After my last foray into what I'm calling my Extreme Theme Brews, I've felt the pull to make more decks that focus on theme over mechanics. These brews are all about perfectly detailed flavor, every non-basic land or spell needing to fit the theme exactly. To get a better idea, you can check out my previous examples of The Castle and Kamigawa's The Temple

My concept for today's Extreme Theme Brew is a little weird, focusing on portraying a Wizard's Laboratory. I'm shying away from the more typical Fantasy-focused Wizards to give myself more of a challenge, opting instead to focus on elements of research and experimentation.

The reason this is challenging is Magic doesn't have much representation in the way of lab equipment like Beakers, a Mortar and Pestle, or an Alembic or stuff for making Potions. It strikes me as odd that this game doesn't have much visual representation for more scientific or alchemical apparatus with as long a lifespan as it has. But we'll make do with what we have.

Choosing the Commander

The big question I need to answer is, who is going to helm my Wizard's Laboratory brew? There have been some good Wizard themes throughout Magic's many sets, with cards like Dominaria's Wizard's Lightning and Wizard's Retort putting the creature type front and center. Dominaria's Balmor, Battlemage Captain could be a good candidate if we were going for a spellslinger build, but that's not the focus this time around.

Alania, Divergent Storm from Bloomburrow would let me challenge myself, but this otter doesn't seem the type to sit back and do research. Then I looked to Arjun, the Shifting Flame, whose mechanic of trading out our hand every time we cast a spell could represent the process experimentation and collecting results.

Eruth, Tormented Prophet from Innistrad turns every card drawn into two exiled cards you can play that turn, which could represent striking out into the unknown and making new discoveries.

I don't particularly like Eruth much since she turns off our ability to draw cards normally while she's in play, but Arjun just shuffles away your hand and draws new cards with every spell you cast, which is a lot of shuffling and busy work. I'll opt for Eruth, because I think she represents an interesting challenge and the setting of Ininstrad is perfect for Laboratory flavor thanks to all the Alchemists and Stitchers.

Figuring Out the Mana

With the Commander selected, we can focus on making sure we can cast our spells. I'm including some Arcane Signet since "Arcane" is 100% in the wheelhouse for Wizards. Artifacts like Astrolabe and Terrarion are excellent representation for lab equipment that will filter our colors and draw us cards.

Apprentice Wizard gives us three colorless mana for a single Blue mana, and every great Wizard needs an apprentice. Arcane Melee hits that "Arcane" theme again while reducing the cost of our instants and sorceries by . Note that also includes our opponents' spells.

Synergistic Card and Win Conditions

Arcane Laboratory is a must-include thanks to its name, but it's ability can prove a little tricky for us since we're in Izzet () and casting multiple spells a turn is our lifeblood. Not to mention our Commander kind of needs us to play our exiled cards so we don't lose them forever. So, make sure you use this responsibly. Of course, limiting the number of spells your opponents can play isn't too bad.

Supreme Inquisitor gives you the option to tap five of your Wizards for a repeatable to Jester's Cap effect that removes five cards in an opponent's library from the game every time you activate it. What a great way to deal with their win conditions and synergy pieces before they become a problem. All you have to do is commit some of your Wizards to researching their strategy, which is great flavor.

I mean, come on. How can we not include Wizard's Spellbook? It costs 5 mana and then can be tapped for no mana at sorcery speed to exile a spell from any graveyard and roll a d20. Depending on the result, we can copy that spells and cast it (costs need to be paid), copy the spell and cast it for , or copy every spell the Spellbook has exiled and cast them for free.

Goblin Wizardry isn't as exciting as our spellbook, but making two Wizards with Prowess at instant-speed is great for increasing our Wizard count.

Overwhelmed Apprentice mills each our opponents for two when it enters and we get to scry 2. The effect is reasonable, but the name and flavor are great. Laboratory Maniac is a common win condition in some Commander decks that wins us the game when we draw from a depleted deck. Note that if we have Eruth out, her trigger replaces the draw and prevents Lab Man from going off, so you'll need to remove her somehow to actually win the game. Thematic and potentially game-winning.

