{"ops":[{"insert":"What This Deck Isn't, And Also What It is\n\nStella Lee is rightly known as a cEDH viable commander, but this is not a cEDH deck and it is not trying to be one. This version of Stella is a budget \"red deck wins\" deck designed for commander. A cEDH version of this deck would need more fast mana, more free counterspells, and probably more card advantage to grind through the inevitable resistance. But mono red in Standard is not playing fast mana, free counterspells, or much card advantage at all. Rather, mono red has devised a gameplan that says roughly, \"I can deal with 1 or 2 pieces of interaction while dealing exactly 20 by turn 4 if I empty my hand.\" And that's what this Stella deck is trying to do; piece together a winning line fast, burn through every card in hand and tap every mana to try and steal the game before the other players know what hit them. That is, however, a very fragile gameplan and if you simply run Stella out on turn 3 every game without a plan you will lose; recasting Stella is almost certainly a death sentence.\n\nWith all that said, what is this deck? This deck is a duel at high noon. You're going to hold your cards close to your chest, finger over the trigger, staring down your opponents to get a read on their interaction. Once you're in a place to safely deploy Stella then it's time to draw and fire. If you played your cards right, when the dust settles you'll be last one standing. But if you blink first, if you make your move too fast or hold your fire too long you'll find yourself dead by daylight.\n\n\n\nThe Combos\n\nBecause this is a budget deck and because it's meant to be able to quickly throw a win together an inordinate amount of deck space is spent on a lot of possible winning lines. All of these will involve turning Stella into a Beyblade, but the payoff will vary wildly depending on which card she's copying and what her board state looks like. Ultimately you're looking for one of three things though.\n\n1) Twisted Fealty is the WotC ordained \"I win\" button for Stella Lee. Lots of commanders seem to have one these days, eg Sprout Swarm in Samut the Driving Force or to a lesser extent Titans' Nest in Teval the Balanced Scale, and this is what we get. I'll be honest, it's only in here because this is a bracket [4] deck and it seems wrong to cut the single best card in the deck from an \"anything goes\" game, but I've rarely personally enjoyed casting it and would cheer you for being a better person than I if you did.\n\n2) Infinite mana. Much more fun than Twisted Fealty, the best games with Stella have been ones where Hidden Strings, Involuntary Employment, Storm-kiln Artist + Twiddle, or some other nonsense has generated infinite mana. Nothing quite puts a smile on the tables' face after a combo turn quite like, \"and then I'm going to pay {8} to lightning bolt you in the face with Valakut Invoker until you're dead.\" Commune with Lava and Pull from Tomorrow are here as alternate payoffs for infinite mana; don't need your win con in hand if you can just draw your deck. Speaking of.\n\n3) Infinite draw. More difficult than infinite mana, but it is usually possible to create a win using just an effect like Cerulean Wisps or Twitch. Some combination of Simian Spirit Guide, Sol Ring, Hidden Strings, or Dramatic Reversal should be able to make you enough mana to win on the spot. You're definitely leaving yourself open to a blowout though. Like I said above, if Stella dies you're probably going to lose on the spot. Needing 2 more mana to recast her and another turn to untap with 3 players who just saw you draw 90 cards and no blockers? Forget about it, you shot your shot too soon, cowboy.\n\nSo that's the heart of the deck. In the early turns you're going to cantrip, ramp, and generally sculpt a winning hand. You're looking for 1 or maybe 2 pieces of defense for Stella, and then 3 cards you can afford to cast the turn after she comes down that ends with you killing the table, making infinite mana and then killing the table, or drawing your deck and then making infinite mana and then killing the table. Simplicity itself.\n\n\n\nCard Analysis (by category):\n\nCopy\nTwinning Staff - 100% my pet card in the deck, at 3 mana \"do nothing and also look scary\" could easily be cut for something more budget or more consistent. But it enables some lines that are just too much fun, too 5head, for me to feel good removing it. I'll bring up the lines it enables as we get to them.\n\nDraw\nBrainstorm... Impulse - all of these cards are just cantrips. cast them early to hit your land drops. cast them with Storm-kiln out cuz they're free. Cast them on the combo turn because they're cheap.