Lathril, Blade of the Elves

Legendary Creature — Elf Noble

Menace

Whenever Lathril, Blade of the Elves deals combat damage to a player, create that many 1/1 green Elf Warrior creature tokens.

{T}, Tap ten untapped Elves you control: Each opponent loses 10 life and you gain 10 life.

Tokens

• Elf Warrior 1/1 G

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
Quest Magic	Legal
Vanguard	Legal
Vintage	Legal

Discussion (41)

Michigone on Isshin for a Fight

6 months ago

Been a second since I changed anything, deck was overdue for a little update. A newer player in my playgroup plays a Kardur, Doomscourge deck, and I read an article recently that talked about how to combat power creep in a playgroup in ways that are fun and interesting for everyone. And the article talked about building decks with your meta in mind, or at least coming up with ways to combat specific decks that you are likely to see, and in the interest of full disclosure, I don't often do that. I find myself building decks that excite me from a mechanical perspective, and then fine tuning the deck relative to my playgroup through playtesting, and in this way letting the meta affect my card choices for slots in my 99. I don't think it's a bad way to deck build, but I think I ask others for their opinions a lot (sorry Crow-Umbra), and that it's a result of me not looking at my meta in particular. I think that thinking about my card slots in terms of what I'll sit down and face on any given play night would actually have me asking less, or maybe just different questions of what my deck should be doing to accomplish its game plan.

Okay, so that's a long ramble, and all of this is to say that against the players in my play group that field decks that put up big bodies that I can't swing into (Gargos, Vicious Watcher, Ghired, Conclave Exile) or their decks go wide enough that they can chump block my creatures to death (Edgar Markov, Ghired, Conclave Exile, Alela, Artful Provocateur, Marrow-Gnawer, Isperia, Supreme Judge, Lathril, Blade of the Elves), or they play Goad (Just the Kardur, Doomscourge Deck currently), I need more protection for my attackers. Now Crow-Umbra mentioned Reconnaissance way back, and I kind of slept on it because I thought (incorrectly) that it would hamper my ability to do damage, but still offer me the benefit of vigilance. But I realized that after the errata by Magic in creating multiple combat steps, that I can still use Reconnaissance to untap my attacking creatures after they've dealt damage, during the combat end step, thus allowing me to "have my cake and eat it too." So I was wondering what to cut, and I landed on cutting Curse of Opulence. It is irritating to the player that it gets put on, and it's hard to assess as early as turn one who the biggest threat will be, and it embitters whichever player I put it on against me, so even though I get ramp off of it, and other players do too, it doesn't really do me too many favors. So Curse is out, Reconnaissance is in.

Gleeock on EDH - Kill 1 opponent …

7 months ago

I like this. I actually am a big fan of the "better them than me" attitude. Kardur, Doomscourge is a big fan of it too. I just build decks that lend themselves to Machiavellian politics & opponents often pick up on that & will even respect it, after all we are all enemies. It is crazy how many players will think their deals out loud -- Seriously, don't announce your preference for another player in a FFA game, it will backfire eventually. I mostly find "alliances" to be dumb in FFA, the balance of power always shifts, but when a player hears you trying to decide their fate & pick apart their board in a weaselly way; you run the risk of making an enemy that will now destroy you at any cost. When you straight up slap people without collusion, at least you are doing it without "ganging up" & there is a powerful political + emotional implication associated with that. The worst is when collusion is going above & beyond what was actually needed to balance the scales of power & now one of those players just wasted a bunch of their hand going way beyond what was needed.

Fortunately, "alliances" never get proposed to me any more, with newer players that don't know me better it will get attempted, but it often backfires for them. The way I typically reason; if someone is proposing a deal to me, then they have something big to gain that will screw the table over in some way. The player that has the most invested in the game will be the first to speak up & that is going to be the player I want to go for. You don't barter or propose unless you have some hope in hand. I have to worry the most about wasted damage if a player is completely indifferent to a beatdown.

For frame of reference though, my decks tend to force a lot of action, or will use a groupslug element. Very few combos, no tutors in my favorite decks anyway... So, there is not alot of margin for error in decks that are trying to force the game into a midrange back-&-forth slugfest.

