“I don’t get no restless human vibe.”
Art:Arabella, Abandoned Doll
by J.P. Targete
Table of Contents
Today’s Featured Commander Is:
Arabella is no doubt one of the most hyped and strong commanders from Duskmourn; they are super cheap, have a ton of cards that support them well within the format and are overall just a very cool card. Arabella allows us to run an aggressive deck full of tiny attackers which turns into huge drain and gain and puts a ton of pressure on our opponents, while this deck is Boros it certainly doesn’t feel like it as we have huge swings of damage and life quite consistently. This is one of those decks where all eyes will be on you when you play it so you need to be careful about when you play your commander and always try to have some form of protection for them. This is an aggressive and overall very fun deck to pilot; even though it’s not officially out yet, this deck is already one of my favorites within the format. Without further adieu, let’s get it!
The Deck:
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Arabella, Abandoned Doll Tiny Attackers!
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Why Arabella, Abandoned Doll?
Arabella is a huge part of our deck and is, without a doubt, the focal point of our deck; she allows us to deal a ton of additional damage, which can help since a lot of our creatures are quite small, while we can definitely go-wide attacking with our commander and getting their trigger is the primary way we like to do damage. Arabella is quite a well-known and infamous commander already, so your opponents will definitely be on high alert when she hits the field. Because of this, we have some strong protection spells that allow us to keep our commander on the board.
Deck Matchups:
Since this is Pauper EDH, there are an absolute ton of things that can tip a game in your favor or out of it. While an archetype may seem favorable, there are absolutely good and bad commanders for our deck to go up against; I have included both these, which were all played among my testing groups using various decks, and I have included the sample size for clarity purposes. This is just meant to be a guide after testing a bunch of games with this deck!
The information below is notes about specific decks that were featured in our testing pods and how we fared against them. Naturally, Pauper EDH is a multiplayer game, so these are just a summary of my notes against different commanders and strategies. When we test these decks we try to test to its strengths and weaknesses to give a full spectrum of what the deck has to offer. Various commanders and archetypes/strategies are used to get the most accurate information.
Commanders, we have a good matchup against:
Enlistment Officer
Record against Enlistment Officer 3-0
Enlistment officers can be a strong deck in combat, but they lack the explosiveness that our commander gives us; they have a tough time whittling us down when we gain a ton of life, and they struggle to recover against all of the damage we do. This is a very favorable matchup for us.
Lazotep Chancellor
Record against Lazotep Chancellor 3-1
Overall, I like this matchup a lot; typically, we don’t engage with Lazotep in combat because there creatures are quite huge, so in this matchup, I just use our commander’s ability to drain and gain until the games are over, most Lazotep decks are extremely focused on cycling as much as possible so they don’t have a crazy amount of removal.
Hallar, the Firefletcher
Record against Hallar, the Firefletcher 3-0
Hallar is just a little bit slower than us, and because of that, we can dominate them with our commander’s ability; we are easily able to drain and gain them out while they try to ramp, I like this matchup a lot, and beyond a few pieces this deck doesn’t have very much removal, their commander can be a beast and is certainly something to be careful with, but overall this is a great matchup.
Commanders, we have a tough matchup against:
Blaze Commando
Record against Blaze Commando 0-3
This is a very tough matchup for the deck, the main reason being they pack so many instants and sorceries that deal damage to our creatures that it can be quite hard to keep our commander and creatures on the board; they also have quite a few effects that damage the board which can be devastating for us. This is a rough matchup for us and a great one for them.
Shipwreck Singer
Record against Shipwreck Singer 0-4
This is an absolutely terrible matchup for our deck; their commander has a built-in ability that hoses almost all of our creatures; it is very hard to win against this deck, and in testing, they just used their commander sometimes multiple times in a turn to kill our entire board.
Yargle, Glutton of Urborg
Record against Yargle, Glutton of Urborg 0-2
Yargle is great at one thing and thing only, one-shots, and they can perform them shockingly quickly since we have a lot of very small creatures. This can be an extremely tough matchup, especially since we are effectively reduced to sixteen life in this matchup, combine that with almost all of their decks running Crypt Rats
as well as quite a bit of removal and this is a rough one for us.
Strategy Overview:
Drain and Gain: Our commander provides a large amount of drain and gain through our ability, allowing us to be very strong against aggressive decks.
Tokens: We are easily able to go wide within this deck and swing-out. While our commander certainly helps with this, we can easily go wide and chip in damage against our opponents.
