Is mono-white playable?
Commander Deck Help forum
Posted on Nov. 10, 2015, 12:51 p.m. by MagicalHacker
So I am building a budget-ish mono-white equipment-based edh deck to play on magic online (unfortunately Batterskull is 17 tix and Enlightened Tutor is 10 tix sad face). Nahiri, the Lithomancer: Armed and Dangerous (MO)
The point of the deck is four-fold:
- Have equipment like Ogre's Cleaver and Tatsumasa, the Dragon's Fang to make my 1/1 tokens relevant
- Have good equipment like Pariah's Shield and equipment support like Puresteel Paladin
- Have token support like Coat of Arms
- Be a deck that can deal with other decks to an extent, using board wipes, spot removal, and Humility
However, I really want some card from the maybeboard in the main deck, notable Knight-Captain of Eos, who would be a powerhouse with Nahiri.
What do you think? Are other cards from the maybeboard worthy? Am I over-valuing having my creatures turn into big creatures? Is the deck too much of a glass cannon?
MagicalHacker says... #3
Depending on how well Slate of Ancestry works, it may eventually get replaced with Mind's Eye. Although I usually like Farsight Mask better, it doesn't trigger off hitting a planeswalker, so my commander makes it less valuable.
With over 40 artifacts and 30 lands, I don't think Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx would be that useful unfortunately. I gotta keep up my Plains count for Land Tax, Strata Scythe, Oath of Lieges, and Emeria, The Sky Ruin.
I decided to take out Dispatch for Knight-Captain of Eos.
November 10, 2015 1:27 p.m.
Interesting deck, but I'm pretty sure you don't have enough creatures in there, and to my eye you don't have enough token generators to make up for that.
I also think that making this a dedicated equipment deck may help, too. In which case, I would recommend Brass Squire. Attaching equipment at instant speed is a fabulous trick for equipment decks. Also, creatures with equipping effects, such as Kor Duelist will be great for you.
And maindeck that Mother of Runes and the Jitte. Those are almost good enough that you could drop a random card from the 99 and it would be an improvement. Almost.
Cards I expect to underperform? Rogues Gloves and Mask of Memory will almost never net you card-draw. If you're swinging with one big, burly, equipped critter, players will block. Replace them with more reliable card draw.
November 10, 2015 5:11 p.m.
RedUndead40 says... #5
With what Egann was saying, you could possibly replace Mask of Memory with an Infiltration Lens for an other-side-of-the-coin version of draw. Especially if you are throwing it on a big creature with other equipment on it.
November 10, 2015 5:16 p.m.
MagicalHacker says... #6
So update: I removed Dragon Throne of Tarkir, Golem-Skin Gauntlets, Dreamstone Hedron, and Pennon Blade for Hero of Bladehold, Knight-Captain of Eos, Swiftfoot Boots, and Blade of Selves.
I think that probably changes things lol xD
Egann, my commander makes tokens, so while I'm not completely relying on that, I think having creatures in the deck for the main purpose of having something to hold an equipment would worsen the deck.
Brass Squire and Auriok Windwalker are both cards I previous thought about, but I'd rather have Indomitable Archangel and Leonin Abunas in over them, and shroud turns off their abilities. Instant speed equipping may be worth it though, and Leonin Shikari comes in, but that's an unknown to me currently.
Mother of Runes and Silverblade Paladin are cards that would be great creatures that also improve other creatures, so they are still in the maybeboard because I don't know what I'd remove.
As for Umezawa's Jitte, I really like it, but at the same time, everytime I've seen it in commander, I always felt like it did a lot of little stuff. Stuff that gets easily overshadowed in the format of big stuff.
Rogues Gloves and Mask of Memory will probably be hard to use, but when you're playing mono-white equipments, equipments that let you draw cards seems like a necessary evil. If these under perform, I want at least 1 more card to draw more cards at 4 mana or less.
RedUndead40, I actually have that in the deck already lol. sorry!
November 10, 2015 10:05 p.m.
Playable? Yup. Good? Unlikely.
You're playing Ogre's Cleaver while questioning if Jitte provides enough value? It does.
Mother of Runes is really good. Play it.
Faith's Shield would fit well and Rebuff the Wicked could as well. I think you could drop some of your lower impact or higher cost equipment to add them. They would let you protect your investments in the boardstate.
Mishra's Workshop really deserves a spot in here considering your need for colorless mana.
Karmic Justice is something to consider if people are targeting your artifacts.
Grasp of Fate and Turn to Dust are good if you are playing multiplayer. They give you a chance to interact over a longer game.
