Last night saw a Commander session at The Luxe with myself, Diego and new member Sam battling it.

Whilst Diego was playing with some of Sam’s decks. I played my Ur-Dragon deck that I hadn’t played in a long long time.

Some new cards had been added during that time, such as Tiamat, and one or two Nicol Bolas cards. So the deck was long overdue an outing.

The first game of the evening was over pretty quickly. I hadn’t hit my land drops, didn’t get to any of the mana rocks or ramp. Diego was doing much better with the enchantments deck he was playing, however neither of us had any answers to the problems Sam was presenting on the battle field. Especially when damage was getting doubled.

I stuck with the dragons for game two. Sam went to a new deck, and Diego stuck with the enchantments (I really should have made a note of the Commanders, next time).

By all rights I should have lost this game. However thanks to mercy or pity (take your pick which) from Sam I didn’t. I was down to 8 life. Sam needed help taking on Diego. So a deal was made. I wouldn’t attack him if he let me live.

That bought me time to get pieces into place and get dragons on the battlefield. My dragons would be coming in with haste and dealing damage based on the number of dragons I controlled to a player or Planeswalker. So when Sam finished off Diego I was able to play some dragons and chip away at his life, and then swing in for lethal and victory.

The final game of the evening I broke out the new Eldrazi deck. Sam and Diego swapped decks also. They both had life gain decks. Both adding counters to creatures. But the one Diego was playing was generating counters and tokens like crazy. On top of all that life gain.

I was going under the radar for much of the early game. I had plenty of land but no cheap creatures to get out. Rounds 6 and 7 were the earliest I was going to get anything out. Field of the Dead was going to help me get some 2/2 zombie blockers out.

Despite drawing Helm of the Host turn 2 I sat on it for most of the game. It might have given a big hint to my game plan and put a target on my back.

I was forced to play my Commander so that I could trash my land that enabled me to fetch a colourless creature. This deck isn’t built around playing the Commander. It’s a nice +1/+1 effect if out. But not a crucial part of the plan. However as I said I was forced into this because Diego was getting out of hand, and his flyer with 19 counters on could kill me his next turn. So I went and got Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre and took it out. Diego swore he wasn’t going to do that, but attack Sam with it. But previous turns that creature had been used to attack me. I wasn’t convinced.

Some how I got another turn and that’s when I played Helm of the Host and attached it to Ulamog. The token then swung at Diego. It was pretty much my last act of the game. Diego crushed me on his turn.

It was then a battle of the life gain decks. Both Diego and Sam broke the 100 health barrier. Neither were showing signs of getting the killing blow. The film for the evening had ended and the poor staff of The Luxe were cleaning up. A draw was called.

It was a fun evening. Sam’s decks were awesome and scary at the same time. Especially the one Diego was playing at the end. Can’t wait to play some more Commander.