Queen Marchesa: Midrange Superfriends

Commander / EDH Aikido Midrange RBW (Mardu) Superfriends Tokens

Earendel

Land (36)

• 1x Battlefield Forge
• 1x Blast Zone
• 1x Boseiju, Who Shelters All
• 1x Caves of Koilos
• 1x Clifftop Retreat
• 1x Command Tower
• 1x Dragonskull Summit
• 1x Evolving Wilds
• 1x Exotic Orchard
• 1x Godless Shrine
• 1x Interplanar Beacon
• 1x Isolated Chapel
• 1x Karn's Bastion
• 1x Kjeldoran Outpost
• 5x Mountain
• 1x Nomad Outpost
• 6x Plains
• 1x Reliquary Tower
• 1x Rogue's Passage
• 3x Swamp
• 1x Temple of Malice
• 1x Temple of Silence
• 1x Temple of Triumph
• 1x Throne of the High City
• 1x Westvale Abbey  ^Flip

Instant (10)

• 1x Path to Exile
• 1x Secure the Wastes
• 1x Swords to Plowshares
• 1x Deflecting Palm
• 1x Anguished Unmaking
• 1x Arcbond
• 1x Crackling Doom
• 1x Kaya's Guile
• 1x Comeuppance
• 1x Settle the Wreckage

Planeswalker (15)

• 1x Chandra, Acolyte of Flame
• 1x Ajani Steadfast
• 1x Ajani Vengeant
• 1x Chandra, Torch of Defiance
• 1x Elspeth, Knight-Errant
• 1x Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
• 1x Nahiri, the Harbinger
• 1x Angrath, the Flame-Chained
• 1x Ob Nixilis Reignited
• 1x Chandra, Awakened Inferno
• 1x Chandra, Flamecaller
• 1x Elspeth, Sun's Champion
• 1x Liliana, Dreadhorde General
• 1x Rowan Kenrith
• 1x Sorin, Grim Nemesis

Artifact (12)

• 1x Sol Ring
• 1x Bloodthirsty Blade
• 1x Boros Signet
• 1x Orzhov Signet
• 1x Rakdos Signet
• 1x Talisman of Conviction
• 1x Talisman of Hierarchy
• 1x Thaumatic Compass  ^Flip
• 1x Chromatic Lantern
• 1x Rings of Brighthearth
• 1x The Chain Veil
• 1x Norn's Annex

Sorcery (4)

• 1x Disrupt Decorum
• 1x Wrath of God
• 1x Jokulhaups
• 1x Primevals' Glorious Rebirth

Commander (1)

Enchantment (15)

• 1x Land Tax
• 1x Legion's Landing  ^Flip
• 1x Blind Obedience
• 1x Luminarch Ascension
• 1x Oath of Chandra
• 1x Ghostly Prison
• 1x Oath of Gideon
• 1x Oath of Kaya
• 1x Oath of Liliana
• 1x Phyrexian Arena
• 1x Anointed Procession
• 1x Smothering Tithe
• 1x Divine Visitation
• 1x Sphere of Safety
• 1x The Eldest Reborn

Creature (7)

• 1x Kambal, Consul of Allocation
• 1x Thalia, Heretic Cathar
• 1x Archangel of Tithes
• 1x Arena Rector
• 1x Baird, Steward of Argive
• 1x Purphoros, God of the Forge
• 1x Kazuul, Tyrant of the Cliffs

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Maybeboard

Planeswalker (21)

• 1x Daretti, Ingenious Iconoclast
• 1x Gideon Blackblade
• 1x Gideon of the Trials
• 1x Kaya, Orzhov Usurper
• 1x Teyo, the Shieldmage
• 1x Tibalt, Rakish Instigator
• 1x Ajani, Strength of the Pride
• 1x Karn, Scion of Urza
• 1x Kaya, Ghost Assassin
• 1x Koth of the Hammer
• 1x Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
• 1x Sorin, Solemn Visitor
• 1x The Wanderer
• 1x Elspeth Tirel
• 1x Jaya Ballard
• 1x Liliana Vess
• 1x Nahiri, the Lithomancer
• 1x Ob Nixilis of the Black Oath
• 1x Sarkhan the Masterless
• 1x Chandra, Bold Pyromancer
• 1x Sorin Markov

