It's Bruna, it's voltron, it's not surprising anyone (until it does). Here is my list for Bruna, Light of Alabaster. Please check out the box-list-things for my silly justifications for the cards I've chosen.

This build of Bruna is exactly what one would expect from the card. It is a voltron style deck using auras to get to lethal commander damage. Where it may differ from other builds out there is the super fast option. The deck can, with the miracle hand, kill a player on turn two, with three to four being consistently possible.

The deck's land count is pretty low to the ground, at least for me. We are only running 34 lands, with as many as possible coming in untapped in order to facilitate getting Bruna out ASAP.

While most of the lands are pretty straightforward (they make mana, typically of one to two colors), there are one or two to note.

Hall of the Bandit Lord is in here for the haste, since the options available to Blue/White are pretty limited.

Command Beacon is sort of a worst-case scenario card. Bruna stats out costing six mana, and after playing her two times the deck strains to find the mana for time number three. Command Beacon can help in these situations, only once obviously, but sometimes once is all you need. In my past experience, once players know you cannot play Bruna again they often leave you alone, meaning a Command Beacon sandbagged in your hand can catch them off guard.

Since we are so light on lands, mana rocks and their equivalent are obviously where many of them went. There are a bunch of them at two mana and below, in order to help Bruna make an entrance as soon as possible. Most are self explanatory.

Lion's Eye Diamond is the card that makes the blisteringly quick starts possible. It's inclusion is entirely due to Bruna's ability. Since she can grab auras from your graveyard, pitching them to LED doesn't really hurt your game plan. Without having to pitch your hand, Jeweled Lotus likewise allows for some quick starts. Diamond Lion does its best impression of just its eye, but is held back a bit by costing two and having summoning sickness.

Non-artifacts such as Knight of the White Orchid, Loyal Warhound, Grand Arbiter Augustin IV, and Tithe also go here, as their inclusion is because of mana (though Grand Arbiter does mess with your opponents too).

I've included many of the standard cheap blue draw spells for their ability to just dig to fast mana and powerful auras. Cantrips are not my usual style in Commander, but they are pretty okay in this deck. They can make an iffy hand keepable for the simple fact that the hands in this deck can be so wonky that we may just need one more land, and Ponder and friends are pretty okay at finding those. Ideas Unbound in particular is sweet because, as with LED, we don't need our win conditions in our hand in order to get them out, so digging for and keeping three useful cards can be pretty cool.

There is also a decently sized suite of aura tutors in the deck. You will usually not need more than one, as there is usually only one aura you will need to break through. Enlightened Tutor does function as an aura tutor and a tutor for a haste enabler or a mana rock, so using that card can require understanding how the game will go and if you need mana, haste, or an aura.

So there are Twenty-two auras in this deck, but most of them do the same thing (make Bruna bigger) and are included for the same reason, because Commander is a singleton format. We have a bunch of auras in the deck, but are really looking for about four of them. The rest are there sort of as a backup plan for the eventual removal spell from your opponent.

The money combination is Eldrazi Conscription and Corrupted Conscience. Conscription alone gets you to lethal infect damage, and trample can help that damage get through. To ensure this attack connects, a third aura like Faith Unbroken, Holy Mantle, or Steel of the Godhead can do the job. Typically you are search for the first two cards and maybe one of the unblockable auras. Everything else is to help keep Bruna safe or provide an alternative to the initial combo.

Some games you don't find the busted auras, and some games you just don't find your tutors, and when those games happen there are a bunch of other auras that can make Bruna nice and scary. Ethereal Armor, Auramancer's Guise, Mantle of the Ancients, and Battle Mastery all help get big power jumps by themselves. All of the umbras, as well as Diplomatic Immunity, Shielded by Faith are in there largely to keep Bruna safe (the umbras do provide a power boost if you are looking to cobble together a high damage Bruna).

