MTGNexus

I had a deck idea for a new deck, which is to play lots of damage prevention cards, simply because i never really see them. My meta also way more go wide than go tall so this could work (in theory, this will not become my most powerful deck). So think stuff like Protection of the Hekma, Thunderstaff, Orbs of Warding, and Sphere of Law and it's variants. So this pits me at least in white, but I can't really come up with a fitting way to win and thus a fitting commander. I did consider Angus Mackenzie and Ghen, Arcanum Weaver as possible commanders, but maybe there's something cooler / better out there? Or something with less colors? Some azorius color hack effects? Alela, Artful Provocateur or Kykar, Wind's Fury token stuff? So many options!

Open for ideas! Also for cool synergies to benefit extra from having these effects.

You could consider going with Queen Marchesa or one of the initiative commanders, since you're presumably trying to make it impossible to damage you in combat.

Since Battletide Alchemist is probably one of if not the best card for damage prevention, you could go for a cleric tribal (sub)theme. Use Nalia de'Arnise as a commander and sprinkle in some (incidental) party stuff such as Oketra's Monument to get the commander to its full potential.
I also like @DirkGently's suggestion of the Monarch mechanic here.

Ardeyn

I would play Personal Sanctuary and a bunch of symmetrical burn! Build yourself a bubble and then torch the place!

I run a Chromium, the Mutable deck that is built around messing with the combat step, although not in quite the way you are looking to do it. Decklist is in my signature if you are interested.

One thing I like about Chromium is that it can just beat people down for commander damage to serve as a win condition. So maybe you could consider some big beater as your commander.

My Gisela, Blade of Goldnight does the defensive "pillow fort" strategy to some degree, heavy in enchantments. It leans into the group slug angle. You could potentially draw some inspiration from that list too.

White, Red, and Blue have some of the best cards for combat step tricks so I'd probably try to use at least two of those colors no matter what direction you go.

Ardeyn wrote: ↑

1 year ago

Since Battletide Alchemist is probably one of if not the best card for damage prevention, you could go for a cleric tribal (sub)theme. Use Nalia de'Arnise as a commander and sprinkle in some (incidental) party stuff such as Oketra's Monument to get the commander to its full potential.
I also like @DirkGently's suggestion of the Monarch mechanic here.

Ardeyn

Or if you want a cleric commander that prevents damage you could go with Orim, Samite Healer or Atalya, Samite Master.

Michiko Konda, Truth Seeker is a legitimately great commander for this. It puts you in a grindy midrange board control deck, but y'know, some people like that, and I'm those people. These days theres tons if supplementary pseudo stax or board control you can use to make sure people have creatures and they do nothing but swing, so it should be pretty easy to put something together.

It does mean your wincon is probably beats and not much else but thats totally viable.

It is a shame Forcefield isn't reprintable. But yeah, there's a great retired primer for Michiko on MTGSalvation that runs this sort of build. As old and outdated as it is its still a strong resource for this archetype.

Thanks