(Lord of TresserhornLord of Tresserhorn | Art by Anson Maddocks)

Happy New Year! In the spirit of New Years and new beginnings, it is my pleasure to announce the first three finalists for the Archidekt Deckbuilding Contest of January 2025.

This is a monthly contest with a different theme each month. Your goal is to build a Commander legal deck that fulfills the prompt in a creative or unique fashion.

At the end of each month, three finalists will be selected for you to vote on. Whoever gets the most votes will be crowned the winner, although all three finalists receive a prize.

As a reminder, this month's prompt was to brew a Commander-legal list helmed by a commander with a drawback that turns that drawback into a strength. The goal was not to mitigate your commander's drawback, but to work with it as much as possible.

We collected submissions from the Archidekt Discord and Archidekt newspost and evaluated them based on how effectively they turn the commander's drawback into an advantage.

Now, it's your turn to decide who will be crowned the winner. Read about each deck list below, then visit your favorite and upvote them on Archidekt.

Whoever has the most upvotes by Wednesday, January 22, 2025 will be the winner, and receive $250 credit to cardsphere.com. Second and third place will receive $150 and $100 cardsphere.com respectively.

Finally, here are the three finalists chosen for this months contest, presented in no particular order. Follow the link in each section header to vote on your favorite!

Knock, Knock. Who's there? It's the Balrog. Again By Darkwolferum47

The Balrog, Flame of UdûnThe Balrog, Flame of Udûn isn't a great commander. A 7/7 with trample for just is pretty good, but not when it runs away to the bottom of your library any time a legendary creature an opponent control dies. It's that exact tendency that Darkwolferum47 is taking advantage of, however.

The key card of this deck is its only creature, Aspiring ChampionAspiring Champion. Whenever this Chaos Marine deals combat damage to a player, you may sacrifice it to reveal cards from your library until you reveal a creature, and put it into play.

If that creature happens to be a Demon, like The Balrog, Flame of UdûnThe Balrog, Flame of Udûn, it deals damage equal to its power to each opponent. To help find Aspiring ChampionAspiring Champion, this deck is packed with other PolymorphPolymorph effects like Collision of RealmsCollision of Realms and TransmogrifyTransmogrify, as well as token makers.

Once you get Aspiring ChampionAspiring Champion into play, you just need two things to set up a repeatable loop every turn. The first are reanimation or copy effects, so you can attack with and sacrifice Aspiring ChampionAspiring Champion every turn.

Darkwolferum47 has included some classic Feign DeathFeign Death effects, along with Dawn of the DeadDawn of the Dead and Virtue of PersistenceVirtue of Persistence.

Add a Warstorm SurgeWarstorm Surge and The Balrog, Flame of UdûnThe Balrog, Flame of Udûn can probably kill a legendary creature as it enters, sending itself right back to the bottom of your library.

Some of the reanimation effects in the deck, like LifelineLifeline and Endless WhispersEndless Whispers even bring those legendary creatures back to life, so you never run out of targets to keep your loop going.

Dralnu's Gifts by Loserboi

Next up we have a Dralnu, Lich LordDralnu, Lich Lord deck by Loserboi. Dralnu, Lich LordDralnu, Lich Lord requires you to sacrifice a permanent for every point of damage he would take.

This makes him unkillable in combat, impervious to Lightning BoltLightning Bolts and Blasphemous ActBlasphemous Acts, but leaves you with no creatures and no lands in play.

Loserboi has taken advantage of that drawback to turn Dralnu into a universal sacrifice outlet in the command zone.

Enchantments are difficult to sacrifice in Magic, but Dralnu easily let's you sacrifice any permanent type. This let's you avoid the downsides of Demonic LoreDemonic Lore, and stop yourself from losing to Demonic PactDemonic Pact.

You also get to take full advantage of Hatching PlansHatching Plans and Induced AmnesiaInduced Amnesia, sacrificing them whenever suits you best. Of course, Dralnu, Lich LordDralnu, Lich Lord isn't limited to sacrificing enchantments.

He can also get rid of Marina Vendrell's GrimoireMarina Vendrell's Grimoire or Ugin's NexusUgin's Nexus, along with a host of smaller artifacts that give you value when they're destroyed.

All of this requires Dralnu to take damage. Dimir lacks the depth of options for direct damage that Izzet has access to, but it's still got plenty of tricks up its sleeves.

Prodigal SorcererProdigal Sorcerer, Rootwater HunterRootwater Hunter, and Zuran SpellcasterZuran Spellcaster all make appearances as steady sources of damage, but Dralnu, Lich LordDralnu, Lich Lord is a spellslinger commander.

