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『Primer』Combo-Cades: The Wallmaster | EDH

Commander / EDH Competitive GWU (Bant) Infinite Combo Primer Tribal

DeltaMoth

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I Absorb The Very Ground Itself (31)

Combo - Untap and Rejuvenate (6)

You Shall Hear Our Wrath (6)

Ramp-parts of the Wallmaster (15)

I Will Find Whatever I Like (10)

Mobilise and Avoid (6)

Combo - Nothin' for Free (2)

Commander (1)

Commander: foil Arcades, the Strategist

I Will Draw into the Earth (12)

Combo - Flicker 'n' Bounce (6)

All Will Hear Our Wrath (3)

Return from your Sleep (2)

Maybeboard

Combo - Flicker 'n' Bounce (6)

I Will Find Whatever I Like (1)

Ramp-parts of the Wallmaster (4)

Combo - Untap and Rejuvenate (1)

Return from your Sleep (1)

I Will Draw into the Earth (2)

Mobilise and Avoid (2)

His ultimate supremacy reigns palisades and bulwarks to His will. We shall pray.

Animate bricks and mortar bore deep into the surface; standing steady for their Master.

"In the beginning, Arcades created the cement and the stone."

"He floats, ever-vigilant above leagues of impenetrable defences."

"With one flick of His mighteous wrist, He can press His once-thought-immovable army against you, their seeping through the Earth at immense speeds.

With one twitch of His unfurled wings, He can will the forces of nature to life, leading you to your demise.

With one snarl of His sharpened fangs, He can brandish frankly broken enchantments and artifacts, leaving you as dust without an urn."

"He is the Alpha and Omega (of defenders)."

(Wallogenesis 1:0)

He goes by many names:

The Siege Machine

Defender Draco

Doran but Cooler

A less Draconic version of Donald Trump

But to us, he goes by one name:

THE WALLMASTER

Upvote and become One with The Wallmaster

Read this before continuing. Show

"Then Arcades said, 'Let there be walls'; and there were walls."

"And Arcades saw the walls, that it was good; and Arcades sloppily slapped some mortar on those walls."

"From deep beneath the ground, the earth cried a bestial roar as acres of inanimate trees and stone started to slowly nudge themselves out of silent obscurity.

The earth roared loud and strong, possibly because it takes quite a lot of effort to re-animate things such as walls, but mainly because it was the earth's day off and it was having a lie-in."

(Wallogenesis 1:1)

With Arcades, we can utilise some of the strongest colours in the entire format as well as some of the most powerful playables and still look like less of a threat.

We lure our enemies into our 'janky, tribal, beatstick strategy' spearheaded by a 'dumb dragon', only to wipe the smiles off their faces with incredible amounts of card advantage and overcoming them all with a solid combo game worthy of cEDH tables.

Keep in mind that other players and Generals will be faster than us, sometimes we will be brought down by sweepers and difficult enchantments, stay ever-vigilant, such as our Wallmaster does.

If you're into the more sneaky side of EDH which involves playing a General which would be originally left alone and underrated by our playgroup, only to bait and switch the opposition into our combo plays - this is the deck for you.

Our deck isn't the top of the tree, alpha of the pack, Thrasios to thy Tymna etc, so if we're looking for something more along those lines you're in the wrong place. (We prefer to keep our friends, thank you very much.)

As well as this, our deck in its current state is a little weak on counterplay and targeted-removal, only 5 cards take up this role as of the latest incarnation, so if you're more into the fully-accurate sniper-scoping of specific permanents, or constantly having an answer to things, this deck might not be for you.

Our deck upholds a strong need for defence and while attacking is a tactic for the real long games, beatdown is not the main-plan of this deck either. Just know that if we hold back, chances are we won't be able to be attacked due to the girth of our defenders.

If you got this far, I can only assume you're interested in our deck! Fantastic! In the below sections I explain the categorisation of the deck portions and what they can do to excel our way to the winner's podium.

These are our lands, the deepest lifeblood of our deck. Self-explanatory.

Our Wallmaster siphons the energy from layers of crust and ancient roots long-hidden to play our spells and ascend our board state.

Example: Command Tower

These are cards we can use to escape threats quickly, say we catch wind of an incoming board-wipe or toughness-hate card on the horizon we can be ready to jump out or protect what we need. These also encompass our hate cards as well as blocking evasion and providing haste.

Cards such as Ghostway are being used over something such as Teferi's Protection as they play double-duty in this deck, being able to flicker all our walls and get precious ETB effects off of every single one. Using Teferi's Protection would be great, however, phasing-out does not trigger ETB or LTB effects and is, therefore, better off not being used over Ghostway.

Examples: Grand Abolisher, Crashing Drawbridge and Tetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive

Our patrons! These permanents are willing to lay themselves on the line for us and get tapped for mana. Indeed these are our dorks.

Some of these dorks stand out especially, such as:

Examples: Birds of Paradise, Sylvan Caryatid and Wall of Roots

Our tutor cards, here to grab anything we need at any time we need it. As we are a combo deck disguised as an aggro deck we will need to find our various parts to construct our game-winning explosions.

Our Wallmaster can extend his long tusks into grassy knolls and mountainsides to attune with the mantle, the viscous flow of magma curls to his desires and points him in any way he needs.

Examples: Wargate, Spellseeker and Birthing Pod

Specifically single-target removal. Our counters, basic permanent destruction and shutdown cards are here.

Our Wallmaster once argued with the wind shortly after creating it, they came to a compromise and every once-in-a-blue-moon the wind will pick up and whisk someone's spell or permanent away, never to be seen again. Our Wallmaster offered an ounce of his power in return, and the wind gained +1 toughness from it.

Examples: Aura Shards and Wall of Stolen Identity

He needs no introduction.

He is our Master.

He is our Lord.

That is all.

Example: High Alert but better and also a dragon.

Here we have our big chunk of cards specifically tailored towards card draw. This can be as simple as a Wall of Lost Thoughts giving us a card when played with Arcades out, to as powerful as a Wall of Blossoms giving us TWO cards!!

Examples: Consecrated Sphinx, Orator of Ojutai and Mystic Remora

These are our board-wipes, the most greatly-damaging and horrendously-powerful sweepers in our deck.

All of the wipes played in this are/can be one-sided, leading to our greater advantage in a beaten-down state or a set of opponents on the edge of ravaging our life total.

Example of one-sided wipe: Cyclonic Rift

Example of general wipe: Bane of Progress

Cards in our deck specifically for graveyard recursion. Sometimes we lose a thing we didn't wanna lose, sometimes we wanna get it back. These make that happen.

Scriptures read of our Wallmaster having the power to tap into our Earth's spinning core and use this rotation to turn back time à la Superman 1978, but we have no solid proof of this.

Examples: Sevinne's Reclamation and Idol of Endurance

These are our cards for flipping our creatures all over the place. Many of the cards in our deck have powerful ETB/LTB effects and with Arcades out, all our defenders draw us a card on showing up to the tea-party.

These are the meat and potatoes of most of our effects, being able to bounce our creatures for cheap with a Temur Sabertooth or Cloudstone Curio means our card advantage can slowly grow completely out of control and take over the game. Sometimes to an irreparable state for other parties!

Examples: Cloudstone Curio and Quicksilver Wall

These are cards that either make things free to cast or are free to cast themselves!

Infinity is easy to reach if everything is perfectly in grasp, and Aluren ensures that everything is entirely in grasp for us. Beware that it also affects our opponents and they can profit from it too. Using a Lavinia, Azorius Renegade (and playing it for free) can cut down their angles.

Example: Aluren

The second level of combo cards is those that untap our things and allow us to tap them again. Some of the dorks in this deck are extremely powerful and can generate a lot of mana, profiting off this and going off is a major key to success!

Examples: Derevi, Empyrial Tactician and Intruder Alarm

Strengths

Our deck's bigger strengths come from keeping Arcades safe out on-board with myriads of strong blockers and using his abilities to the fullest potential as quickly as possible.

