Brewing Baldur's Gate - A Shadowheart, Dark Justiciar Commander Deck

God's Favorite Princess

Yes, I'm a hater and a gatekeeper. I'm also God's favourite princess and the most interesting girl in the world. So goes the hilarious meme attributed to Baldur's Gate 3 companion Shadowheart, which gained enough traction that her voice actress, Jennifer English, saw fit to record the line in her character's voice.

Unfortunately, while this remains true in-game, the actual card featuring God's favourite princess falls far short of being the most interesting girl in the world. In fact, the card is downright boring in my opinion. But, like many, after Larian Studio's amazing game released and I spent untold hours ensconced in it, I decided to revisit last year's Battle for Baldur's Gate Commander set.

Now, armed with the knowledge of who the Sharran cleric actually was, and having judged her as my absolute fav, I had new conviction to build a deck around her. I decided to redouble my efforts despite my misgivings about the card. My final product is not the strongest thing I've ever brewed, but it is a lot of fun to play.

First off, let's take a look at Shadowheart herself and why I found such a hard time making the deck interesting. On first glance, this card isn't terrible. Over-costed, sure, but also anything that gives you card advantage in the command zone and a way to kill your own guys in black can't be that bad right? When you consider that for the same mana value you could just be playing Yawgmoth, Thran Physician

Thankfully for us, there is another line of text on this card that, to me, was the most interesting thing about the commander offerings in Battle for Baldur's Gate.

Burden of Nobility

Backgrounds is a riff on the partner mechanic, but more fair. Plus, the flavor of building a D&D character complete with their backstory is big chef's kiss energy. The question is: which Background did I want to pair with Shadowheart's lackluster textbox to improve that shine? I tried several before arriving at my final choice, which was one I'd never considered building with before, and one that likely wouldn't be the first choice of most when building this deck.

While according to online statistics, Haunted One

Trickle Down Economics

You have the option of putting the counters on any of your other creatures, making them threats and potential huge targets for Shadowheart's natural ability to draw you cards. You can put counters on Shadow herself in order to pivot aggro and try and kill your opponent with commander damage. And of course, the core of this card is that it forces your opponents to make a choice, then allows you to try and talk your way into them making the one that benefits you in the long run. To this end, much of this deck takes advantage of this and the counters you're going to be throwing around. Let's get into some of the key cards in the deck!

First off, as alluded to, this deck wants to maximize the use of the +1/+1 counters that Noble Heritage

Additionally, cards like Scholar of New Horizons

Hating and Gatekeeping

However, seeing as how our opponents can take the option of receiving +1/+1 counters as well, we need ways to counteract that once we no longer have our temporary protection from them. Aside from the suite of effects like Windborn Muse

While we're also running powerful political tools that work with counters, like Orzhov Advokist

We Did This to Ourselves

Of course, Nils and our other tricks aren't always enough to deal with the problems we create ourselves, so sometimes you just need to burn it all down. Invasion of Fiora

The Power of God and Anime

This deck is very good at generating a lot of evasive bodies that could theoretically just end the game with cards like Felisa, Fang of Silverquill and Shadrix Silverquill. Those cards also provide payoffs to our multitude of counters, and, in the case of Shadrix, allow us to place them on opponents' creatures as well in order to support Nils and the like. We also have the option of doing standard aristocrats stuff via the Ao engine, or just going tall with counters, but sometimes you just need to end a game, and in these colors I can't think of another duo that both benefit this deck individually more than the infamous Heliod and Ballista.

Individually, these two cards support the themes of the deck by playing with +1/+1 counters on their own. Ballista becomes a potent removal piece and threat (even without Heliod) with Shadowheart in play. And obviously, together, the two become a potent wincon that the deck can fall back on, but doesn't try to race to or tutor for, making it a bit more suitable for your average casual table.

The Most Interesting Girl in the World

At the end of the day, Shadowheart, Dark Justiciar will never be the strongest deck at the table. There are far more optimal things you could be doing with similar effects. But my goal with this deck wasn't to do that, it was to make a Shadowheart deck that was fun to play and could win. Striking that balance can often be extremely difficult in Commander, but sometimes taking the time to try and really figure it out is worth it. I'm sure I'll keep tweaking this deck, as I've only just finished it, so maybe this is an article I revisit in a few months time.

Shadowheart Full Commander Decklist