Unquestioned Authority

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Legality

Format Legality
1v1 Commander Legal
Archenemy Legal
Canadian Highlander Legal
Casual Legal
Commander / EDH Legal
Commander: Rule 0 Legal
Custom Legal
Duel Commander Legal
Highlander Legal
Legacy Legal
Leviathan Legal
Limited Legal
Oathbreaker Legal
Planechase Legal
Premodern Legal
Quest Magic Legal
Tiny Leaders Legal
Vanguard Legal
Vintage Legal

Unquestioned Authority

Enchantment — Aura

Enchant creature

When Unquestioned Authority enters the battlefield, draw a card.

Enchanted creature has protection from creatures. ((Remember the acronym debt.) This creature can't be damaged, enchanted, equipped, blocked or targeted by creatures. Creatures attached to this immediately fall off.)

king-saproling on Only Slightly A Richard

1 month ago

Cool deck. Personally I would make these swaps:

Dunedain Blade -> Pariah (put Pariah on Tajic and you will never take damage)
Starfield Mystic -> Unquestioned Authority (makes Tajic unblockable)
Geode Golem -> Ornithopter of Paradise (gets Tajic out a turn sooner and can help trigger his ability)
Butcher's Cleaver -> Loxodon Warhammer (strictly better)
True-Faith Censer -> Conjurer's Mantle
Heavy Mattock -> Horn of Valhalla
Commander's Authority -> Forth Eorlingas!

Tsukimi on Can't Thwart the Wild Court [Primer]

6 months ago

Ahhh Crow_Umbra thank you so much for the detailed feedback, it means a lot! Spirit Mantle was a hard cut, because I have so many cheap enchantments I decided to go with Unquestioned Authority because the extra card draw can help you really stack up attackers before swinging, but you're right that I do have a pretty decent suite of card draw already... Ideally I'd want both haha.

Sigarda's Aid is strong but the deck is so chock full of goodies it feels almost lackluster. Did you feel it was really helpful in mitigating spot removal/utilizing your own removal? I've been trying to figure out if I want to keep Greater Auramancy and this might be a replacement option.

Lastly, there's definitely a few combos you can run with Ellivere, but my playgroup doesn't do infinite combos so I avoid them when building, probably to the detriment of my primer.

Also I am definitely biased, but I'd say give Ellivere a try! Like I mentioned, I just built the deck because I loved the artwork of their card, and then when I played it it was so much stronger/more consistent than I expected.

Crow_Umbra on Can't Thwart the Wild Court [Primer]

6 months ago

Solid deck and fun primer! I've been on the fence to build either Ellivere or Gylwain, Casting Director. G/W Auras was one of my first favorite decks when I first started playing 10 years ago, and Aura Voltron was subsequently the first commander deck I put together via Tuvasa the Sunlit.

I'm a little surprised Spirit Mantle is in your Maybe-Board, but I can see how Benevolent Blessing has a functional similarity, and has benefit of having Flash. If anything, I think Spirit Mantle could replace Unquestioned Authority, esp since you tend to draw from Ellivere quite a bit.

Similarly, I think Sigarda's Aid could be helpful in moving it over from your Maybe-Board. In one of my last Aura decks, it let me turn some of those Aggro Auras into combat tricks, or the removal stuff like Kenrith's Transformation into instant speed shenanigans.

My last rec is that you do have a potential combo option with Siona, Captain of the Pyleas and Shielded by Faith. Only hang up is that you need either a haste enabler like Concordant Crossroads or Crashing Drawbridge to give the tokens haste, or Altar of the Brood to negate the need for haste. It's a combo option, but your deck might not need it if the Aggro is already working well for you.

Either way, nice build and keep up the primer writing!

DreadKhan on my wife

7 months ago

Have you thought about an Aura or two in here to help your couple consistently survive combat? I like Unquestioned Authority more than a little in a deck like this, but I also like Holy Mantle, both are budget too fwiw.

