Reality Twist *PRIMER*

Commander / EDH Artifact Battlecruiser Casual Eldrazi Stax

NV_1980

Artifact (33)

• 1x Armillary Sphere
• 1x Basalt Monolith
• 1x Darksteel Forge
• 1x Everflowing Chalice
• 1x Expedition Map
• 1x Forsaken Monument
• 1x Gilded Lotus
• 1x Jeweled Lotus
• 1x Library of Leng
• 1x Lightning Greaves
• 1x Lux Cannon
• 1x Mana Vault
• 1x Mind Stone
• 1x Mind's Eye
• 1x Moonsilver Key
• 1x Mox Opal
• 1x Nevinyrral's Disk
• 1x Pristine Talisman
• 1x Realmbreaker, the Invasion Tree
• 1x Rings of Brighthearth
• 1x Scroll Rack
• 1x Sensei's Divining Top
• 1x Sol Ring
• 1x Sol Talisman
• 1x Staff of Domination
• 1x Staff of Nin
• 1x Thought Vessel
• 1x Thran Dynamo
• 1x Torpor Orb
• 1x Unwinding Clock
• 1x Ur-Golem's Eye
• 1x Urza's Incubator
• 1x Voltaic Key

Land (35)

• 1x Ancient Tomb
• 1x Arcane Lighthouse
• 1x Blast Zone
• 1x Cavern of Souls
• 1x Crystal Vein
• 1x Darksteel Citadel
• 1x Desert
• 1x Eldrazi Temple
• 1x Eye of Ugin
• 1x Haunted Fengraf
• 1x Homeward Path
• 1x Inventors' Fair
• 1x Mutavault
• 1x Mystifying Maze
• 1x Reliquary Tower
• 1x Ruins of Oran-Rief
• 1x Sanctum of Ugin
• 1x Shrine of the Forsaken Gods
• 1x Temple of the False God
• 1x Terrain Generator
• 1x Tomb of the Spirit Dragon
• 1x Urza's Mine
• 1x Urza's Power Plant
• 1x Urza's Tower
• 1x War Room
• 10x Wastes

Planeswalker (4)

• 1x Karn Liberated
• 1x Karn, Scion of Urza
• 1x Ugin, the Ineffable
• 1x Ugin, the Spirit Dragon

Sorcery (3)

• 1x All is Dust
• 1x Environmental Sciences
• 1x Introduction to Prophecy

Commander (1)

Creature (24)

• 1x Artisan of Kozilek
• 1x Burnished Hart
• 1x Cityscape Leveler
• 1x Emrakul, the Promised End
• 1x Endbringer
• 1x Geode Golem
• 1x Hedron Crawler
• 1x It That Betrays
• 1x Kozilek, Butcher of Truth
• 1x Kozilek's Channeler
• 1x Liberator, Urza's Battlethopter
• 1x Metalworker
• 1x Palladium Myr
• 1x Pathrazer of Ulamog
• 1x Platinum Angel
• 1x Platinum Emperion
• 1x Soul of New Phyrexia
• 1x Steel Hellkite
• 1x Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger
• 1x Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre
• 1x Void Winnower
• 1x Walking Ballista
• 1x Wandering Archaic  ^Flip
• 1x Wurmcoil Engine

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Welcome to Reality Twist {C}!

Hi there! Welcome to the primer of my colorless, artifact and Eldrazi-tribe deck; commanded by Kozilek, the Great Distortion. This wielder of void-magic has great potential as a commander. His vast power comes from realms unreachable by mere mortals, and twists reality into something that benefits him. He simply nullifies opposing spells by using energies alien to other spellcasters. Should anything slip by his spell-shield, it will still have to deal with the awesome power of his physical prowess. This deck is meant to be played casually. It’s not meant to be used in a competitive fashion, but of course I welcome anyone to try! Feel free to comment on anything you (dis)like throughout this primer; I hope you will enjoy it!

Why Kozilek?

Multi-functionality. When I summon him, I get to draw seven cards minus how many I have in my hand at the time. So, when timed right, that can mean a summon along with a full-hands worth draw. The main advantage he gives though, is his spectacular countering ability. With him on the field, any card in my hand is a potential counter-spell. This makes opposing spell-casting a bit tricky. Even without any available mana, I can potentially counter anything. Question is: do I have a card in my hand with a CMC that matches the CMC of what you want to cast? Are you willing to play chicken with me? Last but not least, Kozilek’s combat ability (a 12/12 menace) is pretty impressive. His only drawback? Casting cost. But this is colorless mana I are talking about, and this deck can create a lot of that pretty fast.

Strengths and Weaknesses

I use the following ten parameters to determine the strength of the deck. For each, I allocate a score of 5 (very good), 4 (good), 3 (mediocre), 2 (bad) or 1 (very bad); when totalized this score represents the power rating of the deck (maximum score is 50 points).