\nFrantic Search - there's a collection of cards in here that only exist because they're \"free\" on your combo turn, and this is the first of them. Technically Search is card negative, which is often a legitimate downside in a deck with very little card advantage and extremely card hungry combo lines, but being able to get your combo turn started without spending mana is invaluable.\nBig Score, Unexpected Windfall - not great, but if you find yourself with one of these and excess mana in hand early you can play a slower game. Use them to stockpile mana to pay for protection and filter away lands. Something like turn 2 mana rock, turn 3 Big Score, turn 4 Stella holding up a counterspell and Slip Out the Back is 100% a winning line.\n\nFinisher\nComet Storm - this has been in and out of the deck. currently it's in because I had a game where winning with an instant was necessary. Redundancy is also important, if someone Essence Scatters your Valakut Invoker then you'll be thankful you had another way to burn the table out.\nValakut Invoker - my boy, my champ, my hero, my \"please don't hate me for comboing off so fast look how silly this little guy is.\" I would recommend swapping him out for a Bhaal's Invoker if you have it, although the ability to snipe a creature like Platinum Angel/Empyrean is a real upside. Potentially.\n\nLand\nJust gonna say, it's a budget Izzet mana base. There's loads of room for improvement here. But you should prioritize Islands and untapped lands where possible in any potential upgrades.\n\nProtection\nCounterspells are counterspells, I trust you know how they work if you've made it this far in a primer about a [4] deck.\nShore Up, Fleeting Reflection - some of the sleeper best cards in the deck, these put in a ton of work. they're cheap ways to make sure you untap with Stella, and they're also lethal on your combo turn. You can frequently sequence it such that your first spell is one of these, or a sorcery and one of these is your second, and put your opponents into a game they don't know they've lost already. If they resolve, they can't kill Stella to fizzle your combo. If they try to kill Stella, you cast your combo card in response and win over top of their removal. Very satisfying, very gunslinger.\nSlip Out the Back - a bit of a nonbo since using it to protect Stella during a combo turn fizzles your own combo, but sometimes hexproof isn't good enough. Like, when some WotC designer smokes that good shit and prints Farewell.\nTelepathy - aka \"cheating.\" you know that little metaphor about being a gunslinger at high noon, carefully reading your opponents for signs of weakness? yeah, this is like if you got to do that while being Sheriff Xavier. knowledge is power, weaponize it well.\nBane's Contingency - now, is this Cancel? yes, yes it is. BUT HEAR ME OUT, it wins the game with Twinning Staff! First you cast any untapper that targets Stella, like a Shore Up. Then you can cast Bane's Contingency. Tapping Stella to copy your untapper puts two untappers on the stack. Resolve the first one, you have an extra on the stack. Do it two more times and you have Stella untapped with 3 spells targeting her on the stack. Then you tap her to copy Bane's Contingency, countering two of the untappers, letting you scry 2 an draw a card before the last copy untaps Stella. Repeat this enough, and you can draw your deck with a 3 mana counterspell. It's beautiful, it's hilarious, never cut it.\nLeyline of Anticipation - not as much of a cheat as Telepathy, but similar logic. The difference between running Stella out main phase and flashing her in end step is basically cheating. It forces the table to spend every turn playing as though they could lose the game next turn, meanwhile you can ramp and cantrip to your heart's content until they're forced to spend their mana sorcery speed.\n\nRamp\nRamp is ramp, but there are some interesting things here\nReckless Barbarian - another sleeper, this card has only been in the deck for about 4 games and it's won me 2 of them already (note, these numbers only valid at time of original publication, I'm not gonna come back and update these stats). Cast the Barbarian before Stella and it's a cheap way to leave mana up for protection. Even better, it's a free spell on your combo turn.