Xenk Controlling Auras

[ISBPathfinder]

I really liked this commander because I would be in auras but it wasn't as boring as my commander just having a cantrip on cast effect. My commander with this one also doesn't need to receive all of the auras which means I can play a more controlling build with a big stick of a commander to hit with.

Right now card draw is a little bit of my concern. I also have almost no ramp in the list so I should probably add a touch more to that count but I want to sort of sit and look at the draw for a bit first. I threw some swords in last second due to their evasion and card advantage so hopefully the equipment and tutor package works out. I really didn't push that hard on the ramp because trying to go fast isn't necessarily more objective with this build so much as leaning back into more of a voltron control style. I also think that pushing to ramp out a 4 drop commander is really awkward due to how little time you have to draw your ramp and how little the ramp you can do affects it most of the time being just one turn faster.

Decklist

DecklistCMCManaPricesChartsDraw 7

COMMANDER (1)

1 Xenk, Paladin Unbroken

CREATURES (13)

1 Weathered Wayfarer

1 Kor Spiritdancer

1 Lion Sash

1 Light-Paws, Emperor's Voice

1 Sram, Senior Edificer

1 Stoneforge Mystic

1 Mesa Enchantress

1 Archon of Sun's Grace

1 Silent Arbiter

1 Auratouched Mage

1 Boonweaver Giant

1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite|54658

1 Avacyn, Angel of Hope

ARTIFACT (9)

1 Expedition Map

1 O-Naginata

1 Shadowspear

1 Sol Ring

1 Soul-Guide Lantern

1 Mind Stone

1 Tome of Legends

1 Sword of Fire and Ice

1 Sword of Forge and Frontier

ENCHANTMENT (29)

1 Ethereal Armor

1 Flickering Ward

1 Angelic Gift

1 Benevolent Blessing

1 Chosen by Heliod

1 Darksteel Mutation

1 Flickerform

1 Heliod's Punishment

1 Planar Disruption

1 Realmbreaker's Grasp

1 Reprobation

1 Rune of Sustenance

1 Soul Tithe

1 Aura of Silence

1 Nahiri's Binding

1 Pariah

1 Pentarch Ward

1 Prison Term

1 Smuggler's Share

1 Unquestioned Authority

1 Armored Ascension

1 Curse of Exhaustion

1 Faith's Fetters

1 On Serra's Wings

1 Sage's Reverie

1 Suppression Bonds

1 Sigil of the Empty Throne

1 Spectra Ward

1 Sphere of Safety

INSTANT (5)

1 Angel's Grace

1 Blacksmith's Skill

1 Surge of Salvation

1 Heliod's Intervention

1 Reprieve

SORCERY (6)

1 Steelshaper's Gift

1 Open the Armory

1 Replenish

1 Retether

1 Slash the Ranks

1 Wave of Reckoning

PLANESWALKER (0)

LAND (37)

1 Emeria, the Sky Ruin

1 Hall of Heliod's Generosity

1 Kor Haven

1 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx

27 Plains

1 Rogue's Passage

1 Serra's Sanctum

1 Strip Mine

1 Tectonic Edge

1 Wasteland

1 Witch's Clinic

Approximate Total Cost:

MAYBE:
Sun Titan
Emeria Shepherd
Invoke Justice
Brilliant Restoration
Hallowed Haunting

[Ruiner]

I'm a fan of Eye of Singularity as an answer for tokens personally, especially in decks where there are more off the wall cards others are less likely to run.

[pokken]

I always get a ton of mileage out of Saving Grace in aura decks

[ISBPathfinder]

I'm a fan of Eye of Singularity as an answer for tokens personally, especially in decks where there are more off the wall cards others are less likely to run.

I have come close to running that card in the past but my current meta isn't quite as heavy on specifically tokens and there is often just as much of a concern of just general swarm in my current meta as there is tokens. Tokens actually see a lot less play in the metas I am in these days and unfortunately a lot more combo is seen unfortunately. I don't know that I am going to get something specifically for tokens but I might still consider something like Ghostly Prison that can make it harder to swarm me as a whole.

I always get a ton of mileage out of Saving Grace in aura decks

I LOVE Pariah and I have looked at this card several times but in the end the fact that its an ETB and I have to put it on my own creatures is most of the reason why I never run it myself. It doesn't recur well as you have to loop it back to hand so you can cast and get the ETB again when you need it plus you have to sacrifice a creature to it. I like the idea of the card just not the actual implementation of it. Beyond that I have also been seeing a lot more combo / lock based wincons rather than people zeroing life or dealing commander damage which kind of sucks as I like combat wincons.

Ok, lets talk a bit generally first before I walk through the deck updates. I was thinking about how I wanted to play and operate this deck for a while and I realized I really wanted to avoid becoming a fast tempo voltron deck. By this I mean a deck that ramps into its commander puts up evasion and power and tries to win quickly. I just like a slower game so rather than trying to get under my opponents with ramp into tempo kills I wanted to push back into a more controlling long run concept. Some of this means not leaning hard into ramp, keeping up my interaction rather than just evasion and pumping my commander, and playing for a situation where I accept that my commander likely will get answered some.

So, I guess this comes down to what does this mean for my build direction. I am dropping a decent bit of my Aura buff / evasion and boosting up some of my equipment package. The reason for this is that I can get card advantage out of the equipment as well as evasion and I don't run the risk of horribly over extending on my commander quite as bad when buffing him with equipment instead of auras. I am trying to keep my auras more in a controlling aspect rather than proactive kill opponents asap kind of a build and trying to build in a way that I anticipate my commander being targeted and removed some.

