Ahoy Mateys precon upgrade guide

All 34 creature cards in Ahoy Mateys are Pirates, so Admiral Brass can never return a wrong card. What the box lacks is a graveyard to return them from: only thirteen cards fill it on purpose. Ten swaps, about $4, make that sixteen and cut the always-tapped lands from six to three.

The figures below come from resolving the shipped Lost Caverns of Ixalan Commander decklist one card at a time (tap conditions on every land, curve, bracket floor), and the after-swap figures come from putting the ten swaps into that same list and resolving it again. Every price here is for the least expensive copy in print as of October 2026, which for a few of these cards is a promo or a reprint-sheet printing.

What are the best Ahoy Mateys upgrades?

Ranked by what each card does for this list. The slots come from the cuts.

1. Mary Read and Anne Bonny ($0.39): a haste looter for three that makes a tapped Treasure whenever she discards a Pirate, an Island or a Vehicle. Every creature in the box is a Pirate, so pitching any of them pays out, and Admiral Brass can bring the pitched card back at the next combat.
2. Kitesail Larcenist ($0.54): flying, ward {1}, and when it enters you pick up to one other artifact or creature for each player. While the Larcenist stays, each pick is a Treasure with no other abilities, so a blocker stops being a creature (its controller can still sacrifice it for one mana). It's a Pirate, so Admiral Brass can run it back for a fresh target.
3. Throne of the Grim Captain ($0.28): two mana, then tap to mill two cards every turn. It supplies the graveyard every turn for two mana, and an artifact doesn't wait a turn to start working. The Craft side isn't something I'd plan around.
4. Bone Shards ($0.17): one mana to destroy a creature or planeswalker, paid for by discarding a card or sacrificing a creature. Pay with a spare Pirate and the removal spell is also a graveyard fill.
5. Forerunner of the Coalition ($0.58): three mana, a Pirate of your choice to the top of the library when it enters, and every other Pirate that enters after it makes each opponent lose 1 life. Tap the Throne with that Pirate on top and it's in the graveyard for the next combat.
6. Bitter Triumph ($0.31): the instant-speed version of the same removal for two mana, paying with a discard or 3 life.

Dragonskull Summit ($0.45), Drowned Catacomb ($0.50), Shivan Reef ($0.22) and Underground River ($0.51) take the slots of the three Thriving lands, which always enter tapped, and Geier Reach Sanitarium. Every pick gets its argument below.

A commander with 34 right answers and a thin supply line

Every combat on my turn can open with Admiral Brass returning a Pirate creature card from my graveyard, with a finality counter, base power and toughness 4/4, and haste. The only condition is Pirate, and all 34 creature cards in the box are Pirates, so choosing a target is never the problem. The Indomitable is a Vehicle and Throne of the Grim Captain is an artifact, so neither is a creature card in the yard.

Supply is the problem. Admiral Brass mills four on entering, which puts a creature card in the graveyard about four times in five (34 creatures in a 99-card library). After that the engine wants roughly one new Pirate a turn, and the box has thirteen cards that fill the graveyard at all: Faithless Looting, Windfall, Prismari Command, Daring Saboteur, Lethal Scheme, Francisco, King Narfi's Betrayal, The Grim Captain's Locker, Arm-Mounted Anchor, Desolate Lighthouse, Geier Reach Sanitarium, Nephalia Drownyard and Port of Karfell. Four of those are lands, while Windfall hands every opponent a fresh hand and Geier Reach Sanitarium gives them the same rummage you get.

The swaps add four fillers and take one away. Throne of the Grim Captain mills two a turn, Mary Read and Anne Bonny loots, and Bone Shards and Bitter Triumph both accept a discarded Pirate as payment, which makes sixteen. The one that goes is Geier Reach Sanitarium, a colourless land that pays for its rummage with two mana and gives every opponent one too.

