Liesa, Shroud of Dusk | Upping the Average 

Love Budget decks, love Joey, love Liesa. Win win.

Love the addition of Sunbond/Light of Promise! You know what goes great with those? Duelist's Heritage

the sound that I made when you said voltron, having made a voltron style Liesa deck myself. I didn't know about Sunbond. I need to buy Sunbond.

I love the image of your whole family playing magic together. Adorable!

Probably worth mentioning that Alhammaret's Archive is in the Witherbloom commander deck releasing next week, so it should be easier to find for at least a little while.

😑 my playgroup is gonna hate me.. i was already saying "you're tearing me apart Liesa" but with the added "o, high Market" i'm not sure i'll have friends left...

Good timing! Yesterday I cracked some Commander Legends packs and got her foil etched and was thinking about building her a commander deck.

Tragic that The Room reference will be lost on most of your viewers. But I personally appreciate you going for it.

I appreciate the budget version you include!

I love this idea, thank you for making an effort to make such a strong commander so accessible!

Why yes I was wondering how I could improve my Liesa deck.. Was waiting for this.

Joe's scarfs are definitely upping my opinion on accessories.

Woo! Liesa is one of my new favorite commanders. So glad you made this!

I love Innistrad's Lore and I was stunned when I saw her. It's one of my favorite cards in the game. Great additions to this video would be: Simulacrum (this card has an errata and is VERY NICE here); Wishclaw Talisman and Scheming Symmetry (politics tool and budget-friendly tutor); Pain's Reward (yes, you'll draw 4 cards 99% of the time); Wound Reflection (it works better in a Pillow Fort build, but watching your table tear themselves apart is nice too) and our beloved buddy, Gary, the merchant of Asphodel!! Thank you for the amazing video, Upping the Average not only entertain us, but we get to learn how to deckbuild better.

I love that black/white life gain has so many cool options. A lot of similiar cards in diffenrent decks yet they still are very different to play. Cards I absoluetly love with Liesa are Polluted Bonds, Ankh of Mishra, Sword of War and Peace, Rug of Smothering Isolation Cell and Painful Quandary. Also black/white is just boardwipe heaven. I always struggle to choose the few I put into my deck when there are sooo many good ones. I would love to see a decklist of your dads Karlov deck :D

As usual a great episode! I'd definitely love to see what you would do to Hamza in this series

I made a Pestilence Liesa deck, based on an old favorite casual deck of mine. It has so many unique cards for Liesa according to EDH rec

This was a great way to change out a good amount of money to make the decks run smoother. Keep staying Pawzitive guys 👍

Great video as always. Please keep these coming!!

I know im very late to this video but the "oh high market" killed me

Shocked that you don’t have more subs! This content is great!

I built Liesa with cycling and etbs in mind, running Astral Slide and Drift.

Omg, I about died when you said "you're tearing me apart Liesa"!!

great episode joey :)

A whole family nerding out over magic is hard to believe

Day 1 of asking Joey to make a Ruric Thar Upping the Average episode.

"Oh! and that is only half of it, there's another way they treat me cruely, how often I remember someone saying "There she goes Liesa shroud of desk, or dawn or draws or dumb or dark, so is it a wonder I very often cry! It's D U Single S then single K, that's the way you say Dusk!, Liesa Shroud of Dusk."

No love for Shattered Angel? It's an angel, gains you an absurd amount of life, and has a sorta taxing effect. Seems perfect for Liesa

Glad I picked up Hatred back when it was $20

Loved this video!

Even when people know the damn card's in your deck, nobody is ever emotionally prepared for the moment Hatred drops on them.

I love cleric class in my Liesa, you get that plus a soul sister, and then you can level it up to get "when you gain life, add a +1/+1" which doubles off of itself because of the separate triggers! Great budget card, I found it more useful than Rhox faithmender for sure.

