Legolas' Fight Club

[ISBPathfinder]

Ok, I guess I am going to start out by saying I have absolutely no idea if this idea has legs or not lol. My fear with a commander like this is that it probably does play a bit of archenemy magic but I kind of liked the idea of playing mono green without being ramp, tribal, or token based.

Overall its not that complicated of a concept its mostly a voltron fight concept. I don't know if I can really pull it off in part though because it feels like its going to get targeted heavily for what my commander is trying to do. I tried to lean into a good bit of protection as I assume a lot of removal will come my way but I don't know if its going to be enough.

Decklist

DecklistCMCManaPricesChartsDraw 7

COMMANDER (1)

1 Legolas, Master Archer

CREATURES (10)

1 Traproot Kami

1 Sylvan Safekeeper

1 Wall of Blossoms

1 Rhonas the Indomitable

1 Forgotten Ancient

1 Cavalier of Thorns

1 Elder Gargaroth

1 Gargos, Vicious Watcher

1 Ulvenwald Hydra

1 Vigor

ARTIFACT (7)

1 Mox Amber

1 Shadowspear

1 Sol Ring

1 Isochron Scepter

1 Thought Vessel

1 Ozolith, the Shattered Spire

1 The One Ring

ENCHANTMENT (12)

1 Bequeathal

1 Hardened Scales

1 Rancor

1 Bonds of Mortality

1 Canopy Cover

1 Gaea's Touch

1 Kenrith's Transformation

1 Rune of Might

1 Season of Growth

1 Setessan Training

1 Court of Garenbrig

1 Viridian Revel

INSTANT (23)

1 Charge Through

1 Legolas's Quick Reflexes

1 Mutant's Prey

1 Silkguard

1 Snakeskin Veil

1 Tail Swipe

1 Tamiyo's Safekeeping

1 Tyvar's Stand

1 Vines of Vastwood

1 Viridescent Wisps

1 Aggressive Urge

1 Ancient Animus

1 Inscription of Abundance

1 Poison the Blade

1 Provoke

1 Reality Anchor

1 Solidarity of Heroes

1 Tel-Jilad Defiance

1 Titanic Brawl

1 Hunter's Insight

1 Invigorating Surge

1 Force of Vigor

1 Return of the Wildspeaker

SORCERY (11)

1 Green Sun's Zenith

1 Irresistible Prey

1 Explore

1 Finale of Devastation

1 Sylvan Scrying

1 Curse of the Werefox

1 Scale the Heights

1 Visions of Dominance

1 Hunter's Prowess

1 Soul's Majesty

1 Rishkar's Expertise

PLANESWALKER (1)

1 Garruk, Primal Hunter

BATTLE (1)

1 Invasion of Ikoria

LAND (34)

1 Arcane Lighthouse

1 Boseiju, Who Endures

1 Cavern of Souls

1 Reliquary Tower

23 Snow-Covered Forest

1 Strip Mine

1 Tower of the Magistrate

1 Wasteland

1 Wirewood Lodge

1 Witch's Clinic

1 Yavimaya Hollow

1 Yavimaya, Cradle of Growth

Approximate Total Cost:

CONSIDERING:
Basilisk Collar - I like the keyword pairing and it works well with the commander's ability to direct damage out.
Shadowspear - Disabling indestructible and bypassing hexproof can both be big deals situationally. The lifelink is also generally useful.
Rishkar's Expertise - Generally reasonable draw I only omit it because of the fact that the free cast part of this is hard for me to use with my low curve and more responsiveness of the deck.
Sylvan Safekeeper - I run a bit of protection and while it won't buff my commander when I target it, Safekeeper is hard to multi target through to bypass spot protections. I guess there is the question of why not just like Swiftfoot Boots but if I run creature tutors (I have like one currently) it does open options.

[Dunharrow]

So I have been playing this on Arena and it wrecks creature decks. It's hilarious.
So I started a decklist for paper and I think the main things I have that you don't are:
Thrive - you can target opponents' creatures and kill them all.
5 mana dorks, and only 4 other creatures. Getting Legolas down by turn 3 with some mana up to protect him is pretty strong.
Gargos, Vicious Watcher and Greatbow Doyen are high synergy creatures

I picked up a couple ideas from you, mainly for card draw.

I don't like things like Kalonian Hydra... Legolas doesn't need too much help. hardened scales and ozolith pull a lot of weight. Waiting a turn cycle and then throwing your 5 mana dude into the mix is slow for this deck. That being said 4 player it may be harder to protect Legolas so maybe diversifying threats is a good call.