  • Synergy Befits Card Advantage:
    • The high amount of draw cards, as well as the sheer amount of defenders in our deck, play well with Arcades abilities, allowing us to have a generally low risk/high reward playstyle by slamming down a cheap defender and drawing into a new one. Even if the card we draw isn't a defender, we can almost always guarantee it will do something for the board-state, either by melding with our creatures all being starved of power, (Dusk) but also their low CMC (Sevinne's Reclamation).

  • Inviolable Defenses:

    • Arcades himself drops as a 3/5, most of our cards sit on the 4 - 6 toughness line also. This puts them out of reach of most early beatdown creatures, giving us decent blockers just by playing through our deck which can also stand pretty strongly as decent attackers too. In other words, our creature's stats will vastly outnumber most stats of creatures at an equal CMC level. Our natural deterrence will keep the opposition away and keep our combat steps clean.

  • Unflinching Consistency:

    • Our massive amounts of mana-dorks, tutors and cards that all do the same thing but look different give our deck a new level of consistency that can't be reached by other decks of its calibre in EDH. Most of our cards also play multiple roles, such as the Dawn side of Dusk recurring most if not all our creatures from the grave right to our hands, and cards such as Drift of Phantasms and Muddle the Mixture acting both as tutors, but also a decent flying blocker and a pretty sturdy counterspell respectively.

  • Simple Puzzles:

    • Our combos are relatively janky in general but a number of them simply need two cards and a normal creature to go off, making them extremely competitive. Our great level of tutor-play in our deck can easily assemble these pieces given our mana situation is good enough, leaning into an easy win.

Weaknesses

Unfortunately, no deck is truly perfect; even when powered by the almighty Wallmaster.

  • Nullifying and Counterplay:
    • As quickly as our deck can play and profit off of our creatures, it can also be neutered somewhat by spells that nerf effects of cards entering the battlefield such as Torpor Orb or Hushbringer. We hold back our strongest removal for these troublesome effects or pay the price. As well as this, our deck is rather weak on counterplay, running only 2 counterspells. This can be adjusted at our whim to suit our playstyle.

  • Wraths and Sweepers:

    • As with any deck that relies on a strong creature game to uphold victory or stay defensive, our deck is vulnerable to effects that clean the board of our precious walls and we don't have a large amount of recursion to back that up properly.

  • Complex Puzzles:

    • As simple as some of our deck's combos are, others can be far more complex and harder to pull off in the average game. A well-documented combo in decks such as ours is the Axebane Guardian + High Alert pairing, which relies on a minimum of 5 walls down, (including the Axebane) which is a relatively strong position for us and might blow our cover, making us the table archenemy in terms of pure, brute damage. Other combos in our deck also rely on large amounts or very specific defenders in play, so keep them in mind when drawing and tutoring.

  • Smoking Engines:

    • We could come to a point while playing where we reach a blockade at the top of our deck, possibly: multiple turns of drawing lands, multiple turns of drawing no defenders or draw spells, multiple turns of drawing no combo pieces or tutors. Without the right pieces on board, our deck doesn't have the capabilities of doing anything in these more 'dry' turns, and without Arcades out we can't even swing most of the time!

"Then Arcades said, 'Let there be firmness in the midsts of the mortar, and let it connect brick to brick and stone to stone'"

"Thus Arcades hardened the walls, allowing them to take on their true forms as great barriers, absolving themselves from the ground, and their shadows covered large tracts of land like darkened, rectangular monoliths scarring the warm, yellow plains."

"Arcades cried a tear which fell to the ground, and on collision took place a catastrophic rumble. Arcades stood as the only motionless object in a sea of vibration."

"His power ricocheted through continents and their countries, through cities and their villages, through houses and their rooms, and knocked over my scalding cup of tea onto the crotch of my trousers."

(Wallogenesis 1:2)

  • Crashing Drawbridge - A cheap wall that we like to see on turns where we pull a T1 Sol Ring. The main ability here is to give everything haste, which in most cases can make active one of our more powerful dorks a turn earlier than normal, therefore, faster acceleration. Works well with Axebane Guardian and Overgrown Battlement.
  • Bloom Tender - On the topic of powerful dorks! This little badass can tap for all our colours like Noble Hierarch, but it makes them all instead of just one. Indispensible in our list. We might even find ourselves tutoring for her over Axebane in some situations!
  • Doorkeeper - A wall that acts as a wincon if we have a way to keep untapping and tapping it over and over.
  • Grand Abolisher - Classic hatebear, keeps our turn clear of unwanted interaction so we can mess around with pieces as we please. Acts as decent removal fodder by painting a target on itself, keeping our more important pieces clear.
  • Lavinia, Azorius Renegade - A hatebear for the more competitive environment. Shuts down free spells such as Fierce Guardianship, Pact of Negation and the EDH all-star Force of Will, all one-sided, all the time. She also ensures that powerful mana-rocks can't be abused by our opponents by cutting down their mana to their land amount only.
  • Jeskai Barricade - A simple 2 mana wall that can be pushed out to pull back another wall, meaning actions such as playing the Barricade, drawing off Arcades, bringing back a wall such as Wall of Blossoms, replaying that wall and drawing twice off it can take place (2 new walls placed, 3 cards drawn, 4 mana used). Can also be flashed onto the board in a pinch to protect our most important creature.
  • Orator of Ojutai - Don't be fooled by the wordiness of this card! It simply states that as long as Arcades is in our hand or on the battlefield, we can draw a card, making it functionally the same as a Wall of Omens. In most situations, Orator is a 4/4 flyer too which is great defence.
  • Overgrown Battlement - One of our mana-dork all-stars. Can be massively abused early on, similar to a Gaea's Cradle in that it'll make a for every defender we control. Intruder Alarm loves it.
  • Sunscape Familiar - An interesting card that got its price shot up shortly after the revealing of Arcades in M19 and for good reason! This bad boy cuts down the cost of green and blue spells in our deck by 1, and it just happens that the majority of spells in our deck are green and blue, some even both! Ensures a T3 Arcades if it sticks and makes Wargate pretty overpowered.
  • Sylvan Caryatid - A T2 mana dork that makes any colour we need and acts as a good blocker. If top-decked later on with Arcades out it replaces itself with a draw.
  • Tetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive - An interesting inclusion, acting as a plan after all others fail. If we can't find the right pieces or make them fit right, slapping someone in the face with 40 unblockable defender damage oughta do the trick. Be sure to hold up some protection for Arcades though!
  • Ulvenwald Captive   / Vine Trellis - Simple T2 defender dorks that faciliatate a T3 Arcades. Good topdecks for draw potential.
  • Wall of Blossoms / Wall of Omens - Both cards draw a card when they enter and most likely draw a card through Arcades too. 2 mana for 2 cards is a great hand filler and allows us to dig deeper than normals walls.
  • Wall of Kelp - A wall that makes defenders! This is amazing, of course, and acts as: , : Draw a card with Arcades out. Combos well with cards such as Intruder Alarm and High Alert.
  • Wall of Lost Thoughts - A good finisher to pull out if we have a sufficient, infinite engine of bouncing or flickering going. Can clear an opponent of a card they tutor to the top of their deck with Mystical, Enlightened or Worldly Tutor.
  • Wall of Roots - Slightly different to the other T2 dorks in our deck in that it can act immediately as it hits the table due to not having a 'tap' clause. This also means that if we can flicker this wall over and over again, we can use the it makes infinitely. Being a natural 0/5 makes it a good blocker, but also means the mana it can make will facilitate us over many turns.

