TAKE IT TO THE BRIDGE

Commander / EDH Creature Cheat Enchant Enchantment Lands Sacrifice Theme/Gimmick Tokens Toolbox Value Engine

clancy292

Enchantment (37)

• 1x Abundant Growth
• 1x Authority of the Consuls
• 1x Curse of Opulence
• 1x Flickering Ward
• 1x Mana Bloom
• 1x Quest for Ancient Secrets
• 1x Spreading Algae
• 1x Counterbalance
• 1x Fertile Ground
• 1x Goblin Bombardment
• 1x Kenrith's Transformation
• 1x Prismatic Omen
• 1x Sanctum of Stone Fangs
• 1x Sterling Grove
• 1x Sylvan Library
• 1x Tectonic Reformation
• 1x Trace of Abundance
• 1x Wheel of Sun and Moon
• 1x Aura Shards
• 1x Bastion of Remembrance
• 1x Enchantress's Presence
• 1x Garruk's Uprising
• 1x Honden of Infinite Rage
• 1x Rhystic Study
• 1x Sanctum of Fruitful Harvest
• 1x Wild Research
• 1x Greater Good
• 1x Hallowed Haunting
• 1x Honden of Cleansing Fire
• 1x Leyline of Anticipation
• 1x Whirlwind of Thought
• 1x Honden of Life's Web
• 1x Honden of Seeing Winds
• 1x Sanctum of All
• 1x Sigil of the Empty Throne
• 1x Sphere of Safety
• 1x Spreading Plague

Land (37)

• 1x Azorius Guildgate
• 1x Bojuka Bog
• 1x Boros Guildgate
• 1x Breeding Pool
• 1x Command Tower
• 1x Dimir Guildgate
• 1x Field of the Dead
• 1x Flooded Strand
• 1x Forest
• 1x Godless Shrine
• 1x Golgari Guildgate
• 1x Gond Gate
• 1x Gruul Guildgate
• 1x Hall of Heliod's Generosity
• 1x Hallowed Fountain
• 1x Island
• 1x Izzet Guildgate
• 1x Maze's End
• 1x Mistveil Plains
• 1x Mountain
• 1x Orzhov Guildgate
• 1x Overgrown Tomb
• 1x Plains
• 1x Rakdos Guildgate
• 1x Raugrin Triome
• 1x Sacred Foundry
• 1x Selesnya Guildgate
• 1x Simic Guildgate
• 1x Stomping Ground
• 1x Swamp
• 1x Temple Garden
• 1x The World Tree
• 1x Vesuva
• 1x Watery Grave
• 1x Windswept Heath
• 1x Zagoth Triome
• 1x Ziatora's Proving Ground

Commander (1)

Instant (11)

• 1x Noxious Revival
• 1x Pull from Eternity
• 1x Cyclonic Rift
• 1x Muddle the Mixture
• 1x Unexpectedly Absent
• 1x Chaos Warp
• 1x Deflecting Swat
• 1x Endless Detour
• 1x Fierce Guardianship
• 1x Oblation
• 1x Commit / Memory

Sorcery (8)

• 1x Farseek
• 1x Nature's Lore
• 1x Three Visits
• 1x Cultivate
• 1x Idyllic Tutor
• 1x Tempt with Discovery
• 1x Terminus
• 1x Reshape the Earth

Artifact (4)

• 1x Arcane Signet
• 1x Scroll Rack
• 1x Bow of Nylea
• 1x Chromatic Lantern

Creature (2)

• 1x Ulvenwald Hydra
• 1x Sphinx of the Second Sun

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Maybeboard

Enchantment (5)

• 1x Porphyry Nodes
• 1x Endless Ranks of the Dead
• 1x Mortuary
• 1x Aid from the Cowl
• 1x Verdant Succession

Land (4)

• 1x Alchemist's Refuge
• 1x High Market
• 1x Homeward Path
• 1x Volrath's Stronghold

Sorcery (2)

• 1x Strike it Rich
• 1x Collision of Realms

Instant (1)