Kardur, Doomscourge - I leave timmie creature, swing-wide, or voltron decks to "play their game", but I need to try to eliminate a player if they are too heavy in the 2ndary wincon category, or tapdown decks like Lathril, Blade of the Elves

Extus, Oriq Overlord  ^Flip - Somewhat light in late-game engines/card advantage, I need to pick the right player after my blowout spells.

Breena, the Demagogue - True aggro, proliferate, late game superfriends. Constant attacking from turn 3 & up. There is alot of lifelink & vigilance (poop-tier evergreen) & a really good aggro attack trigger. So logically, with advantage gained from attacks & no drawback from attacking - I should use that to put significant pressure on the right player.

Michigone on EngrIsshin - All Your Base Are Belong to Us!

7 months ago

@Last_Laugh Got it. Do you feel like your meta doesn't have a lot of other go wide players in it? My meta has an Edgar Markov deck, a Lathril, Blade of the Elves deck, a Rat Colony deck, a Ghired, Conclave Exile deck, and a Purphoros, God of the Forge deck, among others. I guess that has kinda affected my viewpoint on what tapping a few creatures per player is worth. But I can see it still having value in terms of getting through if all the opponent has is one or two big threats. And that makes sense about making changes. I just built, online only currently, my first Isshin deck and I am looking around to see how other people have built theirs. Thanks for any tips and feedback in terms of how games have played out and what works well in your deck!

K4nkato on Staff of Domination & the …

7 months ago

EDH game, here’s the situation.

I have a Staff of Domination, a Priest of Titania, a Lathril, Blade of the Elves and 9 other elves. This is enough to create infinite mana, endless tap & untap my Elves and use Lathril’s activated ability to win the game.

Now here’s the hitch. My friend also has Staff of Domination & Priest of Titania with five elves, meaning they can also make infinite mana. They didn’t know that so I (foolishly) let them do the combo and now we have a problem. Because both of us have an arbitrarily large amount of mana and we can both endless tap & untap Lathril, we have stack that can never resolve. Any time I untap Lathril they can tap her. Anytime I tap their Priest they can untap it. There is no way to force a combo because my opponent can always disrupt it, but I can always undue their disruption. There are effectively infinite actions taken in a loop that will never resolve.

What happens? Is the game a stalemate?

Guerric on [Primer] Helming the Host of Heaven *Update*

11 months ago

Gameplay Report 1

We're going to call this game a win, though I didn't see the illegal play at the time that made me think that I "lost" it! I was playing against a nasty Queza, Augur of Agonies combo deck, a Veyran, Voice of Duality deck and a Lathril, Blade of the Elves deck. I took a lot of hate and lost a lot of pieces that I fielded, but I was careful not to dump my hand too quickly, and kept my resources strong by attacking every turn with goood old Segovian Angel equipped with Sword of Hearth and Home and Rogue's Gloves, making sure I had no shortage of ramp and cards. Eventually my opponents were exhausted and I dumped a large quantity of angels on the battlefield in a single turn, including Linvala, Keeper of Silence. I had lethal against my remaining opponents, but I thought the Queza player had been able to pull out a game winning combo. This would have required him to cycle Sanctum Plowbeast however, and Linvala should have shut that off since plowbeast is a creature. As such, we'll call this one a win! I think this game illustrates once again the power of Linvala, but also is a reminder that you don't want to commit too many resources before you're ready, and that when getting a lot of hate you can just build up resources for the right time and overwhelm them. Getting this pacing right is how once moves from being a noob at this deck to a pro.

Gameplay Report 2

For the first time this summer I got to play against this deck, as a friend I met a teacher's conference piloted it 1v1 against my own best deck, which is my Inalla, Archmage Ritualist combo deck. Needless to say, I learned from this game that this deck is easily piloted well by someone that isn't me but is a good player, and once again that is a monster deck in 1v1. Despite having lots of premium control pieces in my toolbelt including Cyclonic Rift (which I tutored and played), counterspells, removal pieces, and lots of game-winning, synergistic combos, I just wasn't able to keep up with Giada. Linvala, Keeper of Silence made my life miserable until I erased it with a Toxic Deluge, though the life loss hurt. She still came back quickly even from that and finished me off. It was good to see my deck piloted expertly by someone else, and perform well against my most competitive deck.