How do you plan to use Bequeathal and fruit of the first tree?

also Shadowspear is MVP. deathtouch is cute but not as good as turning off creature protection. Legolas will get big fast.

[ISBPathfinder]

So I have been playing this on Arena and it wrecks creature decks. It's hilarious.
So I started a decklist for paper and I think the main things I have that you don't are:
Thrive - you can target opponents' creatures and kill them all.
5 mana dorks, and only 4 other creatures. Getting Legolas down by turn 3 with some mana up to protect him is pretty strong.
Gargos, Vicious Watcher and Greatbow Doyen are high synergy creatures

I picked up a couple ideas from you, mainly for card draw.

I don't like things like Kalonian Hydra... Legolas doesn't need too much help. hardened scales and ozolith pull a lot of weight. Waiting a turn cycle and then throwing your 5 mana dude into the mix is slow for this deck. That being said 4 player it may be harder to protect Legolas so maybe diversifying threats is a good call.

How do you plan to use Bequeathal and fruit of the first tree?

also Shadowspear is MVP. deathtouch is cute but not as good as turning off creature protection. Legolas will get big fast.

My list is all hypothetical right now so I have no play experience with it yet. I did put in an order for the cards but it will be probably a few weeks before I can play it just because I don't expect to get the cards until next week. Its good to hear that its working out for you I do have some concerns with moving a concept like this to multiplayer as I fear it will turn into archenemy magic but the deck was cheap enough to order I figured it was something I could figure out.

Thrive - Legolas can only trigger a single time regardless of how many opponents creatures you target with a spell. I felt it was a little weak as a 3 mana fight with one counter involved which is why it didn't make my own list. Here is a link to gatherer and the second ruling defines this.

Ramp - I kind of hate ramp if I am being honest and I don't think this idea is so fast that being a turn ahead on playing the commander is super meaningful. This deck is going to be sort of reactive rather than proactive in growth of the commander. I also felt that the overall curve of the deck was somewhat low. I would also probably resort to more of the 2 mana ramp than dorks because casting my commander with a mana up for protection would seem better to me which means ramping on two to play commander with four mana might make more sense than dorks.

Gargos, Vicious Watcher and Greatbow Doyen - Good call I put in orders for both. I could see them replacing the hydra I was just trying to figure out other things that might have synergy with what I was doing but I think the archer fits better than Kalonian Hydra.

Bequeathal and Fruit of the First Tree - I assume there will be more creatures than what I plan to answer with this deck so the idea was mostly that there is probably a tier of priorities in removal and I target the second most threatening target while answering the problem threat with the fight and resort to my next fight effect to finish off the creatures I cast these enchantments onto. It does take more steps but it gives me an opponent creature target for the commander and card draw as well. I do think that Bequeathal should work fairly well for this but I am skeptical on Fruit yet but I figured I will give it a shot.

Yea Shadowspear does seem really good. I wonder if this effect is good enough for me to consider Bonds of Mortality as well. Hexproof or Indestructible can really slow down a tactic like this quite a bit.

I need to think over some changes which I will try to post soon.

[Dunharrow]

Thanks for educating me on Thrive. Ugh.
I did slot in bonds of mortality.
Interesting idea for bequeathal.

You may be right about the ramp. 1v1 is very different as my goal is either to land Legolas turn 2 against Blue counterspell decks, or to play him turn 3 with mana up for protection against W/B/R decks. In a 4 player game with more wraths I may prefer artifact or spell based ramp.
I think it will be about testing it out and seeing how it plays in 4 player magic. Let me know what you find as I am unlikely to get this sleeved any time soon.

[ISBPathfinder]

Ok, cards are still in the mail but I am going to make a few adjustments having given things a little more thought as well as thinking through a few things.

