Bedecked Brokers Upgrade Guide

Ever find yourself in need of some help, but don’t know where to turn? Have no fear, the Brokers are just the folks to get you out of such a bind. It’ll cost you a favor or two, but it’s nothing you can’t handle. Just sign on the dotted line and all your troubles will disappear.

This new Commander deck from Streets of New Capenna is all about putting counters on your things and using those counters to buff up your creatures. In this Bedecked Brokers Upgrade Guide, I’m going to talk about five interesting ideas for how to upgrade the deck. Hopefully one or more of them will give you the inspiration you need to make this deck your own.

A Brief Note on Budget

Before we get too far into this, I need to make my same old disclaimer. There are tons of articles, podcasts, videos, and more out there about how to build the best version of this deck. So rather than aiming for optimization, my goal with this article is to brainstorm a bunch of unique ideas that may or may not be powerful. I will be happy if you are able to take some information from this article and use it to craft your own deck.

Maybe you build the most optimized version. Maybe you build a terrible jank version. Maybe your deck is somewhere in between. Either way, I hope to contribute to something that you genuinely love playing in your playgroup or at your LGS.

For that matter, I don’t claim to be able to come up with all the ideas for upgrading this deck. The ones I list in this article are the top five that I came up with, but there are certainly more than this. If you think of an awesome way to build around these commanders, please let me know down in the comments. I’m always willing to hear cool new ideas.

And lastly, in the interest of cultivating as many ideas as possible, I don’t put a budget restriction on the cards in these articles. Hopefully you can find inspiration regardless of your budget, but I will include any card I find that might be useful to any given strategy. When possible, I will make a note if a cheaper option is available, though.

If you don’t already own the Bedecked Brokers precon, you can get it on Amazon.

Bedecked Brokers Decklist

The preview images for the new cards might not be available yet. You can find them in the New Capenna Commander article and in the New Capenna spoilers article.

Bedecked Brokers General Upgrades

Credit where credit is due: Wizards of the Coast has done a great job building new pre-constructed Commander decks for their Commander products. They are focused, include interesting new cards, and generally have valuable reprints. This deck is really no exception.

If I were to make one complaint about this deck, it is that they definitely could have included a wider variety of counters. I can see that they already have a ton of different kinds, but later in this article I will go over dozens of other counters that could have been easy to include. In a deck that cares about the number of unique counters on your things, there are a lot of repeat kinds of counters. If you only drew your +1/+1 counters cards, the deck would not be performing optimally.

This is a very small concern. Overall, Bedecked Brokers precon is a great deck that I feel confident recommending to anyone. Even still, I have a few great ideas for how to make it better.

The Mana Base

First things first, a deck’s mana base can always be better. Three-color decks are where you might start to have trouble casting your spells if you don’t have an optimal mana base. So let’s go over the pillars of good mana:

Having The Right Colors

First, you want to make sure that you have all of your colors. Cards like Spara’s Headquarters (new in SNC) and Treva’s Ruins can make sure you have all three of your colors when you need them. Similarly, Mana Confluence, City of Brass, Grand Colisseum, and Reflecting Pool act as three-color lands in decks that only have three colors.

One of the weaknesses of some of those lands, though, is that they have a negative impact on your deck’s tempo. These are the lands that enter the battlefield tapped or make you return a land you control to your hand. Sure, they give you access to all of your colors. But they also make you play a turn slower since you don’t instantly have access to those colors.

Enter The Battlefield Untapped

Fetch lands like Windswept Heath, Flooded Strand, and Misty Rainforest can help you find dual lands that can enter the battlefield untapped. Examples of these lands include Savannah, Tundra, Tropical Island, Temple Garden, Hallowed Fountain, and Breeding Pool. The ability of these cards to work together makes up for the fact that the dual lands only tap for two colors of mana. You can always fetch the color that you need when you need it.

Outside the realm of fetchable lands, we have card like:

• Bountiful Promenade
• Sea of Clouds
• Rejuvenating Spring
• Overgrown Farmland
• Deserted Beach
• Dreamroot Cascade
• Horizon Canopy
• Waterlogged Grove

Each of these tap for two colors, enter the battlefield untapped, and sometimes even have additional utility. This is by no means an exhaustive list, but being in three colors means you don’t have to dip as far into the pool of playable lands if you don’t need to.