  • Axebane Guardian - The all-star of all-stars when it comes to mana-dorks in our deck. This baby can fit so much mana in our turn we'll be drowning in it. Such as Overgrown Battlement before it, Axebane relies on our number of defenders to make mana, and such often performs better than a Gaea's Cradle; we don't often get to say that!
  • Carven Caryatid - Chunky body on a cantrip that draws us one extra off Arcades if he's on board.
  • Derevi, Empyrial Tactician - A creature so strong that it had to get banned out of duel commander! Can go infinite with many of the dorks in the deck when teamed up with bounce creatures, and can give us a massive burst of mana for instants after dealing combat damage with a few creatures and untapping/tapping the same dork over and over.
  • Drift of Phantasms - Primarily used as a tutor to grab important and powerful 3 mana cards such as Intruder Alarm, Axebane Guardian, Cloudstone Curio, Faeburrow Elder, Quicksilver Wall and Spellseeker. Pretty much anything for any situation!
  • Eternal Scourge - Creates infinite mana when sacrificed to Food Chain. A good creature to drop after an exile-based boardwipe.
  • Eternal Witness - Simple and straightforward graveyard recursion attached to a creature. Easily abused by flickering effects.
  • Faeburrow Elder - Such as Bloom Tender does before it, this can make any colour we need when we need it and it makes all the others too! An advantage here is that the Faeburrow comes out as a 2/2 vigilance that can make two colours of mana by itself ( + ), whereas, Bloom can only make when she drops without outside help.
  • Quicksilver Wall - A bounce effect on a defender. Paired with infinite mana and an Arcades in play, this card can draw us out our entire deck. Very sturdy at 1/6.
  • Shaman of Forgotten Ways - A more expensive dork that can make 2 colours of mana that we need as opposed to the 1 that most other dorks make. If we can help it, we want Shaman hitting the table on T2 by using a T1 dork, meaning we can cast Arcades T3 and hold up 2 mana in the T1 dork and a land drop to cast another defender. Value!
  • Spellseeker - Tutor on a stick! Best used to grab a cheap spell we need in the moment such as Mystical, Enlightened or Worldly Tutor. She can also grab Dramatic Reversal if we have Scepter in hand as well as decent infinite mana outlets: Finale of Devastation and Pull from Tomorrow.
  • Village Bell-Ringer - Acts as an Intruder Alarm on a stick. If we have a decent outlet to get this card bounced or flickered over and over, we can easily make infinite mana.

  • Brago, King Eternal - A powerful flicker tool if we can deal combat damage with him. One hit from Brago with a field full of defenders and Arcades can refill our entire hand effortlessly as well as trigger any other powerful ETB effects on creatures we have.
  • Profaner of the Dead - A board wipe attached to a creature that was practically made for our deck! We can use the exploit mechanic on a stronger wall to clear the board of weaker creatures, or grab the Profaner as a target of Finale of Devastation (with X = a very high number) to pump the Profaner and clear the board of every creature we don't control. The haste from Finale can then be used to finish everyone off.
  • Misthollow Griffin - Creates infinite mana when sacrificed to Food Chain. Also acts as a relatively bulky, if not too expensive flyer with general protection from popular removal such as Swords to Plowshares, Path to Exile and Anger of the Gods.
  • Temur Sabertooth - A beefy creature that can bounce one of our walls and give itself protection as the second bird with one stone throw. A decent outlet for infinite mana and combos well with Shield Sphere.
  • Wall of Stolen Identity - A relatively new wall but very welcome in our deck! It takes the role of a Sower of Temptation but can also be used to capitalise on a huge, powerful creature someone else plays while also shutting that creature down from combat.
  • Emiel the Blessed - Similar to Temur Sabertooth, this card can take one of our creatures and flicker it. It also acts as a decent infinite mana outlet but as we don't have to cast the creature that gets flickered, it combos well with Wall of Blossoms (and similar) as well as Spellseeker.

The cards here have to do something extremely special to justify their high cost, as our deck is trying its best to keep overall CMC low.

  • Bane of Progress - Highly destructive and hellish for everyone involved. The Bane deals with any pesky artifact or enchantment that chooses to impede our path to greatness, (and all the others in tandem) as well as profiting off their obliteration through +1/+1 counters. Best dropped when we're out of luck with our non-creature, non-land permanents and we want to show everyone else who's boss.
  • Consecrated Sphinx - Powerful, flying and greatly annoying. The Sphinx can give us so much god-damn card advantage that any saviours our opponents have are turned to nought. Best dropped when we're out of luck with card draw, and we'd like to rub that in our opponent's faces. Also acts as the biggest removal magnet ever created.
  • Deadeye Navigator - Useful, tricksy and full of schemes. The Navigator provides an outlet for infinite mana to give us infinite ETB effects, our deck has little to no targets where being soulbonded won't lead to a giant advantage. Best dropped when we're going off with mana and we're looking for a wincon.

  • Counterspell - A card we play because it is good. 2 mana to stop anything we like is just great cardboard and for an extra slap in the face, we can imprint it to an Isochron Scepter and use it every turn!
  • Cyclonic Rift - A one-sided, cheap and effective board wipe to slow our opponents down and excel above them. Can be strong as single-target removal for a big, non-land permanent, but really shines when overloaded.
  • Dramatic Reversal - Matches with Isochron Scepter to go infinite with enough supporting mana. Can be used with enough dorks out to cast something especially big or carry on flickering / bouncing walls if we don't have Scepter in hand.
  • Eladamri's Call - A powerful creature tutor that brings whatever we want to our hand.
  • Muddle the Mixture - Works with our Isochron Scepter + Dramatic Reversal combo by being able to transmute into any of the two cards. Can also trasmute into an Eladamri's Call or Finale of Devastation if we need to grab a creature, Pull from Tomorrow for card draw and Cyclonic Rift for a board-wipe.
  • Pull from Tomorrow - A general wincon in our deck. Pushing a high amount of mana into this card can draw out our entire library into our hand which usually means we're about to win!

  • Beast Within - The word 'permanent' really makes this card. The ability to blow up whatever we want is intensely powerful, and recurring it back to hand with an Eternal Witness, then flickering the Witness after casting it again to recur it once more turns it into a powerful, fearful piece of removal.
  • Blue Sun's Zenith - The big brother of Pull from Tomorrow. This can kill our opponents if we push enough mana into it by forcing them to draw out their entire deck, then it returns to our deck to be used again later. The only reason we use Pull over Zenith is the ease of tutoring the card with the current cards in our deck. For example, Muddle the Mixture and Spellseeker both can't grab Zenith, while they can grab Pull.
  • Fierce Guardianship - A 3 mana spell that we will be casting for free mana. Free counterspells are always powerful and widely used, this one is no different. It also happens to be the only free counterspell without a massively debilitating downside, such as pitching a card to Force, having to pay mana or losing the game with Pact or returning an island to hand through Daze.
  • Ghostway - Why are we not playing Teferi's Protection in this slot? Because Protection cares not for ETB/LTB effects due to the peculiar ruling with phasing, Ghostway, however, cares a lot about ETB/LTB effects and acts as a single activation of Brago in essence. This can reset our hands through Arcades drawing but can also be used as board wipe protection if someone chooses to drop a Wrath of God out of fear of our defenders.
  • Shared Summons - There are a lot of situations where we don't need one creature to win, we need two. This card covers those worries by giving us the equivalent of casting two Eladamri's Call's and putting creatures right to hand. Our favourite combinations are Spellseeker and Axebane Guardian/Faeburrow Elder to clear mana issues and find a cheap spell, but also Temur Sabertooth and Shield Sphere to grab a card bouncer and a great target for the said card to bounce!

  • Finale of Devastation - Creature tutoring turned up to 11! Can grab anything we need, even if it died earlier on, and slap it right back on the battlefield. Acts as a wincon if we push enough mana into it by pumping our creatures up to infinity and turning them sideways. Teams up well with Profaner of the Dead.
  • Sevinne's Reclamation - Recursion, similar to that of Eternal Witness, and can be flashed back to recur 2 permanents instead. Acts as a cheaper, non-creature version of Sun Titan in our deck.
  • Wargate - In our colours, can grab anything from the deck and play it down to the battlefield immediately, works well with Sunscape Familiar, seems like a no brainer.
  • Dusk - A two-sided card with two very relevant abilities. The Dusk side dodges most of our creatures, acting as a one-sided board wipe, (but not Arcades, keep that in mind). The Dawn side acts as recursion for most of the creatures in our deck too! Sometimes too much recursion, watch out for those mill players.