• 1x Fierce Guardianship

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-----------------------------------------------------------{W} {U} {B} {R} {G} TAKE IT TO THE BRIDGE! {G} {R} {B} {U} {W}------------------------------------------------------------

Esika, God of the Tree   deck that focuses on ramping to The Prismatic Bridge   as fast as possible, cheating one or both of the only two creatures in our deck, and a lot of shrines/enchantments/lands with the purpose of mounting value from upkeep triggers and taking advantage of possibly getting land tutors 3 or 4 times a turn from shuffling Ulvenwald Hydra back into the deck. Since we only have two creatures, we can have a lot of fun by putting either one of them back into the deck to pull back out with the Bridge.

Disclaimer

Disclaimer!! Golos, Tireless Pilgrim was recently banned, and in order to appease this change as well as promote a (hopefully) more fun playstyle for the deck, I've swapped out the scout for Ulvenwald Hydra. I plan on changing out some cards that took advantage of Golos's unique attributes in order to play some cards that play better to the Hydra's strengths. I hope this new gameplan will be more fun for me, my opponents, and whoever sees this list and wants to give it a try. Thanks! Leave a like if you enjoy!

UPDATES

December 2021 Show

• Academy Ruins >>> Mistveil Plains Replacing the simpler recursion effect for something with a few more hoops to jump through since our boy, the Ulvenwald Hydra isn't an artifact. A 1-to-1 replacement would be Volrath's Stronghold, but unless someone gets me one for Christmas, that ain't happening. hmu if you're feeling generous :-)

• Alchemist's Refuge >>> Flooded Strand Alchemist's Refuge was originally included to be a tutorable Flash enabler for Golos' second ability, so it isn't as needed anymore. Flooded Strand was just sitting in my binder, and I figure it's better in here than in there. Can search for both triomes, and for another type that Windswept Heath cannot.

• Leyline of Anticipation >>> Greater Good Since we no longer have Golos's ability to worry about on our opponent's turns, we don't need to cast spells as though they had flash. Greater Good was an original idea for the deck, but since Golos was only 3 power, I didn't go for it. Hydra is big so it's more appealing from a card advantage standpoint and working as another free sac outlet if my Goblin Bombardment is indisposed.

• Rites of Flourishing >>> Garruk's Uprising Much like adding Greater Good in the deck for card advantage, including Garruk's Uprising will take advantage of the Ulvenwald Hydra being an absolute unit with the upside of giving it trample in case we decide to attack with it. Rites of Flourishing was included in order to ensure that if we hit more than one guildgate on a Golos activation that we wouldn't get it stuck in exile since we need those to win, so it is no longer needed for that purpose. This new deck does leave room for Exploration effects in order to dump lands after a big Greater Good draw. We shall see as the deck gets playtested and tuned more and more.

January 4, 2022 Show

• Hide / Seek >>> Mirror March The back side of Hide / Seek never got used usually because I never drew it. The front side, which was the reason I ran this card in the first place could tuck away Golos, but Hydra isn't an artifact/enchantment. Mirror March is a cool card because it can create copies of both the Hydra and the Sphinx. More of a fun include.

• Bant Charm >>> Deflecting Swat This is less of a fun include. Although Bant Charm is a flexible card that still works with our new "Commander", The Hydra, Deflecting Swat is such a good card to protect myself that I really decided to shell out for one as a Christmas gift to myself. It can protect my toys, steal removal spells/effects, or any of the other million uses for zero mana. Plus, I added this next card that should have made the list from the get-go since we can trigger it very easily.

• Submerge >>> Aura Shards This is such a good card in the deck. Our gameplan is to have the Hydra enter the battlefield numerous times and create as many tokens as we can. With Aura Shards, we can destroy and police our opponents' artifacts and enchantments cheaply and frequently! Love this card <3

• Smoke >>> Counterbalance This was an agonizing decision to make. I'm a big fan of stax pieces, especially ones that keep me alive longer so I can mess around and accrue value. Smoke was a cool one, but since I've included cards that either make big, powerful armies of tokens that would be great attackers and cards that pay off those tokens dying, I've decided having my armies untap to attack if they don't die before then. Smoke is still a card I could consider if I found the slot for it. I've always loved the value, synergistic abilities, and art of Counterbalance. In a deck where we are constantly shuffling/manipulating our library, it's bound to hit someone's spells and make the purchase worthwhile. It goes hand-in-hand with the next card I added.

