Commander blueprint · Reality Fracture

How to build Aerid Konstrari

Aerid Konstrari counts artifacts rather than creatures, which turns a Signet into a threat and makes the boring half of a Gruul deck the half that ends the game.

Art by Chris Rahn

Every rock in this deck is a counter on the commander

Nineteen cards here are ramp, which is roughly double what a list this size normally wants, and it is not an oversight. X does not care what an artifact does. Sol Ring and Wurmcoil Engine each contribute exactly 1, so the two-mana rock that would be filler in another Gruul deck is doing the same job as the six-drop.

That dissolves the usual problem with a big-mana deck, where the ramp stops mattering once it has been spent. Here it never stops mattering. Thirty-nine of the hundred cards are artifacts before a single token exists, and every Heartwood the commander makes raises the number again while also helping to pay for the next activation.

It also licenses cards that read badly on paper. Myr Battlesphere costs seven mana and does not fly, which is usually enough to cut it. In this list it is five artifacts on one card, and five artifacts is five points of power on a creature most boards already cannot block.

The first activation costs six and every one after it costs five

The token is a mana rock, and it arrives untapped in the middle of the ability that made it. Artifacts have no summoning sickness, so it can be tapped immediately. Activation one costs the full . Activation two costs with one of those paid by the token activation one left behind, and so on for as long as the mana lasts.

Work an example. You control eight artifacts and you activate twice. The first makes the ninth and gives +9. The second makes the tenth and gives +10. Those stack, so a 5/4 becomes a 24/4 flier for eleven mana out of pocket, and both new rocks are still there next turn.

Twenty-one is the commander damage threshold, so one connection at that size removes a player by itself. More often it matters a turn earlier: the same board gets to 14 power for a single activation, which is a third of a starting life total for six mana.

Nothing on the ability says you have to wait for your own turn

There is no timing restriction on it, so it can be used whenever you could cast an instant. Two things follow from that.

The first is that a token can be banked on the end step before your untap. The pump wears off and the artifact does not, so six spare mana on somebody else's turn buys a permanent rock and a higher starting count when your turn arrives.

The second matters more. You can attack, wait for blockers to be declared, and only then decide how much mana to spend. Opponents have to size the attacker before they commit, and they are guessing against whatever you left open. Blocking a 5/4 correctly and blocking a 23/4 correctly are different decisions, and this ability makes them choose first.

Flying gets it there and trample is what beats the chump block

Aerid flies, so most ground boards are irrelevant and the deck does not have to build evasion from nothing. The remaining gap is narrow and worth naming exactly: one 1/1 flying Spirit token, or any reach creature, absorbs the whole hit. Because the pump lands after blockers, that chump block is not an opponent misplaying. It is the correct answer and almost every deck has access to it.

Trample is what takes the answer away, which is why five cards supply it. Garruk's Uprising is the cheapest and the best of them, at for a permanent grant plus a card on the turn it lands. Loxodon Warhammer adds lifelink, which turns a large connection into a life total nobody wants to race. Kessig Wolf Run does the job from a land, so it survives an enchantment wipe and costs no card. Nylea, God of the Hunt hands it to every other creature you control. Kodama of the West Tree only covers modified creatures, which in practice means any turn Aerid is carrying one of the eight equipment or Rancor.

The other route is refusing the block outright. Whispersilk Cloak and Rogue's Passage both do that, and the Cloak brings shroud with it, which answers targeted removal at the same time.

Four toughness, however large the first number gets

The ability is +X/+0. A 30-power Aerid still dies to a four-damage burn spell and still trades with a 4/4 blocker. That is the real cost of the card, and no quantity of mana repairs it.

Nettlecyst is the one card in the list that answers it head on, because it gives +1/+1 for each artifact and enchantment rather than +1/+0. Equipped to the commander it roughly doubles the pump and puts the same figure on the back half, which is the difference between a threat that dies to a blocker and one that does not. Hammer of Nazahn takes the other route with indestructible, and it attaches itself and every later equipment for free.

