Lorwyn Eclipsed releases on January 23rd, and along with the main set there are also two Commander precons. These decks include several new cards, including two legendary creatures who can serve as your Commander. In this article. I’m going to review the Dance of the Elements deck.

This is a 5-color deck that is all about Elementals. However, it’s not just a boring typal deck that just wants to play Elementals and Elemental payoffs more broadly. Instead, it’s all about abusing their powerful “enters” or “leaves the battlefield” triggers by making copies of Elementals and sacrificing them.

THE COMMANDERS

As is typically the case for a Commander precon, you have a choice between two legendary creatures, either of which would make for a powerful Commander. 

The face Commander is Ashling, who grants all of your elementals Evoke for 4 generic. Normally that wouldn’t be the most exciting ability After all, many Elementals already cost less than that, and casting one only to have it immediately get sacrificed isn’t exactly appealing. However, any time you sacrifice a nontoken Elemental you get a hasty copy of it. 

That’s where things start to get interesting, because if that Elemental has an “enters” ability, you’re going to get it twice, and you’ll get to attack with it once too. There are no shortage of Elementals that you can really abuse when that’s the case, as we’ll see later in this article. You can even choose to keep the token copy around if you have the mana.

Mass of Mysteries can also make copies of Elementals by giving them Myriad. As with Ashling, this means that you can get lots of extra value out of them.

While both of these Commanders are incredibly value engines for Elementals, I think Ashling is the better one of the two. You can get it down earlier, and giving evoke to all of your elementals is typically going to be easier to abuse than myriad, which does require you to attack.

OTHER NEW CARDS

This deck also contains 10 other brand new cards. Since this is a five-color deck, it should come as no surprise that the deck has three new lands. Of the new cards in this deck, these are probably the ones that are going to have the most broad appeal for Commander players.

Sodden Verdure and Rain-Slicked Copse are both Simic dual lands that get us one step closer to completing two older dual land cycles. The Verdure is part of a mega cycle that began in Battle for Zendikar, while the Copse is part of a cycle that began in Amonkhet. The most important thing about them is simply the type line, which means that you can grab them with fetch lands or Nature’s Lore.

Abundant Countryside is a strictly better Ancient Ziggurat, and that’s a pretty big deal. The Ziggurat always had the problem of doing absolutely nothing to help you cast non-creature spells, but the Countryside doesn’t have that problem. It still produces mana of any color for creatures, but it can also give you colorless for anything, and it even has a mana sink ability.

The deck also has a couple of new cards that are all about the deck’s five-color identity, while still supporting the Elemental theme. Elemental Spectacle uses the Vivid mechanic to churn out a bunch of Elemental tokens – and in this deck you’ll often be making 5. Meanwhile, Springleaf Parade gives you a bunch of changeling tokens and allows all of your tokens to tap for mana of any color. 

However, I’ve saved the coolest new cards in the deck for last. Lorwyn-Shadowmoor is known for its Elemental Incarnations, beings that are the embodiment of emotions. And this deck has its own exclusive 5-card cycle of them. It’s exceedingly rare for a Commander deck to get a cycle of brand new cards, and I think they hit it out of the park with this one.

Fittingly, the ones in this precon all come with “enters” triggers and from the graveyard they can use Encore to make token copies of themselves, making them excellent alongside Ashling. For example, just imagine paying 4 generic to Evoke Lamentation. That’ll destroy a creature, and then when it gets sacrificed, Ashling will make a copy and you’ll destroy another one.  Then, later in the game you’ll be able to pay the Encore cost and get three more copies of Lamentation and get three more triggers, too.

While the new lands are probably the most exciting part of the deck for Commander players on the whole, this cycle of Elemental Incarnations is also a lot of fun.

$50 UPGRADES

This deck is pretty impressive right out of the box, but there are some changes that you can make to it to make it even stronger without breaking the bank. These changes are geared towards making the most out of Ashling’s ability to cheat Elementals into play with Evoke, as well as sacrificing them.

Magic 2020’s Cavalier cycle are some of the best creatures for this deck, as they are Elementals that have both an “enters” and “dies” trigger, meaning if you Evoke them into play with Ashling, you’ll get both triggers two times. The deck does already include Cavalier of Thorns, but I’d advise getting the other 4 too as that’s just way too much value to pass up.

Tyrant of Discord is another powerful creature to cheat into play with Evoke. While it only has an “enters” trigger, it’s one that can cause all kinds of problems for your opponent, since it destroys random permanents. When it hits nonlands, it just keeps on going until it stops hitting them. So, getting that effect twice and smashing in with a 7/7 is going to feel pretty good for 4 mana.

Fulminator Mage is unlikely to make you very many friends, but it’s great at disrupting mana. While Evoking it isn’t exactly worthwhile, Ashling doesn’t care how you sacrifice an Elemental, he still gives you a token copy of it. So, the Mage’s built-in ability will let you nuke two nonbasic lands every time you play it.

This deck does already contain most of the premiere Elemental payoffs out there – like Incandescent Soulstoke, Risen Reef and Smokebraider, but there are a couple of cards from the main Lorwyn Eclipsed set that this deck can take advantage of. Flamebraider gives you a great way to fix and ramp your Elemental mana.

Ashling’s Command gives you a powerful modal spell that has tons of synergy in the deck. Its Elemental typing means you can do stuff like tap Flamebraider to help cast it, and its ability to make token copies of Elementals goes great in a deck loaded up with Elementals with powerful “enters” triggers.

Here are the cards I removed to make room for these 8 changes:

Reality Shift
Hoofprints of the Stag
Ingot Chewer
Abundant Growth
Shatter the Sky
Faeburrow Elder
Distant Melody
Crib Swap

You can find the updated decklist here.

FURTHER UPGRADES

If you’re interested in going a little harder on upgrading this deck, the first place to start is in upgrading the mana base. It’s pretty amazing that it already comes with several of them, but this deck is missing City of Brass, Cavern of Souls, and Mana Confluence, all of which will go a long way towards shoring up your mana.

There are also some other great Elementals who can really go off alongside Ashling. For example, Ygra, Eater of All makes all of your creatures into Food. This means that they will come with a built-in sacrifice ability, which will lead to Ashling making a token copy of the sacrificed creature. 

There’s also another cycle of Elementals that are very well-suited to this deck – the Modern Horizons 2 Elemental Incarnations. Thankfully, the deck already comes with Endurance and Fury, but the other three are also great for the deck. This is because they all come with an Evoke you don’t even have to pay mana for, and they also have incredibly powerful “enters” triggers that you’ll get twice any time you Evoke them.

Lastly, there’s Nyxbloom Ancient. This is the most explosive mana multiplier in the game, and Ashling can give you access to it way earlier in the game thanks to Evoke. Furthermore, because it multiples your mana so well, it also makes it more likely that you can pay the costs to keep token copies in play with Ashling.

END STEP

The Dance of the Elements deck looks really good. What changes would you make to it to make it even better? Let me know over on X or Bluesky.