I really like it for Commander. It seems like a great way to kill someone in this format. Just play it on any commander when it swings, and if you deal 21, you kill the player due to the commander damage rule. You should have life to spare considering your starting life total of 40. I decided to build a deck around finding Hatred and playing it!

The first question you have when building around a nonlegendary creature is: Who will be your commander? I searched up some interesting ideas, and here are the ones I like the most:

Cao Ren, Wei Commander – Another 4-mana commander, he would force me to run mono-black. However, having horsemanship means he is essentially unblockable. That’s a guaranteed hit against any defense. There are a lot of flyers mucking about the game, and Wydwen could face opposition, but Cao Ren is unlikely to face serious defense on his front.

Maralen of the Mornsong – The major problem with this deck is finding the Hatred. This commander comes with a built-in way of tutoring it, so all of the combo is assembled for you. It should be really good the first time you go off. Once people know what you are doing, they’ll just use the turn to tutor for a counter or removal or a Fog effect or something.

Sygg, River Cutthroat – I love Sygg for a few reasons. First of all, not only does he bring in blue, but the double hybrid cost is very easy to play. You won’t have to worry about having two black mana or two blue mana only in your opening hand. That’s a powerful advantage. He also doesn’t look that bad as a commander. Having Maralen as your commander is a giant warning signal. Having Wydwen as your commander suggests Faeries and a very annoying control deck. (Although why not play Oona if that’s the plan?) Cao Ren asks a lot of questions, and none of them are good. Skullbriar will force people to assume you are going to use and abuse his counter ability—but Sygg just looks like a good, cheap, multiplayer legend you can drop early and use without ever truly abusing it.

So, who did I go with?

Maralen is the first to go. She broadcasts combo too much and enables people to stop it. Despite the usefulness of horsemanship in a commander that wants to win through sneaking in an attack, Cao Ren is the next to go. This deck really needs another color to flesh things out, and Cao Ren doesn’t offer that. That leaves Sygg, Wydwen, and Skullbriar. Of these three, Wydwen is the next off the train. Ideally, I’d like to accelerate a Hatred sooner than turn five, and Wydwen’s casting cost is too prohibitive.

That leaves either Sygg or Skullbriar. One is the better commander for the deck, and the other is the better color for the deck. Which way do I look?

"Skullbriar Hates You"

• Commander (1)
• 1 Skullbriar, the Walking Grave

• Creatures (23)
• 1 Basal Thrull
• 1 Birds of Paradise
• 1 Blood Pet
• 1 Budoka Gardener
• 1 Elves of Deep Shadow
• 1 Elvish Pioneer
• 1 Elvish Spirit Guide
• 1 Fyndhorn Elves
• 1 Gemhide Sliver
• 1 Harabaz Druid
• 1 Krosan Wayfarer
• 1 Leaf Gilder
• 1 Llanowar Elves
• 1 Priest of Titania
• 1 Quirion Elves
• 1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
• 1 Sakura-Tribe Scout
• 1 Skyshroud Ranger
• 1 Soldevi Adnate
• 1 Street Wraith
• 1 Utopia Tree
• 1 Wirewood Elf
• 1 Boreal Druid

• Spells (42)
• 1 Avoid Fate
• 1 Cabal Ritual
• 1 Crop Rotation
• 1 Culling the Weak
• 1 Dark Ritual
• 1 Dismember
• 1 Doom Blade
• 1 Go for the Throat
• 1 Hatred
• 1 Noxious Revival
• 1 Terror
• 1 Vampiric Tutor
• 1 Vendetta
• 1 Withstand Death
• 1 Demonic Tutor
• 1 Diabolic Tutor
• 1 Duress
• 1 Edge of Autumn
• 1 Explore
• 1 Grim Tutor
• 1 Imperial Seal
• 1 Inquisition of Kozilek
• 1 Night's Whisper
• 1 Rampant Growth
• 1 Sign in Blood
• 1 Thoughtseize
• 1 Wretched Banquet
• 1 Exploration
• 1 Chrome Mox
• 1 Grim Monolith
• 1 Lotus Bloom
• 1 Lotus Petal
• 1 Mana Crypt
• 1 Mana Vault
• 1 Mishra's Bauble
• 1 Mox Diamond
• 1 Nihil Spellbomb
• 1 Pentad Prism
• 1 Sensei's Divining Top
• 1 Serum Powder
• 1 Sol Ring
• 1 Urza's Bauble

• Lands (34)
• 12 Forest
• 12 Swamp
• 1 Bayou
• 1 Cavern of Souls
• 1 City of Brass
• 1 Command Tower
• 1 Llanowar Wastes
• 1 Overgrown Tomb
• 1 Twilight Mire
• 1 Verdant Catacombs
• 1 Woodland Cemetery
• 1 Gaea's Cradle

Buy This Deck

If you can drop Skullbriar on turn two, go ahead and swing to add a counter. Then, speed up your Hatred and blow out someone and keep the pressure! The first sort of cards are those few temporary mana-making options. Dark Ritual is a huge fave. With just Dark Ritual, you slay someone on turn three—you need no other accelerants.