Losing the commander is survivable here in a way it usually is not, because the trigger reads enters or dies. Killing it hands you a mana rock, and it is a rock you keep. What removal really costs is the commander tax and a turn, so the protection leans on Lightning Greaves and Swiftfoot Boots, which stop the removal at instant speed and count toward X while they wait.

The famous artifact payoffs are the ones to leave out

An artifact deck normally wants a sacrifice outlet, and this one must not have one. Krark-Clan Ironworks and Ashnod's Altar convert artifacts into mana, which is backwards when the artifacts are the win condition. Any card that eats a permanent is lowering X.

Academy Manufactor deserves its own paragraph, because it looks like a perfect fit and only half of it is. A Heartwood is not a Treasure. It is typed as its own artifact token, so the Manufactor never sees one and never multiplies the commander's own production. What it does instead is triple Bootleggers' Stash, and that pair is the biggest single turn this deck has. The Stash gives every land a tap ability that makes a Treasure. With the Manufactor out, each of those taps makes a Clue, a Food and a Treasure, so ten untapped lands become thirty artifacts before you activate anything at all. Xorn adds a further Treasure to each batch.

Two more cards look like engines and are not quite. The Great Henge draws only on nontoken creatures, so Heartwoods never trigger it, and it pays for itself because a 5-power commander drops its cost to . Idol of Oblivion is the token payoff that does work, since all it asks is that you made a token this turn, which every activation has.

Chandra's Ignition never asks about blockers

Pumping and swinging is one way to turn X into a dead opponent. The other skips combat completely. Chandra's Ignition has a creature you control deal damage equal to its power to each other creature and each opponent, so an Aerid at 21 power clears every other creature on the table and takes all three opponents from 40 to 19 at once. None of that can be blocked, and flying, trample and unblockability stop mattering.

Sequencing matters. Activate first and cast second, because Ignition reads power on resolution. Treat it as a finisher rather than as removal, too. It kills your own Palladium Myr, Solemn Simulacrum, Academy Manufactor and Hangarback Walker alongside everyone else's board, which is a genuine cut to X on any turn it does not end the game.

That is also why the ninety-nine hold no conventional sweeper. A symmetrical wipe in this deck destroys the resource the commander is counting.

Four of the lands are artifacts and one of them grants trample

Darksteel Citadel, Great Furnace and Tree of Tales each make mana and each add 1 to X, which costs close to nothing in a two-colour deck already running fifteen basics. Treasure Map is the fourth, and it flips into a land after three scries while leaving three Treasures behind.

Kessig Wolf Run does two jobs at once, supplying the trample the deck needs and a second mana sink aimed at the same creature. Urza's Saga is the other land doing unusual work. Its second chapter makes a Construct that grows with every artifact you control, and its third fetches any artifact costing or , which in this list means Sol Ring, Everflowing Chalice, Bloodforged Battle-Axe or Retrofitter Foundry. Before the commander is down, take Sol Ring if it is still in the library. Once it is out, take the Battle-Axe, because it copies itself every time the equipped creature connects, and a flier connects often. Chalice is the weakest of the four. It arrives with no charge counters, because it was never cast, so it makes no mana and only ever adds one to X. Inventors' Fair is slower than either, asking and its own sacrifice, but it finds whichever artifact the board is missing.

The core list

Ninety-nine cards plus the commander, built to sit at bracket 3. Hover any card name on this page to see the card itself.

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Ancient Tomb is a quarter of the bill, and the cheap artifacts still count toward X

Neither rung changes what the commander is doing, because there is no version of this deck that does not count artifacts. What moves is how quickly the count gets high, and how much insurance sits behind it.

