Magic: The Gathering - The Lord Of Pain Commander Deck Guide

The Lord of Pain is a very strong burn commander in Magic: The Gathering'sCommander format. It was the secondary commander of the Endless Punishment pre-constructed deck released as a part of the Duskmourn set. While it was a part of the precon, this guide will cover The Lord of Pain as its own commander rather than being used in Endless Punishment.

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The Lord of Pain is all about spreading burn damage to all of your opponents, punishing them for casting spells while you sit back and enjoy the chaos. If you like burn with a side of politics, The Lord of Pain is the perfect commander for you.

Decklist

Commander: The Lord of Pain

Angrath's Marauders

Archfiend of Despair

Blood Artist

Blood Seeker

Bloodletter of Aclazotz

Brash Taunter

Fate Unraveler

Fear of Burning Alive

Fiendish Duo

Gisa, the Hellraiser

Gleeful Arsonist

Gray Merchant of Asphodel

Hearthborn Battler

Heartless Hidetsugu

Kaervek the Merciless

Kederekt Parasite

Keen Duelist

Magda, the the Hoardmaster

Mogis, God of Slaughter

Obosh, the Preypiercer

Ojer Axonil, Deepest Might // Temple of Power

Persistent Constrictor

Razorkin Needlehead

Silent Arbiter

Sin prodder

Solphim, Mayhem Dominus

Sower of Discord

Star Athlete

Stormfist Crusader

Torbran, Thane of Red Fell

Valgavoth, Harrower of Souls

Vial Smasher the Fierce

Blasphemous Act

Feed the Swarm

Prisoner's Dilemma

Toxic Deluge

Wheel of Misfortune

Chaos Warp

Guff Rewrites History

Rakdos Charm

Suspended Sentence

Arcane Signet

Commander's Sphere

Crawlspace

Fellwar Stone

Mask of Griselbrand

Rakdos Signet

Resurrection Orb

Sol Ring

Talisman of Indulgence

Wayfarer's Bauble

Whip of Erebos

City on Fire

Descent into Avernus

Dictate of the Twin Gods

Exquisite Blood

Fiery Emancipation

Furnace of Rath

Gratuitous Violence

Painful Quandary

Sanguine Bond

Spiked Corridor // Torture Pit

The Rollercrusher Ride

Vampiric Link

Wound Reflection

Blackcleave Cliffs

Castle Locthwain

Command Beacon

Command Tower

Dragonskull Summit

Exotic Orchard

Graven Cairns

Haunted Ridge

Leechridden Swamp

Mount Doom

x9 Mountain

Shadowblood Ridge

Shivan Gorge

Smoldering Marsh

Spinerock Knoll

Sulfurous Springs

x8 Swamp

Tainted Peak

Witch's Clinic

The decklist consists of 32 creatures, five sorceries, four instants, 11 artifacts, 13 enchantments, and 34 lands. The majority of the card lineup either deals burn damage or causes extra burn damage to be done to close out games quicker.

Key Cards

The Lord Of Pain

The Lord of Pain is the commander of the deck and will be one of your main sources of constant burn damage. Since you are playing a burn deck, you don't want your opponents gaining life, something The Lord of Pain covers by preventing opponents from gaining life (and notably not yourself).

The Lord of Pain triggers the first time a player casts a spell. This includes yourself, and since there are almost always going to be spells being cast, you'll be able to burn a different player. You can choose which opponent to target with burn, and that's where the political side of Lord of Pain comes in, allowing you to leverage burn damage to make deals with your opponents.

Sower Of Discord

You want to spread burn damage around evenly to make sure no one feels too comfortable, and you can close out games. Sower of Discord is the perfect way to turn burning one opponent into two. Since all damage dealt to one player is done to the other, you can target two players while working together with the opponent not under Sower of Discord's effect.

Alternatively, if one opponent is out of the game, you can use Sower of Discord's effect on yourself to dissuade one of your opponents from attacking you. Sower of Discord is a great card to use to start alliances with, as well as making it easier to take two opponents out of the game at once.

Gisa, The Hellraiser

The Lord of Pain will trigger a crime every time the effect activates, which makes Gisa, the Hellraiser the perfect support card for the deck. While there are a lot of creatures in the deck, there aren't a lot of ones that make for good blockers. Gisa, the Hellraiser will give you an army of tokens to utilize both offensively and defensively.

Gisa's effect only triggers once a turn, but with The Lord of Pain on the battlefield, you are committing crimes every turn. This means within one turn cycle, you will be able to untap with six 2/2 Zombie tokens that get both +1/+1 and menace. These can help you bring life totals down even lower thanks to menace forcing your opponents to have more blockers.

Descent Into Avernus

One of the strongest burn and ramp cards, Descent into Avernus is one of the easiest ways to accelerate rapidly through the game.Rakdos (black/red) can struggle with mana generation, so the Treasure tokens Descent Into Avernus creates help you to cast your higher mana spells.

The burn damage that Descent into Avernus does snowballs quickly, constantly getting two damage larger for each of your upkeeps. While the burn happens evenly to all players, when combined with cards that deal extra burn damage to your opponents, you can burn your opponents out of the game before Descent into Avernus burns you.

Since the burn damage Descent into Avernus does affect you, too, you want to have some ways to gain life to ensure you don't accidentally end the game in a draw. If you play Descent into Avernus too early, there is a chance you'll lose the game before your opponents do - but sometimes that's part of the fun.

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How To Play The Deck

The Lord of Pain is all about sowing chaos and sending burn damage to all your opponents. It also operates like a politics deck, having you make deals with your opponents in exchange for not sending burn damage their way.

The deck has no shortage of other burn cards on top of The Lord of Pain to make sure you can close out games. Kaervek the Merciless acts as a second copy of The Lord of Pain, with the same effect but for every spell instead of just the first. Wheel of Misfortune has the potential for card draw and high burn damage, and Painful Quandary forces opponents to lose five life or discard a card when they cast a spell.

You can take everyone out of the game with the combo of Heartless Hidetsugu and anything that burns for the damage lost that turn. Heartless Hidetsugu can tap itself to make every opponent lose half their life. Then, the other side of the effect triggers, causing your opponents to be burnt for the other half. Cards that can do this include Archfiend of Despair, Solhpim, Mayhem Dominus, and Bloodletter of Aclazotz.

One downside of the deck is that it is low on defensive creatures. As such, you want cards that slow your opponent down. Since you don't care about attacking, Silent Arbiter is perfect since it only allows one creature to attack or block every combat. Crawlspace is one-sided, only letting your opponents attack you with no more than two creatures.

The primary win condition of the deck is through burn damage. The majority of the cards in the deck slowly burn your opponents, and in some cases, deal massive amounts. This is further pushed by noncreature damage doubling (or tripling) with cards like City on Fire, Dictate of the Twin Gods, Fiery Emancipation, and Furnace of Rath. The odds of you winning through combat are slim (but not impossible), so burn is going to be what you're aiming for.

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