  • Carpet of Flowers - The very fastest of fast, coloured mana. Oppressive from the very start. If it's down opponents will either have to play into it, generating us extra mana, or play around it, stripping them off blue in most cases. A prime accelerant and an auto-include in most EDH decks.
  • Mystic Remora - Cheap, powerful, effective. The evil fish is a scourge for all, we choose to abuse it as much as anyone else. Drop it early to profit off mana rocks, drop it late to hinder other players, it does everything.

  • Sylvan Library - A Brainstorm in that triggers for us every turn and can even bring extra cards into our hand at the cost of life. Digging deep isn't hard for our deck, given all the card advantage, but the Library can dig that little bit further and does it without any added costs.
  • Sterling Grove - A good draw in our enchantment heavy build. Can give protection to things already out, such as making a creature attached with Pemmin's Aura entirely shrouded, or tutor up a combo piece like Aluren or Intruder Alarm for a quick win.

  • Aura Shards - With a deck such as ours, it's not hard to be able to capitalise off a Shards in play. The massive amount of cheap creatures we cycle through every turn, as well as the various amount of flicker and bounce effects means we can constantly be pinging things off the table with relative ease. With strong artifacts and enchantments all fit to be cast by our opponents, Shards is a great addition to cut them down to size.
  • Food Chain - An infinite mana engine with specific creatures, also works well with sacrificing some of our weaker walls and creatures into more powerful ones, such as breaking down a Portcullis Vine into casting a Wall of Blossoms into casting a Axebane Guardian.
  • Freed from the Real - Can go infinite with many of the more powerful dorks in the deck by simply untapping itself and then tapping again for more mana.
  • High Alert - Works like Arcades but on a enchantment. Acts as a target for enchantment removal if anything, but can combo with a couple of things in the deck if left alone. Good for a Tetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive plan B all-in strike if Arcades is too expensive to bring back.
  • Intruder Alarm - A 'meat and potatoes' combo card for the deck. Allows things such as infinite mana through tapping, flickering and untapping. Can even be abused to an extent without infinite mana by drawing through many defenders and using the mana from our creatures to keep casting them. In the business, we call this move the Wall-Ball.
  • Pemmin's Aura - An anagram of "I am Superman" which is exactly what the creature we put this on will become. Easily able to go infinite with many of the mana dorks in our deck, as well as supplying shroud to keep itself protected from removal. Truly an annoyingly obnoxious aura!
  • Rhystic Study - Close to the evil fish in function. On turns where we can't drop defenders like mad or Arcades is in the bin for some reason, we can take glee in asking our opponents, "Will you pay the 1?" Heavy card advantage, an auto-include.
  • Aluren - "Ever need infinite mana for creatures but just can't find it? We've got you covered!" Aluren lets us play almost everything from our deck creature-wise entirely for free and with flash, meaning we can go wild with combo and flickering. We can pair Aluren with many other cards to go off very easily, and using Lavinia, Azorius Renegade we can even stop our opponents from using the overpowered, Show and Tell-tier effect so only we get to pour our hand onto the battlefield.
  • Teferi's Ageless Insight - A new addition, this card acts similar to a Panharmonicon in that it doubles up our drawing, but in our deck, this turns every basic defender drop with Arcades out into the equivalent of dropping a Wall of Blossoms, and every Wall of Blossoms drop into the equivalent of dropping two of them! 2 mana for 2 cards is a good rate, but 2 mana for 4 cards is even better!

  • Sol Ring - "Good card is good, play it because you should."

  • Arcane Signet - A great card that filters down into any colour we need for nice and cheap. Loves a T1 Sol Ring. Our deck uses fewer mana rocks due to the amount of mana ramp in creatures and defenders that we have.
  • Isochron Scepter - Matches with Dramatic Reversal to go infinite with enough supporting mana. Can be used with other spells to become versions of that spell we can cast over and over. Good spells that fit the bill are: Cyclonic Rift (For single targeting), Counterspell, Swords to Plowshares, Muddle the Mixture and Eladamri's Call
  • Lightning Greaves - Good for giving creatures haste if we need their mana immediately and also for protecting Arcades from outward strikes. The 0 cost means we can flicker/bounce our creatures and still use their tap effects for free before bouncing them again.

  • Cloudstone Curio - A bounce tool on a rock. Entirely indispensable when we have infinite mana and sometimes even when we don't. Works really well with Aluren and Intruder Alarm.
  • Birthing Pod - A strong tutoring rock that can be used to push our mass abundance of 2 CMC creatures up the ranks to stronger and greener pastures. Recycling our weaker defenders into stronger and better creatures pushes the power of our board state, but also can push us towards a combo, such as: throwing an Orator of Ojutai into the Pod for a Spellseeker to grab a useful spell.

Our list hasn't got any Planeswalkers as they're not too strong in EDH decks that can't support their abilities properly, yet there are some notable choices given we want to put some in.

  • Teyo, the Shieldmage - Gives us hexproof and makes walls for us twice before becoming a creature-vunerable Leyline of Sanctity. Could be decent extra card-draw with Arcades out.
  • Huatli, the Sun's Heart - Lets our walls block well against opposing, attacking creatures and provides some additional lifegain two times.
  • Venser, the Sojourner - Works well with our deck's general sub-theme of flickering and bouncing creatures. Can make our defenders unblockable with Arcades out, meaning we can deal a lot of damage. The Emblem is also extremely powerful with the vast amount of creature spells we can cast in a turn, meaning we can blow up mana bases while building our own.
  • Teferi, Master of Time - We play good cards in commander because they are good, this iteration of Teferi is definitely the definition of good. The phasing ability isn't so helpful for us other than being able to protect Arcades, but the looting every turn, and on every opponent turn, is especially powerful. Reaching the equivalent of a Time Stretch in two-turn cycles is immensely powerful and would allow us to easily go off.

This is more of a general conversation as opposed to a listing of cards, but we only play cards that come into play untapped at a 100% guarantee. This means no lands that could slow us down or come into play tapped beyond our control. We play shocks, but not fast lands. We play pain lands, but not check lands. We also play a large amount of basics to counteract popular STAX strategies such as an opponent speeding out a Blood Moon, Back to Basics or Ruination.

"Then Arcades said, 'Let the many barricades of the Earth rule under me, let them gather into one place so I can sort them out a little better.'"

"And Arcades watched as the walls gathered, He called the gathering of walls Defenders. And Arcades saw that it was good."

"Then Arcades said, 'Let the earth bring forth more Defenders, the wall that yields powerful shielding, and the bolstered spectacles of brick and mortar be so mashed up with toughness they cannot be destroyed, on the Earth'; and it was so.

And the earth brought forth Defenders, the wall that yields shielding according to its kind, and the spectacle of brick and mortar with a toughness number so high it'd make Wall Street brokers collectively spit out their vodka and cocaine cocktails, whose shielding is in itself according to its kind."

"And Arcades saw that it was good."

(Wallogenesis 1:3)

Our deck is a relatively speedy combo build, able to go off unimpeded on T5 or T6 consistently if we know what we're doing and often on T4 if we have a better than average hand.

However, the emphasis here is on the word 'unimpeded'. People don't want to lose and will try their best to stop us, which means it's important to analyse what's going on with the board and what sort of decks we are playing against quickly. This means we can alter our lines of play to be slower or faster, depending on the circumstances.

The game where everyone is blue. If we come up to a matchup where slower play is more advantageous, possibly the table is full of cheap removal flying all over or people, (or we,) have missed land drops; it's important to hold up any interaction we have through the use of counterspells or playing our hardiest palisades to hold up defences, just in case anyone decides to speed up against our will.

A later Arcades is safer here, as long as we start getting the draw advantage to keep our hand stacked quickly. Also consider a beatdown tactic using High Alert and Tetsuko to play a political game with our giant beat-bricks.

The point here is to stay above the curve, we want to use our walls to 'pillowfort' while slowly developing a viable hand that will allow us to blow up quickly when everyone is tapped out.

