MTG Salvation

Hello all,

I am starting this thread in hopes of brewing up some unique new ideas for the RWB color scheme. With the impending arrival of Zurgo Helmsmasher and my love for the beautiful RWB color mix, I really wanted to make a creative build for a new EDH deck. I've read a lot other people's ideas for Sir Helmsmasher, but most of them revolve around either including 10+ destroy creature board wipes or a Voltron oriented deck; I hate both of these things. Repeated board wipes would devastate my playgroups decks and I'm not interested in doing that to them. As for Voltron, I hate its simple mindedness.

I'm thinking a fun build could involve a soldier / token theme. This would essentially take an already existing R/W strategy and splash in some black utility and removal.



To be clear, these cards above are not a deck. These are only a compiled list of cards that may get called up to the big leagues. The most prominent idea for this theme would revolve around an Iroas, God of Victory, Goldnight Commander, Gisela, Blade of Goldnight, and Aurelia, the Warleader. Drop a bunch of tokens, and then have an army of buffed creatures / tokens with things like Spear of Heliod or Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite. Swing for the win. An interesting card I have always wanted to try in an aggro deck is Keldon Twilight. I would throw it in here just because. It also goes with my deathtouch theme below. Psshhh, sorry, can't forget the new and pretty awesome Mardu Ascendancy.

One of my favorite ideas for the deck could involve a deathtouch / first strike theme with many ways of giving your creatures deathtouch like Onyx Mage, the new card Ankle Shanker and obviously Archetype of Finality. That way you could include cards like Goblin Sharpshooter, Wojek Embermage, Thornbite Staff], and Viridian Longbow for some very entertaining deathtouch spot removal or a socially acceptable combo board wipe. Cards like that also make High Priest of Penance a pretty nice addition. If I went this route, I'd definitely make sure to have a splash of vigilance like a Serra's Blessing or Heliod, God of the Sun for defense. Oh, and I can't forget Archetype of Courage. I would also definitely include cards like Basilisk Collar, Gorgon's flail, or Quietus Spike.

Please, I would love to hear your take on a unique RWB strategy or comments on the potential success of my ideas. The Khans release is only a few weeks away and I want to have my deck all laid out and ready for assembly. Thanks in advance.

Ps - I don't mean board wipe and Voltronesque win conditions have to be excluded from the deck, I just don't want to use them as the main strategies.

Moved to Multiplayer Commander Decklists (as this is a specific decklist discussion even if the list isn't 100% yet), merged doublepost - Wildfire393

The token aggro deck also would make it a great home for the new Sorin, Solemn Visitor.

Hello :D!

Im gonnna bookmark this thread, i've been looking at Zurgo and thought; " this is not just a voltron general, this is the badass that sits in his throne if he wants to, or he can just lead his army into battle". I did threw together a typical wrath heavy Zurgo deck, but i want to focus on his badassness! Not his play him turn 2-3 then Armagedon. Im seeing a leader, picking up all kinds of warriors, berserkers, getting some affiliation with Lovisa Coldeyes. MMMM MMMMM!

Im gonna see if i can make a zurgo list right now!

EDIT: Oh yeah, one of the sucky things with my EDH group is that they mostly go for good decks, nobody really has a theme deck except for me, oh yeah and another dude that "abuses"

Haha, I'm glad you hear where I am coming from. I completely agree with you. I'm looking forward to seeing your creation.

I can update you right now if you want to : ).

I bet i can find other cards, but i looked through 8000+ cards, and i picked the ones i felt fits the theme.
The theme that im seeing is, Barbarians, warriors, some knight here and there because they're from homelands lol. Not only that, since my Zurgo deck is more of a, the lost soldiers and mercenarys nobody wants to hire, or if they're wanted etc is in the deck. The theme also includes war, blood and such, since Zurgo loves going into battle himself aswell!

There are some good card in the mainboard atm, but i think you can see my theme to some degree. I just have to cut 40 ish cards from the mainboard, maybe swap some of them from my maybeboard.

Imo Zurgo does not look for help from gods, avatars or the likes, he and his band of barbarians survives with their own strength. I was thinking about putting in a cool dragon like a one off, found a two headed one that looks pretty cool.

No help from demons or angels, any deity like.

Atm there's alot of red, and way too little token effects to get more warriors and barbarians to join the fight.

There are some cool interactions like Shields of Velis Vel + Lovisa Coldeyes. I can basically let another player feel the greatness of being a part of a my band of brothers, this combo can help someone kill an opponent of mine.

