Mardu Surge is the red white and black precon from Tarkir: Dragonstorm. It features warriors, tokens, myriad triggers, and plenty of attacking. Your token army can then help you draw cards or put a steady drain on opposing life totals. Find out how to break the lines with our eleven in, eleven out Budget Upgrade Guide – this time for a cool $50.
Tarkir: Dragonstorm has a whopping five precons this time around: Abzan Armor, Jeskai Striker, Sultai Arisen, Mardu Surge, and Temur Roar. Today we’ll be checking out the Mardu precon (red, white and black). If it’s your first time enjoying a visit to Tarkir, then the names of the clans will perhaps be familiar. They were adopted to describe the five 3-color wedges of the color pie.
Let’s get stuck in on the front lines with the Mardu precon and figure out how to get the most out of it.
MARDU SURGE: ZURGO STORMRENDER
The face Commander of the precon is Zurgo Stormrender, who you may recall as Zurgo Bellstriker and Zurgo Helmsmasher. This time around, you can feel the fervor of the Mardu in this aggressive Commander. Mobilize 1 will bring forth a Warrior token as you wade into battle, and Zurgo’s main ability gives you cards when your creature tokens leave play as an attacker. At any other point of the game, they’ll slowly drain the opponent’s life totals.
This is a fun push and pull of a Commander. While at first it might seem like you have to jump through hoops just to draw a few cards, it’s actually tactically pretty amazing to be able to take cards or drain opponents. You’ll want to be doing different things at different stages of the game.
Neriv, Crackling Vanguard is the alternate Commander for Mardu Surge, and provides another compelling option, to be honest. It’s a real coin toss on which one I’d prefer to build.
Neriv makes some gobbos when it enters, and when it attacks, you get to get yourself a nice pile of impulsively drawn cards equal to the number of differently named tokens you control. Any turn you’ve attacked with a Commander? You get to play those cards. That’s some really hot card advantage, and it reminds me a lot of Neyali, a Commander I liked quite a bit.
That said, a Neriv build ends up veering further away from the precon stock list than a Zurgo one, so for today, we’ll do Zurgo.
MARDUDE, THESE NEW CARDS ARE SICK
Mardu Surge features 10 new designs, and there’s some really powerful stuff to check out. Honestly? If you have an Isshin deck, or something like Duke Ulder, you’re going to want to grab this precon for sure.
Ironwill Forger has a hot Lieutenant trigger – granting a creature myriad until end of turn, which is very, very strong.
Bone Devourer is going to find a home in all sorts of aristocrats and tokens decks, being an excellent source of card draw and a sweet response to board clears.
One of the chasi-est of chase cards in the precons might well be Goldlust Triad, a myriad Dragon that makes treasures on hitting. People really want this one, and who am I to deny that it’s a more than solid card. Yes, this one is a post-Henzie ramper.
Don’t sleep on Redoubled Stormsinger, best friend to Rionya, Fire Dancer. Seriously for three mana? This thing goes hard. You will inevitably leave this in play because you don’t have a board wipe and then lose to it. I swear I wrote something about three-drops like this recently…
SNAPPY REPRINTS
Mardu Surge has some sweet reprints. The first of which, Adeline, continues to take names in Commander. She gets big, drops tokens out like nobody’s business, and can melt life totals.
Gix is a three-drop that helps to melt life totals in a different way – by encouraging attacks going elsewhere. Gix is actually a really sweet card. And he went to the same hairdresser as Lurtz and Ariana Grande, too. He’s putting in the effort.
One card that’s always a welcome sight is Skullclamp. Skullclamp can never be reprinted enough. It’s phenomenally efficient.
The reprint to have your eyes on is probably Grand Crescendo. This protection spell that can drop in a few tokens is highly coveted in tokens-forward builds.
MARDU SURGE: $50 FOR 11 BUDGET UPGRADES
When looking at upgrade plans for this precon, I really didn’t have to think too hard about it. Why? Well, out of the box, Mardu Surge is… one of the best precons in years, as far as playability goes. It just… works? While you could go in there with some high ticket upgrades (which I’ll discuss in more detail shortly), it’s probably more effective to concentrate on small gains first.
