Commander: Ramos, Dragon Engine

ramos dragon engine art

Ramos, Dragon Engine has a body of text that is too fun not to build. It's simply an incredibly powerful card, and gives us an interesting deckbuilding challenge.

Ramos, Dragon Engine - Foil Etched

Whenever you build a Commander deck, you're going to have a ton of "good cards" that would go great in any deck of that Commander's colors, and this "problem" is amplified when you have access to every single Magic card ever printed. While we will include a few notable "good stuff" cards in our various lists here, we are going to focus on synergy and thus on cards that we think are a nice blend of unique, interesting, and fun while still being powerful.

Ramos's ability can only be used once per turn…so we can get around this restriction by trying to use it on each of our opponent's turns! Let's take a look at our list of multicolored instants. There's quite a lot of them here, so when you're building this deck you may want to tune these to balance them among all five colors as much as possible after deciding upon the rest of the cards in your list.

Sphinx's RevelationManamorphoseEsper Charm

1 Abzan Charm
1 Jund Charm
1 Sultai Charm
1 Esper Charm
1 Boros Charm
1 Bant Charm
1 Anguished Unmaking
1 Naya Charm
1 Crosis's Charm
1 Crackling Doom
1 Rakdos Charm
1 Growth Spiral
1 Sphinx's Revelation
1 Utter End
1 Golgari Charm
1 Simic Charm
1 Dromar's Charm
1 Temur Charm
1 Assassin's Trophy
1 Izzet Charm
1 Grixis Charm
1 Jeskai Charm
1 Azorius Charm
1 Treva's Charm
1 Mortify
1 Selesnya Charm
1 Dovin's Veto
1 Expansion/Explosion
1 Despark
1 Mardu Charm
1 Rith's Charm
1 Putrefy
1 Trap Essence
1 Sylvan Reclamation
1 Terminate
1 Manamorphose

Next is a list of cards we found that we consider to be highly synergistic with Ramos, with a focus on multicolored spells. One of the nice things about this deck is that there are several other 5-color legendary creatures that we very much want to play anyway, so when we feel like changing it up we can suddenly be a Golos or Niv-Mizzet Reborn deck. A creative deckbuilder will find just the right balance where any of these would function quite well as a Commander for the other 99 cards in the deck.

Maelstrom NexusGolos, Tireless PilgrimNiv-Mizzet Reborn

1 Maelstrom Wanderer
1 Villainous Wealth
1 Chromatic Orrery
1 Faeburrow Elder
1 Golos, Tireless Pilgrim
1 Jodah, Archmage Eternal
1 Imoti, Celebrant of Bounty
1 Crystalline Crawler
1 Maelstrom Archangel
1 Yidris, Maelstrom Wielder - Foil
1 Niv-Mizzet Reborn
1 Rashmi, Eternities Crafter
1 Marchesa, the Black Rose
1 Duneblast
1 Ruinous Ultimatum
1 Urban Evolution
1 All Suns' Dawn
1 Debt to the Deathless
1 Time Wipe
1 Cruel Ultimatum
1 Inspired Ultimatum
1 Epic Experiment
1 Casualties of War
1 Fist of Suns
1 Maelstrom Nexus
1 Mayael's Aria
1 Thousand-Year Storm
1 Trace of Abundance

It's probably worth talking about +1/+1 counter synergies. For fun purposes we're focusing on how to abuse the mana engine of Ramos, but it's also just really easy to kill people by making Ramos huge and attacking.

Hardened ScalesConclave MentorBranching Evolution

1 Corpsejack Menace
1 Winding Constrictor
1 Pir, Imaginative Rascal
1 Simic Ascendancy
1 Hardened Scales
1 Doubling Season
1 Branching Evolution
1 Conclave Mentor
1 Primal Vigor

Here's our list of favorite ramp spells to include to get us off the ground quickly:

Tome of the GuildpactChromatic LanternPrismatic Geoscope

1 Cultivate
1 Farseek
1 Kodama's Reach
1 Rampant Growth
1 Circuitous Route
1 Explosive Vegetation
1 Skyshroud Claim
1 Migration Path
1 Vastwood Surge
1 Arcane Signet
1 Chromatic Lantern
1 Darksteel Ingot
1 Tome of the Guildpact
1 Coalition Relic
1 Prismatic Geoscope

And lastly the manabase. With 5 colors, you can of course put as much money into it to improve your consistency as you'd like, but there are also plenty of budget options. We've highlighted a few of the notable lands to include below.

Cascading CataractsCommand TowerAlchemist's Refuge

1 Cascading Cataracts
1 Alchemist's Refuge
1 Command Tower
1 Exotic Orchard
1 Reflecting Pool
1 Path of Ancestry
1 Vivid Marsh
1 Vivid Crag
1 Vivid Creek
1 Vivid Grove
1 Vivid Meadow
1 Seaside Citadel
1 Arcane Sanctum
1 Crumbling Necropolis
1 Savage Lands
1 Jungle Shrine
1 Nomad Outpost
1 Frontier Bivouac
1 Sandsteppe Citadel
1 Mystic Monastery
1 Opulent Palace

Ramos is definitely one of the most powerful legendary creatures out there, and we love both building and playing with different versions of this deck!

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Michael Schuller