And im obviously not done with the deck, this is what i've gathered so far, now i just have to cut a bunch of cards.




This is cards i put in the maybeboard so far.

I'm looking into something similar. A Zurgo deck that likes to attack and really smash people in the face.

Aurelia, the Warleader for multiple combats is the best, but Waves of Aggression is great too and often overlooked. Seize the Day can be really surprising. I'll also run Godo, Bandit Warlord and probably Hellkite Charger.

As far as creature pump goes, Nobilis of War is pretty solid. Sunhome Guildmage generates tokens too. Damage doublers like Furnace of Rath and Gratuitous Violence might find their way in too. Marshal's Anthem doubles as recursion. This is the best use Fervent Charge has ever had, so you should play it. It's surprisingly good. Ogre Battledriver seems pretty good too.

Blood Frenzy is a pet card of mine that nobody sees coming. In multiplayer you can get it to be +4 damage on an opponent and a removal spell on another opponent's creature pretty often. It could just be a +4/+0 on Zurgo, too. It's also fetchable with Sunforger, which is a solid card in any r/w deck with creatures. Nobody sees Pyroblast coming either.

I think this might be the deck I finally run Odric, Master Tactician in after wanting to for so long. I'll probably run a few other things that mess with combat, Basandra, Battle Seraph being one of them.

Twilight Drover goes really well with other token generators. Necromancer's Covenant isn't really on theme but is a good token generator and graveyard hoser. Foundry Champion could be decent at taking advantage of a lot of tokens and mana. True Conviction, Vicious Shadows, and Stalking Vengeance can all be pretty bonkers with tokens. Sometimes to the point that they're unfun when they completely turn a game around.

Vorrac Battlehorns gives cheap trample and is silly with Iroas. Shizo, Death's Storehouse is a solid card for evasion. Grappling Hook and Kusari-Gama seem like they'd be fun on Zurgo.

Skull Rend, Rakdos Charm, Cauldron Dance, and Torrent of Souls are really solid r/b staples.

Yeah, i don't want to play many of the cards you listed, there's 6 of them that im planning to use, but since im already using some of them/have used them before im looking for something different.
Im just tired of seeing Sunforger, i love it when i animate it with Karn, Silver Golem to keep my friend from using it.

I don't want help from any dragons or angels, maybe 1 dragon but it has to be a special one. And i don't want any undead or the like, it has to be humans, orc, goblins etc.

Yeah im kinda crippling myself, but i want to see if the rest of my EDH group will follow me when it comes to thematic decks, and not just really good ones like almost all EDH decks usually end up as.

Hakim, those are some very good cards that I will definitely consider. Thank you for the recommendations. Waves of Aggression and Blood Frenzy are awesome. And Fervent Charge? How did I not know about that card? Have you heard of Martial Coup? As I said in the original post, I am not stuffing the deck with board wipes, but a couple are acceptable and that one is definitely in.

And Runnin, I am with you on the themes and non-overpowered decks to a certain point. I want the deck to be unique, but if it rarely ever wins, I won't enjoy playing it. I need to find a balance. My play group has no guilt in kicking someone while their down. If the deck isn't good to a minimum level, I end up sitting on the sidelines watching more game than I actually play.

I can agree with you there dude.. The only one with thematic decks can suck lol.

Some good cards to add could be hero of bladehold, brimaz, king of oreskos, and hero of oxid ridge for tokens / boosting your other creatures even if they don't match the creature type. Each of these is good on its own and even better with other cards so they could be great additions. Skullclamp is a must for any kind of token deck I think as well. Glory of Warfare is a good pump as well. Your deck looks very fun too play though!

I have a Kaalia deck built in a similar style to the standard aristocrats deck a while back. Recursion, tokens, combos all come into play in my decklist which might be able to give you some further inspiration for some synergies, although it obviously don't follow your theme (its given in my sig).

Alright, I made a new build. I took the idea of a mono-red Goblin tribal theme and tried to mix in some other powerful W/B cards. It is convenient that the new cards Mardu Ascendancy, Ankle Shanker, Goblinslide, and Hordeling Outburst all support this theme. I know that this can be better, but it is definitely the most usable alternate Zurgo deck I have built so far. Suggestions are highly appreciated. I know there are definitely some nifty R/W/B combos I could include in here that I haven't heard about. I would also like to hear your opinion on if this is a viable strategy.