One of my goals with this column is to demystify the deck-building process. It's why I often go so deep into my choices; many longer-term Magic players don't need the level of specificity I often give, but those details aren't for them. They're for a new player who's looking to build their second deck, or someone who's just done their first couple of drafts and wants to build a Commander deck because all their friends play it.

In that spirit, and with a new Jumpstart set coming soon, I thought it'd be fun to combine two of my favorite formats and show some deck-building strategies along the way. The first Jumpstart was a lot of fun; between my dad and me, we ended up with a couple of boxes, and it made for several nights of fun play. Since we're both Commander players, we were very limited during the pandemic, and we didn't really want to spend a bunch of time building a sealed deck or building 60 card decks on our own. We normally had just an hour or so to jam before one of us wanted to go to bed! Enter Jumpstart, our savior. It worked great, and often was super fun.

Since Jumpstart is a relatively familiar way for new players to get some cards - kind of a drafting substitute with built-in focus - I thought it'd be fun to randomly choose two Jumpstart packs, throw them into a deck, then build a 100-card Commander deck using all of those cards. Here are my rules:

• I'm using two randomly selected Jumpstart boosters from the original Jumpstart. I'll do two decks like that, then I'll do two from the new Jumpstart set.
• I will use every single card from both packs unless I randomly wind up with a double, in which case I'll cut one. That includes the lands. I will start with 40 cards already chosen.
• I will choose a Commander who can manage the colors from the packs and no more. No three-color commanders, no additional colors.
• I will generally try to keep the selections on the cheaper side. I won't say I won't put in a $10 card, but wherever possible I'll use cheap cards. Often those are the best for new players, because it's the kind of draft chaff more experienced players will just give away.

I'm also going to focus on my process, more than the result. Yes, there will be a functional deck at the end of the article (at least, I hope it functions). But what I'd really like is for you to be able to take your two Jumpstart packs you just opened and be able to build a Commander deck using them as the genesis. Ready to get started?

For my first two packs, I got Devilish (3) and Liliana. (There were four different iterations of "Devilish." I got the one called "Devilish (3).") Sweet! Rakdos () graveyard-matters! We've got some nice synergy here, with the Devilish pack wanting to sacrifice its own stuff for value and the Liliana pack wanting Creatures in the Graveyard.

First, let's talk about the paths not taken. There is a bit of a Devil subtheme to the Red pack. I suppose we could try to go in on that, perhaps using Valki, God of Lies // Tibalt, Cosmic Imposter as the Commander, but it'd be a stretch. Our Black pack doesn't help us at all, and there's no tribal theme to the Liliana pack either, so while it's possible, it'd be hard to make a deck which actually functions. We're also in the colors of Madness, so there's likely a discard-matters deck here. This could be fun with Asmoranomardicadaistinaculdacar at the helm, and Red helps you with all its impulse draw and Faithless Looting-type effects. This is the deck to build if you're a more experienced player looking for a challenge, but I find newer players don't like to discard, because they don't know what to discard when. Also, strategizing mana usage with Madness can be a real challenge. But there's surely a deck there.

I decided to push all-in on the self-sacrifice theme. The first goal was to find a Commander, and one popped up early in looking with this guy:

Juri comes down fast and furious on turn two and cares about everything we sacrifice. Then eventually we can sacrifice him and wallop someone hard, followed by replaying him and doing it all again. He's cheap in all the right ways and does things we want our Commander to do. Perfect.

I then thought I wanted a copy of Attrition. Attrition is one of those go-to spells for me; I play a lot of Black, and I'm always messing around with stuff in my 'yard, so I run Attrition a lot. But Attrition has gotten pricy, so I ended up cutting it for cheaper cards (the deck has enough sacrifice outlets); if you have one kicking around, though, it'd be good here.

The next thing I knew I wanted was card draw. New players love to cut card draw for splashier effects, and they always regret it. The first thing I change when I help someone adjust their deck is I add more draw, because most decks lack it. The more cards you draw, the more likely you are to win the game. So, I looked for Creatures which helped us with that, because we want to be sacrificing our Creatures, so it's best if we have Creatures to sacrifice. My favorite example was this draft all-star: Moriok Replica. We get a 2/2 for which Altar's Reaps itself. Perfect! A counter on Juri, two extra cards, and a Creature in the 'yard. Just what we want. Stirge is similar, just drawing one. Skullport Merchant allows us to sacrifice other Creatures for cards, plus if we wind up with Treasures somehow we can use those too. Dockside Chef can sac other stuff or itself. Then we get the two Exploit creatures, Fell Stinger and Vulturous Aven, which are perfectly happy to Exploit themselves for cards. Disciple of Bolas makes us sacrifice something else, but the payoff is worth it, and Smothering Abomination will force us to sacrifice but pays us back with a card every time. That guy is really awesome in decks like this, and don't forget its trigger!

We do get Relic Vial and Witch's Cauldron as well; both allow us to sac a Creature for a card and don't die to a Wrath of God, so they're worth the slots.

I did a search for Creatures in with the text "sacrifice" and "draw", then I organized them by Mana Value and started selecting. I find this strategy a good way to get started on a theme - pick a thing you want to do, couple it with "draw", and run a search organized by Mana Value. That way you see the cheapest cards first and have a good idea of what you can do at the low end of the mana scale. It helps me keep my decks from getting too out of hand with Mana costs, and gives me an idea of how much stuff I'm looking for, plus it starts me focusing on drawing cards right away. By the time I was done, I'd added 44 cards plus the Commander, so I only had 15 slots left.

