Upgrading Commander Precon: Scions & Spellcraft (Y'shtola, Night's Blessed)

All the Final Fantasy precons are finally out! The one that most stood out to me was Scions and Spellcraft, a classic Esper control list with a bit of life loss.

Y'shtola, Night's Blessed is precisely what you need to make decks like these work, as she gives you resources and also puts pressure on your opponents. She'll give you cards and keep the game flowing while your opponents lose their resources and life totals.

However, as no good deed goes unpunished, the bad news is that this deck centers completely around her. If she's not in play, you may struggle a bit.

That's why we built this ultra-accessible budget list. We wanted to make the main game plan more consistent and less dependent on Y'shtola, all while staying under our budget. The total price of all these new cards is just shy of 10 dollars!

Oh, and if you'd like a bit more power, we'll also show you a more expensive list at the end of this article.

For now, though, this is our first list:

You can check out all the original Final Fantasy precons here!

Ok, you got me. If you compare this version to the original list, you'll see that, actually, the main game plan is still somewhat the same. Our best call was removing excess cards (that is, cards centered around unrelated synergies or tokens) and replace them with more interaction, card draw, and some drain cards that will make all the difference in the world.

The main strategy is still the same: control the board, exhaust your opponents' resources, and hoard value until the game naturally turns in your favor.

The most significant difference is the consistency: now we have more ways to keep the game going even when Y'shtola isn't in play. Furthermore, we tried to spend as little money as possible. Obviously, you can upgrade this list further in several ways, like adding a Rhystic Study or Smothering Tithe, but that's why we added a second list at the end of this article!

Removals

One of the best things about Esper lists is that you can play a wide array of cheap, flexible removals in them. And you bet we took advantage of this, considering our budget.

Cards like Baleful Mastery, Curtains' Call, Mortify, and Anguished Unmaking will remove any relevant threat before they become too destructive, and also trigger our commander. They may also make a 1-for-1 trade favorable to us. Even with this sort of budget, we were able to add a very respectable removal kit, and all of these removals even scale pretty well as the game goes on.

Another highlight is Snuff Out. We didn't include it in our list because it already is in the original precon, but it's so incredible we had to mention it. If necessary, you can use it for free, and it goes really well with our main game plan - trading life for value. This type of efficiency is perfect for grindier decks like ours. If you cast it for 4 life instead of 4 mana, you'll draw a card with Y'shtola. Yes, she triggers when her controller loses life as well.

Ways to Deal Damage

As our plan is to draw cards with Y'shtola by making our opponents lose life, of course we want to deal damage to them as often as possible.

To that end, Bastion of Remembrance and Kambal, Consul of Allocation are great. They deal damage to our opponents bit by bit, all while also keeping us in the game. Even cards like Undermine become ways to keep our game plan afloat while we resolve issues on the stack.

The icing on the cake is Curiosity and Ophidian Eye. These enchantments turn any creature with evasion into a card draw engine, and this may seem simple, but it is actually game-changing when Y'shtola isn't available.

Mana Base and Ramp

Let's be honest: precon mana bases are typically... decent enough. And, with a 10-dollar budget, we couldn't turn everything into shock lands and fetch lands, as much as we wanted to.

Still, we managed to make it a lot better with Fellwar Stone, Mind Stone, and Frantic Search, which not only ramp, but also filter your hand or create extra value with our commander. Now, this list might not have the most luxurious mana base, but its mana curve is decent enough and it has fast answers.

A Real Problem: Protecting the Commander

Listen, here's the honest truth about this upgrade: it still has a hard time keeping Y'shtola alive.

Unfortunately, we couldn't fit any real protection into this list with this budget, so that means no Swiftfoot Boots, Lightning Greaves, or any spells that give creatures indestructible or hexproof. However, our upgraded list has counterspells that work both defensively and offensively, so this shouldn't be the end of the world.

Furthermore, we didn't want to remove many cards from the original list because we wanted to keep the overall essence. This means that, yes, our opponents will probably remove our commander a few times. The good side is, though, we have more card draw, ramp, and interaction, so we can bring her back and get back to our game plan.

In any case, if you want some extra protection and still have funds, you can remove a few cards from the original list. In fact, adding some protection can make a huge difference!

What We Removed and What We Added

We removed cards that relied on alternative mechanics, like tokens and creature types, to open space for cards that, we believe, will make the main game plan a lot stronger. The cards we removed aren't necessarily bad, but they don't do much in in this strategy. Here's a complete list of everything we removed:

As we mentioned, all these cards don't really do much for our main strategy.

In their place, we added:

These, on the other side, are great, particularly with our commander!

Ok, we mentioned the more expensive cards too much in this article to not include a list with them. But, be warned: your friends will hate you for playing this one.

You'll draw a huge number of cards and control your table entirely, and they'll be extra salty.

It seems a bit much, but I'm serious: Y'shtola, Night's Blessed is playable in cEDH (as long as the rest of the list keeps up with her - and please don't use a precon in cEDH tables), and she is extremely powerful.

That being said, this list works just as the one above, but it plays many other cards that don't come in the precon, and wins the game decisively with Thassa's Oracle and Demonic Consultation. Or, if you'd like, you can also kill everyone with infect. Yes, it works.

At the end of the day, this upgrade is simple, straightforward, and efficient. With less than 10 dollars, we managed to make the original precon better and reinforce the control/life drain structure. Y'shtola is still the core of the deck, but now we have better ways to keep the main game plan working even when she's not in play.

If you enjoy long matches, hard decisions, and that feeling you're winning slowly, but very elegantly, this deck is for you.

How would you build this list? Tell us your thoughts in our comment section below.

Thank you for reading, and see you next time!