(Liesa, Forgotten Archangel | Art by Dmitry Burmak)

De-Liesia-ous Archangel

Greetings and salutations from a country which loves cheesing opponents, cheesy stories and cheese in general! I'm Arnaud, and I'm thrilled to take you on a journey of uncanny brews, budget cards, and usage of EDHREC’s filtering features.

Here we are again, reunited for our now traditional bi monthly get-together to explore budget venues for commanders you get to pick. Last time, we left Shalai and Hallar and their pinging devices with a poll attempting to dwell into darker secrets. I've followed with attention the evolution over time, and I have to admit: it's been a tight match. Early on, Rodolf Duskbringer took a decent lead, but saw that advance slowly but surely getting eaten up by an eager Liesa, Forgotten Archangel. Shirei, Shizo's Caretaker stayed the lonely outsider all along, never really standing a chance.

In the end, Liesa took the win with 38% of the votes, followed by Rodolf (32%) and Shirei (30%). All in all, quite a tight bundle, which tells me a couple of things. First, obviously, there were quite a few of you who tried bending the odds in favour of their champion. Exactly 439 votes is no fluke, and for that alone I thank you. It is also a clear illustration of the diversity of the EDH community and of the broad array of builders we have. I would love to please all of you and produce three lists every other week, but that would probably be a drag to read, not to mention a nightmare for my lovely editors.

With that being said, Liesa stood out as the clear winner, so let's take a closer look at this uncanny challenger.

Stats-wise, this beautiful Angel is a solid beater all around. 4/5 with evasion and lifelink for 5 mana is no fluke. I haven't yet gotten a look at the rest of the selection from the EDHREC page, but the Voltron in me definitely resonates with this.

Her abilities are interesting as well. Getting rid of any creature our opponents allow to die while getting ours back to hand to replay again and again... Shenanigans galore if you ask me! I'm hoping for a lot of enter-the-battlefield effects (EtBs) here.

Interestingly, this is a somewhat popular commander, helming 2,788 decks at the time of writing, with a plethora of specific themes (Aristocrats, Lifegain, Angels, Shadowborn Apostles, Sacrifice...) to boot. Since the abilities don't command a specific build, we might dab into some of these specificities later on.

Now then, let's pluck everything that's on the general page on EDHREC and dump these into a deckbuilding website. 288 cards, surely we can work something out, right?

First Trim – The Cardboard Chainsaw Massacre

Let's do the usual cuts. No cards above $1 must survive! To somewhat lessen the pain, we'll use the cheapest available versions on TCGPlayer at time of writing. Doubtful that there'll be any dog-chewed monsters, but that will help keeping more stuff in.

After this initial trim, we're down to 158 cards, and I'm quite happy. In the past few iterations, we've had much worse to work with. As usual, let's have a look at the best cards below $2 that did not make this step by a smidge.

• Kaya's Ghostform: Whenever my commander is somewhat relevant to the build and I'm playing black, this is an Aura I'll gladly include. Cheap protection from almost all removal is no joke. $1.01 is a bitter one, though.
• Path to Exile: The second best removal spell in white currently stands at $1.02. Bitter joke, strike two.
• Fanatical Devotion: A classic sac outlet of any Aristocrats build, and a fantastic protection tool. In conjunction with our commander though, it becomes a powerhouse. $1.05, strike three. Stop trolling me, Liesa!
• Night's Whisper: One of the best instant card-draw spells of all time. I love this card so much!
• Morbid Opportunist: Another classic of Aristocrats, a great card draw engine.
• Drana and Linvala: In my analysis of March of the Machine, I had a sweet spot for this pair. Bound to make stupid stuff happen.
• Deadly Dispute: Same as Night's Whisper. Cheap, efficient and sacs stuff. What's not to like?
• Court of Ardenvale: A nice way to recur some permanents if your commander isn't around.
• Giada, Font of Hope: A must-include in any Angel-themed deck. I'm not quite sure that's the direction we're going for just yet, but if so, give her some well-deserved attention.

There's not too much to comment here. All of the most expensive cards are either staples of a given archetype or part of some stupidly high-priced mana generation.

Well then, now that the easy part is over, let's increase the challenge and move on. Veggies, here I come!

Second Trim – Cardward Scissorhands

Well, folks, this is a situation I had not really foreseen. Looks like our four core categories are packed full of stuff this time. So much so that I get the impression we may get quite low in our card count when we're done here. Let's have a closer look.

• Ramp: 18
• Draw: 21
• Removal: 27
• Wipes: 9

Those are impressive numbers. At least we're not likely to risk becoming empty-handed. I'd like to keep a fairly high count of ramp spells, in order to maximize our mana output. We're likely to have a lot of stuff we'll want to cast over and over!

Let's trim this down, shall we?

So, let's address a few things.

