Balan, one-punch woman

Commander / EDH Aggro Artifact Attach Competitive Equip Mono-White Protection Theme/Gimmick Voltron

Monomanamaniac

Equipment (25)

• 1x Basilisk Collar
• 1x Batterskull
• 1x Blackblade Reforged
• 1x Bloodforged Battle-Axe
• 1x Colossus Hammer
• 1x Commander's Plate
• 1x Dowsing Dagger  ^Flip
• 1x Godsend
• 1x Grafted Exoskeleton
• 1x Hammer of Nazahn
• 1x Inquisitor's Flail
• 1x Lightning Greaves
• 1x Mask of Memory
• 1x Masterwork of Ingenuity
• 1x Prowler's Helm
• 1x Sanctuary Blade
• 1x Shadowspear
• 1x Swiftfoot Boots
• 1x Sword of Feast and Famine
• 1x Sword of Fire and Ice
• 1x Sword of Vengeance
• 1x Sword of the Animist
• 1x Trailblazer's Boots
• 1x Umezawa's Jitte
• 1x Whispersilk Cloak

Tutor (5)

• 1x Enlightened Tutor
• 1x Open the Armory
• 1x Steelshaper's Gift
• 1x Stoneforge Mystic
• 1x Stonehewer Giant

Land (33)

• 1x Ancient Den
• 1x Arch of Orazca
• 1x Bonders' Enclave
• 1x Buried Ruin
• 1x Castle Ardenvale
• 1x Command Beacon
• 1x Emeria, The Sky Ruin
• 1x Geier Reach Sanitarium
• 1x Inventors' Fair
• 1x Mikokoro, Center of the Sea
• 1x Mistveil Plains
• 1x Myriad Landscape
• 1x Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
• 18x Plains
• 1x Rogue's Passage
• 1x War Room

Removal/disruption (7)

• 1x Dispatch
• 1x Drannith Magistrate
• 1x Grand Abolisher
• 1x Heliod's Intervention
• 1x Path to Exile
• 1x Swords to Plowshares
• 1x Winds of Abandon

Mana ramp (6)

• 1x Keeper of the Accord
• 1x Knight of the White Orchid
• 1x Land Tax
• 1x Smothering Tithe
• 1x Wayfarer's Bauble
• 1x Weathered Wayfarer

Commander (1)

Protection (9)

• 1x Akroma's Will
• 1x Devoted Caretaker
• 1x Eerie Interlude
• 1x Flawless Maneuver
• 1x Giver of Runes
• 1x Indomitable Archangel
• 1x Leonin Abunas
• 1x Mother of Runes
• 1x Teferi's Protection

Equipment payoff (6)

• 1x Ardenn, Intrepid Archaeologist
• 1x Armored Skyhunter
• 1x Halvar, God of Battle  ^Flip
• 1x Puresteel Paladin
• 1x Sigarda's Aid
• 1x Sram, Senior Edificer

Mana rock (5)

• 1x Arcane Signet
• 1x Mana Crypt
• 1x Mox Amber
• 1x Mox Opal
• 1x Sol Ring

Draw (3)

• 1x Endless Atlas
• 1x Mangara, the Diplomat
• 1x Tome of Legends

Maybeboard

Other (85)

