Miirym, Sentinel Wyrm Commander Deck Guide

Last updated on April 1, 2024

Miirym, Sentinel Wyrm | Illustration by Kekai Kotaki

What’s better than dragons? More dragons! If you love running creatures with powerful effects, flying over your enemies’ blockers, or just dragons themselves, this Miirym deck is absolutely the list for you.

Miirym, Sentinel Wyrm is a dragon commander that came out, appropriately, in the new Battle for Baldur’s Gate set. As a tribe, dragons have no shortage of powerhouse commanders, but I think it’s safe to say Miirym is powerful enough to make its mark regardless.

Join me as I break down my build for a Miirym, Sentinel Wyrm Commander deck, as well as a few other ways you might want to build your own!

The Deck

Haven of the Spirit Dragon | Illustration by Raymond Swanland

As you can see, this deck is packed with powerful dragons. That’s because Miirym’s real talent is its ability to double up all of your dragons. While the big threats in this deck might be expensive, they seem a lot cheaper when you’re getting two for the price of one.

There are also ways to reduce the price of your dragons and ramp for what you need. Mana rocks, mana dorks, and Treasure (a dragon’s favorite) also help you afford some of the bigger creatures in this deck.

There are also some ways for you to cash in when your dragons enter the battlefield, either for added resources or to take out your opponents. Whether you’re swinging out or doing direct damage, your strategy revolves around one main thing: lots and lots of dragons!

The Commander

Miirym, Sentinel Wyrm’s ability is incredibly powerful. Creating multiple copies of any dragon you play for no added cost is huge. You’re free to load your deck up with all of the best dragons that Temur () colors have to offer and copy them all since the copies don’t count as legendary.

The added ward ability makes Miirym harder for your opponents to remove while its decent power and toughness make it a threat in its own right. That being said, Miirym is going to be a big target on the board so it’s worth giving it some protective equipment.

Ramp Spells

Among the styles of ramp in this deck are traditional ramp spells like Rampant Growth and Nature's Lore. Farseek is always great for mana fixing, as it will allow you to grab any of your dual or tri lands that include basic land types.

Treasure is another great way to ramp, and also on theme for a dragon deck. Dockside Extortionist can be incredibly effective, especially against opponents that run a lot of artifacts. Goldspan Dragon is usually good for a few Treasures, and even better if you can get two out thanks to Miirym.

Cost Reduction

Reducing the cost of your dragons is another great way to get them out earlier, including your commander.

Urza's Incubator does a great job speeding things up.

While Herald's Horn only reduces the cost of your dragons by one, it’s also going to draw you extra cards a lot of the time.

While Monster Manual doesn’t technically reduce the cost of your creatures, it allows you to pay only four mana for whatever creature you have in your hand. Cast triggers won’t activate off of this, but you still get any effects that trigger when the creature enters the battlefield.

Sneak Attack is very similar, but with the downside of forcing you to sacrifice the creature at your end step. This is good if you really just need a dragon to enter the battlefield or swing for some damage on this turn. Of course, this card is much better if you have Miirym on the battlefield since you won’t be forced to sacrifice the copy you make.

Animar, Soul of Elements is a great commander in its own right. It can help make your high-cost creatures cheaper in a deck like this with a lot of them. Animar can also protect itself pretty effectively and act as a threat or blocker.

Earthquake Dragon really only reduces its own cost, but it still counts! Since most of the creatures in this deck are dragons, this creature will hopefully be easy to cast.

Dragons!

A lot of the dragons on this list pull double duty. But some are just really great dragons.

Inferno of the Star Mounts is a great threat to have on the board, especially if you have a way to pump it up and activate its second ability.

There are also dragons that are good on their own. Renari, Merchant of Marvels allows you to keep your mana open instead of spending it on dragons during your turn. This can help keep your opponents guessing as to what you might play.

Swashbuckler Extraordinaire can be a great way to swing a game by doubling the damage output of your dragons.

Dragons like Keiga, the Tide Star are also good on their own, but they're even better once doubled. Now you have two threatening dragons that might be even scarier to kill than to leave alive.

