A deck with Sigarda should be very straight forward: Ramp mana, cast Sigarda, and proceed to smash face. Her mana cost, P/T, and evasion make her an aggressive commander for sure and her powerful defensive abilities mean that your opponents will be sweating blood trying to deal with her.
But lets get into the nitty gritty here and talk about what a deck list with Sigarda might look like. First thing we might want to do, while she is already pretty aggressive, is turn her into even more of a threat. This can be done in a variety of ways; there a certainly some powerful creature enchantments that we could use but if thats the road we want to travel then we're better off choosing another commander since Sigarda cares nothing for enchantments as well as the card advantage problem that those enchantments present.
So it seems like equipment is the way to go, and while Sigarda doesn't care much for equipment either, at least they are better for our card advantage and there is lots of support for equipment in the colors that we have available to us.
First thing that I wanted to do with Sigarda was give her a boost of at least +2/+2 so that she would would be swinging for a minimum of seven combat damage per turn. Putting your opponents on a three turn clock puts you in a very good position to win the game. Fortunately enough, there are plenty equipment cards that do this and more, so the first cards to make the cut were: Behemoth Sledge, Nim Deathmantle, Sword of Feast and Famine, Sword of Fire and Ice, and Sword of Light and Shadow.
Though, there are other ways to trim down the clock you set for your opponents other than simply boosting Sigarda with +2/+2 and some of these cards include Fireshrieker and Quietus Spike
Besides trimming down our opponents clock, the thing that all these cards have in common is that they can be recurred with Sun Titan. Which, of course, made the cut as well. In fact, the only equipment in the deck that can't be recurred with Sun Titan is Batterskull. Unfortunate, yes, but it was too good to be excluded just because of that one fact.
The next problem we are faced with is consistency; how do we get the equipment cards we need when we need them? Luckily, there is lots of support for this in white as we have Enlightened Tutor, Steelshaper's Gift, Stoneforge Mystic, Stonehewer Giant, and Taj-Nar Swordsmith; the need for even further consistency in finding some of these cards themselves brings us to include Survival of the Fittest, Fauna Shaman, and Academy Rector. This rounds out our tutoring package. Though, ideally, I'd like to have an Eladamri's Call somewhere in there as well.
With the equipment and the issue of consistency out of the way. Next up is finding some good creatures to use our equipment, I mean, as diehard as Sigarda is, there will still be times when we'll need to rely on some other creatures, should Sigarda happen to draw a lot of hate (Which she probably will). Luckily, we are blessed with quite a few options in these colors. To keep with the very aggressive nature of the deck we'll want creatures who can swing into the redzone unhindered by blockers. Usually, being unblockable is a characteristic of blue creatures but we still have a few options available to us such as, Rhox, and Beloved Chaplain.
A couple of other excellent creatures to equip things to are: Mirran Crusader, Kemba, Kha Regent, Hystrodon, Hero of Bladehold, and Serra Ascendant.
Now, mass removal is extremely prevalent in EDH and many decks run several cards to this effect. Add to this the factor of multiple opponents and you are pretty much guaranteed to have the board wiped at some point. To take measures against being the victim of a Wrath of God or Fracturing Gust there are a few cards we will look to for aid: Second Sunrise, Ghostway, Dauntless Escort, Darksteel Plate, Spearbreaker Behemoth, and Shield of the Oversoul
With our core strategy laid out, and some cards to cover for our weaknesses, the deck is beginning to take shape; but we're not finished yet. There is still some necessary utility we will need, some acceleration, and of course some good ol' staples that fit into just about any EDH deck but I wont elaborate on everything.
So, to start with the utility, we will need some spot removal (creature or otherwise), mass removal (for when things don't go our way), and some graveyard hate. Believe me, every deck should have graveyard hate. I learned this the hard way.
For spot removal, since we're in white, the obvious choices would be Path to Exile, Swords to Plowshares, and, if you're play-group is okay with it, Condemn. For me, I will stick with the former two as I find tuck effects in EDH are kinda dickish. To round out our spot removal package, we'll add Beast Within, Return to Dust, Harmonic Sliver, Duplicant and for a rattlesnake card, we'll throw in Karmic Justice. The fact that Harmonic Sliver and Karmic Justice can both be recurred by Sun Titan makes it even better.
When it came down to it, I really couldn't find much room for mass removal so I needed something versatile enough to always be useful and Austere Command fit the bill quite nicely.
Like my mass removal, my graveyard hate section is quite small but reusable since they can be recurred with Sun Titan for repeated effect. I'm talking about Stonecloaker and Tormod's Crypt. Sun Titan, if you haven't noticed, is turning out to be an all-star in this deck.
I won't go into detail about the acceleration section or the staples of this deck since I'm sure you don't need me to tell you why you should be playing with Sol Ring or Primeval Titan. Those cards speak for themselves. I'm also sure you're not interested in what my mana base is so I'll leave that out as well. Though, if you want me to elaborate on anything just leave a comment and I'll be sure to answer your questions.
So with all that out of the way, our finished list looks something like this:
Commander:
Sigarda, Host of Herons
Artifacts: 15
Batterskull
Behemoth Sledge
Darksteel Ingot
Darksteel Plate
Fireshrieker
Mind's Eye
Nim Deathmantle
Quietus Spike
Selesnya Signet
Sensei's Diving Top
Sol Ring
Sword of Feast and Famine
Sword of Fire and Ice
Sword of Light and Shadow
Tormod's Crypt
Creatures: 26
Academy Rector
Beloved Chaplain
Brass Squire
Dauntless Escort
Duplicant
Eternal Witness
Fauna Shaman
Genesis
Harmonic Sliver
Hero of Bladehold
Hystrodon
Kemba, Kha Regent
Mirran Crusader
Primeval Titan
Puresteel Paladin
Rhox
Sakura-Tribe Elder
Sanctum Gargoyle
Serra Ascendant
Spearbreaker Behemoth
Stonecloaker
Stoneforge Mystic
Stonehewer Giant
Sun Titan
Taj-Nar Swordsmith
Wilt-Leaf Liege
Enchantments: 6
Burgeoning
Karmic Justice
Mirari's Wake
Shield of the Oversoul
Survival of the Fittest
True Conviction
Instants: 7
Beast Within
Enlightened Tutor
Ghostway
Path to Exile
Return to Dust
Second Sunrise
Swords to Plowshares
Planeswalkers: 1
Garruk Wildspeaker
Sorceries: 6
Austere Command
Harmonize
Kodama's Reach
Remember the Fallen
Skyshroud Claim
Steelshaper's Gift
+ 38 Lands
Cards I'd like to Add
Eladamri's Call
Phyrexian Rebirth
Privileged Position
Sword of War and Peace
Swiftfoot Boots
Etched Champion
Ok, I lied, I'll tell you a little about my mana base, so, just to say, I am playing with Ancient Den, Tree of Tales, and Darksteel Citadel, bringing my artifact count to twenty-one. Hopefully this should be enough for Puresteel Paladin but only play-testing will tell. Also, Hall of the Bandit Lord works with almost every creature in the deck and Forbidding Watchtower, Treetop Village, Stirring Wildwood and Khalni Garden all give us creatures to equip stuff to in dire times.
This concludes our look at Sigarda and next up is either Bruna or Gisela. I haven't decided which yet.
Thank you for reading and I'll see you next time.
Looks pretty solid, man. Good work!
ReplyDeleteThanks Thaum, be sure to check out the next installment! ;)
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