I like Blighted Woodland in a deck like this, but there is also Krosan Verge, and Verge can actually find you two dual lands if they have the Plains/Forest typing, I checked and in your colours there are Arctic Treeline, Radiant Grove, and Scattered Groves that you could add. All should be cheap, and while none are as good as Temple Garden, I find a budget deck can run a few ETB tapped lands and not lose, especially if they are duals. Wood Elves is another relatively cheap ramp creature that can find either an untapped Forest if you need mana that turn, or a dual if you don't need the mana right away. There aren't a ton of cheap ways to fetch non-basic Forests, but they aren't bad. I think you might consider Crop Rotation to dig out one of these ramp lands, but if you added Temple of the False God to your list (I would add a 35th land for it if you add it) you can use Crop Rotation like a Sol Ring when you draw it later, either way it can help get your Commander out.

I am very confident that you should run Sylvan Offering, it even got a LotR reprint, so it's incredibly cheap right now. Another card that is usually pretty bad but is probably pretty good in here is Orochi Hatchery, each turn you can make a bunch of tokens for your couple to buff. Silverwing Squadron is pretty cool, it makes decent tokens and can be a large evasive attacker. It's probably not completely on flavor, but Nacatl War-Pride can make quite a few tokens, and you can stack the triggers from War-Pride and your Commander so that you first make the tokens and then give each a counter, it can be a better Ezuri's Predation. Not sure if you should run Predation or not, it's a heap of mana but Selesnya decks are often good at ramping, you should lose nearly nothing to Predation if you've been buffing your board, but you get a 4/4 for each weenie your opponent's have, and if you somehow haven't buffed your Commander they only have 3 power. I'm not sure if it's really a great card or not without cards that can put it on top of your deck for next turn, but Entreat the Angels can make quite a few Angels sometimes, which can make for fun/memorable games. It's pretty bad if you only get 1 Angel, but if you're getting 3 or more it's not a bad card.

It's a bit higher budget than you want at this point (it used to be really cheap for a long time, so I bought some and wondered why everyone else was sleeping), but Blossoming Bogbeast would be bonkers in here, if you swing with your power couple, Bogbeast and 3 other creatures each of them gets +6/+6 (and most get a +1/+/1 counter) and Trample, your creatures don't need to be very big for that to be very scary, if you've got 10 creatures attacking with Bogbeast you get +12/+12. It's less explosive than a Craterhoof Behemoth (an expensive staple), but it can be bigger and better (while coming down sooner), and it's not an ETB so you can use it again, so I think if you wanted to upgrade it'd be worth looking at.

eliakimras on Sytphilis (give it to your opponents)

10 months ago

Hello! I went through your list looking for spots to upgrade, but I found almost none: congratulations, it is really optimized!

Still, I believe you might want to consider some of these cards to increase your engine:

Ramp: Cultivate and Llanowar Elves could be Starfield Mystic, Bear Umbra, Burgeoning or Exploration instead, to stick with the Enchantments theme.

Draw: Don't forget the other enchantresses (Satyr Enchanter, Verduran Enchantress). I would take out Hyena Umbra and Cartouche of Solidarity for them.

Tutors: Heliod's Pilgrim might be better than Moon-Blessed Cleric, since it puts the card in your hand.

Pillowfort: Raking Canopy is probably more effective to deflect fliers than Spider Umbra. Elephant Grass could take White Sun's Twilight's place, since the former does not blow your own field.

Evasion: You might want Unquestioned Authority for extra evasion. It might replace Aegis of the Gods. (In my experience, players' spells do not usually target other players.)

Hate pieces: Rest in Peace, Ground Seal, Solemnity, Authority of the Consuls, Blind Obedience are some cards you might want to include.

Win conditions:

eliakimras on Menacing Aura

10 months ago

Hello! May I step in to give you some recommendations? Since you're on a budget, all cards suggested are 2 dollars or less.

Part 1: Ramp

In: You probably want aura ramp and cost reducers over standard land ramp: Wild Growth, Transcendent Envoy, Hero of Iroas, Jukai Naturalist and Stenn, Paranoid Partisan (choosing Enchantment). These will allow you to storm through your deck casting Auras ad nauseam.

Out: Elvish Mystic, Farhaven Elf, Arcane Signet, Nature's Lore and Cultivate are all great ramp cards, but you can do better (and more thematically) with the cards I mentioned above.

Part 2: Card draw

Just as important as ramp is card draw: Galea won't always be available to you.

In: Sage's Reverie, Enchantress's Presence, Satyr Enchanter, Mesa Enchantress.

Out: Coiling Oracle, Curious Obsession (unreliable), Curse of Verbosity (unreliable), Eel Umbra.