• Search for Azcanta   >>> Sylvan Library This one was hard to call, but since Search for Azcanta   requires a filled graveyard to flip, I decided to cut it for another card advantage engine at the 2-mana slot. I had never once flipped Azcanta  , so I'm tagging in Sylvan Library to take its place. Not only is it great baseline in a deck that shuffles very often, but it takes advantage of the extra beginning phases that Sphinx of the Second Sun creates as well as can establish a good Counterbalance flip (aiming for Commander mana values, face up plays, shots in the dark, or just as a bluff). A bday gift for myself!

• Trace of Abundance >>> Fertile Ground This one is pretty simple. Fertile Ground is easier to cast than is Trace of Abundance, and the shroud is pretty negligible in my playgroup. I may work to include it back in for ramp, but mainly I'm looking for some 0, 1, and 3 mana ramp cards to power out The Prismatic Bridge   more efficiently. Fellwar Stone is on the list ahead of Trace of Abundance for inclusion though, so I'd have to be desperate to bring it back.

• Arcane Denial >>> Neutralize Another case of a card that never made it to my hand really. Arcane Denial is definitely one of my favorite counterspells in terms of fairness and power. I'm testing out Neutralize in the deck even though it costs {U} more because of the cycling ability. Being able to hold a counterspell, cycle it, and have re-enter my library through something like Wheel of Sun and Moon sounds like a powerful engine I wanna try. It can be re-tutored with Wild Research like Arcane Denial, but it denies the opponent's draw while powering ours if it isn't needed to stop our opponents' spells.

• Estrid's Invocation >>> Muddle the Mixture Similarly to swapping in Neutralizing and partially to support that decision, I'm adding in another counterspell as well as a powerful tutor for a good portion of my deck. I would say that 90% of the time, I will be grabbing Wheel of Sun and Moon as it is the most important card in my deck. It can find Goblin Bombardment for comboing with Wheel, ramp spells, Unexpectedly Absent for interaction, etc. Very versatile card to replace a versatile card like Estrid's Invocation. It was cut because I value Wheel of Sun and Moon higher than possibly having two copies of a Rhystic Study for example.

• Endless Ranks of the Dead >>> Hallowed Haunting Endless Ranks of the Dead is a fine token generator for this deck, but I'm testing out another route of token generator. Hallowed Haunting not only produces tokens based on casting enchantment spells, which is a lot of our deck + synergizes with some new additions I'll show later, it creates white permanents which are a requisite to activate Mistveil Plains to recycle our graveyard. It also has the flying and vigilance clause once we reach a critical mass of enchantments. This gives our token army flight and offensive and defensive capabilities as well as making Ulvenwald Hydra a massive flying threat.

• Sanctum of Calm Waters >>> Mana Bloom I love Return to Ravnica as a set, and I love value! Mana Bloom is both of those things and warms my heart. Sanctum of Calm Waters is an awkward card for me; its cost is higher or equal to my other draw engines with less of an upside. I've slowly been phasing out my least favorite Shrines out of the deck, and this one finally got chopped. Mana Bloom gives me flexible ramp and fixing up to The Prismatic Bridge   which is better the faster we can achieve it. Its clause that returns it to your hand at the beginning of your upkeep allows us to recast it to either draw off of an effect like Enchantress's Presence/Whirlwind of Thought or create tokens with a new card in the deck: Hallowed Haunting.

• Assemble the Legion >>> Squirrel Sanctuary This may seem a lil wacky, but I'm really laying into the same idea as I did with Mana Bloom. This one creates a Squirrel Token and is recurrable whenever our Hydra or Sphinx dies. This plays into our whole Goblin Bombardment + Wheel of Sun and Moon or Greater Good + Wheel of Sun and Moon combo allowing us to reap the same benefits with a slightly higher cost. Doing my best to make this list closer to an "Enchantress" list since I tagged it as one.

