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How to build Pavel Chekov, First Posting

Pavel Chekov lets you swap any draw for a land or a spell, whichever you name. So this build draws as often as Simic can manage, asks for a land while it still has a land drop to fill, and asks for a spell every time after that.

Art by Matt Stewart

Take a land while a land drop is left, and a spell once they are gone

The decision Chekov hands you comes up every turn, and the rule for it is short. Until you have played every land you are allowed this turn, ask for a land. After that, ask for a nonland card. A deck with this many extra land drops normally has two problems. It runs out of lands to play, and the lands it draws late in the game are dead cards. This list runs 37 lands and has neither problem, because each draw comes from whichever half of the deck the turn needs.

Exploration, Dryad of the Ilysian Grove, Oracle of Mul Daya, Wayward Swordtooth, Captain Kathryn Janeway and Aesi, Tyrant of Gyre Strait each let you play one more land a turn, and Azusa, Lost but Seeking lets you play two more. Explore and Urban Evolution give one extra drop for the turn you cast them. Burgeoning lets a land in your hand go onto the battlefield whenever an opponent plays one, which spends the land picks on other players’ turns. With Azusa and Exploration both out you can play four lands a turn, so a hand holding one land wants its next three picks to be lands as well.

Every card that draws and then puts a land down is now a sure thing

Growth Spiral draws a card, and then a land in your hand can go onto the battlefield as well. On its own that is a gamble on what you draw. With Chekov out the draw can be the land, so it is two mana for a card and a ramp every time. Uro, Titan of Nature’s Wrath does the same on entering and on every attack once it escapes, with 3 life on top. Lt. Arex, Ever-Adapting draws three and puts up to three lands from your hand onto the battlefield tapped, so three land picks are three lands, and Arex grows with each new name among them, since his power and toughness count your differently named lands.

Explore and Urban Evolution work the same way from the other side. Each grants an extra land drop and draws as well, and the draw is what fills the drop. Several other cards hold a draw in reserve until you know which half you want. Tireless Tracker makes a Clue every time a land enters, and cracking a Clue later is a draw you can turn into either kind. Waterlogged Grove sacrifices itself for a card the same way, and Tranquil Thicket and Lonely Sandbar can be cycled for one mana.

Tatyova and Aesi turn each land into the next pick

Tatyova, Benthic Druid draws a card and gains you 1 life every time a land enters, and Aesi draws on the same trigger if you want it to. Replace that draw with a land pick, play the land, and the land you just played triggers them again. The chain runs as long as you have land drops. With Azusa beside Aesi, one land from your hand becomes four lands, and the trigger from the fourth is a spell. Once the drops are spent, every trigger after that becomes a nonland pick. Lotus Cobra adds a mana for each of those lands, and Simic Growth Chamber returns a land to your hand as it enters, so you get to play that land a second time and trigger everything again.

The same lands are what this deck wins with. Avenger of Zendikar arrives with one 0/1 Plant per land you control, and every land after that grows each Plant by a +1/+1 counter. Scute Swarm copies itself on each land once you control six, and Rampaging Baloths makes a 4/4 for each one. Field of the Dead makes a 2/2 Zombie whenever a land enters while you control seven or more lands with different names. The list has 26 nonbasic lands with their own names plus Forest and Island, though six of the 26 sacrifice themselves to go and get another land, so the count builds up over the middle of the game. Starship Enterprise takes four charge counters per land and becomes a 4/6 flier at sixteen, which is four lands. Each point of combat damage it does to a player is a card drawn, so connecting once is four picks.

Let Mr. Spock double the draw first, then take both cards as picks

Mr. Spock, Science Officer replaces each draw with two draws. When two replacement effects want the same draw, the player drawing picks the order, which is how the rulings handle Thought Reflection, a card with Mr. Spock’s exact wording. Apply Mr. Spock first and you are drawing two cards, then Chekov replaces each of those two with a pick. In the other order Chekov takes the draw away and leaves Mr. Spock nothing to double. So with both out, every draw in the deck becomes two picks. Without Chekov he still turns every landfall draw into two cards, so he is worth casting on a turn when Chekov has been removed. Harmonize is six, a Tatyova trigger is two, and a draw step with Sylvan Library is six cards that you choose.

Alhammarret’s Archive doubles every draw except the first one in your draw step, which covers the landfall draws and the draw spells, and it doubles the life from Tatyova, Courser of Kruphix and Earth, Sector 001 as well. Deep Space Scan draws one card for each differently named land you control and lifts your hand size limit until your next turn, and Pull from Tomorrow draws any number you can pay for and then has you discard one. Reliquary Tower removes the limit for good, which matters in a deck where a big turn can end with more than seven cards in hand.