DECK CHANGES:

• Wall of Omens → Lion Sash I thought more about Wall of Omens and with the arrest effects, lack of planeswalkers, and ability to damage race I just didn't feel like this deck needed it for now. I wanted to stay feeling like a control deck and with the equipment tutors getting access to grave hate in my equipment package is good utility.
• Phyrexian Furnace → Soul-Guide Lantern stronger grave hate at the cost of some average card advantage.
• Scrabbling Claws → Aura of Silence I swapped up my grave hate above and I wanted some artifact / enchantment removal and disruption.
• Arcane Signet → O-Naginata I thought a bit more on if I wanted more or less ramp and I opted for less. O-Naginata is able of being quite the buff for a double striker.
• Mask of Memory → Flickerform - I thought more about Mask of Memory and if I am able to hit opponents with my commander then things are probably already good so it felt a little winmore. I am adding Flickerform mostly for Auratouched Mage and Boonweaver Giant as you can use them to set up crazy aura chains by starting with Flickerform.
• Gryff's Boon → Flickering Ward With cutting a lot of my commander buffs I felt like Flickering Ward becomes better as I can pick white with it. It also opens up my one drop enchants a bit more for Light-Paws, Emperor's Voice and it can be loop cast to draw with some of the enchantresses.
• All That Glitters → Steelshaper's Gift cutting down on my aura buffs. I opted to keep Ethereal Armor in part because I felt like Light-Paws, Emperor's Voice needed some one drops but otherwise cutting down my aura buffs. Steelshapers with the expanded equipment list should be helpful.
• Spirit Mantle → Expedition Map cutting aura buffs and I run some sweet utiliity lands so more access to them seems good with the map.
• Angelic Destiny → Heliod's Intervention cutting more of my aura buffs. Angelic almost stayed but I did some basic math on the buff and realized that the speed and efficiency wasn't actually that amazing for an aura buff and its cost plus it lacks any defensive measure. I wanted a little more to interact with artifacts and enchantments so I think Heliods should be a good add for that.
• Holy Mantle → Silent Arbiter cutting more of the buffs. I thought about it a bit and while Silent Arbiter is a bit vulnerable to removal I like its combat control effect vs swarm. Lots of swarm decks tend to be more proactive rather than having much interaction.
• Serra's Embrace → Sigil of the Empty Throne cutting off more of the aura buffs. I like Sigil being both attack and defense that isn't related to my commander. I thought about Hallowed Haunting also but while in mono white and without better draw I think I like the size of the angels better.
• Karametra's Blessing → Blacksmith's Skill with cutting a lot of the commander buffs it actually made less and less sense to run Karametra's which cares about the creature being enchanted. Its also worth noting that I can use Blacksmith's Skill on my own auras to defend them from interaction which is cool.
• Winds of Rath → Slash the Ranks With dropping a lot of the buff auras I needed to swap out Winds of Rath sadly. But I think Slash the Ranks will accomplish a similar effect. The problem is going to be passive ability commanders as a lot of my arrest affects don't stop passive ability commanders but I assume a lot of my Arrest affects are going to be aimed at commanders as it is.
• 1 Plains → Emeria, the Sky Ruin oops forgot Emeria in a mono white.... butter fix that.

My commander showed up in the mail so I have been tinkering with a paper list for a bit. Hopefully I can get out of the house and go play as its again been a while. I still need to wait on some of the more niche and newer arrest effects as I don't have some of the ones that came out in the last year but I think my list is close enough that I would just improvise and run it anyways.

As I get a chance to play the deck I am curious to see how much commander hate I bring down on myself as well as how well my draw and ability to keep playing lands is. I can really only theorize but with having cut a lot of the aura buffs I think it shouldn't hurt as much unless someone is just brutally tearing my commander down but if they are doing that then I will consider shifting to making my land drops more as well as protection. I don't want to jump to conclusions yet without playing him a few games at least though.

[ISBPathfinder]

I had a real quick game with this deck and I felt kind of bad because it ended up being a 3 player game where an aggressive strat tends to shine a bit more. I only played it in one game but I do plan to play it more moving forward but hopefullin in 4 player games. It was mostly somewhat of a goldfish but it went like this:

T3: Sol Ring off the top into Xenk
T4: On Serra's Wings and bonk the 5c dragon player for 8 commander.
T5: I assumed the dragon player would play out something on defense but instead he just super ramped and I was stairing down a Smothering Tithe. Now.... I could afford to pay it but I also just drew Open the Armory and I was doing some combat math in my head on how a O-Naginata play would play out. It looks like it was enough and I just killed the 5c dragon deck even though I hadn't planned on just running him down Smothering Tithe is too annoying and he ramped too much.
T6: I bonked my other opponent who was building up some bigger threats but given my lifelink + vigilance and double strike its making it harder for him to do anything about it. I have a few answers in my hand but I don't really need to answer any of his board with my setup. He wraths the board seeing the race being a losing one.
T7: Recast commander. At this point I screwed up forgetting some text on O-Naginata in that my commander isn't naturally large enough to equip it. I probably need to keep this in mind and keep an eye on it with having less buffs in my deck. Opponent makes a play that makes like a 15/15 creature who gets MUCH larger this turn but it has to attack to get bigger.
T8: Drop Arrest effects on all his guys and walk through with trample / double strike for the win.

It was after this game was over that I realized I can't actually vanilla equip my commander with O-Naginata. I need to do some more testing as it wasn't enough for me to really draw any conclusions yet.