Haytham Kenway "Knights of No Honor" - Plot Twist #13
Haytham Kenway by Andreia Ugrai
Welcome back to Plot Twist, the series where we build a Commander deck that looks like it'll tell one kind of story only to throw out a twist for our opponents mid-game. If you're joining us for the first time, welcome! I'd encourage you to check out the previous articles in the series to get a sense for the types of stories we're looking to tell.
Last time, we built a lifegain combo deck helmed by Sorin of House Markov that looked to gain a whole bunch of life at once, then knock our opponents out with Sorin, Aetherflux Reservoir, and the like. This week, we've got a new set with tiny, seven-card packs in Assassin's Creed. I've never played an Assassin's Creed game, though I've heard very good things about them, so this set didn't catch my eye as much as other Universes Beyond products in the last couple of years. As I was scrolling through the set, though, Haytham Kenway was the one potential commander that immediately stood out to me because Haytham does something that I've tinkered around with before: Haytham cares about the creature types of our opponents, specifically if they're Assassins.
How Does Haytham Kenway Work?
Haytham is an Azorius commander with three abilities in total. The first is that Haytham has protection from Assassins. It also grants other Knights you control the same protection from Assassins ability and an additional +2/+2. Finally, when Haytham Kenway enters, we get to exile up to one creature each opponent controls until Haytham leaves the battlefield.
Unfortunately, this is the fixed wording from Banisher Priest rather than the wording on Fiend Hunter, so we'd have to jump through more hoops if we wanted to try to blink Haytham a bunch of times to exile our opponents' boards for good. We could certainly do that with cards like Containment Priest and Hallowed Moonlight if we wanted to, but that sounds rather miserable to play against, and on Plot Twist we prefer to focus on making games with interesting stories.
In looking at Haytham's EDHREC page, there are only 54 decklists at the time of writing, but it looks like many of them go in one of two distinct directions. The first is a Kindred Knights build that uses cards like Knight Exemplar, Herald of Hoofbeats, and Kindred Discovery to quickly get a bunch of Knights into play and overwhelm our opponents. The second, evidently more popular, build so far revolves around the new card Templar Knight from Assassin's Creed and cards like Thrumming Stone to cheat big legendary artifacts like Akroma's Memorial or The Circle of Loyalty into play. Therefore, when we sit down with our new Haytham Kenway deck, our opponents will probably expect us to either be a relatively straightforward kindred deck, or one that's built around Templar Knight and legendary artifacts. But this is Plot Twist, so we've got a surprise in store for our opponents, because this deck is actually planning to win the game by turning all of our opponents' creatures into Assassins.
Doing the Twist
When I read the line "Other Knights you control get +2/+2 and have protection from Assassins" on Haytham Kenway, I knew this was going to be a commander we'd brew around. I've tried to build a deck around the extremely niche "Cowards can't block" mechanic in the past, but found that the card pool was too shallow and didn't have a commander that supported what the deck wanted to do, so it ended up being a Warrior kindred deck with a weird win condition built into it. But with Haytham, we have a commander that can help tie this sort of "type hack" deck together.
"Protection from ________" has slowly been phased out of Magic over the years because it's really complicated and not very intuitive. If you look at a card that has protection from red, like Aven Smokeweaver, it's not immediately clear that Aven Smokeweaver can't be blocked by red creatures, targeted by red spells or abilities, dealt damage by red sources, enchanted by red auras, or equipped by red Equipment. I've personally always found that the "can't be blocked by" part of protection is the least intuitive, but today we're going to use that to our advantage in particular.
Using cards like Amoeboid Changeling, Imagecrafter, Shields of Velis Vel, and Unnatural Selection, we're able to turn our opponents' creatures into Assassins, allowing our Knights to slip through unblocked. We're also running functionally similar cards, like Reverse the Polarity, for the flexibility to choose between making all creatures unable to block at instant speed, which we can use ourselves or to help knock out an archenemy, as a counterspell, or as some weird anti-Walls tech.