Sylvan Library cannot charge you for a card you never drew

Sylvan Library lets you draw two extra cards in your draw step, then makes you choose two cards in your hand drawn this turn and pay 4 life for each one or put it back on top. Its rulings deal with exactly this case. If you replaced the draws, the cards you got were never drawn, and if you have not drawn any card that turn, the rest of the ability does nothing. Replace the normal draw and both extra draws with Chekov and you keep three cards you chose, for no life, with nothing going back on top. If you let one draw through as a real draw, that is the card you must choose, so the habit is to replace all three.

It costs two mana, and with Chekov beside it it is the best card in the deck: three cards of your choosing every turn, and nothing to pay for them.

Play the land on top before you ask for a spell

A nonland pick sends every land it turns over to the bottom at random, and a land pick does the same to spells. That makes the top card worth knowing, and three cards here tell you what it is. Courser of Kruphix and Oracle of Mul Daya play with it face up and let you play lands from the top, and Captain Pike, Fullness of Time lets you look whenever you like and play lands from there too. When the top card is a land and you still have a land drop, play it from the library before the next draw spell or landfall trigger, so the nonland pick that follows starts past it instead of burying it. In your draw step the same land is the card to take, by drawing normally or by asking for a land, because asking for a spell would send it to the bottom.

Retreat to Coralhelm scries 1 whenever a land enters, which is one more look at the top after each land you play off it. Castle Vantress scries 2. Captain Kathryn Janeway makes each creature you control explore as it enters, which reveals the top card, puts a land into your hand and leaves a spell where it is or in the graveyard, whichever you choose.

Scapeshift and Genesis Device swap every land at once

Scapeshift sacrifices as many of your lands as you like and puts that many from your library onto the battlefield, all in one go, so every landfall card triggers once for each of them. Genesis Device fetches a basic or a Planet when it enters, and later does what Scapeshift does for five mana, a tap and the Device itself. Titania, Protector of Argoth makes a 5/3 whenever one of your lands goes to the graveyard, so eight lands sacrificed to Scapeshift come back as eight 5/3 Elementals as well as eight new lands. Avenger of Zendikar puts eight counters on each Plant from the eight that arrive, and Field of the Dead makes eight Zombies. Titania has to be on the battlefield before you cast it, because she only sees lands that reach the graveyard while she is there.

Ancient Greenwarden lets you play lands from your graveyard and makes each landfall trigger happen twice, so Avenger, Tatyova, Field of the Dead and the rest all double. Crucible of Worlds also lets you play lands from the graveyard, which turns Misty Rainforest, Prismatic Vista, Fabled Passage, Evolving Wilds and Terramorphic Expanse into a land drop you can spend every turn for two landfall triggers. The search from a fetch, Myriad Landscape or Rampant Growth shuffles the library, which also scatters the lands the last pick sent to the bottom.

He is a 1/4 that never attacks, so the protection is for him

Nothing here needs Chekov to fight. He needs to survive, because every turn without him the draws go back to being random. Lightning Greaves gives him shroud for no equip cost, and Tamiyo’s Safekeeping and Heroic Intervention answer removal in response. Counterspell, Arcane Denial and Swan Song stop what Greaves cannot, and Arcane Denial’s card for you arrives in the next upkeep as a pick. Boseiju, Who Endures and Otawara, Soaring City are lands that can be discarded as removal, and each costs one mana less for every legendary creature you control. Chekov counts, and so do the other ten legendary creatures in the list.

Pongify, Rapid Hybridization and Reality Shift deal with a creature for one or two mana, Beast Within with any permanent, and Kenrith’s Transformation turns a threat into a vanilla 3/3 and draws you a card for it. Cyclonic Rift clears the board when you overload it, Aetherize sends an attack back to hand, and Roil Elemental takes a creature for every land that enters while it stays. Rhystic Study taxes every spell an opponent casts and Mystic Remora every noncreature one, and each tax they do not pay is a pick. One thing the list leaves out on purpose: cards that reward drawing, such as anything that triggers on your second card each turn, never see a replaced draw, and in this deck most draws are replaced.

The core list

Twenty three creatures besides Chekov, thirty seven lands and nine sorceries. Prices are for the cheapest paper version of each card on sale, and any name shows its card when you hover over it.

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Twenty eight sources of each colour, and the double pips can wait a turn

The deck has 28 green sources and 28 blue. One pip of either by turn two turns up 93.8 percent of the time on the play. Two of the same colour by turn three is 78.5 percent for each, and that is the thin side of this mana. Captain Pike, Fullness of Time and Courser of Kruphix want two green at three mana and Counterspell wants two blue at two. The other double pips (Avenger of Zendikar, Ancient Greenwarden, Harmonize, Rampaging Baloths, Scapeshift, Titania, Mr. Spock, Deep Space Scan, Pull from Tomorrow and Roil Elemental) sit on cards you rarely cast before turn four, and by then the extra land drops have usually caught up.

