[EDH] Kaalia of the Vast

[Zlatzman]

You could just target one of your lands with Aegis Angel before you play Armageddon. With Avacyn mass land destruction gets rather crazy.

[kombatkiwi]

This deck just keeps getting more and more stuff
Griselbrand
4BBBB
7/7 Flying Lifelink Demon
Pay 7 Life: Draw 7 Cards

[TsumiBand]

Man this deck has a billion cards coming out right now. I think that this guy probably one-ups "draw cards equal to damages dealt" dragon, for the fact that it doesn't depend on jank like Oni of Wild Places. It could just be my shitty luck but the whole "abuse Oni of Wild Places and red guys that do stuff when they ETB" trick has never worked for me.

[Kuma]

I knew when I came to this thread, someone would have suggested Griselbrand.

Where to start? Holy fuck, this guy is broken in EDH. Like, best creature in this deck broken. I read this guy and my brain broke. In this deck, he's Yawgmoth's Bargain for that doesn't make you skip draws. Oh, did I mention he lifelinks?

Lifelinks. A Yawgmoth's Bargain that lifelinks.

In this deck, Griselbrand is the easiest auto-include in the history of auto-includes.

Henceforth, he shall be referred to as Griselbroken.

Man this deck has a billion cards coming out right now. I think that this guy probably one-ups "draw cards equal to damages dealt" dragon, for the fact that it doesn't depend on jank like Oni of Wild Places. It could just be my shitty luck but the whole "abuse Oni of Wild Places and red guys that do stuff when they ETB" trick has never worked for me.

Yeah, Griselbrand is better than Knollspine Dragon for sure. Oni of Wild Places shenanigans doesn't happen often, but it should remain in the deck. There's too much potential for awesome there, and besides, there are lots of other crappy angels, demons, and dragons to cut.

My shitlist right now is, in no particular order:

Deathless Angel
Knollspine Dragon
Reya Dawnbringer
Aegis Angel
Bloodgift Demon
Adarkar Valkyrie
Twilight Shepherd

Any of these cards could go for new angels, demons, and dragons. I hope to replace at least half these guys when Avacyn Restored is fully spoiled.

[TsumiBand]

I knew when I came to this thread, someone would have suggested Griselbrand.

Where to start? Holy fuck, this guy is broken in EDH. Like, best creature in this deck broken. I read this guy and my brain broke. In this deck, he's Yawgmoth's Bargain for that doesn't make you skip draws. Oh, did I mention he lifelinks?

Lifelinks. A Yawgmoth's Bargain that lifelinks.

In this deck, Griselbrand is the easiest auto-include in the history of auto-includes.

Henceforth, he shall be referred to as Griselbroken.



Yeah, Griselbrand is better than Knollspine Dragon for sure. Oni of Wild Places shenanigans doesn't happen often, but it should remain in the deck. There's too much potential for awesome there, and besides, there are lots of other crappy angels, demons, and dragons to cut.

My shitlist right now is, in no particular order:

Deathless Angel
Knollspine Dragon
Reya Dawnbringer
Aegis Angel
Bloodgift Demon
Adarkar Valkyrie
Twilight Shepherd

Any of these cards could go for new angels, demons, and dragons. I hope to replace at least half these guys when Avacyn Restored is fully spoiled.

Decisions, decisions... heh.

My first thought is that Griselbrand pretty well trumps Bloodgift Demon, but card drawing is card drawing and I'd just as soon play Necropotence AND Phyrexian Arena. Aegis Angel and Avacyn have a similar relationship, in that Aegis is the 'Mini-me' to Avacyn. But as the need to protect Kaalia increases (both because the threats we can drop are that much better, and the pressure to kill her will be greater), I think the right answer is ultimately going to be to run both, to keep her alive under more circumstances than not. Reya is sort of unimpressive with all the indestructible the deck can grant, and Knollspine is already on my shitlist.

Since I think I'm going to value indestructibility over recursion (Avacyn over Reya), in my opinion cards like Adarkar Valkyrie and Twilight Shepherd are looking less impressive. You might have another take on it, but the way I see it this deck is setting itself up to depend on Kaalia a little *too* much, meaning the need to protect her is high and the need to take advantage of the indestructible assets that angels are granting en masse by exploiting 1-sided sweepers is increasingly important. Recursion is a slow-trip compared to indestructible, except in the case of a giant sacrifice effect, which AFAICR is generally limited in scope when compared to Wrath effects.