Type Hacking
Being able to change the creature type of our opponents' creatures, AKA type hacking, is just the sort of strange way to win the game that we love on Plot Twist. There's just something so memorable about being able to leave our opponents' creatures basically untouched but completely unable to block. Shields of Velis Vel and Unnatural Selection are the secret all-stars of this deck because they can either let us turn all of an opponent's creatures into Assassins at once or as many as we have mana laying around with Unnatural Selection. In general, it seems like it's better to hold off on casting these too early in the game and instead look for an opportunity to turn all of an opponent's creatures into Assassins and then sneak through for lethal damage with our unblockable Knights. We're also running Mystical Tutor and Enlightened Tutor to give us additional ways to find these pieces when we need them.
Amoeboid Changeling and Imagecrafter, on the other hand, are cards we'll want to cast early in the game. With Haytham Kenway out, we can change a single large attacker into an Assassin with either Amoeboid Changeling or Imagecrafter and freely block it. This should make our opponents think twice about attacking us with their largest creatures, giving us plenty of time to build out a board of Knights and find our win conditions. We could consider other versions of this effect, like Trickery Charm or Standardize, but we'll want to be able to either get all of our opponents' creatures at once or have a repeatable way to change their creature type. Unfortunately, casting Standardize doesn't work the way we want it to because our creatures would no longer be Knights, so they'd lose the protection from Assassins ability that Haytham Kenway grants them. While we didn't end up running Trickery Charm and Standardize in the final decklist, they could be something we want to add back into the deck after playtesting it for awhile should we need more ways to change the creature type of our opponents' creatures.
Keeping Our Hand Full
The more Commander decks we brew, the more it seems that just drawing a bunch of cards will cure pretty much whatever ails our deck of the week. Kindred Discovery will draw us a card every time we cast or attack with a Knight, Chivalric Alliance will draw us a card as long as we have two Knights that attacked, and Bident of Thassa will draw us a card each time one of our Knights deals damage to an opponent. It also has a goad-esque effect we can use if we ever need to force our opponents to attack, too. We're also running Goliath Paladin because the initiative encourages combat and helps us hit our land drops. While it's no White Plume Adventurer or Seasoned Dungeoneer, it's a Knight, so it'll get all the benefits of our various kindred effects. Lastly, The Council of Four isn't a Knight, itself, but it draws a lot of cards and makes Knight tokens, so we'll take it!
We're also running a few cards that synergize with the rest of the deck well but don't explicitly draw us cards. Battle Angels of Tyr can net us cards, Treasures, or life depending on the game state and how many of the myriad tokens connect. Knight-Errant of Eos should act a lot like Collected Company with the number of Knights we're running and tokens from cards like History of Benalia and Invasion of New Phyrexia. Is it just me, or does every card that references Eos in its name seem to be busted? Sky Hussar can be card draw if we need it, and it will also untap all of our creatures when it enters the battlefield; just the sort of flexibility we like from a random 4/3 flyer.
Knights, but Make Them Honorable This Time
Aside from some cheeky type hacking, this deck should otherwise play out like a Knight kindred deck. We're winning the honorable way: with combat damage! (Even if turning our creatures into Assassins who can't block isn't terribly honorable). Herald of Hoofbeats should make all of our Knights unblockable, unless your local meta game has lots of horsemanship running around (if that's the case, I definitely want to hear more about the types of decks you're playing). Marshal of Zhalfir, Radiant Destiny, Skyhunter Strike Force, and Valiant Knight all buff our Knights, making them really intimidating in combination with Haytham Kenway. Radiant Destiny in particular seems great because giving our Knights vigilance allows us to attack and still hold up blockers, something that paid off big in our "Oops All Tokens" Duskana, the Rage Mother deck.