The normal game, we want to be dropping defenders and mana-dorks/walls semi-efficiently. Due to the natural, bolstered toughness of most of our creatures, we will secretly dominate the board even with Arcades sitting in the command zone. Here it's good to go with the flow of the game, watch land taps, hold up interaction for powerful drops, generally play at a normal or even slow pace as not to show too much, or blow too much steam in our opponent's faces.

Once Arcades is out, we can generate advantage quickly and overpower the game if we see any playable combo lines, or overpower our opponents if we find a powerful play through an expensive Finale of Devastation or Cyclonic Rift.

Play on rate, calm down and stay ahead.

The game where we're up against three 'Hat-tribal' decks and we, with an evil glint in the eye, want to show everyone how it's done.

We want to be mashing down mana walls as fast as is possible as if we're playtesting the deck to see just how fast we can go off. A quick Arcades is vital here so we can get as much card advantage from him as fast as is possible. Use our tutors efficiently to find some good combo lines based on the cards we have out or in hand, for instance, lots of non-dork creatures prefer combos such as Aluren and Cloudstone Curio to go off without the need for mana, lots of dorks and mana-walls prefer combos such as Shrieking Drake, Intruder Alarm and Jeskai Barricade where we can tap down everything and go off with bounce effects.

Hold up a few pieces of interaction or drop a speedy Grand Abolisher and play so aggressively they won't know what's coming. We can even race another combo player and use Lavinia, Azorius Renegade and Mystic Remora to punish if they're getting a little rowdy.

Early turns should be spent pumping out quick card advantage such as Mystic Remora and getting out hardy dorks, fast. If the table is removal light, we can tutor for a Rhystic Study which, if it sticks, generates an incredible amount of value over a game.

We want to build our board and ramp as hard as we possibly can.

Example cards to be playing T1 and T2: Mystic Remora, Avacyn's Pilgrim, Bloom Tender, Noble Hierarch, Axebane Guardian, Sol Ring and Faeburrow Elder.

Mid-game turns are when the deck ramps up. We want to be slamming Arcades down T3 at the latest to get that dank defender value. Play cards, draw cards, build a board.

We should be trying to assemble one of our combos at this point, be it infinite mana, infinite draw or infinite kelp. The defender card draw helps us out with this gameplan and our creatures keep opposing forces at bay by being far tougher than creatures generally are this early on in a game. Helpfully, opponents tend not to look too far past the fact walls have high defences. We use this to our advantage to not get hit at all by anything unless it's very substantial, which also means that they make themselves a target by attacking us.

Defence is the best offence!

Example cards to be playing T3 to T5: Spellseeker, Wall of Kelp, Quicksilver Wall, Cloudstone Curio, Rhystic Study, Card Advantage Walls, Teferi's Ageless Insight and Temur Sabertooth.

We should be assembling combos, building a huge board for a big strike or playing very scary cards like Consecrated Sphinx at this point, anything that will excel us towards a finale, either by beatdown or by infinites. Alternatively, we can use our tutors to look for powerful board-wipe effects, allowing us to destroy the board state and rise above. We might be able to go big with our walls, but not wide. Tribal players such as Goblin Spammers or Rhys 'I'm going to need a bigger playmat' Elf-Ballers can run us over with ease so it's important to close the game out before they go absolutely mad.

Other combo decks or decks built around one set of cards would be attempting to play them at this time, if they haven't done so already, holding up some interaction to stop this would also be good.

In summary, we want to be finding our lines of play and then riding them as well as we can to pull a win out of the bag, leaving it too late in a combo-player environment is a major point of failure that we cannot handle.

Example cards to be playing T6+: Consecrated Sphinx, 'Overloaded' Cyclonic Rift, Shared Summons, Wall of Stolen Identity, Aluren, Profaner of the Dead and Tetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive.

"Then Arcades said, 'Let there be lights in the skies to divide night from day, and let these lights shine down to earth'; and it was so."

"Then Arcades made two great lights: the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night. He made the stars by clipping his claws and leaving the remains to float aimlessly. And Arcades saw that it was good."

"These events are highly discussed in the bastion because Arcades has very small eyes and cannot see well in the night, so it makes absolutely no sense that he would create night-time, but mainly also because they have almost, but not quite, entirely nothing to do with walls."

(Wallogenesis 1:4)

Here are 10 sample hands for us to ponder, as well as short descriptions of the routes of play we'd take if we pulled these cards in a real game. The descriptions are going along the lines of the Fast-Wall Playstyle, and so all actions will be made as if nothing is stopping us.

Here we're looking for a hand that contains 2 - 3 lands, something to give us mana to support those lands, such as a dork or a rock, and something that either allows us to be interactive, such as: a counterspell, taxing card-draw or targeted removal. Alterantively, a tutor or a combo piece does fine here. This leaves us with 2 - 3 cards space for other things that might be important, such as hatebears and other good stuff. These cards can also be defenders, as with Arcades they cycle themselves anyway.

This is a good hand to start a slower game. Starting with 3 lands that free us up to all our needed colours as well as having two sources to facilitate a strongly hand. We have a great tutor for the start in Drift of Phantasms which can grab us a mana dork or combo piece. High Alert works well with Tetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive to keep us dangerous sans Commander. Quicksilver Wall will draw us cards through Arcades if we pump the mana into it.

The only issue here is the lack of a mana dork, which make a T3 Arcades hard to accomplish unless we draw into a dork T2, but as this hand is more slow-wally anyway, that's fine! However, if our opponents are playing a more combo style route, it might be a good idea to ship this hand off to look for faster plays if first free mulligans are allowed.

On the Draw: Hallowed Fountain allows a T4 Arcades play, as well as supplying even more for Quicksilver Wall loops.

A nice 7 if we don't mind the self-harm from Adarkar Wastes and Mana Confluence. Three lands which make all the colours we need is always a particularly good keep. Grand Abolisher acts as some good protection if we manage to get a combo online using that Wall of Lost Thoughts or Derevi, Empyrial Tactician. Wall of Stolen Identity acts as some targeted removal but also copies an enemy threat later on for our own usage.

This is the sort of hand that needs gas to really fire up, there's walls, mana, pieces, however, there isn't anything really explosive or any tutors to find anything explosive. If we can't wait for the action to start because we're in a race, this hand is being put away. If we can survive to be a little slower, this is good fixing and can be kept.

On the Draw: Island gives us a T4 Arcades even without a dork. is also the second most common colour in the deck, chances are it'll come in useful later.

A bad hand. One land is never good and not being able to cast the only dork in hand with that one land is worse. Shift this immediately on sight and never look back.

On the Draw: Wall of Kelp is not going to turn this into a God hand, no matter how awesome it is.

Very greedy! T1 Mystic Remora is an absolute killer play in most metas, and we are here to take advantage of that. The two land hand is worrying, but the incredible card advantage we should be gaining from our remora, as well as starting with available through both lands and a Wall of Blossoms to springboard off should bring us into at least one other land or another dork.

Starting with an Isochron Scepter is also great, the ability can be used for many things, such as sticking it to the classic Dramatic Reversal but also to an Enlightened Tutor to find powerful pieces efficiently. This is a great keep for faster games.

On the Draw: Brago, King Eternal is pretty perfect as long as we can gather the mana to cast him. Being able to flicker both our draw walls but also Wall of Lost Thoughts to shut down other players playing tutors 'to the top' is fantastic.

An interesting hand. Starting with a dork that allows us to get the third colour we need is fragile, but works! Grand Abolisher protects us in case we manage to get something going with our Dramatic Reversal, but we can't cast him yet with available mana. Drift of Phantasms is a good tutor and Cyclonic Rift is good, targeted, temporarily removal for a threat.

The worry here is that third land drop. If we can't get Arcades out we can't start drawing off defenders. Moreso, we need two sources to use Drift of Phantasms to grab anything, be it Spellseeker or Faeburrow Elder. If Avacyn's Pilgrim gets pinged off we're stuck. We'd only keep this one if we're feeling particularly lucky.

On the Draw: Quicksilver Wall is a good, self-bouncing wall for Arcades to get us some draws later on. It also acts as good defences to keep people off our weak dork.

