Commander Deck Tech - Ultra Magnus, Tactician

Even though it was released some time ago, one of the Transformers which stood out a lot to me was Ultra Magnus, Tactician. The possibility of creating a deck full of giant robots is quite fun, and it is from that idea that today's deck tech came to be!

Ultra Magnus, Tactician is by far one of the most interesting Transformers to use as a commander, and can cheat out the mana cost of the giant artifact creatures in this deck.

Its other side, Ultra Magnus, Armored Carrier, can be played for less mana and doesn't count as a creature outside your turn.

Even though the Naya color combination isn't the most common one for the artifact creature archetype, I was still able to build a deck that is very fun to pilot. So, let's go!

This is our list. At the end of this article, I'll show you a more accessible budget list, but keeping the original idea - after all, this commander's goal is quite linear, so we'll see several repeated cards in both of these lists.

Accelerators

Considering this commander costs 7 mana, every help with mana we can have is welcome. So, we use Sol Ring, Arcane Signet, Talisman of Conviction, Talisman of Impulse and Talisman of Unity as mana rocks. We also count with the ramp tools Farseek, Three Visits, Nature's Lore and Rampant Growth on curve 2, and Kodama's Reach and Cultivate on curve 3.

As a discount, we have Foundry Inspector because it has a low cost and lowers our artifact costs, and finally Smothering Tithe, which is a very efficient way to create mana long term.

Creature Helpers

In this section, we have a bit of everything to give our game some consistency. It is clear we can't depend on our commander 100% of the time to play our high-cost creatures. So, starting with two mana cheaters, we use Monster Manual and Doors of Durin - I'll highlight Doors of Durin, which, despite not having interaction with Dwarfs or Elves, works really well, considering this deck is aggressive and wants to attack any time it can.

Even though our creatures are huge, we need to defend them somehow. Considering that, we added Clockwork Scholar to prevent our opponents from dealing damage to our attacking artifact-creatures, and it provides card draw on top of it all. We have Leonin Abunas to give our artifact-creatures Hexproof, and Rebbec, Architect of Ascension, both to protect our creatures and to make them Unblockable against certain mana costs.

Finally, we have Tempered Steel to grow our creatures even more and Rhythm of the Wild to avoid problems with those counterspell players. We can also use this card to aggro more with Riot Haste, or even to grow our creatures with a +1/+1 counter.

Giant Robots

Finally, we have a huge amount of giant robots. Some of them aren't that giant, but they have utility and value.

Starting with Megazords, we use Metalwork Colossus, Ancient Stone Idol, Darksteel Colossus, Rust Goliath and Blightsteel Colossus, which, by the way, can bring down a single opponent in one go.

Next, we have our utility robots: Bosh, Iron Golem, Wurmcoil Engine, Phyrexian Triniform, Triplicate Titan, Ruin Grinder, Cityscape Leveler and Combustible Gearhulk. I'll highlight Bosh, which can serve as a possible win condition by throwing our giant robots at our opponents.

We also have robots which are not that giant, but bring a lot of utility: Sandstone Oracle, Canoptek Spyder and Platoon Dispenser to draw cards; Angel of the Ruins, Meteor Golem and Steel Hellkite to remove problems on the board; Blaster, Combat DJ and Steel Seraph as buffers and Bronze Guardian to protect our creatures better, not to mention its clear potential as a creature that can grow its power a lot.

To complete our robot section, we have Karn, Legacy Reforged to give us mana and be a big body on board; Cybermen Squadron to spread our damage better among our opponents by giving Myriad to our artifact-creatures; Alibou, Ancient Witness to have access to Haste and deal damage; Scrap Trawler to recover resources you've lost and finally Prowl, Stoic Strategist to draw cards and bother opponents with something that is "almost" a removal.

Drawing Cards and Interacting with Artifacts

An important factor is drawing cards, considering that, if you get hit with a global removal and don't have any answers, being empty-handed will make it harder for you to come back into the game. By keeping that in mind and trying to keep this deck's resourceful, we use Garruk's Uprising and Guardian Project as enchantments to fulfill this role as creatures activate their ETBs, and Rishkar's Expertise and Return of the Wildspeaker as spells (sorceries???). Considering the creatures on board can be significantly powerful, these cards can draw from 6 to 10 cards depending on the situation.

Still to draw cards, Valakut Awakening can renew a hand that isn't that great or be used as a land; whatever's most convenient at the time.

Also to return resources from the graveyard, we use Daretti, Scrap Savant, which both returns an artifact from the graveyard and draws cards, and Wake the Past, which can be a finisher depending on the game state and depending on how many artifact cards you have in your graveyard.

Answers and Interacting with the Board

Last, but not least, we have our spot and global removals and our answers, so this deck has interaction and isn't frustrating to play because it is completely vulnerable to mass removal.

Starting with the global removals, we have Blasphemous Act and Organic Extinction, as they are easy to access and because they only keep our creatures on the board most of the time, respectively.

To protect ourselves from global removals, we added Flawless Maneuver, Heroic Intervention, Teferi's Protection and Boros Charm. After all, building a board full of big creatures isn't easy, and simply losing them is, at the very least, sad. I'll also give a nod to Akroma's Will, which can be protection at the same time it is a game finisher.

Finally, we have our spot removals: to remove only creatures, we have Swords to Plowshares and Path to Exile, and, to deal with any type of permanent, we have the classic Beast Within, Chaos Warp and Generous Gift. Low-cost answers that deal with almost everything that is problematic are already enough to complete our list.

As said before, because this deck's idea is linear, we haven't changed much when we compare the Budget version to this Deck Tech's original list. Of course, stronger resources and cards were removed, but this deck is still fun to pilot anyway.

I didn't expect to enjoy a possible Transformer commander this much, and, after analyzing them, I realized some of them, like Ultra Magnus, can be in fun lists like this one, Giant Robots Naya. Ever since this idea sprouted in my head, I couldn't stop thinking about this deck until I indeed built it, and I hope I have delivered a satisfying end result.

Did you enjoy this list? Would you use other creatures? Or explore a Golem or Construct typal deck? Comment down below!