DECK CHANGES:

• Ulvenwald Tracker → Shadowspear I thought about the tracker a bit more and while I can protect it its slow to do its thing and the rest of my deck is designed to do what he does so he seems redundant and kind of slow while also painting an additional target on me that I don't need. Shadowspear gets me past two very problematic keywords while also giving me some life and trample. Really it does a lot of things that I want to pick up for my commander as just in case sort of things.
• Nylea, God of the Hunt → Bane of Progress I thought about it and I felt that I had a lot of evasion in my deck already and I didn't need a mass trample effect so much as wanting trample on my commander. Between all the fight effects and targeted trample things I just didn't think Nylea was as good and she might not be a creature either for attacking or blocking given how permanent light I am. I kept thinking about having more Naturalize style of effects and I considered a bit more spot effects but in the end I thought a nuke them all might be fine. We will test and if its a problem change to another effect as my next assumption was to run Force of Vigor which might still happen but waiting on some testing to figure that out.
• Kalonian Hydra → Gargos, Vicious Watcher The hydra is a bit slow to spin up lacking haste effects and still takes a bunch of defending. I like Gargos in that it fits the design of the rest of the deck and gives me some redundancy to my commander that can be played alongside him just fine.
• Sword of Truth and Justice → Wild Defiance I thought about the sword for a bit and my end consensus was that its too much mana for what it does. The protections are nice against disruption but the swords triggers itself were lacking. I am not entirely sure if its worth trying out Defiance but it could let me voltron out of nowhere with spells and it can also allow me to have size right after recasting my commander.
• Fruit of the First Tree → Grothama, All-Devouring I thought that the fruit was probably a little clunky. I did some more thinking about my commander's fight effect and it can be used to direct damage something like Grothama to death without actually fighting (unless I am bigger than him). I think its something I want to try out for draw.
• Burst of Strength → Bonds of Mortality I just felt like the small buff and untap effects weren't entirely necessary. I do need to get past opponents protecting their creatures though so in comes bonds.
• Stony Strength → Canopy Cover Cutting some small buff stuff and adding some evasion / protection. I looked at a few other permenant based hexproof sources but I like this one the most given it comes with evasion too.
• Tyrite Sanctum → Wirewood Lodge I was originally thinking about doing some Seedborn Muse type things but I didn't find enough lands that felt like I could abuse them for value which is why I went away from that. I don't know that I need Sancum for small counter adds over something like untapping for some block options from my commander.

Some other random card thoughts:

• Greatbow Doyen - Soooo I kept thinking about this card. My biggest issue right now is that multiplayer commander is a 40 life format and my current primary wincon is commander damage. So, I guess it just feels like its very expensive and it doesn't speed up my commander damage gameplan so much as give me an alt wincon of zeroing life. I do think this can work I just think its sort of expensive for a gameplan that still puts a lot of weight on my commander to get there without diversifying my wincons over multiple targets to remove.
• Sylvan Safekeeper - I like its protection but it isn't a targeting spell effect and I also don't have that much creature tutor to the deck. Its something I am going to keep thinking about and I do encounter a lot of spot removal in general but that is also why I am running the spot protect effects in my deck. Right now I want to play the deck and see how it does before I think more about something like this.
• Delighted Halfling - Its ramp and it does protect from counter magic. In a lot of my normal gameplay I don't worry that much about my commander being counterspelled though especially when they are as cheap as this one is. This deck is a little more focus on the commander though so maybe we will see I guess. If I have issues with my commander getting countered I will probably smash this and Cavern of Souls in I am just starting out by assuming it isn't a problem until it is.
• Venerated Rotpriest - Its an interesting thought for an alt wincon. It is 10 spells though but its amusing if you have a spot removal war. It can also play well with potentially removing all the creatures someone has as then you can attack them for more poison.
• Tendershoot Dryad - Really just thinking about alt wincon options. I am not super excited but I like that its not too expensive and it can spin up a game winning boardstate.
• Scute Swarm - Similar to the Dryad. Its an option but ehh.
• Pathbreaker Ibex - Could be fun but its slow as all hell.

[ISBPathfinder]

I got a good number of the cards in this week and also came up with a few changes based on some things I just wanted to push around in the deck. This does add a little bit of ramp to my deck but its still not a major priority of mine for right now. Its possible that if I want to step it up further I might examine things like Mox Amber, mana dorks, or some 2cmc ramp but right now I don't think that I am really pushing this concept into being a ramp heavy focus unless my draw ends up being just way better than I would expect which I doubt.