Winter's InterventionWinter's Intervention and Pharika's CurePharika's Cure are perfect for this deck. Your commander can give them flashback, letting you easily make yourself sacrifice two permanents at a moment's notice.

But what if your opponents have their own ways to deal damage to Dralnu, Lich LordDralnu, Lich Lord? A Dimir deck could always plan to counter Blasphemous ActBlasphemous Act, but Loserboi has a different answer.

They'd rather DonateDonate their commander with Reins of PowerReins of Power in response, to make someone else deal with those sacrifices instead.

These Shifting GriftShifting Grifts are also how this deck plans to win. Give someone your Archfiend of the DrossArchfiend of the Dross once it's run out of oil counters and force them to lose the game.

The Archfiend will return to your battlefield, where you can use Dralnu, Lich LordDralnu, Lich Lord to flash back a DonateDonate effect to repeat the process two more times.

And if anyone tries to stop you, you just ping Dralnu, Lich LordDralnu, Lich Lord to send the Archfiend away.

Korlash, The Grandeur Duke of Death by Stavrogin

Last, but certainly not least, we have a Korlash, Heir to BlackbladeKorlash, Heir to Blackblade deck by Stavrogin. Most KorlashKorlash decks focus on ramping out as many swamps as possible, to win through commander damage, but this deck is built to use the commanders Grandeur ability.

Grandeur is a mechanic on some legendary creatures that lets you discard another card with the same name for an effect. In commander this is incredibly difficult to pull off, but Stavrogin as constructed a deck that wins the game by repeatedly discarding Korlash, Heir to BlackbladeKorlash, Heir to Blackblade to it's own Grandeur ability.

The first step in this combo is to make a copy of Korlash, Heir to BlackbladeKorlash, Heir to Blackblade. That copy will sit in play, while you discard your actual commander over and over.

This deck uses Activated SleeperActivated Sleeper or Abyssal HarvesterAbyssal Harvester for that function, both of which require your commander to have died that turn.

You can achieve that in a number of ways, from Bone ShardsBone Shards and Village RitesVillage Rites, to Soldevi AdnateSoldevi Adnate.

Next, you'll need a way to get KorlashKorlash back into your hand. Stavrogin has included a number of spells like Ghoulcaller's ChantGhoulcaller's Chant that return a creature from your graveyard to your hand once, but you'll need Veinwitch CovenVeinwitch Coven or Phyrexian ReclamationPhyrexian Reclamation, in conjunction with Amulet of VigorAmulet of Vigor, to pull of the full combo.

Each time you discard KorlashKorlash to his own effect, you'll get two Swamps into play tapped. Amulet of VigorAmulet of Vigor untaps them, letting you pay the mana for either Veinwitch CovenVeinwitch Coven or Phyrexian ReclamationPhyrexian Reclamation to return KorlashKorlash to your hand. At least, as long as you're gaining life every time you discard your commander.

That's where Retreat to HagraRetreat to Hagra and Feast of SanityFeast of Sanity come in. Each of these drains your opponents every time you discard KorlashKorlash, triggering Veinwitch CovenVeinwitch Coven and offsetting the life you pay for Phyrexian ReclamationPhyrexian Reclamation.

Less importantly, they also slowly kill your opponents. Stavrogin also included Ob Nixilis, the FallenOb Nixilis, the Fallen and Syr Konrad, the GrimSyr Konrad, the Grim for direct damage, and Tormod, the DesecratorTormod, the Desecrator and Bone MiserBone Miser to make an army of tokens as you combo.

The rest of the deck is filled with ways to set up the combo, and survive until the pieces are assembled. Being mono black means there are plenty of options for tutors, draw, and removal.

There's even a few additional ways to take advantage of all the swamps you'll get in play, in case the combo isn't quite enough to win. Consume SpiritConsume Spirit isn't a card you see often, but it makes perfect sense in this deck.

And there you have it, the three finalists for 2025's first Archidekt Deckbuilding Contest. Which is your favorite? Be sure to follow the links in the headers of each section to visit the deck pages and upvote the one you think should win! The final rankings based on your votes will be announced on Wednesday, January 22nd, 2025.

Ben Doolittle

Ben was introduced to Magic during Seventh Edition and has played on and off ever since. A Simic mage at heart, he loves being given a problem to solve. When not shuffling cards, Ben can be found lost in a book or skiing in the mountains of Vermont.