Which direction to take a Soldier deck - Brimaz, Gahiji, Marisi, Linden, other?

[bobthefunny]

So in building my Knights deck, I pulled out a lot of cards, among which was a nice soldier package which didn't (all) make the cut:

• Brimaz, King of Oreskos
• Precinct Captain
• Mavren Fein, Dusk Apostle
• Hero of Bladehold
• Leonin Warleader
• Catapult Squad
• Militia's Pride
• Mobilization
• Recruit the Worthy
• Dawn of Hope
• Reconnaissance

I feel this gives a decent theme/option to explore for a new deck. However, I'm seeing a few ways to take this.
Obviously, the idea is to attack, which gives more tokens, for more attacks. There are a few other cards that fit this Strategy in other colors:

For example:

• Emmara, Soul of the Accord
• Hanweir Garrison
• Hellrider
• Grenzo, Havoc Raiser
• Five Alarm Fire

I've wanted to explore this theme previously for a Gahiji, Honored One, but never got around to it. Today there's also Marisi, Breaker of the Coil which feels like a good fit in the Command zone for it, (and then Gahiji in the 99). Marisi looks to pair well with cheap flying low-crew vehicles as well - Heart of Kiran, Smuggler's Copter, Aethersphere Harvester, etc. which are generally easily crewed by tokens.

Vigilance + Reconnaissance + Catapult Squad is quite pretty to assemble as well, with all pieces being acceptably good alone

On the other hand, there's a lot of heavy double symbols in these costs, and the question arises if I should commit to it to mono-white, maybe taking Brimaz, King of Oreskos or Darien, King of Kjeldor in the Command Zone - or even see if I can pull something with this with Linden, the Steadfast Queen ? Linden opens up immediate synergy with Dawn of Hope, Path of Bravery, and Archangel of Thune, which is brutal.


What have others tried? What other cards might fit these ideas/themes?

[ilovesaprolings]

Each of them has their own pro and cons. Honestly i would try going bicolor or tricolor. Monocolor deck are boring to me and monowhite is weakest of the weak in EDH. Linden especially seems really weak.
I would try either with boros (weird that you didn't list it) or Marisi because Gahiji+tokens is high on my threat list

[bobthefunny]

Boros is an option as well - just that I guess no Commanders immediately jumped out at me. Perhaps Jor Kadeen, the Prevailer is the most obvious, or Iroas, God of Victory, Adriana, Captain of the Guard?

[Sinis]

Boros is an option as well - just that I guess no Commanders immediately jumped out at me. Perhaps Jor Kadeen, the Prevailer is the most obvious, or Iroas, God of Victory, Adriana, Captain of the Guard?

Aurelia is also an option; the vast majority of these cards trigger on attacking or damaging an opponent.

But, as long as you're playing with tokens, why not Ghired, Conclave Exile?

[TheAmericanSpirit]

I think Kambal, Consul of Allocation would be an excellent albeit unusual choice to lead your soldiers. Black covers a lot of white's inherent EDH shortcomings and kambal advances your aggro plan by punishing value plays that would otherwise threaten to overtake/disrupt your proactive board presence.

[MeowZeDung]

Mono-white is generally seen as pretty weak, but I think soldier tribal is one of the cooler ways to salvage it. I've always been intrigued by Odric, Lunarch Marshal and, to a lesser extent, Odric, Master Tactician

I don't know how casual vs. optimized you are thinking here, but if you're ok with something a bit more casual you could look at Anafenza, Kin-Tree Spirit. I had a lot of fun a few years ago with her at the helm of a soldier deck looking to abuse +1/+1 counters with the outlast lords: Abzan Battle Priest, Abzan Falconer, Ainok Bond-Kin, and High Sentinels of Arashin. Add a package of solid white soldiers and soldier lords into the mix along with goodies like Stoneforge Masterwork, Martial Coup, Deploy to the Front, and Elspeth, Sun's Champion and you've got a good time on your hands!

There's also the long list of generic tribal cards like Vanquisher's Banner, Adaptive Automaton, Metallic Mimic, and Door of Destinies that grows even longer with each new set these days it seems.

If you want to look at multicolored there's already some good suggestions here. I would add that this tribe lines up pretty well with the boros strategy, which is pretty shallow and linear, but with enough synergy can be fun. I think Iroas, God of Victory, Adriana, Captain of the Guard, or Gerrard, Weatherlight Hero would all be fun to brew a deck around.

If you REALLY want to go deep, you could just do a Morophon, the Boundless or Saskia the Unyielding soldier deck, which would be sweet!

[cryogen]

I've been having a lot of fun with Marisi, but I think it benefits from a lot of cards that wouldn't necessarily be appropriate for a tribal soldier deck. Still, the deck is fun to play with.

[Sanity_Eclipse]

To bounce off of MeowZeDung's post, you could also go Khan Anafenza. There are some soldiers, and hell, the Portal 3 Kingdoms ones may be the best of that bunch, without going into any that are or . Decently flavorful too, from a historical perspective.

My Anafenza build went down the soldier route a bit, but also just kinda an Abzan theme deck. Haven't done much with it recently, but it might give an idea or two.

[bobthefunny]

I've been having a lot of fun with Marisi, but I think it benefits from a lot of cards that wouldn't necessarily be appropriate for a tribal soldier deck. Still, the deck is fun to play with.

What cards are you thinking of here?