• Crackling Perimeter >>> Bastion of Remembrance The last card that can produce us a new token type. This card provides more damage than Crackling Perimeter could ever offer, as well as healing us just as much, AND creating a 1/1?? Sounds good to me! Crackling Perimeter was a pipe dream in terms of usefulness, especially since I added it alongside Nexus of Fate (which has been taken out since writing this) and Wild Research, but it is definitely a fun include if you're looking for a more fun, less powerful version/play pattern.

January 8, 2021 Show

These card updates are geared towards adding good methods of shuffling from the graveyard to the deck and adding some more ramp!

• Reito Lantern >>> Quest for Ancient Secrets These next few swaps were a little difficult to make. Swapping out Reito Lantern, which is a card I liked and had no issues with, for Quest for Ancient Secrets makes a bit of sense. They can both shuffle cards from any player's graveyard, but Quest for Ancient Secrets does so for significantly less mana up front and per card. I like it. Plus, if it targets myself for the shuffle ability, it recycles the Quest as well.

• Honden of Night's Reach >>> Mortuary I had no clue that Mortuary existed until yesterday, and I promptly went and bought from my LGS. It is essentially a second copy of Wheel of Sun and Moon for our two creatures! And it also can save time by reducing the amount of shuffling my deck I would have to do. I like the Shrines as a backup value engine/win condition, but I'm taking out the least efficient ones and ones that may just make the game less fun for opponents.

• Sanctum of Tranquil Light >>> Bow of Nylea Bow of Nylea was a card I originally considered for the deck, but it got beat out by who knows what. Here it gives our token army deathtouch, which combos nicely with Garruk's Uprising, as well as having four utility abilities. The main one is the ability to recycle cards from the graveyard to the library, but the others aren't useless either!

• Amulet of Vigor >>> Fellwar Stone Amulet of Vigor is not really necessary since we don't have extra land drops per turn like we used to. This may be something I change back, but on the slim chance I draw Amulet of Vigor and get value off of it early game, I think having another ramp spell is better as I can sequence my land drops and be fine if there are too many guildgates stuck in my hand. Chromatic Lantern as a 3 mana rock that fixes our lands will get us straight from 3 mana of any color to the WUBRG we need for our commander. This swap was made for consistency's sake and due to the clutter of 2 mana ramp spells already in our deck.

• Circuitous Route >>> Lotus Petal This is pretty simply to power out The Prismatic Bridge   sooner than Circuitous Route ever could. Lotus Petal is ramp at any part of our curve which is the weakness of a card like Circuitous Route, which we could only cast with 4 mana. This allows us to curve more smoothly into our Commander and start our gameplan faster.

February 14, 2021 Show

Out:

• Swamp
• Squirrel Sanctuary
• Sphere of Safety
• Omen of the Sea
• Nexus of Fate
• Paradox Haze
• Mirror March
• Hall of Heliod's Generosity
• Confounding Conundrum

In:

• Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
• Hidden Stockpile
• Flickering Ward
• Compost
• Mark of Eviction
• Spreading Algae
• Sigil of the Empty Throne
• Mirrorpool
• Mark of Fury

July 27, 2022 Show

Out:

• Mortuary
• Porphyry Nodes
• Hidden Stockpile
• Impact Tremors

In:

• Sphere of Safety
• Leyline of Anticipation
• Endless Detour
• Commit / Memory

Overview and Gameplan

-The idea of the deck is non-creature/enchantment-based gameplay to allow for The Prismatic Bridge   to pull Hydra and/or Sphinx of the Second Sun the upkeep after it hits the field. Shrines get extra value from the Sphinx and Hydra is a house. Whenever you pull Hydra the first time, the main choices for the land tutor are The World Tree for mana fixing, Field of the Dead to start generating tokens/blockers per our singleton mana base, or Maze's End to begin our Guildgate plan, which is the for-sure win condition of the deck. Outside of Maze's End, we can win by value from our token generators, Sanctum of All + Shrines, or the new outlets for burn that I've included in the deck: Bastion of Remembrance and Impact Tremors to take advantage of just how many Zombie, Angel, and Spirit tokens this deck can create. Wild Research is a house and can tutor for nearly everything we would want to; Wild Research + Deflecting Swat can be used to protect our gameplan. The latest addition is the addition of cheap enchantments that can be recycled to our hand to take advantage of Hallowed Haunting/Sigil of the Empty Throne and Enchantress's Presence/Whirlwind of Thought.