• 1x Accorder's Shield
• 1x Akroma's Will
• 1x Angel of Jubilation
• 1x Angelic Guardian
• 1x Archangel of Thune
• 1x Argentum Armor
• 1x Armored Ascension
• 1x Armory Automaton
• 1x Assault Suit
• 1x Aven Mindcensor
• 1x Basri Ket
• 1x Bonders' Enclave
• 1x Bone Saw
• 1x Bonehoard
• 1x Burnished Hart
• 1x Caged Sun
• 1x Captain's Claws
• 1x Cathar's Shield
• 1x Cobbled Wings
• 1x Concerted Effort
• 1x Condemn
• 1x Conqueror's Flail
• 1x Containment Priest
• 1x Crashing Drawbridge
• 1x Danitha Capashen, Paragon
• 1x Darksteel Mutation
• 1x Eerie Interlude
• 1x Eldrazi Monument
• 1x Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
• 1x Elspeth, Sun's Champion
• 1x Empyrial Plate
• 1x Endless Horizons
• 1x Faith's Shield
• 1x Fleetfeather Sandals
• 1x Foundry Inspector
• 1x Geier Reach Sanitarium
• 1x Generous Gift
• 1x Golem-Skin Gauntlets
• 1x Grafted Wargear
• 1x Heavenly Blademaster
• 1x Heliod, Sun-Crowned
• 1x Helm of the Host
• 1x Hero's Blade
• 1x Jhoira's Familiar
• 1x Keeper of the Accord
• 1x Kemba, Kha Regent
• 1x Kismet
• 1x Konda's Banner
• 1x Kor Cartographer
• 1x Lapse of Certainty
• 1x Leonin Abunas
• 1x Linvala, Keeper of Silence
• 1x Loxodon Warhammer
• 1x Loyal Unicorn
• 1x Mace of the Valiant
• 1x Magebane Armor
• 1x Maul of the Skyclaves
• 1x Moonsilver Spear
• 1x Nahiri, the Lithomancer
• 1x Nim Deathmantle
• 1x Ogre's Cleaver
• 1x Quietus Spike
• 1x Relic Seeker
• 1x Reliquary Tower
• 1x Ring of Thune
• 1x Second Sunrise
• 1x Sejiri Shelter  ^Flip
• 1x Sigil of Distinction
• 1x Skullclamp
• 1x Soul of New Phyrexia
• 1x Spidersilk Net
• 1x Stitcher's Graft
• 1x Stoneforge Masterwork
• 1x Strata Scythe
• 1x Sublime Archangel
• 1x Sword of Sinew and Steel
• 1x Teferi's Protection
• 1x Teshar, Ancestor's Apostle
• 1x Tome of Legends
• 1x Treasure Hunter
• 1x Vedalken Orrery
• 1x Wall of Reverence
• 1x War Room
• 1x Worldslayer
• 1x Wrath of God

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A vicious voltron style deck that kills opponents with a single hit. Balan is a very powerful commander with a single goal, cheat on equip costs and strike to deal 21 commander damage as fast a possible. With the help of a few powerful equipment this deck can devastate opponents. The main one punch combos are: Balan, Wandering Knight + Grafted Exoskeleton + Whispersilk Cloak , Balan, Wandering Knight + Colossus Hammer + Prowler's Helm , or Balan, Wandering Knight + Commander's Plate + Inquisitor's Flail as well as many others will let you end the game with one punch

A word on equipment

Normally equipment have a much higher cost than you think. You must pay to cast and you must pay to equip, and that means that even 0 cost equipment cost their equip costs. Balan cheats this system by having an ability that allows you to equip them for 1 at instant speed. This makes some equipment that might not work otherwise great additions to the deck.

