Commander Deck Tech - Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver

In today's Deck Tech, we'll bring one of the, if not the most, iconic creatures that are part of the "Halloween" theme: Zombies! Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver stars as the commander!

Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver is one of the, if not the most popular commander for Zombies nowadays in Commander. It is a great creature for this concept: it can create several Zombie tokens and draws cards at the end of the turn.

When we analyze the other possible commanders with the color combination, Wilhelt stands out for this concept, and that's why he was chosen to lead this Deck Tech.

This deck can win in several ways: running your opponents down with a swarm of Zombies, draining them with several cards, or even finishing the game by playing out some combos.

Accelerators

This is the classic "Commander Kit" for mana rocks nowadays: Sol Ring, Arcane Signet, Dimir Signet and Talisman of Dominance.

To avoid discarding cards because you have too many of them in hand, we have Thought Vessel. Finally, we have Crowded Crypt - a great artifact that can create several Zombie tokens that seems to be particularly made for this type of deck.

Lords and Typal Interactions

Lords and Other Important Creatures

Like any typal deck worthy of its title, this one needs Lords - creatures that usually buff a creature type you choose in some way. Therefore, we have Death Baron, Cemetery Reaper, Lord of the Accursed, Tomb Tyrant, Undead Warchief and particularly Diregraf Captain, considering it is useful as a combo piece, which we'll mention later on.

We have other important creatures for this deck that are neither Lords nor Zombies: The Scarab God, Gisa and Geralf, Gray Merchant of Asphodel, Sidisi, Undead Vizier, Cryptbreaker and Hordewing Skaab.

In the non-zombie section, Gisa and Geralf fill your graveyard and provide you with access to it at least once per turn to retrieve some lost Zombie.

The Scarab God can deal a considerable amount of damage to your opponents, and also selects cards thanks to its Scry effect. Its last ability is also incredibly useful to answer Reanimator decks by "stealing" your opponents' essential creatures.

Now, speaking of Zombies, we use Sidisi, Undead Vizier to search for whatever's necessary, or even look for combo pieces to finish the game. Cryptbreaker will help you draw cards, and Hordewing Skaab guarantees your creatures an efficient form of evasion.

Finally, we have one of the, if not the most used Zombie in Commander, used even in non-typal decks due to its potential: Gray Merchant of Asphodel. This is practically a mandatory slot that will help you keep yourself in the game with more health while you drain your opponents with its ETB at the same time.

Other Zombies and Typal Interactions

As non-creature typal interactions, we added Rooftop Storm, Zombie Apocalypse, Ghouls' Night Out, Empty the Laboratory, Distant Melody, Rise of the Dread Marn, Necroduality, Liliana's Mastery, Liliana, Death's Majesty, Endless Ranks of the Dead and Dreadhorde Invasion.

These are great cards to complement our horde of Zombies, and they do a bit of everything: they create more creatures for the board, buff them, draw cards equivalent to the number of creatures, and even steal opponents' creatures and transform them into Zombies.

This typal group is ancient in MTG, so there are many, but many support cards to build and develop this deck. By the way, it is important to state that Rooftop Storm is part of another combo in this deck.

Champion of the Perished and Diregraf Colossus can create numerous tokens; Midnight Reaper and Undead Augur draw cards; Ravenous Rotbelly, Noxious Ghoul and Fleshbag Marauder remove your opponents' creatures; Cleaver Skaab clones interesting Zombies (such as, for instance, Gray Merchant of Asphodel), Gleaming Overseer makes your Zombie tokens even stronger, and, finally, to have an effect similar to Wilhelt, we have Headless Rider.

As stated before, Zombies are numerous and varied, so we curated only the more interesting ones to use in this build.

As stated before, we have several combo pieces as alternative win conditions, besides combat damage.

First, let's discuss the sources of damage we need to make this possible: we already have the aforementioned Diregraf Captain, Bastion of Remembrance, Plague Belcher and Mirkwood Bats. These are our main sources of damage to lower our opponents' health points to zero. Considering that any of these pieces is on the board, let's check out our combos.

Gravecrawler with Phyrexian Altar and a Zombie on the board results in an endless sacrifice cycle, with an infinite death trigger.

Still using Gravecrawler, alongside Rooftop Storm and Carrion Feeder, it is always possible to cast Gravecrawler for 0 and sacrifice it with Carrion Feeder.

This provides you with access to infinite damage or infinite Zombie tokens, depending on what you have on the board. Ashnod's Altar alongside Rooftop Storm and Gravecrawler also creates the same effect.

Still using Rooftop Storm, we have the combo with Acererak the Archlich, with an infinite Dungeon trigger, which can finish your opponent in several ways depending on the Dungeon you use.

Finally, we have Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver, Poppet Stitcher transformed into Poppet Factory and any of the sacrifice sources listed before - Wilhelt Zombies will not have Decayed due to Poppet Factory, so, when you sacrifice them, Wilhelt will create another token, and that's how the loop starts.

Answers and Other Interactions

Removals

We use just a few removals, but the ones we selected are the most efficient ones.

We have Toxic Deluge, Damnation, Aetherize and Cyclonic Rift as global removals, and Infernal Grasp and Feed the Swarm as target removals. I'll highlight Grave Pact because, considering this deck interacts with several creatures being killed, Grave Pact works as a sort of removal.

Counters and Miscellaneous

To have some defensive resources and avoid our opponents' problematic cards, we use An Offer You Can't Refuse, Arcane Denial, Counterspell and Lazotep Plating, to defend possible combo pieces from risky situations.

To draw cards, Reanimate and Tutor others, finally, we have Victimize, Village Rites, Corrupted Conviction, Diabolic Intent and Expedition Map, to look for Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth, and Cabal Coffers to create great amounts of mana.

It is always nice to remember that Tolaria West is also in this deck to look for these lands.

This is a budget Wilhelt list that keeps the same Zombie horde essence we have in the previous list.

It was definitely interesting to work outside my comfort zone: a typal deck with combos. Particularly, I don't really like Zombies, but building a list and researching them sparked my curiosity about this typal group.

Did you like this list? Would you use another commander? Do you prefer Werewolves? Vampires? Spirits? Comment down below!