\nMana dorks - I usually loathe mana dorks. You spend a card from hand, wait to get the mana, deploy more cards from hand, pulling ahead of the table. Someone wraths, now you're empty handed and your ramp is also gone. However, that's just how this deck works. If you cast Stella, cast 3 more spells to turn on her ability, and then someone kills her your hand is empty and you have to find 2 more mana to try again. In for a penny, in for a pound. The nice thing about these dorks is that as turn 2 plays you can easily cast a cantrip or pass on 1, ramp on 2, and play Stella with protection on 3.\nTablet of Completion, Bonder's Ornament - there are many ways to turn these into a win, but they all work the same; if you can untap both Stella and one of these, then you can float infinite mana "},{"attributes":{"italic":true},"insert":"and"},{"insert":" draw your deck with just this one card. Plus, they're jank as hell so if you spend a turn ramping by casting one of these absolutely no one will take you seriously as the threat.\nStorm-Kiln Artist - maybe the only 4+ mana card I haven't considered cutting, this is like a better version of Twinning Staff in that it enables winning lines. The humble Twiddle becomes infinite mana, for example. Plus, as a lightning rod it eats a removal spell for Stella. If this is 4 mana to make 1 or 2 treasures and protect Stella from a Doom Blade? Already worth it. And the ceiling is \"win the game\" so.\n\nRemoval\nGut Shot - it's free on your combo turn. Also, if you have Twinning Staff it becomes another infinite damage outlet. Just cast any untapper, have Stella make infinite copies of that untapper thanks to the staff, and then use her to make copies of Gut Shot. Another way the deck can win at instant speed, which isn't usually relevant but has come up.\nLightning Bolt - Gut Shot, but 1 mana instead of 0.\nBlasphemous Act - this is mostly here as emergency glass to break in case of other aggro deck, or a creature based stax deck. Also, in your opener tells you that you can play the game slow. You have time to ramp and sculpt your hand because you can cheaply clear the board and slam Stella in the aftermath later.\nChaos Warp - your answer to whatever incidental stax is preventing you from winning. There isn't space to run a ton of interaction with Stella's \"you need to cast 3 spells in one turn\" requirement, so if you're facing a stax deck maybe just try to take the L with grace. But a single Glacial Chasm won't be the end of you.\n\nUntap\nCerulean Wisps, Twitch - these say \"draw your deck\" which I hear is very good in Magic the Gathering, premier card game for ages 13+. Refocus should also be in the deck but I can never find one in stock.\nTwiddle - can just be a free spell on your combo turn, can also win the game with Twinning Staff or Storm-kiln Artist on the board.\nDramatic Reversal, Hidden Strings, Reality Spasm - the default ways to make infinite mana in the deck. so long as you can untap Stella and at least 1 mana source per copy, these should win the game.\nInvoluntary Employment, Traitorous Greed - I have considered cutting these, but they do have some utility. First, they make infinite mana with just Stella so you're not dependent on mana rocks for example. Second, they give haste. So if you have ramped to the moon, or made infinite treasures with Storm-kiln and passed for lack of card draw, and then eaten a wrath this let's you haste in Stella for another go. And if you have Twinning Staff they turn into Insurrection.\n\n\n\nThe Maybeboard\n\nCards tagged in red I want to add but haven't, either because they're outside my budget or because I can't even find them in stock. Otherwise these are cards I ran in the deck until recently and I'm leaving them over there as a reminder of things I could put back in if something expensive finally gets the chop.\n\n\n\nConclusion\n\nI love this deck, it's extremely rewarding to pilot. Because it runs no tutors and has so many ways to combo off each game is a relatively novel test of skill. Mulliganing for the right mix of spells, not just number of lands but spell effects, is inherently interesting because of the number of possible lines. You're not digging for just Twisted Fealty, you're looking for any of a hundred different early plays that can lead you into a score of different combos. You're not a brainless aggro deck dumping your hand of goblins on the board and praying your Impact Tremors gets there, but you're also not a brainless counterspell.deck list that can rely on an abundance of free interaction to protect you. Some games you'll have Telepathy or Leyline and can be proactive more safely, some games you'll have Blasphemous Act and Big Score and you need to take things slow.\n\nJust remember, when the time comes, you'll only get one shot.\n"}]}