Every Ritual-ish effect that made mana made the cut. Cabal Ritual makes 1 usually, and Culling the Weak can sacrifice a creature for a 3-mana bump. These are cards you want. We also have Blood Pet to play early and sacrifice later and Lotus Petal to give us a free 1-mana bump when needed, while Lotus Bloom needs time—but not mana—to develop. Finally, Pentad Prism stores 2 mana for the turn we go off, giving us 2 more. (And don’t ignore Elvish Spirit Guide!)

I also have green creatures that tap for mana. I included every 1-drop or 2-drop that taps for both colors. From Birds of Paradise to Gemhide Sliver, we have a lot of ways to make the mana. Any 1-drop that tapped for a mana was also included. It could tap for just green—Llanowar Elves; just black—Elves of Deep Shadow; or just colorless—Boreal Druid. As long as it gave me mana, it went in. A few 2-drops that made just green were added because I needed to fill out the space in the deck—Priest of Titania has the potential to tap for more than 1 mana, while Leaf Gilder and Wirewood Elf add to our Elf total for the Priest. I decided to emphasize that synergy rather than focusing on 2-drops that make green mana but could do other things, such as Werebear and Wall of Roots.

With green in the deck, the final contribution green adds is land fetching and acceleration. I started with the obvious cards such as Rampant Growth and Sakura-Tribe Elder. I also liked all of the 1-drops that added lands to the battlefield. Two tap to add a land, one brings a land when you play it, and the fourth sacrifices to put out a land. I felt all of these helped to enable our land speed. Finally, Budoka Gardener joined the list. It will come online the same time as something like Utopia Tree does, so it’s not too expensive on the casting cost.

With all of this acceleration, we have the potential to have some mana up when Hatred is played, so two more green cards may look random, but I doubt they play that way. The best is Avoid Fate. When you swing with Skullbriar, playing Hatred comes out of nowhere. The weakest part of the combo is before your Elemental hits. Due to that weak moment, I included Avoid Fate and Withstand Death. The second keeps it out through removal, and the first keeps it safe from any instant that targets it—especially bounce and shuffle-back-to-your-library cards such as Oblation. Both are real troopers.

With few ways to draw cards in my colors cheaply, I included what card-drawing I could. I even dipped into the two Baubles: Urza’s and Mishra’s. I have Street Wraith here to draw me a card, with Night's Whisper and Sign in Blood coming in cheap enough to be played. After that, there are not a lot of options. I decided to stay away from the 1-mana cantrips and cycling cards. There’re too weak in this deck. Instead, we have mana-free cycling in Edge of Autumn and the Wraith. I also snuck in a Sensei's Divining Top for when you have extra mana sitting around waiting to be used.

In case my foe has some defense assembled, I included a few answers. All of the ones you expect to be here are, so you have friends such as Doom Blade and Vendetta. One clever card is the 1-mana Wretched Banquet. You may have to play around it a bit since it’s a sorcery. If your target is bigger than Skullbriar for some reason, Hatred Skullbriar during your main phase, and kill it before attacking.

All of the answers are 1 or 2 mana, and this is another reason you may want to have mana in excess of 5 when you Hatred your commander.

My policy on tutor inclusion was that if it cost 1 mana, it could place the card on top of the library. Otherwise, it should put it right into the hand. I even included the not-that-great Diabolic Tutor because we must have the Hatred. Feel free to mulligan into a Tutor or Hatred hand if the first doesn’t have anything. It’s better to have a hand that may not go off until turn four or five than to have a hand that can blast someone early but has no chance of finding Hatred. Without the extra tutor of blue and the ton of deck-sifting and draw, you have to be more aggressive when playing this deck. That’s why I included Serum Powder—in case you need a free mulligan off a really bad hand that includes it.

I included the handful of good 1-mana discard cards that would help the deck. Feel free to drop a Duress or friend in order to help protect the Hatred. This is a sideline and not the main attraction, so I didn’t include too many of these cards. Besides, in a multiplayer game, you would never be able to hit everyone who might have a counter, bounce, Fog, or removal spell. When you have the extra black mana, use these guys, but I didn’t want to take up too much deck space with more of these cards.

I wish I could play Tinder Wall, Manamorphose, Urborg Elf, and Wild Cantor, but the rules don’t allow it. Other cards you might want to consider are a bit metagame dependent. Perhaps your group has a lot of defensive artifacts and enchantment, so in goes some removal for them. Consider Nature's Claim and other friends. On the other hand, if fast creatures are all over the place, more removal is necessary. Everything from Edicts to Tragic Slip seem like interesting choices.

If you need to fight through a lot of counter magic, Boseiju, Who Shelters All can protect your Hatred, and cards like Undying Evil can add to your Protect Skullbriar section quite well if removal is rampant. (It’s too bad you can’t play Fate Transfer as a surprise way to make a Birds of Paradise a player-killer if Skullbriar is about to bite it permanently.)

Some formats might suggest more recursion, and Regrowth can be added, while others may be so fast that Gemstone Caverns is a good play. Add whatever flavor is needed to the deck for your table and to suit your card collection.

I hope that you enjoyed today’s Hatred-inspired deck. Let me know what you think in the comments, and we’ll catch you again in two weeks!

Until Later,

Abe Sargent