The Coat of Harms [w/ Primer]
Commander / EDH
SCORE: 7 | 2 COMMENTS | 808 VIEWS | IN 1 FOLDER
Bonus Update — Final (Fantasy) Revision 2 —May 16, 2025
Cleaned up the primer, and completely rewrote some sections to explain its performance in terms of our new power brackets system!
Also, I stand by referring to my previous version as the "Final Revision." I've been very happy with this deck, and I consider my quest to "fix it" complete. So, despite plenty of new Knights and Equipment coming out, I haven't felt the need to make room for any of them. Well... almost any of them. Then Final Fantasy spoiler season started.
Battle Angels of Tyr --> card:Freya Crescent
This might seem wild. Battle Angels is not at all a bad card, but I've gotten to play with it a lot, and I've found that you don't have as much control over triggering it as you might expect. While you can use equipment to help force it through, the play patterns still don't match up: if you're behind because you lack equipment, then it struggles to get through on its own and draw the cards you need. If you're ahead of the table due to lots of equipment and can more easily push its damage through, then you don't need its utility effects. That example even assumes that you aren't so far ahead that you fail the ability's condition outright. So, Battle Angels isn't actually achieving its intended role as a utility creature. In the past four games I've cast it, it succesfully triggered (and actually got me something) once over each game, but it only ever gained life. Freya is an unassuming card, but I think she perfectly slots-in as a replacement. She's still an evasive knight but at a much cheaper cost (which does matter for Kayla's Reconstruction and my recursion effects), and she more consistently offers mana in those rare cases where I desperately need it. The supposed loss of Card Draw will not be felt as badly due to the commander drawing cards, in addition to the near full suite of other sources still in the mainboard.
Eowyn, Fearless Knight --> Squall, SeeD Mercenary
Despite this being a deck that often wins more gradually through a resource grind, I'm removing this bit of interaction. Eowyn suffers from the same issue that Swords and Path did, which is being creature-only in a deck that needs to its interaction to kill noncreature stuff. The protection gave me the potential to go for big attacks with Gwyn and Eowyn, but not only have I moved away from surprise kills, I also have colored equipment that fall off when my creatures gain protection! Squall will not only be a far better combat creature—since he matches my squad of other 3-power Double Strikers—but he also provides repeatable recursion, which when it matters, is one of the most powerful effects for this deck.
Sigiled Sword of Valeron --> Dragoon's Lance
I can explain this change much easier. Sigiled Sword of Valeron was already such an iffy inclusion. It's not that powerful as a combat equipment, and it didn't even correctly perform its utility as a "tutorable creature" without already having one in play, such as Syr Gwyn. So, it's practical function overlapped too much with Heirloom Blade. I am instantly replacing it with Dragoon's Lance, which does the same job correctly AND provides evasion with its keyword.
Nomad Outpost --> Shattered Landscape
Getting my land types is much more valuable for this decklist than having access to all pips simultaneously, due to the way I've set up the rest of the manabase. This makes check lands come in untapped more frequently, and it still finds me whatever individual color I'm missing or that I need a second source of.