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Ragnarok (Giant Tribal: Brion Stoutarm)

Commander / EDH* RW (Boros) Tribal

imoutogetyou


Ragnarok

Giants want to smash everything and Brion Stoutarm is the one to lead them. All the normal big creatures are here for Brion to fling, but this is really just a distraction. If everyone is afraid of the big creatures and wrath the board or attempt to spot remove them, Brion Stoutarm lets me sac them and keeps me ahead on life until I can consistently blow up everything on everyones board. There are two ways to do this: Bearer of the Heavens and Worldslayer , and protect our board using Boros Charm or Rootborn Defenses .
Brion Stoutarm deserves some credit as a boros commander. He has the direct damage of red, and the lifegain of white. He isn't that threatening when he is on the board as he isn't a top tier spiky commander, but he can always do damage as a reaction to anyone acting against you. It also helps deter spot removal against all the big threats I can put on board, as I can usually sacrifice them at instant speed. What I like about Brion Stoutarm though, is he is a different type of boros commander than we usually get. He is offensively, defensive; which is the inspiration for how the deck should play. If someone hits me, they end up hitting themselves ( Comeuppance Deflecting Palm Wild Ricochet ). Or I can immediately retaliate by having Brion throw someone. The pillars of the deck stonehewer and Sunforger are super reactive, and let me grab answers for almost anything. In this way the mindset when piloting the deck is a lot more along control lines, hence the inclusion of white counterspells
Stonehewer Giant is one of the hubs of the deck, as there is a lot of pertinent equipment in the deck. Most importantly Worldslayer , which can be attached to an unblocked creature, or Sunforger as it allows us to cast any instants I need for another 2 mana (the first time). Defensively, we can also get protection from Darksteel Plate , Lightning Greaves , and Swiftfoot Boots . Utility comes from skull clamp, Illusionist's Bracers , and Thornbite Staff , which allow for card draw, double-activate abilities, and frequent untapping of creatures. Because of the vigilance, Stonehewer Giant can become a voltron death machine by himself by attacking and equipping himself or other giants mid-combat as a combat trick.
Sunforger is a critical part of this deck as it is used to tutor all of the instants that we run. Most importantly Boros Charm and Rootborn Defenses , to defend the board or creatures from wraths. If the game is going well, I should be the one wiping the board regularly too. Offensive Defense Deflecting Palm and Comeuppance , make sure no one tries to hit you even if your board state is open or vulnerable. Dawn Charm and Wild Ricochet can prevent the worst spells, while Mana Tithe is only really useful in the early game to prevent people from tapping out. Toolbox-o-Answers Likewise Enlightened Tutor is useful early game for finding sunforger, but also can be used to find any of the other artifacts and enchantments. Orim's Thunder and Return to Dust take out enemy artifacts or enchantments easily, while Swords to Plowshares and Path to Exile deal with creatures as spot removal. Debt of Loyalty is helpful as it works as an instant speed threaten effect which most Brion Stoutarm decks like to run. The regeneration clause makes it a bit limited but it is fun to steal an opponents commander permanently. Keeping My options open Finally, and probably most importantly is Tithe as; it searches for plains. This allows you to search for Mistveil Plains which allows you to put any equipment or instants back into your deck to tutor for them. This lets you keep all of your permanents indestructible when you use Worldslayer Mistveil Plains and Boros Charm together. This recursion lets everyone at the table know I have answers to their game plans, and if they hit me with creatures they will be slapped with a Deflecting Palm in a predictable Comeuppance , and spells will Wild Ricochet right back at them. Getting my graveyard back into my deck is also my reasoning in running Jotun Grunt as the cumulative upkeep is great targeted graveyard hate, and also lets me bottom more of my graveyard.