Obviously, some of those lands are more expensive than others. You can also look into Pain Lands, Filter Lands, and even other useful lands that enter the battlefield tapped to accommodate your budget. Just keep in mind that playing your spells will be easier if you have as many dual lands that enter untapped as you can.

What to Take Out

I wouldn’t say that this deck has many if any “bad” cards in it. In fact, chances are good that I will be recommending more suboptimal cards than there already are in the deck. For the most part, I think that the cards you should take out will depend on which upgrade path you ultimately end up choosing.

I am a firm believer in including as many cards in the deck as possible that can synergize with your strategy. Because of this, utility cards that contribute to the deck’s game plan are better than cards with similar abilities that are simply powerful.

For each upgrade path, I will discuss briefly the cards that I think you can take out of the deck. I don’t have any, though, that I would recommend cutting before we even start.

5 Ways to Upgrade Bedecked Brokers

And now, here are the five ideas I came up with to upgrade this deck:

1. Voltron
2. Varied Counters
3. Tribal
4. Goad
5. Shield Counters

As I said before, there are likely other cool upgrade ideas that I haven’t come up with. Please contribute to this brainstorm article with any great ideas you have in the comments section at the end of the article.

Power Level

At the beginning of each of the next sections, I included a range of numbers. That range is what I expect this deck to be able to perform at on a 1-10 power scale (based on the power scale established by the Command Zone Podcast). For more information on the Commander power scale, you can take a look at the table below.

Actual power levels may vary, but let those numbers be a guide when considering upgrading this deck in those ways.

1. Voltron (4-7)

Recommended Commander: Perrie, the Pulverizer

If you are unfamiliar with Voltron decks, let me give you a quick explanation of what that means. Inspired by the animated series from the 80s, Voltron refers to a deck strategy where you build up one single Creature, usually your commander, to be able to deal enough Commander damage to kill and opponent. Oftentimes, players use Equipment or Auras to increase their Voltron’s power. However, in this instance, Perrie can buff a Creature himself based on how many kinds of counters you control. So let’s look at how we can get counters on Perrie to make him more powerful:

(Note: If I forgot to include a keyword counter in this list, it is likely because it already appears on a card in the precon. Since Perrie cares about unique kinds of counters, I tried to avoid counters that the deck already has.)

• Vivien, Monster’s Advocate
• Luminous Broodmoth
• Flycatcher Girrafid
• Helica Glider
• Vitality Hunter

In addition to these cards, you can also use +1/+1 counters to buff up your creature’s power. You should just note that Perrie will only count a single counter with his ability.

If you work so hard to get your counters onto your Creature, though, you will want to make sure they stay on that Creature. The precon comes with cards like Nesting Grounds and Power Conduit, but neither of these are as good as The Ozolith at this role. A Perrie deck would be incomplete without a copy of this card.

New Cards From Streets of New Capenna

The number one card that this deck needs from New Capenna is Luxior, Giada’s Gift. This card is basically another copy of Perrie, which means your counters can make your Creature even stronger. Other than that, there aren’t many cards with unique kinds of counters from the main set. There are, however, plenty of cards that reward you for having counters:

• Celestial Regulator
• Falco Sparra, Pactweaver
• Fight Rigging
• Metropolis Angel
• Sanctuary Warden

What to Take Out

While useful cards, Declaration in Stone, Bant Charm, Tezzeret’s Gambit, Urban Evolution, and Rishkar’s Expertise don’t really contribute to this deck’s strategy. It would be better to find ramp, removal, card draw, etc. that also works well with counters.

Additionally, it seems like there are a lot of ways to proliferate in this deck. Proliferate could work well with Kros or other cards from the set, but Perrie doesn’t care about have two or more of the same kind of counter on anything. You could definitely cut down on some or all of the proliferate cards.

2. Varied Counters (2-6)

Recommended Commander: Perrie, the Pulverizer

While writing this article, I had a difficult time differentiating this section from the previous one. After all, the last section also wanted to accumulate a wide variety of unique types of counters.

Here’s the distinction I was able to come up with. The Voltron section of this article is going to include counters that, for the most part, you would put on Perrie or another single creature to pump up their power.

This section of the article also tries to pump up one Creature’s power, but does so by playing cards with various kinds of counters on any kind of permanent. In other words, this section is not discriminating on whether the card is “good” or “bad”, but rather on whether it has a kind of counter that we have or have not used yet.