• Mana: indicates the availability of mana sources within the deck.
• Ramp: indicates the speed at which mana sources within the deck can be made available.
• Card Advantage: indicates availability of filter- and draw resources represented within the deck.
• Overall speed: indicates the deck’s potential for pace, based on resource availability and mana curve.
• Combo: indicates the measure of combo-orientation of the deck.
• Army: indicates the deck’s creature-army strength.
• Commander: indicates how much the deck is commander-oriented/dependent (less dependency is better).
• Interaction: indicates how much this deck can mess with opponents’ board states and turn-phases.
• Resilience: indicates whether the deck can prevent and take punches.
• Spellpower: indicates the availability and strength of high-impact spells.

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Mana: 5

One of the great advantages of a colorless deck, is that there are abundant artifact mana sources available to generate a shit-ton of energy. This deck contains a whopping fourteen mana rocks and four creatures with mana generating abilities; this even puts most of my green decks to shame.

Ramp: 3

Artifacts can provide great opportunity for ramping, but I never got the chance to own many of the available specimens for this. So unfortunately, this deck only features six ramping options, of which one comes in creature form.

Card Advantage: 4

There’s a nice combination of different card-advantage abilities featured in this deck. In terms of direct draw, it contains seven options. Then there’s two tutors (which are for artifacts specifically), two cards I can use to filter cards and one card with which I can steal opponents’ properties.

Overall speed: 5

The average CMC of this deck is high by my standards. However, the deck’s abundant mana resources and decent card advantage opportunities make up for that to a significant extent. As a matter of fact, I currently do not own other decks that can cast high-powered, high-CMC cards this quickly.

Combo: 1

Sure, there are some combos in here.

Army: 5

This deck brings da smack down! As a race of creatures, the Eldrazi add a number of beings into the mix that by themselves can be considered one-man-armies, wiping away the opposing force with annihilator before the first blow even lands. Let’s not forget some of the wildest artifact creatures out there will also join the rumble-team. All in all, powerful stuff.

Commander: 4

There is no doubt that the Great Distortion brings some tactical advantages to this deck. However, with resources aplenty, a ton of nasty creatures and even some (infinite) combos, this deck can hold its own very well against a lot of decks without needing him all that much.

Interaction: 5

As a matter of fact, this deck has a surprising amount of interaction for a colorless deck with three non-permanent spells. Most of it is comprised of Kozilek’s magnificent countering ability but a decent portion of it is forced sacrifice (seven options), destruction (four cards) , two damage- and two stealing spells.

Resilience: 3

All-out destruction is a lot more fun when my stuff is unaffected. A couple of options have been added to make my permanents impervious to harm, along with a few cards that provide recursion.

Spellpower: 1

Not this deck’s strong suit; it relies heavily on permanents.

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Total power score: 35

Colorless is quick because obtaining large quantities of colorless mana is relatively easy. Mana requirements are therefore easier to meet as well, even if the required quantities are a bit higher than average. The deck is decently resilient and its creatures are very powerful; able to win battles by themselves if left unchecked.

General strategy

There’s not that much to it. Build up resources, release Kozilek, the Great Distortion as early as possible (because this will allow access to his countering ability) and then proceed to summon as many Eldrazi and other powerful colorless creatures as possible to stomp on my enemies. If I can combo off in the meantime, sure I will do that too. Simple.

Combos

For variety’s sake, I decided to add a few combos:

• Basalt Monolith + Forsaken Monument: with Monument in play, Monolith grants me 4 instead of 3 colorless mana upon tapping. I can use 3 of that mana to untap Monolith again and presto: infinite colorless mana.
• Basalt Monolith + Rings of Brighthearth + an additional 2 mana in mana pool: tap Monolith for 3 mana. Pay 3 mana to untap Monolith (gets put on the stack first) and pay 2 mana to copy this untap ability with Rings (this copy ends up on top of the stack). Now let the copied untap resolve. As a reaction, tap Monolith to generate 3 colorless mana. Now the original untap resolves. As a reaction, tap Monolith to generate 3 colorless mana again. This series of steps has a net-yield of one colorless mana each time and can thus be repeated an infinite amount of times.
• Everflowing Chalice/Metalworker + Rings of Brighthearth + Voltaic Key: in order for this to work, Chalice/Worker need to be able to generate at least 4 colorless mana upon tapping. Tap Chalice/Worker to generate this amount of mana. Pay 1 mana to activate Key’s untap ability (with target = Chalice/Worker). Pay 2 mana to copy this untap ability with Rings; target in this case is Key. First, the copied untap ability resolves (Key untaps). Next, the original untap resolves (Chalive/Worker untaps). Repeat this cycle (it nets one colorless mana each time).
• Mana Vault + Forsaken Monument + Rings of Brighthearth + Voltaic Key: tap Vault to generate 4 colorless mana (3 + 1 from Monument). Pay 1 mana to activate Key’s untap ability (with target = Vault). Pay 2 mana to copy this untap ability with Rings; target in this case is Key. First, the copied untap ability resolves (Key untaps). Next, the original untap resolves (Vault untaps). Repeat this cycle (it nets one colorless mana each time).
• Metalworker + Staff of Domination: in order for this combo to work, Worker needs to be able to generate at least 5 colorless mana upon tapping. Tap Worker to generate this amount of mana. Pay 3 of this mana to activate Staff’s ‘untap creature’ ability. Then pay 1 mana to activate Staff’s own untap ability. Repeat this cycle (it nets one colorless mana each time).
• Nevinyrral's Disk + Soul of New Phyrexia: activate Soul’s first ability and then activate Disk; this will destroy all opposing permanents and spare my own (due to indestructibility).