Gameplay Report 3

This game was short and a bit of a sequel to the previous game. I once again was piloting my Inalla deck against a friend who was playing Giada, though this time it was a four player game. The Giada deck worked well, and was the major target at the game table. Unfortunately for them this meant they ignored me, and I combo'ed off out of nowhere well before they were expecting it. As such, it was a loss for Giada, but the deck worked the way it was supposed to even in another player's hand, even if the threat assessment of all three of my opponents did not work as well.

Gameplay Report 4

This was the truly epic win that I've been waiting for since I built this deck, and my favorite game with it to date. Not only did I finish the game with 150 life (thanks to Bishop of Wings, Soul's Attendant, and especially Righteous Valkyrie), but I formed Brisela, Voice of Nightmares  ^{Meld  Meld} not once, but twice, and brought Emeria, The Sky Ruin fully online. My opponents were playing my own decks, which are good, including my super fast Yuriko, the Tiger's Shadow deck, but not even Yuriko could keep up with my lifegain, which left my opponents in quite the dilemma as they tried to figure out which threats to do with. Brisela fell he first time to a Dokuchi Silencer, but I was able to kill the Yuriko player before he could repeat the act, and I brought Bruna back with Emeria and Gisela back with Karmic Guide, and there was nothing my remaining opponent could do to stop me. I think this game was an illustration of just how good this deck can be when performing at its ceiling.

PolarisFluff on Pact weapon

11 months ago

Pact weapon would go pretty well with Greven, Predator Captain.

For all of them, maybe Dina, Soul Steeper? Golgari lifegain so you can offset the life costs, and a built in sac outlet for Junji.

There's also Lathril, Blade of the Elves who is a classic, built in evasion and makes lots of tokens you can equip.

Zaxara, the Exemplary makes pre-modified creatures

Finally, another card you might like here is Unspeakable Symbol

Stardragon on Changling Tribal Help Wanted pls

1 year ago

made a changing tribal deck but it needs massive help it is currently at 100 card but needs tinkering to really help it get going. The goal it use th changling ability to abuse creature specific cards like Rakdos the Defiler or Lathril, Blade of the Elves since they are demons they are safe from rakdos effect and they are also elves so they can be used for Lathril's effect

Link: All but none of the Tribes

KBK7101 on Deck Crisis

1 year ago

Some recently released commanders that are extremely powerful, even in budget decks, that I would recommend would be -

Three color :

Isshin, Two Heavens as One, Miirym, Sentinel Wurm, Muldrotha, the Gravetide (recently reprinted) and Alela, Artful Provacateur

Two color :

Lathril, Blade of the Elves, Sythis, Harvest's Hand and Aesi, Tyrant of Gyre Strait

Most of these could easily be powerful even on a low budget. Most of them are also pretty easy to follow for newer players. Isshin cares about cards that have "Whenever ~ attacks" triggers, Miirym cares about anything relating to dragons, Muldrotha loves graveyard shenanigans and Alela cares about artifacts, enchantments and faeries. Lathril is all about elves and tokens, Sythis is enchantment focused and Aesi is lands-centric (and is available as a precon!).

It all really comes down what type of playstyle you enjoy. Given what you have, I think I'd recommend Alela, Artful Provacateur. You have some {W}{U}{B} cards from your precons already, is in perfect colors for disruption/interaction with opponents and she could be built in literally any way that has enchantments and/or artifacts as a focus. Auras such as All That Glitters and Ethereal Armor? Sure! Anthems such as Favorable Winds or Glorious Anthem? Yep! Artifact-centric cards such as Sai, Master Thopterist, Etherium Sculptor, Foundry Inspector and Bident of Thassa can make your board state explode from one turn to the next. I had an Alela deck for my brother for a bit that focused on playing cheap artifacts/enchantments and then buffing the tokens with cards like Favorable Winds. With a few effects like that on the field, casting a single artifact/enchantment could net you something like a 7/6 flier, which is insane! She could very easily be built on a budget as well.

Again, it all depends on your playstyle. If you could specify your favorite colors/strategies it would help us recommend you something that you would find more fun!