Counters Galore

If you are like me, you will be surprised by the sheer number of unique kinds of counters that can show up in a game of Magic: The Gathering. Many of these cards are likely not very helpful to making a powerful deck. However, while this deck will still be able to win games, the goal is probably to impress your friends with the random counters that they have never heard of that you were able to find.

Remember, cards that you find that have cumulative upkeep naturally get Age Counters, Sagas naturally get Lore Counters, and Planeswalkers naturally have Loyalty Counters. Those are easy.

And finally, before we get to the actual list, if a certain kind of counter doesn’t appear below, it is possible that I missed them in my research. However, it is also possible that a card with that kind of counter appears in the precon. Since we are trying to diversify our counters as much as possible, I tried to not include repeat counter types here.

If I genuinely missed one, though, feel free to let me know in the comments, and I will add it to the list. Additionally, if a card doesn’t directly reference the counter that I claim it does, it is possible that the card’s errata does.

The List of Counters:

It is worth noting that this deck opens up the possibility of using a few alternative win-conditions. For example, Azor’s Elocutors and Helix Pinnacle both give you unique ways to win and also synergize with the strategy of using unique counters.

New Cards From Streets of New Capenna

For the most part, the new cards for this strategy are the same as the ones from the previous section. I won’t repeat myself, so feel free to scroll up and apply everything I said in that part to this one.

What to Take Out

For this version of the deck, choose your favorite card that adds a unique kind of counters (including +1/+1, -1/-1, hexproof, flying, charge counters, etc.) and cut all the other cards. Try to select cards that have other utility, but you don’t need to repeat any kinds of counters. Perrie will reward you for doing so.

3. Tribal

Some sets, like Innistrad, Zendikar, and Kaldheim, give us tribal-focused Commander decks. Not all precons have a tribal theme, but all commanders are members of a tribe. Whenever we get new decks, I like to look at the commanders that come in them in the context of the rest of their tribe. Sometimes, they don’t contribute anything. Other times, you find interesting synergies that you might not have considered otherwise. Let’s look at the commanders from this deck and see if we can find any of those gems.

Rhinos (5-7)

Recommended Commander: Perrie, the Pulverizer

You’ve likely never experienced a tribal Rhinos deck in the wild. There are honestly not very many Rhinos in the game, and none of them care about other Rhinos. However, there are a handful of very useful Rhinos in the game. Additionally, some of them care about +1/+1 counters, which actually works well with Perrie.

Some other Rhinos work decently well with gaining life. This doesn’t matter very much to Perrie, except that cards like Heliod, Sun-Crowned, Sunbond, Light of Promise, or Cleric Class can translate your life gain into counters. You will most likely need a combination of these effects in order to maximize the effectiveness of this obscure tribe.

• Charging Rhino
• Cliffrunner Behemoth
• Crashing Footfalls
• Crowned Ceratok
• Dauntless Escort
• Enraged Ceratok
• Gnarlback Rhino
• Horncaller’s Chant
• Loyal Guardian
• Master Symmetrist
• Mirror-Sigil Sergeant
• Rhox
• Rhox Bodyguard
• Rhox Charger
• Rhox Faithmender
• Rhox Maulers
• Rhox Meditant
• Rhox Oracle
• Rhox Veteran
• Rhox War Monk
• Rockcaster Platoon
• Roon of the Hidden Realm
• Stonehorn Dignitary
• Thriving Rhino
• Thundering Ceratok

New Cards From Streets of New Capenna

Although rare in other worlds of Magic, Rhinos run rampant in New Capenna. Here are some of the new Rhinos from the set:

• Freelance Muscle
• Rhox Pummeler
• Workshop Warchief

Soldiers (4-7)

Recommended Commander: Perrie, the Pulverizer

In contrast to Rhinos, Soldiers have been around for a very long time. Because of this, building a Soldier tribal deck is quite a bit easier. However, blue and green are colors that are not used as commonly, so lets look at some of the things that those colors can add to this tribe, with relation to Perrie’s abilities.

• Bant Sojourners
• Battlewise Hoplite
• Coralhelm Commander
• Enclave Elite
• Halimar Wavewatch
• Leech Bonder
• War-Wing Siren
• Joraga Auxiliary
• Salt Road Quartermasters
• Servant of the Scale
• Spike Soldier

New Cards From Streets of New Capenna

There are a few solid Soldiers in this set that could contribute well to this deck’s strategy. We’ve mentioned some of them before, but I’ll list them here again since they show up in a slightly different context.