Cloning Spells

This deck still has options for cloning your dragons when Miirym isn’t on the battlefield, like Cursed Mirror.

Spark Double is good to get around the legendary rule and has the added benefit of slightly buffing your creature. You can also clone Miirym, which in turn will make even more clones of your other dragons.

Helm of the Host can be an incredibly powerful card, especially when equipped to Miirym, Sentinel Wyrm. It’s also good attached to any of your other dragons.

Reflections of Littjara has basically the same effect as Miirym. Unfortunately it doesn’t get around the legendary rule. But a lot of great creatures in this deck aren’t even legendary. You still get ETB triggers even if you clone a legendary dragon, which are helpful for this deck’s ultimate strategy.

Token Doublers

Cards like Doubling Season and Parallel Lives make Miirym’s effect even better since the copies of your dragons that it makes are creature tokens. This deck also has several ways to make Treasure tokens, so token doubling effects can also help you get huge amounts of mana.

Second Harvest has flash, making it a good way to double up tokens when your opponents aren’t expecting it. You can also use it to double your Treasure tokens right before your turn, giving you access to a lot more mana. It’s also a good way to cash in on a lot of ETB effects all at once if you have a lot of creature tokens.

Card Draw

Enchantments that allow you to draw spells are super helpful since they continue to add value throughout the game.

Rhystic Study is a classic and goes in most blue decks.

Kindred Discovery is great in tribal decks and even better here since Miirym will have you drawing twice off each dragon you cast.

The ancient metallic dragon cycle from Battle for Baldur’s Gate gave us a lot of great new dragons. Ancient Silver Dragon has the potential to draw you a whole bunch of cards. While this card is a strong contender for any blue deck, it’s pretty much a no-brainer for one focused on dragons.

Removal

This deck is full of its own big threats, but it’s still nice to have ways to deal with other threats on the table.

Beast Within can hit any kind of permanent, which makes it very powerful.

Chaos Warp is fun because you can use it on your opponents' threats or one of your own permanents and maybe get an expensive card for free if you want to roll the dice.

Decimate is probably one of the best removal spells for Commander. It’s so versatile, allowing you to spread your targets out among all your opponents or severely slow down one of them. Since you’re going up against three different people there’s a good chance that each type of permanent will be out on the board, destroying four permanents for four mana.

Earthquake is a fantastic spell in decks like this with mostly flying creatures. Traditional board wipes aren’t as useful in a deck that relies on having creatures out, so this is a good alternative for just destroying your opponents’ creatures.

Direct Damage

Direct damage spells like Banefire and Fireball are great because the buy-in is cheap. That gives them a use in the early game as creature removal, or you can wait until you have a bunch of mana and possibly finish off an opponent.

Another way this deck deals damage directly to opponents is through the use of cards like Terror of the Peaks and Warstorm Surge. Not only will these cards deal a good amount of damage from the high-power dragons entering the battlefield, they're also dealing damage for the original creature and its clone if Miirym, Sentinel Wyrm is out.

Dragon Tempest can end up doing a lot of damage depending on how many dragons you manage to get out at once. It also allows you to swing right away with any flying creatures for more damage.

The Mana Base

This deck runs a few dragon-specific mana rocks on top of the usual mana rocks.

Carnelian Orb of Dragonkind can be used to give dragons haste which is very helpful for dragons with attack triggers.

Dragon's Hoard can double as card draw.

There are also a couple of mana dorks in this deck. Rattleclaw Mystic is especially good because it can tap for any color you need at a low mana value.

Fetchable dual and tri-lands are very helpful for a 3-color deck since they allow for more consistent mana fixing. There are also useful dual lands like Shivan Reef that enter untapped.

A couple dragon-specific lands also help make sure you have the right colors you need. Haven of the Spirit Dragon is great for casting a majority of the creatures in this deck, and both it and Crucible of the Spirit Dragon have the option to tap for one colorless.

Both of the Neon Dynasty legendary lands in this deck are very helpful since they double as spells. It may be more useful to use Boseiju, Who Endures to remove a pesky enchantment or even a dangerous land like Field of the Dead if you draw these lands when you already have a solid mana base.