Part 3: Removal

Swords to Plowshares is GREAT, no doubt. But, in this kind of deck, you can spice it up with the great Auras that has for removal.

The objective is, then, to use the cheapest Auras that can hit more than one permanent type, with emphasis on "loses its abilities" in the text box.

In: Mortal Obstinacy, Ossification (synergy with your basic land fetchers).

Out: Reclamation Sage, Swords to Plowshares.

Part 4: Boardwipes

In: I believe you should run more boardwipes that leave your board mostly untouched. Austere Command is one such example. You almost always will clean all artifacts and the half of creatures that are more dangerous to you. Curse of the Swine is another selective wipe.

Out: Time Wipe (not one-sided), Plains.

Part 5: Protection and Evasion

In Voltron, tempo is crucial.

Now to the Auras:

Following the same logic as with removal, I'm using auras over instants to protect the Voltron.

Part 6: Tutors

Without Hammer of Nazahn, Nazahn, Revered Bladesmith is just a more expensive Open the Armory.

In: Open the Armory, Heliod's Pilgrim, Moon-Blessed Cleric, Light-Paws, Emperor's Voice and Invasion of Theros  Flip (bonus that all those tutors also change your library's top card).

Out: Nazahn, Revered Bladesmith, Celestial Archon, Heliod's Emissary, Hypnotic Siren, Curse of Unbinding (7 mana is a lot for an Aura).

Part 7: Win Conditions

In: Since you're going all-in with auras, All That Glitters and Ethereal Armor do wonders.

Out: Bruna, Light of Alabaster is slow and telegraphed in this build. People won't let her stick to the field. Nissa, Steward of Elements is tough to protect in a Voltron build, while she only offers scry, which your lands can already do.

Part 8: Lands

In:

Out:

  • Thriving Grove, Thriving Heath and Thriving Isle are neat fixing, but the Temples are superior since they play into Galea's strategy.
  • Path of Ancestry is great if you're in a 5-color deck or in a tribal-heavy creature deck. This build is neither.
  • Lumbering Falls is good for suiting Equipments on, but Auras will just go to the graveyard when this land stops being a creature.
  • Azorius Chancery, because you don't run the other two bouncelands.
  • Razorverge Thicket. You'll soon realize that the later turns are more important than the early ones in EDH. This land is a beast in Modern, but it is far from worth it in Commander unless you're playing a turn-3 win deck.
  • Forest and Forest to give room for the two remaining Panoramas. (With all the land searching above, you're probably more likely now to have a target for Utopia Sprawl than before.)
  • Seaside Citadel. I know, I know: tri-lands are great and all, but, in this build, I'm trying to bake the top-of-library manipulation into the manabase so you have more free spell slots for your Auras, similar to what I did with Yennett, Cryptic Oddity (to a great success): each land in it has to either enter untapped somehow or change the top card of the library.

If you read this far, congratulations! Here is the list of the deck with all the suggested alterations, in case you want to test it: Galea, Menacing Aura. Good luck and have fun!

DreadKhan on Super Shivan

1 year ago

Power doublers that stack with double strike such as Two-Handed Axe, Gisela, Blade of Goldnight, and Inquisitor's Flail are pretty useful if you need Shivan Dragon to be huge.

I like how Unquestioned Authority offers unblockability while replacing itself. War Cadence offers a combat trick you can use to help get through.

Dawnbreak Reclaimer and Pulsemage Advocate are repeatable ways to recur your Dragon, there is also Gift of Immortality.

A nice spare Ghostly Prison effect can be found in Kazuul, Tyrant of the Cliffs or Sphere of Safety, there are also Baird, Steward of Argive and Windborn Muse. In a pinch a card like Spurnmage Advocate or Intrepid Hero can make good deterants.

Vs running so many 1 colour wards have thought about Flickering Ward? You can run various tutors that can find it or another Enchantment such as Heliod's Pilgrim or Moon-Blessed Cleric, there are various spells that can do the same or better, plenty can also find equipment. If you do stick Flickering in you could also try Mesa Enchantress, which is also great with enchantments period.

With access to Pro Red, maybe some Red wipes that use damage? Some include Blasphemous Act, Chain Reaction, and Reckless Endeavor, Pro Red makes these 1 sided.

Hope some ideas here apply, I typed this fairly early in the morning, with only so much coffee, so forgive me if this is a heap of spam!

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