How to build Captain Benjamin Sisko

Each spell or ability you choose modes for on your own turn pays out a 1/1 Officer at your end step, and the Officers set how big a spell Captain Benjamin Sisko's seven-mana ability can cast for free. This build is thirty-five cards that make you choose and a mana base that pays for all five colors at once.

He only counts your own turn

The trigger happens at the beginning of your end step and counts the dilemmas you faced this turn, so a charm cast during somebody else's turn makes nothing. That changes how the instants in this list get played. Abzan Charm, Esper Charm, Kolaghan's Command and the rest are instants because their modes are flexible, but the Officer only comes if the choosing happens on your turn. The default is to spend them in your own main phase and keep one back as an answer, not to sit on four of them while the table takes its turns.

The count is taken when the trigger resolves, not when it goes on the stack, and that gives you a way to have both. Hold Dromoka's Command or Boros Charm up through your turn as protection. If nobody gave you a reason to cast it, cast it in your end step with Sisko's trigger still waiting, and the Officer arrives anyway.

The same rule decides when to activate him. The usual habit with a tap ability is to use it at the end of the turn before yours, so the mana comes straight back. Here that is the wrong turn. Every modal spell the activation casts is a dilemma, and on an opponent's turn those dilemmas make nothing, so activate in your own main phase and the free spells turn into Officers as well.

Five Officers cover all but three spells

The cap matters early and fades quickly. Of the 63 nonland cards in the core list, 45 cost three or less and 55 cost four or less, so three Officers already make about seven in ten of them free, and at five Officers everything is free except Austere Command, Season of Gathering and Deep Space 9. On average three of the five exiled cards are spells and two are lands, and the lands are simply lost, because the ability lets you cast cards and a land cannot be cast. By the time the deck can pay for the activation, the real question is how many spells come off the top, not whether they fit under the number.

Free casting has rules of its own. A spell with X in its cost would come in with X as zero, which is why this list runs none. Additional costs can still be paid, and the best one here is the escalate on Collective Effort, which is paid by tapping creatures rather than with mana. Two Officers are enough to cast it with all three modes, destroying a big creature and an enchantment and putting a +1/+1 counter on every creature you control, for no mana at all.

Timing restrictions go away too. The spells are cast while the ability resolves, so a sorcery like Austere Command or a creature like Jetmir comes off the top on any player's turn. That matters once the deck can untap him.

Paying for all five colors in one activation

asks for every color at the same moment, which is a harder test than casting five-color spells one at a time. Chromatic Lantern and Joiner Adept answer it outright, since both let every land tap for any color. Dryad of the Ilysian Grove gets there by making every land every basic type. Birds of Paradise, Xenobotanist, Arcane Signet and the Treasures from Black Market Connections and Smothering Tithe each cover whichever color is missing. Training Grounds takes the off the cost, leaving one mana of each color, and no other card in the list brings the first activation sooner.

The lands follow from that. Nine Triomes and eight shock lands all carry basic land types, so Windswept Heath, Flooded Strand, Wooded Foothills, Farseek, Nature's Lore and Three Visits each find a two- or three-color land instead of a basic. Krosan Verge is the one to know about. It fetches a Forest and a Plains at once, and the Triomes count, so Jetmir's Garden and Raffine's Tower can come down together and cover all five colors between them.

The color counts land at 29 white sources, 26 blue, 25 black, 26 red and 27 green, and a single pip of any color arrives on time at least 92% of the time. Two pips of one color early is where five colors pays its tax. White, blue and green come in between 74% and 81% for two pips on turn three, and red at 80% for two on turn four. Nearly everything asking for that costs five or six: Austere Command, U.S.S. Enterprise-A, Free Spirit, Kindred Discovery, Mystic Confluence, Glorious Sunrise and Season of Gathering. The cheap exceptions are Collective Effort, which is rarely a turn three play anyway, and D'Vana Tendi, Optimistic Ensign, whose hybrid cost takes green and blue in any mix.