Sage's Reverie is one of the more powerful auras in the deck, as in addition to making Bruna stronger it also can draw you a decent chunk of cards. Attacking with Bruna, dumping five cards on her, and then drawing five more cards is a really powerful sequence.

The deck runs two equipment, Lightning Greaves and Swiftfoot Boots. Haste is something that is rarely granted outside of red cards, so these equipment and their cheap equip costs do a lot of heavy lifting for the deck. Your powerful games will generally involve one of these cards.

So Bruna is scary, and as such people will try to keep her off the board or out of the red zone. In order to quash those plans, there are a few cards in here solely to help Bruna out.

The counterspells are your catch-all protection spells, keeping both Bruna and you safe. We are only running seven, because of the number of auras needed to make Bruna a more consistent threat. Mana Drain is cheap, hits everything, and can potentially help cast Bruna a second time maybe. Delay is also cheap and hits everything, and when your commander can kill people in one go, it often does not matter that the spell aimed at Bruna will come back in three turns (that player might not even be alive in three turns). Stubborn Denial and Miscast are both cheap and hit pretty much everything coming at Bruna (remember that Bruna is quite ferocious, so if she is out Stubborn Denial is always on). An Offer You Can't Refuse is another cheap counterspell that, in a pinch, can help get some mana to cast Bruna.

While not a counterspell per se, Flawless Maneuver does a reasonable impression, keeping Bruna alive through a bunch of nasty effects. Slip Out the Back can help Bruna dodge a whole rotation of shenanigans, and if she manages to stick around without needing protection we can Slip a pesky blocker away.

As previously mentioned, the umbras and the boots both can help keep Bruna alive while helping her kill things. Eel Umbra in particular is neat because it has flash; there have been more than a few times that people wait to see where Bruna is going before the try to murder her, and flash totem armor is pretty neat there.

Grand Abolisher helps keep Bruna alive by just making your whole turn a safe place. It can be tricky to use effectively, since when you play the card it sort of tells your opponents I am planning to do some silly things. But even then, if it draws a counterspell of removal spell, then it has in a way helped protect your commander by taking away a removal option from your opponents.

After looking at this deck for maybe three seconds you can probably tell that it is not what one might call "consistent". Its draws can be all over the place, its game plan is stopped by a single errant Path to Exile, and even if it does its thing it has to do it three times in a typical game. It is not a really good deck, but it is a really powerful deck. Sometimes players just get caught unprepared for Bruna to attack them, sometime Bruna is just attacking on turn three, and sometimes players aren't willing to help another player being attacked. A lot of playing this deck is patience; holding Bruna until after a spell is used or when the blue player taps out can make all the difference.

The playgroup in which the deck exists also plays a huge part. I am blessed to play with a huge group of people who often consider a single Swords to Plowshares to be all they need in a deck, which makes my life often much easier. If you are thinking this kind of glass cannon deck might be cool for you, consider your playgroup and then decide if you need more countermagic or not.

This deck has some more expensive cards that are obviously not important. Lion's Eye Diamond is sweet, but the deck can probably work fine with a Worn Powerstone or something in its place. A more reliable yet slower version of the deck might be better; I built this version because I already have a (okay, several) slower yet more grindy voltron deck and wanted to build a super fragile yet scary deck.

If there is a card I'm not running there is one of two reasons for that. A, I just didn't think about it. B, it cost fifteen cents and I know I have a copy somewhere I just can't find it. Feel free to let me know if I am missing the number one card that without which all Bruna decks lose and I am a moron for not running.

Thanks for looking at my deck. Feel free to tell me I'm and idiot (you won't be wrong) in the comments below.

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Date added 6 years
Last updated 1 year
Legality

This deck is Commander / EDH legal.

Rarity (main - side)

17 - 0 Mythic Rares

33 - 0 Rares

22 - 0 Uncommons

21 - 0 Commons

Cards 100
Avg. CMC 2.47
Tokens Treasure
Folders Inspirations, Others decks, Commanders of interest, bruna, decks I want to build/upgrade
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