FEEL FREE TO ADD ME ON ARENA: ApolloPaladin#83413
This deck has been continuing to STOMP on MTGA, even against other Knight-Deck builds. I'm convinced it's one of, if not THE strongest & quickest Knight build possible I've seen in Arena formats. I'm sure a statement like that is open to some debate, but the Win/Loss record with this deck is really quite impressive in actual playtesting; Good consistency too.
COMMENTS, THOUGHTS, and/or UP-VOTES APPRECIATED! :)
It's a variant on some similar Mardu Knight builds I've seen elsewhere. Notable additions & differences from most other builds I've seen are my inclusion of Convoke mechanics on
Conclave Tribunal
and
Venerated Loxodon
to really play into the high Creature count (and
Worthy Knight
Tokens) for the deck. I've been averaging emptying my hand by Turn 3, which may sound awful Topdecking that soon, but the synergy and power with which pretty much any mix of creatures can combo more than makes up for it. It also prevents me from being subject to "Hand Hate" decks with Discard elements, and it renders me all but immune to mono-red decks relying on
Robber of the Rich
since my hand is basically nil very early on.
All cards in this deck with a Converted Mana Cost higher than 3 have some form of mechanic to further reduce its Casting Cost. (Either through Convoke mechanics or through Controlled Knights on
The Circle of Loyalty
) It is FAST. It's quite incredible how quickly you can get 5 creatures in play with
Worthy Knight
s and then drop something like
Venerated Loxodon
down for absolutely no mana and give them all +1/+1 counters to boot.
Ideal Turn(s) go something like this:
-
"Ideal" Hand Draw:
Worthy Knight
,
Venerated Loxodon
,
Knight of the Ebon Legion
,
Inspiring Veteran
,
The Circle of Loyalty
,
Savai Triome
,
Tournament Grounds
, Next Draw: Land Card (with White Mana)
-
Turn 1: Play
Savai Triome
. Especially with
Venerated Loxodon
in-hand, we don't want to play 1-mana Knight creatures until
Worthy Knight
is in play, if we can help it
- Turn 2: Play
Tournament Grounds
and
Worthy Knight
- Turn 3: Play 3rd Land Card, paying the 2 life if it's a Shock Land, and Play
Inspiring Veteran
and
Knight of the Ebon Legion
-- this creates two 1/1 Tokens off of
Worthy Knight
's ability, leaving 5 untapped creatures in play; follow up by playing
Venerated Loxodon
for Zero Mana (tapping them all, and adding +1/+1 counters to them all as well; still leaves the Loxodon himself as an untapped 4/4 blocker)
- Turn 4: Play
The Circle of Loyalty
for 3 mana (due to Knights in play), Attack with 5/5 Loxodon, 5/5 Worthy Knight, 4/4 Inspiring Veteran, 4/5 Ebon Legion, and two 3/3 Tokens. 24 Attack Damage in Total. (This includes the 'Lord' gains from having played
Venerated Loxodon
already, plus
Inspiring Veteran
and
The Circle of Loyalty
.
- Even if they have Blocker(s),
Knight of the Ebon Legion
most likely gets a counter, and you're set up nicely for a 2nd attack on Turn 5 using the 3 available mana to pump up Ebon's mana ability.
- There are also multiple variants of Hand Draws which are just as good (or nearly) using different Knights to cast on Turn 3.
Worthy Knight
and
Venerated Loxodon
are the only 2 real key components to the ideal Hand Draw in order to get 5 untapped creatures in play as soon as possible
- I'd say about 1/4 to 1/3 (quarter to a third) of all games I play with "Ideal" (or near) Hand Draws, opponents just resign on Turn 3. If we've got a total of 6 creatures, five (5) with +1/+1 counters, AND are STILL dropping a 5-mana spell on Turn 3, a lot of people just won't even stick it out beyond that.
- The biggest vulnerability to this deck are board-wipe type effects (like
Kaya's Wrath
), but opponents are looking at (at least) Turn 4 or 5 before they can drop anything like that into the mix. Even against these types of decks I've found that coming on hard enough with early attacks is enough to seal the game. Just be wary if you see Black-White or Blue-White (for
Time Wipe
) mana colors being played...I've also added in 2x
Unbreakable Formation
and some
Professor's Warning
to help manage the board wipe/cheap creature destroy dilemma.
KEY COMBOS:
Other Info:
List of "Knight Lord" type effects (some of which hit more than just Knights):
I finally got a
Murderous Rider
to Wildcard, but for now he's still out for now as an option. I was planning on adding him in once I managed to snag a copy, but this deck is working remarkably well even w/o his Planewalker destroying capabilities.
Conclave Tribunal
serves the same function pretty nicely, and it's often much less mana than the Swift End spell off
Murderous Rider
anyway due to the sheer number of Creatures/Tokens this Deck can put out. I find sitting on him in hand as a control options diminishes the overall attack power & speed of the build.
I've begun to really like
Grafdigger's Cage
especially with some of the newer cards, so it's on the Sideboard with occasional swaps into the Main Deck in place of
Joust
. It wasn't incredibly useful when I originally pulled it back when M20 was the newest-release set, but now, not only does it COMPLETELY (and laughably) shut down those annoying & time-draining Cat Oven type Decks, but it also prevents any Escape abilities from firing on the array of creatures that see lots of play like
Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath
and
Kroxa, Titan of Death's Hunger
. It also offers some serious deterrents on some Red and Blue decks for their 'recasting' ability on various Instant/Sorcery spells (like some of the Chandras and Jaces, for example).
I've been playing around by pulling
Wintermoor Commander
in and out trying to evaluate him (because I'm a huge fan of the card in general), but I'm finding that the extra options afforded on some of the cards I was having to drop for him are actually nicer in many cases. I guess this deck comes on so strong in most games that I don't need a big beefy Deathtouch blocker as I can just target remove (or destroy) any real threats quite early on. I'm still on the fence though, so stay tuned on that one I suppose.
Any input or suggestions are very much appreciated!!!