Every extra untap is five more cards

The activation taps him, so its ceiling is how often he untaps. Thousand-Year Elixir does two jobs. It lets him use the ability the turn he is cast, which matters after a removal spell sends him back to the command zone, and for it untaps him for a second go. D'Vana Tendi untaps another permanent by tapping herself, and Retreat to Coralhelm can untap him whenever a land enters, so cracking a fetch land after the first activation readies him for the second. Each of those still needs another seven mana, or five with Training Grounds, so they matter most once the deck has ramped.

Illusionist's Bracers needs no untap at all. Equipped to Sisko, it copies the ability every time you activate it. The copy resolves first, so one payment exiles ten cards and casts from both piles, and it is the first thing to equip once he has lived through a turn cycle.

The Retreats turn land drops into Officers

Four enchantments in the list ask a question whenever a land enters under your control: Retreat to Coralhelm, Retreat to Emeria, Retreat to Hagra and Felidar Retreat. Every answer is a dilemma. With two of them out a normal land drop is two Officers at the end of the turn, and a fetch land is four, because the fetch enters and then so does the land it finds. Dryad of the Ilysian Grove adds a second land drop each turn and Krosan Verge puts two lands down at once, which is why both are here.

Which answer you pick matters too. Retreat to Emeria and Felidar Retreat can make bodies, a Kor Ally or a 2/2 Cat, but neither token is an Officer. On most turns the better answer is the team mode. A counter from Felidar Retreat on every creature turns a row of 1/1s into 2/2s for good, and the drain from Retreat to Hagra takes a point from each opponent per land, which adds up quickly with two land drops a turn.

Federation Outpost is the Star Trek version of the same idea. It taps for white, and once you control two other lands it enters untapped and makes you choose between 2 life and surveil 1. It is a land that makes an Officer all by itself.

Two more permanents ask on a schedule. Black Market Connections asks in every first main phase and Glorious Sunrise at the start of every combat on your turn, so together they are two Officers a turn before you have cast anything. Take the Treasure from Black Market Connections on most turns, because the color it makes is whichever one the activation is short of, and take the 3/2 Shapeshifter when you can spare the three life, because changeling makes it an Officer. Captain James T. Kirk asks when he enters and every time he attacks, and one of his own modes makes an Officer, so an attack with him is two of them: the token now and Sisko's at the end step. With an empty hand he lets you take every mode, and it still counts as one dilemma.

Doubling the end step

Roaming Throne naming Officer makes Sisko's end step trigger fire twice, because he is an Officer and the Throne repeats the triggered abilities of creatures of the chosen type. Both triggers count the same dilemmas, so the Throne doubles every Officer he makes. Annie Joins Up repeats the triggers of any legendary creature, and he is legendary, so with both out the trigger happens three times. Parallel Lives then doubles each of those, which turns a turn with four dilemmas into twenty-four Officers.

Kirk and Picard are legendary Officers too, so both of those cards reach them, and for Kirk that is worth more than a token. A repeated trigger is a second trigger with its own choice of modes, so an attack under Roaming Throne is two dilemmas as well as two Officer tokens. Strionic Resonator is a different kind of card. It copies a trigger instead of repeating it, the copy arrives with its modes already picked, and so it adds tokens but no dilemma. Point it at Sisko's end step trigger, where the number is all that matters.

Name Officer on Kindred Discovery as well. It draws a card whenever an Officer enters or attacks, and his tokens all enter together, so a turn with four dilemmas ends with four new cards as well as four new creatures. Human is the only other type in the list worth thinking about, and it misses every token he makes.

Maskwood Nexus makes every creature you control every creature type, so every creature is an Officer. That raises the activation's cap by however many other creatures you have, lets Kindred Discovery draw for each of them, and makes the Throne repeat every creature's trigger, including Charming Prince and Aether Channeler, which then ask twice on the way in. Mirror Entity does the same until end of turn. Pay X before activating him, and even at X equal to one, every creature on your side counts toward the cap for that activation.

Picard taps seven Officers for a starship

Captain Jean-Luc Picard gives every other creature +1/+1 and makes an Officer whenever you cast a creature or Spacecraft spell, which includes the ones the activation casts for free. His last ability is the one this deck is built to reach. Tap seven untapped Officers and a Spacecraft comes out of your library onto the battlefield with seven charge counters on it. Tapping creatures to pay for another permanent's ability ignores summoning sickness, so the Officers that arrive at your end step can pay for it at once. Sisko and Picard are Officers as well, and they count toward the seven, so tap tokens and leave the commander ready.