creatures

Since the focus of our deck is our commander, the creatures are mostly just going to be small creatures that slow our opponents down. Balan won't hit the field until you have 6 mana so you need to use creatures to bait out removal. Devoted Caretaker not as flexible as the runes sisters but can still offer protection from Instants and sorceries you any permanent this deck controls. Giver of Runes , Mother of Runes grants protection, which keeps the commander in the game or let her hit home with pseudo unblockable. Weathered Wayfarer a highly efficient ramp tool, helping this deck keep up with the land ramp of other decks. Drannith Magistrate shuts down enemy commanders until he's dealt with. Grand Abolisher my turn is mine, stops opponents from easily interacting with my turn. Knight of the White Orchid decent low costed ramp that also happens to be a knight. Leonin Shikari instant speed equip lets the deck be more flexible. Puresteel Paladin one of the best creatures in the deck, draws cards for playing equipment and makes equip costs 0. Sram, Senior Edificer a possible co-commander for the deck. Great source of card draw. Stoneforge Mystic one of the most powerful cards in any voltron deck, she tutors for an equipment and can cheat costs on casting. Ardenn, Intrepid Archaeologist an interesting set up card, he can give a creature a pseudo Balan like equip ability, or enable Balan to equip without spending Mana for hers. Keeper of the Accord mainly used to help the deck keep up with land ramp decks., Leonin Abunas hexproof for all of this decks artifacts. Makes them harder to interact with. Indomitable Archangel shroud for artifacts and a flying body. Mangara, the Diplomat a nice spin on a taxing effect that gives an advantage to opponents playing cards. Armored Skyhunter an evasive creature with an amazing effect that pulls equipment from the top of the deck and puts them straight onto a creature without targeting. Stonehewer Giant tutors for whatever tool the deck needs and helps end the game by putting it directly onto a creature. Really good because it doesn't target.

Spells

The deck feature a modest number of spells to help with removal and protection, as well as using a few tutors for the important combo pieces. Enlightened Tutor one of the most efficient tutors, to get any equipment, Mana rock, or valuable enchantment and get it to the top of the deck is a very powerful ability. Dispatch exile for that has little downside. Path to Exile affordable single target creature removal that gives a small benefit. If the deck needs to can be used to target its own creatures for ramp. Can also be used to give an opponent more lands to enable the ramp effects that are dependant on them having more lands. Steelshaper's Gift tutors for an equipment, and is very inexpensive to cast. Swords to Plowshares affordable single target creature removal that gives your opponent only a slight condolence for having their creature exiled. Heliod's Intervention Mass artifact/enchantment removal that's targeted, or massive life gain. Scales with how much mana you put in. Open the Armory tutor for any equipment for just 2 mana. Winds of Abandon powerful single target removal or it can be overloaded to open up all opponents at once. This is a poor man's cyclonic rift and it's a great card. Eerie Interlude a descent way to avoid removal. Flawless Maneuver the only spell that can make this deck's creatures indestructible that is potentially free to cast. Teferi's Protection the ultimate in protection, phasing out of all this decks permanents and preventing it's opponents interactions. Best uses against a board wipe once this decks key cards are in play.

Enchantments

Land Tax an almost guarantee to fix land drops needed to get Balan into play on schedule. This it's a powerful enchantment that works best if this deck is not going first, essentially ensuring its hand will be flooded with lands early on. Even if some of those lands and up being discarded it's still useful to thin the deck out a little bit. Also it doesn't generate meaningful ramp so it doesn't interfere with the other land ramp cards in the deck. Sigarda's Aid one of the best tools for equipment voltron, attaching for free when they come into play and playing equipment at instant speed. Ideally the equipment will be on the field when Balan comes into play, but this is good for setting up the board and letting it keep up threats in hand till the last second. Smothering Tithe white staple that produces a lot of mana. It is hard to pay the tax and eventually your opponents will stop altogether.

Non-equipment Artifacts

These artifacts serve to ramp and let the draw, speeding it to 6 mana and beyond. Mana Vault the most powerful Mana rock in the game. Mox Amber situational ramp that's easy enough to use and it's very cheap to cast. Once Balan is in play it will always tap to produce a white, which is good for using Balan's activated ability. Mox Opal an amazingly efficient Mana rock that can be counted on more times than not. Sol Ring best mana rock available. Wayfarer's Bauble a great ramp card that should be in any non-green commander deck. Arcane Signet 2 cost that taps for 1 white every turn is great. Endless Atlas great consistent card draw. Tome of Legends much needed card draw that rewards the deck for doing what it's designed to do.