November 11, 2015 11:58 a.m.
RedUndead40 says... #9
" I want at least 1 more card to draw more cards at 4 mana or less."
You may want to consider Pursuit of Knowledge. It takes time to set up, and you have to skip 3 draws before it goes off, but when it does you're effectively getting 4 card advantage for 4 mana. Not even Blue can match that.
The downside of course is if it gets removed when it has 2 counters on it you've wasted 2 draws. High risk high reward.
November 11, 2015 1:05 p.m. Edited.
To answer the question posed in the title of the thread: It depends on your definition of playable.
If you want a decent deck that performs well at casual kitchen table matches, mono white white is fine. If you're wanting to build something to take to tournaments, no. Mono white is arguably the single worst color / color combination in EDH. Even mono red is marginally better due to having access to two powerful commanders (Purphoros and Krenko). Mono white suffers from problems with speed, card advantage, and stack interaction outside of targeted removal, making it as of now unusable at any higher level of play.
But since you stated you're just wanting to play around with it on MTGO, you should be fine.
November 11, 2015 6:11 p.m.
MagicalHacker says... #11
To everyone, thank you for the comments, I really am having a tough time figuring out what to add, what to cut, etc.
Ohnoeszz, Nahiri's first ability makes equip costs not matter that much. Nahiri's second ability makes cmc's not matter that much. Basically, it's the effect of the cards that matter more than the amount of mana you would normally pay for them. The good thing about Ogre's Cleaver is it makes a 1/1 be able to kill a titan or put someone on a 7 turn clock. Very few equipments can give that much power boost to a 1/1 without having any loops to jump through.
Jitte is a card I really like, but I can't figure out what card I like less from the deck.
Mother of Runes is a good card for sure, but I don't want to stuff the deck with non-equipment or sacrifice synergy to make it close to a good-stuffs deck.
Faith's Shield and Rebuff the Wicked are cards I would 99.99% never play in EDH, especially when I still have so many cards I like so much for the deck.
Mishra's Workshop is nice, but I kinda want to be able to play my commander, and this doesn't let me do that.
Karmic Justice is nice, but Leonin Abunas and Indomitable Archangel can also hold equipment.
I've never liked Oblivion Ring effects because of the way they can be undone. Removal doesn't help you win, but it helps you not lose. But if that removal can be removed, it's not very good at it's job.
Return to Dust was in the deck at one point, but I took it out to make more room for equipment shenanigans.
RedUndead40, it was in the deck at one point, but I am keeping it in the back of my mind just in case I need more draw.
NarejED, thanks for the feedback! I'm thinking that my most competitive mono-colored deck will be mono-red Purphoros featuring Blood Moon, Magus of the Moon, From the Ashes, Ruination, Burning Earth, and maybe Price of Progress.
November 11, 2015 7 p.m.
Cyberpunkette says... #12
I based my 8.5 Tails deck off of the best white deck I've seen in commander. Eight-and-a-Half-Tails | Equipment Voltron. I've won many games destpite not getting the chance to use it much.
November 16, 2015 12:07 p.m. Edited.
MagicalHacker says... #13
Allisin, thanks for the comment! I will only mention that I've had issues regarding that deck due to the attitude of its builder, and I'll leave it at that.
I already have a Voltron deck around Thrun, so I wanted something a little different, and this equipment deck has been so much fun after the changes I've made. I ended up seeing that the deck was waaaay to slow and fragile, so I followed Egann's genius advice (thank you!) and added 1- and 2-drop creatures to hold equipments, and also provided my deck with more synergy in itself (added Fireshrieker and the two missing sword-of's). This deck has gone 6-1 of the games I've played so far, which is really surprising but awesome! I can't wait to put in Blade of Selves, which obviously wouldn't in a Voltron deck lol
November 16, 2015 4:04 p.m.
Didgeridooda says... #14
White can do alright I guess, but to answer your title, no it is not.
Splash another color at the least.
November 16, 2015 4:42 p.m.
MagicalHacker says... #15
Lol I've had soooo much fun winning a lot of games with this mono white deck though! XD
RedUndead40 says... #2
Mono W can work well in EDH, but you have to build around it a bit. Personally I run a Darien, King of Kjeldor soldier tribal EDH deck and it runs very well. The main problem you will run into is draw power.
I'd suggest adding a few more draw engines like Mind's Eye or Farsight Mask. Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx would also fit very well here.
Otherwise that looks good!
November 10, 2015 12:59 p.m. Edited.