When I was looking at Marisi, I was seeing two obvious builds - 1) unblockable/goblin war drums etc, or 2) go wider than they can block/tokens. for 1), I don't want to start looking to build in a similar style as an Edric deck, where the deck has cheap unblockables.

I like the thought of Marisi, because it negates blockers, and most of my creatures are small and require value over time of attacks, to give me time to drop anthems or something.

My Anafenza build went down the soldier route a bit, but also just kinda an Abzan theme deck. Haven't done much with it recently, but it might give an idea or two.

Thanks, I'll definitely check it out for ideas.

Mono-white is generally seen as pretty weak, but I think soldier tribal is one of the cooler ways to salvage it. I've always been intrigued by Odric, Lunarch Marshal and, to a lesser extent, Odric, Master Tactician

I don't know how casual vs. optimized you are thinking here, [...]

I think Odric, Master Tactician is a great addition to the deck, I had already pulled him aside, regardless of which way the deck goes. I feel that he'll really shine in Marisi since he'll guarantee guys to go through, and thus trigger the goad - but it'll still be good in other builds, to ensure that my main token attackers remain alive.

I'm still figuring out how casual/optimized I want to make it. I mean, some optimization needs to come in if it's mono-white, just to keep up to par, like Sun Titan with some fetch lands or something. Even in 3 color, I'll want some solid fixing/duals to get going out the gates with all these double costs.

Aurelia is also an option; the vast majority of these cards trigger on attacking or damaging an opponent.

But, as long as you're playing with tokens, why not Ghired, Conclave Exile?

I think my current tokens might be a bit small for Ghired, but I like that he carries the theme. With Aurelia, I worry a little of the threat perception - but again, she assists the theme very well. Two good ideas I'll need to consider.

Do you think Ghired is good enough if he only populates a 1/1 soldier (if the rhino dies, for example).

I think Kambal, Consul of Allocation would be an excellent albeit unusual choice to lead your soldiers. Black covers a lot of white's inherent EDH shortcomings and kambal advances your aggro plan by punishing value plays that would otherwise threaten to overtake/disrupt your proactive board presence.

An interesting choice as well. I've used Kembal before, and there's a Kembal deck in my group - but it focuses more on the group bleed/drain motif. I like where your idea is going here.

[MeowZeDung]

You seem most interested in a Naya build, and I'm intrigued with what you might do with Marisi and soldiers, but I think I would gravitate more towards other Naya commanders. Just some food for thought which might give you more ideas as you brew!:

Rienne, Angel of Rebirth: There's plenty of multicolored soldiers, tribal strategies love anthems, and this gives you a source of pseudo recursion and/or ETB trigger abuse.

Akiri, Line Slinger partnered with Sidar Kondo of Jamuraa: This could be fun with a token/weenie strategy taking advantage of Sidar's abilities and some relevant equipment making Akiri a force to be reckoned with.

Samut, Voice of Dissent: If I was building Naya soldiers, I'd probably start here. The haste is a big deal for a smaller, squishier tribe that wants to be attacking anyway, Samut wears equipment very well, and the untap ability goes fantastic with Captain Sisay, Intrepid Hero, and some key non-soldiers like Stoneforge Mystic, Knight of the Reliquary, or Mikaeus, the Lunarch.

[Sinis]

Do you think Ghired is good enough if he only populates a 1/1 soldier (if the rhino dies, for example).

Probably not, and that was my line of thinking after I posted.

[ISBPathfinder]

So, I actually took another look at Brimaz recently. I do like the Hero of Bladehold style of creatures in that build but I actually went sort of anthem heavy when I was looking at it recently in part due to King of the Pride being sort of a sweet looking card. If you are making 3/3s or bigger it might be more impressive. I have also done an Iroas, God of Victory deck with on attack token generators and that was also quite good. At one point that deck had also been Rune-Tail, Kitsune Ascendant but I realized that the on attack token generation was the crux of what I was building on so I shifted to boros for more access.

[bobthefunny]

So, I actually took another look at Brimaz recently. I do like the Hero of Bladehold style of creatures in that build but I actually went sort of anthem heavy when I was looking at it recently in part due to King of the Pride being sort of a sweet looking card. If you are making 3/3s or bigger it might be more impressive. I have also done an Iroas, God of Victory deck with on attack token generators and that was also quite good. At one point that deck had also been Rune-Tail, Kitsune Ascendant but I realized that the on attack token generation was the crux of what I was building on so I shifted to boros for more access.

What cards did you run from red? Got a list up?

[ISBPathfinder]

So, I actually took another look at Brimaz recently. I do like the Hero of Bladehold style of creatures in that build but I actually went sort of anthem heavy when I was looking at it recently in part due to King of the Pride being sort of a sweet looking card. If you are making 3/3s or bigger it might be more impressive. I have also done an Iroas, God of Victory deck with on attack token generators and that was also quite good. At one point that deck had also been Rune-Tail, Kitsune Ascendant but I realized that the on attack token generation was the crux of what I was building on so I shifted to boros for more access.

What cards did you run from red? Got a list up?

https://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the ... -me-tokens

I haven't updated it in the last year but I did play it for a few games online last night randomly and it did well.

[hyalopterouslemur]

Why did you put Mavren Fein in a soldier package?

[bobthefunny]

I suppose it's less a 'soldier' package, and more a lot of guys that pump out more guys when I attack - most happen to be soldiers. When I was building the Knight deck, I noted a fair bit of cross soldier synergy and pulled a few soldier lords as well, on top of the 'on attack' generators.

There's still quite a few ways this could go.