Commander Oracles: Kefnet Creativity

Hello internet, my name is Blue, and today I want to dive into a Commander that’s been around for about a year or so now. God-Eternal Kefnet is one of the more powerful Gods from War of the Spark, but especially so for EDH. There are several ways to build him and I’ll be going over two of them today; control and extra turns. Before we get into all that though, let’s go over some of the cards you’ll want to use regardless of what version you’re playing!

Mono-Blue Support Cards

Every deck needs its support pieces and I feel as though most, if not, all mono-blue decks use the same package for support. Of course, every deck needs its card draw, removal, and protection, so we’ll go over all of that here.

Removal

Normally, I advocate for the least conditional removal as possible so you can answer anything you need to in Commander since threats can range from lands to Planeswalkers. In blue, however, there isn’t anything like Assassin’s Trophy or Vindicate so we have to settle for conditional removal. Luckily, we get access to some relatively decent spells for this. The four cards I put in almost every mono-blue deck for spot removal are Rapid Hybridization, Pongify, Reality Shift, and Imprisoned in the Moon. Even better for us, three out of the four of these are instants so they can be copied with God-Eternal Kefnet! Additionally, you always want to play some number of sweepers. Since blue doesn’t get hard wraths like Damnation, we instead get mass bounce spells. The best one is Cyclonic Rift by miles; but at about $20 each, it’s a bit expensive money-wise. If you can’t afford Rift, there are budget options like Coastal Breach and Devastation Tide

Protection

Blue arguably has the weakest literal protection available outside of the typical Lightning Greaves package. Black gets reanimation and regeneration, white gets Indestructible, and green gets Hexproof, so to fill in this gap, we get to play counterspells instead. While they don’t synergize very well with Kefnet, since you can’t cast them when drawn on your own turn, they serve an important purpose in keeping us from dying to something outrageous as well as keeping our commander from dying to removal. If you have the budget, the best ones are Force of Will, Force of Negation, and the new Fierce Guardianship. They’re the best simply because they can be cast for free, though they’re expensive money-wise for the same reasons. If you can’t afford to buy them, I’d recommend the cheapest, most mana-efficient options available that are as unrestricted as possible. Counterspell is one of the best, as well as Arcane Denial as an option that can even be reduced with Kefnet!

Some additional options most people forget about. [Editor’s Note: Disallow is amazing when used right.]

Card Advantage

Depending on how you normally play blue, this package may differ from your usual because we need it to take advantage of Kefnet as much as possible. As much as I love cantrips like Preordain, sorcery-speed card draw is pretty weak in this deck compared to what it could be in other decks. If you choose to play cantrips, they need to be instant-speed like Opt to maximize efficiency with Kefnet. You also want repeatable card draw that can happen during the opponent’s turn, so the ever-popular Rhystic Study and Mystic Remora can fill this role rather well. Lastly, you want ways to manipulate the top of the library so you can take full advantage of Kefnet whenever you want. Scroll Rack and Sensei’s Divining Top are the best options, but there are others to use as well if you’d like.

Control

Now that we’ve covered our basic blue stuff, let’s get started with the first of the two versions I’ll be going over. This one is just a typical mono-blue deck with a lot of fun shenanigans — fun for the pilot at least. I like to play it with a lot of card draw and reactive elements. In this version, you want to play a lot of cards that do multiple things, like Cryptic Command and Mystic Confluence. You want the option to do several different things so you can cast them off Kefnet to draw cards or something else and still use them as reactive counter-magic or removal when necessary. You’ll want a lot more sweepers than normal, so don’t be shy to play Evacuation or similar cards. They’ll be useful in a pinch.

Charm as an additional modal card,
Crush as an additional bounce option,
Counterbalance as another way to take advantage of the top-of-library manipulation.

Turns

Next, let’s discuss the turns version. Extra-turn spells like Temporal Manipulation can be cast when drawn off of Kefnet, and with the mana reduction provided from the copy, it’s possible to cast multiple extra-turn spells in the same turn! For 8 mana, you could copy and cast from hand the turn spell drawn for the turn if it’s a 5-drop like Time Warp. The best turn spells however are Nexus of Fate and [/c]Beacon of Tomorrow[/c] since they shuffle back in so they can be repeatedly cast off of Kefnet. In this version, you’ll want to rely less on control-like cards from the previous version and more on ways to keep the gas flowing, such as Howling Mine.

Winning

Lastly, you don’t want to skip out on ways to finish the game. With all the cards you’ll be drawing, Laboratory Maniac and Thassa’s Oracle are both exceptional options, or you could play ways to make Kefnet unblockable and kill with commander damage over time. This is much more viable in the turns version since you’ll be taking all the turns but it can technically be done in the control version as well. Additionally, you can play other win cons such as Sphinx of the Final Word as a Hexproof beater that makes your spells uncounterable or cards that make tokens like Talrand, Sky Summoner.

Additional Options

Wrap-Up

What do you think of my look into Kefnet? I know he’s a pretty straightforward build, but I still felt like I should talk about him. Do you have any other suggestions yourself or was there something I missed in my discussion? Let me know in the comments below or on Twitter @TheRealBlueMTG! While you’re there, check out the site @MTGOracle to keep up with everything Magic! That’s all from me today. This is Blue, signing out!