Ramp and Mana Fixing

A five-color deck like this one, especially one geared to tutor up lands as its win condition, naturally comes with a full swath of ramp in all forms at multiple Converted Mana Costs (Mana Values). I'll break it down in increasing order:

• 0 cmc: Apart from guildgates, shock lands, two triomes (both searchable with Windswept Heath), and the Command Tower freebie, a good number of our lands are not very useful for mana fixing. The utility lands and basics are not efficient at covering the WUBRG spread to cast our commander, but The World Tree fixes our mana for us. Lotus Petal is a recent addition to the deck to get us to our Commander as fast as possible. It probably won't be fixing necessarily since we can get The World Tree very reliably, but Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth can help us cover black mana if we get bottlenecked.

• 1 cmc: For fixing we have Abundant Growth that turns any land to a rainbow land as well as cantrips on ETB. Curse of Opulence was recently slotted in since it was sitting around doing nothing; it serves double uses here to give us Gold tokens as well as rewarding opponents for attacking someone other than us, hopefully giving us some longevity to pull off our shenanigans.

• 2 cmc: The bulk of our ramp sits at this bit of our curve. Prismatic Omen and Fertile Ground work to get us our precious WUBRG. Farseek, Nature's Lore, Three Visits, and Arcane Signet push us one step closer to getting our engine online. Mana Bloom is not exactly 2 cmc ramp solely, but it exists as a flexible option to ramp us into our preparatory turns as well the turn we commit to taking it to THE BRIDGE  .

• 3 cmc: Sanctum of Fruitful Harvest and Cultivate are both ramp and fixing. I included one basic land of each type for searching with Cultivate to fill any gaps left by our land draw. Sanctum can get us the one color we might be missing to cast our Prismatic Bridge. Chromatic Lantern gets us from 3 mana of any color to the WUBRG spread we need as long as we have enough lands.

• 4 cmc: At this slot, we only have one of my favorite pet cards to rely on. Tempt with Discovery is one of my favorite ramp spells as it allows to tutor up at least one of the 37 different lands in my deck to suit my fancy and set me ahead, all while giving me practice at utilizing my political skills (easily the weakest muscle I have to flex at a commander table).

• 6 cmc: Ulvenwald Hydra is one big ramp spell that we aim to utilize and accrue game-winning value out of through our deck construction.

• 9 cmc: Last but not least, Reshape the Earth is the biggest ramp spell in our deck that can offer us up an instant win if it resolves with an extra uptap step or turn on deck behind its resolution. With Golos, Tireless Pilgrim as the commander, it served well to manipulate it to the top and cast it for the cost of a Golos activation, but in this iteration of the deck, it is a bit more fair as we can't cheat it out for less than it's actual cost. 9 mana, win the game is fair, right?

Removal and Interaction

-The removal and interaction pieces serve double duty here: Chaos Warp/Oblation/Unexpectedly Absent/Terminus/Hallowed Burial/Quest for Ancient Secrets/Noxious Revival are geared to return Hydra and/or Sphinx back to the deck so they can pull them back out and get more land fetches and protect our value pieces, as well as deal with threats on the board or in the graveyard. Pull from Eternity is in the deck for a similar effect to hopefully never be without Hydra if he happens to get exiled. All in all, there are about 13 ways to get Hydra back into the deck if he ends up in the graveyard, and one way to get him back from Exile. Homeward Path is a bit of a personal meta call-out. A friend of mine has a Thassa, Deep-Dwelling deck based around stealing permanents, so I side-board it in against that or if I suspect thievery is afoot. In general, it wouldn't be a terrible card to include since it's the only way that Hydra can be put out of reach of most of our spicy recursion tech cards, especially if they have ways of giving hexproof, shroud, or other nasty effects that may fizzle our attempts to get our boy back.

