Best offence is defence by nconran12

Format: Commander

Commander: Arcades, the Strategist

Bracket: 3

Deck overview

This is a Bant Defender strategy helmed by Arcades, the Strategist. The primary plan is to seed high-toughness walls, cast Arcades, and turn those defenders sideways for toughness-based combat damage while drawing a card for every defender that enters. High Alert and Assault Formation replicate his combat rules if he is unavailable, and Tetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive makes the deck's many 0-power walls unblockable. A secondary combo axis pairs Freed from the Real or Staff of Domination with mana creatures (Axebane Guardian, Bloom Tender, Arbor Adherent) to produce infinite mana, then wins through Thrasios, Triton Hero plus Laboratory Maniac or a lethal Finale of Devastation. The deck plays as a midrange combat engine that can pivot into a compact combo finish, backed by a dense instant-speed interaction suite and one-sided wipes in Wave of Reckoning and Dusk // Dawn.

Decklist (100 cards)

• 1 Amphibian Downpour
• 1 Angel's Grace
• 1 Arbor Adherent
• 1 Arcades, the Strategist
• 1 Arcane Denial
• 1 Arcane Signet
• 1 Assault Formation
• 1 Aura Shards
• 1 Aven Mindcensor
• 1 Axebane Guardian
• 1 Beast Within
• 1 Bloom Tender
• 1 Bountiful Promenade
• 1 Brave the Sands
• 1 Breeding Pool
• 1 Brushland
• 1 Calamity's Wake
• 1 Canopy Vista
• 1 Capsize
• 1 Chromatic Lantern
• 1 Command Tower
• 1 Counterspell
• 1 Crashing Drawbridge
• 1 Cyclonic Rift
• 1 Defabricate
• 1 Dreamroot Cascade
• 1 Dusk // Dawn
• 1 Eladamri's Call
• 1 Elesh Norn, Mother of Machines
• 1 Enduring Innocence
• 1 Esper Sentinel
• 1 Exotic Orchard
• 1 Filter Out
• 1 Finale of Devastation
• 1 Flooded Grove
• 1 Flumph
• 3 Forest
• 1 Freed from the Real
• 1 Generous Gift
• 1 Glacial Fortress
• 1 Guardian Project
• 1 High Alert
• 1 Hinterland Harbor
• 1 Hushwood Verge
• 1 Idyllic Beachfront
• 1 Into the Flood Maw
• 7 Island
• 1 Laboratory Maniac
• 1 Last March of the Ents
• 1 Meekstone
• 1 Mockingbird
• 1 Overgrown Battlement
• 1 Path to Exile
• 7 Plains
• 1 Pollywog Prodigy
• 1 Rammas Echor, Ancient Shield
• 1 Rejuvenating Springs
• 1 Reprieve
• 1 Seaside Citadel
• 1 Secret Door
• 1 Sevinne's Reclamation
• 1 Silence
• 1 Smothering Tithe
• 1 Sokrates, Athenian Teacher
• 1 Sol Ring
• 1 Song of the Dryads
• 1 Spider-Sense
• 1 Staff of Domination
• 1 Steal Enchantment
• 1 Stern Dismissal
• 1 Sunpetal Grove
• 1 Sunscape Familiar
• 1 Swords to Plowshares
• 1 Sylvan Library
• 1 Temple of the False God
• 1 Tetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive
• 1 Thalia, Heretic Cathar
• 1 The Pride of Hull Clade
• 1 The Walls of Ba Sing Se
• 1 Thrasios, Triton Hero
• 1 Trickbind
• 1 Wall of Denial
• 1 Wall of Stolen Identity
• 1 Wandering Archaic // Explore the Vastlands
• 1 Wave of Reckoning
• 1 Weathered Sentinels