Stolen Goods: Road to Recovery, Part 2

This is part two of my two part series on how I came back to the game of Magic after getting my collection stolen last summer. This part of the article is going to focus heavily on the EDH deck I built which allowed me to once again enjoy the game. To read the backstory, please see Stolen Goods: Road to Recovery, Part 1.

Welcome back loyal readers! So at the end for the first part, I was about to tell you about my new EDH deck featuring my favorite angelic host, Jenara, Asura of War. Check out the deck HERE!

First things first, let's take a look at why I chose this beautiful angel as my Commander. I knew that I wanted to play Bant (U/W/G). Not only are Blue and White my favorite colors, but the Bant colors allow me to: run counter-magic, draw cards, take extra turns, ramp mana, tutor for creatures, wrath the board, run diverse removal and recur permanents all in one deck! Together, these three colors are extremely powerful and give the deck very little in the way of weaknesses to any particular strategy that my opponents may be using. Since we know what colors we want to be playing, let's next take a look at some of the Legendary creatures that we could use to head our deck.

• Rafiq of the Many: I find him to the most common Bant general that I have had to face off against. Rafiq wants to run in a more aggro/voltron-style of deck than the one I am running.
• Derevi, Empyrial Tactician: No doubt, a great choice for a Bant general. He seems to want to be built as a control or heavy token commander. Not a great choice for the ETB (Enters the Battlefield) deck that I'm looking to build here.
• Roon of the Hidden Realm: A very interesting creature from the Commander 2013 product. Originally, I had planned to use him as my Commander for my rebuild Bant deck. he is a value engine for sure, if he survives long enough to untap. I found him too slow in playing with him and he requires a more 'build around me approach' to ETB effects. His awkwardly high mana cost means that recasting him can become difficult.

These are the main 3, besides Jenara that I considered when building a Bant deck. Of course you have other choices like Treva, the Renewer, Rubinia Soulsinger, and Angus Mackenzie. However, I believe Jenara to the best candidate to be leading this deck forward to victory, she gives us an early, very powerful beater, who can stop other aggressive generals in their tracks. Just ask Javier how much he likes seeing a turn 3 Jenara! A 3/3 flyer for U/W/G gives her amazing power for her cost, and the fact is that her ability to add +1/+1 counters remains relevant for the entire game. Your opponents have to worry about her whether she comes out on turn 3 or as late as turn 15! That's the kind of power that I'm looking for in a general! Another great thing about her is that she doesn't require other cards to work. She is not a build around me general, which makes her great for the leader of an ETB/good stuff/control deck like the one that I am planning on building; the other 99 cards can all have more use when you don't have to use multiple cards to turn on your commander.

The way that I usually like to play this deck is with an attrition style. Throughout the game I poke at my opponents' resources, including life totals! Weakening them until it is hard for them to put up a fight. I generally try to control my opponents, using my ETB effects, until they run out of things to do and then go in for the kill with my utility creatures and the queen of them all, Jenara! ETB effects and the engines which help them be effective are the keys to this kind of play-style. I like to consider these kinds of cards as my 'renewable resources' as they can often times be blinked or recurred to give me more incremental advantage over my opponents; this is especially important in larger Free-For-All style games where I have multiple adversaries. This slow, methodical buildup of resources usually allows me to take over the game later on, resulting in most times a huge Jenara or a combo-kill of some kind. Good stuff cards do have a place in this deck; however, sometimes you just need value cards like Path to Exile or Wrath of God. These cards have the least synergy with the rest of the deck, but sometimes when things are going south they will be the cards that will save you.

I feel like a major portion of this deck is how it uses value engines that, while powerful, are not really degenerate. Sure, sometimes I can do 'mean' things like bounce a Woodfall Primus or Acidic Slime a bunch of times to blow up lands; but quite honestly those kinds of plays don't happen very often with the deck. Most of the time those cards are going to come in and blow up a problem non-creatures card (or 2) and then give me a valuable creature on the field to do something with; you definitely sometimes have the option to do degenerate things sometimes, but overall you are just trying to gain incremental value while keeping your opponents in check. Jenara is used mainly to plug any and every hole that there might be with the deck. She gives us a very good play, and response to almost anything after turn 3. Opponents plays Kaalia? Go ahead and drop your blocker. You had a nice board position that was just Wrath-ed away? Add an instant threat to the board. Need that Solemn Simulacrum to get your ramp going? Use Birthing Pod and offer her up as sacrifice to find it. She really allows us to always have a play that your opponent needs to answer, but that's not to say that she has no synergy with the deck though, far from it in fact! The ability for the deck to gain incremental advantages over time plays right into her ability to be a mana sink in the late game. Pump her up with a Mirari's Wake on the field or a Prophet of Kruphix and go to town!

Speaking of the Prophet, she is an all-star in the deck. The ability to untap your creatures and lands at the end of each player's turn is killer! Not to mention, with her giving creatures the Flash ability you can cast basically anything you want.. at any point you want! The deck obviously works much better with her on the field, which makes her a top target for opponents' spot removal.

Well there you are! A look into the deck that made me enjoy playing Magic again. I fell in love with Jenara when I first played her and I can only see that love growing stronger as time goes on. 

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-Evan Forster