Midrange is an archetype of cEDH gameplay designed around two key concepts: resiliency and flexibility.

Midrange has existed for as long as cEDH has been around, and it shows no signs of disappearing any time soon.

From age-old decks like TnT to freshly-brewed newcomers like Kefka, Court MageKefka, Court Mage, midrange is everywhere.

If you want to play cEDH, then you have to know how this strategy works - either to pilot it yourself, or play against it.

Keep your eyes up, your mana open, and the word "trigger" at the ready. Good luck in your matches, and thanks for reading!

Capable of repeatedly pushing win attempts throughout the game, usually in the mid-to-late turns (turns three-plus), midrange decks support themselves with consistent, gradual resource accrual and hearty disruption packages.

These decks aren't trying to win first, but they also aren't trying to stop their opponents from progressing, either.

Instead, midrange is all about window shopping: surviving the early-game turbo turns, then launching forward.

On her own, Tymna may not look like a whole lot at first glance. For , this 2/2 Human Cleric with lifelink offers the promise of some card advantage, if you can manage to get through with some creatures each combat.

With no evasion and a small statline, it's easy to dismiss Tymna as ineffective. Afterall, many of the best creatures in cEDH are defined by their immediate relevancy, and Tymna is far from immediate...at least, on her own, that is.

Crucially, Tymna is from the batch of cEDH commanders with the partner mechanic, allowing you to run two different legendary creatures in the command zone.

It's this one extra bonus on Tymna that absolutely breaks the card as a commander, as she'll never be on her own.

From helming Blue Farm alongside Kraum, Ludevic's OpusKraum, Ludevic's Opus, to the TnT team-up with Thrasios, Triton HeroThrasios, Triton Hero, Tymna isn't just an ok engine - she's also an easy way to add on two critical colors to a deck's color identity.

When added to green, for example, Tymna takes unblocked mana dorks and turns them into reliable card advantage.

When in red, she provides a fall back plan for when the faster spells fizzle out. When in blue, she's another layer in the Rhystic StudyRhystic Study-based engine lock.

Speaking of partners, next up on our list is the other half of TnT: Thrasios, Triton HeroThrasios, Triton Hero.

Unlike Tymna, Thrasios here is a compact engine all by himself - if you have to spend, that is.

Breaking down the card and its role in cEDH, Thrasios is a legendary 1/3 Merfolk Wizard for with the activated ability ": Scry 1, then reveal the top card of your library. If it's a land card, put it onto the battlefield tapped. Otherwise, draw a card."

Four mana is a lot to ask for a single card, but - when backed up by mana dorks, cost reducers like Training GroundsTraining Grounds, and untappers like Seedborn MuseSeedborn Muse - Thrasios can quickly become a potent source of both mana and card advantage, cEDH's two most prized resources.

Additionally, Thrasios also has no restrictions on when or how often he can be activated, meaning that his activated ability is also an infinite mana outlet.

On to cEDH's biggest mana deck, it's time to talk about Kinnan, Bonder Prodigy - one of the closest things to high-powered casual that the format has to offer.

For , Kinnan is a 2/2 legendary Human Druid with two devastating abilities. First off, whenever you tap a nonland permanent for mana, add an additional one mana of any type that permanent produced.

Secondly, you can pay to look at the top seven cards of your library and reveal a non-Human creature from among them.

Put that card onto the battlefield, and the rest on the bottom of your library in a random order.

As long as Magic is printing big creatures in Simic that draw cards and/or make mana, Kinnan is going to be popular and powerful.

Not only does Kinnan aid in the mana production necessary to cast (or find via his activated ability) these potent creatures, but so too does he support spell-agnostic gameplay.

Once enough mana is on board, Kinnan can just pass the turn, activate his ability in an endstep however many times it can afford, and win from there - no spell-casting required.

Our first (and only) red commander is none other than Ob Nixilis, Captive KingpinOb Nixilis, Captive Kingpin - a deceptively potent card advantage engine that also enables a one-card combo.

For , Ob Nixilis is a legendary 4/3 Demon creature with flying, trample, and "Whenever one or more opponents each lose exactly 1 life, put a +1/+1 counter on Ob Nixilis, Captive Kingpin. Exile the top card of your library. Until your next end step, you may play that card."

Despite a trigger condition that seems niche at first, Ob Nixilis is actually a card that is rapidly enabled by some of the most commonly played cards in all of cEDH: fetch lands.

Whenever an opponent goes to crack a fetch (which might as well be whenever an opponent plays a land), Ob Nixilis will get a trigger.

Similarly, NecropotenceNecropotence and Ad NauseamAd Nauseam are incredibly powerful and popular bursts of card advantage which are played across black cEDH decks, and Ob Nixilis parasitizes those card in a way that no other deck can even dream of.

