cEDH Deck Guide: Ikra Shidiqi, the Usurper & Kraum, Ludevic's Opus

This list was created by me and is a turbo deck. However, it has tools to stay relevant in the late game, generating value, and can be faster or slower depending on the table you are at.

Both commanders are relevant and even though white is an extremely powerful and relevant color in cEDH, unless you intend to use stax pieces, you end up not losing much by not running this color.

Ikra & Kraum

Commander, FELIPE

17 commons, 18 uncommons, 61 rares and 4 mythics

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Land29

1

Rejuvenating Springs

41.28

1

Training Center

106.79

1

Undergrowth Stadium

93.58

1

Morphic Pool

138.53

1

Luxury Suite

122.03

1

Badlands

2717.53

1

Forbidden Orchard

63.59

1

Ancient Tomb

935.99

1

Taiga

1714.43

1

Underground Sea

2863.22

1

Tropical Island

1941.16

1

City of Brass

178.86

1

Bayou

1535.07

1

Volcanic Island

3097.02

1

Exotic Orchard

1.44

1

Marsh Flats

231.86

1

Bloodstained Mire

120.87

1

Blood Crypt

150.11

1

Watery Grave

137.28

1

Polluted Delta

150.59

1

Mana Confluence

414.74

1

Steam Vents

134.87

1

Command Tower

1.73

1

Flooded Strand

114.12

1

Wooded Foothills

124.06

1

Gemstone Caverns

461.91

1

Verdant Catacombs

189.92

1

Misty Rainforest

228.64

1

Scalding Tarn

222.68

Creature10

1

Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer

366.51

1

Birds of Paradise

64.43

1

Dauthi Voidwalker

47.84

1

Thassa's Oracle

241.1

1

Dockside Extortionist

217.64

1

Dark Confidant

45.81

1

Opposition Agent

230.85

1

Elvish Spirit Guide

12.92

1

Simian Spirit Guide

12.51

1

Grim Hireling

128.21

Artifact17

1

Jeweled Lotus

481.99

1

Lion's Eye Diamond

5788.43

1

Chrome Mox

830.4

1

Lotus Petal

232.74

1

Mana Crypt

776.37

1

Mox Diamond

7717.94

1

Mox Opal

1495.85

1

Sol Ring

10.69

1

Mana Vault

670.76

1

Wishclaw Talisman

21.88

1

Arcane Signet

1.73

1

Grim Monolith

3665.98

1

Talisman of Indulgence

16.1

1

Talisman of Dominance

6.85

1

Grinding Station

135.78

1

Fellwar Stone

5.1

1

Bolas's Citadel

86.73

Enchantment5

1

Carpet of Flowers

23.53

1

Mystic Remora

77.17

1

Underworld Breach

66.56

1

Sylvan Library

239.95

1

Rhystic Study

554.2

Sorcery11

1

Gamble

61.26

1

Imperial Seal

965.61

1

Gitaxian Probe

52.95

1

Demonic Tutor

414.14

1

Diabolic Intent

100.51

1

Jeska's Will

242.54

1

Wheel of Fortune

2199.53

1

Timetwister

8735.13

1

Windfall

25.71

1

Culling Ritual

6.64

1

Peer into the Abyss

30.28

Instant26

1

Miscast

12.63

1

Vampiric Tutor

467.8

1

Flusterstorm

53.29

1

Demonic Consultation

163.91

1

Dark Ritual

38.33

1

Pyroblast

49.26

1

Mystical Tutor

100.61

1

Red Elemental Blast

38.72

1

Nature's Claim

19.31

1

Chain of Vapor

72.86

1

Swan Song

98.4

1

Spell Pierce

1.25

1

Mental Misstep

72.26

1

Noxious Revival

57.88

1

Assassin's Trophy

48.44

1

Cabal Ritual

163.91

1

Abrupt Decay

7.52

1

Brain Freeze

106.67

1

Tainted Pact

164.31

1

Fierce Guardianship

385.7

1

Deflecting Swat

396.7

1

Force of Negation

495

1

Fire Covenant

48.14

1

Deadly Rollick

127.23

1

Force of Will

528.99

1

Ad Nauseam

157.13

98 cards maindeck

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Kraum, Ludevic's Opus

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Certainly, one of the most beloved commanders of cEDH, its card advantage potential is insane, and so that it doesn't happen, your opponents can only cast one spell per turn. If Kraum is respected, you should get 0-3 cards per turn, if not at most it should reach 5, with the amount of ramps in the deck, it's not difficult to play him kn turn one and start filling the hand since early game.

