Oloro, the Barrier King

Commander / EDH Casual Lifegain Pillow Fort WUB (Esper)

TheSpiritombEnthusiast

Land (34)

• 1x Arcane Sanctum
• 1x Command Tower
• 1x Dismal Backwater
• 1x Drowned Catacomb
• 1x Evolving Wilds
• 1x Glacial ChasmGC
• 1x Glacial Fortress
• 5x Island
• 1x Isolated Chapel
• 8x Plains
• 1x Prairie Stream
• 1x Scoured Barrens
• 1x Sejiri Refuge
• 1x Sunken Hollow
• 7x Swamp
• 1x Terramorphic Expanse
• 1x Tranquil Cove

Creature (13)

• 1x Cliffhaven Vampire
• 1x Felidar Sovereign
• 1x Fog Bank
• 1x Grand Arbiter Augustin IVGC
• 1x Kambal, Consul of Allocation
• 1x Karlov of the Ghost Council
• 1x Perimeter Captain
• 1x Shield Sphere
• 1x Wall of Denial
• 1x Wall of Essence
• 1x Wall of Glare
• 1x Wall of Hope
• 1x Wall of Omens

Enchantment (16)

• 1x Aura of Silence
• 1x Authority of the Consuls
• 1x Blind Obedience
• 1x Decree of Silence
• 1x Dream Tides
• 1x Exquisite Blood
• 1x Ghostly Prison
• 1x Monastery Siege
• 1x Propaganda
• 1x Rhystic StudyGC
• 1x Sanguine Bond
• 1x Solemnity
• 1x Sphere of Safety
• 1x Suppression Field
• 1x Tainted Remedy
• 1x Test of Endurance

Instant (11)

• 1x Arcane Denial
• 1x Beacon of Immortality
• 1x Counterspell
• 1x Cyclonic RiftGC
• 1x Disenchant
• 1x Enlightened TutorGC
• 1x Lim-Dul's Vault
• 1x Negate
• 1x Return to Dust
• 1x Silence
• 1x Swords to Plowshares

Sorcery (9)

• 1x Beseech the Queen
• 1x Dark Petition
• 1x Debt to the Deathless
• 1x Demonic Collusion
• 1x Diabolic Tutor
• 1x Fabricate
• 1x Increasing Ambition
• 1x Ponder
• 1x Vindicate

Commander (1)

Artifact (16)

• 1x Aetherflux Reservoir
• 1x Azorius Signet
• 1x Crawlspace
• 1x Dimir Signet
• 1x Elixir of Immortality
• 1x Fellwar Stone
• 1x Isochron Scepter
• 1x Ivory Tower
• 1x Mana Web
• 1x Meekstone
• 1x Mind Stone
• 1x Orzhov Signet
• 1x Sol Ring
• 1x Talisman of Dominance
• 1x Talisman of Progress
• 1x Torpor Orb

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Introduction

As you can see, this is an Oloro deck! But wait, something is different! Are those...Walls!? As you may have noticed, a prominent feature of this deck are the seven(Oh god, is it only seven now? How the times change...)walls underneath the Creature tab! Why walls, you ask? Well, what if I told you...that I liked the creature type? That's it! Walls are my favorite creature type, and Oloro, I feel, is the best way to make them 'work,' so to speak(get on that wall legend, Wizards!).

How to Use This Deck

Nothing TOO specific is required to effectively play, but having an explanation of some sort is useful, right? Starting with your opening hand, you want at least two lands, preferably of different types, along with something like Sol Ring or Mind Stone . Getting things like Propaganda , Monastery Siege , or Ghostly Prison in your opening hand are wonderful. Crawlspace turn two or three is nice, too. After the first few turns of playing lands and ramping, perhaps setting up a pillowfort effect or two, just start dropping things. Not much strategy to it, just be wary of counterspells. Hopefully, you should eventually land yourself a tutor card or both parts of a combo. Tutoring Aetherflux Reservoir is never a bad thing to do, ever. It's a game ender. To simplify this even further, this is the strategy:

Early-game: Play lands, enchantments and mana artifacts.
Mid-game: Play creatures, artifacts, and hopefully assemble a combo. Try and gain as much life as you can.
Late-game: Tutor for Aetherflux Reservoir or another game ending combo piece.

Combos

Exquisite Blood + Sanguine Bond : Speaks for itself! It's an infinite combo, and all you need to do is deal one damage or gain one life.

Glacial Chasm + Solemnity : Do you like damage prevention? Of course you do! That's what this combo does! Solemnity , of course, is useful in many, many situations, but this combo in particular is absolutely wonderful.

Beacon of Immortality + Tainted Remedy : Another game-ending combo! By doubling an opponent's life total under the effects of Tainted Remedy , you essentially deal damage to them equal to their life total, reducing it to zero instantly! Beacon of Immortality is also great with Aetherflux Reservoir .

Isochron Sceptor + A Bunch of Things: Isochron Sceptor is really cool! Do you like reusable tutors? Of course you do! Everyone does! Exiling Enlightened Tutor allows it to be reused forever. Pretty great, if I do say so myself! Like counterspells and removal? Imprint some! Hate all of your friends? Silence hates them, too!

Wincons

A few things mention in the Combos section will be briefly mentioned again here, in addition to a few other wincons. These are the combos or cards that will let you finish the game quickly once you put them out.

Aetherflux Reservoir : Aetherflux Reservoir is the easiest wincon to pull off. It only requires itself, its ability isn't a tap ability, and if you are able to put it out early(say, turn three or four), you don't have long to wait to use it. The earliest you can pull this combo off(without lifegain from sources other than Oloro)is turn five, but that results in a draw, so it's obviously better to do turn six. The absolute earliest it can be used is turn three(requires two lands, a Sol Ring , and Elixir of Immortality ).

Exquisite Blood + Sanguine Bond : See Combos.

Felidar Sovereign & Test of Endurance : These are your good old-fashioned lifegain wincons, and staples in any Oloro(or mine, at least). They are very self-explanatory.

Beacon of Immortality + Tainted Remedy : See Combos.

Strengths & Weaknesses

I'll be honest, I haven't actually tested this deck against another one in its current iteration. I have, however, run it through the playtester here dozens of times, so I'll leave those results here in lieu of actual results, which I don't have as of now, along with things that I know will trouble this deck. Starting off, left unopposed, this deck wins fairly consistently by turn six. I'm not sure how it will fare against an actual opponent yet, but I assume it will take slightly longer to accrue the health needed to fire off Aetherflux Reservoir , the main wincon. That's all that can really be gleaned from the playtester. What more I CAN say, however, is what shuts this deck down. Lifegain prevention is the big one. A friend of mine in my playgroup runs a Yidris, Maelstrom Wielder deck with Sulphuric Vortex, and that card is the bane of this deck's existence. In addition, this deck has no method of interaction with Planeswalkers whatsoever, which is unfortunate. I'll add more information here after more play testing, but if you decide to try it for yourself, feel free to leave a comment about how it went!

Future Additions

None, at the moment!

If you want to suggest something, could you please also add what you want it to replace? As in, "I want you to put in X, so take out X." Thanks for your feedback!

Top Ranked	Achieved #61 position overall 8 years ago
Date added	8 years
Last updated	4 years
Key combos	Exquisite Blood + Sanguine Bond Beacon of Immortality + Tainted Remedy Glacial Chasm + Solemnity
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	2 - 0 Mythic Rares 32 - 0 Rares 31 - 0 Uncommons 15 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	2.85
Folders	Oloro, Edh ideas, Oloro Thoughts, EDH, Commander, Potential decks, Xmage, I like these