Each Necropotence activation grants Ob Nixilis a trigger, as does each one-drop revealed off of Ad Nauseam.

Moving to unique win conditions, Ob Nixilis also has a one-card thanks to All Will Be OneAll Will Be One, provided you have a way to start the chain reaction (i.e. put a +1/+1 counter on Ob Nixilis).

Our last midrange contender is the closest to hard control that cEDH has to offer, without pivoting to stax, and that is Tivit, Seller of Secrets.

For , Tivit is a 6/6 legendary Sphinx Rogue with flying and ward , as well as the trigger ability "Whenever Tivit enters the battlefield or deals combat damage to a player, starting with you, each player votes for evidence or bribery.

For each evidence vote, investigate. For each bribery vote, creature a Treasure token." To further support this ability, Tivit also breaks the way voting normally works, allowing you to vote an additional time.

Rather than providing early support a-la Kinnan, Tivit is a deck that sits back, rests on the power of its color identity, and then invokes its commander when it's time to close out the game.

Pairing Tivit with Time SieveTime Sieve allows you to to take infinite turns (provided you still have all three opponents alive), but until then Tivit does what Esper Midrange does best: searches for Rhystic StudyRhystic Study and Mystic RemoraMystic Remora, counters spells, and waits.

Rhystic StudyRhystic Study, Mystic RemoraMystic Remora, and Esper SentinelEsper Sentinel

As cEDH has become a slower format, so too have the bevy of excellent draw engines become more and more common place across all archetypes - midrange, turbo, and stax.

However, no strategy benefits quite as from these cards as midrange. The midrange goal is to win gradually, after all, and no card rewards you for the game going long more than Rhystic Study.

In order to capitalize on its plethora of resources, midrange decks also take time to slow the pay of play through gradual removal (such as the picking off of creatures by Orcish Bowmasters), the stopping of combos (such as Drannith Magistrate's prohibition of Underworld BreachUnderworld Breach loops), and the silencing of win attempts (such as through cracking a Ranger-Captain at just the right time).

The name of the game with midrange is time, and these are the cards that buy it.

Finally, midrange decks also bring with them some of cEDH's more mana-intensive engines, cards which are either too expensive for other decks or which take too much time to get off the ground.

The One Ring, for example, is an excellent card if you can tap it three or more times.

Otherwise, it's just a HarmonizeHarmonize (or worse), and no one plays that card in cEDH. Similarly, Seedborn Muse generates an inordinate amount of value, if you have an outlet to churn all that mana into.

Outside of cEDH's standard win conditions - Thassa's OracleThassa's Oracle plus Tainted PactTainted Pact/Demonic ConsultationDemonic Consultation and Underworld BreachUnderworld Breach plus any of its many packages - the midrange suite is primarily backed-up by infinite mana combos.

Discounting commander-specific interactions, there are four popular options.

As a starting condition for this combo, Devoted Druid has to be in your graveyard. This allows Hazel's Brewmaster's enters-trigger to exile Devoted Druid, creating a Food token that has the additional activated abilities of ": Add ," as well as "Put a -1/-1 counter on this permanent: Untap it."

From here, you can tap and untap the Food to make infinite , as an infinite amount of -1/-1 counters doesn't matter for a noncreature permanent.

Similar to the Brewmaster option above, this combo also seeks to make infinite mana via a noncreature Devoted Druid, this time by enchanting an on-the-battlefield Devoted Druid with the enchantment Swift Reconfiguration.

This enchantment causes Devoted Druid to become a Vehicle artifact and lose all other card types.

For this combo, all you need to get off the ground is Hullbreaker Horror (or the less-common Tidespout Tyrant), plus two mana rocks which, together, are mana positive: Sol RingSol Ring and Grim MonolithGrim Monolith, Mox AmberMox Amber and Mox OpalMox Opal, etc.

Simply resolve the big blue creature of choice, then cast a spell, which will cause a trigger from the creature to go onto the stack, returning one of your mana rocks to hand.

Replay the newly-untapped mana rock, which will generate another trigger, bouncing the other mana rock. From there, rinse and repeat.

Just like our first combo, this last combo requires a little bit of setup, as Abdel Adrian needs to be in a graveyard for this to function.

From there, enchant it with any Animate Dead-esque enchantment (NecromancyNecromancy and Dance of the DeadDance of the Dead also work), and Abdel will come back from the dead, placing its enters-trigger on the stack.

Use this to exile the animate enchantment, plus any other important nonland permanents (i.e. mana rocks).

This will cause Abdel to die, since the enchantment left play. When that happens, the second part of Abdel's ability will trigger, bringing all of the exiled permanents back into play.

Put the reanimator enchantment back on Abdel, then repeat the loop until you want to stop.

Every time the exiled permanents come back, you can tap any mana rocks exiled this way, which is where the infinite mana comes from.