Ikra is a controversial commander in cEDH, some like her, some hate her, I, personally, love her. She plays a key role in longer tables, granting you extra life for Ad Nauseam, even if losing life to opponents' attacks, card effects, having an Ikra on the field helps keep Ad Nauseam a possibility.

The fact that we have a commander who gains life when you attack with any creature and damages a player, in addition to being able to attack with a big flying threat, gives the possibility to pressure your opponents' life totals, while yours gets bigger.

This deck has two different combo lines, which are Thassa Consult and Breach.

Thassa Consult

Combo Condition: Thassa's Oracle and Demonic Consultation/Tainted Pact in hand, and enough mana to cast them.

1. Cast Thassa's Oracle

2. Respond to her ETB by casting the other spell from your hand, naming a card you don't have in your library, exiling all cards from your library.

At Oracle's ETB resolution, you win the game.

Breach

Here, we have two ways to proceed with the usual one which is Breach + Freeze + LED, and we can also go to Breach + Station + Rock.

Breach Freeze

Combo Condition: Underworld Breach in hand, Brain Freeze, and Lion's Eye Diamond in hand or graveyard, and at least 4 mana available, one blue and one red, the others two do not need to be colored.

1. Cast Underworld Breach;

2. Cast Brain Freeze, targeting you and milling at least 6 cards;

3. Cast Lion's Eye Diamond, discarding your hand and generating 3 blue mana;

4. Repeat step 3 until you have only 3 cards in the graveyard, in addition to the cards you intend to cast, then repeat from step 2 to this step;

5. When the Storm Count is high enough, target your opponents until they have no cards in their deck and pass the turn, so they lose the game.

Breach Station

Combo condition: Underworld Breach and Grinding Station + one mana rock from the ones below, all on the battlefield and untapped + at least 3 cards in the graveyard.

All of the above mana rocks generate enough mana to be cast and tapped repeatedly.

1. Tap the mana rock to generate mana;

2. Sacrifice the mana rock using Grinding Station and mill 3 cards from your own library;

3. Cast the mana rock for the escape cost, putting it into play, and untap Grinding Station.

Repeat the process until you have no cards in your deck, switching the mana rock to one that generates colored mana, then cast Thassa's Oracle and win the game.

Ramps

Speeding up available mana is indispensable: the more mana, the easier it is to cast multiple spells in the same turn.

For this, the deck has all the positive mana stones, the mox that make sense to be in the deck, rocks that generate colored mana, in addition to cards that generate mana only once like Elvish Spirit Guide. In addition to rituals like Culling the Weak, it also includes Grim Hireling, which generates treasures as you deal combat damage to your opponents.

Tutors

Tutors are the foundation of a deck's consistency, together with a good density of working copies, being able to find the card you need for a situation.

As we have black mana, which helps a lot with one or two mana tutors like Vampiric Tutor, Imperial Seal, Demonic Tutor and Diabolic Intent, in addition to Wishclaw Talisman, which is a reusable tutor if you have bounces to respond to its effect before it resolves.

It is critical to comment that even though red is not the color of tutors, it gives us a great one mana tutor, Gamble Red Entomb, being an optimized tutor good enough to be included in the list, mainly due to its low cost.

Card Draw

In addition to owning Kraum, this list also has other tools to guarantee you additional cards every turn, such as Dark Confidant, which is falling into disuse, but is still a very efficient card, Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer, which steals cards from the top of the opponent's deck and generates treasures (I promise this is the last time I speak well of this monkey), and that good old set present in basically every deck that can use them: Rhystic Study and Mystic Remora.

Windfall, Wheel of Fortune and Timetwister are simple ways for you to draw many cards after using up everything important in your hand.

Bolas's Citadel, Ad Nauseam and Peer Into the Abyss serve to gain access to a massive number of cards, losing life for it.

Interactions

Free counterspells, optimized removals, ways to stop an opponent even if he resolves a spell and serious hate: everything , or almost everything, that a deck needs to interact with its opponents.

We also have Fire Covenant which removes exactly the creatures that need to be eliminated, for a small amount of mana and life, Culling Ritual which, in addition to taking away every nonland permanent with mana value 2 or less, also gives you mana equal to the number of permanents it destroyed.

The counterspell package of this deck is a bit greater than the standard farm decks, just to be used in other occasions than protecting your game.

Strengths

- It's an extremely adaptive deck, being able to respond and deal with different deck types.

- It is possible to cast Kraum on turn 1.

- The deck can handle opponents attacking you well, not to mention that the commanders are tough enough to kill or withstand many creatures.

Weaknesses

- It's not as fast as other farm decks.

- At tables where your game plan will be faster, Ikra loses its usefulness on the battlefield.

I close this article here, stay tuned as we will soon have another cEDH deck guide!

Thanks for reading!