“The mind commands the body, and it obeys. The mind orders itself and meets resistance.”
Art:Khenra Spellspear // Gitaxian Spellstalker
by Artur Nakhodkin
Table of Contents
Today’s Featured Commander Is:
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Khenra Spellspear has been a commander I have wanted to feature on the site for a long time, and I am really happy I get to share it with you all today! This card is extremely strong in Pauper EDH and hard to stop. This deck can take your opponents by surprise and one-shot them with relative ease. We are as Izzet as they come and have all the most fun and best elements of the color combination. If you are a lover of all things, cantrips and huge creatures, then this is the deck for you. Without further Adieu, let’s get it!
The Deck:
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Khenra Spellspear Izzet Prowess!
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Why Khenra Spellspear?
Khenra Spellspear is a huge part of our deck. Not only can Khenra Spellspear come out early, but we can easily flip them. When we do flip Khenra Spellspear, things begin to get out of hand trample, ward two, and double prowess make even a cantrip quite a threat to our opponents. Khenra Spellspear can allow us to get some quick and easy commander damage kills. Khenra Spellspear is strong both offensively and defensively. While we rarely block with them, we can, if needed, save some much-needed life and use some instants to buff them up.
Deck Overview:
This section contains information about cards in the deck and how they function within the deck! I also highlighted some of my favorite cards in the deck!
Creatures:
We have a bunch of payoffs for all of the instants and sorceries we cast with some of the best being Guttersnipe
, Erebor Flamesmith
and Kessig Flamebreather
which are great ways to whittle down our opponents. Goblin Electromancer
is strong since it reduces the cost of many cards in our deck. Our commander is one of our best creatures in combat. Still, we also have Spellgorger Weird
and Pyroceratops
, which can get out of hand very quickly and help us put a ton of pressure on our opponents. Archaeomancer
is a strong piece of recursion to grab a key instant or sorcery.
Instants:
We are an Izzet deck so counterspells are an absolute auto-include. We have the namesake Counterspell
, Arcane Denial
, and Essence Scatter
to name a few. Fling
is one of my favorite cards in the deck, and in testing, I ended two games by swinging and flinging! Our commander or any buffed-up creature of ours is susceptible to single target removal so we can counter that with cards like Intervene
, Shore Up
, and Turn Aside
which are all cheap to cast and great pieces of protection. Temur Battle Rage
and Psychotic Fury
are great ways to double our damage and end the game.
Sorceries:
We have some really strong cards in our sorcery package with one of my favorites being Artful Dodge
which is cheap and can easily be flashbacked on another turn. Coronation of Chaos
can take the pressure off of us and make our combat step much easier. When we are buffed up with Prowess Crash Through
is a great cantrip that allows us to nearly guarantee some damage. We also have Ponder
and Preordain
which are great cantrips that can help us keep casting and getting bigger! Ravenform
is a strong removal spell that I find myself using to clear the biggest and best blocker an opponent has. Ghostform
is not only strong in this deck but is a very underrated card within PDH.
Artifacts:
Mana rocks are great in our deck since they trigger Prowess and help us cast more and more! Bonder's Ornament
is an expensive mana rock, but since we can get some cards from it, it makes it into the deck. Arcane Signet
and Izzet Signet
are just cheap ways to get on color mana. We also have equipment that can make our commanders/creatures much more threatening. Another commonality between many of our equipments is that they instant equip on cast. Dueling Rapier
, Javelin of Lightning
and Mirran Banesplitter
are all cheap to cast, trigger prowess and make our commander/creatures better!
Enchantments:
Witness Protection
is a strong and cheap removal spell that can effectively nullify the effect of a key creature or commander. Beyond that, our enchantment package focuses on making our creatures and commander more evasive. Our enchantment package is strong since they all trigger prowess and only cost one mana. Aqueous Form
is an amazing card for the deck that does a whole lot for only one mana. Sticky Fingers
is another strong one-mana card that allows us to get some mana advantage and menace. Messenger's Speed
is strong, but since Khenra Spellspear will get trample when he is flipped we typically save it for another creature. Arcane Flight
makes our creatures/commander much more evasive for only one mana.
Land Base:
While we do draw a bunch of cards through our spells we also have The Surgical Bay
and The Autonomous Furnace
, which can be strong pieces of supplemental card draw. Mystic Sanctuary
is a great card allowing us to recur key instants and sorceries, and because we have a ton of islands in the deck it is almost always turned on. Not too much to say beyond that. Even though we have a low mana curve I found that 35 was the perfect number as we want to be hitting the fifth and sixth land drops to fully “go off”.
Strengths of the Deck:
- We often have a “big turn” where we can easily one-shot opponents
- A ton of card draw
- Many ways to make our creatures more evasive
Weaknesses of the Deck:
- Besides mana rocks, we are not strong in the early turns
- Can be weak to combat decks as we do not have much of a board presence
- Weak to aggressive strategies
Deck Stats:
Sample Hands:
Main Win Conditions:
There are no infinite combos or loops in the deck. Our typical game plan is to speed out Khenra Spellspear // Gitaxian Spellstalker and transform them quickly. Once that is done, we can cantrip and prowess our way through, and we typically get our kills through commander damage. We also have a strong supporting cast that can help whittle down our opponents like Guttersnipe and Kessig Flamebreather. We also have some spells that can help push us over the edge, like Temur Battle Rage and Antagonize
. Even though there are no combos or loops within the deck, we are still quite fast and explosive!
Conclusion:
Khenra Spellspear is an absolute blast of a deck and is also really explosive. While this is not uncommon for Izzet decks, there are only a handful of PDH decks that can contend with Khenra Spellspear. While it is by no means CPDH, it is still very strong. This deck took me way too long to build and feature on the site, this deck may not appeal to all players but can be piloted with relative ease at any skill level. Thanks for reading, and thanks for all of your support!