[Kuma]

Decisions, decisions... heh.

My first thought is that Griselbrand pretty well trumps Bloodgift Demon, but card drawing is card drawing and I'd just as soon play Necropotence AND Phyrexian Arena. Aegis Angel and Avacyn have a similar relationship, in that Aegis is the 'Mini-me' to Avacyn. But as the need to protect Kaalia increases (both because the threats we can drop are that much better, and the pressure to kill her will be greater), I think the right answer is ultimately going to be to run both, to keep her alive under more circumstances than not. Reya is sort of unimpressive with all the indestructible the deck can grant, and Knollspine is already on my shitlist.

Since I think I'm going to value indestructibility over recursion (Avacyn over Reya), in my opinion cards like Adarkar Valkyrie and Twilight Shepherd are looking less impressive. You might have another take on it, but the way I see it this deck is setting itself up to depend on Kaalia a little *too* much, meaning the need to protect her is high and the need to take advantage of the indestructible assets that angels are granting en masse by exploiting 1-sided sweepers is increasingly important. Recursion is a slow-trip compared to indestructible, except in the case of a giant sacrifice effect, which AFAICR is generally limited in scope when compared to Wrath effects.

Reya Dawnbringer is definitely the worst creature still in the deck and the first one out. After that, it gets a little murky. I agree that indestructibility > recursion, but no mana > mana, especially when we're trying to blow up all the lands.

Adarkar Valkyrie is pseudo-indestructible with the added benefit of being able to steal opposing creatures after one of our creatures kills them. I think it stays for now.

Deathless Angel grants indestructibility, but at the cost of WW. I think in my entire history of playing the deck I've made one creature indestructible with it. It's probably gone.

The only other possible cut forebearing any more playable angels, demons, or dragons is Twilight Shepherd. It grants resiliency to Wrath of God effects and occasionally allows neat tricks with fetchlands/Armageddon, but I don't think I've ever pulled that off. I think the potential is greater than the crappy indestructible ability.

Right now, I think the changes are:

- Reya Dawnbringer
- Deathless Angel

+ Avacyn, Angel of Hope
+ Griselbrand

[TsumiBand]

Derf.



Yeah, because what a deck that drops a derpy number of huge flyers needs is a way to make them more huge and more resilient. Haha. It's like this whole set is just made to pump up Kaalia in Commander, I'd eyeroll but I bought the precon too so whatever

[Kuma]

Derf, indeed. That card is the hotness on multiple levels.

Question is, do we cut Aegis Angel, Knollspine Dragon, or Twilight Shepherd?

Knollspine Dragon requires a ton of set up, but the rewards are huge.

Twilight Shepherd gives the deck some resiliency to sweepers and potentially lets you get your lands back after an Armageddon

Aegis Angel lets you make Kaalia of the Vast indestructible for no mana investment.

What do you guys think?

[TsumiBand]

Derf, indeed. That card is the hotness on multiple levels.

Question is, do we cut Aegis Angel, Knollspine Dragon, or Twilight Shepherd?

Knollspine Dragon requires a ton of set up, but the rewards are huge.

Twilight Shepherd gives the deck some resiliency to sweepers and potentially lets you get your lands back after an Armageddon

Aegis Angel lets you make Kaalia of the Vast indestructible for no mana investment.

What do you guys think?

Honestly, I feel like Gisela is "both sides" of Archangel of Strife, and it might be worth thinking about cutting that dude for this one. Consider that Archangel gives opponents the option of choosing what's best for them; this card flat out says that we deal more damage and they deal less. To us. Only us. We hit all of our opponents for 2x damage, from ALL sources - Beacon of Destruction is 10 damage for 5 mana and recursive, and that Dragon that gives your team Firebreathing is now doubly effective. Meanwhile, they can only come at us for half damage; but they still get to fight each other for 2x damage.

Obviously their effects are additive, but where Archangel of Strife will sometimes give the opponents an advantage they didn't have before, Gisela will never do that. I would strongly consider cutting Archangel of Strife for Gisela, since honestly those other cards you mention are going a long way towards keeping Kaalia online. Gisela does this too, by making her that much more difficult to just kill. I want to play both, because more aggro is good and their effects in tandem would be nuts. But I suspect the right answer is to cut Archangel.

[Kuma]

I agree that Gisela, Blade of Goldnight is better than Archangel of Strife. The question then becomes, "Is Archangel of Strife better than Knollspine Dragon, Twilight Shepherd, and Aegis Angel?