DECK CHANGES:

• Primal Might → Explore I kept looking at all of my sorcery speed fight and I feel like I want to pair it down a little. I like that there are some cheap options still but I feel like scaling the X up on Primal Might stops allowing it to be a cheap fight effect even though there is versatility there I prefer some of my other sorcery fight over it because of some of them hitting harder or giving small buffs while keeping the mana lower. I like Explore on curve as it brings me up to the T3 cast my commander and have a mana up situation but more than that I like that its just a cantrip later on rather than always being stuck with it being ramp. When I have a deck like this that doesn't need to fix colors due to being one color I think effects like Explore really shine over the 2 mana find a land effects.
• Wild Defiance → Gaea's Touch I do think Wild Defiance could put in some work but the more I think about it.... I probably don't need to go blowing my load trying to one shot people. Gaea's Touch is a more expensive Exploration but it comes with emergency mana on demand that can help protect my commander.
• Bane of Progress → Force of Vigor I kept thinking about it and while its probably not the end of the world if I take out my own artifact and enchantments I really wanted something cheaper that could remove what needed removing on demand rather than a mass effect. I also don't have the creature tutor count to really toolbox creatures too much.
• Sword of Once and Future → Sylvan Library I kept thinking about how much mana it was to cast and equip in one go and I didn't feel like it was quite economical enough for green to run this sword even with it being on theme. The spellcast is also after combat and further commits to my commander as the engine. I am adding Library because it could be another draw engine of sorts especially with how much removal I have in here and I even have some lifegain to offset in a pinch but I think drawing a few cards with Library is probably fine and it creates a separate engine away from my commander which is nice.
• 1 Snow-Covered Forest → Boseiju, Who Endures I just kept thinking about how I need more naturalize options and realized I should probably have a Boseiju. I almost considered cutting a nonland for Boseju just because I am going to want to keep it as a nonland more often but for now we will cut a land. I might keep that in mind in the future though to shift a land back in.
• Plaza of Heroes → Cavern of Souls the plaza costs a lot to use and its a one shot answer to a control deck. Cavern is repeatable use and while more narrow it can potentially carry itself more against what it works against.
• Opal Palace → Myriad Landscape I kept thinking about Opal and how it could help me get back into play a little faster but I think instead I like Myraid which gets me into play a little faster upfront. Its true that it costs 3 mana to pop which is when I could cast my commander but I likely don't want to tap out for my commander anyways so it lets me cast my commander into a situation with more mana up which is probably better. Lets utility our way into a faster start over a slightly better rebuild.
• 1 Snow-Covered Forest-> Yavimaya, Cradle of Growth well they are both green mana producing lands and Yav helps cover some of my other utility lands. It is a bit rough when I run into Blood Moon / Ruination effects but those are rather rare.

[ISBPathfinder]

Ok, I had two EXTREMELY rough games lol. Needless to say I lost both games quite brutally. Lets talk about some of the issues I am currently having with the deck as I am not ready to throw in the towel but I need to address some of my problems.

• I lack blockers. I have very few creatures and very few of them can block for %$#%. I found I had to keep Legolas on defense until he is swull in both games which is harder.
• I draw a lot of attention when it comes to removal and I had some issues with consistency in defenses. One game I saw no hexproof options and ate two spot removals at super key times after blowing my load getting bigger and it was my end.
• I couldn't get my draw to work very well in part because I lack blockers and I need to have size plus evasion for some of the draw to work. The draw when hitting a player effects can work but its awkward with the fact that I had to use my commander as my defense often as well.
• I need more lifegain. I didn't see any lifegain options either game and the second game I died on like turn 6 or 7 to aristocrat bullcrap plus some targeted hate. I did try to attack him with a 30 powered trampling commander in his defense but it was also because he kept hitting me.
• Swords of Pro Green are a problem. Just saying there are some very good swords of X and Y that give pro green and I don't have much for answers to them.

So, I need to look at my draw, defense, and lifegain again I think. Some of the lifegain problem might be resolved by running more nonbasic land tutoring like Sylvan Scrying fetching Witch's Clinic just because its one of the few tutors I could run. I do think I could run Basilisk Collar as well and I might. I really need to figure out some better defense and sustain concepts though to keep me in the games longer. Its possible I might explore adding some level of elfball package to the deck from a ramp and draw stance. I do think I need to do a fairly large overhaul of my idea as my experience so far was everyone running my ass down with everything they have lol.

I am not scrapping this idea so much as saying I am going to probably come up with a fairly large shift in direction.

[ISBPathfinder]

Ok, I have a bunch of changes I am making to this deck and I have very low confidence that all of these are going to work out however I was having a lot of issues just being zurged down, spot removed on my commander, and lack of card draw as a whole so my goal for these changes was mostly to increase my draw and defense. Its possible I don't have enough ramp as my curve feels like it came up a little with these changes but we will start here and adjust as needed.

