Bully Tahngarth, Master of the Arena

Commander / EDH Casual Land Destruction Mono-Red Theme/Gimmick Voltron

Ziembski

"Information is a powerful weapon." (18)

• 1x Dictate of the Twin Gods
• 1x Expedition Map
• 1x Glacial Crevasses
• 1x Godo, Bandit Warlord
• 1x Gratuitous Violence
• 1x Hammer of Purphoros
• 1x Homeward Path
• 1x In the Web of War
• 1x Mind's Eye
• 1x Reforge the Soul
• 1x Rogue's Passage
• 1x Seething Song
• 1x Sensei's Divining Top
• 1x Soul-Scar Mage
• 1x Staff of Nin
• 1x Sunset Pyramid
• 1x Terrain Generator
• 1x Vessel of Volatility

"Beauty is in the eye of the exploder." (8)

• 1x Aftershock
• 1x Pillage
• 1x Shattering Pulse
• 1x Shattering Spree
• 1x Smash
• 1x Smelt
• 1x Structural Distortion
• 1x Vandalblast

"Decades to build. Hours to demolish." (7)

• 1x Aftershock
• 1x Crumble to Dust
• 1x Pillage
• 1x Ruination
• 1x Seismic Spike
• 1x Structural Distortion
• 1x Wake of Destruction

"It's the flint that sparks a warrior's rage." (14)

• 1x Basilisk Collar
• 1x Blight Sickle
• 1x Champion's Helm
• 1x Claws of Valakut
• 1x Darksteel Plate
• 1x Grafted Exoskeleton
• 1x Hammer of Nazahn
• 1x Magebane Armor
• 1x Mask of Avacyn
• 1x Obsidian Battle-Axe
• 1x Strata Scythe
• 1x Swiftfoot Boots
• 1x Tenza, Godo's Maul
• 1x Thornbite Staff

"The pits swallow the weak as predators swallow prey." (14)

• 1x AEther Flash
• 1x Anger of the Gods
• 1x Blasphemous Act
• 1x Burn Away
• 1x Chandra's Ignition
• 1x Chaos Warp
• 1x Possibility Storm
• 1x Repercussion
• 1x Scavenger Grounds
• 1x Smoke
• 1x Spine of Ish Sah
• 1x Sweltering Suns
• 1x Tormod's Crypt
• 1x Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle

Commander (1)

"Let your heels point you home." (43)

• 1x Arcane Lighthouse
• 1x Caged Sun
• 1x Extraplanar Lens
• 1x Fire Diamond
• 1x Gauntlet of Power
• 1x Homeward Path
• 1x Mind Stone
• 1x Rogue's Passage
• 1x Scavenger Grounds
• 30x Snow-Covered Mountain
• 1x Sol Ring
• 1x Terrain Generator
• 1x Thran Dynamo
• 1x Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle

“Enough!” (7)

• 1x Balduvian Rage
• 1x Blasphemous Act
• 1x Chandra's Ignition
• 1x Disrupt Decorum
• 1x Grafted Exoskeleton
• 1x Insurrection
• 1x Repercussion

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Maybeboard

Other (2)

• 1x Neheb, the Eternal
• 1x Wheel of Fate

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You can definetly call me The Oracle Vorthos Johnny Player.

This is my approach to building casual, noncombo deck. Tahn is definetly uncommon commander, but he is really fun to pilot. Voltron-style decks are pretty straight-forward, but Tahngarth's ability lets to be a little tricky.

Main plan is to put Tahngarth as soon as possible and start hitting your enemies with commander-damage. To speed it up, I use quite much equipments, few enchantmens and quick mana.

Another theme in this deck is bullying. By bullying I mean disabling and answering enemy wincons using some nasty enchantments or spells. Tahn himself bullies eavry creature and there are few cards that bully lands, artifacts, go-wide tokens, graveyards and combo-decks.

In first build, deck included few fight-mechanism spells, but since Tahngarth, Talruum Hero does it best himself, all of them ever cut, also due to fact that there aren't many other creatures.

Each card category is named after flavor texts. Just for more Flavor.

In each panel below, I'll explain cad picks one by one in each category.

Click to see full resolution Proxy I made Show

Bullying is one of main themes in this deck. It includes: artifact-hate described in "Beauty is in the eye of the exploder." section, land-hate in "Decades to build. Hours to demolish." section, and other hatefull things that are in this section.

• AEther Flash - completly breaks few other commanders and kills token decks. Might also kill our Soul-Scar Mage but thats only single card.