Epic Experiment exiles the top X cards of our library and we can cast each instant or sorecery exiled that costs X or less. The rest of the cards head to the graveyard. Empty the Laboratory asks us to sacrifice X Zombies and then reveals cards from the top of our library until we find that many Zombies, putting them into play untapped. We aren't a Zombie deck, but the flavor here is too good to pass up, and we do have a decent number of Zombies in the deck that could be worth effective tutoring into with this.

Of course, if we have a lab, then we absolutely need to Gather Specimens. This card lets us steal creatures that would come into play under our opponents' control this turn. Why use our own creatures in our experiments when another player's will do? We're also including Specimen Collector since it provides us with more test subjects in the form of a 1/1 Squirrel, 0/3 Crab, and a death trigger to effectively Populate.

Arcane Bombardment exiles a spell from our graveyard whenever we cast our first Instant or Sorcery on a turn. It then lets you copy each spell exiled with it and cast each copy without paying the mana costs. That's a lot of potentially game-winning value.

Experimental Overload gives us am X/X blue and red Weird creature token with power and toughness equal to the number of instant and sorcery cards in our graveyard, and it puts one of the spells in our graveyard back in our hand. We need to have some sizeable creatures to actually attack and defend with, and this does the trick.

Relearn returns a spell to our hand and fits with the theme of rediscovering information you forgot you knew. Mystic Retrieval fills that same niche, has a great name, and has Flashback so we can cast it again.

Galvanic Iteration fits perfectly here as iteration is fundamental for the scientific process. It copies the next spell we cast and it has flashback to do it again later. Thermo-Alchemist taps to ping each of our opponents for one and untaps whenever we cast a spell. It's an excellent and flavorful win condition.

Of course, we have to include one of Innistrad's premier researchers and scientists, the Stitcher Geralf. Geralf, Visionary Stitcher taps for one blue man to sacrifice one of our non-token creatures and make an X/X blue Zombie where X was the sacrificed creature's toughness. He also gives all your Zombies flying, which is a pretty good way to chip in for damage.

Stitcher Geralf taps for to make mill everyone for three cards. You get to exile up to two creatures milled that way to make an X/X Zombie token where X is equal to the creatures' combined power. Each of these provide a lot of value, and are also great at removing our Commander whenever she causes issues. Not to mention they give us more Zombies to work with Empty the Laboratory.

Answers and Problem Solvers

Now, let's talk about answers. I am choosing not to run Counterspell, but Arcane Denial fits the theme well. Wizard's Retort is obviously a must-include due to the name alone. Likewise, Patron Wizard is both flavorful and powerful, letting us tap a Wizard to Force Spike a spell. You should be wary of using that ability too much in Multiplayer since you'll expose yourself to attacks by tapping your creatures.

Electrodominance will ping any target for X damage and then lets you cast a spell from your hand that costs X or less for free. Sorcerer's Wand equips for 3 mana and turns whatever it's equipped to into a pinger for players and planeswalkers. Though, if that creature is a Wizard it'll do two damage instead of the normal one.

Arcane Teachings grants a creature +2/+2 and also turns it into a pinger. You'll notice I've included several Pingers in this list, since they do a great job of providing pressure or answering creatures. Relic Amulet gains charge counters as we cast Wizards, Instants, or Sorceries, and you can trade in all of those counters to deal and equal amount of damage to a creature. What a great and flavorful way to answer threats.

Card Advantage

Lunar Mystic and Library are must-includes for the theme. Lunar Mystic is from Innistrad and arrives with another cast trigger of our instants to swap 1 mana for a card draw, which triggers Eruth. Library is an enters tapped land that can Investigate to make a Clue token for 4 mana, which is both very thematic and an excellent mana sink when we're running low on cards.