Equipment

Balan just needs to get to 11 power to be lethal, due to her double strike ability. This deck uses a few equipment that get her there quickly, and a few that make her difficult to stop; making her very deadly often as soon as she his the board. Basilisk Collar deathtouch and lifelink are great abilities. Bloodforged Battle-Axe this axe can quickly make deadly copies of itself. One interaction with this card is that if Balan is equipped with this equipment only, and she hits an opponent, she can use get activated ability to attach the copy at instant speed and gain double-strike by having 2 equipped. Colossus Hammer without balan this card is a joke, but she makes it deadly. With just this and 1 more equipment, balan is swinging for lethal. This is a key combo card. Commander's Plate a powerful equipment that gives a huge stat boost and amazing protection abilities. Equipped to Balan this card will give her pro red, blue, green, and black. Masterwork of Ingenuity any Equipment you control for 1. It can be an extra copy of any equipment that the deck has already played that's non-legendary. Shadowspear provides great key words and can take the shields down from opponents creatures. Blackblade Reforged super powerful equipment that gives a massive boost equal to the amount of lands this deck has in play. Dowsing Dagger   useful as an equipment and useful as a land. Inquisitor's Flail halves the amount of power needed to kill opponents by doubling damage output. Lightning Greaves haste and shroud. With balan you don't have to worry about shroud slowing her down too much, because she can bypass it with her ability, and haste is great. Mask of Memory card draw is important enough to discard. Prowler's Helm pseudo unlockable, with this Balan can only be blocked by walls. Swiftfoot Boots hexproof and haste are a great combo. Sanctuary Blade poor man's Sword, this weapon grants efficient protection which can make it harder to block Balan. Sword of the Animist mana ramp that's guaranteed even if the creature gets blocked. Trailblazer's Boots more basically unblockable. Umezawa's Jitte v versatile card that has a lot of good options. Godsend great equipment that gives good stats and an exile trigger. Sword of Fire and Ice a legendary equipment which can deal damage to any target and draws a card every time Balan connects. Sword of Feast and Famine a legendary weapon that punishes the opponent who gets hit (if they survive) and untap all of this deck's lands enabling it to be more ready to respond to threats. Sword of Fire and Ice a powerful equipment that gives decent protections, can draw cards from combat damage and deal extra damage at the same time. Sword of Vengeance decent keywords including haste and vigilance, and stat boost. Whispersilk Cloak unblockable and shroud. Grafted Exoskeleton infect is nice, just 10 points. The deck just needs this and 1 other equipment to start taking players out. Hammer of Nazahn sigarda's aid meets darksteel plate, this is the most powerful equipment in the deck. Batterskull comes down as a living weapon, so it's a 4/4 creature with vigilance and lifelink and when Balan comes into play it will give her a decent buff and good keywords. It can also dodge removal if it needs to

lands

The abundance of artifacts means this deck can afford to use several nonbasic lands. Arch of Orazca having the ability to draw on a land in invaluable. Bonders' Enclave adorable repeatable draw that relies on having a strong creature. Buried Ruin great for bringing back artifacts that this deck's opponents kill. Emeria, The Sky Ruin late game recursion for threats this deck's opponents get rid of. Geier Reach Sanitarium draw spell on a land, can be used to did through the deck to key answer cards. Inventors' Fair tutor for any artifact. Also can give this deck a small amount of life. Mikokoro, Center of the Sea can be good in certain situations, and it's a land. This deck needs the card draw and often can do more with it than its opponents. Myriad Landscape decent mana ramp. slow, butthus is a mono-white deck. Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx explosive mana ramp. Ancient Den artifact land produces white and helps with metalcraft. Mistveil Plains decent recursion which can put any card in the graveyard back into the deck to be fetched later, or to be usable once the library it's shuffled. Castle Ardenvale good backup plan to get bodies in the battlefield. War Room pay Mana, 1 life, and draw a card is decent enough to see play.

