Anikthea, Hand of Erebos | Art by Magali Villeneuve

A Star is Born

Welcome back to another EDHREC precon Upgrade Guide. This time, we're aligning the stars for the Enduring Enchantments deck from Commander Masters. Before we go any further, let's get a reading on the original deck.

The face commander for this deck is Anikthea, Hand of Erebos. Anikthea is a five mana enchantment creature with menace, and she provides menace to all your other enchantment creatures. She also can exile an enchantment from your graveyard when she enters the battlefield or attacks and create a 3/3 Zombie token version of that card. 

She's quite strong, though not at the top end of commanders. Her ability can cheat the mana cost on some powerful enchantments, and giving evasion provides a way to get in some combat damage. We haven't gotten a dedicated Abzan Enchantress commander before this, but Anikthea bears some resemblance to Karador, Ghost Chieftain who can pull creatures out of the graveyard. We'll be keeping her as the commander for this upgrade. The deck itself works fine out of the box, but I think some of the cards aren't as impactful as I would like. There's also a self mill package in the deck that I want gone. While I understand that it's there to fill the graveyard for the commander's ability, you only get one enchantment at a time no matter how full your graveyard is, so racing to fill it up might not be as useful as it seems.

Star Players

It seems like many players are leaning harder into the self mill with this commander, with Cemetery Tampering being added to about 45% of the 1,200 or so Anikthea decks on EDHREC. I still want some way to move enchantments into the graveyard, but I want to take some lessons from my own Abzan Enchantment deck and employ some symmetrical discard effects instead.

Before you close the browser or skip to the comments to call me a monster, hear me out. Necrogen Mists and Creeping Dread will put some pressure on our opponents while letting us be more selective in what we're adding to our graveyard. Similarly, Geier Reach Sanitarium will do this and keep everyone at the same hand size; we're not looking to completely shred our opponents hands, after all. Bottomless Pit is a little more rude due to the random nature of the discard, but sometimes you need to be a little mean to win. Solitary Confinement is a great way to discard our best enchantments while staying safe from any damage, and for the most part we can expect our card draw to outpace the upkeep cost.

A few staple ramp cards from enchantress decks were missing from the precon and I wanted to add those back in. Land auras like Wild Growth and Fertile Ground are low cost, and still useful late game to trigger your enchantress effects when you otherwise might not want to cast a ramp spell. 41% of players are already adding Wild Growth and 31% have put in Fertile Ground. Utopia Sprawl would be the other card to add here, but we aren't upgrading the mana base, so we're less likely to have a forest and this card.

Skybind is one of my favorite cards to play with in enchantment heavy decks. Most often we'll be using it to clear out blockers, which can be especially effective when our commander is granting menace to things. It becomes a huge problem for our opponents if we also have Heliod, God of the Sun to make enchantments at instant speed. Aside from that, we can always blink the temple lands for an extra scry. I also added Auramancer for one more thing to blink and to take some of the burden of recursion off of our commander. Weaver of Harmony is showing up in 77% of Anikthea decks so far, and I'm inclined to agree with that. Getting an extra trigger off of our commander or the numerous other effects we're doing is great, and you can't be mad about getting an anthem for enchantment creatures on top of that.

I also wanted to add a few ways to get in some more damage. With deathtouch from Bow of Nylea, our menace creatures will cost our opponents two creatures if they want to block - most of the time they just won't. Grim Guardian is a card I was surprised not to find in the deck. The drain effect is a good supplement to combat damage. Finally there's Fallen Ideal for a commander damage kill. I'm also fond of this card because it goes back to your hand instead of the graveyard, so we can cast it again to trigger our enchantress effects.

The Fault in Our Stars

Now it's time to make some room for all these new cards. First of all, I want to get rid of some of the more traditional ramp cards. Sol Ring and Arcane Signet can stay since they can be used the turn you play them, but I'm not big on using Farseek, Kodama's Reach, and Rampant Growth, when we could be using enchantments that trigger our other effects.