For anyone coming into this video in 2024, I may have some tips and card recommendations. I have ten cards that generate an insane amount of value I've found. 1. Bloodchief Ascencion. Okay so you know vein ripper? In liesa this is that plus lifegain on a one mana enchantment. 2. Kambal, Consul of Allocation. Its a cheaper but less versatile liesa that gains you life passively. A necessary inclusion 3. Vito, Thorn of the Dusk Rose. Sanguine bond on a creature is amazing. 4. Actually Sanguine Bond. Also exquisite blood if you have access but i find infinite combos to be a bit cheap. 5. Esper sentinel. If anything, this deck needs card draw. This with a Phyrexian Arena or especially a Black market Connections really helps down the road. 5. Sorin Markov. Sometimes you're playing against lifegain, they have no flyers, and you have sanguine bond. Set their life total to ten, swing and win. 6. Smothering Tithe. This deck also needs mana a lot. Everyone already hates you. They can only hate you so much. 7. Caduceus staff of Hermes. It turns stuff into non flying indestructible Serra Ascendants. Counters, industructible, and lifegain. So good. 8. Ghostly Prison. Often times I've found that this deck can get extremely overwhelmed by go wide strategies with a lot of creatures. This with 4-5 boardwipes helps with that a lot. Commander tax hurts them more than it hurts you. 9. Vizkopa Guildmage. A sanguine bond for every player on a stackable activated ability is crazy. Possibly the best game ender in this deck. 10. I hate to say it but Avacyn Angel of Hope is unmistakably good in this deck. With your board getting targeted so often putting this into play and then oppressing opponents with a bunch of boardwipes is great. And then it costs them life to rebuild. Worse case she gets Swords, you gain 8 life and get s Sanguine Bond or Vito trigger to ping someone for 8. Thats my advice. Play to set up, keep opponents in check and then boardwipe when there are too many creatures looking your way. You dont even need to hit players directly to steal games. Hell even a Liesa with 3 activations of Vizkopa guildmage is draining everyone for 15. Usually its more.

Celestial mantle seems a good inclusion: 3 colourless 3 white Entchanted creature gets +3/+3 Whenever enchanted creature deals combat damage to a player, double it's controller's life total

This makes me reexamine my Lurrus the Dream Den deck, which uses Liesa, Kambal, Crypt Ghast, and just about every other Extort card.

Would love to see an Upping the Average for Yennett, Cryptic Sovereign

As a long time gain and drain player, I can confirm that sunscorth regent and angelic accord are good. Also, if you really want life gain voltron, uncle Karlov can be a beast.

I run a taxes/group slug version of the deck and it's one of my favorites! For a really nice repeatable life gain source on a land, try slotting in an inventor's fair. Using the tutor ability to grab aetherlux doesn't hurt either.

Wait a second, is that a Liza Minnelli reference in the wild??

Recently I tried using Liesa as commander instead of Karlov for my orzhov life gain deck and the results were impressive.

"Oh hi, Market" got me, you little rapscallion.. well played 🤦

I would love to see an episode on zaxara.

Heliod ballista is in my liesa deck as a win con. Sometimes you just need a way to win now

I was playing Liesa recently, I got a KO on someone with a top deck Sign in Blood lol Opal Palace for Liesa let her swing for 9 (it was a 3-person game) plus the Sign in Blood was exact lethal at 11

11:26 i dont think the average of 1 and 10 is 5... sry for nitpicking :)

I particularly like the new Veinwitch Coven and Stinging Study for this deck! Stinging Study especially is just a better Phyrexian Arena that I think will cost less, so there's no downside to adding it! I've also got a video about Liesa, but mine focuses a lot more on the high budget "life and taxes" style of build, if anyone's interested :)

It would be nice to see an Upping the Average of Brago, King Eternal, if not already happened + I like the content :)

10:24 feel like Joey missed the opportunity to say thank you, next 😅

Knowledge Pool seems to me like such a good card if you're going all-in on punishment. Most punishment cards are tax effects, making it cost extra mana or life to cast spells. Knowledge Pool takes that and doubles up the punishment cost while also not giving people what they want guaranteed. While it also leaves our strategy with a barrier to work through, it's definitely not something to sleep on especially since most of your tax effects are one sided.

