Our man Panda has a way of finding the best combos in about any color. And, sometimes or most times, he finds them in WUBRG! But very rarely does he settle into mono-White. It’s just not his favorite color. But once he sees synchronicity, he’s on it! (See decklist at the bottom of the article!)
Many of the Legendaries from the Baldur’s Gate Commander set have the caveat of ‘Choosing a Background’. Abdel Adrian, Gorion’s Ward is one such card. And the Background Panda picked? Far Traveler.
Abdel Adrian, Gorion’s Ward has an ETB (Enter the Battlefield) that allows him to exile any number of nonland permanents he controls and they stay there as long as he’s on the battlefield. The important part is that in the place of these cards are 1/1 white soldier creature tokens.
That brings us to Far Traveler. This Background gives your commander the ability (at your end step) to exile on creature and then return it: A FLICKER action. This means that Far Traveler can flicker Abdel and bring him back. Abdel, when leaving the battle field returns all of the permanents you have in exile, trigger all of their ETB abilities and turn around and exile and make tokens all over again.
This makes him extremely hard to pin down and destroy.
PROTECTING THE COMMANDER
If your opponent does get lucky and catches you and your commander unawares, this deck has plenty of ‘return from the graveyard’ cards.
Other protection comes in the form of, of course, Exile. Both exiling your opponents creatures…
and using flicker effects and exiling to your hand to trigger your commander. It can also keep him out of harms way, at times.
Enter the Battlefield triggers are important for this deck to destroy enchantments, add life, draw cards or make tokens. And the flicker effects in this deck makes those happen over and over again.
Flaming Fist Officer can take advantage of all of this flickering also!
Elspeth, Undaunted Hero makes a great edition to this deck with +1/+1 counters and an ultra that can take advantage of all that white mana! Devotion ramping your creatures every turn can turn that ‘white winnie’ army into a beefed up regiment of destruction!
And Elspeth Conquers Death can take care of that big boss problem AND return your commander from the graveyard!
Bolster the Ranks!
Of course, a deck notorious for creating a ‘White Winnie’ army, could make good use of White’s many cards that ramp said army.
And what white devotion deck would be complete without lifegain! With cards like Linden, the Steadfast Queen (seen to the left), The Birth of Meletis, Lunarch Veteran and Daxos, Blessed by the sun we can get the most pop from the army.
And we dropped in an Ajani’s Pridemate and Light of Promise to put a few life bombs in.
And, to finish (quite literally), don’t forget to pack in a few boardwipes!
Look the whole deck over below and lets us know what you think! What would you add? What would you take out?
AoE Table Top 