There are two ships to fetch. U.S.S. Enterprise-A, Free Spirit lands as a 5/5 flying lifelink creature, since seven counters is past its threshold of six, and it brings three new Officers with it, so it really costs four. Deep Space 9 is the one worth waiting for. Cast, it costs nine. Fetched, it exiles your top four cards as it enters and again in every upkeep, and every permanent card among them goes onto the battlefield. The lands it puts down trigger every Retreat at the start of your own turn, so its upkeep feeds that turn's end step as well. Station two more counters onto it by tapping one Officer that Picard has made a 2/2, and every creature you control gets +3/+3. It is also the station Sisko commanded.

Three good cards that fight this engine

Skullclamp is the usual answer to a deck of 1/1 tokens, and it is missing on purpose. With Picard out every Officer is a 2/2, so the clamp leaves it alive at 3/1 and nothing is drawn. Without him it does draw, but every Officer it kills lowers the number the activation reads. Tocasia's Welcome draws off the same tokens once a turn without costing one.

Delney, Streetwise Lookout repeats the triggers of creatures with power 2 or less, and Sisko is a 2/2, so on paper it is a second Roaming Throne. Picard makes him a 3/3 and switches it off. The Throne has no such condition.

Return of the Wildspeaker looks like the finisher, since Officer tokens are not Human and +3/+3 on a wide board ends games. Maskwood Nexus makes every creature every type, Human included, and with the Nexus out that mode reaches nothing. The list keeps the Nexus and finishes with Akroma's Will, which with Sisko on the battlefield gives the whole team flying, double strike, indestructible and protection from every color in one spell.

Austere Command leaves your crew standing

Austere Command picks two of four modes, and two of those split creatures by mana value, three or less against four or more. Every token has a mana value of zero, Sisko's is two and Picard's and Kirk's are three, so four or more plus whichever of artifacts or enchantments hurts the table more leaves your Officers, your commander and most of your creatures where they are. What you lose is Jetmir, Roaming Throne and the Enterprise-A once it has become a creature.

Fiery Confluence needs the same care from the other side. One of its modes deals 1 damage to every creature, which kills every Officer still at 1/1. The other two are 2 damage to each opponent and an artifact kill, and you may repeat a mode, so three rounds of the damage mode is six to every opponent, a finisher once the board has done its work.

Why the core list sits at bracket 3

Smothering Tithe and Jeska's Will are the core list's only Game Changers, and both are there for the turn you activate. Smothering Tithe makes a Treasure whenever an opponent draws and will not pay . Jeska's Will, with Sisko on the battlefield, adds red mana for every card in an opponent's hand and also exiles three cards you may play, and choosing both of those is a dilemma of its own. Bracket 3 allows three Game Changers, so one new mark on a Star Trek card here leaves the floor where it is, and a second would move it to 4.

The core list

Thirty-five of these hundred make you pick a mode. Point at any card name to see the card, and the printing that appears is the one whose price is counted.

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Cheap lands cost the Retreats their second trigger

The budget rung takes the core list from at least $613 to at least $162 in twenty-three swaps, and eighteen of them are lands. The Triomes become the tri-lands in the same colors, which costs less than it looks, since both kinds enter tapped. What that swap really loses is the land types, so Farseek, Nature's Lore, Three Visits and Krosan Verge go back to finding basics and the few shock lands that stay. The fetch lands go, and with them the second Retreat trigger each one gave you. Two of them become Quark's Bar and The Unicomplex, the set's other two lands that make you choose when they enter untapped, so each still makes an Officer. Four shock lands become Star Trek's Planets, two-color lands that enter tapped and gain a life, and Bajor takes Sacred Foundry's place for the same red and white. It is the world that called Sisko its Emissary.