DECK CHANGES:

• Kodama of the West Tree → Wall of Blossoms my problem with Kodama was that I couldn't just go out swinging from the get go. I would get targeted somewhat heavily in the early game forcing me to use my commander on defense early and I felt it lost a lot of the reason to use it later. I did however want more blockers and a cheap cantrip sounds good all in one.
• Toski, Bearer of Secrets → Elder Gargaroth I wanted to move away from some of the draw on doing damage effects and have a little more defense. This guy is a bit slow but I also think it flies a little under the spot removal radar as he probably isn't the best and most important thing on the table plus I have a decent bit of protection in deck still.
• Ohran Frostfang → Forgotten Ancient I had hoped that the draw per attacker was going to work out better for me but the problem is I can't fight enough to full clear most players so I end up not really getting these effects to work so well right now. Forgotten Ancient gives me another threat other than my commander and it allows me to snowball my commander quickly.
• Grothama, All-Devouring → Rishkar's Expertise I was hoping to use Grothama as draw but I think the steps for that with this commander are a bit higher than I wanted. I am going to flip to Rishkar's instead and just hope for the best.
• Keen Sense → Sylvan Scrying I was having some issues with all of the auras and sorcery effects due to their timing as well as how a lot of them were problems to use as fight effects. I wanted a little more access to some of my utility lands too as I have a lot of needed utility in there.
• Sixth Sense → Mox Amber cutting the awkward auras and adding a little more ramp. I like the mox because it can be used quickly and I can use it sort of like a land in that I usually want to have my commander plus a mana up in most cases so I can even deploy it before my commander in a turn to use it for protection.
• Sylvan Library → Cavalier of Thorns I just wanted a lot of chunky bois that can defend me right now. Sylvan is still great but I wasn't nearly as fast out of the gates as I wanted to be using a bunch of life as a resource for sylvan. I also don't have a ton of shuffles so it might be the right call to cut sylvan for now.
• Snake Umbra → Viridian Revel I have been seeing a hell of a lot of treasure in my meta lately and I want to see how Viridian Revel works out. I was including Snake Umbra as draw anyways but was having issues connecting consistently at all stages of the game due to needing to grow in size and gain evasion before I could really connect with my commander. This takes a targeting and buffing effect out for one that isn't but I expect better draw from it so I am fine with the change.
• Primeval Bounty → Ulvenwald Hydra I still like the idea of the bounty but I needed more creatures on defense so I am swapping it for now for a big boy.
• Blossoming Defense → Sylvan Safekeeper swapping some of my defensive protection to safekeeper for now. I think safekeeper shines when you have low sweepers bug high spot disruption which seems to be my issue.
• Ranger's Guile → Legolas's Quick Reflexes I TOTALLY didn't know that quick reflexes was a card and then when I saw what it does and I have the option of split second protect or split second fighting when targeting an opponent creature it seems like a really useful trick. Unfortunately it seems unlikely that I would ever protect my commander and then tap him after that for his fight as that part of the card but I think its fine.
• Royal Treatment → Finale of Devastation I wanted to get more creature tutors as I am adding a few desirable creatures to my list. I figure with cutting a spot protect its kind of fine as the tutor can get me Sylvan Safekeeper.
• Audacity → Invasion of Ikoria // Zilortha, Apex of Ikoria I wanted to get more creature tutors as I am adding a few desirable creatures to my list.
• Blizzard Brawl → Traproot Kami I wanted some additional blockers and even though it has no power it helps cut down on damage I take.
• Ruinous Intrusion → Garruk, Primal Hunter I really wanted to push to have more draw and more defense for now. I do think that artifacts and enchants can be a problem for this deck but lets start one step at a time as I need more draw and defense first.
• Animist's Might → Court of Garenbrig I am not overly sure about monarch in this deck but I really like the +/+ counters part of this card. With adding a few more defensive creatures it might just make it ok though.
• Myriad Landscape → Tower of the Magistrate I ran into some pro green Sword of X and Y and then I realized how good most of the pro green swords are. Running this lets me force creatures to drop their equipment especially if indestructible or pro green.

This gives me 3 cards to try to fish up utility lands of which I feel like two of them buy me quite a bit of defense between untapping my commander and or giving him lifegain. I also have four additional strong blockers with this and I think my card draw is a bit splashier with this. I was really trying to maintain as many cheap instants as I could with this as I think that is what makes the deck interesting. I don't know where the fine line between too many and too few is but with more draw coming in I am hoping I can find them a little more consistently. Quite a few of my protection instants also couldn't target opponents creatures so that also limited my options when it came to fight cards so I prioritized the stronger protections and the ones that could enemy creature target to stay.