Living EndLiving End | Art by Nathan Jurevicius

Welcome back to 60 to 100, a series where I take beloved decks from 60-card formats and convert them to Commander.

Cascade decks, like Living End or Temur Rhinos, have been staples of Modern for years. In the years I spent playing a lot of competitive Modern, Living End played the role of my arch nemesis. All of my favorite decks had a horrible match-up against it, and Living End inevitably found me in the last round before top cut in too many of the Regional Championships Qualifiers I participated in. In this installment of 60 to 100, I'm going to conquer Living End by building it in Commander.

The Source Material

In Modern, Living End is a cascade deck. There are no spells with a mana value lower than three so that cascade spells like Shardless AgentShardless Agent can only cascade into Living EndLiving End. The deck spends the early turns putting creatures into the graveyard via cycling abilities, disrupting the opponent with discard spells, like GriefGrief, and counter magic like, SubtletySubtlety and Force of NegationForce of Negation.

The version of Living End I chose to highlight here is from 2023, before the banning of Grief and Violent OutburstViolent Outburst, which was easily the most powerful cascade spell in the format. Because it's an instant, it was possible to play Violent Outburst at the opponent's end step and protect it with Force of NegationForce of Negation, then untap and kill the opponent in one big combat step.

The release of Marvel's Spider-Man brought with it Superior Spider-ManSuperior Spider-Man, a creature that can copy a creature from a graveyard as it is cast. Superior Spider-Man's ability allows Bringer of the Last GiftBringer of the Last Gift to be copied from the graveyard, and since Superior Spider-Man was cast, it gets Bringer of the Last Gift's enters trigger. The result is a deck that plays similarly to Living End, looking to build a big graveyard and get Living End's effect for just four mana to close the game. I thought it important to show off both of these decks, as my grand scheme for this deck tech is to merge elements from these decks into one!

Choosing a Commander

Superior Spider-ManSuperior Spider-Man is very unique among reanimation effects, but there's at least one other creature that can copy a creature from a graveyard while getting Bringer of the Last GiftBringer of the Last Gift's enters trigger, and it just so happens to be a legendary creature in just the three best colors for this archetype. Enter: The MimeoplasmThe Mimeoplasm.

Here, The Mimeoplasm will play the role of Superior Spider-Man in the Standard Living End decks and the role of the cascade spells in Modern. It's a creature that will effectively always start in my opening hand that should almost always be able to convert five mana into executing the deck's primary strategy.

Key Cards for Living End

The basic premise of this deck is no different than the two 60-card decks I showed off. I'm going to mill over a bunch of creatures, use Bringer of the Last GiftBringer of the Last Gift, Living DeathLiving Death, or Living EndLiving End to bring them all back, then get to swinging with my new army of big creatures. Bringer of the Last Gift is the most consistent option, as all that needs to happen for it to work is for The MimeoplasmThe Mimeoplasm to be cast while it's in the graveyard.

Like any good deck, there is a backup plan. What if someone casts a board wipe the turn after the Bringer of the Last Gift trigger happens? Living Death and Living End are this deck's ways of trying again post-board wipe. Diluvian PrimordialDiluvian Primordial can be copied with The Mimeoplasm, and its enters trigger can exile and cast either of the two. At the rate this deck mills itself, getting both Diluvian Primordial and one of these two sorceries into the graveyard at the same time should be a trivial task by the stage of the game that it's necessary.

Step two, how are all these cards getting into the graveyard? Dredge cards! Golgari Grave-TrollGolgari Grave-Troll and seven other cards with dredge combine with 12 repeatable looting effects to create a mill engine that can quickly fill the graveyard. Even better, it can often do so at instant speed with Merfolk LooterMerfolk Looter effects, which drastically improves the deck's capabilities versus one-shot graveyard hate, like Soul-Guide LanternSoul-Guide Lantern.

When it comes to creature cards in the graveyard, I'm shooting for quantity over quality. As long as I'm putting enough power on the board to overwhelm the table, the text on the creatures is hardly relevant. I've included 25 creatures with some form of cycling ability, mostly creatures that cycle to search for lands. This enables me to run a dangerously low amount of lands, just like the Modern version of the deck!

Sometimes, especially at tables with faster decks, it will be necessary to commit material to the board while building up the graveyard. Insidious RootsInsidious Roots, Sidisi, Brood TyrantSidisi, Brood Tyrant, and Teval, the Balanced ScaleTeval, the Balanced Scale are all engines that reward the dredge game plan with creature tokens, sometimes with a little additional upside. The PlantPlant and ZombieZombie tokens are lovely to sacrifice to Dread ReturnDread Return!

The biggest point of failure to a graveyard decks like this one is opposing graveyard hate. One Bojuka BogBojuka Bog can slow this strategy down quite a bit. Therefore, my suite of interaction is meant to shore up that weakness. There are seven StifleStifle effects in this deck, meant to fend off activated and triggered abilities that can exile the graveyard. DefabricateDefabricate is the best of the bunch, as it can also counter artifacts and enchantments, the two most common card types for graveyard hate.

Winning the Game

After reanimating a huge board, winning via combat is an inevitability. Here, I'll go over a few cards that can help secure that path victory.

Emergence ZoneEmergence Zone and Final-Word PhantomFinal-Word Phantom open a window to resolve The MimeoplasmThe Mimeoplasm on another player's turn to grant pseudo-haste to all the creatures that are being brought back. This will often shorten the time it takes to win the game to a single combat step.

Syr Konrad, the GrimSyr Konrad, the Grim gives the deck a burn game plan as it's going through the motions of milling each turn. It also provides an excellent mana sink for all the black mana that Crypt of AgadeemCrypt of Agadeem can produce.

Living End Commander Deck List

Conclusion

I had a lot of fun building this deck! I've been in search of a different way to build The MimeoplasmThe Mimeoplasm than the first drafts I came up with a few years ago, and this one tickles my brain just right. This version of the deck is slow going enough that I see it sitting pretty comfortably at Bracket 2 (Core) tables, while it's game plan is powerful enough to hold its own in Bracket 3 (Upgraded).