Angel tribal is typically seen as slow and weak so I wanted to find a way to make it competitive in higher power level pods. The idea is to gain infinite mana and win via 9999/9999 angels sweeping the board. Shalai does a few things that make her a playable commander.
1) Access to green ramp and tutors
2) Hexproof for all creatures, protecting your key board pieces.
3) Infinite mana outlet in +1/+1 counters for your whole team.
Now in the real world this deck would be much more powerful if I just replaced the angels with hatebears but that doesn't let me kill everyone with the coolest, yet weakest tribe. Early game just ramp and play a handful of angels. Eventually tutor for any number of two card infinite combo pieces and just end the game on the spot through brutal angel fisting.
Combos -
Argothian Elder + Maze of Ith - Infinite mana of any color.
Vizer Of Remedies + Devoted Druid - Infinite Green mana.
Viridian Joiner or Selvala, Heart of the Wilds + Sword of the Paruns or Umbral Mantle - Infinite Green mana.
Assemble one of these and activate the commander's ability a trillion times, then sweep my opponent with fliers. Use Eternal Witness type cards and hexproof to build combo resilience and targeted removal to eliminate blockers and key threats. Angels that spawn tokens are important as they force the opponent to find more blockers. 3-4 1/1 birds becomes a lethal threat once they do 999 damage per hit. Other angels have utility effects, often very powerful support options. Use Tooth and Nail to summon Brisela, Voice of Nightmares because it's funny, but more often I use the tutors to just assemble a combo and win.
Lastly Lifelink angels are important. Dealing infinite lifelink damage to a blocker gives me infinite life which helps prevent lethal counter attacks. They're also quite good at keeping you alive in a non-infinite scenario.
Anyhow the deck has been really solid in testing. I'm kind of worried about fast combo but that isn't super common in my meta. What I'm looking for is maybe some better ways to give my creatures haste so I can combo off / attack faster. I tried posting this on reddit I got literally zero advice from anyone, but I've heard good things about this site
I've made an Atraxa, Praetors' Voice Angel deck for super causal tribal games. I always lose, just because there are no synergies
My suggestions are if you can afford her, Captain Sisay. She can get 6 legendary creatures and even a couple of legendary lands. She can get one of your combo pieces in Selvala, Heart of the Wilds.
These are my "tech" cards for my Angel deck, Hunting Grounds and Descendants' Path. Now they are hard to use, and I'm not actually suggesting you use them, but they are the sort of cards I like to build around. Scroll Rack helps, and I notice that you already have Land Tax in, so this is a card that would be good in your deck anyway. Sylvan Library helps with top deck manipulation and Sensei's Divining Top is another card that I use.
Aura Shards is kind of a go to card for any Selesnya deck with creatures in it.
Same with Mirari's Wake, will help with casting multiple cards a turn.
As far as what to remove for any of the potential cards above. here are some of the cards which I think do the least work for you: Sigarda, Heron's Grace - Backup to Shalai? Nope, not even close. Endless Horizons - Too slow, you might as well play ramp at the cost of 4 mana. Reclaim - It is possible to have too much graveyard recursion. I get it you always want to be able to get your combo back in the face of disruption, but the reality is a lot of games you'll be holding a few graveyard cards, with no really great targets. Only good if you have a specific plan on how to fill your graveyard, like Life from the Loam. Luminarch Ascension - Surprisingly underwhelming when I've played it and when it's played against me. Sure some games you might get a few Angels out of it before it must be removed. But often because it has a wind-up period people are ready for it.
Can pump it into Shalai, Voice of Plenty +1/+1 so any unblocked creatures are going to kill. Even if everybody has blockers, a million/million creatures are going to put pressure on opponents. Dramatic Reversal is blue.
There's also Scroll of Avacyn and Seraph Sanctuary lol, but both are kind of terrible.
I've made an Atraxa, Praetors' Voice Angel deck for super causal tribal games. I always lose, just because there are no synergies
Come to think of it Karona, False God could also be an angel tribal commander. She's partially made of Akroma so... almost an angel!
My suggestions are if you can afford her, Captain Sisay. She can get 6 legendary creatures and even a couple of legendary lands. She can get one of your combo pieces in Selvala, Heart of the Wilds.
That's a good idea. Her price has dropped recently. She can be under 20 dollars now.
These are my "tech" cards for my Angel deck, Hunting Grounds and Descendants' Path. Now they are hard to use, and I'm not actually suggesting you use them, but they are the sort of cards I like to build around. Scroll Rack helps, and I notice that you already have Land Tax in, so this is a card that would be good in your deck anyway. Sylvan Library helps with top deck manipulation and Sensei's Divining Top is another card that I use.