I do want a touch of extra mana in this deck. Eventually I might need quite a bit to recast Juri, or do a few sacrifices in the same turn or something, so a couple of mana rocks seemed worth it. I don't, however, want to bump into Juri's mana cost, so Sol Ring, with its absurd cost of , and four with a cost of (all of which help with card advantage in some way) make the cut. That gets us to 90 cards.

I knew I wanted some extra removal, and my first thought was the old-school Shriekmaw. This is a Terror with fairly substantial legs; it can be cast for , which kills a thing and counts as a sacrifice, or it can be cast for , still kill a thing, and leave behind a not-insignificant body with built-in evasion. Of course, now we have Ravenous Chupacabra, which is great, and you have to love a Creature like Rot-Tide Garganua. I didn't go the Fleshbag Marauder route, but if you find you're having trouble keeping the board clear enough, throwing in a few of those wouldn't be bad. To find these cards, I did a search for Creatures in my colors with "Destroy" in the text, and once again organized by Mana Value. This also found me Irreverent Revelers, which I'm delighted to have, and reminded me of Ingot Chewer, which is the Shatter-maw the deck wanted. I added five cards which serve as point removal, then threw in Deathbringer Regent as a last-ditch Wrath effect. It's never too bad when you're the only one with a Creature and that Creature is a 5/6 Flying one.

With my remaining four slots, I decided I wanted just a touch of recursion, so we got Doomed Necromancer, Apprentice Necromancer, Bonecaller Cleric, and Nullpriest of Oblivion. We get a sacrifice and can return something. The two Necromancers (and Bonecaller, for that matter) can actually create a bit of a loop; it won't go infinite, but you might be able to get a few rounds of out if before you run out of mana in the late game.

Jumpstart Juri | Commander | Mark Wischkaemper

• Commander (1)
• 1 Juri, Master of the Revue

• Creatures (43)
• 1 Apprentice Necromancer
• 1 Blighted Bat
• 1 Bonecaller Cleric
• 1 Brash Taunter
• 1 Chained Brute
• 1 Deathbringer Regent
• 1 Disciple of Bolas
• 1 Dockside Chef
• 1 Doomed Necromancer
• 1 Fell Stinger
• 1 Ghoulraiser
• 1 Goremand
• 1 Gravelighter
• 1 Havoc Jester
• 1 Hobblefiend
• 1 Ingot Chewer
• 1 Irreverent Revelers
• 1 Lightning-Core Excavator
• 1 Liliana's Devotee
• 1 Liliana's Elite
• 1 Liliana's Standard Bearer
• 1 Liliana's Steward
• 1 Moriok Replica
• 1 Nullpriest of Oblivion
• 1 Pit Keeper
• 1 Pitchburn Devils
• 1 Priest of Forgotten Gods
• 1 Rakshasa Gravecaller
• 1 Ravenous Chupacabra
• 1 Rot-Tide Gargantua
• 1 Ruthless Knave
• 1 Shriekmaw
• 1 Silumgar Butcher
• 1 Skullport Merchant
• 1 Smothering Abomination
• 1 Soulreaper of Mogis
• 1 Spiteful Prankster
• 1 Stirge
• 1 Thraxodemon
• 1 Torch Fiend
• 1 Viscera Seer
• 1 Vulturous Aven
• 1 Wailing Ghoul

• Planeswalkers (1)
• 1 Liliana, Waker of the Dead

• Instants (2)
• 1 Collateral Damage
• 1 Dance with Devils

• Sorceries (5)
• 1 Act of Treason
• 1 Cemetery Recruitment
• 1 Rise Again
• 1 Settle the Score
• 1 Traitorous Greed

• Artifacts (8)
• 1 Bonder's Ornament
• 1 Commander's Sphere
• 1 Crowded Crypt
• 1 Culling Dais
• 1 Lantern of Revealing
• 1 Relic Vial
• 1 Sol Ring
• 1 Witch's Cauldron

• Lands (40)
• 13 Swamp
• 7 Mountain
• 1 Akoum Refuge
• 1 Blighted Gorge
• 1 Bloodfell Caves
• 1 Bojuka Bog
• 1 Castle Locthwain
• 1 Command Tower
• 1 Evolving Wilds
• 1 Foreboding Ruins
• 1 High Market
• 1 Hostile Hostel // Creeping Inn
• 1 Keldon Necropolis
• 1 Rogue's Passage
• 1 Scavenger Grounds
• 1 Smoldering Marsh
• 1 Stensia Bloodhall
• 1 Temple of Malice
• 1 Terramorphic Expanse
• 1 Thriving Bluff
• 1 Thriving Moor
• 1 Witch's Cottage

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One thing I haven't talked about is Act of Treason. There are two such effects from the Devilish pack, and that's certainly a direction which might be worth exploring. Zealous Conscripts comes to mind as a Creature which does that, but even just more Threaten-style effects to steal your opponents' stuff and sacrifice it for value could be fun. I wanted to play into the self-sacrifice style, but having the couple of stealing effects isn't a bad thing.

This deck won't be winning any tournaments, but it will be fun to pilot and is decently cheap to put together once you consider the cards you've already got from the Jumpstart packs. It's also a starting point which can be upgraded and adjusted over time. As you get more cards and more experience with the deck, you can start moving in the Threaten direction, or add the Fleshbag Marauders, perhaps switch to Tymaret, the Murder King or some other Commander. The sky's the limit, but at least you're going in a direction, rather than casting about aimlessly.

Now get out there and kill your own stuff.

Thanks for reading.