Start by defending. Continue defending. Then, rip your opponent's face off with your defenders.
This deck is blue and white, with a splash of red for the flavor. Each of the cards plays off of the defender mechanic, and there are multiple win conditions. Feedback and suggestions are welcome and greatly appreciated.
The main win con is Assault Formation and
Tower Defense
, which turns all your low CMC, innocent-seeming defenders into beefy threats (especially
Tree of Redemption
, which is a beast). A secondary win con is burn with Vent Sentinel, which is why I've splashed red. Finally, you can mill your opponent out with Doorkeeper, or beat them down with
Ludevic's Test Subject
. The best thing about these win cons is that they all have defender themselves, so they give strength to each other. You can have multiple threats at the same time.
Mana base: I like to try to keep my decks affordable, so I'm only using basic lands. I have twelve forests, eleven islands, and a mountain. I also have two mana dorks, the Axebane Guardian and Sylvan Caryatid, both of which create mana of any type, which can really help if you're not getting the lands that you need. Axebane Guardian, in particular, becomes ridiculously powerful as the game goes on. In addition to these, I have
Gatecreeper Vine
, which allows you to get one basic land of any type, so you can grab that mountain if you need it.
The biggest threats to this deck are burn, and creatures with flying and trample. To deal with burn, I'll have a few counters in the sideboard. To deal with flying creatures, I have
Wall of Vines
, Fog Bank, and
Wall of Tanglecord
. However, trample is a nuisance. I have an Archetype of Aggression in the sideboard, but with a mana cost of 1RR, he can be hard to get out. The best response to annoying creatures is Reality Shift, for a nice trip into exile for any particularly bothersome creatures, to be replaced by a very blockable 2/2. I also have Curse of the Swine in the sideboard, which has the same effect.
White has some great defenders that were hard to cut out of this deck. One of my all-time personal favorites is
Perimeter Captain
, especially in a deck made of defenders, he makes you opponents think twice about attacking you. Additionally,
Wall of Denial has got to be one of the best defenders out there. Finally,
Stalwart Shield-Bearers
provides a great boost to all the defenders, especially if Attack Formation is on the battlefield. Other good white defenders are
Order of the Stars
,
Pride Guardian
,
Dragon's Eye Sentry
,
Fortified Rampart
, and
Woolly Razorback
.
High Ground
is a great low-cost enchantment. Finally, white provides some great exile outlets, like
Reciprocate
,
Path to Exile,
Excise
, and
Vengeful Dreams
. Also,
Emerge Unscathed is a good spell, and
Luminarch Ascension is an additional win con.
An additional fun trick that white allows you to play is this: start with a defender like
hornet's nest
,
Kaijin of the Vanishing Touch
,
Cathedral Membrane
,
Souls of the Faultless
, or
Wall of Essence
and then, when your opponent decides to cut his or her losses and attack anyways, a
Valor Made Real
to redirect all attackers to the one defender, and a
Withstand Death
on the defender to sweeten the deal.