Five other cards change. Smothering Tithe and Jeska's Will, the two Game Changers, become Commander's Sphere and Season of the Bold, which still makes Treasure, still exiles cards to play and still counts as a dilemma. Roaming Throne becomes Intangible Virtue, so the end step trigger stops repeating and the tokens get +1/+1 and vigilance instead. Parallel Lives becomes Retreat to Kazandu, a fifth card that asks on every land. Thousand-Year Elixir becomes DOT-7 Repair Squad, a Star Trek flier that untaps a creature for once a turn at sorcery speed. That is a smaller loss than it sounds, because your own main phase is where the activation belongs anyway.

What the rung gives up is pace, and the engine survives it. Sixteen lands now always enter tapped, red and blue each come in one source short of 90% for a single pip on turn two, and Annie Joins Up is the only card left that repeats the end step trigger. Every modal spell still turns into a body. The rung has no Game Changers, so it sets no bracket floor above 1, and it belongs at bracket 2 regardless, since a board that grows by four or five creatures a turn is not what a bracket 1 table expects to face.

The bracket 4 rung swaps eleven cards and comes to at least $1,052, adding six Game Changers to the core's two. Seedborn Muse is the card it is built around. It untaps your permanents during every other player's untap step, Sisko and your lands included, so the activation can happen on every player's turn instead of once a round. Those extra activations make no Officers, for the reason in the first section, but each one is still five cards off the top.

Anointed Procession and Doubling Season join Parallel Lives, and three doublers make every Officer eight. Doubling Season also doubles the seven charge counters from Picard's search, so Deep Space 9 arrives with fourteen and gives the team +3/+3 straight away. Enlightened Tutor and Demonic Tutor find those pieces. Three Tree City naming Officer taps for as much of one color as you have Officers, Mana Confluence and Marsh Flats tighten the colors, and Rhystic Study, Cyclonic Rift and Fierce Guardianship are the usual reasons a bracket 4 table plays blue. What leaves is the cheapest modal cards and three lands that enter tapped, and none of those cuts touches the plan. The result expects tutors and free counterspells from the other side of the table, and it stops being welcome anywhere they are not.

FAQ

What counts as a dilemma for Captain Benjamin Sisko?

Choosing one or more modes for a spell or ability. His card has no reminder text for it, and the definition is printed on Seven of Nine instead. One spell or ability is one dilemma however many modes it takes, so Mystic Confluence makes one Officer, not three. A Retreat asking on a land drop counts, Black Market Connections asking in your main phase counts, and so does Captain James T. Kirk's attack trigger.

Does a charm cast on an opponent's turn make an Officer?

No. The trigger happens at your own end step and counts the dilemmas you faced during that turn, so anything chosen on another player's turn is not counted. The count is taken when the trigger resolves, though, so an instant cast in your own end step with the trigger on the stack still makes one.

Can Sisko's ability cast sorceries on another player's turn?

Yes. The spells are cast while the ability resolves, which sets aside the usual timing rules, so a sorcery or a creature it exiles can be cast on any turn, and the ability itself can be activated whenever you have priority. Activate it in your own main phase anyway, because the modal spells it casts only make Officers on your turn.

How much does a Captain Benjamin Sisko deck cost?

At least $613 for the core list, buying the cheapest paper printing of every card. That counts 92 of the 100 cards, because the eight Star Trek cards in it have no price yet. Moving down to the budget rung brings that to at least $162 and moving up to bracket 4 takes it to at least $1,052. Both of those skip the unreleased cards as well, the budget one a few more, since it adds Star Trek lands and a Star Trek flier.

Can Benjamin Sisko, Besieged go in the same deck?

Yes. The legend rule only stops two cards with the same name, and Benjamin Sisko, Besieged is a different card, a green 5/5 Officer for six from the Star Trek Commander set that lets you play lands and cast creatures from the top of your library. He is not in this list because it runs fourteen creatures, so the top card would rarely be one he can cast. He does show you the first of the five cards the activation is about to exile.

When can you play Captain Benjamin Sisko in Commander?

He becomes legal on 13 November 2026. Seven other cards in this list are new in the same set and become legal that day too, so a deck checker run before then refuses all eight for being unreleased, and the list needs no change when the date comes.