Artifact (7)

• 1x Mox Amber
• 1x Chandra's Regulator
• 1x Spear of Heliod
• 1x Sword of Truth and Justice
• 1x Nevinyrral's Disk
• 1x Thran Temporal Gateway
• 1x Bolas's Citadel

Land (3)

• 1x Arcane Lighthouse
• 1x High Market
• 1x Memorial to Glory

Sorcery (18)

• 1x Rolling Earthquake
• 1x Scheming Symmetry
• 1x Vandalblast
• 1x Mizzium Mortars
• 1x The Elderspell
• 1x Anger of the Gods
• 1x Slagstorm
• 1x Sweltering Suns
• 1x Toxic Deluge
• 1x Armageddon
• 1x Fiery Confluence
• 1x Kaya's Wrath
• 1x Yawgmoth's Vile Offering
• 1x Command the Dreadhorde
• 1x Merciless Eviction
• 1x Insurrection
• 1x Obliterate
• 1x Blasphemous Act

Creature (13)

• 1x Kytheon, Hero of Akros  ^Flip
• 1x Grand Abolisher
• 1x Magus of the Balance
• 1x Varchild, Betrayer of Kjeldor
• 1x Xantcha, Sleeper Agent
• 1x Heliod, God of the Sun
• 1x Mogis, God of Slaughter
• 1x Seraph of the Scales
• 1x Silent Arbiter
• 1x Twilight Prophet
• 1x Archangel Avacyn  ^Flip
• 1x Djeru, With Eyes Open
• 1x Gisela, Blade of Goldnight

Instant (17)

• 1x Gideon's Sacrifice
• 1x Mana Tithe
• 1x Batwing Brume
• 1x Boros Charm
• 1x Brought Back
• 1x Comet Storm
• 1x Dawn Charm
• 1x Mandate of Peace
• 1x Rakdos Charm
• 1x Starstorm
• 1x Backlash
• 1x Lapse of Certainty
• 1x Make a Stand
• 1x Mortify
• 1x Teferi's Protection
• 1x Repeated Reverberation
• 1x Return to Dust

Enchantment (10)

• 1x Authority of the Consuls
• 1x Kaya's Ghostform
• 1x Dawn of Hope
• 1x Spectral Grasp
• 1x Mudslide
• 1x Lightmine Field
• 1x Marchesa's Decree
• 1x Assemble the Legion
• 1x Sunbird's Invocation
• 1x Captive Audience

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Queen Marchesa: Superfriends:

Hello and welcome to this guide. I will try to convince you of the potential of a mardu PW list in multiplayer EDH and go in depth about my thought process. English is not my native langage so don't be surprised if you find some sentences that do not sound right. I will gladly listen to any critiscism in the comment section. This deck guide is still work in progress, i will add a maybe board section later. This archetype is really flexible and i have tons of ideas to share.

What's the goal of the deck ?

The goal is to control the game by using Planeswalkers in a midrange style while taxing your opponents life and ressources.Your PW will provide you with a lot of token generations, protecting themselves and also provinding you with slow burn damages every turn. The main idea is that you get immediate value from your cards when they hit the board and your opponents will have to deal with them but not for free. Each attack on your planeswalkers must cost them ressources (slowing their own game plan) and life and sometimes.. even the game.

You have some instants that will help to protect you and your permanents by redirecting damages into the ennemy, sometimes ending the game in a surprising manner.

Why Mardu Superfriends ?

The original idea comes from the fact that Queen Marchesa is already played in this playstyle in the 1v1 format and performs really well. I tried to inspire me from this archetype and tuning it for the multiplayer experience. Mardu is a set of colors that provides really good instants, wraths, and recursion.

