Religion and Politics: Cleric Tribal EDH

Commander / EDH* Lifegain Tribal WB (Orzhov)

Gammer001

Creature (46)

• 1x Akroma's Devoted
• 1x Alms Collector
• 1x Ancestor's Prophet
• 1x Atalya, Samite Master
• 1x Auriok Champion
• 1x Auriok Replica
• 1x Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim
• 1x Battlefield Medic
• 1x Battletide Alchemist
• 1x Bishop of Rebirth
• 1x Bygone Bishop
• 1x Cabal Archon
• 1x Celestial Gatekeeper
• 1x Custodi Lich
• 1x Custodi Squire
• 1x Dark Supplicant
• 1x Devout Chaplain
• 1x Disciple of Griselbrand
• 1x Drana's Emissary
• 1x Edgewalker
• 1x Eight-and-a-Half-Tails
• 1x Fiend Hunter
• 1x Grand Abolisher
• 1x Hanweir Militia Captain  ^Flip
• 1x Heliod, God of the Sun
• 1x High Priest of Penance
• 1x Kor Sanctifiers
• 1x Liliana, Heretical Healer  ^Flip
• 1x Master Apothecary
• 1x Mikaeus, the Lunarch
• 1x Mother of Runes
• 1x Oriss, Samite Guardian
• 1x Pious Evangel  ^Flip
• 1x Pontiff of Blight
• 1x Priest of the Blood Rite
• 1x Rotlung Reanimator
• 1x Scion of Darkness
• 1x Selfless Spirit
• 1x Sin Collector
• 1x Skirsdag High Priest
• 1x Suture Priest
• 1x Thraben Doomsayer
• 1x True Believer
• 1x Twilight Prophet
• 1x Weathered Wayfarer
• 1x Whipgrass Entangler

Land (32)

• 1x Arch of Orazca
• 1x Bojuka Bog
• 1x Caves of Koilos
• 1x Command Tower
• 1x Concealed Courtyard
• 1x Evolving Wilds
• 1x Forsaken Sanctuary
• 1x Inventors' Fair
• 1x Isolated Chapel
• 1x Myriad Landscape
• 1x Orzhov Basilica
• 1x Orzhov Guildgate
• 1x Path of Ancestry
• 5x Plains
• 1x Scoured Barrens
• 1x Shambling Vent
• 1x Shefet Dunes
• 1x Starlit Sanctum
• 2x Swamp
• 1x Temple of Silence
• 1x Temple of the False God
• 1x Terramorphic Expanse
• 1x Throne of the High City
• 1x Unclaimed Territory
• 1x Vault of the Archangel
• 1x Westvale Abbey  ^Flip
• 1x Windbrisk Heights

Enchantment (4)

• 1x Attrition
• 1x Fanatical Devotion
• 1x Hidden Stockpile
• 1x Vampiric Rites

Sorcery (2)

• 1x Day of Judgment
• 1x Wrath of God

Commanders (2)

Artifact (14)

• 1x Aetherflux Reservoir
• 1x Ashnod's Altar
• 1x Commander's Sphere
• 1x Darksteel Ingot
• 1x Gilded Lotus
• 1x Hedron Archive
• 1x Lightning Greaves
• 1x Mind Stone
• 1x Orzhov Signet
• 1x Phyrexian Altar
• 1x Pristine Talisman
• 1x Sol Ring
• 1x Swiftfoot Boots
• 1x Wayfarer's Bauble

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The goal of the deck is to create a board state in which we always have political gain from something happening. Typically this is brought about through damage prevention or spot removal until we are able to kill our opponents with beats assisted by creatures stolen with Scion of Darkness as well as Mikaeus, the Lunarch, or even through Aetherflux Reservoir with all the lifegain we have access to.

Play this deck if you enjoy:

• Politics

• Board police

• Working within group meta

• Long games

Do not play this deck if you enjoy:

• Fast win strategies

• Being the 'threat' at the table

• Straight foward gameplay

• Giant beat sticks

Why these commanders?

There are plenty of potential commanders, but as a tribal deck, we are less reliant on our commander since there isn't an outright "Cleric Tribal Commander" like there is for C17 tribes, or Legendaries from tribal themes blocks such as Lorwyn and Ixalan. This means I decided to use the commander(s) that would give us the most bang for our buck based on more subtle synergies.

Ravos, Soultender

Ravos gives us sweet, sweet grave recursion in the command zone. In case you haven't noticed, a lot of clerics and even BW related things involving sacrificing creatures. Being able to bring those creatures back and loop them per turn can be very valuable. On top of this, he also buffs the team, helping us win the game.

Tymna the Weaver

Similar to Ravos, Tymna gives us a useful effect right in the command zone. This one being card advantage. The list itself has very little without her, which is fine as it allows us more room to deckbuild for our other plans.

Removal Suite

Removal is important to any deck, and as with a commander deck, you typically want your removal to be versitle, reusable, a blanket effect, or some combination of the three.

Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim

Once her second ability is active, it is one of the most powerful pieces of removal in this deck. Having that much life is not always a huge issue as we have options for life gain, which do include Ayli herself.

Custodi Lich

Rather limited removal, however if an opponent has only one creature and the creature is not targetable, then this is your solution. Other than that, he is solid card advantage, drawing us at least one card to replace himself.

