Choosing Your Commander - Bant

The last of the allied three-color combinations is white/blue/green or the Bant shard.  Bant is an interesting color combination in that is combines the controlling aspect of blue-white with the token, mass creature pump, and lifegain strengths of green-white.  What you end up with is often tilted one way or the other, but the commanders are mostly tilted to the control side.  Ironically however, the best Bant commander in the format is arguably a very agressive commander in Rafiq although utlimately I would see that even Rafiq would gravitate towads a more controllish deck.

Angus Mackenzie:  At least with Angus Mackenzie you get to Fog an entire attack step, which can have some uses in decks that are trying to stall the game.

Arcades Sabboth:  In my opinion, he is the worst of the Elder Dragons.

Jenara, Asura of War:  There is somethign to be said for commanders that can be cast early and can be easily pumped tp be able to kill with general damage quickly and efficiently.  Although some other commanders ask you to jump through a few hoops in order to pump them, Jenara is nowhere near as demanding on your creativity; just add mana and you have yourself a commander that can start dealing some serious damage almost immediately.  If you can find ways to accelerate the +1/+1 counter accumulation, either through Proliferate cards or things like Doubling Season, or by generating tons of mana with Mirari's Wake or Mana Reflection, then you have a dangerous deck on your hands.








Phelddagrif:  Phelddagrif is the poster child for what is known as the "Group Hug" deck.  The concept is that you play a bunch of effects that help everyone rather than hurt anyone, creating a game state where everyone has access to mana and cards and can pretty much do anything they want.  The theory behind such a deck is that if you are helping everyone, they will most likely leave you alone and focus their energies on eliminating your opponents.  This should allow you to get into the late game where you can drop big threats and hopefully overwhelm whatever players are left standing.  The problem is that in practice the group hug player is actually enabling combo players easier access to their game winning cards and is leaving other players the job of eliminating game-ending threats.  This in turn can make the group hug player the perceived biggest threat, and in come circles this type of deck is actively attacked and eliminated before it does too much harm to the rest of the game.  Whatever your personal views of the "Group Hug" strategy, it is safe to say that Phelddagrif is defintely well suited for the job.

Rafiq of the Many:  Rafiq is a classic "Voltron" style commander.  Due to Double Strike, any Aura or Equipment card attached to him will do double duty and the various Swords can make him especially lethal.  Along with the usual equipment theme, Rafiq is also usually paired with other carsd that have combat triggers and can benefit from having double strike.  The nice thing about Rafiq is that he doesn't need muc to support him, so you have lots of leeway for whatever else you may want to include in such a deck.

Ragnar:  If I really wanted this kind of effect I would run Asceticism and a better commander.

Rubinia Soulsinger:  She's not bad, but when given a choice I think I would take Merieke Ri Berit over Rubinia Soulsinger based on their not being so much of a downside when she gets destroyed.

Treva, the Renewer:  This might be interesting as a "lifegain matters" commander that allows you to play blue alongside the more traditional green and white, but on his own merits Treva leaves a lot to be desired other than just being a 6-power flyer for 6 mana.