Crafting a Themberchaud Commander Deck in MTG

The Wyrmsmith of Gracklstugh, Themberchaud, stands out as one of the most iconic red dragons in Dungeons and Dragons lore. With the crossover of Magic: The Gathering into D&D and the Honor Among Thieves Secret Lair, Themberchaud also emerges as a remarkable commander for a red “Mountains matter” deck.

This plump dragon can lead a host of other dragons, showcasing fantastic synergy and powerful methods for unleashing damage. While it lacks white’s flicker effects, keeping his abilities active requires some effort, but when this hefty creature makes its entrance, the impact will be enormous.

Sample Decklist

The Commander

In the Forgotten Realms, Themberchaud is an adult red dragon responsible for lighting the forges in the underground city of Gracklstugh. In exchange, the city provides him with all his desires, especially treasure and food. Thanks to the seemingly endless free meals, he has gained weight, to the point where he can no longer fly.

In Magic, he’s represented as a 5/5 legendary Dragon with trample instead of flying. Once he gets rolling, it will take a Mountain to slow him down. His ability allows him to deal damage equal to the number of Mountains you control to all non-flying creatures and players when he enters the battlefield.

Furthermore, his last ability grants him flying until the end of the turn when he attacks, enabling better positioning for damage potential.

While a 5/5 with trample and occasional flying isn’t particularly imposing in modern Commander games, His ability to land with a massive splash effect makes him unique. Equip him with numerous mountains and a few flying companions to avoid any potential wipeout, and you’ll create a powerful mono-red deck!

How to Build the Deck

Though Themberchaud may not be the most powerful dragon on its own, the splash damage it creates can be a huge advantage when used correctly. He serves as an excellent commander for a “Mountains matter” archetype, giving considerable benefits for your expansive land base.

With a high mana cost associated with such a powerful burn spell, it’s crucial to build a deck full of Mountains. While red excels in land destruction, it struggles with ramping into additional lands. Finding innovative ways to get sufficient Mountains into play is essential, but once established, you will have enough mana to deploy some exciting game-changers.

The abundance of red mana combined with the need to keep your key creatures protected from attacks means Themberchaud partners nicely with other dragons. Focusing on this secondary theme will present multiple valuable tools and strategies to help you dominate the game.

Ramp

In red decks, utilizing rituals for ramp is common, and the sample deck list possesses a few notable options. However, in a land-focused build, the ability to search for and put basic lands into play is crucial. Without green-favored staples like Rampant Growth, red must rely more on artifacts to fulfill this need.

Burnished Hart can fetch two basic Mountains for three mana, and while it lacks efficient recursion, this deck includes several methods for creating creature copies, allowing you to replicate Burnished Hart for additional land tutoring.

Solemn Simulacrum serves a similar purpose, searching for a land each time it arrives and drawing a card upon death. Normally, it would cost four mana for a land search, and perhaps a subsequent attack or defense, but thanks to the deck’s support, you can extract significant value from opponents if they overlook it early on.

Canoptek Wraith also brings redundancy, offering land-fetching ability like Burnished Hart. It can retrieve two basic lands that share a name with one already in play, although it requires combat damage and sacrifice. Given its unblockable attribute, getting past defenses is relatively simple.

For consistency, even if land-fetching creatures are in short supply, you can locate multiple basic Mountains through Equipment! Sword of the Animist and Bitterthorn, Nissa’s Animus can each search for a basic land whenever the equipped creature goes into battle. Bitterthorn has a higher cost but creates an attached Germ token to assist.

Sword of Hearth and Home helps retrieve an additional Mountain whenever the equipped creature inflicts combat damage. Since it also offers protection from green and white, you’re likely to evade blockers. Additionally, it can flicker one of your creatures, creating opportunities to trigger enter effects on creatures like Solemn Simulacrum or Themberchaud multiple times.

Draw

Red offers various drawing options, typically involving “discard a card, draw a card” or “exile the top card of your library; you may play it this turn.” While these methods can be useful occasionally, red also features several inexpensive ways to genuinely draw cards.

Throne of Eldraine and Dragon’s Hoard serve dual functions as ramp and card draw engines. Throne of Eldraine has the capability of tapping for four red mana, which is inaccessible for casting artifacts or activating abilities but beneficial for the remainder of the deck. Alternatively, paying three red mana lets you draw two cards, making it one of the most cost-effective draw options in mono-red!

Dragon’s Hoard functions much like Commander’s Sphere: it costs three mana to deploy and taps for any color of mana. In a Dragon-centric deck, it can also be tapped to draw cards! Each time a Dragon enters the battlefield under your control, Dragon’s Hoard receives a gold counter. Tap it and remove a counter to draw a card just for summoning a Dragon!

For a deck focused on one type of land, Endless Atlas becomes almost a must-have. For two generic mana, you can tap it to draw a card as long as you control three or more lands with the same name. Considering Mountains constitute a significant portion of your deck, achieving that requirement is straightforward.

