Doctor Doom, King of Latveria Commander Deck Guide

Doctor Doom, King of Latveria | Illustration by Nathaniel Himawan

Doctor Doom, King of Latveria is the new Grixis villain commander from the Marvel Super Heroes Commander precon. It was designed to be the enabler and payoff for the same strategy, and it’s pretty easy to build around, even on a budget.

While most of us anxiously wait for Doctor Doom’s MCU debut in Avengers: Doomsday, the character and his cards have arrived in MTG in full force, and we can build a Commander deck around this version that’s very villainous and 100% scheming some evil plans.

Here’s my guide to a Bracket 3 Doctor Doom deck, with some of the card choices and the strategy behind it. Let’s go!

The Deck

Doctor Doom | Illustration David Palumbo

This is a Bracket 3 deck built around Doctor Doom, King of Latveria, closer to Bracket 2 than 4. It’s a pretty fair and value-midrangy deck centered around villains and the connive mechanic.

The Commander: Doctor Doom, King of Latveria

Doctor Doom, King of Latveria, like most precon commanders, is a very flexible creature that lets you execute different strategies. Its main ability is to deal damage to all opponents whenever you discard a land. It also lets a villain connive every turn, which means you’ll draw and discard a bunch. Connive is worse when you discard a land, so Doom makes up for that.

Blue, black, and red are the main villain colors in MTG, and we’re only missing like 4-5 good villains outside of these colors – Mole Man, Moloid Master is probably the best one that can't be played in this deck.

Many MTG villains were designed with connive in mind, so all of this deck’s themes come together. You’re drawing two or more cards a turn while conniving, you’re discarding a bunch of cards which will feed our commander’s ability, and you’re also playing a villain typal deck.

However, there are very few extremely good villains in MTG, so almost all Doom EDH decks look alike and play the same good creature cards.

To avoid confusion, this deck runs the Doctor Doom card too, so be aware that whenever I say just “Doom”, I’m referencing the commander, Doctor Doom, King of Latveria.

Villains

Your commander makes a villain connive every turn, so it makes sense to play a lot of villains and go after a typal theme, although a light one.

Doctor Octopus, Master Planner gives your villains +2/+2, despite its expensive 7-mana cost. The Squadron Sinister does the same, and it has a cheaper mayhem cost.

Iron Monger, Sadistic Tycoon puts +1/+1 counters on your villains whenever you connive, and that tends to happen once a turn or more. Most creatures in this deck are villains, and Tombstone, Career Criminal makes them cheaper.

Plans

They're not needed for the deck’s main themes, but plans are interesting here. There’s a few cards that interact with plans: The Masters of Evil fetches them, while Doctor Doom is indestructible as long as we have plans on the battlefield. But it’s also interesting that they synergize with what we’re doing.

Doom Reigns Supreme cares about villains and makes you draw more, while Construct a Cosmic Cube is a reward for drawing cards. Villainous Syndication is the weaker plan, but tapping villains to reanimate others can be good in a deck with expensive creatures and so much discard.

Draw Matters

Many cards in MTG, especially in blue and black, give you benefits for drawing two cards a turn. You basically need to connive once to trigger this, which happens naturally if your commander is on the battlefield.

Kang, Temporal Tyrant gives you a convenient drain effect, nice since this deck has a lot of life payment and not that many ways to gain life. Construct a Cosmic Cube triggers when you’re drawing two or more cards. Red Ghost, Intangible Genius gives you a 3/3 villain token, and so on.

Another interesting benefit is that, if we’re drawing so many cards, you can discard to hand size, triggering other discard-related synergies.

Discarding

There’s a lot of ways to discard in this deck with all the conniving, so let’s see how you can benefit from this besides your commander’s ability.

Tectonic Reformation is key here, allowing you to cycle lands. Cool but Rude and Monument to Endurance are direct discard payoffs. Living Laser can hit for a bunch when you’re discarding cards, and you can get a kind of myriad trigger. Archfiend of Ifnir is another cool payoff for discarding, letting you control the board with -1/-1 counters.

This isn’t the best Frantic Search deck, but the discarding might come in handy. Green Goblin, Nemesis is nice when you’re discarding cards each turn.

I’ve also included some cards with mayhem, which is a discard-matters mechanic, like Carnage, Crimson Chaos and Oscorp Industries.