Protection: Our commander is a huge removal magnet, that comes as no surprise because there trigger can end games quite quickly and it only takes a few combats, because of this we are packing quite a bit of removal protection like Stave Off
, Gods Willing
and Loran's Escape
as cheap and strong ways to keep our commander on the board and keep the Gain and Drain going.
Deck Overview:
This section contains information about cards in the deck and how they function within the deck! I also highlighted some of my favorite cards in the deck!
Creatures:
It’s all small over here! We have a ton of very small creatures and quite a bit of token producers like Mogg War Marshal
and Goblin Instigator
, which provide a ton of bang for our buck and help a ton of our commander, the same is true for Beetleback Chief
which for only four mana provides us three extra damage and life on our commander, I also love Witty Roastmaster
within the deck as it is essentially an additional copy of Impact Tremors
and gives us a ton of additional damage and since we are in Boros that is truly the name of the game! Militia Bugler
is another great card for the deck as it allows us to filter through our deck when no card draw is available and can hit pretty much anything in our deck. We do have a few cards that don’t trigger our commander, like Basilica Shepherd
, but they make up for it by not only being evasive but by creating two creatures that do trigger our commander.
Instants:
Removal is our biggest enemy since our commander is a huge removal magnet, so we are packing quite a few ways to protect our commander, like Stave Off and Gods Willing, which are great ways to keep our commander on the board and keep the damage coming. We are quite light on removal but we do have some strong cards like Abrade
and Lightning Bolt
which are nice and cheap ways to deal with some creatures, this deck certainly isn’t focused on removal but having the option to take out problematic things our opponents are doing is quite strong. Even though we are in Boros we actually do have a decent amount of card draw through Big Score
and Unexpected Windfall
as well as Your Temple Is Under Attack
which is a two-fold win for the deck because we can protect our creatures by giving them indestructible or get some cards which is just great for only three mana.
Sorceries:
Almost all of our sorceries produce tokens that helps with our commander’s abilities and with cards like Mob Justice
, which is a great non-combat way to eliminate an opponent. Battle Screech
is definitely one of the best token generators we have and is an amazing way to fill up our board very quickly; we have a ton of different token generators which all serve the same purpose but help us to fill up the board and have a huge hit from our commander and chump block as needed.
Artifacts:
We have quite a bit of cheap token production from our artifacts like Carrot Cake
and Tinker's Tote
, which can be a great follow-up to playing our commander on turn two but are pretty strong at almost any stage of the game. We have quite a few mana rocks to help speed up the overall game plan and establish our colors, which is key to casting our commander and winning the early game. Even though we don’t go into combat without our commander that often, we can do it a little safer if we have Greatsword of Tyr
, which is one of my favorite equipment in the deck and can help clear the way and buff up a creature to increase damage, it doesn’t really matter which creature we put this on. For mana-rocks, we have Boros Locket
, which is a little pricier, but the card draw it offers can come in handy and help us refill our hand when it starts getting low, which happens pretty quickly.
Enchantments:
Glassworks // Shattered Yard is a brand new card that works perfectly for the deck; not only do we get some single-target removal, but we are able to unlock the room and consistently deal some additional damage to our opponents, which supports the overall gameplan very well. We have a lot of defensive enchantments like Minimus Containment
, which is an amazing way to take out the best creature our opponent has, especially one with activated abilities. We also have Impact Tremors and Raid Bombardment
these are both amazing damage dealers for the deck and allow us to output a crazy amount of damage in just a couple of turns. They also work perfectly with cards like Omen of the Sun
, which produces some additional tokens to trigger both our commander and both of those enchantments.
Strengths of the Deck:
- We are quite well-positioned against aggressive decks since we can gain a ton of life.
- We are able to deal a ton of damage to each opponent, which allows us to be quite efficient in whittling down each of our opponents.
- We are great at chump blocking since we have a ton of creatures.
Weaknesses of the Deck:
- We are very weak to instances that damage the board like Evincar's Justice
or Cosmotronic Wave - We are quite reliant on our commander to deal large amounts of damage.
- We don’t have much removal within the deck and are most certainly a “win-more” strategy.
Deck Stats:
Sample Hands:
Conclusion:
Thanks for reading to the end and for all of your support! I hope you are excited for Duskmourn Week! We have a ton of awesome deck techs coming out. If you have any suggestions, let us know; we have done a ton of the really popular commanders from this set, and they are ready to go.