My deck isn't creature heavy enough for Hunting Grounds or Descendant's path but Scroll Rack and Sense's Top are great suggestions. I only just now noticed that Scroll Rack is reusable. That's incredible.
Aura Shards is kind of a go to card for any Selesnya deck with creatures in it.
Yeah this is solid. I really have no excuse not to run it.
Same with Mirari's Wake, will help with casting multiple cards a turn.
I've found this to be a little weak. The +1/+1 effect is basically meaningless while the mana doubling effect comes a bit too late to really matter. By turn 5 or 6 I should be comboing off. I think I'd rather just run another mana rock.
Apostle is kind of meh but giving my board protection from wipes sounds really nice. I've found that targeted removal isn't a huge deal as people aren't willing to target Shalai directly. They're more likely to just board wipe.
As far as what to remove for any of the potential cards above. here are some of the cards which I think do the least work for you: Sigarda, Heron's Grace - Backup to Shalai? Nope, not even close.
I was mostly just using it because I like the art lol, but the token ability is really nice. 2-3 99999 power human tokens puts a lot of pressure on people.
Endless Horizons - Too slow, you might as well play ramp at the cost of 4 mana.
Agreed
Reclaim - It is possible to have too much graveyard recursion. I get it you always want to be able to get your combo back in the face of disruption, but the reality is a lot of games you'll be holding a few graveyard cards, with no really great targets. Only good if you have a specific plan on how to fill your graveyard, like Life from the Loam.
Yeah I do have a bit too much. A little is nice but I'm pushing it a little.
Luminarch Ascension - Surprisingly underwhelming when I've played it and when it's played against me. Sure some games you might get a few Angels out of it before it must be removed. But often because it has a wind-up period people are ready for it.
Definitely, it just makes me a target immediately. I actually forgot I still had it in the deck lol.
Out
- Luminarch Ascension
- Endless Horizons
- Nature's Spiral
- Hour of Revelation
In
+ Sensei's Divining Top
+ Scroll Rack
+ Aura Shards
+ Heroic Intervention
Hey dude. I have been running an angel tribal Avacyn, Angel of Hope deck for over a year now that I poured a very large chunk of my soul and way too much money into.
It's still too slow to keep up to most Commanders in my playgroups meta as well. Krufix, Rashmi, Hapatra, Atraxa, etc etc... These are really fast decks even in our casual meta.
I also noticed Shalai as an excellent choice for Angel tribal. The Hexproof and pump from the commander are very interesting tools for angel tribal. Yes I agree with some of the comments on here. I was infatuated with Angels when I was a young kid when this game was in its infancy. Back in the day angel tribal used to be too cool for school cause you could do things like 4 Serra angels, and 4 Pristine angels give the pristines vigilance, and lifelink, and the serra's lifelink. And seem like an unstopable life gaining monster. Back in my day, (HA!), In the "quads" standard days, shennanigans like this gave Angels a following and devotion that is kinda similar to my devotion to the Montreal Canadiens... It's a devotion that is based on the glory of yester-year. The reality of Angel tribal in the commander singleton format is that its a very lack-luster tribe due to its overwhelming lack of synergy.
There is some tips I can give you on this topic. There is no magic stick solution that I can think of to make angels synergize really well. Here are a few that are on my radar.
A few in the tribe that can interact with Shalai: Aegis Angel, in this case is an angel that can give Shalai some protection: Indestructible. Also, Avacyn, Angel of Hope. Avacyn can be fetched by above mentioned Captain Sisay. Now I get it, it's not hexproof/shroud. But when you dig through target removal lists, you do eliminate a decent chunk of staples that use the word "destroy". And these are tools in the tribe. You don't have to waste extra card slots to get this protection.
The Bruna, Gisela, Brisela trick is also 100% on Sissay's radar.
Green has creature fetching and finding power so there is some notable synergy/interaction between Angelic Skirmisher / Angelic Field Marshal & Pristine Angel. Again it's worth mentioning not just for green's creature tutor capability, also because of the sensei's divning top-ish scan the top of your library and get creatures mechanism green does often.
Also, Lyra and Herald of War were mentioned but there is also the little fellah people always forget. Radiant, Archangel. The whole damn tribe is flying. This little guy usually comes in with pretty impressive stats, and is also a Sissay target in this color scheme. To be honnest A lot of the highest ranking angels in the tribe are Sissay targets. I'm actually seriously considering de-commissioning my Avacyn deck and re-tooling it as a Shalai Angel deck with a Legendary Sub-theme so as to be able to run Sissay an Alternate commander from time to time for a laugh. Also don't forget guys, lifelink is a pretty common theme in the Angel Tribe and White so Archangel of Thune.
