Last time we talked about the work of art that is Thoughtseize into Tarmogoyf into Liliana of the Veil in the form of a Jund deck captained by Xira Arien. Now don’t get me wrong, I like Jund as much as the next guy. However, I started playing magic back in Battle for Zendikar when a little card called Siege Rhino ruled the roost in Standard, and Abzan will always have a special place in my heart. Sadly, Siege Rhino is not legal in Tiny Leaders, but its trusty leader Anafenza, the Foremost certainly is, and she is a force to be reckoned with. Let’s take a look at what a deck might look like with Anafenza at the helm.
Just like last time we have the bread and butter of a GBx deck, the discard package. Complete with Inquisition of Kozilek, Thoughtseize, Collective Brutality, Hymn to Tourach, and of course Liliana of the Veil. We also have more of the same flexible removal spells in Abrupt Decay and Assassin’s Trophy, and amazingly efficient creatures to generate value in Dark Confidant, Tireless Tracker, Grim Flayer, and Deathrite Shaman.
Okay, okay. By now I’m sure you’re thinking, “Well that’s great, but why did you bother writing this if it’s all the same?”
To answer that, let’s take a peak at what the addition of the colour white gives us. First, we gain access to some of the most efficient creature removal ever printed, namely Path to Exile and Swords to Plowshares. More notably, we get some redundancy in our more expensive but flexible removal in the form of Vindicate being able to take care of anything giving you grief, as well as Council’s Judgment giving you access to a way to deal with indestructible or hexproof permanents (this should bring some relief to any legacy players who are still scarred from their experiences playing against True-Name Nemesis).
Perhaps more importantly, white also gives us access to some of the beefiest and most efficient creatures around. Some are just big, scary, and cheap like Fleecemane Lion, while some provide a little bit more flexibility like Qasali Pridemage giving some extra insurance against artifacts and enchantments in the main deck. We get Lingering Souls to win the game in the skies while your bigger creatures lock up the ground for the ultimate midrange breaker. We have Kitchen Finks gaining some life against the aggro decks while simultaneously generating some incidental card advantage against your grindier matchups. We have Voice of Resurgence forcing your opponent to play hearthstone. We also get the addition of one of the most infuriating creatures to play against, Mother of Runes. Letting your opponent untap while they have a mom in play will almost always result in you having a bad time.
White also gives us access to some stronger sideboard cards. One in particular, Stony Silence, is a huge boon to this deck against combo artifact decks (which I’m sure we’ll see in some future articles, be sure to check back). Eidolon of Rhetoric is a favourite of mine, preventing strategies such as storm from taking over the game. Additionally we have some very efficient disenchant effects in the form of Fragmentize, which reads as a one mana sorcery speed disenchant in this format, and Knight of Autumn for a little more flexibility. You’ll also notice that we’ve moved our Pernicious Deed as well as a copy of Toxic Deluge to the sideboard as the strong creatures added to this iteration of the deck mean we’ll being to sweep the board away less often.
Now we just need to petition Wizards of the Coast to errata Siege Rhino to cost one less mana. As always, check back soon for more updates.
