Commander Deck Tech: Alesha, Who Smiles at Death - Reanimator

Reanimation? Aggro? Combo? We have a Mardu commander here who covers many aspects of Magic! Alesha, Who Smiles at Death can gain a lot of steam early on and be a constant threat at the tables!

Having a 3/2 body with first strike, Alesha still has an impressive recursive ability in her kit. By paying two mixed mana (either white or black, or any combination of both), Alesha can put a creature with power 2 or less from your graveyard directly onto the battlefield, and that's the ability we'll explore in this deck.

The main archetype explored in this Deck Tech will be that of reanimation, aiming to abuse the commander's attack triggers and the great recursion options that her colors offer.

Adopting an aggressive and proactive posture since the beginning of the game, the deck seeks to be aggressive while also accelerating resources.

The idea to finish the game is through one of the several forms of combo that the deck offers, and we'll talk about that in detail later.

Alesha, the Commander

As it is not surprising, our Alesha covers a good part of the functions that our deck seeks to perform, and being a 3/2 creature with first strike, she manages to guarantee a successful attack most of the time from the beginning to the end of the game.

Our Commander is the most constant piece of recursion in the deck, always ensuring the return of the desired creatures to the battlefield, which puts our gears on track from the very beginning. We just need to get the desired creatures into the graveyard somehow.

Diving into the Grave

Alesha needs something to reanimate whenever she attacks, so it's vitally important that we have the necessary parts in our graveyard at the right time.

In this question, Entomb, Vile Entomber and Buried Alive are cards that fulfill this function perfectly, placing the desired piece in our graveyard and allowing our strategy to progress.

Other noteworthy are cards like Plargg, Dean of Chaos and Thrilling Discovery, which make it possible to put a card from our hand in the graveyard and draw a card from the deck to replace it, the famous “looting”.

Consistent recursion

Not all creatures are accessible through our commander's reanimation, and besides, at some point it will be removed, so we have a small reanimation package, such as Reanimate, Persist and Animate Dead that ensure that extra value as consistently as possible.

These cards ensure that, even without the commander on the battlefield, we still have access to the most important part of the deck: the graveyard.

Despite being a deck that has many steps and stages to complete its game plan, Alesha brings with it one of the greatest characteristics of the Mardu colors: aggressiveness and proactivity.

Using creatures filled with effects when entering the battlefield or capable of generating immediate value, the deck seeks to immediately impact and establish advantage in the match, removing threats through effects when creatures enter the battlefield, specific removals or putting yourself ahead with tutors and value cards. This is all while continually aggressively attacking your opponents.

Once the tutors or discards manage to place the desired creatures in the graveyard, it's time to bring our commander to the board and guarantee victory through the deck's various finishers.

The deck has several powerful combos that manage to establish themselves quickly and efficiently on the table, and can end the game unexpectedly.

Sun Titan + Fiend Hunter + Sac Outlet

This combo works by generating a reanimate and sacrifice looping involving the creatures.

- Target Fiend Hunter's ability on Sun Titan and let it resolve completely.

- Sacrifice the Fiend Hunter to the desired sac outlet (such as Goblin Bombardment).

- Reanimate the Fiend Hunter through Sun Titan's ETB and repeat the process.

Through this interaction, we managed to ensure that whenever the Sun Titan enters the battlefield, it reanimates the Fiend Hunter, which, when entering the battlefield, can exile it, and when it is sacrificed, the loop starts again. This way, we get infinite ETB and LTB triggers, and depending on our sac outlet, we gain advantage or even manage to end the game.

Leonin Relic-Warder + Animate Dead + Sac Outlet

Following the same basis as the previous combo, the synergy between the cards allows you to generate a reanimation and sacrifice loop that, in the same way as Sun Titan + Fiend Hunter can end the game.

Anafenza, Kin-Tree Spirit + Murderous Redcap + Sac Outlet

Having both creatures on the board and any sac outlet to sacrifice Murderous Redcap that through its ability “Persist” will return to the battlefield dealing damage to any target and will put Anafenza's ability on the stack, which will nullify its -1/-1 counter, ensuring infinite damage.

Karmic Guide + Reveillark + Sac Outlet

This combo can be performed with all pieces on the board and ordering the trigger pile of both cards can end the game depending on your sac outlet or even seek all creatures with 2 power from your graveyard, and enabling other combos in the process.

- Sacrifice Reveillark to sac outlet;

- Reveillark's ability will trigger, and you must target Karmic Guide in your graveyard. (If it is in play, sacrifice it before sacrificing Reveillark).

- Return Karmic Guide and, with its ability, return Reveillark.

- Sacrifice Karmic Guide with the sac outlet.

- Repeat the process.

Honorable Mentions

Although they are not game-winning combos at the time, two powerful plays deserve to be highlighted, namely:

Alesha, Who Smiles at Death + Master of Cruelties: When attacking, Alesha can reanimate Master of Cruelties bypassing the requirement that it can only attack alone, leaving the opponent with 1 life.

Entomb+ Sire of Insanity + Reanimate or Animate Dead: By reanimating Sire of Insanity from your graveyard, you can create an absurdly complicated situation for your opponents, making the cards in their hands almost nil while filling your graveyard with targets for recursion (note that the earlier this happens in the game, the more powerful it becomes, and this combo can be performed as soon as turn 1 or 2).

Since the beginning of our journey, I've been talking about our commander's versatility and that she can be explored in different ways.

One of the options is to take advantage of the aggressive attributes that the Mardu color combination offers and its “human” and/or “Warrior” types.

In this case, we are going to use the synergy of cards that a tribal Human deck can offer, providing a cheaper alternative focused on combat, without forgetting the synergy and also managing to exploit Alesha's ability as a commander.

This list features lords who, while increasing their attack power, complete Alesha's abilities on the battlefield. Judith, the Scourge Diva and Jirina Kudro power up our attackers while synergizing with our commander.

Other pieces, such as Coppercoat Vanguard and Frontline Medic, manage to ensure the safety and performance of our strategy by protecting our humans.

Following this list, Alesha manages to recover about twenty of our creatures, being, alongside Angel of Glory’s Rise, our main source of recursion.

Enabling a very versatile and powerful deck, Alesha can create several lock situations, threats and even game finishing very early in the game. Possessing very pertinent tribes and colors and an absurdly useful ability in the game, the commander can follow several paths very effectively and abuse reanimation strategies effortlessly.

A compelling and fun deck that can suit your play style and the table!

I hope you liked it and see you next time!