Legends Legends - Vaevictis Asmadi
Vaevictis Asmadi by Andi Rusu
Welcome once again to the annals of Legends Legends, a weekly column where we're transported back to the forgotten age of 1994 and the release of the original legendary creatures in Legends. This week, we're taking our first look at a proper Elder Dragon Highlander deck, led by the Jund-aligned progenitor of the Shivan dragons. This Vaevictis Asmadi Commander deck is sure to burn your foes away in a torrent of dragon fire!
Vaevictis At A Glance
Vaevictis Asmadi, like his cousin Legends-printing Elder Dragons, is an eight-mana 7/7 with flying and an upkeep cost. In addition, he has the traditional Shivan Dragon/Firebreathing ability to dump mana to up his power. This Asmadi deck wants to build around using that ability to win, so we're emulating one of the greatest deck archetypes of all time: Elfball. Although, instead of specifically Elves, we'll use a slew of staple ramp spells to get Vaevictis on the field by turn five and then swing in for lethal the following turn.
The Ramp In Question
Our big nasty Elder Dragon is a whopping eight mana to cast and another three during each of our upkeeps. If we ever want to cast our commander at a reasonable time, we'll need to ramp early and ramp often. We're talking about hitting the eight mana we need to cast Vaevictis Asmadi by turn five.
To that end, we're running no less than 35 pieces of ramp, spread across dorks, rocks, Treasure tokens, and more! You'll recognize many of the more common ramp elements in this deck, like Arbor Elf, Llanowar Elves, Fyndhorn Elves, etc. However, there are a few ramp spells we should call out in particular.
First, Radha, Heir to Keld and Savage Ventmaw add mana on an attack trigger, instantly dumped into Vaevictis in most cases.
Next are the Carnelian and Jade Orbs of Dragonkind. These two-mana rocks are the best ramp to use to cast Vaevictis, either protecting him for a turn or turning him into an immediate threat. I'm serious when I say they're worth a Gamble.
Finally, we've replaced some of the typical removal and tutor spells with possibly suboptimal versions that'll fetch a land. In place of an Infernal Grasp, we're running Deathsprout. Instead of Field of Ruin or Stone Rain, Reap and Sow and Frenzied Tilling. Where other decks run Krosan Grip, we'll run Archdruid's Charm (which, I'll admit, is really funny to use as a Rampant Growth like I'm suggesting).
One-Shot Kill
Since Vaevictis is such a heavy mana investment, we better be ending the game when we play him. To help make him a threat right then and there, we've got various haste-enablers, power-doublers, and evasion to guarantee we knock out a player or two immediately.
First off, I want to shout out a cycle of Auras that I don't think see enough play in Commander. The "Dragon" Auras from Scourge are some of my favorite accessories to expensive commanders. They can be pitched early with Big Score and Faithless Looting, resting quietly in the graveyard until you cast Vaevictis Asmadi and buff him, give him shadow, trample, and haste all at the same time.
Atarka, World Render, Thrakkus the Butcher, and Mr. Orfeo, the Boulder should each hit the field before our commander, if possible (feels funny to say we're still preparing to cast our commander with seven-mana spells). The power-doubling effects of Thrakkus and Mr. Orfeo play well into Atarka's double-strike anthem, or our Temur Battle Rage, Psychotic Fury, or Fireshrieker. If we have both a power-doubler and double strike on Vaevictis, we're looking at an instant kill from the 28 commander damage he deals, minimum.
The most important piece for Vaevictis Asmadi's Voltron-style build is Kediss, Emberclaw Familiar. In any game where you have more than one opponent, Kediss is your ticket to the triple kill. Even though Kediss's damage doesn't count as commander damage specifically, the amount of extra power you can pump into Vaevictis can result in 30+ damage from a single attack.
The Serpent's Tongue
Vaevictis is nicknamed the "The Serpent's Tongue," known for his deceitful ways. Though we appear to be a Timmy deck on our face, we've got more than a couple tricks for keeping our commander and mana dorks safe.
Avoid Fate has got to be one of the most criminally underplayed cards in Commander. It's only in something like 5300 decks on EDHrec, and not consistently in any of them. Compare that to Krosan Grip, in 17,000+ decks. What seems like an incredibly gated protection spell is actually one of the best counters in green when you're trying to protect an eight-mana Elder Dragon. Avoid Fate blocks some of the most common removal in the format, from Infernal Grasp to Imprisoned in the Moon.
But what if we can't save Vaevictis? We couldn't quite connect with enough damage when we ran him out, and now three players' worth of targeted removal has seen him on his way to the graveyard. Fortunately, we're playing around that pricey commander tax with Road of Return and Netherborn Altar, and we can always return him from the graveyard if we have Timeless Witness.
Dragon-elfball Z
Our main "out" in this deck is dumping all of our mana in Vaevictis' firebreathing. However, there are alternatives if you've found yourself locked out of Vaevictis, either by a Darksteel Mutation or just too many trips to the command zone. The traditional Elfball deck from way back used a tried-and-true strategy of ramping really hard with a bunch of Elves, and then dumping all of that mana into a Fireball. The same principle applies here, and in the worst case scenario, we can just use our Crackle with Power and Comet Storm as big creature removal.
Vaevictis Asmadi Decklist
Budget Options
For the cheapest printings, this Vaevictis Asmadi deck will run you about $130, which really isn't too bad in the grand scheme of things. In fact, much of that price is taken up by the $30 in shocklands and nearly $15 The Reaver Cleaver. While these are the most optimal lands we can fetch, they can easily be replaced with some uncommon dual lands like gainlands.
The Reaver Cleaver is kinda tough to replace. It just enables so many exciting Timmy moments, like when you've given Vaevictis double strike and the Cleaver and use all of those Treasure tokens created during first strike damage to pump his power up to twice as much. That said, other artifacts, like Whispersilk Cloak, would be just as useful and a fraction of the price.
Wrap Up
This Vaevictis Asmadi deck is built around maximizing the number of times we activate his firebreathing abilities and scorching a path of destruction through our foes with reckless abandon. But that's not the only Vaevictis Commander deck running around out there. Vaevictis is the perfect color identity for building an entirely Dragon creatures deck with the best Dragons from Jund. Or, since Vaevictis already benefits from having a huge mana pool, run a Jund-aligned Landfall deck that uses your commander as a surprise finisher.
How would you build around Vaevictis Asmadi? How does he shake up versus the other Legends Elder Dragons? Let me know what you think in the comments!
That's all for this week's Legends Legend! Thanks for reading, and check back next week for another exciting installment!