I actually won a game against a friend of mine who was playing my Kaalia of the Vast deck because his Archangel of Strife gave me exactly enough damage to kill him. Despite that, I feel like I'm almost always getting more out of Archangel of Strife than my opponents. When both cards are out, you're essentially getting +6/+0 from "war" and your opponents are getting either +1/+0 or +2/+0 from "war" when they attack you. They're getting +6/+0 from "war" if they attack each other. Talk about incentives...

There's no arguing that Gisela, Blade of Goldnight is better than Archangel of Strife, but I think I'd rather have both. I'm leaning toward cutting Knollspine Dragon for her, but I have a feeling all of Aegis Angel, Knollspine Dragon, and Twilight Shepherd will be out of the deck by the time Avacyn Restored is fully spoiled.

[TsumiBand]

I agree that Gisela, Blade of Goldnight is better than Archangel of Strife. The question then becomes, "Is Archangel of Strife better than Knollspine Dragon, Twilight Shepherd, and Aegis Angel?

I actually won a game against a friend of mine who was playing my Kaalia of the Vast deck because his Archangel of Strife gave me exactly enough damage to kill him. Despite that, I feel like I'm almost always getting more out of Archangel of Strife than my opponents. When both cards are out, you're essentially getting +6/+0 from "war" and your opponents are getting either +1/+0 or +2/+0 from "war" when they attack you. They're getting +6/+0 from "war" if they attack each other. Talk about incentives...

There's no arguing that Gisela, Blade of Goldnight is better than Archangel of Strife, but I think I'd rather have both. I'm leaning toward cutting Knollspine Dragon for her, but I have a feeling all of Aegis Angel, Knollspine Dragon, and Twilight Shepherd will be out of the deck by the time Avacyn Restored is fully spoiled.

Knollspine Dragon is probably one of the more mana intensive tricks in the deck, which doesn't really gel with the idea that you're going to be playing a bunch of fat and then blow up everyone's mana. Considering that Griselbrand is going to let you Wheel at your leisure and doesn't need to be recast, I'm not sure when Knollspine would ever be a better play, especially after a Geddon effect.

[The Big Ragu]

Kaalia really loves this new expansion, she does. You guys are gonna have a blast getting to play with all of her exciting new friends

[TsumiBand]

Kaalia really loves this new expansion, she does. You guys are gonna have a blast getting to play with all of her exciting new friends

It kind of feels like how Goblins did for a long time... just printing a red utility creature and going "whoops, AND it's a Goblin" instantly gives it +1. Kaalia's retarded like that, and she gets to steal from 3 tribes to boot. It's really kind of stupid haha. Unfortunately it really centralizes the deck in a big way; not getting Kaalia out and protected via Swiftfoot Boots or some other kind of protection means you're just playing a billion huge guys. Which is not the worst position in the world to be in when playing EDH, but the strategy's pretty linear is all.

[TsumiBand]

EH, thptptbthpthpbtthp, I know I'm double-posting, but the original post mentions Kiki-Jiki, and I'm realizing that this set alone has put like....four new Legendary creatures into the deck. If not more, after all there's only a couple of cards spoiled yet. As the Legendary: Non-Legendary ratio starts to favor the numerator, I wonder how much longer Kiki will have any use? Also, ironically, if this balance is off-set too much, I may actually start to favor Oni of Wild Places O_o Truly there is something amiss when Oni of Wild Places starts looking more tech than Kiki-Jiki, hah.

[Kuma]

EH, thptptbthpthpbtthp, I know I'm double-posting, but the original post mentions Kiki-Jiki, and I'm realizing that this set alone has put like....four new Legendary creatures into the deck. If not more, after all there's only a couple of cards spoiled yet. As the Legendary: Non-Legendary ratio starts to favor the numerator, I wonder how much longer Kiki will have any use? Also, ironically, if this balance is off-set too much, I may actually start to favor Oni of Wild Places O_o Truly there is something amiss when Oni of Wild Places starts looking more tech than Kiki-Jiki, hah.

Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker is going to be good in this deck for a long time. We'd have to run a shit-ton of legendary creatures before that would be a problem. Even if you aren't getting a ETB effect from the activation, you're still getting another copy of your biggest non-legendary beater to swing with.