Marchesa is a 3 on 1 card in this deck: she will provide card draw, tokens while being a good blocker herself and will protect your planeswalkers in a really subtle way. Your opponents must choose to either attack your planeswalkers or take the monarchy. It will be really hard for them to do both and you will be abble to make them pay for each decision they make.

Also, Mardu colors provides a really good and fun package of planeswalkers. Planeswalkers are a really special type of permanent. They are pretty hard to deal with except by combat damages. In commander, you don't expect to see many of them, specially in mardu colors. So your opponents will propably have one or two single target removal like ''exile target permanent'' but that's it. You have many more planeswalkers than they have single target exile removal, they will need to kill them through creatures and at this game, you are far better than your opponents.

How do you play ?

Early game: you want to ramp as quickly as possible to play Queen Marchesa. She's the corner stone of the deck. You have to mulligan for a hand that will ensure you can cast her turn 4 or sooner. Most of the time, you want to set up your manas rocks, one or two enchantments and Marchesa.

Then, you try to play one good card per turn, generating tokens along the way. And starting to pressure your opponents with your PWs' abilities. Some planeswalkers can defend themselves and have an impact on the board like Ajani Vengeant . Don't play a PW if the board state is not in your favor. What i describe here is the ideal gameplan. Sometimes, you fall behind. Wait carefully and use wraths to reset the game. You Pws wil provide many good things: single target removal, card draw, ramp, tokens, wraths, life tax and discard.

Late game: You can take three directions depending of how the game goes:

1. Now you have enough mana, try to abuse The Chain Veil 's tap ability and Rings of Brighthearth to copy the more impactfull abilites of your PWs. Defend them with your instants and sorceries or lock down the game with Jokulhaups or Obliterate .

2. Prepare a huge tempo turn with Primevals' Glorious Rebirth to resurrect all of your PWs and legendary creatures. Notice that The Chain Veil is legendary, so it will come back too. Same will happen with your legendary enchantments.

3. Always look for an opportunity to end the game with some surprises instants you can find in the 4th strategy below. Looking at you Arcbond .

You will find the main strategies of this deck below:

1. Tax them all

Every cards in this section is here to either slow down your opponents or make them use their manas if they want to attack you or your planeswalkers and loose life in the process. Each of their actions must be paid with a sacrifice from them: either life or tempo. These tax effects won't cost you any manas and will develop while you are playing on curve. The idea is that each card you play will need some attention from your opponents but it will always be at least one card for one card + a life loss or mana tax. In the end, you will always win.

Kambal, Consul of Allocation : The most efficient life tax card of the deck. Your opponents will learn to hate him a lot.

Oath of Kaya : this enchantment is a target removal when entering the board and also provides a nice tax everytime one opponent tries to attack one of your planeswalkers.

Blind Obedience : will help to protect your planeswalkers from creatures with haste and will also slow down your opponents' ramp plan with artifacts. Lategame, it becomes a pretty good mana sink that can deal enough damages to give you the victory.

Authority of the Consuls : Same plan as Blind Obedience but it will give you a lot of life during the process. Which is pretty good considering you have some life loss caused by your mana rocks and lands.

Ghostly Prison : White staple, no need to say more.

Norn's Annex : another garanted life tax on your opponents if they don't run white. If they do, that's still mana they won't spend into their own cards. This card is awesome vs token decks.

Archangel of Tithes and Baird, Steward of Argive both have the same plan, nothing really interesting to say. Good blockers, tax their mana, just solid cards for this deck.

2. Build an army

You will find all the cards that help you either create or take advantage of tokens. Tokens in this deck are the best way to protect your planeswalkers but they can also become one of your winconditions by themselves. The idea is to create tokens at the same time you are deploying another permanent in play (PW, enchantments, etc) resulting in a straightforward playstyle.

Oath of Liliana and Oath of Gideon : Both will take advantage of your PWs. Gideon gives two tokens and one more loyalty counter when a PW comes into play, keep this in your mulligan. Liliana generates a token every time you play a PW and helps to tempo the board at the same time, forcing a sacrifice from your opponents.