• Anger of the Gods - wipes most tokens, most commanders, probably all mana dorks. Clears the board for Tahngarth, Talruum Hero so he can swing in.

• Blasphemous Act - Best creature wipe avaiable in Red, win games with Repercussion onboard.

• Burn Away - Instant speed removal. Exiling graveyards is really bullying GV-based decks.

• Chandra's Ignition - Another wiped that goes in par with our commander. Add some power and Grafted Exoskeleton for win.

• Chaos Warp - Spot removal for all those nasty enchantments and tought creatures.

• Possibility Storm - good bye for all those boring cEDH combo decks.

• Repercussion - Passing damage from creatures to their controller aka "perfect trample". Add massive burn to win.

• Scavenger Grounds - Graveyard hate, tutorable with Expedition Map.

• Smoke - With so few creatures in deck, this slows only enemies.

• Spine of Ish Sah - Another spot removal that works in Red. Use your own artifact-hate to take it down and reuse.

• Sweltering Suns - Mass burn with ability to cycle when not really needed.

• Tormod's Crypt - Another Graveyard hate.

• Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle - Shooting Lightning Bolt's almost each turn let you control the board.

Under this category, there are equipments that make it easier to hit that 21 commander damage and protect Tahngarth, Talruum Hero .

• Basilisk Collar - Staple in each Voltron deck, here mostly for deathtouch and lifelink that works no-so-bad with Tahn's ability.

• Blight Sickle - Unique wording in Tahn's ability lets to lower target creature's power and toughtness before getting hit back. Work wonders.

• Champion's Helm - Protection is very important, so this works good for sake of hexproof and additional +2/+2 is sweet.

• Claws of Valakut - In monoRed deck, this works mostly like Strata Scythe but is enchantment for 1RR only.

• Darksteel Plate - Another protection, this time indestructibility, works good with Tahn's ability.

• Gorgon Flail - Deathtouch, while not so great in voltron, works fine with Tahn.

• Grafted Exoskeleton - Just like Wither, Infect lets lower power before Tahn gets hit back.

• Magebane Armor - Prevents damage Tahngarth get from using his ability while also pumping him.

• Mask of Avacyn - Hexproof for win.

• Obsidian Battle-Axe - Haste-enabler with autoequip since Tahngarth is a warrior.

• Scythe of the Wretched - With it, Tahngarth hits so hard, that opponent's creautres are comming back from Graveyard to join you.

• Strata Scythe - Snow-lands might lower it's worth, but in monocolor deck it works wonders.

• Swiftfoot Boots - And another hexproof. Haste is also very important.

• Tenza, Godo's Maul - Not so bad itself, but I am waiting to get new Hammer of Nazahn from Commander 2017.

• Thornbite Staff - Change Tahngarth into machinegun as long as you have open mana.

Nothing bullies more that having your Sol Ring destroyed before Turn 2. Below I present my choice of artifact-hate.

• Aftershock - Being able to destroy not only artifact but land or even creature is very rare in Red.

• Pillage - Cheap, effective and multitasking.

• Shattering Pulse - Buyback buys its slot in this deck. Good for lategame.

• Shattering Spree - Pay X and destroy X artifact.

• Smash - Picked over Smash to Smithereens due to "draw a card" part.

• Smelt - My favourite artfact-hate and probably overall card. Instant speed lets you destroy other player's Turn1 Sol Ring.

• Structural Distortion - 4CMC is worth that it exiles it's target. Good for graveyard-based decks (I'm thinking of you, The Gitrog Monster).

• Vandalblast - Cheaper than Shattering Spree if there are a lot of artifacts onboard.

Land-hate might not be really casual strategy, but people get too much from Cabal Coffers and Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth combo. They won't have mercy aganist your Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle neither.

• Aftershock - Multitasking bought it's slot.

• Crumble to Dust - Exiling aganist GV-based decks.

• Pillage - As in artifact-hate section, cheap, effective and multitasking.

• Ruination - Kills multicolored decks that thinks dual-lands are fair.

• Seismic Spike - Actually costs only RR.

• Structural Distortion - Aganist, exile means a lot.

• Wake of Destruction - In a meta where You are only player who is not playing Green, this works wonders. Also might be that guy to pick Swamp when Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth is onboard.

Mana is important. Monocolor decks are really strong due to ability to use mana doublers to it maximum. Using only few most important nonbasics to accomplish that.

• Arcane Lighthouse - In a word of hexproof and shroud boots, this is very important.

• Caged Sun - Costy but best mana doubler since it only buffs you.

• Extraplanar Lens - With only 3 CMC and full snow-land base, this is probably going to only buff you.