Going down, almost every cut is about price rather than function. Ancient Tomb on its own is close to a quarter of the core list's total, and Urza's Saga and The Great Henge together are nearly another hundred dollars. What comes in is more artifacts rather than fewer: Hedron Archive, Guardian Idol, Prismatic Lens, Commander's Sphere, Copper Myr and Iron Myr all count toward X for a few cents each, and Foundry Inspector makes the rest cheaper to deploy. Sword of Vengeance covers the lost trample and brings first strike, vigilance and haste along with it. Two costs are real. The mana gets slower by one more land that always enters tapped, and losing Ancient Tomb and Crop Rotation removes both Game Changers, which is exactly what lets this version claim bracket 2.

Going up does not change the plan either. Mana Vault, Grim Monolith, Mox Opal and Chrome Mox are all artifacts, so the fast mana is also more X. Doubling Season makes every activation produce two Heartwoods instead of one, which doubles the rate the count climbs at. Unwinding Clock untaps your artifacts on every opponent's turn, which turns the instant-speed banking described above into a habit rather than an occasional trick. Old Gnawbone converts a trampling connection straight back into Treasures, so a 24-power hit is 24 more artifacts for next turn. Five Game Changers place this version at bracket 4, and the price roughly triples.

FAQ

Is a Heartwood token a Treasure?

No. It is an artifact token named Heartwood that taps to add or , and it is not sacrificed for that mana the way a Treasure is. That matters twice over. It stays on the battlefield and keeps counting toward X, and effects that care specifically about Treasures, Clues or Food cannot see it.

Does Academy Manufactor multiply Heartwood tokens?

No, because a Heartwood is none of the three token types it names. It is still one of the strongest cards in this deck, for a different reason: it triples what Bootleggers' Stash produces, so every land tap becomes a Clue, a Food and a Treasure instead of a single Treasure.

Can you activate Aerid Konstrari at instant speed?

Yes. The ability carries no timing restriction, so you can use it on an opponent's turn or after blockers have been declared. The +X/+0 wears off at end of turn, but the Heartwood is permanent, so mana spent on somebody else's end step is never wasted.

Do artifacts your opponents control count toward the pump?

No. X is the number of artifacts you control, and it includes the token the ability has just made. Because that token is created first, an otherwise empty board still gives at least +1/+0.

What does this Aerid Konstrari deck cost?

The core list is $523, the budget rung $139 and the upgraded rung $1,604, priced at each card's cheapest paper printing. Every card in all three has a price now, so those are exact totals rather than floors.

Which bracket does this Aerid Konstrari build land in?

The core list has a floor of bracket 3, set by two Game Changers, Ancient Tomb and Crop Rotation. That 3 is where the list starts rather than where it stops. Nothing in Reality Fracture joined the Game Changers list, which still holds 53 cards, so the floor has not moved since this build was written. The budget rung drops both and reaches bracket 2. The upgraded rung runs five of them and sits at bracket 4. One thing the Game Changers count cannot see is a combo, and the core list holds one: Nyxbloom Ancient and Basalt Monolith together make infinite colorless mana, which the commander's ability turns into unlimited power. Bracket 3 allows a two-card combo that cannot win early, and a seven-mana creature is never an early play, so the floor holds. Tell the table before the game anyway.

Do Heartwood tokens become Dragons with Draconic Visitor?

Yes, and that is why it is in the list. Draconic Visitor replaces the creation of any artifact tokens you would get with that many 5/5 red Dragons with flying, and a Heartwood token is an artifact token. So the commander's entry trigger, its death trigger, its ability and the Treasures from Bootleggers' Stash all produce fliers instead of mana. You give up the ramp to get a clock, which is the trade this deck can afford at nineteen ramp pieces.

How much commander damage can Aerid Konstrari deal in one attack?

Twenty-one is the threshold, and reaching it in a single connection needs an X of 16, which means sixteen artifacts once the activation's own token is counted. Two activations get there sooner. From a board of eight artifacts they give +9 and then +10, for a 24/4 flier.