I agree 1000% With this entire thread. Angels as a tribe are getting a bad reputaion in commander because there are super slow due to their mostly White/Red/Boros roots. Not much quality draw and ramp in that scheme. Colorless crutches that those colors rely on in that department cannot substitute the raw power of things like Consecrated Sphinx, Rhystic Study, Skyshroud Claim, Cultivate, etc etc.
The one thing that Angels in commander really really desperately need in is MANA. The Selesnya route for green's ramp is forward thinking on your part and at the moment receives my two thumbs up as a long time MTG Angel fanatic.
Also, let's get real here. Your running green. RAAAAMMMMMMMMMMPPPPP If it goes off the way you want, your Wayfarer ain't fetching crap. I would say things like Crop Rotation or green's scan to find stuff like Vivien Reid is the most efficient way to fetch or help find Maze of Ith or ... Cavern of Souls You can always get a land back from the crop rotation via Sun Titan, Ramunap Excavator, Crucible of Worlds etc...
1) Access to green ramp and tutors
2) Hexproof for all creatures, protecting your key board pieces.
3) Infinite mana outlet in +1/+1 counters for your whole team.
Now in the real world this deck would be much more powerful if I just replaced the angels with hatebears but that doesn't let me kill everyone with the coolest, yet weakest tribe. Early game just ramp and play a handful of angels. Eventually tutor for any number of two card infinite combo pieces and just end the game on the spot through brutal angel fisting.
Combos -
Argothian Elder + Maze of Ith - Infinite mana of any color.
Vizer Of Remedies + Devoted Druid - Infinite Green mana.
Viridian Joiner or Selvala, Heart of the Wilds + Sword of the Paruns or Umbral Mantle - Infinite Green mana.
Assemble one of these and activate the commander's ability a trillion times, then sweep my opponent with fliers. Use Eternal Witness type cards and hexproof to build combo resilience and targeted removal to eliminate blockers and key threats. Angels that spawn tokens are important as they force the opponent to find more blockers. 3-4 1/1 birds becomes a lethal threat once they do 999 damage per hit. Other angels have utility effects, often very powerful support options. Use Tooth and Nail to summon Brisela, Voice of Nightmares because it's funny, but more often I use the tutors to just assemble a combo and win.
Lastly Lifelink angels are important. Dealing infinite lifelink damage to a blocker gives me infinite life which helps prevent lethal counter attacks. They're also quite good at keeping you alive in a non-infinite scenario.
Anyhow the deck has been really solid in testing. I'm kind of worried about fast combo but that isn't super common in my meta. What I'm looking for is maybe some better ways to give my creatures haste so I can combo off / attack faster. I tried posting this on reddit I got literally zero advice from anyone, but I've heard good things about this site
1x Shalai, Voice of Plenty
Creature (28)
1x Angel of Condemnation
1x Angel of Finality
1x Angel of Invention
1x Angel of Jubilation
1x Angel of Serenity
1x Archangel of Tithes
1x Argothian Elder
1x Avacyn's Pilgrim
1x Baneslayer Angel
1x Bruna, the Fading Light
1x Devoted Druid
1x Emancipation Angel
1x Emeria Angel
1x Eternal Witness
1x Gisela, the Broken Blade
1x Grand Abolisher
1x Karmic Guide
1x Linvala, Keeper of Silence
1x Lyra Dawnbringer
1x Recruiter of the Guard
1x Resplendent Angel
1x Selvala, Heart of the Wilds
1x Sigarda, Heron's Grace
1x Sigarda, Host of Herons
1x Stoneforge Mystic
1x Viridian Joiner
1x Vizer Of Remedies
1x Weathered Wayfarer
1x Fellwar Stone
1x Lightning Greaves
1x Mana Crypt
1x Selesnya Signet
1x Sensei's Divining Top
1x Scroll Rack
1x Sol Ring
1x Sword of the Paruns
1x Umbral Mantle
Land (36)
1x Blighted Woodland
1x Bountiful Promenade
1x Buried Ruin
1x Canopy Vista
1x Eiganjo Castle
1x Exotic Orchard
9x Forest
1x Fortified Village
1x Krosan Verge
1x Maze of Ith
1x Mistveil Plains
1x Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
9x Plains
1x Razorverge Thicket
1x Saltcrusted Steppe
1x Selesnya Sanctuary
1x Sunpetal Grove
1x Temple Garden
1x Windswept Heath
1x Yavimaya Hollow
1x Aura of Silence
