How To Build An Ozox, The Clattering King Commander Deck In MTG

The dry rattle of bones echoes across the tombstones as a mass of bones, the remains of a composite Skeleton you just smashed reforming into a new, more horrifying arrangement. The world of Magic: The Gathering has long had Skeletons that reform after being destroyed, but none quite like Ozox, The Clattering King.

Exclusive to Foundations: Jumpstart, Ozox, The Clattering King is a pile of bones that keeps reforming in different orientations, represented as different creatures that replace themselves as they die. It works well in any black deck, but a king should be in command.

Sample Decklist

Black may be the best color to build a mono-colored deck from, since it has ample access to card draw and solid ramp. This sample decklist makes use of black’s broad toolbox while leaning into Skeleton typal and sacrifice themes, while including access to some commander-enabled combos.

The Commander

Ozox, The Clattering King is a new creature from the Ghastly-themed packs of Foundations Jumpstart. It’s a 3/2 legendary Skeleton Noble that can’t block. Ozox only costs three mana (two generic and one black), so you can have it in play on your first turn with a Dark Ritual.

Ozox’s most notable feature is its recursion system. Many Skeletons in Magic: The Gathering have ways to come back into play from the graveyard, playing to the trope of Skeletons reassembling themselves when broken. Ozox is unique in its ability to create a Skeleton token when it dies, and then return to your hand when that token dies.

The flavor is masterful: When Ozox, The Clattering King dies, it reassembles in a different form, turning into Jumblebones, a 2/1 legendary Skeleton that can’t block. When Jumblebones dies, Ozox, The Clattering King returns from your graveyard to your hand so you can cast it again.

The ability to create another creature when Ozox, The Clattering King dies and then play it again when the token dies makes Ozox a resilient commander that will keep putting pressure on your opponents. Board wipes will leave you with a creature, and killing (or sacrificing) that creature will get your commander back without a commander tax.

How To Build The Deck

Recursive graveyard abilities are classic fare for combos, and you can build several around Ozox, The Clattering King. With the right tools, you’ll be able to play, sacrifice, and replay Ozox, The Clattering King multiple times per turn. Combine that with one of the many effects that drain life or destroy creatures when one of your creatures leaves or enters play, and you’ve got your win engine.

Although there are several ways to assemble infinite combos around Ozox, The Clattering King, they tend to be complex enough for your opponents to see them coming and counter. Adding additional ramp means that you’ll still be able to sacrifice and replay Ozox several times per turn in order to generate value.

A vital part of the deck is ways to destroy your own commander and token: since neither can block, and you want Ozox and Jumblebones to die, your opponents will be tempted not to block your attacks. Efficient sacrifice outlets, like Ashnod’s Altar and Carrion Feeder, allow you to start your engine after getting through with an attack.

Neither Ozox, The Clattering King nor Jumblebones can block, and you want them to die, so you should attack with them every turn.

As a backup for the combo engines, or to distract your opponents from the combo you’re assembling, you can also include combat-oriented black creatures. Skeleton lords that buff Ozox, The Clattering King and Jumblebones will make them more of a threat and encourage blocking, while using a mono-colored deck will reward you for high devotion to that color.

Ramp

Mono-black decks have access to some fantastic ramp in the form of the ‘swamps matter’ archetype. Cabal Coffers is the best example: once you control a few Swamps you’ll be able to tap for tons of mana. The downside is that it doesn’t produce any mana by itself, so be cautious about keeping it in your opening hand.

Cabal Stronghold has a weaker ramp effect, since it costs one more mana to activate and doesn’t count nonbasic Swamps like Witch’s Cottage. However, it does produce colorless mana on its own, so it’s a safer first draw.

Crypt Ghast passively increases your mana production from swamps, effectively doubling your mana production from lands. The ramp provided by Crypt Ghast is huge, but it also has extort, which allows you to pay one extra black mana for your spells to drain one life from each opponent.

The extort ability on Crypt Ghast means that it can double as a combo piece with Ozox, The Clattering King.

An alternative to ramping for more mana is decreasing the cost of your spells. Reducing the casting cost of Ozox, The Clattering King by one generic mana with Jet Medallion enables several combos around replaying it while reducing it by two can create multiple infinite mana combos.

When you play Urza’s Incubator and choose Skeleton as the creature type, Ozox, The Clattering King’s casting cost drops to one black mana. Other Skeletons get the same benefit but tend to be inexpensive anyway, so Semblance Anvil with a creature imprinted is more synergistic with the rest of the creatures in the deck.

