Naya tokens in an enchantress shell, with some light untapping shenanigans.
Strategy
The aim of this deck is to win suddenly by generating a burst of tokens with one of a variety of win-condition enchantments on the board.
Samut, Voice of Dissent serves two main functions:
- Giving all your tokens haste, which makes a sufficient amount of tokens a win condition in itself.
- Untapping creatures which can untap your (enchanted) lands, to help make enough mana to make all the tokens you need.
Having a haste enabler (with flash!) in the command zone is amazing for this deck, and her untapping ability has surprising synergy if you can get the deck's engine running as intended. She's also just a pretty impressive attacker and blocker, which can surprise opponents who forget she has flash.
The deck has four main parts: enchantress effects (draw), ramp, token generation and win conditions.
Enchantress Effects
The classic draw engine, with all the usual suspects: Enchantress's Presence, Argothian Enchantress, Verduran Enchantress, Mesa Enchantress, Satyr Enchanter, Setessan Champion, Eidolon of Blossoms and Sythis, Harvest's Hand.
The card advantage generated by these cards is fantastic, but naturally requires the deck to be dominated by enchantments. Other sub-themes within the deck have to function without significantly reducing the number of enchantments. Fortunately, as will be seen below, that works fine for the token strategy and its win conditions.
It also means that the deck tries its best to use enchantment varieties of supporting and utility effects, including other card advantage and filtering engines, removal and graveyard hate. See Sylvan Library, Aura Shards, Aura of Silence, Cast Out, Grasp of Fate, Song of the Dryads, Rest in Peace, Humility, and Stony Silence. Fortunately, all these effects are still very powerful, and in some circumstances more so than non-enchantment options (e.g. Song of the Dryads and Humility). Flickering Ward is also an excellent draw spell with an enchantress effect and enough white mana. The archetype is popular for a reason!
Another upside of stapling all relevant effects to enchantments is that it makes enchantment tutors very flexible. See Idyllic Tutor, Enlightened Tutor and Sterling Grove.
There is also a bit of protection and recursion for enchantments: Greater Auramancy, Sterling Grove, Privileged Position, Replenish and Hall of Heliod's Generosity. Shigeki, Jukai Visionary permits more flexible recursion.
Ramp
Unsurprisingly, almost all the ramp in the deck is enchantment based, which usually means land auras: Wild Growth, Dawn's Reflection and the like. While less efficient than the good mana rock options or land-based ramp spells like Cultivate, these can potentially become very effective in a Samut, Voice of Dissent deck when supported by creatures such as Voyaging Satyr and Magus of the Candelabra which tap to untap your lands (see also Deserted Temple). These already give you extra value out of lands that produce more than one mana, and can then be untapped by Samut to further double up on the effect. Earthcraft means even our enchantresses or spare tokens get to join in (but keep in mind the "basic land" limitation). It's a bit of a painfully finicky process, but the mana output can quickly become absurd - which is excellent for the token strategy.
There are also a couple of more conventional mana doublers: Mana Reflection and Mirari's Wake (bonus anthem effect!). Note that Mana Reflection will not double the mana from most land enchantments (cf Gift of Paradise) (thanks iammute). Carpet of Flowers seems like a bit of a niche option, but I find it almost always pulls its weight.
Of course, no enchantress deck would be complete without a Serra's Sanctum, which is a fantastic untap target.
I know there's a whole host of other land-untapping creatures out there, many of which are probably usually better than Voyaging Satyr, e.g. Krosan Restorer or even Arbor Elf. I don't know whether it's a good idea to go too deep on this synergy at the expense of the deck's other parts (I rarely feel like I don't have enough mana as it is), and I like Voyaging Satyr as a very cheap, regular ramp effect to smooth the early game if necessary. It's not set in stone, and you may want to mix it up a bit if trying this deck.
Token Generation
Most of the token generation in the deck focuses on producing a large amount of tokens in one burst. This is where the deck has to dilute its enchantment focus most, relying on X cost spells like Secure the Wastes, Tempt with Vengeance, Awaken the Woods (doubles as instant ramp with Samut out), March of the Multitudes, Finale of Glory, Grand Crescendo (bonus protection) and similar effects like Storm Herd. If you need more, consider Sylvan Offering (which I replaced with Awaken the Woods), or Eiganjo Uprising, which is fine but probably worse than most of the other options. Decree of Justice has the advantage that the cycling trigger is a bit harder to counter.
There are also a couple of enchantment and creature options to find with the relevant tutors: Rise of the Hobgoblins and Tilonalli's Summoner.
There is a bit of incidental token generation, to assist with chump blocking and making use of Aura Shards (see Kher Keep, which also works well with land untapping), but there are now so many enchantresses and enchantment creatures that I don't think this is as important as it used to be. Notably, the deck could easily utilise the classic Squirrel Nest and Earthcraft infinite squirrel combo if you added the former - it used to be in the deck but to me felt a bit too easily tutorable, so I always avoided using it. If you run it, don't forget to put Squirrel Nest on a basic land.
Win Conditions
To further justify the enchantment theme, there are a number of powerful enchantments which work extremely well with large numbers of tokens.
Firstly, there are the usual "doubling" enchantments: Parallel Lives and Anointed Procession. Unbound Flourishing works with most of the token creators (not Tilonalli's Summoner, but it does work with Magus of the Candelabra!). Note the absence of Doubling Season, which is partly because I use my copy in another deck but also because it's actually just a more expensive Parallel Lives in this deck.
