“What’s your wager?”
Art:Azra Oddsmaker
by Josh Hass
Table of Contents
Todays Featured Commander Is:
Azra is a really fun Rakdos commander who is not only a great draw engine but a great discard engine as well, combine this with a ton of ways to make our creatures hard to block we can cheat things out with our madness cards and and keep refilling our hand which is not a very easy thing to do in Rakdos! This deck is a really powerful deck that allows us to cheat out a ton of permanents for their madness cost and beatdown our opponents for the win!
The Deck:
Azra Oddsmaker Madness!
Why Azra Oddsmaker?
The main reason we chose Azra is that she does pretty much everything we want, being able to discard a card on our combat and draw two cards if the creature connects allows us to play a true madness, since we can always fallback on our commander as a madness enabler, even if it is only once per turn! Azra is just a great card that allows us to play a true build around deck! Azra is also a very easy to creature to cast and we can get her down early and start drawing and discarding to our hearts content!
Deck Overview:
This section contains information about cards in the deck and how they function within the deck!
Creatures:
To start off our creature package we have a few small creatures that allow us to deal some damage and trigger Azra. Changeling Outcast
, Gingerbrute
and Insolent Neonate
are all sweet early game creatures that allow us to easily trigger Azra. Dauthi Horror
and Dauthi Slayer
are also great ways to trigger Azra.
We also have a whole bunch of madness creatures that we can discard out and cast them for super cheap, some of our sweet madness creatures include Bloodmad Vampire
, Skophos Reaver
and Gorgon Recluse
while we have a bunch of other madness creatures they all pretty much do the same thing, easy discards that we can get a bunch of mana advantage with!
To discard our cards and be able to cast them for their madness costs we have a few discard outlets that can help a ton. The best of our creature based discard outlets are Olivia's Dragoon
and Hell Mongrel
are both super easy discard outlets that can help an absolute ton!
Instants:
Lightning Axe
is a super awesome card for our deck since we can discard a card and deal 5 to any target, a really great piece of removal or even targeting an opponents face! Abrade
is a great card to kill an annoying creature or target an annoying artifact at any two mana this card is strong! Terminate
is a classic rakdos removal spell that is just plain good and that is no different here!
We also have some pretty sweet instants that have madness as well like Dark Withering
, Alchemist's Greeting
and Psychotic Haze
are all great cards that get even better when we cast them for their madness cost!
Sorceries:
Bone Shards
is a really sweet sorcery speed removal spell since it is also a discard outlet, just a great card for the deck! Call to the Netherworld
is really strong whether you cast it for its mana cost or if you cast it for its madness cost. Distemper of the Blood
is a great sorcery that we can cost for its madness cost and can easily help us trigger Azra. Murderous Compulsion
is another great madness based removal spell!
Artifacts:
Our artifact package naturally has a bunch of artifact mana like Charcoal Diamond
, Fire Diamond
, Rakdos Signet
and Fellwar Stone
. All of these are common and standard rocks, just good cards never really bad but really strong in the early game.
The otherside of our package is cards to make our creatures harder to block and basically guarantee a trigger of Azra every time we go to combat. To accomplish this we use Wedding Invitation
, Whispersilk Cloak
, Kitesail
and Haunted Cloak
all of these cards are just really strong ways to do more damage and ensure a trigger of Azra!
Enchantments:
One of the coolest enchantments in the deck is Tortured Existence
since it is graveyard recursion and a discard outlet all in one, this card is super strong and lets you do some ridiculous things when its out and your graveyard if full! Goblin War Drums
is just another way to deal damage and make our creatures harder to block so we can get Azra triggers.
Oubliette
is just a really great well-costed removal spell that should go in pretty much every PDH deck that’s black, just a great card overall. Raid Bombardment
, Impact Tremors
are both great ways to deal direct damage to our opponents and help end the game quicker, more damage is never bad!
Land Base:
We are Rakdos so our land base is pretty much what you would expect, any common rakdos duals like Bloodfell Caves
, Geothermal Bog
and Rakdos Carnarium
pretty basic two-color deck lands but help an absolute ton!
We also have the cycling lands for our deck in Barren Moor
, Forgotten Cave
just great ways to draw cards if we are flooding! Mortuary Mire
can be a great way to recur a creature. Witch's Cottage
has the same effect and we will never say no to more graveyard recursion!
Strengths of the Deck:
- Easy to fill the board cheaply with madness creatures
- Easy to draw a ton of cards with Azra
- Many ways to interact with our opponents
Weaknesses of the Deck:
- Weak to graveyard hate
- Weak to counterspells
- Deck struggles without a discard outlet!
Deck Stats:
Sample Hands:
Main Win Conditions:
We do not have any combos or loops within the deck, we typically win through straight up combat, we have a bunch of cantrips that allow us to buff our creatures. Combine this with many discard outlets allowing us to cast madness creatures pretty early and we can close out games pretty quickly!
Conclusion:
In conclusion Azra is a really sweet madness commander who is one of the best! Being able to draw and discard just from your commander makes her very powerful if no other discard outlet is available. Being Rakdos we can play a deck filled to the brim with sweet madness cards and creatures as well as a bunch of discard / draw enablers! This deck is the real deal and a ton of fun to pilot, do you have an Azra Oddsmaker deck or played against it? Let us know how it went on twitter or in our discord. Thank you so much for checking out our site! Any feedback is appreciated!
Thanks for reading to the end!