• Fire Diamond - Artifact for R mana to fix nonbasic's colorless.

• Gauntlet of Power - Working best with monoRed since Red is probably least played color in EDH.

• Homeward Path - How often Tahngarth, Talruum Hero gets Mind Controled? Too often, I hope this will help at least sometimes.

• Mind Stone - Manarock with draw when we are getting empty on hand.

• Rogue's Passage - Staple land for Voltron. Unblockable mostly means 1HK in late game Voltron.

• Scavenger Grounds - Basic land with ability to sacrifice and wipe graveyard.

• Snow-Covered Mountain - Important part is full snow-land basics here. Not only for Extraplanar Lens but also works wonders with Glacial Crevasses.

• Sol Ring - One to rule them all.

• Terrain Generator - With only few nonbasic lands, this lets to ramp quickier in early game.

• Thran Dynamo - Good for paying equip costs, worth the slot.

• Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle - Lightning Bolt on a land. Very good and very annoying for your opponents.

This category contains all utility cards, including other creature cards in this deck.

• Dictate of the Twin Gods - Better than Furnace of Rath due to Flash ability. Popping it after Declare blockers step or at pior EOT is very fun.

• Expedition Map - Lands are answers in this deck. Be it hexproof, graveyard-hate, aganist Mind Control or simply get Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle and start burning them,

• Glacial Crevasses - With Snow Mountains as lands here, this lets to defend yourself aganist nasty Stompy decks.

• Godo, Bandit Warlord - Tutoring is very important part of this card, but additional combat steps while Tahngarth, Talruum Hero have vigilance is also very important.

• Gratuitous Violence - Took Fireshrieker slot. Same CMC as it's CMC + Equip. Also enchantment, so it's harder to be removed.

• Hammer of Purphoros - Haste-enabler with ability to create blockers when needed.

• Homeward Path - How often Tahngarth, Talruum Hero gets Mind Controled? Too often, I hope this will help at least sometimes.

• In the Web of War - Another Haste-enabler with power pumping.

• Rogue's Passage - Staple land for Voltron. Unblockable mostly means 1HK in late game Voltron.

• Seer's Sundial - With lack of draw in Red, this solves this problem as long as we have lands.

• Seething Song - Allows to deploy Tahngarth earlier.

• Sensei's Divining Top - IMHO, very important card in each Red deck. When You lack draw, this at least let you control whan You draw.

• Soul-Scar Mage - Adds Wither to Tahngarth, Talruum Hero ability.

• Staff of Nin - Draw cards and ping those mana dorks.

• Sunset Pyramid - Lets to draw more cards earlier and scry out bad cards endgame.

• Temple Bell - Again, card draw is a Red color flat, this solves it a little.

• Terrain Generator - Drop more basics to deploy your theats earlier.

• Vessel of Volatility - Same as Song, lets drop Tahn early.

When you have enought of game, when it lasts too long, there should be ways to instantly win. Below are cards that allows that.

• Balduvian Rage - Surprise pump for +20 power outright kills with commander damage. Use it when they think they can let that attack through without blocking.

• Blasphemous Act + Repercussion - Few creatures means tons of damage for almost free. Don't fear to use even when below 13 health, you can reorder Repercussion triggers so it hits all of your enemies first.

• Chandra's Ignition + Grafted Exoskeleton - add some more power to finish every opponent with Infect.

• Insurrection - Stealing all creatures and using them to finish their owners. Might not be enought to kill whole table, but works most of the time.

Over all, it is very fun to pilot this deck. Playing for fun and not only to win is real soul of EDH.

Once playing xMage, joined an casual 4pod table. When one guy dropped turn2 Hermit Druid, 2 other guys scooped. It was only me and him. Luckly, I had turn1 Sol Ring so I was still able to do something. I started Turn3 before him, topdecking Posibility Storm and instantly casting it. When that cEDH Druid Combo deck Guy noticed it he wrote "ooo, fun!". For the remainning of game he struggled to do anything, trying to set up his library with tutors but nothing really worked. I was removing every creature he played as soon as possible. Lastly, I drawn Grafted Exoskeleton and he scooped turn before I would place 10th counter on him. That way, I won a game aganist top notch cEDH Hermit Druid Combo Deck with this casual, crappy Voltron. Was really fun.

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Am also looking for suggestions and comments!

Date added	6 years
Last updated	6 years
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	1 - 0 Mythic Rares 36 - 0 Rares 21 - 0 Uncommons 12 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	3.41
Tokens	Enchantment Golem 3/3 C
Folders	Some Decks i want to build, Commander, Stolen EDH, EDH Ideas