Luminarch Ascension : A win condition by itself.

Legion's Landing  : cheap token generator that can also provide white mana.

Anointed Procession : This card will power up your token strategy by a lot. If you are not the monarch, Queen Marchesa is going to provide two assassins tokens.

Divine Visitation : Another huge win condition. If you are not the monarch, you can create one angel per turn with only Queen Marchesa on the board.

Secure the Wastes : A really interesting card. You can simply use it to generate a lot of tokens on your side but it's also a nice way to combo with Divine Visitation and it can act as a fog effect during your opponents turn. Using all of your mana to generate a board at instant speed to provide blockers.

Memorial to Glory : Just another way to produce some tokens in case you are in a bad position. It can combo and provide some angels or 4 tokens if you use it at the right time.

Elspeth, Sun's Champion , Elspeth, Knight-Errant , Chandra, Flamecaller , Liliana, Dreadhorde General and Chandra, Acolyte of Flame :

Gideon, Ally of Zendikar : Most of the time, you want to ulti him right away. If you have Oath of Gideon in play, your PW won't even die and you get a free powerfull emblem. He is one of the PWs you want to abuse with Rings of Brighthearth to get two emblems. He provides a token if needed too.

3. Burn them slowly

The goal here is to use effects to slowly burn every turn our opponents' life total, putting a timer on everyone's head except you. Remember that these are offensive burns, they add to the several life tax effects we already have in the first strategy.

Oath of Chandra : A single target removal and will provide 2 damages to every opponents every turn if you curve well your planeswalkers. This card is not frightening by itself so there is bug chance your opponents won't use ressources to destroy it. Underrated card in my opinion but you probably can use something else if you don't like it.

Chandra, Awakened Inferno : The star of the deck. Since she was spoiled, i wanted to find a home for this card. She's the one you want to protect and abuse her +2 ability as much as possible. She can't be countered and has a really high amount of loyalty counters. With a board full of tokens and tax effects, she won't be easy to remove.

Angrath, the Flame-Chained : 2 damages and discard a card, he must be dealt with quickly. You can also use his ability to take a creature from one opponent and attack with it. If you have High Market or Westvale Abbey   in play (depending of witch one you prefer), you can also sacrifice the creature after its attack.

Sorin, Grim Nemesis : Card draw that provides damages at the same time. Same has the others, your opponents can't let him free to do what he wants.

Rowan Kenrith : a favorite card of mine. She's not that powerfull in this deck so you can change her for any planeswalker in mardu colors that you would best see fit ( Gideon Blackblade is a good idea if you want to be faster and more aggressive). But her ability to force an opponent to attack is what makes this card so satisfying with this deck. Target an opponent with a huge board and see if he attacks you (in that case, he's going to loose a ton of life, each of his minions triggering our life tax effects and we can also trap him with one of our aikido instants. I will talk more about them in the 4th strategy) or someone else (in that case, this opponent is just doing the job for you and it can change the politics of the table). Her ult is amazing if you can get to it and her -2 ability synergises really well with Authority of the Consuls , Blind Obedience , Thalia, Heretic Cathar . Can't wait to see her return in Throne of Eldraine and hope she will be a good addition to this deck.

Purphoros, God of the Forge : really expensive but awesome card. If you can afford it, don't hesitate to put him in your deck.

4. Turn their strengh into a weakness

This strategy comes from the idea that your opponents will focus on your PWs. This is the superfriends effect, you become quickly a huge target at the table. We use this psychological state they will be in to our own advantage. My main inspiration for this part comes from this awesome decklist:Queen Marchesa: Politics, Aikido, and Control

If they try to kill you quickly with a huge burst or creature (mostly, Voltron strategies) before you can outvalue everyone with your Pws, just use Deflecting Palm at the right moment and look at them crying. Comeuppance is a similar card but even more flexible. It can turn into a board wipe against tokens or heavy creatures decks. Settle the Wreckage does not redirect damages but it will exile a lot of creatures or one huge that you can't target.

