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Dominaria United is upon us. With it, a plethora of new legendary creatures are bursting upon the format. Usually, I find myself building a deck for each new set. This one has me wanting to brew several. I don’t know if we are in a golden age of commander, but if we are not we are close to it. The card that caught my eye in this set was Ratadrabik of Urborg. I’ve always liked gaining value. This deck offers a value build. When this deck was brewed there were no decks yet available of EDHREC. This is a deck builder’s Christmas allowing you to dream big and then compare what you come up with compared to the EDH community. (editor’s note: 60 Ratadrabik Decks appeared on EDHREC while this article was in editing) 

Ratadrabik

Ratadrabik is a zombie and the tokens it creates are zombies as well. The deck could be built in a zombie tribal theme. Due to Ahmonket black and white zombies, this is a zombie theme that can be achieved. It would be easy just to reskin such a concept and call it a day. With Ratadrabik’s ability; however, zombie tribal sells this deck short of all that it can be. We will be making zombies but more importantly we want to break its ability to make non legendary creatures out of legendary ones.

Breaking Ratadrabik 

Wizards of the Coast has a tendency to make powerful creatures . However, they also balance these creatures for the game. One way they do this is with mana cost. If a card is powerful it often costs more to cast. They also limit the card by making it legendary. With only one copy of the card allowed on the battlefield at a time, it limits how much of an ability will occur. Also in nonEDH formats where extra copies of cards are allowed, you increase the odds of drawing a certain card. As you run more in your deck it creates a greater chance of a dead card in your hand. 

Ratadrabik breaks this. When a creature dies it makes a non legendary token of a legendary card. In and of itself it is a one for one on the battlefield although the potential is there to create multiple copies of the token. That is what the deck wants to do. We will want to make multiple tokens with as few cards as possible. Because we gain value by making tokens but the more cards we spend to make multiple tokens the less value we achieve. We will also want to make as many tokens as possible to abuse and have powerful effects. There is a way to accomplish this with minimal effort.

Enter Myriad

Normally you would need to play legendary creatures. Then let them die or sacrifice it to make a token. Then you will want token synergy cards in order to make multiple copies of tokens. Unfortunately, we are not in green so some of the best token doublers are not available Doubling Season, Second Harvest and Primal Vigor are all off the table. We do have access to Anointed Procession but that will not fuel our strategy. One piece of enchantment removal and our value engine comes crashing down. Instead we will use Myriad to make copies of our legendary creatures. 

Myriad is a simple way to maximize token creation with Ratadrabik.

Commander Clinic MTG

The interaction is simple. When you put Myriad on a legendary creature and attack with it you will create a token copy of the creature for each other opponent you have.  In a standard commander game you will be making two token copies. Then, due to the legend rule all three of the copies can not exist and you must sacrifice two of them. These are death triggers and will create non legendary copies of the cards you sacrifice. Thus, Myriad is a simple way to maximize token creation with Ratadrabik.

It doesn’t matter if you sacrifice the tokens or the actual creature. We will choose to sacrifice the tokens where possible. This way there will be less things to recur from our graveyard and limit the impact of graveyard hate on our deck. We can also avoid an Orzhov creature reanimator strategy and can brew in another direction or in this case add in more tutors (more on this later).  This is not to say that we do not have any reanimation cards in the deck, just that we are not going to allocate cards to a reanimation package. Sheoldred, Whispering One reanimates our creatures but it also fits the removal package and a legend package that the deck wants.

The First Myriad

Myriad is great on any legendary creature but your commander wants it most. Your commander says “whenever another legendary creature you control dies” This means if you sacrifice your commander nothing happens. However, if you make a token copy of the card through myriad you now have another creature with the same text. So when the tokens get sacrificed you are now getting multiple instances of the card. Then when your commander dies you will be making multiple copies of the card to add to your stash of tokens.

An additional advantage of this is your standard board wipe. As long as it does not exile creatures when the board is cleared your zombie Ratabrabiks will see your legendary Ratadrabik die (as well as any other Legendary creatures) and leave multiple copies for you to rebuild with. 

The Problem with Myriad 

There is one problem with Myriad. There are only two cards in Orzhov colors that grant myriad. The first is Blade of Selves and the second is Legion Loyalty. This causes two problems. First few ways to create myriad means the odds of drawing these cards are low unless we include a critical mass of cards that can go fetch what we need. The deck will need to be tutor heavy in order to ensure our strategy is effective. Luckily black and white have the tutors needed to fetch these cards. 