1x Aura Shards
1x Darksteel Mutation
1x Defense of the Heart
1x Land Tax
1x Song of the Dryads
1x Sylvan Library
Sorcery (11)
1x Austere Command
1x Cleansing Nova
1x Farseek
1x Nature's Lore
1x Open the Armory
1x Primal Command
1x Rampant Growth
1x Steelshaper's Gift
1x Tooth and Nail
Instant (9)
1x Beast Within
1x Congregation at Dawn
1x Eladamri's Call
1x Heroic Intervention
1x Noxious Revival
1x Oblation
1x Path to Exile
1x Reclaim
1x Swords to Plowshares
1x Unexpectedly Absent
(W/U)(B/R)GForm of Progenitus, Shape of a Scrubland
BRGJund Tokens with Prossh, the Magic Dragon Foil
URGAnimar, the RUG CleanerFoil
RRRFeldon of the Third Path 2.0 Foil
BG(B/G)Not Another Meren DeckFoil
UR(U/R)Mizzix, Y Control and X Burn Spells
(W/U)(B/R)GHarold Ramos - The 35 Foot Long Twinkie (In +1/+1 counters)
UB(U/B)Dragonlord Silumgar
I've made an Atraxa, Praetors' Voice Angel deck for super causal tribal games. I always lose, just because there are no synergies
My suggestions are if you can afford her, Captain Sisay. She can get 6 legendary creatures and even a couple of legendary lands. She can get one of your combo pieces in Selvala, Heart of the Wilds.
These are my "tech" cards for my Angel deck, Hunting Grounds and Descendants' Path. Now they are hard to use, and I'm not actually suggesting you use them, but they are the sort of cards I like to build around. Scroll Rack helps, and I notice that you already have Land Tax in, so this is a card that would be good in your deck anyway. Sylvan Library helps with top deck manipulation and Sensei's Divining Top is another card that I use.
Aura Shards is kind of a go to card for any Selesnya deck with creatures in it.
Same with Mirari's Wake, will help with casting multiple cards a turn.
I do like the idea of having a couple of Shalai, Voice of Plenty protection spells, so that you can feel safe about one-for-one removal. Apostle's Blessing is the cheapest for for this. Heroic Intervention is good against the mass creature removal spells.
Teferi's Protection has always done me proud.
As far as what to remove for any of the potential cards above. here are some of the cards which I think do the least work for you:
Sigarda, Heron's Grace - Backup to Shalai? Nope, not even close.
Endless Horizons - Too slow, you might as well play ramp at the cost of 4 mana.
Reclaim - It is possible to have too much graveyard recursion. I get it you always want to be able to get your combo back in the face of disruption, but the reality is a lot of games you'll be holding a few graveyard cards, with no really great targets. Only good if you have a specific plan on how to fill your graveyard, like Life from the Loam.
Luminarch Ascension - Surprisingly underwhelming when I've played it and when it's played against me. Sure some games you might get a few Angels out of it before it must be removed. But often because it has a wind-up period people are ready for it.
Niv-Mizzet Reborn
Feather, the Redeemed
Estrid, the Masked
Teshar
Tymna/Ravos
Najeela, Blade-Blossom
Firesong & Sunspeaker
Zur the Enchanter
Lazav, the Multifarious
Ishai+Reyhan
Click images for decks->
-Prime Speaker Vannifar
---------------------Will & Rowan Kenrith
Niv-Mizzet Reborn
Feather, the Redeemed
Estrid, the Masked
Teshar
Tymna/Ravos
Najeela, Blade-Blossom
Firesong & Sunspeaker
Zur the Enchanter
Lazav, the Multifarious
Ishai+Reyhan
Click images for decks->
-Prime Speaker Vannifar
---------------------Will & Rowan Kenrith
There's also Scroll of Avacyn and Seraph Sanctuary lol, but both are kind of terrible.
Come to think of it Karona, False God could also be an angel tribal commander. She's partially made of Akroma so... almost an angel!
That's a good idea. Her price has dropped recently. She can be under 20 dollars now.
My deck isn't creature heavy enough for Hunting Grounds or Descendant's path but Scroll Rack and Sense's Top are great suggestions. I only just now noticed that Scroll Rack is reusable. That's incredible.
Yeah this is solid. I really have no excuse not to run it.
I've found this to be a little weak. The +1/+1 effect is basically meaningless while the mana doubling effect comes a bit too late to really matter. By turn 5 or 6 I should be comboing off. I think I'd rather just run another mana rock.
