The current 18-Land configuration is actually a little shy. Based on Frank Karsten's classic article on manabases, this means we need should be running 19x B sources, 14x R sources, and 12x W sources. The manabase challenge is that the deck really wants B or R on Turn 1, BB by Turn 3, and W by Turn 3 (postboard). You have to keep the mana cost of spells very low for Ad Nauseam, but it's worth it especially because it was reprinted recently and is only a few dollars I think. Two cards that are surprisingly good for this are , or similar cards but you probably would rather draw into them because that also gets you your control cards. Because they are common competitive win conditions, some of those pieces are expensive.Īllow me to advise you on getting to these win conditions though. The ways you 'draw' through your deck are either Similarly, you can draw through your entire deck and then play The way it works is you draw through your entire deck while Laboratory Maniac orĪre on the board then you attempt to draw a card and you win. It's probably the most common win condition in high powered competitive decks. (Probably pick two or three, not all of them).Ĭombos as a win condition, since you are in the right colors for it. Cards like Windfall are also very strong as they allow you to refill your hand. But they can't, so only you draw new cards. , which makes everyone discard their hand and draw new cards. The lock is formed when you have one of those pieces out and you cast a spell like All of these prevent opponents from drawing cards to some extent, which benefits your control plan. The soft locks all involve preventing players from drawing cards. All of those cards, are also things you use to limit the amount of actions other players can take as a part of your control strategy. But you can cast cards from other players hands if you have Effectively this means to no one can play spells from their hands. Prevents casting any spell after the first spell. This means that a player must cast two spells for anything to resolve. Players can then cast a spell from the previously exiled cards. The Knowledge Pool lock has only one required card.Įxiles every spell that any player casts from their hand. Helps you cast opponent's spells by allowing you to spend your mana as though it were any color. Stops opponents from using mana rocks and The cards are also useful to you individually because This means that opponents can't tap anything for mana. Your opponents can't activate any abilities of permanents on the battlefield. The Karn lock is very specifically Karn, the Great Creator + Mycosynth Lattice The hard locks I would suggest with this are the Karn lock and the Knowledge Pool lock. This is often done by forcing your opponents to discard all of their cards. Soft locks are where you severely diminish an opponents ability to play the game. You accomplish this by setting up a situation where they can't cast spells, they can't untap, or they can't generate mana.

Hard locks will literally stop your opponents from being able to play the game at all. There are a few different kinds of those.

If you're playing a very heavy control theme in commander your win condition is going to probably be a game lock.

Mycosynth lattice