Now, this is a mana-heavy hand! With a decent land into T1 Birds of Paradise into T2 Shaman of Forgotten Ways, we've got the mana to drop Arcades and the Portcullis Vine on the same turn for some card draw too!

The issue here is that is how far it goes, with consistent land drops by T3 and dropping the wall, we'd 4 other cards in hand which makes us dependent on draws, although, the vast amount of mana we have extremely quickly makes the hand very good. The Spellseeker absolutely sweetens the deal. Snap keep.

On the Draw: Dramatic Reversal is a nice card to push our dorks a little further in a turn, but should really be used in conjunction with Isochron Scepter for infinite combos.

A strong hand for a quick combo play. Starting with all our colours covered with lands is always great, followed by a cheap wall in Portcullis Vine, protection for Arcades through Lightning Greaves and the combo piece of Cloudstone Curio in hand, as well as a tutor to assist finding the other piece/pieces is fantastic.

On the Draw:Ulvenwald Captive   is possibly one of the greatest pulls to find on our first draw, being a dork it allows us to fly Arcades out T3.

Starting with a Sol Ring usually always makes a hand a winner. The main issue with this hand is the lack of mana which can really be a drag later on when we're trying to cast spells or utilise transmute effects.

If we can find that one we need, we're in cash with a combo piece, a great piece of interaction through Fierce Guardianship and some board protection / extra card draw with our Jeskai Barricade.

On the Draw: Shield Sphere is a glorious card acting as a free draw with Arcades out and coming down as a 6/6 too. Works well with Jeskai Barricade here, allowing us to play the Barricade, draw, bounce the Shield Sphere, play the Shield Sphere and draw again.

An alright hand. No dork but Arcane Signet accurately represents that role and looks damn good while doing it. Bane of Progress acts as a formidable drop if the pillow-fort player is getting too big for their boots and Wall of Blossoms and Carven Caryatid are nice for that extra card draw. Wall of Stolen Identity should be held back here until there's a threat worthy for its astonishing power, we'd use our smaller walls for defence until then.

Here we'd use the Windswept Heath to grab a Temple Garden as it covers the three colours we need in two lands, but keeps as the most prevalent on our board, which works with our strongly focused cards and deck overall.

On the Draw: Forest makes up our third land for a T3 Arcades with Arcane Signet support. It also supports a Carven Caryatid drop without having to burn ourselves for 1 through Waterlogged Grove.

Can we really say no to a start this good? Getting out a T1 Arcane Signet off a Sol Ring and then being able to push that mana into an Enlightened Tutor the very same turn to grab a combo piece or Rhystic Study is absolutely golden.

Derevi in hand acts as a good way to untap our rocks and Beast Within plays well as a strong piece of removal.

On the Draw: Counterspell is a great card for this hand as with our amazing T1 we'd attract immediate attention and might be stymied a little by our opponents.

"Then Arcades said, 'Give my walls life, and let them procreate to ascend and evolve further,'"

"The earth was confused by this request as it had already given the walls life. To remedy this it chose to take life away from them while Arcades wasn't watching and return it to them while he was. And Arcades saw that it was good."

"So Arcades blessed them. And allowed the many walls under his reign to copulate and create offspring of which to be fruitful and multiply.

How do they do this? I'll spare you the details, but imagine the leftovers of a building demolition slowly quivering on the ground. That is how the walls do."

"And Arcades saw that it was pretty good."

(Wallogenesis 1:5)

These are combos we can pull off only having the powerful, slightly-cheaty, free-card-machine Aluren in play.

Combo Type: Infinite Defender ETB triggers

Prerequisites: Control an Aluren with either Jeskai Barricade or Shrieking Drake in play and the other in hand.

Setup Cost: Either with Shrieking Drake or with Jeskai Barricade.

Loop Cost:

Steps:

1: Cast Shrieking Drake or Jeskai Barricade for free using Aluren's effect.

2: Bounce the other creature to hand.

3: Cast the bounced creature for free using Aluren's effect.

4: Bounce the other creature to hand.

5: Repeat.

These are combos we can pull off only having the unholy, untap, monster-machine Intruder Alarm in play.

Combo Type: Infinite Mana and Defender ETB Triggers

Prerequisites: Control a Temur Sabertooth, Intruder Alarm, various mana dorks and a single cheap creature.

Setup Cost: Variable, but at least for Temur Sabertooth and Intruder Alarm.

Loop Cost: Variable, but at least to cover the Temur Sabertooth activation.

Steps:

1: Tap our dorks, use the Sabertooth's ability to bounce a cheap creature to our hand. This also gives Sabertooth indestructible.

2: Play the bounced creature.

3: As per Intruder Alarm's effect, untap all our creatures.

4: Repeat.

Combo Type: Infinite Mana and Defender Tokens

Prerequisites: Control an Axebane Guardian, Wall of Kelp and Intruder Alarm

Setup Cost:

Loop Cost: ,

Steps:

1: Tap Axebane Guardian and add 2 Blue mana.

2: Tap Wall of Kelp and make a 0/1 Kelp defender token.

3: As per Intruder Alarm's effect, untap all our creatures.

4: Repeat, netting exponential mana and Kelp defender tokens each loop.

Combo Type: Infinite Mana and Defender ETB triggers

Prerequisites: Control a Quicksilver Wall, Intruder Alarm and various mana dorks, (this time we're talking quite a lot of dorks.)

Setup Cost: Variable, but at least for Quicksilver Wall and Intruder Alarm.

Loop Cost:

Steps:

1: Tap our dorks for mana.

2: Use of that mana to return Quicksilver Wall to hand.

3: Use another to play Quicksilver Wall again.

4: As per Intruder Alarm's effect, untap all our creatures.

5: Repeat.

Combo Type: Infinite Mana

Prerequisites: Control: Intruder Alarm and various mana dorks with Shrieking Drake in hand.

Setup Cost: Variable, but at least for the Intruder Alarm.

Loop Cost:

Steps:

1: Tap our dork(s) for and excess.

2: Cast Shrieking Drake.

3: As per Intruder Alarm's effect, untap all our creatures.

4: Use Shrieking Drake's ETB to return itself to our hand.

5: Repeat.

These are combos we can pull off only having the bouncy, confusing, combo-machine Cloudstone Curio in play.

Combo Type: Infinite Mana and Defender ETB triggers

Prerequisites: Have a Derevi, Empyrial Tactician in hand, control a Cloudstone Curio, Axebane Guardian, at least four other creatures with defender and Portcullis Vine.

Setup Cost: Variable, but at least for Cloudstone Curio and Axebane Guardian.

Loop Cost: Variable, but at least to cast Derevi, Empyrial Tactician and Portcullis Vine.

Steps:

1: Tap Axebane Guardian and add , and , the mana to re-play what we return with Cloudstone, and excess .

2: Play Derevi, Empyrial Tactician.

3: Use Derevi's effect to untap our Axebane Guardian.

4: Return a Portcullis Vine to our hand as per Cloudstone Curio's effect.

4: Re-play the Portcullis Vine.

5: Return Derevi to our hand as per Cloudstone Curio's effect.

6: Repeat.

These are combos we need two of three of the machines to pull off.

Combo Type: Infinite Various

Prerequisites: Control an Aluren, Cloudstone Curio and two creatures, one on the battlefield and one in hand that have a CMC of less than 3.

Setup Cost:

Loop Cost:

Steps:

1: Use Aluren's effect and play a creature card with a CMC less than or equal to 3 from our hand without paying its mana cost.

2: Activate Cloudstone Curio on the creature entering the battlefield, return a creature card with a CMC less than or equal to 3 to our hand.

3: Repeat.

Combo Type: Infinite Various

Prerequisites: Control an Intruder Alarm, Cloudstone Curio, various mana dorks and two cheap creatures, one in play, one in hand.

Setup Cost: Variable, but at least for Intruder Alarm and Cloudstone Curio.

Loop Cost: Variable, depending on cheap creatures used.

Steps:

1: Tap our dorks for mana.