• Metropolis Angel
• Lagrella, the Magpie
• Brokers Veteran
• Dapper Shieldmate
• Rhox Pummeler
• Sanctuary Warden
• Wingshield Agent

Cats (3-4)

Recommended Commander: Kros, Defense Contractor

Several years ago, Cats was a theme in one of the Commander decks from the yearly Commander product. That deck was green/white, and firmly established those colors as the most well-supported Cat tribal colors. You can find cats in other colors as well, but few if any of them contribute to the larger goals of the tribe. Oftentimes, these tribe members want to wear equipment and hit for a bunch of damage. Unfortunately, this is not really what the Bedecked Brokers deck wants to do, even with Kros as the commander.

If you are interested in reading more about tribal Cats, check out the Cat precon in article with all 63 Commander precons, or the Cabaretti Cacophony upgrade article. Otherwise, I could not find a compelling reason to try to force Bant Cats. If you are successful in doing so, I would love to hear about it down below in the comments.

New Cards From Streets of New Capenna

If you do go for a Cats deck, here are some of the new cards you might consider adding to the deck:

• Broker’s Initiate
• Chrome Cat
• Civil Servant
• Jewel Thief
• Mage’s Attendant
• Rigo, Streetwise Mentor
• Spara’s Adjudicators

Advisors (3-6)

Recommended Commander: Kros, Defense Contractor

The low-hanging fruit with tribal Advisors is always Persistent Petitioners. They, more than any other card in the game, care about Advisors as a tribe. While it is perfectly reasonable to build a Bant Advisors Mill deck, there are a few other things that Advisors are good at. Here is a list of the relevant ones I could find:

• Azor’s Elocutors
• Bruvac, the Grandiloquent
• Council of the Absolute
• Droning Bureaucrats
• Gaddock Teeg
• Generous Patron
• Glenn, the Voice of Calm
• Grand Arbiter Augustin IV
• Jakob Hauken, Inspector
• Kongming “Sleeping Dragon”
• Loyal Retainers
• Masako, the Humorless
• Mavinda, Student’s Advocate
• Novijen Sages
• Orzhov Advokist
• Scholarship Sponsor
• Seasoned Tactician
• Tomik, Distinguished Advokist

Notably, Stax is probably the thing that Advisors are second best at. If this strategy seems interesting to you, I absolutely encourage you to give it a try. However, be sure that your playgroup or anyone else that you play against is willing to be apart of such a game.

New Cards From Streets of New Capenna

There are lots of new Advisors in SNC. Most of them are not Stax pieces, for better or for worse, but you might still be able to find some usable cards among them:

• Angelic Observer
• Celestial Regulator
• Ledger Shredder

What to Take Out

In my opinion, tribal decks should be completely or at least mostly made of tribe members. If it were me, I would take out every Creature that wasn’t a member of the tribe I was building around to make room for more cards that fit the theme.

However, I know that there are lots of people out there who are okay with a few cards from other tribes in their tribal decks. Both ways are fine. That being said, you can probably remove any or all of the off-tribe Creatures that you want. You could also look at the non-Creature cards to see which ones contribute well to your tribe’s strategy, and take out the ones that don’t.

4. Goad (4-6)

Recommended Commander: Kros, Defense Contractor

There are not very many goad cards in the game that are blue, white, or green. However, when your commander is one of the cards goading other creatures, you can get away with running cards that trigger your commander’s ability instead. For reference, here are all the cards with Goad that could fit in this deck:

• Bloodthirsty Blade
• Coveted Peacock
• Jeering Homunculus
• Martial Impetus
• Predatory Impetus
• Psychic Impetus
• Sly Instigator

Bident of Thassa, Vow of Flight, and Illusionist’s Gambit are also honorable mentions in the world of making your opponent’s Creatures attack even if they don’t want to.

Like I said, it will probably be more common for you to try to goad your opponents’ Creatures with Rigo’s ability than any of these cards. You will want to put/move counters onto your opponents Creatures, and Proliferate those counters. The deck comes with Nesting Grounds and Power Conduit, but you could definitely use more cards that do this.

