Legends Legends - Arcades Sabboth

Hello, and welcome back to another exciting installment of Legends Legends. This week, we've finally hit our second Elder Dragon of the bunch, and it's none other than Arcades Sabboth

General Thoughts

Like his cousin Elder Dragons, Arcades Sabboth

Arcades's +0/+2 anthem falls off of our creatures as soon as they attack, even if we give them vigilance. If we want to get the most value out of Arcades, we'll need to incentivize our opponents to attack into our toughened-up Walls. We'll strike a careful balance of cards that switch our creatures to dealing damage via their toughness instead of power versus actual physical Walls to do that combat. 

The Best Defense

...is a good defense! Defender decks are spoiled for great Wall creatures choices in this day and age. Really, your choices of Wall will come down to personal preference, but I think there are some mainstays that every Walls deck should run.

Many of our Walls are just plain ol' value when we factor in the "power-as-toughness" effects we run alongside them. Wall of Blossoms

While it's not a Wall, Charix, the Raging Isle

Wall of Stolen Identity

Tree of Redemption

A number of our Walls function more as utility creatures than as combat-based beaters. Perimeter Captain

Drift of Phantasms

Finally, Teyo, the Shieldmage

Tough Guy, Huh?

Our next largest group of cards is our collection of defender synergies. These aren't necessarily big-butted Walls, and they aren't necessarily the "power-as-toughness" effects. Instead, these cards provide some utility or value that our defenders lack.

For example, Abzan Beastmaster

Inga and Esika

Rammas Echor, Ancient Shield

Mentor of the Meek

Finally, Arcades Sabboth

How Much is Too Much?

The hard truth of it is our deck doesn't do much if we can't stick one of our Assault Formation

• Huatli, the Sun's Heart
• Walking Bulwark
• Rasaad yn Bashir
• Arcades, the Strategist
• Bedrock Tortoise
• The Pride of Hull Clade
• Assault Formation
• Gauntlets of Light
• High Alert
• Treefolk Umbra

These are the key cards to making this deck work. They are the primary targets for your tutors, even if you already have one or two on hand. Enlightened Tutor, Shared Summons, Idyllic Tutor, and Drift of Phantasms should all be used liberally to fetch these cards from your library.

Mana Base

Like the other Legends Elder Dragons, Arcades Sabboth is not cheap. Eight whole mana plus a three-mana upkeep means we better have a lot to spare by the time we get around to casting him. Lucky for us, Bant defenders decks have access to some of the best ramp in the game.

Axebane Guardian and Overgrown Battlement are like Gaea's Cradles for us. (Not really, but you see where I'm going here). Sunscape Familiar is a great Bant-cost reducer and it's a Wall, so it stays on theme! Besides those, we've also got Vine Trellis and Sylvan Caryatid as a pair of mana dorks that'll scale well into the late game once they can attack.

But that's not all! We're also running six whole mana rocks, plus Cultivate and Kodama's Reach, in addition to our 35 lands.

Strategy

Generally, our strategy for our [elArcades Sabboth[/el] defender deck is simple: play Walls, ramp into Arcades, find something to let our defenders attack, and swing away.

Two-thirds of our creatures are less than four mana, so we should have no trouble assembling a barricade of Wall creatures to shelter behind while we set up our board. Priority defenders you want to see in your opening hand include our rompers, Axebane Guardian and Overgrown Battlement, plus Perimeter Captain, since all three will scale well into the late game if they arrive early. Any of our utility creatures that need to tap to activate make good early plays, as well, so Alluring Siren and Courtly Provocateur make good plays, too.

The absolute earliest I've been able to play Arcades in this deck is turn four, but that's with a perfect hand of ramp and Axebane Guardian into Overgrown Battlement. Realistically, we're more likely to cast Arcades on turn six or seven, using him as surprise damage in the air with Crashing Drawbridge or Lightning Greaves on the field. From then on, we should continue to dig for more high-toughness defenders while dumping our excess mana into Arcades's ability. If Arcades dies, it'll be steep to recast him. We'll usually only get one Arcades cast per game, so timing it well is paramount to your success. 

Ending the game with a defender deck will look a little wonky. Instead of the typical Craterhoof Behemoth/Overcome, we'll use the much cheaper Tower Defense effectively as a +5/+5 for our board. We can swing in for big damage on any turn where we've provoked and then Aetherized all of our opponents' blockers, or simply wiped the board of anything with more than 0 power when we cast Dusk // Dawn.

Budget

This deck is dirt cheap compared to some other EDH decks, clocking in at just under $160. A majority of that is concentrated on a few expensive singles.

Enlightened Tutor is the most expensive card here, at about $15. It's one of the most important tutors for consistently grabbing our Assault Formation or High Alert, but we could downgrade to a Plea for Guidance without too much fuss.

Last March of the Ents is another expensive new rare. It generates enough value to win us the game there and then, but we could swap it out for any other draw spell. Distant Melody could work here with enough Walls in play.

Arcades Sabboth Deck List

Wrap Up

Arcades Sabboth was always a toughness-based legend, so it's no surprise that the DMU reimagining of this classic Elder Dragon saw him becoming Wall-focused. Between old Arcades, new Arcades, and Pramikon, Sky Rampart, there really aren't too many great commanders for Wall decks. These three have the broadest color identities, making them more useful for the archetype than just, say, Rasaad yn Bashir and a blue background, or The Pride of Hull Clade and its expensive activated ability.

What are your favorite Walls? How would you build an Arcades Sabboth deck? Let me know in the comments, or come harass me on Twitter.

Thanks for reading!