• Deflecting Swat, Neutralize, and Muddle the Mixture are explained in the UPDATES section, but here they serve the purpose of protecting our gameplan as well possibly hindering our opponents, drawing us cards, or tutoring for Wheel of Sun and Moon, respectively.

Surviving While Spinning Wheels

-Our anti-aggro and stabilization effects like Authority of the Consuls/Honden of Cleansing Fire/Sanctum of Stone Fangs/Bastion of Remembrance are useful for gaining life. In addition to these, we have several token generators that serve to create blockers in case the other outlets aren't online yet: Field of the Dead makes us zombies, Honden of Life's Web produces 1/1 Spirit tokens that are good for chumping or sacrifice fodder for Goblin Bombardment, and last but not least, Hallowed Haunting/Sigil of the Empty Throne generates tokens based off of our enchantment casts. Other ways to police the board include Honden of Infinite Rage/Goblin Bombardment to shoot down creatures (or players).

Powerful Pet Cards

• Wheel of Sun and Moon is a card I discovered while building this deck, and I've gotta say, it's destined to be one of my new pet cards. Enchanting yourself means any one-time-use cards get put back on the bottom to be shuffled back in if The Prismatic Bridge   has no targets to pull out. It also ensures Hydra sticks around as long as he isn't exiled. Goblin Bombardment is featured as a sac outlet if I need or want to do so at instant speed which can fizzle peskier effects that might exile or steal my creatures. And on the converse, Wheel of Sun and Moon is a cute way to hose graveyard, self-mill, or mill decks that can be recycled with Chaos Warp, Oblation, etc. Very flexible card. I love it.

• Wild Research is a bonkers card for this deck. Gambling for an enchantment, most importantly the combo Wheel of Sun and Moon and Goblin Bombardment to start our engine, or an instant, such as our interaction/recursion pieces like Deflecting Swat, is so much value. And, if we already have Wheel of Sun and Moon on the battlefield and attached to ourselves, then discarding the tutored card/other important cards puts them back in the deck to be gambled for again or to be shuffled back from the bottom after any shuffle effect or Prismatic Bridge trigger. If we layer triggers correctly, we can draw the card we discarded for turn if we really wanted to by putting the card on the bottom of our library right below one of the creatures the Bridge   pulls out, as long as we don't shuffle afterwards. This would mean saying no to a land tutor with Hydra which would be very situational. I really enjoy the choices and the intricate decisions this deck and its value engine(s) allow!

• Tempt with Discovery is a funny card that I love. "You can go get a land to pay for my Rhystic Study" is a good way to tempt people lol

• Mana Bloom gives me flexible ramp and fixing up to The Prismatic Bridge   which is better the faster we can achieve it. Its clause that returns it to your hand at the beginning of your upkeep allows us to recast it to either draw off of an effect like Enchantress's Presence/Whirlwind of Thought or create tokens with a new card in the deck: Hallowed Haunting.

Please enjoy and leave a like!

Top Ranked	Achieved #2 position overall 2 years ago Achieved #1 position in Commander / EDH Creature Cheat 2 years ago Achieved #1 position in Commander / EDH Enchant 2 years ago Achieved #1 position in Commander / EDH Enchantment 2 years ago
Date added	2 years
Last updated	1 week
Key combos	Goblin Bombardment + Wheel of Sun and Moon Greater Good + Wheel of Sun and Moon
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	9 - 0 Mythic Rares 41 - 0 Rares 25 - 0 Uncommons 19 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	3.11
Tokens	Angel 4/4 W, Gold, Human Soldier 1/1 W, Spirit 1/1 C, Spirit Cleric */* W, Zombie 2/2 B
Folders	Built Decks, Coolest Decks in Town, Cool, Interesante EDH decks, Bookmarked CMDR, Untapin, Decks, Try, EDH, tri deck, See all 19