Cut #8 Finals - The Redeemed and the Restless

Here we are... "the defeated" have almost turned into "the victorious", and two deckbuilders have made it to the finals for the first time! Through creativity, lovely wordplay, and your wonderful votes, these fantastic deck creators have achieved something only a limited number of folk have. That is a chance at eternal glory, at bragging rights with their playgroups, that yes, they have won a small, vote-based, Magic: the Gathering deckbuilding competition, and really, what's better than that? Before we can crown a winner, we need to see what they're offering us this round to prove that they deserve to come out on top!

The two finalists we have today are...

Congratulations to Mike and Zachary!

It never feels good to be the odd person out, especially since this round was full of the "odd person out". But, hey! You just gotta try, try again, and you'll get there someday through hard work, determination, and just building more decks! Thank you to Sinclair and his wonderful submission of his Old Stickfingers

Now on to our main event!

The challenges our finalists had to face were:

- Max 10 rares/mythics
- Commander has to have 250 decks or less on EDHrec
- You must use at least 20 non-land cards from previous decks you have created on Cut

First up is Mike! Let's see what he has up for us this time!

Shirei, Shizo's Caretaker

The gameplan is to make a ton of Treasure tokens and creature tokens and sacrifice them to Tymaret, the Murder King

This deck is a graveyard dance, and frankly, it makes me feel excited.

I've had a Lyzolda, the Blood Witch

Shirei with Morbid Opportunist

I finalized my list at 2AM before needing to send it in to Travis. I don't know that my brain can get out what I need to to make it sound compelling, so straight up, let me just say this: PLAYTEST THIS BAD BOY IN MOXFIELD, IT'S VERY FUN!

I love youuuuuu!

xo Mike Carrozza

artistocrats for life baybeeeeeee!

Thanks, Mike, and we love you, too! Thanks for always bringing us another take on aristocrats and bringing to our attention that there are lots of commanders out there just looking for a little bit of love to make them shine! If you haven't already go and check out Mike's articles here on Commander's Herald!

Lastly we have Zachary! What did he bring to the table this time?

As part of the challenge for this article, I had to include at least 20 cards from my past decks in this series. For context, my decks were mono-green and mono-white. So naturally, I decided to go with a Selesnya leader. The commander I settled on not only is Gabriel Angelfire

Okay, so that's all well and good, but why would someone block Gabriel with more than one creature in that case? Easy. They wouldn't. Not by their own choice anyways. But what if they were forced to block our Angel friend with all their creatures? Introducing Lure effects! Cards like the titular Lure

Normally, getting out a seven-mana commander consistently would be tricky. However, with the help of a LOT of ramp, we can consistently get Gabriel out by turn 5 on average, and ready to start the Rampage on turn 6. Importantly, haste-enablers don't do much here, as Gabriel's ability triggers at our upkeep, so we do have to keep it around for a turn cycle. In order to accomplish this, we've got plenty of protection and disruption. Rebuff the Wicked

If we get Gabriel to stick around to our next upkeep where we can then choose Rampage 3, we need to make sure that an opponent has creatures to block with. That's why we're playing Jangling Automaton

Now, Gabriel is big. What do we do with it? The obvious answer would be to give them a trample effect like Unflinching Courage

You may have noticed that a lot of our strategy revolves around enchantments. So much so, in fact, that I decided to dedicate half of the rare/mythic spots in this decklist to enchantress effects. Not to mention a couple at lower rarity as well.

Gabriel Angelfire is another strange commander with an extremely unique strategy you will never see anywhere else, and I love this deck for that very reason.

Thanks, Zachary! Another commander that gives a person pause and definitely interesting to build around! The commanders you have brought to our attention have been big creatures to get out, but once you do, it seems the decks always kick into high gear. Here's hoping that your angelic entries get you to the top!

Our former last-placers are chasing that first place dream, and their destinies are in your hands! Make sure to vote below for who you think made the best deck or deserves redemption from coming last in their respective round. Pick your choice below and remember if you don't love it, CUT it!

If you or anyone you know, or if you have some challenges you would like to see on CUT please email the.only.travis.stanley@gmail.com.

Poll Closes: December 17, 2021