As mentioned earlier, that self mill package has got to go. The Binding of the Titans is already unimpressive even in dedicated Saga decks; it's an easy cut. The Mending of Dominaria is much better, but it's usefulness is hurt by cutting the mill. Nyx Weaver probably could have stayed in the deck, but I really wanted to make room for Auramancer since we're adding Skybind. Mindwrack Harpy was probably the toughest to cut. It gets menace from the commander, so it'd be likely to dish out some damage, but its milling would be a liability against another graveyard deck.

Some of our cuts are just not impactful enough. I've found Cunning Rhetoric doesn't protect you from the attacks that really matter, and enchantress decks tend to be synergistic enough that more often you'd rather cast your own cards. I get that Omen of the Sun makes a decent number of tokens if you cast it, sacrifice it, then bring it back with the commander, but I think better things can be done with that card slot and the six mana. Dreadhorde Invasion is here in the hopes that those Zombie enchantments you've been making get to six power so they get lifelink, but I don't think that's a reliable scenario with this deck. It would be a great include if you wanted to build Anikthea as a Zombie typal deck, though.

Krosan Verge would be better if the deck contained more lands with a basic land type. As it is, it just gets basics and Canopy Vista, and we need room for Geier Reach Sanitarium. I'm not thrilled to share card draw with an opponent with Love Song of Night and Day when I can keep it all for myself and take the risk with Treacherous Blessing, and the other effects aren't convincing me otherwise. Courser of Kruphix isn't bad, but it doesn't provide an extra land drop, which people forget all the time, and I'm not fond of giving opponents that much information as to what's in our hand. Finally we're cutting Narci, Fable Singer. She's a cool card and a great commander in her own right, but we've cut quite a few Sagas and she just isn't getting the support she needs here.

Now that we've seen what's going in and out, let's take a look at the final constellation.

Supernova Goes Pop

The sky's the limit if you're looking to add expensive cards to your enchantment deck. Serra's Sanctum is the poster child for this. It's not as easy to abuse as Gaea's Cradle, but it can still generate absurd amounts of mana. There are plenty of cards that can get back all of your enchantments, but none of them are nearly as efficient as Replenish. At four mana, you'll likely be able to resolve other spells in the turn and it's much easier on the mana base with that single white pip. Argothian Enchantress is probably the best enchantress ever printed. At two mana she's easy to cast, and shroud helps her stay on the board. It's a shame I have to discuss it in this section, because it would have been a great reprint.

If you're looking for something more specific to Anikthea, Parallel Lives and Anointed Procession will double those Zombies she makes. If you decide to run discard instead of self mill to fill your graveyard, Oppression certainly lives up to its name. Forcing a player to discard every time they cast the spell will leave most players Hellbent in a couple of turns. You have to live with that effect too, but it's almost a benefit with the commander giving you ready access to your graveyard. Nylea's Colossus easily makes creatures massive out of nowhere and would be a great supplement to all the evasive tokens this deck seems to make.

Normally I just provide suggestions on expensive cards to add, but since I've had an Abzan Enchantress deck for a few years now, I figured I would share my list so you can see a deck utilizing many of these pricey cards. Mine focuses more heavily on the discard theme, and I still haven't made any additions from the new precon cards, but I know I'm putting Anikthea at the helm as soon as I get her.

Star Struck

I like the final state of our upgraded precon; it feels more focused and a bit more of a challenge to play against. You may have to be a smooth talker for those discard effects, but I don't think they're particularly egregious here. Honestly, keeping that element palatable to the table is why I didn't include Thoughtrender Lamia, even though it would be a powerful include here. Sphere of Safety and Sterling Grove are also cards I would consider if my recommendations aren't to your taste; I certainly have them in the deck I play. This is going to be an interesting experience going forward, since for quite some time there weren't many people doing enchantment decks in this color combination. I'm excited to see what becomes of this archetype now that a lot more people are going to focus on it. Be sure to check out our other primers and upgrade articles, and as always, remember to budget before you buy it.

Scrap Trawlers

Scrap Trawlers is a Magic: The Gathering budget EDH streaming and video group, with gameplay, deck techs, chats, and more. Catch our videos at youtube.com/scraptrawlers. Andy, Lenny, and Bert.