Interaction and Sweepers

Grixis colors are very fit for a midrange/control deck with plenty of interaction. You’re playing the classics here: Chaos Warp, Bedevil, and Terminate for spot removal, Blasphemous Act, Vandalblast, and Toxic Deluge to control the board.

An interesting card here is Lethal Scheme, which lets your creatures convoke it and also connive.

The Mana Base

The mana base for this deck is built on a budget, although I’ve used a lot of nonbasic duals and tri-lands. Lands that cycle are interesting with Doom’s ability, and I have cycles of shock lands, check lands, bicycle lands, and more.

Another interesting aspect is that there’s some typal lands, like Path of Ancestry and Villainous Hideout, which fix your mana if you’re casting villains.

The Strategy

As with many midrange/control Commander decks, you don’t want to be overrun in the early game. Cast your commander, connive here and there, and try to make a villain board where the small synergies between your cards helps you here and there.

You’re not doing anything explosive where you need to draw like 4-5 cards a turn, go off, storm, or spellsling. Cast a plan card early on and start building toward that goal. You’ll get small edges by conniving, growing your creatures, and sometimes casting something via mayhem. If things get ugly, there are ways to reset the board, like Blasphemous Act.

In the late game, your best bet is to chain together multiple connive triggers to discard lands and deal damage to your opponents, while attacking with your bigger villains like Abomination, World Ravager, or casting a Rise of the Dark Realms to take advantage of your filled graveyard (and others, too).

Combos and Interactions

This is a fair deck, so you’re not running any tutors or combos. It’s fair to say that it passes Rule 0. The only card I’d say can do more unfair things in this deck is Tectonic Reformation, which lets you cycle lands and deal damage each time via your commander. Each land essentially gains: “, discard this card: Deal 2 to every opponent. Draw a card.”

Rule 0 Violations Check

Not this time. This deck is very midrangy, fair, and value-driven. I doubt people will find Rise of the Dark Realms to be a very pushed card, and even then, you’re not reanimating a combo.

Budget Options

This is a budget build, so I’m going to suggest other cards you could add to this deck that’ll fit perfectly.

Expensive mana rocks like The Soul Stone and Mana Vault can make the deck faster and less clunky, especially in the early game.

Roaming Throne is excellent in a deck like this, filled with villain triggers you can double. Just having this besides alongside Doom means discarding a land deals 4 damage to each opponent, and you get to connive twice.

Bone Miser is one of those cards that gives you something good whenever you discard any type of card. Waste Not is also a cool addition if you build around symmetrical wheels or forced discard.

Jeska's Will is an excellent Game Changer in a value-driven deck. Generating a lot of mana and getting to cast spells right away is good at every stage of the game.

Loki, Lord of Misrule can make all your villains into a copy of a given creature you control. You can copy Doctor Octopus, Master Planner and buff everybody, or copy your commander before you discard a lot of land cards and win.

Fierce Guardianship is an excellent protection spell for a key villain or your commander that you can cast for free.

Crucible of Worlds lets you play lands from your graveyard, and you’re not playing green, so this is one of the only ways to do that in UBR colors.

Other Builds

Doctor Doom, King of Latveria is a flexible commander, and you don’t need to play a lot of villains in a lower power villain typal deck.

One problem with this commander is that if you discard a lot of lands at once, the damage is still 2 per trigger. A build like wheels can still work well: You’ll fill your deck with cards that reward you for drawing while punishing your opponents and get some additional damage when you discard lands.

You can also clone Doom with cards like Sakashima of a Thousand Faces and focus harder on the individual draw and discard trigger, with looters and such.

Cycling is also interesting, especially if you have explicit cycling payoffs (ex: “whenever you cycle a card”). You can have different synergies outside of playing villains with cards like Rielle, the Everwise, which are strong in a discard-oriented deck.

Commanding Conclusion

Doom Reigns Supreme | Illustration by Alexander Gering

That’s my take on Doctor Doom, King of Latveria as a Grixis villains/connive commander. It can be powerful, and it’s surely synergistic. Besides, if you already have the Doom Prevails precon, most of these cards are already available in it.

As usual, I’d like to know what you think about this build, and which combos you think this deck can support to become stronger and more competitive. Leave me your thoughts in the comments section below, or over on the Draftsim Discord. Thanks for reading, and for more EDH and Marvel, be sure to check our YouTube Channel, The Daily Upkeep.

See you, guys!