I’ve decided to add:
- Efficient token production
- Mana generation
- Ways to make our tokens hurt
- Powerful ways to increase our velocity
Mardu Surge $50 Budget Upgrade Package on Moxfield
First up, let’s talk about the obvious Mardu adds: Isshin and Zurgo.
Isshin could basically be an alternate Commander for this deck, so it makes a lot of sense to get him added. You could easily put the warrior package into Isshin instead and have a great time. Zurgo, Thunder’s Decree from the main set is also a shoe-in. It’s much cheaper than Sundial of the Infinite, let me tell you that much.
Mana generation is important for any deck, especially the bursty sort. If we’re going wide, then Professional Face-Breaker makes a lot of sense. It’s an all-star now in red decks. Settle the Wreckage performs even better than usual in this build, as you’ll be able to capitalize on Zurgo’s trigger, making the tokens leave when they’re attackers, getting the card draw, and managing to ramp yourself. It’s perfect. And sure, you can use it defensively if you like.
We’ve got some extra token generation in Call the Coppercoats and Eiganjo Uprising, and you’ll be surprised at just how many tokens you can get out of the former. The game I played at the weekend had me get ten tokens for just three mana. In fact, I had to exile it from my graveyard in order to stop another player casting it to get eighteen tokens at a later point.
One card I haven’t seen talked about in these builds is a bit nastier, and that’s Attrition. A single black mana and one of your tokens to both draw a card and remove an opponent’s creature? Sign me up. Well, don’t sign me up, not in that sense.
As far as ending the game quicker, sure, we have Mirkwood Bats in here, but the real treat of a card is Mercadia’s Downfall. There’ll be a tension in whether to block your tokens while playing this deck, as opponents won’t want to give you free cards. They’d rather just take a damage.
Well, not when Mercadia’s Downfall is in hand. Thanks for putting me on to this one before, Sheldon. It’s still great.
Mardu Surge Upgraded on Moxfield
The final list is above, with the cuts in the sideboard. Cuts wise I went for cards that either didn’t do quite enough (Emeria Angel, Aron, Shadow Summoning) cards we’d upgraded (Commander’s Insignia, Ogre Battledriver) or stuff that was just too expensive to cast (Legion Loyality, Siege-Gang Commander).
The upgraded list has a lot of potential, but what if you want to juice it further?
FURTHER UPGRADES
The big two from Tarkir: Dragonstorm are Elspeth, Storm Slayer and All-Out Assault. Both are right at home in this build, but they’ll set you back, collectively, more than the $50 budget we set for this upgrade guide at pre-sale prices. Elspeth is a bonkers-good Magic card, and the extra combat anthem All-Out Assault is made for a deck like this.
A card I really wanted to recommend here was Dolmen Gate, but it’s crept right back up in price to eat up way too much of that initial upgrade budget. Both Dolmen Gate and Iroas would both be very good in this build, so I’d definitely consider adding them.
If you’re going all-in on Mobilize and Myriad, then Sundial of the Infinite can help you get the most out of these cards. You can end the turn with the triggers to get rid of the tokens on the stack, keeping them for a future turn. It’s a fun trick.
Of the new Mobilize goodies, Voice of Victory is the priciest, as it’s another Grand Abolisher adjacent effect for cEDH and high-power gameplay, not to mention decent in Standard.
If you feel flush, then there’s some excellent white Mythics in the form of Mondrak and Ocelot Pride that are especially good in a Zurgo deck that goes all-in on making tokens.
And, if you’re looking for more ways to make mana and get rid of those tokens during combat, then Warren Soultrader is the one for you.
END STEP
Mardu Surge is an excellent precon, and offers ten fresh designs that synergize with multiple decks and strategies. The precon is strong out of the box, and with some upgrades, is sure to break the lines and rout the enemy.
Do you have other upgrades you’d make to this precon? Let us know over on Bluesky!
Kristen is Card Kingdom’s Head Writer and a member of the Commander Format Panel. Formerly a competitive Pokémon TCG grinder, she has been playing Magic since Shadows Over Innistrad, which in her opinion, was a great set to start with. When she’s not taking names with Equipment and Aggro strategies in Commander, she loves to play any form of Limited.