What makes the supply worth building is what each returned Pirate does on arrival. Skeleton Crew makes a 2/2 Skeleton Pirate whenever creature cards leave your graveyard. Gemcutter Buccaneer makes a tapped Treasure for each Pirate that enters, Merchant Raiders freezes a creature, and Coercive Recruiter steals one for the turn. Forerunner of the Coalition, one of the upgrade's Pirates, drains each opponent for 1 every time another one lands. A single returned Pirate can set off all five of those at once.

Six lands that enter tapped, in a deck that wants to attack

Six of the stock list's 37 lands never enter untapped: Crumbling Necropolis, Path of Ancestry, Port of Karfell and the three Thriving lands (Bluff, Isle and Moor). The curve runs sixteen cards at three mana and seventeen at four, averaging 3.29, so a tapped land on turn three or four is a real cost.

The swap trades the three Thrivings for Dragonskull Summit, Drowned Catacomb and Shivan Reef, and Geier Reach Sanitarium for Underground River. Always-tapped goes from six to three, conditional lands from six to eight, and untapped from 25 to 26. The checklands are easy to satisfy in this list: eleven lands are Swamps or Mountains (Dragonskull Summit) and twelve are Islands or Swamps (Drowned Catacomb). The two painlands never enter tapped and cost a point of damage only when they tap for colour.

This is a speed change and not a fixing change. A Thriving land taps for its own colour and one more it picks as it enters, so each already covered two of the deck's three colours, the same as the duals replacing them.

I priced the lands that would do this job with no condition at all: Watery Grave ($9.86), Blood Crypt ($8.68) and Steam Vents ($9.91). They come to $28.45, and all three reprint in Star Trek on 13 November 2026, so I'd wait. The checklands will sometimes enter tapped on turn two or three, and I'd take that over paying $28 for a condition that matters in the first few turns only.

Six spells and four lands leave

Evacuation sends every creature to its owner's hand for five mana. In this deck that undoes the board it just built, and it puts Pirates in the hand, where each costs its full mana value to deploy again, when a Pirate in the graveyard costs Admiral Brass nothing.

Captivating Crew is a 4/3 for four whose steal ability costs {3}{R} at sorcery speed. Coercive Recruiter already steals a creature whenever it or another Pirate enters, for no extra mana, and stays in the list.

Rakdos Charm has three modes: exile a graveyard, destroy an artifact, or have each creature deal 1 damage to its controller. The first two need the right thing on the other side of the table, and the third hurts whoever controls the most creatures, which is the player this deck is built to be.

Departed Deckhand and Timestream Navigator are both cheap Pirates with a condition attached. The Deckhand sacrifices itself the moment a spell targets it. The Navigator is a 1/1 whose extra turn needs ten permanents and {2}{U}{U} on top. The slots go to Mary Read and Anne Bonny and Forerunner of the Coalition, which do their jobs as soon as they land.

Wayfarer's Bauble costs one to cast and two more to sacrifice, for a basic land that arrives tapped. The deck already has Sol Ring, Arcane Signet, Commander's Sphere and three Signets, and at least eight cards make Treasure as part of their normal text: Corsair Captain, Gemcutter Buccaneer, Captain Lannery Storm, Malcolm, Ramirez DePietro, Black Market Connections, Pitiless Plunderer and Enterprising Scallywag. Mary Read and Anne Bonny makes nine.

The four lands are the three Thrivings and Geier Reach Sanitarium. The Thrivings are the tapped ones. The Sanitarium taps for colourless in a three-colour deck and rummages for the whole table.

Why four likely cuts and three tapped lands stay

Angrath's Marauders costs seven, and nobody wants to cast it for seven. It's a graveyard card: discard it, mill it, and Admiral Brass returns it at the next combat with haste, doubling the damage every source you control deals while it's out.