[DarkForce]

A card you can consider that I am running in my version of the deck is Reliquary Tower. This land will be definitely be useful once you add Griselbrand to the deck with all of the cards that you have the potential to draw. It will also work nicely with the Kiki Jiki + Knollspine Dragon combo, so long as you keep Knollspine in the deck (because i know you mentioned you were considering cutting it).
I think Reliquary tower would prove to be much superior to Tainted Field, Spinerock Knoll, or even Hall of the Bandit Lord.

[TsumiBand]

A card you can consider that I am running in my version of the deck is Reliquary Tower. This land will be definitely be useful once you add Griselbrand to the deck with all of the cards that you have the potential to draw. It will also work nicely with the Kiki Jiki + Knollspine Dragon combo, so long as you keep Knollspine in the deck (because i know you mentioned you were considering cutting it).
I think Reliquary tower would prove to be much superior to Tainted Field, Spinerock Knoll, or even Hall of the Bandit Lord.

I think I disagree, on the basis that this deck's plan is often to puke fatties while also tutoring for a Geddon effect. While Avacyn gives the deck the potential to make all forms of Wrath/Geddon completely miss its own side of the table, I don't know that it will be worthwhile to assume that such a line of play will occur often enough to be of any consequence.

The biggest upshot of the big draw effects is that, as long as Kaalia is active, we continue to draw and play threats; lands are only drawn because they are in the deck. So while it's not without merit, I think that ultimately it'll just be in the graveyard along with the rest of your lands; the fact that it will then only be tapping for colorless while it's in play is sort of a dealbreaker, at least for me.

[Kuma]

A card you can consider that I am running in my version of the deck is Reliquary Tower. This land will be definitely be useful once you add Griselbrand to the deck with all of the cards that you have the potential to draw. It will also work nicely with the Kiki Jiki + Knollspine Dragon combo, so long as you keep Knollspine in the deck (because i know you mentioned you were considering cutting it).
I think Reliquary tower would prove to be much superior to Tainted Field, Spinerock Knoll, or even Hall of the Bandit Lord.

You may be right that Reliquary Tower deserves inclusion especially with Griselbrand. There are two issues with Reliquary Tower: This deck likes to blow up all the lands, meaning that Reliquary Tower likely won't do its intended job of keeping our hand large, and this deck is extremely color hungry, meaning we need a good reason to run a land that doesn't make colored mana.

I absolutely hate Tainted Field and Tainted Peak. Still, until Wizards gives me better duals, they're staying put.

Spinerock Knoll is an amazing card because it's so easy to trigger when you're attacking with Kaalia of the Vast.

I have a love/hate relationship with Hall of the Bandit Lord, but getting Kaalia of the Vast swinging is so important that I can't cut it.

I could see Reliquary Tower being better than Volrath's Stronghold, a card I've grown to hate in this deck. I'll take it under consideration.

Man, Wizards needs to print like 3-4 more good duals in this deck's colors and the mana base will be set.

[Sims]

Sooo......

Colorless land that has the ability:

, tap: Target creature gets +2/+0, gains haste and vigilance until the end of turn.

Worth it? Not useful in this particular deck compared to a straight Gisela/Jor kadeen deck?

[TsumiBand]

Sooo......

Colorless land that has the ability:

, tap: Target creature gets +2/+0, gains haste and vigilance until the end of turn.

Worth it? Not useful in this particular deck compared to a straight Gisela/Jor kadeen deck?

Hall of the Bandit Lord, Lightning Greaves and Swiftfoot Boots are still better than this. Kaalia's the one that needs haste most of all, since she's putting dudes into play that don't care if they have haste or not, they're already attacking. Lucksacking a turn 2 hasty Kaalia is about as sexy as it gets and that's a huge Godhand (City of Brass, Mana Crypt, a Signet, Greaves/Boots, and then 3 relevant threats to make it worthwhile). I guess my thought on it is, if I have to spend 6 in one turn to make Kaalia hasty, and I can't split it up as I can with equipment (making it 2 on turn and 4 the next), then it isn't really haste, because I'm waiting for that mana to be open when I could just play a threat and let it get over summoning sickness.

It's the same as the Reliquary Tower suggestion; it's not outright incorrect, but the deck has better things to do and is probably going to just blow that land up along with everyone else's. vOv

If it tapped for W or R or B it might be worth looking at, but for another colorless land to enter this hungry deck it has to either make 2+ mana or just be strictly better than any other colorless land, and I don't think that this is.