The second problem is protecting these cards. Legion Loyalty is an enchantment and this provides some protection. Cards like Sterling Grove and Zur, Eternal Schemer are not accessible to us. Hall of Heliod’s Generosity can get our enchantments back should they be destroyed. There is a case to run more enchantments in your deck. The seven enchantments in this deck are “must answer” types of cards so The Hall is a good fit to recur all of them.

There’s more artifact destruction in the format than enchantment destruction. Thus Blade of Selves, while cheaper in mana value, is far more vulnerable. Your suite of protection cards could include cards like Blacksmith Skill and Renegade’s Gateway. Darksteel Forge will protect all your artifacts as well. Unfortunately, these cards did not make the cut. Instead our protection package choses cards that will protect the creatures that were committed to the battlefield. Ratadrabik is critical and we will make sure we can protect it. This limits the room for artifact protection. However, Buried Ruin and Sequestered Stash are lands that will get Blade of Selves back from the graveyard. Like Hall of Heliod’s Generosity these are lands that will generate generic mana while providing some recursion should our opponents attack our ways to create myriad. 

Ratdrabik Value Loops

The deck contains a sacrifice outlet package as well. Myriad is wonderful but if our opponents shut us down we will need other ways to force our creatures to die. The eight sacrifice outlets that are in the deck are pretty standard. Ghoulcaller Gisa is legendary and also fits the zombie theme. These 2/2 zombies are expendable and you can be as aggressive… or not as you want with those tokens. They are expendable. Shadowheart, Dark Justicar is another Legendary card for our theme and it can draw us a lot of cards to replenish our hands. Sacrificing our creatures once is good but we want more.  

Liessa, Forgotten Archangel, Mikaeus the Unhallowed and Luminous Broodmoth either reanimate your creatures that just died or returns them to your hand. The ability to sacrifice creature cards again provides an alternative way to get multiple copies of your legendary creatures in non legendary form on the battlefield. Solemnity can be a beast with Mikaeus Unhallowed and Luminous Broodmoth. Both of these cards rely on counters to stop you from reanimating your creatures from the graveyard again and again. Solemnity will allow you to infinitely sacrifice your creatures to make infinite tokens. Haste would end the game and Crashing Drawbridge could do that for you but by including it in the deck we are diluting our deck’s main strategy for what some call “Magical Christmas Land”  

The Key Three

As with most magic decks, there are key cards. These cards make the deck sing and overachieve. You can find the decklist broken down by category on moxfield.com or the deck by card type below. This article only highlights some of the cards. You need to check out the lists for the full understanding of the deck.  

Anointed Procession

This card breaks myriad by doubling all tokens. Let’s just assume that we have Blade of Selves on Ratadrabik with Anointed Procession out. Here is how things play out. You attack with Ratabrabik. Myriad triggers and we make two tokens each for every player Ratadrabik is not attacking. IN a standard 4 player game that is four tokens. These tokens are legendary so the legendary rule kicks in and we will sacrifice the four tokens. This triggered Ratabrabik and instead of making four tokens that are non legendary we will make 8 tokens of Ratadrabik except they are non legendary and 2/2 zombies. 

Teysa Karlov

This card is almost as good as Anointed Procession, Teysa doubles the death triggers and she is a legendary too. With myriad, two tokens are created. When they die four death triggers go on the stack creating four non legendary zombies. Any other death triggers that are in the deck are doubled as well. For example, Dictate of Erebos.  

Syr Konrad, The Grim

This card is a win condition and goes absolutely bonkers once the deck gets rolling. He also synergizes with both Anointed Procession and Teysa. More Myriad tokens means more tokens to die causing one life loss to each opponent when they hit the graveyard and then an additional one life each when they disappear because they are a tokens for an additional 1 life each. More death triggers means when the tokens hit the graveyard you are doubling the life loss triggers.  Things get really out of hand once you have six to ten tokens created by Ratadrabik. A board wipe can cause significant damage as all those tokens hit the graveyard and then disappear. 

Pet Cards

Decks are not just made up of staples. Often a deck contains cards that are not on the fringe. EDHREC has yet to show any stats to compare my decklist to a standard one yet. But here are a few fun cards in this deck that add some fun. Plus an interaction card that is certain to make the list. 