Devout Chaplain

Having two other humans can be a bit tricky with this deck, but we have two of them in the command zone so theoretically this shouldn't be a problem. Repeatable Disenchant effects are useful as well.

Fiend Hunter

For those unaware, we can sacrifice him in response to exile trigger on the stack to then exile the targeted creature forever since nothing is exiled under him at that point and both abilites are not contingent upon eachother. Notice, these effects are since changed in cards like Banisher Priest.

High Priest of Penance

This is easily one of my favorite parts of the deck. He is either a deterring blocker, or he can be used as a pawn to convince your opponents to block him to get rid of another opponent's threat. That's right, not only can this be used for political favors, but also used for your own nefarious deeds. Don't forget, he can also be easily brought back with Ravos too.

Kor Sanctifiers

Similar to Devout Chaplain, this cleric instead gives us sac fodder that we can then bring back if another artifact or enchantment is bothering us.

Attrition

An underrated card in Commander, Attrition doubles as both a sac outlet, and spot removal for our opponent's biggest threats. This of course can become problematic if the threats are black.

Day of Judgment//Wrath of God

This is fairly straightfoward, board wipes are always good to have. Potentially a Damnation would be good to have a 3rd, but I am personally fine with just the two.

Political Pawns

As mentioned many times previous, this deck wants to use others for their own gain in order to stay alive and keep the board manageable.

Atalya, Samite Master//Battlefield Medic//Battletide Alchemist//Master Apothecary//Oriss, Samite Guardian

These creatures are our damage prevention. They can either save a player who can help us, slow down the game, or outright protect your own stuff. Even can be used as a combat trick in a pinch to protect your blockers. There is so much versatility in these cards, just try to keep in mind what you have to gain from helping a player any time they may be in danger.

Eight-and-a-Half-Tails//Mother of Runes

I put these seperate from damage prevention as they are a more powerful effect. They can be used for destroy effects, or even things like Song of the Dryads. Typically Mom's tap ability will be used on your own stuff for fear of spot removal before you untap, however if you find the board state in a spot where you either don't care, or you will untap before an opponent with spot removal does, you may have something to gain from using her to protect other people's creatures. The same goes for Eight and a Half Tails in regards to how much mana you have, but that can be a bit more complicated as you then need to predict how much can your opponents throw at it, or even how much are they willing to.

Whipgrass Entangler

A rather unique version of a Pacifism effect, this card can be used to protect the entire board from a huge beater, potentially a lethal beater. Be very careful with this one though, because as soon as you do this to protect someone else, you best bet that once that players gets a chance to attack with their beater, it's coming for your face.

Value Train

Welcome to the Value Express, destination Victory! This deck has a lot of stuff that synergizes for what we call in the biz, Value. This means we are getting something out of a certain card that is beyond what the card itself says and instead is said on another card. I am exlcuding both of the commanders from the list since they were discussed above.

Ashnod's Altar//Phyrexian Altar//Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim//Cabal Archon//Dark Supplicant//Disciple of Griselbrand//Attrition//Fanatical Devotion//Hidden Stockpile//Vampiric Rites//Westvale Abbey  

This is our long list of sacrifice outlets. These combined with grave recursion or token generation allows us to amass card advantage, mana, lifegain, or even protection. This, in a lot of ways, is the heart of the deck and are all very important to understand.

Akroma's Devoted

Vigilance is comparatively a mediocre ability so I was at first hesitant to put it in this list. However, one of our main gameplans is to kills our opponents with beats and having vigilance can be very useful to keep us alive while enacting our win-strategy. We also plan to hit opponents for card advantage with Tymna the Weaver so doing this while also being able to still use tap abilities is also very valuable.

Ancestor's Prophet//Battlefield Medic//Cabal Archon//Celestial Gatekeeper//Dark Supplicant//Edgewalker//Rotlung Reanimator//Whipgrass Entangler//Akroma's Devoted

These are all the cards that benefit from us building around Cleric Tribal specifically. There's a lot of ways we could do a BW politics deck, but by doing a cleric tribal strategy, we get these lovely cards that want us to have as many clerics in our deck or on the fields as possible.

Thraben Doomsayer//Hanweir Militia Captain  //Heliod, God of the Sun//Westvale Abbey  

We also have the option of making a lot of little tokens. Three of them make clerics specifically which can be rather valuable for the reasons above, but also having a wide army is good for our beatdown strategy, or even more value with Tymna the Weaver.

Windbrisk Heights

This card is a bit unique, but can give us essentially a free card. Attacking with three creatures in one turn is not hard with four token generators and 46 creatures. One of the more ideal things hit is of course a high drop such as Pontiff of Blight or Scion of Darkness. At the very least, it's easy to trigger card advantage, all in the form of a land.

Date added	6 years
Last updated	6 years
Exclude colors	URG
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	7 - 0 Mythic Rares 40 - 0 Rares 29 - 0 Uncommons 16 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	3.07
Tokens	City's Blessing, Clue, Demon 5/5 B, Emblem Liliana, Defiant Necromancer, Enchantment Cleric 2/1 W, Human 1/1 W, Human Cleric 1/1 BW, Servo 1/1 C, The Monarch, Zombie 2/2 B