Moonshaker Cavalry allows us to do huge amounts of damage out of nowhere and is apparently a Knight too! Kinsbaile Cavalier is the latest in a long line of weird kindred cards from Morningtide and Shadowmoor that I've rediscovered, and it continues to make me think that that block was secretly one of the best ever for Commander. Virtue of Loyalty is a card we'll always be happy to draw because it plays out a lot more like Cathars' Crusade than you'd think, and it'll give our enormous Knights a form of vigilance, too.
Knights Need a Way to Cross a Moat
One thing that kindred decks like this one historically struggle with is cards like Moat, Ghostly Prison, and Propaganda, so we're packing lots of interaction for noncreature permanents. For only two more mana, Cavalier of Dawn gives us a Generous Gift-effect, a Regrowth-effect for an artifact or enchantment when it dies, and a 4/6 Knight with vigilance. That's a pretty sweet deal when it comes to dealing with problematic permanents, and it can help us really catch up when our opponents are ahead. While Stroke of Midnight can't hit lands like Generous Gift can, the 1/1 it leaves behind won't be able to block our Knights nearly as well as a 3/3 normally could. Dovin's Veto is flexible and uncounterable, exactly what we'll need to buy ourselves another turn or resolve our win conditions. While I wish Westfold Rider could be used anytime instead of just at sorcery speed, it does seem like it'll be better than Loran of the Third Path in our deck.
Galadriel's Dismissal continues to be a two-way star in our interaction section, allowing us to either save our creatures from a board wipe or remove all of an opponent's blockers at the opportune time. It seems to make memorable games every time I see it get cast, so we're going to keep adding it to our decks. Crib Swap is like a Swords to Plowshares that leaves behind a 1/1 changeling, which won't be able to block our Knights as long as Haytham Kenway is in play. If you've never had the chance to cast Settle the Wreckage against an opponent who swung all out at you and isn't running a lot of basics, then just trust me that it's the sort of card that they'll play around in every game you play with this deck from now on.
A Few Additional Twists for Good Measure
This week's decklist features a lot of interesting Knights that happen to benefit from some of the type hack stuff we're doing. Tivadar of Thorn can destroy any creature on the battlefield in combination with Unnatural Selection, Imagecrafter, or Amoeboid Changeling, and there's something so wonderful about turning an Atraxa, Grand Unifier into a Goblin and then destroying it.
Pentarch Paladin does something similar but for permanents of the chosen color, which feels really powerful if you happen to be in a pod where all three of your opponents are playing, say, green. Pentarch Paladin seems like something that could be really good in a blink deck that can constantly reset the color we've chosen, so we may need to revisit it in a future decklist. We're also running Order of the Sacred Torch for similar reasons. A repeatable counterspell in white, albeit for only black spells, is the sort of card you won't play in every deck, and will sometimes be a dead card, but sometimes it'll be fantastic.
Waylay is definitely going into our next token deck. Getting three 2/2 Knights for only three mana is a great deal, and any additional tokens you make with Anointed Procession or Mondrak, Glory Dominus won't go away at the end of turn. I'm also curious if Allies have enough support in Commander to make them work after seeing how strong Talus Paladin can be, and it's only a one-time effect in this deck. I'm looking to add Titan of Littjara to my kindred Wizards deck as soon as I can get my hands on a copy. For only one more mana than Kindred Discovery, we get a 6/6 and potentially more cards each time it triggers? Don't get me wrong, we'll run both Titan of Littjara and Kindred Discovery in any blue kindred deck, but I'm baffled how I missed this card when it came out in Commander Masters.
Here's the full decklist for you to peruse:
Roll the Credits
I hope you enjoyed reading the latest edition of Plot Twist featuring Haytham Kenway. Next time you sit down for a game of Commander, see what sort of plot twists you can add to take the game's narrative in a new direction.
I'd love to hear your thoughts on today's deck and what cards could find a home in it in the comments below or on Archidekt. The Maybeboards of my decklists are always filled with cards I thought could work but didn't make the final decklist.
You can find me on Instagram at @girtenjeff and you can check out my other articles here or see what decks I'm currently playing here.
Stay tuned to see what other twists and turns are headed your way in the next edition of Plot Twist.