Extraplanar Lens is a must-have for mono-colored decks: when it enters, just imprint a basic Swamp (or other basic land in other colors) to double the mana output of all your basic Swamps. Your opponents will get the same benefit from their basic Swamps, but if you use only Snow-Covered Swamps you can all but guarantee they won’t benefit.

Draw

Black has ample access to card draw, often at the cost of paying life or sacrificing a creature. Occasionally, it also rewards you for sacrificing creatures by providing you with fresh cards when one of your creatures dies. Since you’ll be sacrificing your commander and other recurring skeletons frequently, you can lean into this feature.

Liliana, Dreadhorde General draws you a card each time one of your creatures dies, but also creates Zombie tokens and serves as a decoy to pull attention away from you. Your opponents may target her early to prevent her from wiping their board, giving you a little breathing room while they deal with the apparent threat.

Grim Haruspex does almost the same thing, but only for your nontoken creatures. On the other hand, Morbid Opportunist draws you a card any time a creature dies, but only once per turn. If you can work out a way to kill a creature on each of your opponents’ turns, this becomes a powerful, if slow, draw engine.

One of the ways you can guarantee that Morbid Opportunist gets you a card on your opponents’ turn is to use instant cards like Village Rites that trade one of your creatures for a couple of cards. Nasty End is particularly good since it nets three cards when you sacrifice Ozox or Jumblebones.

If you don’t need cards right away, it’s a good idea to sit on Village Rites until you need to dodge removal. Use it to get rid of Ozox or Jumblebones when an opponent tries to gain control of them or remove their abilities, shutting down your deck.

Endless Ranks Of The Dead

Even when you aren’t popping off clattering combos, there’s still a lot of graveyard synergy in the deck.

Tormod, the Desecrator, and Skeleton Crew have similar effects, creating a 2/2 creature whenever cards leave your graveyard. Jumblebones’s trigger will cause Ozox, The Clattering King to leave your graveyard frequently, earning you a growing army of Zombies and Skeletons.

Desecrated Tomb offers a similar effect but produces 1/1 flying Bats instead of undead. While this may not be quite as flavorful, it offers more aerial coverage than anything else with similar effects.

In order to get value out of Ozox, you’ll be sacrificing and replaying it regularly, and Open the Graves gives you value on the front-end. Each time one of your nontoken creatures dies, you’ll get a 2/2 Zombie token. Then you’ll get a second token when Jumblebones dies and bounces Ozox back to your hand, as long as you control any of the previously discussed cards.

One more way that you can squeeze more value out is with Crowded Crypt, a black mana rock that accumulates corpse counters as your creatures die. Once you have as many Corpse Counters as you want, you can sacrifice Crowded Crypt to make that many 2/2 Zombie tokens with decayed in order to overrun your opponents with your undead horde.

Grave Consequences

This deck focuses on sending things to the graveyard and then bringing them back, and there are plenty of cards that add additional effects to the cycle.

Grave Pact is a great way to make yourself the archenemy, because it forces your opponents to sacrifice a creature whenever one of your own dies. Since you’ll be killing your own creatures frequently, this can quickly turn into a one-sided game, even without hitting a combo. Dictate of Erebos has the same effect, but with flash.

Don’t forget about life drain effects that can trigger in a similar manner! Bastion of Remembrance is a classic enchantment to trigger this effect, but there are several other cards with similar effects for redundancy, like Vengeful Bloodwitch. Stacking several of these effects will make your recurrence engine a nightmare for your opponents.

Clattering Combos

The most basic form of the Ozox loop combo is Phyrexian Altar, Ozox, The Clattering King, and Jet Medallion. With these three cards you can sacrifice Ozox, The Clattering King for one black mana, create a Jumblebones token, sacrifice Jumblebones for a black mana, return Ozox, The Clattering King to your hand, and replay Ozox, The Clattering King for the two mana you produced.

This cycle can then be paired with Grave Pact, Bastion of Remembrance, Desecrated Tomb, or many of the other cards discussed to wipe your opponents’ board, create a critical mass of tokens, drain all of your opponents’ life, or draw out your deck.

The combo is reasonably resilient, as there are several backup pieces available. Anything that reduces the cost of Ozox can replace Jet Medallion, and if it reduces the cost by two, like Urza’s Incubator, you’ll have an infinite mana engine. Pitiless Plunderer can also be substituted in to replace Jet Medallion or Phyrexian Altar if paired with a sacrifice outlet.

Ozox himself can be replaced by several other skeletons in the deck with a little tweaking of the combo. Swapping in Reassembling Skeleton or Tenacious Dead works just fine if you replace the Jet Medallion with Pitiless Plunderer. Persistent Specimen can do the same thing if you have an Ashnod’s Altar to sacrifice it to, instead of its Phyrexian cousin.