Then we have this pair of card-drawing Instants with built-in cost reduction. Arcane Epiphany draws us three cards and costs less if we control a Wizard. Scour the Laboratory costs less if have four or more card types in our graveyard (thank you Delirium) and also draws us three cards. Both are on-theme for the deck and it's hard to say no to three new cards at instant speed.

Windrider Wizard gives us the option to Loot (draw then discard) whenever we cast an instant, sorcery or Wizard. Rummaging Wizard lets you spend to look at the top card of your library and put it in the graveyard. Jar of Eyeballs gains eyeball counters when one of your creatures dies. We can then spend 3 mana and tap it to look at the top X cards of our library (X being the number of counters removed), and we get to put one of them into our hand.

Arcane Encyclopedia taps for three to draw a card, and fits that sweet Wizard research flavor. Archivist just taps to draw a card to trigger our Commander whenever we want to. And Research Assistant taps for to loot. All of these are excellent flavor inclusions that still give us card advantage.

Yay! Here's my brew.

The Wizard's Lab in Innistrad | Commander | Abe Sargent

• Commander (1)
• 1 Eruth, Tormented Prophet

• Creatures (27)
• 1 Alchemist's Apprentice
• 1 Archivist
• 1 Apprentice Wizard
• 1 Cunning Sparkmage
• 1 Daring Apprentice
• 1 Erudite Wizard
• 1 Geralf, Visionary Stitcher
• 1 Hapless Researcher
• 1 Hydroelectric Specimen // Hydroelectric Laboratory
• 1 Laboratory Brute
• 1 Laboratory Drudge
• 1 Laboratory Maniac
• 1 Lunar Mystic
• 1 Overwhelmed Apprentice
• 1 Patron Wizard
• 1 Prodigal Pyromancer
• 1 Prodigal Sorcerer
• 1 Research Assistant
• 1 Riptide Director
• 1 Rummaging Wizard
• 1 Specimen Collector
• 1 Stitcher Geralf
• 1 Supreme Inquisitor
• 1 Thermo-Alchemist
• 1 Voidmage Prodigy
• 1 Windrider Wizard
• 1 Wizard Mentor

• Instants (12)
• 1 Arcane Denial
• 1 Arcane Epiphany
• 1 Electrodominance
• 1 Frantic Search
• 1 Galvanic Iteration
• 1 Gather Specimens
• 1 Goblin Wizardry
• 1 Refute
• 1 Sage's Dousing
• 1 Scour the Laboratory
• 1 Wizard's Lightning
• 1 Wizard's Retort

• Sorceries (9)
• 1 Compulsive Research
• 1 Deep Analysis
• 1 Empty the Laboratory
• 1 Epic Experiment
• 1 Experimental Overload
• 1 Field Research
• 1 Mystic Retrieval
• 1 Relearn
• 1 Tome Scour

• Enchantments (7)
• 1 Arcane Bombardment
• 1 Arcane Laboratory
• 1 Arcane Melee
• 1 Arcane Teachings
• 1 Combat Research
• 1 Private Research
• 1 Wizard Class

• Artifacts (11)
• 1 Alchemist's Vial
• 1 Arcane Encyclopedia
• 1 Arcane Signet
• 1 Astrolabe
• 1 Jar of Eyeballs
• 1 Magnifying Glass
• 1 Relic Amulet
• 1 Sorcerer's Wand
• 1 Spellbook
• 1 Terrarion
• 1 Wizard's Spellbook

• Lands (34)
• 20 Island
• 10 Mountain
• 1 Arcane Lighthouse
• 1 Library
• 1 Mystic Sanctuary
• 1 Riptide Laboratory

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And there we have it. I tried to stick to my theme as much as possible, but what do you think? What would you choose to include? There are honestly so many options for ways to take a Wizard's Lab Theme brew, I could see any number of justifiable inclusions. But, I hope you like the list and that it inspires you to build your own flavor-first Commander deck!