Card Choices

Lands

Reliable sources of mana, and some utility:

• Ancient Tomb: major colorless mana for a small price in life-points; excellent land to start games with.
• Blast Zone: works as a wipe in case I really need one.
• Cavern of Souls: keeps them from countering my Eldrazi spells.
• Crystal Vein: tap for 1 or sac once for 2; could be handy in a pinch.
• Desert: a single damage to an attacking creature may not seem like much; but it can still prove to be a deterrent in some cases.
• Eldrazi Temple: more colorless mana for my Eldrazi casting.
• Eye of Ugin: cheaper Eldrazi; yay! It also acts as a tutor for any colorless creature in my deck.
• Haunted Fengraf: a chance to get back something significantly powerful.
• Homeward Path: Eldrazi are not supposed to be stolen.
• Inventors' Fair: aside from decent life-gain potential, this land can help me find combo-pieces.
• Mutavault: gives me a little mana, and … *in the voice of Optimus Prime*: Mutavault, … Transform into … Dirticus!
• Mystifying Maze: let’s not get damaged by something terrible, shall we?
• Reliquary Tower: I like to keep my options open, as in more than seven options.
• Ruins of Oran-Rief: very useful as all of my creatures are colorless and can always use another power/toughness boost.
• Sanctum of Ugin: as this deck contains sixteen colorless spells of CMC 7 or more, this land can prove pretty useful to find more expensive spells.
• Shrine of the Forsaken Gods/Temple of the False God: more mana for (colorless) spells once I get my land-base going.
• Terrain Generator: the deck's single ramp card, though it can only use land cards that are already in my hand.
• Tomb of the Spirit Dragon: nice potential for life-gain in a deck filled with colorless creatures.
• Urza's Mine/card:Urza’s Powerplant/Urza's Tower: with your powers combined, much more mana will be available!
• War Room: the one deck in which I don't have to pay life for this land's secondary ability!

Mana and ramp

The cards I use to accelerate mana-availability:

• Armillary Sphere/Burnished Hart: a small sacrifice that gets me two basic lands from my deck a piece; brilliant.
• Basalt Monolith: classic rock that becomes downright dangerous when combined with some cards within the deck; infinite mana FTW baby!
• Everflowing Chalice: a great variable mana rock that I can kick into the stratosphere for more mana.
• Expedition Map: not as effective as Sphere or Hart, but still pretty damn nifty to fetch lands; and it comes at a cheaper casting cost.
• Jeweled Lotus: so this can only be used once, and just to summon my commander. The amount of mana it can generate for CMC0 is still pretty impressive.
• Gilded Lotus/Thran Dynamo: not exactly cheap-to-cast mana rocks; but they do grant a ton of mana in return.
• Hedron Archive: decent mana rock that can be sacced for some card draw.
• Hedron Crawler/Palladium Myr/Kozilek's Channeler: yes, bring the colorless mana dorks; love em.
• Mana Vault: this is such a great accelerator rock; especially when I use it at the start of games to get some more mana sources active, or perhaps an early Eldrazi.
• card:Mindstone: a little colorless mana, with some draw-in-a-pinch.
• Mox Opal: with this many artifacts around, obtaining the three-artifact threshold to use this (and summon it for free!) is a piece of cake.
• Pristine Talisman: mana and lifegain in one.
• Realmbreaker, the Invasion Tree: steals opposing lands.
• Sol Ring: are there EDH decks without this card?
• Sol Talisman: not exactly as powerful as its Ring counterpart, but still very useful!
• Thought Vessel: decent mana rock and prevents me from having to discard with a 7+ hand-size; sweet.
• Wandering Archaic  : stealing your spells is what I do.

