by Johnny Cycles, January 24, 2024

 

Welcome to our second Budget Commander article! I’m really excited about this budget-friendly deck in which every card, including our commander, is under $1. Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn incentivizes us to play a bunch of creatures and gain a bunch of life in order to grow our army to massive proportions. Sound like fun to you? Maybe this picture will convince you:

The TL;DR, better yet, TS;DR (too small; don’t read), is we’ve spent a few turns growing our team with cards like Forgotten Ancient, Citadel Siege, and Tempered Veteran on a stalled board while waiting for our 6th land. We never actually found it, but instead cast a Gift of Paradise and finally resolved our Sigarda’s Summons the next turn in order to swing out through the air for 31 points of damage. And we did all of this without even having our commander on the battlefield.

And all on a budget.

Interested now?

Let’s take a look at the decklist!

Decklist – G/W Lifegain with Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn

Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn

Creatures (32) 

Jaddi Offshoot
Mikaeus, the Lunarch
Soul Warden
Ajani’s Pridemate
Gala Greeters
Grateful Apparition
Huatli’s Raptor
Kurbis, Harvest Celebrant
Luminarch Aspirant
Pollenbright Druid
Scavenging Ooze
Serene Steward

Tempered Veteran
Trelasarra, Moon Dancer
Abzan Falconer
Evolution Sage
Kutzil, Malamet Exemplar
Managorger Hydra
Renegade Krasis
Rishkar, Peema Renegade
Abzan Battle Priest
Basri’s Lieutenant

Forgotten Ancient
Heron of Hope
Sigardian Paladin
Constable of the Realm
Gwaihir, Greatest of the Eagles
Herd Baloth
Sunscorch Regent
Trollbred Guardian
Verdurous Gearhulk
Victory’s Envoy

Artifacts (4)

Fountain of Renewal

Potion of Healing
Pristine Talisman
Well of Lost Dreams

Enchantments (11)

Ajani’s Welcome
Cleric Class
Ashes of the Abhorrent
Dawn of Hope
Together Forever
Captured by Lagacs
Gift of Paradise
New Horizons
Verdant Haven

Citadel Siege
Sigarda’s Summons

Instants (10) + 1 mfdc

Fight as One
Light of Hope
Vastwood Fortification (mfdc)
Inscription of Abundance
Revitalize
Unbounded Potential
Inspiring Call
Pledge of Unity
Unbreakable Formation
Ruinous Intrusion

Sorceries (3)

Basri’s Solidarity
Smell Fear
Kayla’s Command

Lands (39) + 1 mfdc

Brokers Hideout
Cabaretti Courtyard
Command Tower
Elfhame Palace
Encroaching Wastes
Evolving Wilds
Field of Ruin
Idyllic Grange
Llanowar Reborn
Obscura Storefront
Radiant Fountain
Riveteers Overlook
Seraph Sanctuary
The Shire
Vastwood Thicket (mfdc)
Plains (12)
Forest (12)

Primary Game Plan

There are three things we want to do with Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn as our commander. First, we want to play a lot of creatures in order to have targets for Lathiel’s +1/+1 counters. Second, we want to gain life to trigger Lathiel’s static ability. And third, we want ways to increase and abuse the +1/+1 counters on our creatures. Our card choices, whether they be ramp, removal, or card draw, are all geared towards at least one of these three things and, as often as possible, two of these three. On occasion, we get all three things in one card.

And, of course, our card choices are limited to under $1.

I really like this style of deck and this kind of commander. We aren’t all in on a lifegain plan, or on a counters-matter plan, or even on a go-wide strategy. Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn wants a mixture of all three of these strategies and is at her best when we have a balance of each, both in our deck and on the battlefield.

In my breakdown of this deck, I will focus on two primary aspects of Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn‘s ability: lifegain and counters. In the process, I’ll discuss the army of creatures that we need for our plan to come together. The reason for this is that every creature we play either furthers our lifegain plan or supports our counters plan or both.

Ways to Gain Life

We want repeated ways to gain life, both on our turn and on our opponent’s turn, in order to trigger Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn and grow our army. But not only is this synergy so important in achieving a large enough army to attack profitably, but we can’t abuse counters on creatures if there aren’t counters on creatures… As you will see in the section on counters, much of our deck is made up of ways of putting counters on creatures other than our commander for this very reason. That being said, Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn is still our first and best way to put counters on creatures. These are the cards that trigger that ability.