• Orzhov Advokist
• Evolutionary Escalation
• Fall of the Imposter
• Nils, Discipline Enforcer
• Promise of Loyalty
• The Ozolith
• Regna’s Sanction
• Meadowboon
• Contagion Engine

New Cards From Streets of New Capenna

Again, there aren’t any new cards from the set with Goad, but there are a small handful that can put counters on Creatures your opponents control. Most of these cards are flexible, as they can also put these counters on Creatures you control in most instances. Be aware of that as you consider putting these in your deck.

• Backup Agent
• Boon of Safety
• Caldaia Strongarm
• Elspeth Resplendent
• Slip Out The Back

What to Take Out

Its going to be tough to sift through which of the counters cards from the precon can or cannot fit in this deck. A good rule of thumb in to include anything that can put a counter on “target creature” rather than “target creature you control”. That way, you can always choose to Goad one of your opponents’ Creatures or just buff one of your own.

Unlike in previous sections, I really like the Proliferate cards in this version. Proliferating puts another counter on an opponent’s Creature, even if it is the same as a counter that Creature already has. For Kros, that still counts as putting a counter on a Creature you don’t control.

Other than cards that do exactly these things, feel free to take out anything else. Keeps cards you like or cards that give you necessary utility, but you already know that. I’m beating a dead horse at this point.

5. Shield Counters (4-8)

Recommended Commander: Perrie, the Pulverizer

The last upgrade path I want to cover in this article is related to the set mechanic for the Brokers family. Shield Counters play in a way that is very similar to mechanics like Regenerate or Totem Armor. Basically, they let you save your creature if it would be destroyed or dealt damage. Because of this, there is at least one very mean way to build around this mechanic: Board wipes. If you use all of your resources to put Shield Counters on your things, then play Wrath of God, that board wipe will be mostly one sided.

A lot of people don’t like playing against these kinds of decks, because it can be frustrating to build up your side of the battlefield only to have it destroyed again and again. This is another one of those strategies that you should make sure your opponents are okay playing against before you commit to a game. However, if everyone is in agreement, you could have a lot of fun building an immortal army of shielded soldiers.

How To Build The Deck

I don’t think this deck needs too much of an explanation. Basically, if a card says, “Destroy all creatures”, it’s probably one that you want to include. Avoid board wipes that exile, bounce, or sacrifice, as those will get around the Shield Counters.

Additionally, Shield Counters can be removed by non-lethal damage. Avoid situations where your Creatures might take damage, even if they will live through the encounter. This just makes it so you are more likely to survive your own board wipe onslaught.

Lastly, you might want to include some counter magic just in case your opponents can remove your Shield Counters at instant speed. I don’t usually recommend a lot of counterspells in these articles, but you’re already playing a board wipe tribal deck. Might as well commit to the meanness.

New Cards From Streets of New Capenna

New Capenna has a couple of cards in it that do what you’re trying to do. Specifically, there’s Depopulate, Soul of Emancipation, and Titan of Industry seem like really synergistic cards. Also, anything that puts Shield Counters on themselves or other permanents you control would be obvious includes for this deck.

What to Take Out

There are a good number of cards that give you Shield Counters in the precon. Keep all of them except for Kros, Defense Contractor. While he does put Shield Counters on things, he puts them on your opponents’ Creatures, which could save them when you wipe the board. If you like that kind of politics, Kros could still be a valuable card in your deck. Otherwise, he is a safe cut.

Bedecked Brokers Upgrade – Conclusion

And that about wraps it up for Bedecked Brokers Upgrade Guide. I hope you were able to get your creative juices flowing, and that you have some cool ideas for how to upgrade your Bedecked Brokers precon.

If you would like to get a hold of me, leave a message in the comments below, or find me on Instagram or Twitter. I will also be releasing an episode of the Gathering: My Thoughts MTG Podcast where I go over potential upgrade paths for this deck. You can find that podcast on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

If you’d like to crack some Capenna packs to try your luck and perhaps open some cards that would upgrade your Bedecked Brokers deck, you can get a New Capenna Set booster box on Amazon.

More Content

Perhaps you want to upgrade another one of the Streets of New Capenna Commander decks. In that case you should come back soon as you’ll be able to find the upgrade guides for the other articles here as well:

• Maestros Massacre Upgrade Guide
• Cabaretti Cacophony Upgrade Guide
• Obscura Operation Upgrade Guide
• Riveteers Rampage Upgrade Guide