The details

The ramp in this deck isn't really "ramp" as all it can do is make my land drops consistently. I am not running a lot of lands but the cheap mana acceleration makes a lot of hands keeps on one land, and pulling lands into my hand thins the deck to make my draws better. Tithe I am running a lot of white ramp: Tithe is a great opponents-turn-two-end-phase play. This means that it hits Plateau and Sacred Foundry , so you can get red mana from it. I can also use it to search for Mistveil Plains which is a good combo piece with Sunforger , and is an instant, Tithe can also be tutored for with Sunforger late game. I am also running Gift of Estates which is a more expensive sorcery speed version that also searches for plains, but is good for thinning the deck and filling my hand. Enchantments I realize that this deck is really lean on lands, so Land Tax fixes this, only finds basics but there are plenty of mountains and Plains . Endless Horizons lets you hit all the land drops you need after turn four and thins the deck so that you get better draws. Additionally it finds plains so you can find the dual lands and dangerously Mistveil Plains . No one really thinks about it as (land)-card-advantage so its not a big target for removal and enchantments are usually pretty safe. Either of these makes for really quick recovery if your table is Armegeddoned or I can't protect my lands from Worldslayer , as I should have a bunch of lands in hand, or something that will fill it with lands really quickly. Fun I am experimenting with running Thaumatic Compass   as it would have good utility early and late game and can be a good sink for extra mana. Even if I cast it and it transforms immediately I do get a land out of it ( Spires of Orazca ). Also running a few mana rocks Commander's Sphere , Sol Ring , and Boros Signet , but the huge overachiever is Stinkdrinker Daredevil , as I am running 16 giants. It's a bit weirder because the ability gets creatures out faster but so does Deathrender , which add some unknown threat to the board and fits the offensive defense theme. Finally I include Mana Geyser because literally any time this resolves I have ended up with 16+ mana which jumps me 2-3 turns ahead in plays. Functionally usually I drop 1-2 big red threats, and then equip them with whatever I put on the board in turns 1-4.
Brion's Buddies Serra Avatar and Malignus show up to be thrown, while Stalking Vengeance hangs out to make it painful. The giants though are equally good with Borderland Behemoth , Hamletback Goliath , and Impelled Giant . But throwing any of these once isn't enough to end the game, hence there is a lot of recursion. Worldslayer
Emeria, The Sky Ruin : searching for all those plains means that if the game runs long I am getting a big creature back from the graveyard every turn. Flameshadow Conjuring : lets me throw the copies. Small shout-out to warcheif giant and Blade of Selves , cause they also let me throw copies. Gift of Immortality : great for repeatedly throwing creatures, but also pairs really well with Protector of the Crown . It also lets me retrigger ETB abilities. Emeria Shepherd : lets me get good value out of all the cards that let me search for plains. Stalking Vengeance : This isn't recursion it just lets me hit people twice throwing the same creature with Brion, and if that is a stretch so are Illusionist's Bracers which do essentially the same thing. mimi vat: finally lets me get copies of anyones dead creature at instant speed. This is really good as it can reccur ETB effects, of which we have a bunch ( Giant Harbinger , Inferno Titan , and Thundercloud Shaman ). Finally there are card that get things back in the library so that I can find them again with Stonehewer Giant and Sunforger , these are Jotun Grunt which doubles as graveyard hate as the deck was completely lacking it before, and Mistveil Plains . Also, Frantic Salvage gets back artifacts and draws a card, mostly here to buffer against Shatterstorm s or Vandalblast s that take out all the equipment, so that it gets back in the library where Stonehewer Giant can find it.
Haste and Shroud/Hexproof: Swiftfoot Boots Lightning Greaves Indestructible: Darksteel Plate Untap creatures: Thornbite Staff Double ability activation: Illusionist's Bracers Literally all the instants: Thornbite Staff Destroy literally everything: Worldslayer A second one of any of these: Masterwork of Ingenuity Other: Skullclamp Blade of Selves Conqueror's Flail Deathrender
Enlightened Tutor gets all the artifacts and enchantments, just like Open the Armory which is more limited but puts cards into the hand.
All the giants included are really good situationally, want a soft one sided boardwipe Thundercloud Shaman might work. Want to wipe all the creatures off the board more forcefully get Desolation Giant . Need literally everything scoured off of the board (because the superfriends player is going off soon and I'm not letting him get away with this again GAAAHH) Bearer of the Heavens , needs to take one for the team first but it is effective. Need to hate out a graveyard Jotun Grunt is your dude. All of the giants give a good range of usefulness depending on the situation. Although the harbinger is usually here to get Stonehewer Giant into the party.
This is the quote unquote "ramp package". If you care for the details read that (above somewhere)... We want to get all the plains in case Emeria, The Sky Ruin or Emeria Shepherd are on the board.
Fling big dudes with Brion Stoutarm , and if that doesn't work try to assemble: Sunforger and Worldslayer , so that we can get Mistveil Plains , and blow up everything with Worldslayer while protecting our board every turn with Boros Charm . Usually all we need to get this together is Stonehewer Giant and a few turns.
Ok I conceed that playing against a deck that is built around Worldslayer can be aggravating, as it really slows down the games. So I only try to do this while protecting my own stuff with Boros Charm , because that way I can lock down the board, everyone sees it and scoops and we go to game two. It is a bit of a feel bad card but my meta runs so many Armegeddons already that this doesn't feel unfair at the table. It just gets tedious if I need to rebuild as well and/or can't wrap up the game when everyone else literally has nothing on the board.

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Updates Add

So this went from a ~100$ deck to ~300$ now because this project is my baby and I traded in a lot of cards. There are two sides to this: first manabase, second instants. This is a major update that has been ongoing for a year now, trying to make this the best version of giant tribal that can exist

I have traded in a pile of dollar rares for Arid Mesa, Rugged Prairie, Sacred Foundry, and Plateau. These are just so that I have all the possible dual lands and good fetches, without off-color fetches. These have replaced the scry lands, the life lands, and all the tap lands I was running.

The focus of the deck has shifted, instead of giant tribal with a elemental sub-theme it is now straight giants with the best Sunforger toolkit possible. The rest of the deck has been retooled to revolve around two hubs, Sunforger and stoneforger. The equipment for the voltron also been upgraded to include the Ragnarok payload Worldslayer. A lot of the deck has been shifted around this, but those are the major details. The big creature flinging with Brion Stoutarm is still there, but the all the one use threaten effects have been taken out. These were taken out for Might Makes Right which just makes sense given my other creatures, and Debt of Loyalty which is more situational, as it only hits on regeneration, but it is instant speed so Sunforger finds it, and it is permanent. Added utility lands: because the game plan is to blow up everything I am running all the indestructible lands, and Flagstones of Trokair so that I can bounce back faster. Tower of the Magistrate is here to strip enemy voltrons of equipment and running two colours I can have a few more colorless lands than normal. Finally, added Frantic Salvage which is strange tech in here so that I can get equipment back into the library and/or draw a card so that I can get them back with Stonehewer Giant, without solely relying on Mistveil Plains. This is the same reason I am running Jotun Grunt which seems like the perfect place for him, because he nerfs opponents graveyards, gets my stuff back in the library and is an on tribal themed two mana 4/4, which acts as graveyard hate late game.

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98% Casual

Competitive

Date added 7 years
Last updated 4 years
Legality

This deck is Commander / EDH legal.

Rarity (main - side)

6 - 0 Mythic Rares

51 - 0 Rares

22 - 0 Uncommons

8 - 0 Commons

Cards 100
Avg. CMC 3.54
Tokens Copy Clone, Experience Token, The Monarch, Treasure
Folders Deck ideas, Finders
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