general strategy

This deck begins the game as quickly as it can, utilizing spells and creatures while playing key equipment early even if they're not getting equipped. The first goal is to get 2 or more equipment and be able to produce 6 mama by turn 3-4. Once that is accomplished the deck moves into phase 2, dropping in Balan and using her ability immediately equip every equipment on the board to her. If that goes right and she ends up with haste then The goal is to slam her into the strongest player on the board.The first player this deck takes out will be surprised, but it will aggro the other 2 players onto it instantly. So it has to be sure to kill the strongest player first. Hopefully the other players can't react fast enough to avoid dying. The focus of this deck is speed, evasion, and ramp as much as possible.

cards that are good with this deck but I'm not running

There are a lot of great cards that can be in a Balan deck that I'm not running for my own reasons.

Creatures

Angel of Jubilation decent buff to creatures this deck controls and prevents sacrifice effects. Angelic Guardian source of indestructible, but costs too much. Archangel of Thune powerful creature that gives a buff to every creature this deck controls, but this boils isn't focused on creatures. Armory automation good replacement stand in for Balan, but it got edged out by creatures that protect Balan. Sven mindcensor a high value stax card that punishes tutoring. Burnished Hart decent ramp, but I don't need 2 lands for 6 mana. Containment Priest a stax card that deals with graveyard recursion. Crashing Drawbridge very decent haste enabler, but lack luster late game and doesn't have haste. Danitha Capashen, Paragon a great cost reducer card that helps get equipment onto other targets besides Balan. Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite great control card that licks down the opponents board while buffing the creatures in its side. This card is amazing, but high cmc. Foundry Inspector decent cost reducing card that makes it easier to swarm the battlefield with equipment. The decks current avg cmc is 2.2 so it's not really needed. Heavenly Blademaster a backup win con that can buff all the creatures on its side of the battlefield and equip all the equipment to. Heliod, Sun-Crowned powerful life gain and buffing card, but not really what I'm going for overall. Jhoira's Familiar lowers the casting cost of historic spells, but costs 4 to play. Kemba, Kha Regent can steady create an army of cats, but doesn't synergize with Balan. Kor Cartographer fetches a plains, but you're paying 4 for 1 land and a body. Linvala, Keeper of Silence a powerful stax card, I don't own it so I'm not putting it in the deck until I do. Loyal Unicorn vigilance and prevent all combat damage to creatures on its side of the battlefield is good, but it's 4 cmc and isn't an equipment. Relic Seeker an equipment tutor, but it is slow and requires a lot of set up. Soul of New Phyrexia big creature that gives all permanents on its side of the battlefield, but it's 10 mana to set up and 5 each time it's repeated. Sublime Archangel turns all the utility creatures on its side of the battlefield into a buff for Balan. I am planning on adding it back in because it's a bomb. Teshar, Ancestor's Apostle repeatable recursion for artifacts. Not as flexible as skin titan. Treasure Hunter artifact recursion. Wall of Reverence repeated life gain.

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Balan, one-punch woman

Commander / EDH Monomanamaniac

SCORE: 36 | 36 COMMENTS | 3396 VIEWS | IN 6 FOLDERS

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Top Ranked	Achieved #43 position overall 11 months ago Achieved #36 position in Commander / EDH 11 months ago Achieved #1 position in Commander / EDH Artifact 11 months ago Achieved #1 position in Commander / EDH Competitive 6 months ago
Date added	1 year
Last updated	1 day
Key combos	Balan, Wandering Knight + Grafted Exoskeleton + Whispersilk Cloak Balan, Wandering Knight + Colossus Hammer + Prowler's Helm Balan, Wandering Knight + Commander's Plate + Inquisitor's Flail
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	12 - 0 Mythic Rares 44 - 0 Rares 21 - 0 Uncommons 4 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	2.18
Tokens	1/1 Soldier, 0/2 Plant, Copy Clone, Treasure, 0/0 Germ, 1/1 Human, City's Blessing
Folders	Fun Commander Decks, Uncategorized, edh, Deck1, Balan, Wandering Knight, Mono