ETERNAL BARGAIN Commander Deck....Unboxing and Review

HOORAY!  The SpartanWife got me the OLORO, AGELESS ASCETIC DECK!

First of all, I thought OLORO must be the commander for me when I first saw the artwork on the card!  He's just kicked back, relaxing, and directing a win!  (I first saw the card in the store at the Tangled Web.)

As far as a product, it is more or less exactly the same as the Derevi deck that I already reviewed as far as the packaging and presentation are concerned.  The SpartanSmurfs  both got a commander deck also(Mind Seize and Power Hungry), and they are all boxed the same, with a different set of instructions specific to their deck, a different color box for storage, and three oversized commander cards.  I might get to review their decks as well, if they don't mess them up too bad.

Back to OLORO.

You are always gaining life with this deck.  And the cards included count on that, as many of them say "Pay X life..." as a cost for their effect.

This is what the box looks like.  You can clearly see the three colors, White, Blue, and Black, "Esper."  The purple coloring is a good compliment, though it doesn't mean anything else to me.  My boys were puzzled by the purple...all of the other commanders have a color of box that represents one of the REAL colors of magic.

Here's the back.  It's just propaganda.

All that hype aside...you open the box and see something LIKE this.  Only this isn't the correct product.  This is what POWER HUNGRY looks like inside. not ETERNAL BARGAIN.  How did this happen?  Regardless of how I swapped out the pics accidentally, I assure you it looks like this when you open it.  You get a nice box that perfectly fits the deck....at least when the cards are sleeveless.  Three big foil cards.  And two pieces of paper.  You might as well throw the blue one away.  The other one is specifically for the deck it came with.

ETERNAL BARGAIN came with this commander on top.  OLORO, Ageless Ascetic, of course.  Read it and weep.  Basically, unless someone is playing EREBOS, GOD OF THE DEAD, you gain life constantly.  Notice the art too.  This is what struck me first.  I am an art kind of guy!  I have studied this picture several times, and am finding new things.  Notice the bandolier he is wearing...He's a giant...He has regular sized human weapons strapped to that bandolier!

You also get this sqinx as an alternate commander.  This deck plays lots of artifacts, so this card approaches that angle.

This card also tackles the artifact angle.

This poster comes with the deck.  It is pretty, but this side doesn't accomplish much but tell you some fantasy story that surrounds Oloro.

This side accomplishes a lot!  You get a very light summary of how to play the deck, and then the deck list.

Here is the deck list alone, if you want to try and read it.

OK, already.  What cards are in the deck?  Well, I have played the deck twice against the SpartanSmurfs, and am going to play in a more "serious" tournament tomorrow.  But I have kind of an idea how this is supposed to work.  I have a self designed life drain deck, and this accomplishes that, but on a commander scale...It could definitely be improved, but I am keeping it vanilla for awhile.  (I am just playing what was here, at least until a second more serious tournament.)

AZORIUS.  Enough said.  But cool enough, both times I have played this deck, he wound up in the graveyard, and I was able to cast him from there and get the life gain benefit!

Great card if it didn't get burned off :(

There is one of these in every Commander deck apparently.  This is a great card, and legal in modern!

This card is one of the staples of my self designed life gain deck.  The fact that she can give you life and burn EACH opponent is great!  She can be burned easily, though, and her abilities are indeed a tad expensive.

Sorry about the sideways action.  I didn't get to use the ability on this card, but it is a source of card draw.

A slow source of mana....

This card is normally a complete board wipe.  Get rid of those indistructibles and hex proofers!

Same as Azorius Herald, I was able to cast this from the graveyard.  But I have never been able to pay the echo cost.  It has always appeared in the early game.

I'm glad to own this!  A panorama card comes with each Commander deck.

I played this today, I like it...But I held off and used the tokens as blockers.

Heh Heh.  Drop this onto a commander...He becomes utterly useless!

Another good source of life gain.

Now we're talking!  A board sweeping artifact!

A big drain spell.  I usually wait 'til the very end to play stuff like this.

The OLORO deck has lost both matches...I think it's me, not the deck.  Proshk, Sky Raider of Kherr is the one that did me in, with the commander damage rule.  Oloro pretty much forces your opponent to swing with his commander, because there is probably no way that your 40 life is going to be whittled down.

I am not going to rate this deck...  Compared to Derevi, it hasn't won as much.  On the other hand, these are more of my natural colors...I like this deck, and love the art!  Darksteel Mutation is maybe the best card for a commander, and then the Vizkopa Guildmage also really makes it work.


UPDATE:

Last night I played the deck at the Commander tournament...It was my first EDH tournament ever.  And each match was exceeding long.   Oloro as a Commander makes you into a target...not so much as Nekusar (SpartanSmurf #1 found this to be the case).  Just the same, Oloro did what he was supposed to.  I should have won the first match.  I played Sanguine Bond, and then a few turns later Filigree Angel.  I forgot to call the trigger.  So it was my fault.  I didn't make good draws during round two, and SpartanSmurfs were tired out by the time that was over...

Next time I am plain Derevi.  Or maybe I will tweak this deck.  Drain is one of my favorite styles.  It just tends to be slow.  I should maybe tweak this some.