The Commander
Whenever another creature dies, or a creature card is put into a graveyard from anywhere other than the battlefield, or a creature card leaves your graveyard, Syr Konrad deals 1 damage to each opponent.
: Each player mills a card. (They each put the top card of their library into their graveyard.)
Guide
Gameplan
Syr Konrad is a mono-black aristocrats/mill payoff that turns every creature hitting a graveyard into direct damage to all opponents. You flood the board with expendable creatures, sacrifice and recur them repeatedly, and use his mill ability to dump creature cards from libraries—each trigger pings everyone. The game ends when you generate a loop or mass-death event that drains the table out.
Strengths
- Inevitable, color-agnostic damage that ignores blockers, lifegain, and most creature-based defense
- Punishes opponents' own creature deaths and self-mill, making him relevant in any pod
- Mono-black gives access to elite tutors, recursion, and ramp like Cabal Coffers
- Multiple trigger types (deaths, milling, graveyard exile/recursion) make him absurdly flexible
Weaknesses
- Hard commander-dependent; the deck does little without him on the field
- Highly vulnerable to graveyard hate that shuts down recursion engines
- Triggers can be slow without a payoff engine and easily disrupted by removal
- Single-color means no interaction with counterspells and limited flexible answers
Key Cards
- Gravecrawler — Recurs from the graveyard for one mana endlessly, pinging the table on each leave and death with a sac outlet.
- Phyrexian Altar — Free sacrifice outlet that, combined with Gravecrawler and a Zombie, creates an infinite damage loop.
- Grimgrin, Corpse-Born — With Gravecrawler and a sac outlet, enables infinite sacrifice loops that Konrad converts to lethal damage.
- Gray Merchant of Asphodel — Massive drain that also feeds graveyards, and pairs with reanimation for repeated value.
- Mind Grind — Pairs with Konrad to mill entire libraries, dealing damage for every creature card revealed.
Upgrade Path
Add fast mana and tutors (Dark Ritual, Demonic Tutor, Vampiric Tutor, Diabolic Intent) to assemble combos faster and protect Konrad. Prioritize free or repeatable sacrifice outlets (Phyrexian Altar, Viscera Seer, Ashnod's Altar) plus recursion like Reassembling Skeleton to enable infinite loops. Round out with graveyard protection, mass reanimation (Living Death), and Cabal Coffers/Nykthos ramp to power out enormous mill activations.
Core Cards
The most-played cards for this commander, built from aggregated deck data (the Mythic Graph). Build public decks to seed it.
Win Conditions
- ▸Infinite sacrifice loops (Gravecrawler + Phyrexian Altar + Grimgrin) for unbounded Konrad damage
- ▸Mass mill effects converting opponents' creature cards into table-wide pings
- ▸Big death/recursion swings draining the whole pod simultaneously
- ▸Gray Merchant or board-wipe aristocrats turns to finish low-life opponents
Archetypes
- Aristocrats — Konrad converts every creature death into damage, rewarding sacrifice outlets and token generators.
- Mill/Self-Mill — His activated ability and damage triggers turn milling creature cards into direct damage.
- Reanimator — Creature cards leaving your graveyard trigger Konrad, so recursion doubles as a damage engine.
- Combo — Gravecrawler plus a free sac outlet and a Zombie creates infinite damage loops.
Combos
- The Mindskinner + Syr Konrad, the Grim
→ Near-infinite mill
- Syr Konrad, the Grim + K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth + Tortured Existence
→ Infinite damage, Infinite lifegain triggers, Infinite self-discard triggers
- Syr Konrad, the Grim + Tortured Existence + Phyresis
→ Each opponent loses the game
- Syr Konrad, the Grim + Morality Shift + Phyresis
→ Each opponent loses the game
- Syr Konrad, the Grim + Tortured Existence + Tainted Strike
→ Each opponent loses the game
Combos via Commander Spellbook.
Related Commanders
Same color identity (B), by popularity.
