Hello and welcome to Commander Bites!

Today we are going to talk about Sarulf, Realm Eater!

Sarulf is a three mana 3/3 with whenever a permanent an opponent controls is put into the graveyard from the battlefield, put a +1+/1 counter on Sarulf. At the beginning of your upkeep, if Sarulf has one or more +1/+1 counters on it, you may remove all of them, and if you do exile each other nonland permanent with mana value less than or equal to the number of counters removed this way.

Game Plan

Sarulf is a Commander that wants to pile on counters so that they can clear the board for an open attack. This puts Sarulf in an interesting place as a board wipe Commander that can deal with a good number of problematic permanents on the board.

We need ways to put counters onto Sarulf, have our opponents sacrifice things to fuel Sarulf, and all the while making sure that we can’t really commit too much to the board since Sarulf is also exiling our things, which while a bit troublesome can be dealt with pretty handily.

Support

Any permanents we do commit to the board need to ideally be cheap and have an effect that can cause an opponent to lose something on their board or gain us a one time advantage that we don’t mind losing. Gravelighter for example enters to draw us a card if a creature died this turn or have each player sacrifice a creature if one didn’t.

Cankerbloom also helps us a lot because we can pay one mana to either destroy target artifact, destroy target enchantment, or proliferate. No matter which one we choose we can always get a +1/+1 counter onto Sarulf, though the proliferate gets less effective if there aren’t any counters on Sarulf.

Since Sarulf counts any permanent an opponent controls leaving the battlefield, we actually can be pretty heavy on removal spells to make sure that Sarulf can get counters reliably.

Mire in Misery is a very simple way to do so by having each opponent sacrifice a creature or an enchantment while Tribute to the Wild has it so that each opponent sacrifices an artifact or enchantment, which also allows us to potentially get rid of some of the less interactable permanents our opponents may control.

If an opponent is playing a lot into having a lot of tokens on board, then we can punish them by playing a Force of Despair, which we can cast for free if it isn’t our turn and we exile a black card from our hand to destroy all creatures that entered the battlefield this turn.

Smallpox can also be a solid way for us to gain a good number of counters because it has each player lose 1 life, discard a card, sacrifices a creature, and then sacrifices a land. Since Sarulf counts any permanent, this can net us a maximum of six counters for Sarulf to clear the board of anything.

If we really want to go big on this sort of effect, especially in the late game, then we also have access to Pox Plague which has it so that each player loses half of their life, discards half of the cards in their hand and half the permanents they control of their choice, rounded down. This can be an extreme measure, but it can be an effective way to get counters onto Sarulf.

Even if you didn’t want to go that far, then you can still use a Toxic Deluge to get rid of a lot of small creatures, Bane of Progress to destroy all artifacts and enchantments then put that many +1/+1 counters on it, or even Braids, Arisen Nightmare to be a consistent way for us to sacrifice something to either force an opponent to sacrifice something or they lose 2 life and we draw a card.

Setbacks

Your deck is going to be removal heavy, which may make you the archenemy of the table.

Considering the fact that Sarulf is a board wipe Commander that gets the fuel to wipe the board anytime a permanent of any type that your opponent controls goes to the graveyard, people will be wary of your deck.

To play the deck optimally you will need a lot of removal, which can be broad so everyone gets a taste or narrow if you want to make deals, but the moment that you activate the board wipe effect to get rid of all other nonland permanents by exiling them, any good will you made will likely be gone.

Some people may be adamant to remove Sarulf before they even have enough counters to be as effective, and while we do have access to a lot of ways to protect and recur Sarulf, it may not be enough if your three opponents band together to get rid of Sarulf.

What’s more, you can’t really commit too many things on the board because Sarulf is symmetrical, and since your stuff gets removed you can’t rely on permanents to better help you get more counters like Hardened Scales or Winding Constrictor.

You can be a bit cheeky and mutate onto Sarulf to gain some effects, and since they are part of Sarulf they are immune to the removal effects, but that can’t be our only way to commit some additional effects onto the board.

What’s more, if you do happen to play into the Pox Plague side of things, then you are touching into mass land destruction since it counts all permanents, and if you aren’t in the right brackets for that, then that can lead to some less than ideal experiences.

Bracket Rating: Mid 3, Low 4 if playing MLD

Sarulf can be a tricky Commander to navigate, but on the face of it is a control Commander that uses +1/+1 counters as a way to help keep the board in check.

While you can go into the higher brackets to play into the mass land destruction potential the deck has, Sarulf works better in the middle of bracket three as a control deck that has a way to win by making sure that Sarulf sticks onto the battlefield, clears the board when necessary and pile on the counters to get Sarulf big enough to win via Commander Damage.

Thank you for reading, see you all tomorrow!

Peace,

From, J.M. Casual