Seven lands always enter tapped, and each earns the slot some other way. Myriad Landscape fetches two basics. Simic Growth Chamber hands back a land to play a second time. Field of the Dead is a win condition. Earth, Sector 001 gains a life that Alhammarret’s Archive doubles. Lumbering Falls becomes a 3/3 hexproof creature, and Tranquil Thicket and Lonely Sandbar cycle into a pick on a turn with no land drop left. Six more enter tapped only if a condition fails, and in a deck that hits its drops that is rare after turn three.

The budget list keeps Sylvan Library and Mr. Spock, and bracket 4 hides a 20/20 in two lands

The budget rung costs at least $279 against the core list’s $657 and has no bracket floor, because Field of the Dead, Rhystic Study and Cyclonic Rift all come out. What it keeps matters more than what it cuts. Sylvan Library, Mr. Spock, Alhammarret’s Archive and every extra land drop except Burgeoning stay, so the draws are still picks and the land picks still have somewhere to go. Rhystic Study becomes Thought Reflection, which has Mr. Spock’s doubling on a seven mana enchantment. Scapeshift becomes Harrow, which sacrifices one land for two basics at instant speed, so three mana buys two landfall triggers. Crucible of Worlds becomes Ramunap Excavator, the same ability on a 2/3. Misty Rainforest and Prismatic Vista become Escape Tunnel and Warped Landscape, which put the basic in tapped and still make two landfall triggers. Burgeoning becomes Druid Class, whose second level is another land drop. Starship Enterprise becomes Zendikar’s Roil, a 2/2 for every land. Boseiju and Otawara become Ash Barrens and Simic Guildgate, which costs the deck its two answers that sit among the lands, and Cyclonic Rift becomes Evacuation. Field of the Dead gives its slot to Thornwood Falls, so the cheaper list wins with Avenger of Zendikar, Rampaging Baloths and Titania instead of Zombies.

The top rung costs at least $955 and runs nine Game Changers. Fierce Guardianship costs nothing while Chekov is on the battlefield, since he is your commander, and Force of Will costs no mana if you exile a blue card and pay 1 life. Consecrated Sphinx gives you two draws whenever an opponent draws one, and each of those is a pick. Crop Rotation sacrifices a land at instant speed and puts any land from your library onto the battlefield. Worldly Tutor sets a creature on top for the next pick to take, and Ancient Tomb is two mana on the first turn. Dark Depths and Thespian’s Stage take the two cycling lands’ slots. Pay two and tap the Stage to make it a copy of Dark Depths. The copy has none of the ten ice counters, so you keep it when the legend rule makes you choose, and it becomes Marit Lage, a 20/20 flying indestructible Avatar. Land picks dig for whichever half you are missing, and Crop Rotation fetches either one. Arcane Denial, Into the Roil, Aetherize, Expedition Map, Lumbering Falls and Retreat to Coralhelm make room. The three colourless lands cost two sources of each colour, which takes two of a colour by turn three down to 74.2 percent.

FAQ

When can Pavel Chekov, First Posting lead a Commander deck?

Once Star Trek Commander is out on 13 November 2026. He and the nine other new cards in this list become playable that day, and a deck checker that refuses them earlier is going by the calendar.

Which Star Trek Commander deck is Pavel Chekov in?

Landing Party, the green, white and blue deck led by Commander Spock. Chekov is a green and blue card in its 99, so he can also lead a Simic deck of his own like this one.

Does Chekov’s ability count as drawing a card?

No. You put a card into your hand instead of drawing one, so abilities that trigger when you draw do not see it. The replacement is optional, so you can still take any single draw as a normal draw.

Can Pavel Chekov stop me from losing with an empty library?

Yes, while he is on the battlefield. You can replace a draw even when your library is empty, which means you never try to draw from it. You just get nothing for that draw.

How does Chekov work with Mr. Spock, Science Officer?

Apply Mr. Spock first. When two effects replace the same draw you choose the order, so one draw becomes two, and Chekov then turns each of the two into a land or a nonland pick.

Is Pavel Chekov the same as Abundance?

The wording matches, except that Abundance lets you choose the order of the cards going to the bottom and Chekov sends them there at random. Running both adds little, because once one of them replaces a draw there is nothing left for the other, so this list leaves Abundance out.

How much does this Pavel Chekov deck cost?

The core list was at least $657 on 1 November 2026, a figure that leaves out four new cards with no price yet. The budget version comes to at least $279 and has no Game Changers, and the bracket 4 version comes to at least $955. The preorder cards should get cheaper after release.

What bracket is this Pavel Chekov deck?

Bracket 3 at the lowest, because Field of the Dead, Rhystic Study and Cyclonic Rift are Game Changers and three is the most bracket 3 allows. That can go up but not down. None of the new cards from these sets carries the tag yet, and the next revision of the list could change that.