Card Advantage

The mechanisms that provide me with card advantage:

• Artisan of Kozilek: gets me one card back from the ol’ dirt nap, and is a very powerful creature with annihilator to boot.
• Endbringer: great utility creature that can provide some draw.
• Introduction to Prophecy: scrying and drawing for almost minimal cost.
• It That Betrays: you need to sacrifice something? What a shame … hand it over :-)
• Karn, Scion of Urza: draw enabler that gives the opponent some choice as to what I am going to get first.
• Library of Leng: this works fantastic with Kozilek’s countering ability. Instead of having to discard after countering, whatever I used goes right back up on top of the library.
• Moonsilver Key: allows me to find a number of useful lands/mana-artifacts in this deck.
• Mind's Eye: someone draws, a small tax paid, and then I get to draw too.
• Planar Bridge: with enough mana available (not so much that it’s a tall order for this deck), it allows me to tutor for any permanent I want and put it on the battlefield … wow.
• Scroll Rack/Sensei's Divining Top: fantastic filterings card that allows for (additional) draw in a pinch.
• Staff of Nin: not just one extra card per turn, but a weenie-killer as well!
• Ugin, the Ineffable: generates 2/2 minions that upon death grant me some draw; also cheapens my colorless spells significantly.

The Colorless Force

These creatures are not as bland as they seem; prepare for some pain:

• Emrakul, the Promised End: not just a terrifying name; super strong, super tough and one of your turns is all mine.
• Geode Golem: not just a 5/3 trample, but can get Kozilek onto the field without me paying anything for it. What’s really great about the wording for this creature, is that Kozilek is still being ‘cast’; this means the draw bonus still applies when he enters the field.
• Kozilek, Butcher of Truth: one of the most frightening annihilators in MTG with some added card-draw chance.
• Pathrazer of Ulamog: menacing annihilation for everybody!
• Platinum Angel: a winning move? You’ll have to get rid of this guy first.
• Platinum Emperion: you can’t damage meeee (and I can’t gain life, … oh well)!
• Soul of New Phyrexia: not just a nice, relatively cheap bulldozer, but also an enabler that can make all my permanents indestructible.
• Steel Hellkite: my flying, selective wipe engine; especially powerful against anyone trying to take me on with a creature token deck.
• Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger: the ultimate exiler of libraries.
• Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre: my most powerful, indestructible annihilator.
• Void Winnower: you’d better be playing odds; or you’re in biiiiiig trouble.
• Wurmcoil Engine: hell of a powerful creature that actually splits in two new ones should it expire.

Removal

You are going to lose some stuff!

• All is Dust: a wipe that by definition only affects my opponents; nice!
• Cityscape Leveler: has an ability similar to annihilator and can be retrieved from the graveyard.
• Introduction to Annihilation/Scour from Existence: not the cheapest removal spells, but still very effective.
• Karn Liberated: omg this guy is cool; exiles like a champ and can restart entire games, giving me a huge edge in the process; welcome to the team bud!
• Lux Cannon: I charge her up and fire a destructive beam of pure light at anything I want to destroy.
• Nevinyrral's Disk: my portable black hole, in case the game goes awry and others have way more stuff than I do (or stuff I can’t destroy in other ways).
• Ugin, the Spirit Dragon: throws colorless card:Lightning Bolts’s, wipes away entire gatherings of colorful permanents with the same CMC and to top it all off, can give me one hell of a boost in terms of life, card advantage and board-presence.
• Walking Ballista: pinging power; ow yeah!

Utility

And then there are these cards I also enjoy using in this deck.

• Darksteel Forge: indestructibility artifacts helps my board-state a lot when opponents start hurling wipes.
• Liberator, Urza's Battlethopter: all my spells can be cast at instant speed!
• Lightning Greaves: let’s give my great distortion some protection.
• Rings of Brighthearth: lots of interesting activated abilities I can copy with this.
• Staff of Domination: though this beauty is mostly in the deck for its utility ‘creature untap’ ability, I can’t help but notice it can also be used for draw in a pinch.
• Torpor Orb: my deck doesn’t include any ETB effects, so let’s prevent everyone else from potentially profiting from them!
• Unwinding Clock: like Seedborn Muse, but just for artifacts!
• Voltaic Key: untapping any of my ‘facts for just 1 is a steal.

Thank you for reading!

I appreciate the time you took to read my primer. Hopefully it was entertaining and useful to you. If so, feel free to leave a +1 and/or feedback of any kind in the comments below. Thanks again!

Date added	6 years
Last updated	4 months
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	28 - 0 Mythic Rares 28 - 0 Rares 24 - 0 Uncommons 10 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	4.62
Tokens	Construct 0/0 C, Powerstone, Spirit 2/2 C, Wurm 3/3 C w/ Deathtouch, Wurm 3/3 C w/ Lifelink
Folders	eldrazi, Commander Decks For TTS