As I did with Amonkhet before it, I decided that there was at least one new Legendary creature from Hour of Devastation worth building a deck around. I was lucky enough to pull a Temmet, Vizier of Naktamun from the lone fat pack I bought of the previous set, and it was really the only legendary creature I wanted to build a deck around and have done so already. The Minotaur from that set is pretty decent too, but I wasn’t excited about it, just like I wasn’t excited about HoD’s Scorpion God. However, this new set came with a few decent cards to add to existing EDH decks of mine, and I couldn’t wait to build a deck around The Locust God:

He’s not a cheap god by any means, but we intent to fix that by putting in a solid amount of card draw and some decent ramp. Blue and Red aren’t the best ramp colors, but they allow for decent card draw, and I’ve thrown in a good amount of mana rocks to fix things. We don’t have to worry about commander tax with The Locust God either, because when it dies it returns to your hand. The real benefit though is the fact that any time you draw a card, you get a 1/1 flyer with haste. If you can’t manage to get extra draws, you at least have the main draw phase along with the ability to loot built into the card. So most turns you should be netting at least a couple of these flyers, but that sounds like it would take far too long to get anything done. So let’s look at card draw effects that will help speed up our army of insects:

Blue provides the majority of card draw effects, but they are present in red, and there is of course some artifact and creature help. I’ve made sure to include some self draw, X draws and other effects that allow me to draw more cards all the time. Wheel effects happen to be very powerful in this deck as well, so I made sure to add some of those. Discarding your hand sounds detrimental, but being able to draw another full set sometimes comes with hidden benefits, and no matter what you’re generating more insects to swing with, each turn.

  

Outside of using these sorts of effects, I’ve also included some powerful enchantments that can multiply their effects:

Being able to draw additional cards per turn, or multiply the amount of cards drawn is powerful in conjunction with the insect production of the God. Outside of this, I’ve also added several different counterspell options and some burn spells for removal or to finish off a low life player. I also added in staple dual lands along with as many of the cycling lands I could find, due to the fact that late game those cards can net additional creatures, but also sometimes come in handy to discard if you are mana flooded. In the event that you start cycling through your deck a bit too fast, I’ve included cards like Commit // Memory and Temporal Cascade so you can get your graveyard shuffled back into your library. So what about the creatures, you may ask?

A sampling of the creatures in the deck, each has its own purpose but flows with the theme of the deck. Some make spells cost lest to cast, others help with card draw or wheel effects. One helps shuffle your graveyard into your deck, some ping for damage on card draw or ETB, and a couple of mages who will fish up other artifacts. Finally, we should discuss win conditions, outside of the obvious card draw and over run with 1/1 flyers.

There is a potential infinite combo here with Ashnod’s Altar, Skullclamp and The Locust God. Not coincidentally, I included both Trinket and Trophy mages to help fish these pieces up. Sacrificing an insect token to the Altar gives two mana with which you can use to equip the Skullclamp to draw two cards, creating two new insects, which nets infinite mana and infinite 1/1’s. Alternatively, you can use the combo of Enter the Infinite and Laboratory Maniac to draw out your library and win the game:

Lastly, if you prefer (or don’t pull the right cards) you can use cards like these to make your swarm overwhelming and get a good old beat down win:

There are a bunch of other small interactions between cards in the deck, and this is my first combo deck where I might be able to finally get that win where everyone is still alive with high health totals and can’t do anything to stop me! You can check out my full deck list over on MTG Goldfish, and I’ll be back with more brews as I complete them.