Yavimaya, Cradle of Growth is a card that belongs in any deck running green. The only time this card might be an issue is if one of your opponents is running creatures with Forestwalk. But it isn’t that big of a downside for you since you’re already running Forests.

The Strategy

This Miirym deck has a variety of ways to win, but they all involve one thing: getting out as many dragons as you can. Once you have some powerful dragons on the field there are a few ways you can go about winning the game.

First and most simple is attacking your opponents. Not all decks run flying creatures or creatures with reach, and even when they do it might just be one or two creatures. Since most dragons have flying you can probably just swing at opponents in the air and chip away at their life with your big creatures.

Of course, there are downsides to relying specifically on combat so it’s good to have other tricks up your sleeve. That’s where cards like Terror of the Peaks, Warstorm Surge, and Dragon Tempest come in. These cards allow you to directly damage your opponents while keeping your creatures up as blockers.

Spells like Banefire and Fireball can also be used to win the game, especially if you’ve managed to create a lot of Treasure tokens with cards like Ancient Copper Dragon or Goldspan Dragon.

Combos and Interactions

Since part of this deck’s strategy is to deal direct damage when dragons enter the battlefield, cards like Warstorm Surge interact well with Miirym, Sentinel Wyrm. You get two activations of Warstorm Surge or cards like it when Miirym copies a dragon. Helm of the Host also interacts well with these cards. You can deal a lot of damage each turn at no extra cost to you if you equip it to one of your large creatures like Earthquake Dragon.

Minion of the Mighty and Sneak Attack also play well with cards like Terror of the Peaks if you just need to deal a little bit of extra damage. You can basically turn your dragons into cheap burn spells by not having to pay full mana value to put a dragon onto the battlefield. Since Sneak Attack can be activated multiple times per turn for only one mana you can do a lot of damage if you have enough creatures in your hand.

Galazeth Prismari pairs well with any of your Treasure-generating cards since it can turn your Treasures into permanent mana rocks. This allows you to cast big creatures faster or pump a ton of mana into a Fireball to remove a player.

Budget Options

The first place to look when it comes to saving money on this deck is the mana base. Replacing the original dual lands with cheaper options like Stormcarved Coast or Grove of the Burnwillows can quickly drop this deck’s price tag.

You can probably be fine without the use of fetch lands if you're looking to save on the mana base with so many great budget dual lands. This can potentially slow you down a little bit, but this deck is already going to be better late game as it is.

Dockside Extortionist is another very expensive card in this deck. While not as powerful, Bootleggers' Stash also has the ability to create a ton of Treasure for you. Or you can include cheap mana dorks like Paradise Druid if you’re looking for early ramp.

Other Builds

Another direction you could take Miirym is making a changeling deck that looks to cash in on tribal support. Since creatures with changeling count as dragons, Miirym copies them when they enter the battlefield. They also work with any of the dragon support cards that are listed above.

Along with being able to use cards like Dragon Tempest with creatures that have changeling, you can also cash in on other powerful tribal support cards. Cards like Stoneforge Masterwork can significantly buff any of your creatures since they’ll mostly share a type, and Coat of Arms can give all of your creatures with changeling +1/+1 for each other creature on the battlefield.

You can also include some tribe-specific support that still works if most of your creatures have changeling. For example, if you include Marwyn, the Nurturer, its ability triggers each time you play one of those creatures. Including a Maskwood Nexus in your deck also allows any creature to have changeling, which can make adding cards from other tribes less of a risk.

Wrap Up

Nature's Lore | Illustration by Kim Sokol

Even if you choose to change this deck up a little bit you now have some good ideas as to where to start with your Miirym, Sentinel Wyrm decks for Commander. Dragons are a mainstay in Magic so you can be sure that support for this deck will continue to be printed. Keep an eye out for any new cards you may want to include!

Are you thinking of building a Miirym deck? Any ideas for what to do for a shapeshifter build? Any of your favorite dragon cards you’d like to include in this list? Let me know in the comments below or over on the Draftsim Twitter.

I hope your new Miirym deck serves you well. I look forward to seeing you in the next deck guide!