Secondly, if sheer volume is not sufficient, there are a couple of enchantments which should ensure any attacks made by your tokens are lethal: Beastmaster Ascension, Shared Animosity and Roar of Resistance (which is less immediately impressive but can mess with other player's combats and is a backup haste enabler). It's not too difficult to play one of these followed by an X cost token spell in the same turn, as X doesn't even need to be that large when these are in play. Consider also Divine Visitation, if you need more.
Finally, there are the enchantments that sometimes let you win without even needing to attack: Purphoros, God of the Forge, Impact Tremors and Goblin Bombardment. Note that Purphoros can be found with both enchantment and creature tutors.
Almost all of these effects can make a sudden burst of tokens instantly lethal, particularly with Samut's haste ability.
Notable Exclusions
A few notable exclusions. First, there are a lot of enchantments that interact well with a token strategy, and you may want to swap in a few if you try the deck. See, for example, Sigil of the Empty Throne, Luminarch Ascension, In the Web of War, Glare of Subdual, Breath of Fury and maybe Vicious Shadows. Cathars' Crusade would be an auto-include if it wasn't such a pain to resolve. Trace of Abundance can be used to protect key lands, but at the expense of the ability to untap them (shroud not hexproof). You might want to try the various anthem effects in these colours, but I don't think they really do enough by themselves. There are also other good token generators like Sacred Mesa, land enchantments like Utopia Sprawl and Gift of Paradise, and various decent enchantment-based support cards like Burgeoning, Solitary Confinement, Sphere of Safety, Tectonic Reformation and Crackdown. Banishment is a Cast Out variant which loses cycling but can take out opposing token swarms. I've considered these and more while developing this deck and have elected to go with the current balance, but I like mixing things up occasionally. Recommendations welcome.
Second, there are a bunch of enchantment and non-enchantment ramp options which can leverage the (hopefully many) creatures into more mana. This includes the powerful Gaea's Cradle (particularly if you can untap it), which I used to play until it got too expensive to comfortably carry around (see also Growing Rites of Itlimoc
). Mana Echoes can produce truly ridiculous amounts of mana when multiple token creatures enter the battlefield at once, as they will all "see" each other for the purpose of its effect. It was in the deck for a while, but really requires you to have two token spells to chain into one another, which wasn't common enough to be worth it. Likewise Cryptolith Rite, which would be better if the deck had more incidental token generation. I've gradually de-emphasised this source of ramp over time as I usually want to be winning once I have that many creatures out anyway.
Third, there are a bunch of creatures and a few planeswalkers which synergise with enchantments and/or tokens, but are not really necessary to win and dilute the enchantment theme. See also the other land-untapping creatures referred to above. There are a few which might be worth the trade-off, like Monastery Mentor, Huatli, Radiant Champion or Calix, Destiny's Hand. Witty Roastmaster is probably the top candidate for inclusion, if I thought the deck needed Impact Tremors redundancy enough to add more non-enchantments. Elspeth, Sun's Champion might be good enough. You could consider playing Dryad Arbor to cut out the middle man in the untapping game, but note that loading it up with auras might hurt if it gets removed. If you need more ways to get creatures, consider also Green Sun's Zenith and/or Finale of Devastation, although I think the extra utility of the latter justifies the extra mana when you just need to get an enchantress.
Finally, there are a large number of powerful artifacts which have been excluded. For example, there is no Ashnod's Altar or Phyrexian Altar in the deck. They could be great, but also dilute the enchantment theme, and generally I'd be hoping to be in a position to win once I start generating sufficient tokens to make relevant amounts of mana in any case. Cards like Eldrazi Monument and Coat of Arms work great with large numbers of tokens, but I think the enchantment options are more than sufficient.
There is no Sol Ring in the deck. While it is no doubt better than any single land enchantment, I think the potential additional value of drawing a card off an enchantress effect and untapping the enchanted land once or twice makes it reasonably close. There are also no other artifacts in the deck, so I like the thematic consistency of excluding it. Throw it in if you prefer, but I'm happy leaving it out on this occasion.
Skullclamp might be the hardest exclusion to justify. A large part of that decision is probably because I enjoy the challenge and flavour of keeping the deck artifact free. Arguably it's also a bit less useful when you're not consistently producing small numbers of disposable creatures, as opposed to a burst of tokens when you're hopefully about to win (although it would probably be worth casting a low value X cost token spell just to refill your hand). I think it's likely I'll end up putting it in eventually.
Closing Comments
Samut makes for a slightly more original take on the usual Bant enchantress decks, if you're a fan of the archetype but want to try something a little different (or just can't decide between tokens and enchantments).
Updates
22/08/21 - Cards removed: High Market, Finale of Devastation, Taiga, Plateau, Savannah. Cards added: Sythis, Harvest's Hand, Sanctum Weaver, Branchloft Pathway
, Cragcrown Pathway
, Needleverge Pathway
.
11/06/22 - Cards removed: Exotic Orchard, Academy Rector. Cards added: Jetmir's Garden, Grand Crescendo.
29/07/22 - Cards removed: Squirrel Nest, Land Tax. Cards added: Shigeki, Jukai Visionary, Jukai Naturalist.
27/01/23 - Cards removed: Sylvan Offering. Cards added: Awaken the Woods.
09/03/23 - Cards removed: Defense of the Heart, Austere Command, Martial Coup. Cards added: Roar of Resistance, Farewell, White Sun's Twilight.
24/09/23 - Cards removed: Mana Reflection. Cards added: Virtue of Strength.