Moreover, Ghirapur Orrery serves a dual purpose as well. Its initial ability grants each player the option to play an additional land each turn, speeding up the game overall. It also allows players to draw three cards during their upkeep if they have no cards in hand.

This ability can benefit everyone; however, you can hold onto it until it’s your last card, ensuring you’ll execute its secondary effect. It also grants you some freedom to play more brazenly, knowing you’ll regain card advantage at your next turn’s start.

Even though the majority of the lands in the deck are Mountains, War Room stands as an exception. It can tap for colorless mana when necessary, while spending three mana and one life allows you to draw a card. This card is an excellent addition to nearly any nonblue mono-colored deck, offering minimal drawbacks and extra drawing potential.

Mountains Matter

Themberchaud’s effectiveness hinges on coordinating numerous Mountains, and various cards can assist in this mission or provide additional benefits for having lots of land.

Koth appreciates Mountains, and Koth, Fire of Resistance can help you secure a new one every turn, gaining one loyalty each time to ensure your land drops stay consistent. His second ability can serve as removal, inflicting damage to creatures based on your Mountain count, although it’s usually better to save it for the emblem to let you deal damage whenever you play a Mountain.

Although not a Mountain, Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle produces red mana. Similar to Koth’s emblem, it also deals damage to a target whenever you play a Mountain, but only after you have five in play. A free Lightning Bolt every turn can accumulate significant damage!

Downhill Charge can provide one of your creatures with a sudden power increase, granting it bonus strength equal to your total Mountain count at instant speed. You could even sacrifice a Mountain to pay for it if it helps bring down opposing life totals!

While land destruction is rarely favored in Commander, it often works fine if the targets are specific and primarily focus on non-basics. Demolition Field can produce colorless mana, and can be sacrificed to destroy a problematic nonbasic land like Cabal Coffers. Afterward, both you and your opponent search for a basic land to put into play.

Regarding nonbasic land hate, including Blood Moon and Magus of the Moon is advantageous. Both permanents convert all nonbasic lands into Mountains, restricting your opponents from leveraging any crucial abilities associated with their lands.

This strategy can be devastating for multicolor and nonred decks, while your game strategy won’t be affected. Just be cautious, as you will likely attract enemy attention, and be prepared for opponents to target you heavily.

Drag in Dragons

Several red dragons work well with Themberchaud, allowing you to enhance a red Dragon theme.

As you aim to play many lands, Nesting Dragon’s landfall ability should trigger frequently. Each time you put a new land into play—whether from your hand or by attacking with a creature equipped with Sword of Hearth and Home—you generate a 0/2 Dragon Egg token. When it dies, you get a 2/2 flying Dragon!

These Dragon Eggs can synergize beautifully with Themberchaud and Wrathful Red Dragon. Wrathful Red permits Dragons to deal damage whenever they receive any, meaning that if you have several Dragon Eggs when Themberchaud attacks, they can strike your opponents upon hatching!

Brash Taunter and Stuffy Doll can also deal damage to your opponents without relying on additional support. It’s crucial to apply this extra damage, as otherwise, Themberchaud’s power can backfire on you!

Terror of the Peaks offers another source of noncombat damage, triggering each time a creature enters the battlefield under your control. Terror of the Peaks checks the creature’s power and deals that much damage to any legal target. This presents a strong case for including larger dragons and targeting them with flicker and copy effects.

High-cost commanders like Themberchaud introduce a challenge: if they perish, the commander tax can quickly become unmanageable, especially if you aim to recast them frequently.

Hellkite Courser can mitigate this by returning Themberchaud directly from the command zone, granting him haste before returning him at the close of turn. Since you aren’t casting Themberchaud, the tax won’t rise even if he falls. Repeating the flicker or cloning effect with Hellkite Courser enables continuous triggering of Themberchaud’s splash damage.

Spawn of Thraxes acts as a backup for Themberchaud. With a similar mana cost and the same stats, it deals damage based on the number of Mountains you control when it enters the battlefield. Although it only targets a single player or creature rather than multiple, the same strategies apply.

Double Dragons

As previously noted, Themberchaud’s high mana cost creates challenges. You’ll want to call upon him multiple times, leading to hefty commander taxes. The way around it? Cast him once, and begin making copies!

As a legendary creature, most copies will die immediately after entering, which is perfectly fine. You won’t need his longevity when Orthion, Hero of Lavabrink allows you to use him for a two-mana board wipe or create five copies for a draw!

Blade of Selves combines excellently with Themberchaud, generating two copies upon his attack. Like with Orthion, the duplicates will disappear per the legend rule, yet you inflict substantial damage on all players and most creatures before blockers are declared.

For lasting copies, Helm of the Host is the way to go! Each combat phase, it creates a copy of the equipped creature, but this copy is nonlegendary, so it remains on the battlefield!