotage
• 1 Tainted Strike

• Sorceries (7)
• 1 Buried Alive
• 1 Damnation
• 1 Notion Rain
• 1 Thought Erasure
• 1 Traumatize
• 1 Tunnel Vision
• 1 Windfall

• Enchantments (2)
• 1 Endless Scream
• 1 Rhystic Study

• Artifacts (11)
• 1 Ashnod's Altar
• 1 Dimir Signet
• 1 Fireshrieker
• 1 Inquisitor's Flail
• 1 Lightning Greaves
• 1 Mask of Avacyn
• 1 Nim Deathmantle
• 1 Orbs of Warding
• 1 Sol Ring
• 1 Swiftfoot Boots
• 1 Witchbane Orb

• Lands (34)
• 12 Island
• 12 Swamp
• 1 Buried Ruin
• 1 Cabal Coffers
• 1 Choked Estuary
• 1 Hall of the Bandit Lord
• 1 Morphic Pool
• 1 Rogue's Passage
• 1 Sunken Hollow
• 1 Sunken Ruins
• 1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
• 1 Watery Grave

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Are there Dimir "pet" cards you always run in your decks that you didn't see up there? By all means throw them in if they make more sense to you than some of the cards I've chosen to include.

If you don't think you'd ever want to run an infect deck, I'm sure you can build a list that works for you, but i don't think this will be a good starting point. I'd have you read Jason Alt's excellent article and start from there, dropping out his infect cards and going after a Necrotic Ooze combo build instead. It might be even better than this list, though I expect this one will pack a nice punch.

Final Thoughts

At this point I think this should be an effective list that has the capacity to really surprise your friends with how resilient and deadly it can be, but you'll need to learn when to keep your mana open and when go all out to get a kill.

I don't yet see how this deck could pull off a true cEDH early turn win, but if you can make it to the midgame, fill up the bin and protect it, there should be no reason why this deck can't do a very effective job at killing off the most powerful players at a table. You knock off the big threats first and then in subsequent turns you should be able to pick off the players who are having slower starts or are just playing slightly weaker decks.

This is the kind of build that will get casual playgroups to discuss increasing their infect count to 15 or 20 poison counters. Last September I devoted a column to the topic of poison counters in Commander in The Problem of Poison.

My personal conclusion, and the rule my EDH league runs by, is that 13 is the ideal number for the format, but the official rules have it at 10 and I don't expect that to change any time soon. Just don't expect your friend who complains about combo wins to not complain after getting blindsided by a 4 mana Vector Asp / Gudul Lurker / Phyrexian Dreadnought activation chain into a Lazav, the Multifarious kill.

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