2: Play our cheap creature.

3: Return our other cheap creature to hand with Cloudstone Curio.

4: As per Intruder Alarm's effect, untap all our creatures.

5: Repeat.

These are combos that aren't related to any of the machines.

Combo Type: Infinite Mana

Prerequisites: Control an Axebane Guardian, High Alert and at least four other creatures with defender.

Setup Cost: Variable, but at least for Axebane Guardian and High Alert.

Loop Cost:

Steps:

1: Tap the Axebane for a and a mana, two other colours we don't care for , and the final colour we wish to produce . This is possible by controlling 5 defenders total, which means we can use Axebane to make 5 mana of any colours we choose.

2: Pump the , and two other colours into the High Alert to untap our Axebane. This profits 1 every time.

3: Repeat.

Combo Type: Infinite Mana

Prerequisites: Control an Isochron Scepter with an imprinted Dramatic Reversal and rocks or dorks that make up to 3 mana between themselves.

Setup Cost: Variable, but at least for Isochron Scepter.

Loop Cost: Variable, but at least to tap Isochron Scepter.

Steps:

1: Tap our dorks and make at least 3 mana.

2: Tap Isochron Scepter, casting a copy of Dramatic Reversal.

3: As per Dramatic Reversal's effect, untap every nonland permanent we control.

4: Repeat.

Combo Type: Infinite Mana

Prerequisites: Control a Food Chain, and either Eternal Scourge or Misthollow Griffin.

Setup Cost: Variable, but either for Eternal Scourge or for Misthollow Griffin.

Loop Cost:

Steps:

1: Cast either Eternal Scourge or Misthollow Griffin.

2: Immediately exile it with Food Chain's effect, generating its CMC worth of mana.

3: Re-cast it from exile, netting 1 mana each time.

4: Repeat.

Combo Type: Infinite Mana

Prerequisites: Control: Axebane Guardian and another defender, Faeburrow Elder or Bloom Tender. Attached to the creature is a Pemmin's Aura or Freed from the Real.

Setup Cost:

Loop Cost:

Steps:

1: Tap our dork for and excess.

2: Use Pemmin's Aura or Freed from the Real to untap our dork.

3: Repeat.

"Then Arcades said, 'Let the walls be free to spread across all realms, all countries and all planes: creeping into every corner and staying strong against the floor'; and it was so."

"And Arcades let the walls creep wherever they wished to roam, lay on his consecrated land and generally just sit around for a bit. And Arcades saw that it was good."

"Then Arcades said, 'Let us annoy man in Our obstacles, according to Our bland likeness; seize them from dominion over the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, stop them from going places all over the earth."

"And so Arcades halted man in His own image, and it was pretty funny the first time but now it's starting to get a little old."

"Arcades rested with His fortifications, His bulwarks and His palisades, His ramparts of which he had dominion, leagues of high stone.

Then Arcades saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good."

(Wallogenesis 1:6)

We'll be using terminology here such as: Bouncegine and Flengine. These mean Infinite Bounce Engine and Infinite Flicker Engine respectively, a state of the game where we can have infinite bounce to hand or flicker effects. This also implies having infinite mana. Here are examples of both:

Prerequisites: Control either a Temur Sabertooth or Cloudstone Curio, creatures with ETB effects on the field or in hand, and have infinite mana through another combo.

Setup Cost: The cost of the infinite combo as well as the creatures and either for Cloudstone Curio or for Temur Sabertooth.

Steps:

1: Cast our ETB creature with our infinite mana.

2: Activate Cloudstone Curio when the creature hits the battlefield to return another creature to hand.

or

2: Activate Temur Sabertooths effect when the creature resolves, returning it or another creature to hand.

3: Repeat.

Prerequisites: Control either a Emiel the Blessed or Deadeye Navigator, creatures with ETB effects on the field or in hand, and have infinite mana through another combo.

Setup Cost: The cost of the infinite combo as well as the creatures and either for Emiel the Blessed or for Deadeye Navigator.

Steps:

1: Cast our ETB creature with our infinite mana.

2: After the creature resolves, either soulbond it with Deadeye Navigator or pay to flicker it with Emiel the Blessed

3: If the creature is soulbonded, pay to flicker it.

4: When the soulbonded creature is flickered, it becomes un-soulbonded. When it enters the battlefield again, soulbond it with Deadeye Navigator.

5: Repeat 2 - 4.

The categories are defined by the specific card used to make a finisher effect happen, not the cards in the combo entirely. For instance: With Axebane Guardian, Wall of Kelp and Intruder Alarm in play we can tap the Axebane for mana to tap the Wall of Kelp and make infinite defenders. Here, the card in question creating the finisher is the Wall of Kelp, even though the Axebane Guardian and Intruder Alarm need to be in play for the combo to happen.

Finisher Type: Complete Removal of Enemy Permanents

Prerequisites: Control a working Bouncegine or Flengine, moving around an Eternal Witness with Beast Within and Cyclonic Rift in hand.

Setup Cost: The cost of the Engine and for Eternal Witness.

Steps:

1: Cast Beast Within, turning an enemy permanent into a beast.

2: Cast Eternal Witness, bringing back the Beast Within to our hand.

3: Again cast Beast Within, turning an enemy permanent into a beast.

4: Flicker or bounce the Eternal Witness, every time returning the Beast Within to hand and casting it with a new target.

5: Repeat this until all enemy permanents are beast tokens.

6: Finish with an overloaded Cyclonic Rift to removal all the beast tokens from the game.

Finisher Type: Draw our entire deck

Prerequisites: Have a Pull from Tomorrow in hand, with infinite mana.

Steps:

1: Cast Pull from Tomorrow with the X cost being equal or just less than the amount of cards in our library, as not to mill ourselves out.

2: Draw that many cards, discarding one.

Finisher Type: Bounce opposing creatures and perform a powerful alpha strike

Prerequisites: Have a decent board state of creatures, one creature we don't mind sacrificing and infinite mana. In hand, have Finale of Devastation.

Steps:

1: Cast Finale of Devastation with the X cost being a ridiculous number.

2: Using the Finale of Devastation, find a Profaner of the Dead and put it into play.

3: Finale of Devestation buffs all of our creatures by X/X, which is a ridiculous number.

4: Exploit a creature with Profaner of the Dead after Finale of Devestation has resolved to clear the enemy boards of creatures.

5: Swing.

Finisher Type: An alpha strike with infinite walls

Prerequisites: Control the pieces contained in the KelpBane Alarm! combo, Crashing Drawbridge and either Arcades or High Alert.

KelpBane Alarm! Show

Steps:

1: After creating infinite Kelp defender tokens, tap Crashing Drawbridge, this gives them all haste.

2: Swing with infinite 0/1 defenders for 1 damage each.

Finisher Type: Draw our entire library

Prerequisites: Control a Flengine or a Bouncegine, as well as having Arcades in play and at least one defender.

Steps:

1: Use our Engine to flicker or bounce our defender.

2: If the defender is flickered, draw a card when it enters the battlefield from Arcades.

3: If the defender is bounced, cast it and draw a card when it enters the battlefield from Arcades.

4: Repeat.

Finisher Type: Draw our entire library

Prerequisites: Control a Quicksilver Wall, Arcades and infinite mana.

Steps:

1: Use our mana to bounce Quicksilver Wall.

2: Cast Quicksilver Wall and draw a card when it enters the battlefield from Arcades.

3: Repeat.

Finisher Type: Draw our entire library

Prerequisites: Control the pieces contained in the Shrieking AluBarricade! combo and Arcades.

Shrieking AluBarricade! Show

Steps:

1: Return Jeskai Barricade to hand using Shrieking Drake.

2: Cast Jeskai Barricade and draw a card when it enters the battlefield from Arcades.

3: Return Shrieking Drake to hand using Jeskai Barricade.

4: Cast Shrieking Drake.

5: Repeat.

Finisher Type: Draw our entire library and create infinite Kelp defender tokens

Prerequisites: Control the pieces contained in the KelpBane Alarm! combo and Arcades

KelpBane Alarm! Show

Steps:

1: Create Kelp defender tokens on every activation of Wall of Kelp.