Sidisi Undead Vizier

Sidisi, Undead Vizier does not catch anyone by surprise in a death trigger deck. The ability to exploit makes him a one time sacrifice outlet. But things get a little gross with Sidisi in a Ratadrabik deck. Just assuming Ratadrabik and no doublers and that you used myriad once on your Ratadrabik you exploit Sidisi to himself. You get one tutor effect and make two Sidisi tokens. You then exploit each of these Sidisi tokens and go search for an additional two cards. If you have an expendable creature other than Sidisi and can exploit something else then use Sidisi with a myriad trigger will make an additional two tokens you can exploit and then four non legendary Undead Viziers to exploit to tutor for seven cards. (1 original + 2 myriad +4 from Ratadrabik and his tokens).

Binding Mummy

The deck is not a tribal deck. However it doesn’t mean that zombie synergies will not work in this deck. Any ETB effect will be good in this deck. Binding Mummy will trigger off of all the tokens created by Ratadrabik. This specific card was chosen to help clear the way when you attack with Ratabrabik. Here is how Binding Mummy clears the way. Ratadrabik with Myriad you will tap down two creatures. Then when you sacrifice those tokens and create two more zombies there is an additional two zombies entering the battlefield to tap down your opponents creatures. This creates four tap triggers. Often four creatures being tapped down will be enough to neuter one opponent that you do not need to worry about Ratadrabik dying. 

Burakos, Party Leader

In this deck Burakos is a ramp card. Both the Burakos trigger and the myriad are an attack triggers. Stack the triggers so that the myriad trigger resolves first. Because Burakos, Party Leader can count as any one member of your party you now have three of the four members of your party. Plus Ratadrabik is a wizard for the fourth member of your party. Then when Burakos’ trigger resolves you have a full party. The defending player loses four life and you make four treasure tokens. Next turn you will have three Burokos to attack with for twelve treasure tokens.   

Daxos Blessed by the Sun

Daxos, Blessed by the Sun is wonderful because the card is so low in mana value. He comes out fast to help offset any life loss from people attacking you before you are set up. With legendary myriad triggers you will gain two life for each legendary token created 1 from the enters the battlefield trigger and one when they die. You will gain additional life when the non legendary tokens are created as well. The deck is not a life gain deck but it can pad your life to make it very difficult to die. 

Masterwork of Ingenuity

One of the problems with this deck is that myriad is very limited in Orzhov colors. One way to increase this count is to include Masterwork of Ingenuity. When it enters the battlefield it will become a copy of any equipment and we will use it to make an additional copy of Blade of Selves. Myriad triggers stack so you can equip the Masterwork onto whichever creature combination you desire. For example, I could put both the Blade and the Masterwork on Arvad the Cursed creating four legendary Arvads. 

I would suggest keeping one of these two equipments on Ratadrabik then stacking the myriad triggers on so that Ratadrabik resolves first. This way you get an additional two non legendary tokens of whatever creature has the second myriad trigger. While this equipment is intended to be used with Blade of Selves, Sword of Feast and Famine is in the deck to ramp and is not legendary so that you can copy it as well.  

Visara the Dreadful

This is a unique card. It costs six mana. You can ramp to six and play this card mid game. Which is good it does nothing right away this means you will have it online for late game when removal is necessary. There is a window where it is vulnerable. The upside of having multiple cards that can remove creatures is strong and worth the risk. Visara, the Dreadful is a card that is best used in politics. In order to keep it on the board you can put it out there you will let the table decide how the card is going to be used. Most times the table will choose something you will be considering removing so it does not affect how you use it and you keep your creature for little or no resource investment.  

Primevals’ Glorious Rebirth?

One notable exclusion from this deck is Primevals’ Glorious Rebirth. The card is strong in deck builds because you have the legendary creatures to cast it while you want to sacrifice your legendary cards to make copies of them. It’s strong because it will bring all your legendary cards back from your graveyard. It does have its drawbacks though. First it’s a sorcery. Once you cast it you are telegraphing exactly what you are doing… swing for the win. Orzhov is not the colors for haste so you will cast this card then wait a full turn cycle to attack with your cards begging the table to kill you. If you are not doing this, then you are spinning your wheels for a win more situation when you should really be winning the game. 

In a game where there are multiple board wipes I can see it as a catch up and rebuild card. It does cost seven mana which is the top end of your curve. You can achieve seven mana pretty easily with a solid ramp package but it sits at the point on the curve where unless you are getting five or six legendary cards back from your graveyard I am not sure if the bang is worth the buck. I think I would prefer to spend two more mana and play Rise of the Dark Realms and get all creatures from all graveyards than just legendaries from yours. 