Port Razer untaps your team and adds a combat phase when it connects. Every combat phase has its own beginning of combat, so the extra one gives Admiral Brass a second trigger and a second Pirate back. It can't attack a player it has already attacked this turn, so in a two-player game it connects once and the rest of the team takes the second combat.

Coercive Recruiter steals a creature each time it or another Pirate enters. With 34 Pirates and a commander returning one a turn, that's a steal every turn Admiral Brass has a target, and the stolen creature becomes a Pirate for the turn.

Arm-Mounted Anchor looks like a single-creature attachment in a go-wide deck. But when the carrier connects, it draws two and then asks for two discards, or just one if that one is a Pirate card, which in this deck is the discard you want anyway. The equip drops to free when you hold one card or none.

The three tapped lands that stay each do something the replacements can't. Crumbling Necropolis taps for all three colours. Path of Ancestry makes any colour of the commander's identity and scries 1 when that mana casts a creature spell sharing a type with your commander, and Admiral Brass is a Human Pirate, so every creature qualifies. Port of Karfell is the only land in the box that reanimates: for {3}{U}{B}{B} and itself, it mills four and returns any creature card tapped, and it works with Admiral Brass stuck in the command zone.

The upgraded decklist

The full hundred with the ten swaps in: 37 lands (26 untapped, eight conditional, three always tapped, against the stock 25, six and six), 34 creature cards in the 99 and an average mana value of 3.26, down from 3.29. Neither list holds a Game Changer, which leaves the bracket floor where the box had it, and the ten adds come to $3.95. Hover any name to see the card and its current price.

Load into the deck builder Copy decklist Playtest the upgraded deck

“Load into the deck builder” opens this list in your account, pinned to the printings the box shipped, ready to edit or save. “Copy decklist” gives you plain text for Moxfield, Archidekt or Arena, with no account needed.

FAQ

Which creatures can Admiral Brass actually return?

Any Pirate creature card in your graveyard, and all 34 creature cards in the box are Pirates. The exceptions are the ones that aren't creature cards once they're in the yard: The Indomitable is a Vehicle and Throne of the Grim Captain is an artifact. The Pirate comes back with a finality counter, so it's exiled if it would die, its base power and toughness become 4/4, and it has haste until end of turn.

Can the partner Pirates in the box lead instead of Admiral Brass?

Four of them carry partner: Francisco, Fowl Marauder, Ghost of Ramirez DePietro, Malcolm, Keen-Eyed Navigator and Breeches, Brazen Plunderer. But any two cover at most two colours, and the rest of the list was chosen for three. In the upgraded list a blue and black pair makes 34 cards illegal, black and red makes 43, blue and red makes 35, and every pair gives up the graveyard engine that the rest of the list is built around.

How much do the ten swaps cost?

About $4: $3.95 for all ten at the cheapest released printings in October 2026, with Forerunner of the Coalition the dearest at 58 cents. The only spend I priced and passed on was the three untapped shocklands, $28.45 together, which reprint in Star Trek on 13 November 2026.

Is Angrath's Marauders worth a seven-mana slot?

In the hand, no. In the graveyard, yes, which is why it stays. Admiral Brass returns it for free at the next combat as a 4/4 with haste, and while it's out every source you control deals double damage to permanents and players. The good game is the one where it gets milled or pitched to Faithless Looting, and casting it for seven is the backup.

Will Throne of the Grim Captain deck me?

Not in a game that ends on a normal clock. The library starts at 99 cards and is 92 after the opening hand. Tapping the Throne every turn from turn two through turn ten mills 18, Admiral Brass mills four more, and nine draws on the play take nine, which leaves about 61 cards.

Which creature type should Icon of Ancestry, Vanquisher's Banner and Herald's Horn name?

Pirate, every time. Thirty-four creature cards are Pirates and 18 are Humans, the next largest group, so naming Human leaves 16 of the 34 creatures out. Secluded Courtyard and Unclaimed Territory should name Pirate too, and Distant Melody draws a card for each Pirate permanent you control.