2: Whenever a Kelp defender token comes into play, draw a card from Arcades.

3: Repeat.

Finisher Type: Draw our entire library and create infinite Kelp defender tokens

Prerequisites: Control the pieces contained in the Isochron Reversal! combo, Wall of Kelp and Arcades

Isochron Reversal! Show

Steps:

1: With infinite mana, tap Wall of Kelp for a Kelp defender token.

2: Whenever a Kelp defender token comes into play, draw a card from Arcades.

3: Tap Isochron Scepter, casting a copy of Dramatic Reversal.

4: As per Dramatic Reversal's effect, untap every nonland permanent we control.

5: Repeat.

Finisher Type: Reduce enemy life totals to zero

Prerequisites: Control a Shaman of Forgotten Ways, creatures with power high enough to reach 8, Cyclonic Rift in hand and infinite mana (or) .

Steps:

1: Cast an overloaded Cyclonic Rift for .

2: Tap Shaman of Forgotten Ways for its Formidable trigger for .

3: All life totals become the amount of creatures players control, our opponents control no creatures.

Finisher Type: Mill opponents out

Prerequisites: Control a Flengine or a Bouncegine, as well as Wall of Lost Thoughts.

Steps:

1: Use our Engine to flicker or bounce Wall of Lost Thoughts.

2: If Wall of Lost Thoughts is flickered, mill an opponent for 4.

3: If Wall of Lost Thoughts is bounced, cast it and mill an opponent for 4.

4: Repeat.

Finisher Type: Create a huge, unblockable, shrouded, flying wall.

Prerequisites: Control Arcades or High Alert, Tetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive, a defender of our choice with an attached Pemmin's Aura and infinite mana.

Steps:

1: Use Pemmin's Aura to give our creature Shroud.

2: Use Pemmin's Aura to give our creature Flying.

3: Use Pemmin's Aura to give our creature -1/+1 a ridiculous amount of times.

4: Swing.

"Thus the cement and the stone, and all made from them, were finished. And Arcades was a tad tired so he slept from all His work and what He had done."

"In His sleep, He dreamt of a world entirely made of walls, every corner emblazoned with remarkable barricades and stones scattered high, all built and living of which to worship Him. In His sleep, He smiled."

"As He slept, so did the walls with him."

"Then Arcades scoffed at His work and sacrificed it all to Towering Titan for a laugh."

(Wallogenesis 1:7)

1:0

"In the beginning, Arcades created the cement and the stone."

"He floats, ever-vigilant above leagues of impenetrable defences.

With one flick of his mighteous wrist, he can press his once-thought-immovable army against you, their seeping through the Earth at immense speeds.

With one twitch of his unfurled wings, he can will the forces of nature to life, leading you to your demise.

With one snarl of his sharpened fangs, he can brandish frankly broken enchantments and artifacts, leaving you as dust without an urn.

He is the Alpha and Omega (of defenders)."

1:1

"Then Arcades said, 'Let there be walls'; and there were walls."

"And Arcades saw the walls, that it was good; and Arcades sloppily slapped some mortar on those walls."

"From deep beneath the ground, the Earth cried a bestial roar as acres of inanimate trees and stone started to slowly nudge themselves out of silent obscurity.

The Earth roared loud and strong, possibly because it takes quite a lot of effort to re-animate things such as walls, but mainly because it was the Earth's day off and it was having a lie-in."

1:2

"Then Arcades said, 'Let there be firmness in the midsts of the mortar, and let it connect brick to brick and stone to stone'"

"Thus Arcades hardened the walls, allowing them to take on their true forms as great barriers, absolving themselves from the ground, and their shadows covered large tracts of land like darkened, rectangular monoliths scarring the warm, yellow plains."

"Arcades cried a tear which fell to the ground, and on collision took place a catastrophic rumble. Arcades stood as the only motionless object in a sea of vibration.

His power ricocheted through continents and their countries, through cities and their villages, through houses and their rooms, and knocked over my scalding cup of tea onto the crotch of my trousers."

1:3

"Then Arcades said, 'Let the many barricades of the Earth rule under me, let them gather into one place so I can sort them out a little better.'"

"And Arcades watched as the walls gathered, He called the gathering of walls Defenders. And Arcades saw that it was good."

"Then Arcades said, 'Let the earth bring forth more Defenders, the wall that yields powerful shielding, and the bolstered spectacles of brick and mortar be so mashed up with toughness they cannot be destroyed, on the Earth'; and it was so.

And the earth brought forth Defenders, the wall that yields shielding according to its kind, and the spectacle of brick and mortar with a toughness number so high it'd make Wall Street brokers collectively spit out their vodka and cocaine cocktails, whose shielding is in itself according to its kind."

"And Arcades saw that it was good."

1:4

"Then Arcades said, 'Let there be lights in the skies to divide night from day, and let these lights shine down to earth'; and it was so."

"Then Arcades made two great lights: the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night. He made the stars by clipping his claws and leaving the remains to float aimlessly. And Arcades saw that it was good."

"These events are highly discussed in the bastion because Arcades has very small eyes and cannot see well in the night, so it makes absolutely no sense that he would create night-time, but mainly also because they have almost, but not quite, entirely nothing to do with walls."

1:5

"Then Arcades said, 'Give my walls life, and let them procreate to ascend and evolve further,'"

"The earth was confused by this request as it had already given the walls life. To remedy this it chose to take life away from them while Arcades wasn't watching and return it to them while he was. And Arcades saw that it was good."

"So Arcades blessed them. And allowed the many walls under his reign to copulate and create offspring of which to be fruitful and multiply.

How do they do this? I'll spare you the details, but imagine the leftovers of a building demolition slowly quivering on the ground. That is how the walls do."

"And Arcades saw that it was pretty good."

1:6

"Then Arcades said, 'Let the walls be free to spread across all realms, all countries and all planes: creeping into every corner and staying strong against the floor'; and it was so."

"And Arcades let the walls creep wherever they wished to roam, lay on his consecrated land and generally just sit around for a bit. And Arcades saw that it was good."

"Then Arcades said, 'Let us annoy man in Our obstacles, according to Our bland likeness; seize them from dominion over the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, stop them from going places all over the earth."

"And so Arcades halted man in His own image, and it was pretty funny the first time but now it's starting to get a little old."

"Arcades rested with His fortifications, His bulwarks and His palisades, His ramparts of which he had dominion, leagues of high stone.

Then Arcades saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good."

1:7

"Thus the cement and the stone, and all made from them, were finished. And Arcades was a tad tired so he slept from all His work and what He had done."

"In His sleep, He dreamt of a world entirely made of walls, every corner emblazoned with remarkable barricades and stones scattered high, all built and living of which to worship Him. In His sleep, He smiled."

"As He slept, so did the walls with him."

"Then Arcades scoffed at His work and sacrificed it all to Towering Titan for a laugh."

(Wallogenesis Absolute)

We thank 3Drinks, pufflex, benjameenbear and ChocoDude of the MTGSalavation/MTGNexus forum for help over time and getting us into the format as a whole!

We thank our friends for telling us to give up so we won't.

We thank our Wallmaster for giving us life.

We thank you, the reader, for hearing our words and hymns. We hope we can implore you to join us on our journey to hardened divinity.

[Space reserved for future changes, stay tuned!]

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Revision 15 See all

(4 years ago)

+1 Burgeoning maybe
+1 Exploration maybe
Top Ranked
  • Achieved #1 position overall 4 years ago
Date added 4 years
Last updated 4 years
Legality

This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)

5 - 0 Mythic Rares

46 - 0 Rares

23 - 0 Uncommons

16 - 0 Commons
Cards 100
Avg. CMC 2.55
Tokens 0/1 U Creature Plant Wall, Beast 3/3 G
Folders Stuff I like, EDH, Decks that impressed me, Deck Ideas, Other Decks, zCommander, Flavorful, EDH, Arcades Help, Primers
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