Creatures

Abzan Battle Priest – our first of many cards looking to gain more value out of counters than just increased power and toughness. This Cleric gives all of our creatures with counters lifelink, which means we’ll get a whole bunch of counters from Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn after we swing out.
Gala Greeters – a worse Soul Warden for our purposes, this Elf Druid is an auto include in our deck because we can also put a +1/+1 counter on it. When I first read the card, I thought it let us put a +1/+1 counter on a target creature, but it isn’t that good, unfortunately. The Treasure token will sometimes be relevant.
Heron of Hope – who wants to gain 1 life if you can gain 2? Being able to give itself lifelink is a plus, since sometimes we just really need a way to trigger Lathiel once to turn on all of our counters-matter cards. Of course, at 4 mana, you’d think they could’ve just given this Bird lifelink, but it is a common. Can’t have it all on a budget!
Jaddi Offshoot – gaining 1 life for each land we play is one of our best and most consistent ways to trigger Lathiel each turn.
Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn – our commander has lifelink, which means it can trigger itself, even if it can’t target itself. As a 2/2, attacking with it just to gain life is unilkely, but we have other ways of putting counters on it to help it win in combat.

Scavenging Ooze – it’s hard for me to believe this card is under $1. I guess it’s either been reprinted into the ground or it’s a sign of just how far Jund as a Modern archetype has fallen. Either way, our deck is the beneficiary! This card is similar to Gala Greeters in that it both gains us life and grows itself with +1/+1 counters, all while giving us some necessary graveyard hate. Sometimes, even a budget deck can have it all!
Sigardian Paladin – that’s a lot of text… Basically, by jumping through some relatively easy hoops, we can either give this Human Knight or another creature lifelink.
Soul Warden – probably our best way of triggering Lathiel, as it will trigger for each creature that enters the battlefield, whether ours or our opponent’s. And since Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn triggers at the beginning of each end step, this is one of our most reliable ways to get a trigger out of our commander on our opponent’s turn. That’s a lot of triggers…in every sense of the word.

Sunscorch Regent – I’m sure it will come as no surprise to you, dear reader, that I have a special place in my heart for this card. It’s a dragon, after all. I also started playing Magic again just before Khans of Tarkir and I remember wanting so badly for this card to be playable. Now, I think I’ve finally found its perfect home. Not only does it gain us life to trigger Lathiel, but it grows itself along the way! With evasion! And look at that art! It’s hilarious. It looks a little like Cookie Monster with wings with that dopey-looking face. Looking at the picture on the left above, you can see its teeth, which makes it a bit better, but in the foil version I have, it just has a big glowing blob for a mouth.

Enchantments

Ajani’s Welcome – a 1-sided Soul Warden effect on an enchantment. This is one of our best ways to repeatably gain life and trigger Lathiel.
Cleric Class – gains us an additional life for 1 mana. For 4 more, we get a worse Lathiel effect, though with some pluses. We only get a single +1/+1 counter, no matter how much life we gain, but we do get the counter any time we gain life. So, if we can get multiple instances of lifegain in a turn, then we get multiple counters. And, we don’t have to wait until our end step. The final level offers us some synergistic recursion. All in all, this card is bonkers in our deck.
Gift of Paradise – our first of several ramp cards that synergize with our strategy. All are overcosted for this reason. This one gains us 3 life while letting us tap the enchanted land for 2 mana of any one color.
Verdant Haven – our second ramp card, this enchantment gains us only 2 life on ETB, but does let us tap the enchanted land for its own color plus one of any color. Yay!

Artifacts

Fountain of Renewal – arguably our best way to guarantee a Lathiel trigger. The only thing preventing it would be if we died before our end step. That happens sometimes, I guess. The card draw is a nice bonus, even if we’ll hardly ever use it.
Potion of Healing – this card was in my non-budget version of this deck for awhile, but it didn’t make the cut when competing against all the cards. Here, though, I like it. It replaces itself and, for the low cost of , gives us an instant-speed way to trigger all of our lifegain synergies.
Pristine Talisman – another 3-mana ramp spell, this artifact gives us a repeatable and instant-speed way to gain life, which is pretty awesome on a mana rock in our deck.

Instants

Inscription of Abundance – this card is another that does it all for us. When kicked, it gains us life, puts counters on a creature, and functions as conditional removal. It’s so good I play it in my non-budget version.
Light of Hope – more instant-speed lifegain with the added flexibility of putting a +1/+1 counter on a creature or destroying an enchantment. All for a single . Now that’s value!
Pledge of Unity – there are a few cards that put counters on all of our creatures, but few, if any, do it at instant speed while also gaining us life. And all for 3 mana.
Revitalize – gaining life and drawing a card? Yes, please! