Temur Roar Upgrade Guide: Ureni Commander Deck (Budget & Premium)

Geeky Domain Crew
2026-05-02T23:37:19-07:00

The Temur Roar precon from Tarkir: Dragonstorm has massive potential, but the out-of-the-box list is far too slow for a modernized Commander pod. Learn how to transform Ureni of the Unwritten into a Tier-1 threat by stripping out the bulky filler, streamlining your ramp, and adding the most devastating Dragon Typal artillery.

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Precon Upgrade Guide: Temur Roar (Tarkir Dragonstorm)

Transform the Ureni of the Unwritten preconstructed deck from a sluggish casual build into a ruthless, high-tier Dragonstorm engine.

In the Magic: The Gathering Commander economy, buying a preconstructed deck (precon) is simply paying the entry fee. Wizards of the Coast designs these $45 to $60 decks to be playable out of the box, but they intentionally throttle the power level by including tapped lands, over-costed removal spells, and "filler" creatures that lack synergy.

The Temur Roar precon from the highly acclaimed Tarkir: Dragonstorm set is no exception. Helmed by Ureni of the Unwritten, the deck's theoretical ceiling is massive. It operates in the Temur color identity (Green/Blue/Red), giving you access to the best ramp, the best card draw, and the most aggressive aerial threats in the game. However, the factory decklist is far too slow for a modernized 2026 Commander pod.

To actually dominate your local tables, we need to strip away the bulky, high-mana-value filler and streamline the engine. This guide will walk you through exactly which cards to cut, the best budget singles to buy, and the premium high-end staples that will permanently lock in this deck's Tier-1 status.

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The Commander: Ureni of the Unwritten

Before we make a single cut, we must define exactly what the commander is trying to accomplish. Ureni of the Unwritten is a massive threat that rewards you for casting Dragons by generating massive elemental tokens and burning your opponents.

However, Ureni costs a staggering 6 mana (4 generic, 1 Green, 1 Blue, 1 Red). If you rely on the precon's default ramp package, you will not cast your commander until Turn 5 or Turn 6. By that point, faster combo decks will have already locked down the board.

The Golden Rule of Ureni

You are not playing a generic "good-stuff" deck. You are playing a highly specialized ramp engine. Every non-Dragon card in your 99 must either accelerate your mana production, protect Ureni from removal, or draw you more Dragons. If a card in the precon does not fulfill one of those three exact criteria, it is getting cut immediately.

Addition by Subtraction: The First 10 Cuts

To make room for the optimized singles, we have to extract the dead weight. The Temur Roar precon suffers heavily from "flavor bloat"—cards that fit the Tarkir lore, but are mathematically terrible to cast in a real game.

Pull these 10 cards out of your deck immediately. Do not hesitate. They are actively lowering your win percentage.

Cut: 3x Over-costed Burn Spells (e.g., Spit Flame)
In Commander, spending 3 to 5 mana to deal 4 damage to a single creature is an abysmal exchange rate. We will replace these with highly efficient 1-mana interaction and one-sided board wipes.

Cut: 4x Filler Non-Dragon Creatures (e.g., Parapet Thrasher)
Ureni only triggers when you cast Dragons. Paying mana for a generic 4/4 creature that does not trigger your commander's engine breaks the golden rule. Out they go.

Cut: 3x Enters-Tapped Lands (e.g., Temple of Abandon)
Temur needs speed. Playing a land that enters the battlefield tapped puts you a full turn behind the rest of the table. We will swap these for lands that can enter untapped to secure our early-game ramp.

The Engine Rebuild: Optimizing the Ramp

Because our commander costs 6 mana, and our primary win conditions are 6-to-8 mana Dragons, we must aggressively upgrade the deck's mana generation. We are going to lower the "mana curve" by replacing the clunky 3-cost mana rocks in the precon with highly efficient 1-cost and 2-cost ramp spells.

Add: Nature's Lore & Three Visits

Unlike standard ramp spells that put lands onto the battlefield tapped, these 2-mana Sorceries allow you to search for a Forest (including dual-lands like Cinder Glade) and put it onto the battlefield untapped. This effectively refunds you a mana on the turn you cast it, drastically increasing your momentum.

Add: Dragon's Hoard

This 3-mana artifact is the single best mana rock for this specific deck. Not only does it tap for any color of mana, but whenever a Dragon enters the battlefield under your control, it gains a counter that you can remove to draw a card. It perfectly synergizes ramp with late-game card advantage.

The Shield: Protecting a 6-Mana Investment

When you finally generate the 6 mana required to cast Ureni of the Unwritten, you are painting a massive target on your back. The rest of the table knows that if you untap with Ureni on the board, you are going to overwhelm them. They will immediately attempt to destroy or exile your Commander using cards like Swords to Plowshares or Path to Exile.

The precon does not include nearly enough cheap interaction to prevent this. We are fixing that by adding highly efficient, 1-mana protection spells that you can easily hold up while still advancing your board state.

Add: Stubborn Denial
For a single Blue mana, this instant counters any non-creature spell unless its controller pays 1. However, if you control a creature with power 4 or greater (which is literally every Dragon in your deck, including Ureni), it becomes a hard counterspell. It is the most mana-efficient way to stop a board wipe or targeted removal in the Temur identity.

Add: Tyvar's Stand
For a single Green mana, you grant your Commander Hexproof and Indestructible until the end of the turn. This completely blanks targeted removal and ensures your engine survives a crucial turn cycle.

Momentum: The Temur Holy Grail

The biggest weakness of large, expensive flying creatures is that they suffer from "summoning sickness." If you cast a massive 7-mana Dragon, but have to pass the turn and wait to attack, you are giving your opponents an entire turn cycle to find an answer.

To fix this, we are cutting the precon's slow enchantment options and installing the two most important engine pieces for any Green/Red/Blue creature deck.

Add: Temur Ascendancy & Garruk's Uprising

Temur Ascendancy is an absolute mandatory upgrade for this deck. It gives every single creature you control Haste, completely altering the math of the game. When you cast a Dragon, it swings immediately.

Crucially, both of these enchantments state that whenever a creature with power 4 or greater enters the battlefield under your control, you draw a card. Because Ureni creates massive elemental tokens when Dragons enter the board, a single Dragon cast will often draw you two or three cards, keeping your hand entirely gassed up for the late game.

The Artillery: Budget Dragon Upgrades

Now that we have protected our Commander and established a card draw engine, we need to upgrade our win conditions. We are swapping out the "vanilla" precon Dragons for creatures that have an immediate, devastating impact on the board state the second they resolve.

Add: Scourge of Valkas

Whenever Scourge of Valkas or another Dragon enters the battlefield under your control, it deals damage to any target equal to the number of Dragons you control. With Ureni's engine duplicating Dragon entries via token generation, Scourge turns every subsequent creature spell into a lethal, targeted sniper rifle. You can burn out an opponent without ever declaring an attack.

Add: Wrathful Red Dragon

This turns your entire board state into a massive deterrent. Whenever a Dragon you control is dealt damage, Wrathful Red Dragon deals that much damage to any target that isn't a Dragon. This effectively prevents your opponents from blocking your attacks, and weaponizes damage-based board wipes in your favor.

The Reset Button: Asymmetrical Clearance

Standard board wipes (like Wrath of God) destroy all creatures evenly. In a deck where you are investing 6 to 8 mana per creature, a standard board wipe hurts you significantly more than it hurts the player running a swarm of cheap 1-mana goblins. You need asymmetrical removal—cards that wipe out your opponents' boards while leaving your Dragons entirely untouched.

Add: Sarkhan's Unsealing This 4-mana enchantment is the perfect clearance engine for the Ureni deck. Whenever you cast a creature spell with power 7 or greater, Sarkhan's Unsealing deals 4 damage to each opponent and each creature and planeswalker they control. Because Ureni naturally buffs your massive Dragons, almost every creature you cast will trigger this devastating, one-sided board wipe, completely locking your opponents out of the game while your flight path remains clear.

The Vault: High-End Premium Upgrades

The budget upgrades listed above will easily push this precon into a highly competitive Tier-2 bracket. However, if you want to push Ureni of the Unwritten to its absolute maximum ceiling, you need to look at the format's premium staples. Because Commander is an eternal format, investing in these high-end, mythic-rare Dragons guarantees long-term value that transcends a single decklist.

If you are looking to secure the most powerful, blue-chip assets for your Dragonstorm build, these are the premium foil and extended-art staples you should target.

Terror of the Peaks (Extended Art)

The undisputed king of Dragon Typal damage. Whenever another creature enters the battlefield under your control, Terror of the Peaks deals damage equal to that creature's power to any target. Combined with Ureni's massive elemental tokens, resolving this card often results in an immediate, game-ending amount of direct damage.

Ancient Copper Dragon (Borderless Foil)

This mythic rare breaks the fundamental rules of MTG's mana economy. Whenever it deals combat damage to a player, you roll a d20 and create that many Treasure tokens. Granting this creature Haste via Temur Ascendancy allows

The Geeky Domain Verdict

Respect the Ramp. Unleash the Storm.

The Temur Roar precon is an incredibly fun starting point, but playing it unaltered is a surefire way to watch the game happen without participating in it. By ruthlessly cutting the high-mana-value filler and investing in cheap, efficient ramp, you transform Ureni of the Unwritten from a sluggish target into an inevitable threat.

Whether you build this out using the $10 budget artillery upgrades or invest in the premium mythic Dragons from the Vault, remember the golden rule of Temur: momentum is everything. Establish your draw engine, protect your Commander, and let the sheer density of your aerial threats close out the pod.

Level Up Your Arsenal:

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