Control

'Control' is a strategy that focuses its efforts on repeatedly eliminating threats deployed by their opponents, often with forms of removal, mass removal, and countermagic. Control decks focus on reactive gameplay rather than proactive gameplay, depleting each enemy's reserve of powerful cards and resources before deploying their own game-ending effects.

Control decks are commonly centered in color combinations that include blue and/or white.

## **Popular Cards & Commanders**

**Popular control cards include:**

* Counterspell
* Supreme Verdict
* Reliquary Tower

**Common control commanders include:**

* Talrand, Sky Summoner
* Oloro, Ageless Ascetic
* Baral, Chief of Compliance

## **Strategy**

A control deck has a simple goal: prevent opponents from developing their gameplans while simultaneously gaining incremental advantage. Once the coast is clear, then they can move to win the game themselves.

### **Answers**

Control decks contain a significant number of diverse removal spells to answer opponents' threats and keeping board states in check. This often includes a high amount of countermagic, which prevent opponents from establishing their plans in a meaningful way. Control decks particularly enjoy low-cost forms of removal (such as Path to Exile) so that they may spend minimal resources to remove cards their opponents have invested lots of mana into.
Control decks in Commander also use an above-average number of mass removal spells (such as Austere Command and Supreme Verdict. These cards help scale to multiple enemies and solve multiple problems at once, resulting in positive card economy for the control player as their opponents lose many game pieces at the cost of a single spell.
Control decks commonly prefer flexible removal spells that can target multiple permanent types, especially at instant speed, which allows them to respond to various or unpredictable board states (for instance, Assassin's Trophy. Contrarily, control decks may also use '[silver bullets]', cards that vastly disrupt very specific enemy strategies, even if those spells are not very effective against other archetypes (for instance, using Rest in Peace to disrupt Reanimator strategies or Rule of Law to stall out Storm decks).
### **Card Draw/Value Engines**

Control decks require a steady influx of card draw to keep their hands fueled, so that they may both find more removal spells to handle enemy threats and also outpace their enemies' resources. Control decks often employ a combination of slower card advantage spells that will accumulate many cards over a long period of time (for example, Rhystic Study) or spells that help refill their hand with a very high number of cards (such as Stroke of Genius). Flexible cards that can fulfill these roles as well as the role of removal are especially helpful for a control player (see Mystic Confluence).
Control decks may also occasionally use planeswalkers as a source of these advantages, since they may provide consistent benefit over the course of many turns. Recursion effects may also be used by the control player, to reclaim their already-used spells and prepare to use them again against persistent enemy threats.
Control decks tend to shy away from sorcery-speed effects that provide card advantage, preferring to keep mana available in case they must use a removal spell on an enemy card later on in the turn cycle. Control players may choose to make use of abilities such as Leyline of Anticipation to increase their flexibility in this manner.
### **Winning the Game**

Control decks tend not to deploy their lethal or game-ending effects until they have exhausted their opponents' resources, and feel secure in their ability to keep their win condition protected from enemy responses. Control decks tend not to run a high number of win condition cards in their decks, assured in the knowledge that they will eventually draw those win condition cards over the course of a long game anyway. Win conditions may vary for each control deck, sometimes deploying a single, enormous creature, casting one game-ending spell, assembling a lethal combo, or using Alternate Win Cards.
## **Control as a Sub-Theme**

While some decks are specifically dedicated to the control strategy, others archetypes employ strong elements of control to assist their plans in a more peripheral way. Archetypes that may use control as a secondary plan include:

* Pillowfort
* Enchantress
* Goodstuff
* Spellslinger

## **Common Deck Categories**

* Card Draw
* Mass Removal
* Removal
* Counterspells
* Protection Cards
* Win Conditions
* Ramp

**10 cards** will probably give you **2 cards in a given game** from that category, and a good chance to **start with 1** in your opening hand. Critical categories for your deck may require a similar or larger number than this, depending on expected levels of Counterspells or Removal.
**5 cards** will probably give you **1 card per game** of that category. Cards you don't want to overload on but still want access to (*board wipes in a tokens deck for instance*) may want a similar figure to this... Going smaller than this number makes receiving a card of this category very unlikely without Tutors or some other Toolbox approach.

## **Strengths and Weaknesses**

### **Strengths**

* Control decks are among the most interactive archetypes in the format, rewarding clever players who correctly predict the plans of their enemies while preventing other opponents from ever accessing their deck's most powerful potential.

* Control decks tend not to commit many game pieces to the battlefield, sometimes using no creatures at all, which can cause several cards (especially removal spells) in enemy decks to have almost zero impact on their plans)

* Control decks are nearly unmatched in their ability to achieve victory over a longer game, owing largely to the amount of card advantage they can accrue over an extended time.

### **Weaknesses**

* Control cannot respond to every problem. With multiple enemies, any attempt to remove every threat at the table will cause the control player to run out of removal spells too quickly. This problem becomes compounded if the control player is unable to find a steady stream of card advantage, as they cannot keep parity against multiple enemies at once without a consistent influx of spells that help them stabilize the board.

* Multiple enemies also can cause some difficulty in assessing the most threatening opponent at any given time. The high-variance nature of the Commander format can create unpredictable scenarios that make it difficult for a control player to adequately prepare themselves against.

* Control decks are slow. Fast-paced decks, especially aggro strategies, can sometimes deal lethal damage to control players before they have a chance to properly set up any plans.

## *Control in various colors*

Despite it's propensity for White and Blue, virtually every color has some access to both answers and card advantage and can therefore do some version of Control, or contribute to a White or Blue deck's Control plan. Below are details for assembling a Control-style gameplan in colors other than White and Blue.

{{ms-g **Control in Green**: Green has limited access to answers as it's spells can deal with Artifacts, Enchantments and Creatures with flying, however to deal with other creatures it must rely on Fight effects and therefore needs powerful creatures or creatures with deathtouch. Green can provide fantastic card draw engines for a control deck focused on having many, or having a powerful creature, and also provides creature tutors which can be very useful for finding silver bullets, but mostly in other colors.
**Example Green cards:**Return to Nature, Ulvenwald Tracker, Broken Wings, Worldly Tutor, Beast Whisperer, Guardian Project, Return of the Wildspeaker, Rishkar's Expertise, Gargos, Vicious Watcher, Ayula Queen among Bears and Creatures with Deathtouch

{{ms-b **Control in Black**: Black has access to answers for Creatures, some board wipes and some measure of ability to deal with Enchantments. It does however need to lean on colorless effects or another color to deal with Artifacts generally. Black provides solid card draw, either in single shot spells or repeatable engines with the only issue being a small loss of life, and also provides a good array of tutors which can be very useful for finding Answers or setting up Card Draw if you are short on either. It also optionally offers recursion from the graveyard for creatures, which can be used to repeat creature based draw or removal.
**Example Black cards:**Phyrexian Arena, Sign in Blood, Infernal Grasp, Feed the Swarm, Pharika's Libation, Demonic Tutor, Vampiric Tutor, Damnation, Coffin Queen, Infernal Caretaker, Ravenous Chupacabra, Phyrexian Gargantua, Audacious Thief, Baleful Beholder, Whisper, Blood Liturgist, Toshiro Umezawa

{{ms-r **Control in Red**: Red has tools for Control, but is more difficult to leverage in a multiplayer format like commander. It has access to answers for Artifacts, and conditional single target and board wipe cards in that they deal damage, or temporarily gain control of creatures and sacrifice them. Red's card draw is not necessarily ideal for Control in that it must either use Impulse draw *(to get cards it must use now rather than finding an optimal time)* or Wheels *(Which grant your opponents cards too)* but it can definitely support another color or provide an unusual take on Control.
**Example Red cards:**Outpost Siege, Commune with Lava, Syr Carah the Bold, Lightning Bolt, Blasphemous Act, Abrade, Captivating Crew

### **Toolbox**

Control decks are all about having answers, but sometimes having the correct answer is the most important thing... the addition of tutors can slightly dilute your ratio of answers, but can be converted into whatever you need at any given point
**Example Cards:**Perplex, Muddle the Mixture, Brainspoil, Demonic Tutor
### **Aikido**

Control decks normally corral their opponents by denying them important components or win conditions... But surely It's more efficient if you can use them against your opponents?
**Example Cards:**Disrupt Decorum, Agonizing Demise, Redirect Harm, Comeuppance, Inkshield, Selfless Squire
### **Pillowfort**

The only problem with a control deck denying your opponents resources to weaponize... is that they then can't use them against YOUR opponents! With a few Pillowfort pieces you can let your opponents slug it out while you sit in relative safety
### **Spellslinger**

The most common way control decks deny their opponents resources is through spells... So why not get rewarded for doing so?
**Example Cards:**Archmage Emeritus, Talrand, Sky Summoner, Murmurring Mystic
### **Stax**

Control decks intend to control the flow of the game reactively, but by introducing a few proactive pieces you can apply a much harder lock to the types of decks that cause you the most trouble
### **Theft**

Control decks normally corral their opponents by denying them important components or win conditions... But surely It's more efficient to deny them these things by taking them for yourself?
**Example Cards:**Confiscate, Slave of Bolas, Enslave, Grab the Reins
**References:**

* Control tagged articles on EDHRec