Apostle is kind of meh but giving my board protection from wipes sounds really nice. I've found that targeted removal isn't a huge deal as people aren't willing to target Shalai directly. They're more likely to just board wipe.
I was mostly just using it because I like the art lol, but the token ability is really nice. 2-3 99999 power human tokens puts a lot of pressure on people.
Agreed
Yeah I do have a bit too much. A little is nice but I'm pushing it a little.
Definitely, it just makes me a target immediately. I actually forgot I still had it in the deck lol.
Out
- Luminarch Ascension
- Endless Horizons
- Nature's Spiral
- Hour of Revelation
In
+ Sensei's Divining Top
+ Scroll Rack
+ Aura Shards
+ Heroic Intervention
https://deckstats.net/decks/104290/1018584-avacyn-queen-of-winter-angel-t
It's still too slow to keep up to most Commanders in my playgroups meta as well. Krufix, Rashmi, Hapatra, Atraxa, etc etc... These are really fast decks even in our casual meta.
I also noticed Shalai as an excellent choice for Angel tribal. The Hexproof and pump from the commander are very interesting tools for angel tribal. Yes I agree with some of the comments on here. I was infatuated with Angels when I was a young kid when this game was in its infancy. Back in the day angel tribal used to be too cool for school cause you could do things like 4 Serra angels, and 4 Pristine angels give the pristines vigilance, and lifelink, and the serra's lifelink. And seem like an unstopable life gaining monster. Back in my day, (HA!), In the "quads" standard days, shennanigans like this gave Angels a following and devotion that is kinda similar to my devotion to the Montreal Canadiens... It's a devotion that is based on the glory of yester-year. The reality of Angel tribal in the commander singleton format is that its a very lack-luster tribe due to its overwhelming lack of synergy.
There is some tips I can give you on this topic. There is no magic stick solution that I can think of to make angels synergize really well. Here are a few that are on my radar.
A few in the tribe that can interact with Shalai: Aegis Angel, in this case is an angel that can give Shalai some protection: Indestructible. Also, Avacyn, Angel of Hope. Avacyn can be fetched by above mentioned Captain Sisay. Now I get it, it's not hexproof/shroud. But when you dig through target removal lists, you do eliminate a decent chunk of staples that use the word "destroy". And these are tools in the tribe. You don't have to waste extra card slots to get this protection.
The Bruna, Gisela, Brisela trick is also 100% on Sissay's radar.
Green has creature fetching and finding power so there is some notable synergy/interaction between Angelic Skirmisher / Angelic Field Marshal & Pristine Angel. Again it's worth mentioning not just for green's creature tutor capability, also because of the sensei's divning top-ish scan the top of your library and get creatures mechanism green does often.
Also, Lyra and Herald of War were mentioned but there is also the little fellah people always forget. Radiant, Archangel. The whole damn tribe is flying. This little guy usually comes in with pretty impressive stats, and is also a Sissay target in this color scheme. To be honnest A lot of the highest ranking angels in the tribe are Sissay targets. I'm actually seriously considering de-commissioning my Avacyn deck and re-tooling it as a Shalai Angel deck with a Legendary Sub-theme so as to be able to run Sissay an Alternate commander from time to time for a laugh. Also don't forget guys, lifelink is a pretty common theme in the Angel Tribe and White so Archangel of Thune.
I agree 1000% With this entire thread. Angels as a tribe are getting a bad reputaion in commander because there are super slow due to their mostly White/Red/Boros roots. Not much quality draw and ramp in that scheme. Colorless crutches that those colors rely on in that department cannot substitute the raw power of things like Consecrated Sphinx, Rhystic Study, Skyshroud Claim, Cultivate, etc etc.
The one thing that Angels in commander really really desperately need in is MANA. The Selesnya route for green's ramp is forward thinking on your part and at the moment receives my two thumbs up as a long time MTG Angel fanatic.
Also, let's get real here. Your running green. RAAAAMMMMMMMMMMPPPPP If it goes off the way you want, your Wayfarer ain't fetching crap. I would say things like Crop Rotation or green's scan to find stuff like Vivien Reid is the most efficient way to fetch or help find Maze of Ith or ... Cavern of Souls You can always get a land back from the crop rotation via Sun Titan, Ramunap Excavator, Crucible of Worlds etc...
All said, this doesn't seem like a terrible list, honestly. Good work!
UB Dralnu, Lich Lord
RBW [Primer]-Kaalia of the Vast
BUG [Primer]-Tasigur, the Golden Fang
GWU [Primer]-Arcades, the Strategist
WUB Primer-Aminatou, the Fateshifter
UBR Nicol Bolas, the Ravager
agreed. Also that new Beast Whisperer card