Choosing Your Commander - Selesnya

The last two-color allied combination we come to is green/white, which is my favorite color pairing with regards to the types of commanders available.  Green and white have a lot of design space overlap, and as such the green/white cards tend to really reinforce those themes and mechanics and give you very powerful cards.  Token making, lifegain, and "Crusade" effects are all on vivid display in both colors, giving us very powerful linear synergies to build around.  Furthermore, the two colors also compliment one another in that what green is weak at removing (creatures), white excels at, and what white lacks (mana acceleration) green is best at.  Of all the color combinations I think GW has some of the best unique commanders, and that I will end up building more GW decks than any other.

Asmira, Holy Avenger:  Asmira's ability is actually quite good, but the timing of when you get the counters makes it a tad hard to really use.  Asmira really wants a lot of tokens to go to the graveyard so it plays well with Doubling Season, but you really need a sac outlet to bring the whole package together and most of the time I'd rather just accumulate more tokens.

Captain Sisay:  Captain Sisay is the perfect kind of general for the Commander format.  You have a very clear direction to take with your deckbuilding and a real incentive to want to play and activate her ability.  There are many good Legendary permanents in white and green, but there are also a lot of good artifacts and lands that you will want to include.  As we go through each set, we will compile a list of all the various options and see if there are even more synergies we can take advantage of (rather than Sisay being 'just' a toolbox commander). 

Chorus of the Conclave:  I really like the effect Chorus of the Conclave can have, but the eight mana cost for such an effect is a little steep.  Still, I like that it rewards you for ramping your mana to cast her, then continues to reward you by giving you an outlet and use for that extra mana.

Gabriel Angelfire:  You don't get enough for what you are paying.

Gaddock Teeg:  Gaddock Teeg has a very immediate and negative impact on a lot of games, and if your deck is built correctly those negatives should be negligible to you.  In response to playing him, expect a lot of removal being thrown at him due to others not being able to play their spells with him on the table, but you should be fine with this for two reasons.  One, that's another removal spells that your oppoennt's don't use on something bigger/better, and two he's super cheap to cast so casting him again is no problem.  The more and more he's played, the less and less likely it is that your opponent's have answers to him.  The rest of the deck should be designed to take advantage of that window of disruption to take over the game.

Jasmine Boreal:  Yawn...

Kei Takahashi:  Average ability that is not worthy of a commander slot.

Krond the Dawn-Clad:  That awful casting cost aside, Krond is actually a decent creature if you can keep him enchanted and exile key permanents.  He's a bit hard to really want to build around, and I would personally want to build Uril, the Msistalker instead.  I will look at possibly including him in an Uril deck if we can make the mana work.

Lady Caleria:  Being able to deal 3 damage is much better than some of the two damage options that are very similar, but its still not good enough to base a deck around.

Lord Magnus:  If Plainswalkers (as opposed to Planeswalkers) are a problem in you playgroup, then Lord Magnus is your man.





Rhys the Redeemed:
When WotC unveiled the Populate mechanic, they stated that they first tried it so that it mirrored what Rhys does (a copy of each token type).  They found out really quickly that such a mechanic would be broken and wuickly changed it to what it is now.  Fortunately for us, we still get to have Rhys in all his token-loving brokeness, and we ge tto have fun with all the various token types that are available.  Rhys is the premiere "tokens matter" general and is a blast to play, especially when you can break out cool cards like Bestial Menace.







Saffi Eriksdotter:  Saffi can do all sorts of cool tricks with various other creature cards, and is infmaously entwined with Crypt Champion to produce a near-infinite loop od creatures entering and leaving the battlefield for all sorts of nefarious purposes.  As her own commander, we are relgate to only using Selesnya colors and hence much less potent combinations, but there are still many things that you may want to loop or protect and having Saffi around can help immensely.






Sigarda, Host of Herons:  Sigarda's most attractive trait is how difficult it is for opponent's to get rid of her without using a mass removal spell.  Those kinds of spells are usually plentiful in a multi-player game, but being able to dodge everything else definitely has its advantages.  The fact that you also protect your other permanents from sacrifie effects, and she basically turns off a lot of things that would otherwise kill you or your permanents.

Sir Shandlar of Eberyn:  Too bad his name was not Sir Eberyn of Shandalar...




Tolsimir Wolfblood:
Tolsimir is a sold inclusion in any deck that wants to mass pump its creatures, including token decks.  As his own commander, you can concentrate on including creatures that are both green and white to maximize his effect. 

Torsten Von Ursus:  I am glad to be done with the vanilla Legendary Creatures from Legends... finally.









Trostani, Selesnya's Voice:
Trostani has generated a lot of buzz since she (they?) were released, and most of it is centered around her Populate ability.  Problem is that Rhys the Redeemed exists and blows the populate ability out of the water.  However for the longest time I have wanted a GW general for a "life gain matters" deck, and Trostani's first ability conveniently goes in that direction.  I wish they would print a general tht actuall ydoes something with the life you gain, but until then Trostani will be the leader of a deck that runs things like Ageless Entity, Serra Avatar, and Boon Reflection.

Top 5 Selesnya Commanders
1. Captain sisay
2. Rhys the Redeemed
3. Sigarda, Host of Herons
4. Trostani, Selesnya's Voice
5. Saffi Eriksdotter