Wallet Warriors: Arcades, the Strategist
Welcome back Wallet Warriors! So I’m not one to buy into the hype of new cards. I aim to explore the hidden gems that people often forg… Oh who am I kidding?! We’re doing Wall Tribal Mutha Flippaaas!
So. Much. Hype. We’ve got new Elder Dragons! The cards that our format is literally named after! We’ve got a new wall commander that has absolutely everything we could want from a wall commander!
Arcades is almost too powerful. What I mean by that is we rely heavily on him being in play for our strategy to function. We essentially cannot win the game without our big dragon in play. This can be a problem for any EDH deck but luckily our general only costs four mana which makes it feasible to cast him multiple times out of the command zone in a game.
Without further drooling, let’s see the deck list
If you want to see the list separated by the categories I talk about click here.
Deck Overview
When Arcades is in play we are able to get a steady stream of cards while deploying huge threats for very little mana. Without Arcades we are just playing a bunch of walls. While piloting this deck we want to be strategic with how and when we deploy our commander.
We need to be deliberate with Arcades. In the early game if we have a few walls to chain together it can be safe to drop him then try to take advantage of his card draw. In the late game it can often be worth it to keep him in the command zone until we have enough walls to make a powerful attack.
In the mid game it can be reasonable to bring Arcades out but we should have some kind of protection for him such as a piece of countermagic or a flicker spell.
But enough about Arcades, let’s get into the bricks and mortar holding the deck together
We’re Gonna Build A Wall
We have a total of 33 defenders at our disposal. The majority of our walls are simply cheap creatures with high toughness able to swing in for big chunks while we have Arcades out. They also disincentivize our opponents from coming after us which is a useful bonus.
Shield Sphere is the most efficient wall in the deck since with Arcades in play it is effectively a 6/6 that draws a card for no mana! Some other walls in the deck just for their stats and efficient costs are Angelic Wall, Hover Barrier, and Fortified Rampart. Conveniently many walls have flying, intended as an additional defensive bonus, however in this deck it is used as an evasive bonus.
As I mentioned earlier, it is difficult to find redundancy for Arcades since his abilities are incredibly unique and powerful. One way we attempt to sure up our game without the dragon is having walls that draw cards on their own. We have Carven Caryatid, Jungle Barrier, Wall of Blossoms, Wall of Omens and Mnemonic Wall that can replace themselves when they come into play. The best part is they do so twice with Arcades in play!
A specific wall worth mentioning is Wall of Kelp. This little guy is the epitome of a card that would never see the light of day without the right surroundings and that is one of the big reasons I love this format. Arcades notably reads “whenever a creature with defender enters the battlefield under your control, draw a card” This means Wall of Kelp lets us pay two blue mana to make a little wall and draw a card! Commander is the format for weird cards to shine and this one is no exception.
Using Ramparts to Ramp
Because Arcades is so key to our strategy we want lots of ways to ramp on turn two to get him out a turn early. Luckily there are plenty of walls that fill this role while pulling double duty as big cantripping creatures once Arcades is on the field.
Sunscape Familiar, Sylvan Caryatid, Ulvenwald Captive, Vine Trellis, and Wall of Roots are all able to get us to four mana on turn three to speed out Arcades. Overgrown Battlement can do this as well while also being able to generate tons of mana later in the game. Axebane Guardian can’t get Arcades out earlier but it does help us fix our mana while making lots of it.
Apart from our walls that can ramp us we have some more options for turn two ramp and mana fixing. The three signets in our colors, Rampant Growth, Sakura-Tribe Elder and Sol Ring round out our ramp package.
Something that is said a lot, that I definitely agree with, is that ramp and card draw are the two most important things in our format. These two things let you keep up with the rest of the table almost no matter what is going on. They give you access to resources and both complement each other very well. Since Arcades is a great source of card draw we want lots of ramp to go with him.
Protecting and Interacting
We need lots of ways to keep Arcades safe and the cards we have to do that fill multiple roles. The most basic form of protection we have is countermagic.
We have good ol’ Counterspell, Negate, Swan Song and Delay. A small suite of efficient counterspells focusing on non-creature spells since our walls are able to keep most creatures at bay.
Another tool we have to protect Arcades is the ability to flicker him. Momentary Blink, Ghostly Flicker and Eerie Interlude all let our elder dragon dodge spot removal while also giving us the option to draw extra cards by flickering our walls.
Once we have our game plan enacted, we need to be able to shift our focus to what our opponents are up to. The two main ways we interact are by clearing out artifacts/enchantments and wiping the board with cards that synergize very well with our low power creatures.
Nature’s Claim, Broken Bond, and Pir’s Whim give us ways to clear out artifacts and enchantments which are always prevalent in our format.
Slaughter the Strong, Fell the Mighty, Dusk to Dawn, Aligned Hedron Network, and Solar Tide are all ways to clear out creatures that have more power than ours. Often these can act as one-sided board wipes which is a great upside to focusing on walls.
A couple other cards that we are able to play because of our low power are Meekstone and Marble Titan. Stopping our opponents big creatures from untapping can often act as removal, not just stopping them from attacking but also allowing our walls to get in unimpeded.
Best of the Rest
This section only has a few cards but they are all very important to the deck. Assault Formation is one of the key cards in the 99 because it is one of the only cards in the game able to replicate Arcades’ ability to turn on our walls.
Sidar Kondo and Tetsuka Umezawa give most of our walls unblockable because Arcades’ ability does not change their power. These often act as Overrun effects when played in the late game to allow our board to get through to someone who thought they were safe.
Finally Zendikar Resurgent gives us some Arcades redundancy as it essentially provides the same card draw ability that Arcades has except for all our creatures. It also boosts our mana production dramatically so it earns its spot easily.
Upgrades
Solar Tide and Aligned Hedron Network are good budget cards but they are not optimal. Ensnaring Bridge and Retribution of the Meek are cheaper options that accomplish the similar task of punishing our opponents for having higher power creatures than us.
Upgrading our counterspell suite to include some “free” countermagic is important because protecting Arcades is so key to our strategy. Being able to tap out and play our commander without having the shields down completely is a great option to have.
Finally Elspeth is a great win condition that can be added to our list of “one-sided” board wipes. Aura Shards is a card that should probably belong in any creature-based deck that has access to it. Repeatable artifact/enchantment destruction is incredibly powerful since it can clear out the board while stranding cards in our opponents hands.
Wrap Up
Well that’s wall tribal! I hope you enjoyed this article and I swear I will hop off the hype train and get back to focusing on weirder generals (it is a great day when the wall tribal commander is not the weird one).
See you all next time! Cheers!
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