I also think I would prefer a more limited animation spell like Ghouls’ Night Out that will cost less and leave a little more mana to do something else. Ghouls’ Night out also gives the zombies reanimated decayed. All you have to do is attack and then you sacrifice the creature at the end of combat doing what your commander wants. When you cast Ghouls’ Night out just make sure you choose a legendary card from each of your opponent’s graveyard.  

Swords Lost on the Path 

The deck also notably is missing both Swords to Plowshares and Path to Exile. These are some of the most efficient pieces of removal in the game. Normally they are auto inclusions in decks that contain white. However, these cards are not doing what this deck wants to do and there are other choices that synergize better than these strong cards. Some cards like Tetzimoc, Primal Death are on legendary creatures which we can utilize our commander with for more value by adding additional bodies on the battlefield. Other removal cards do additional things and fill multiple packages. Kaya, the Inexorable is an example of this. Other staples that are pinpoint removal can target multiple categories of cards. It is this versatility that gave these pinpoint removal cards and some later game cards that can remove multiple creatures at a time the edge over these two stalwart pieces of removal.  

Summing It Up

The decklist is below. You can also see the deck broken down by function on moxfield to help give an understanding of the deck. 

If you enjoyed this article can you do me a favor and help spead the word about Commander Clinic MTG and grow the website. Follow me on twitter. Take a moment to retweet the article so that others can know about us. Thanks. It is greatly appreciated.  

Ratabradik provides an unique gameplay experience. Unfortunately, cards to break your commander are few in Orzhov colors. You will need tutors galore to make sure your strategy works and then protect what you have. The deck does not need all the legendary cards in it and three or so legendary cards could be cut for a for a haste package but then again you could be limiting yourself in options to trigger our Ratadrabik off of myriad triggers. What cards are you excited to copy off of Ratadrabik? Would you include Primeval’s Glorious Rebirth in your version of the deck or would you use Rise of the Dark Realms instead? Leave a comment below.  We would love to hear from you.  

Deck List

Commander

• Ratadrabik of Urborg

Creatures

• Arvad the Cursed
• Atheros, The Shroud Veiled
• Bennie Bracks, Zoologist
• Binding Mummy
• Burakos, Party Leader
• Crypt Ghast
• Daxos, Blessed by the Sun
• Elas il-Kor, Sadistic Pilgrim
• Elenda, The Dusk Rose
• Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
• Ellyn Harbreeze, Busybody
• Ghoulcaller Gisa
• Liesa, Forgotten Archangel
• Luminous Broodmoth
• Midnight Reaper
• Mikaeus, the Unhallowed
• Ob Nixilis, Unshackled
• Pitiless Plunderer
• Shadowheart, Dark Justicar
• Sheoldred, Whispering One
• Sidisi, Undead Vizier
• Stoneforge Mystic
• Syr Konrad, the Grim
• Tetzimoc, Primal Death
• Teysa Karlov
• Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
• Varagoth, Bloodsky Sire
• Visara, the Dreadful
• Weathered Wayfarer
• Yahenni, Undying Partisan
• Yoshimaru, Ever Faithful

Artifacts

• Arcane Signet
• Ashnod’s Altar
• Blade of Selves
• Lightning Greaves
• Masterwork of Ingenuity
• Orzhov Signet
• Sol Ring
• Sword of Feast and Famine
• Talisman of Hierarchy

Enchantments

• Anointed Procession
• Black Market
• Dictate of Erebos
• Legion Loyalty
• Martyr’s Bond
• Smothering Tithe
• Solemnity

Planeswalkers

• Kaya, the Inexorable
• Kaya, Geist Hunter

Sorceries

• Austere Command
• Demonic Tutor
• Feed the Swarm
• Night’s Whisper
• Open the Armory
• Read the Bones
• Sign in Blood
• Steelshaper’s Gift

Instants

• Deadly Dispute
• Enlightened Tutor
• Generous Gift
• Malakir Rebirth/Malakir Mire
• Rootborn Defenses
• Vampiric Tutor
• Wail of the Nim

Lands

• Bojuka Bog
• Buried Ruin
• Cabal Coffers
• Command Tower
• Godless Shrine
• Hall of Heliod’s Generosity
• High Market
• Isolated Chapel
• Myriad Landscape
• Orzhov Basillica
• 7 Plains
• Sequestered Stash
• 12 Swamp
• Temple of the False God
• Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
• War Room
• Westvale Abbey

About the Author: Chad masquerades as an oompa loompa by day shipping chocolate and moonlights as a commander content creator. In his free time he squeezes in as many commander games as possible.