If you like tainted sigil try running children of kolis in liesa. Pay one white for a 1/1 body the dosen't require to be tapped but only sac it to gain life equal to the life you've lost this turn. I use it on combination with vilis broker of blood and any pay life to activate effect cards Ex: deepwood ghoul, to draw as much cards as you can spare and crack to reset. I run thought vesel and reliquary to hold in hand all the answers and plays for the rest of game.

Just in time for my lunch break!

I'd love to see an upping the average for The Locust God

Love this series, love Liesa, thank you very much. But I just can't skip over the fact, that average of 1 and 10 is 5.5, not 5...

love The Room references

Auriok Champion's price is due to the current modern metagame, so that is why it is 60 dollars (AKA don't buy it for a while). Also, alhammarret's archive is being reprinted in the new commander decks, so it should be a bit cheaper for a while.

I'm building a Liesa life swap deck. It's really tricky to balance I think. We'll see how it turns out after I can play again.

What the heck, I totally thought that Tainted Sigil only cared about your own life loss!

"oh, hi Mark-et"

Got the reference loloool

im building a Liesa deck atm. Tribal angels i will be making

Think you could try upping the Lyra Dawnbringer average?

Do you happen to know, is there a way to use phrexian gremlins to manipulate winter orb to my advantage?

Just in time. I started working on Liesa death and taxes. Any info for her is welcome!

15:36 *chefs kiss

How do you feel about Necropotence in this deck?

Maybe its time to rebuild my Vito deck ....

I guess im that guy since i want a Liesa Stax deck

Do Obeka 🙏🏼😁🖤

Do K'rrik!

Sun Droplets

I think that if you want to go tribal with liesa you could do a mix of clerics and angels as they both have lifegain themes

Snl skirt reference? Lll

Li instead of Lee its simple as can be see Liza!!!!

MAKE OBEKA UPPING AVERAGE

Joey, you have a 70 USD Command Tower! Put the 0.25 USD instead!

Wait ghostly prison doesn’t make tons of sense in the list, does it? There is enough creature to hold, enough lifegain to sustain losses, and no enchantement payoff in the deck.

I did not hit her. I did not!

maybe add timestamps of the parts? thanks

When Joey pointed out that 1 and 10 will average to 5, anybody else scratch their head and think “Well that’s not true.”

where are the decklists tho?

Cutting Starnheim Aspirant feels like cutting Jeweled Lotus. Aspirant almost guarantees you play Liesa the turn after and any turn after she is out. Liesa rarely gets a full 2 rotations at the table, so I have easily have to cast her for at least 6 additional life each game I've played with Liesa. Aspirant let's you cast your spells and then cast Liesa, a flying lifelinking 5/5, for just 3 mana each turn. And even if Aspirant only helps me cast 1 other angel, that's just gravy! In my estimation, you're underrating it

I don't want to sound offensive, but those inclusions are so bad, that even budget limit can not be an excuse. Like, really? Tap land that gives you life? That and a ton of other questionable cards... Liesa by her own is a weak card, only really strong deck can make her somewhat playable. All of those who I know will just rip me to shreads, and they are casuals! Anyway, thank you for your content

Please do a revised version of this deck. So much. New support

Id add selfless geist. Saves all your soul sisters from a board wipe. Witg all the low cmc stuff that gets super appealing. Keeper of the accord fishes out soul sisters/serra ascendant. Great tutor and filters out the deck. Couldnt have asked for a more fun commander. The variability of winning with voltron/burn/token beatdown is too much to ever grt too bored.

I am so surprised by some of those prices! For me Resplendent angle was a bulk mythic, and phyrexian arena only worth $5. So many prices have changed recently (even in Europe, even though it increased less)