Building Choco from Final Fantasy

Posted on June 9, 2025

Hello everyone! I'm Levi from The Thought Vessel, and today we're looking at the coolest bird in all of Magic: Choco, Seeker of Paradise. As a big Final Fantasy fan, I was overjoyed to see a Legendary Chocobo that could be a commander. It is a new alternate Bant bird commander to Derevi, Empyrial Tactician, and this commander was a blast to brew. I'll first go over this commander, then highlight some of the key cards for the deck, and finally, as always, I'll include the full decklist. Let's begin!

The Commander

For this commander, we've got two main themes: Birds and Landfall. This is an interesting pairing, as it gives us three options. We can go all-in on Bird typal, lean into a landfall strategy, or take the risk and blend both into a mix of land and sky. If we're looking for a pure Bird typal commander in these colors, Derevi, Empyrial Tactician is likely a stronger choice - she dodges commander tax and offers dynamic lines of play with untapping permanents. For Landfall, Chulane, Teller of Tales or even Amareth, the Lustrous might be more efficient, as they don't rely on stuffing the deck with a specific creature type like Choco does. That's why we're going with a top-down build that fuses landfall triggers with Bird typal to build an aerial army and swing for the win!

The Deck

There's a balance of Birds and payoff cards that needs to be addressed. Since we want to dig deep into the deck to trigger landfall as much as possible, we need a solid board of Birds. Luckily, enough have been printed recently to support this. We also want a few ways to retrieve cards from the graveyard - either to hand or back into the library - to avoid accidentally milling ourselves out.

To maintain this balance, we're running 29 Birds or bird-producing cards, 9 landfall payoffs, and two failsafe cards. Let's look at some of the highlights in each category.

Key Cards

Birds - The first standout is Kastral, the Windcrested. Kastral does everything we want here: pumping up our Birds, drawing cards, and recurring cards from the graveyard that Choco discards with its activated ability. Teshar, Ancestor's Apostle also helps by recurring historic spells, letting us reuse key pieces. Aerial Extortionist is a tempo machine - exiling opponents' permanents and drawing us cards when they return. Mockingbird is a fun inclusion too, copying the best creature on the board and granting it the Bird creature type.

Some cards synergize with both the Bird typal and landfall themes. Emeria Angel creates 1/1 Bird tokens with every landfall trigger, while Springheart Nantuko copies the bestowed creature on every landfall trigger. If it's attached to a payoff creature, this can snowball hard. Sazh's Chocobo is a great turn-one play that can grow into a threat capable of taking out a player or drawing removal.

Landfall Synergy - This is what pushes the deck over the top. At its core, it's a Field of the Dead deck, with Field of the Dead, Thespian's Stage, and Vesuva in the mix. We want to flood the board with expendable bodies to overwhelm opponents. That's why we're playing 39 uniquely named lands to maximize Field of the Dead's output, along with a couple of tutors to find it. Scute Swarm supports our go-wide strategy by generating tons of tokens. Felidar Retreat can either produce more tokens or pump the team with +1/+1 counters and vigilance, helping us stay aggressive while keeping blockers up against any crackback attackers.

Failsafes

The two failsafe cards are Echo of Eons and Nexus of Fate. Echo of Eons can be cast from the graveyard to wheel everyone's hand and shuffle graveyards back into libraries. Nexus of Fate is more extreme - it's an extra turn spell that always shuffles itself back into the library. If we're about to mill out, Nexus of Fate can be the only card left, giving us infinite turns to keep attacking until we close out the game.

Other Notable Cards

Reconnaissance is fantastic in attack trigger decks. It lets us pull creatures out of combat, protecting them. In go-wide decks, it's incredibly helpful for preserving our smaller creatures while we chip in with unblocked attackers. Archdruid's Charm is a great utility piece that can fetch Field of the Dead, a Bird, or remove a problematic artifact or enchantment. Flurry of Wings is a flavorful typal card that creates a 1/1 Bird for each attacking creature. We can use this defensively to block a wave of attackers or aggressively to double our Bird army during an all-out swing.

And there you have it! That's my list for Choco, Seeker of Paradise. This deck is an absolute blast to pilot, and I hope you give Choco a shot. The decklist is below. Until next time - happy gaming!