Arcbond is a really really flexible and interesting card. Most of the time, that's a surprise board wipe. Block with Queen Marchesa or one assassin token and target them with Arcbond to apply deathtouch to the whole board. But it can also be used against a big creatures. If you (or one of your opponents) block a 15/15 or more with a creature, just Arcbond the blocker and deal 15 damages to every player and every creature. If you can survive the damages, it's a surprise win condition that can come out from nowhere. Eliminate with one instant all of your opponents or one or two and at the same time, clear the board for your PWs.

These cards will become easier to be lethal as the game goes because you will lower the life total again and again, making the lethal range of these cards even easier to reach and end the game. But if it's not the right situation, they still act like fog effects that will protect you.

Bloodthirsty Blade is awesome. You can turn the most dangerous creature on the board into a damage dealer working for you or use it to pressure annoying creatures that stay behind to commit suicide. It's a kind of sublte removal and protection you can use as many times as you want until it's destroyed or exiled.

Crackling Doom will protect you against big creatures. Really good against Voltron strategies. 6 damages dealt and 3 creatures down. Nothing more to say.

Planeswalkers ultimates

Trying to ultimate your planeswalkers is not the main goal of the deck. Of course, if it can happen, you will be far ahead. But you should not play with this only plan in mind. Getting to an ultimate must be a logical conclusion of a good anticipation and tempo plays.

Ajani Steadfast , Chandra, Acolyte of Flame and Karn's Bastion are the cards that can help you get your PWs to a hugh amount of loyalty counters. But most of the time, you will get these emblems by a mastery of the board state. Rings of Brighthearth can also be used to copy the abilities that will give loyalty counters on your planeswalkers.

Consider playing the The Elderspell if your meta allows it. I have in my playgroup fans of Lord Windgrace and Saheeli, the Gifted so it can turns in an interesting removal and at the same time, ramping up your PWs.

Here are the most interesting ultimates you can get and those you should priorities:

WIP

Maybeboard and ideas

I will discuss budget options and cards that can oriente the deck more towards an agressive deck or a control value/oriented one, depending of what you like and the meta of your playgroup. Marchesa also provides a really good pillowfort playstyle with a tons of possible wraths effects in mardu colors. This deck is not oriented toward this style and is more agressive, the philosophy behind is totaly different.

But you will find in the maybeboard many cards that can fit a more slow and control strategy. If you want to go in that direction, just remove token orienteded enchantments and add more defensive ones. Also change the instant and sorcery packages as you wish.

I will write down some examples soon. WIP

Conclusion

WIP

Thanks for reading, hope you liked this guide. I will keep improving the list as i'm playtesting it and will consider any new ideas and critiscism !

I would like to thank precociousapprentice who gave me the passion for finding new ideas and archetypes for Queen Marchesa .

Long may she reign.

Date added	5 years
Last updated	3 years
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	22 - 0 Mythic Rares 44 - 0 Rares 18 - 0 Uncommons 2 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	3.53
Tokens	Angel 4/4 W, Angel 4/4 W w/ Vigilance, Assassin 1/1 B w/ Haste, Elemental 1/1 R, Elemental 3/1 R, Emblem Ajani Steadfast, Emblem Chandra, Awakened Inferno, Emblem Chandra, Torch of Defiance, Emblem Elspeth, Knight-Errant, Emblem Elspeth, Sun's Champion, Emblem Gideon, Ally of Zendikar, Emblem Ob Nixilis Reignited, Emblem Rowan Kenrith, Human Cleric 1/1 BW, Knight Ally 2/2 W, Kor Ally 1/1 W, Ogre 3/3 R, Soldier 1/1 W, Spirit 1/1 WB, The Monarch, Treasure, Vampire 1/1 W, Vampire Knight 1/1 B, Warrior 1/1 W, Zombie 2/2 B