First, some of you may be surprised at seeing me cut Well of Lost Dreams, with a lifelinking commander in the zone. That's from my personal experience. Insofar I've always been disappointed by the artifact and never get quite the value I expected from it.

Second, yes, I'm leaving a lot of removal, mostly in the form of creature. This, in conjunction with our commander sounds like a good way to level the field and leave the track wide open for our creatures to bash heads. We have a somewhat reanimating commander, let's make the most of if!

And with that, we're already down to 127 cards, and already the deck is looking quite good in my eyes. Let's keep going further down.

Third Trim – Cutting off the rough edges

You know by now this is my favorite part, where we decide the direction we want to undergo in order to take down our opponents.

So let's see. We have Angels, a decent amount of pingers, a lot of removal, some lifegain, a few token-makers... If this looks like it's trying to do seven things at once, don't worry... it is. Thing is, I'm quite certain it's not detrimental to our goals.

First, there is a solid Aristocrats package in here. Seven pingers, most of them staples of the format. These are here to stay, no questions asked. My only regret is that Syr Konrad, the Grim cannot join the fray. Sadly, his fees were too high. Nevertheless, we have a decent sacrifice package, and our commander will make sure we can bring them back again and again.

Second, Angels. There are 10 of them, and most of them fit rather well within our theme, as they are both decent hitters and help keeping our life to healthy highs. I might get rid of the most underwhelming, but all in all I quite like what we have.

Third, life. There's a few spells that benefit from us gaining life, especially by creating nice tokens. A solid addition.

Fourth, tokens. A few cards help us out by pumping out critters when creatures die, ready to be used as cannon fodder for our spells.

Fifth, reanimation. This is the one that I'm not really a fan of, so let's keep the best of the best only.

I'm not too keen on touching most of these categories, so I guess we'll have to cut down some miscellaneous stuff elsewhere.

Let's try and take this all down to 110 cards, shall we?

• Cosmos Elixir
• Court of Grace
• Debt to the Deathless
• Diabolic Tutor
• Echoing Return
• Feast of the Victorious Dead
• Fleshtaker
• Field of Souls
• Hidden Stockpile
• Immortal Servitude
• Kaya, Intangible Slayer
• Priest of Fell Rites
• Rampage of the Valkyries
• Sigarda's Splendor
• Unburial Rites
• Victimize

I've got mixed feelings over these cuts. Some were easy, others not quite so. And we still have the hardest part to go through. Onwards then, let's get to the final 10.

Fourth Trim - Heart-Wrenching Choices

And finally, the best/worst part of the build. For some reason it reminds me of the time I built a Nikya of the Old Ways with 120 cards, 40 of which were a pool of creatures I'd draw randomly 20 from each game.

Alas, that's not what we are here for, so let's get to it. As usual, bear in mind that none of these are bad choices per se.

• Taborax, Hope's Demise: This is a tough one, the first of many. I really like the versatility of this flyer. Yet I feel like the build-up to 5 counters will take too long, and there are not that many Clerics in this deck to make his second ability draw relevant enough.
• Open the Graves: The continuous body stream is nice, but 5 mana is a lot to invest in something without an immediate payoff.
• Selfless Savior: I like the targeted removal protection, but there are other ways to protect our board and this one is a smidge too narrow for my taste.
• Benevolent Bodyguard: Same reasoning.
• Plains: It's starting to become gimmicky at this point, but with Sejiri Shelter I'm confident that 36 lands are enough.
• Gravelighter: I've got mixed feelings on the one. I like the idea, but my gut tells me it will likely not do the thing I want it to do when I cast it.
• Denethor, Ruling Steward: I like my pingers to do work without having to invest mana in them. And the token produced is anecdotal.
• Invasion of Dominaria: This one is a heart-breaker, because I love Serra Angel so much. Still, 3 mana to draw one and gain incidental life is not enough, and I'm not sure I want to devote the needed power to turn it into a creature.
• Firja, Judge of Valor: While the filtering looks nice enough, I'd rather have cards come to my hand rather than in the bin.
• Westfold Rider: Looks quite nice on paper, but the sorcery restriction is what tipped me over.

And there you have it! Liesa, mother of Angel pingers of the lifegain (or something similar).

Conclusion

That was not quite what I had expected when starting this build. This is why I really like this build process. While not exactly the best way to find hidden gems, it's still an exciting journey.

But now I'd like to hear from you people. Did you like this final iteration? Would you add other exciting cards? Would you have gone all-in with a single plan?

Let me know below, and I'll see you in two weeks with who's next on the chopping block!

Arnaud Gompertz

Arnaud Gompertz has been playing Magic since 4th Edition, back in 1995. He's been an assiduous EDH enthusiast since 2012, with a soft spot for unusual and casual Commanders. He'll always favour spectacular plays against a boring path to victory. Aside from mistreating cardboard, he's a dedicated board games player, loves a challenging video game and occasionally tries to sing with his choir.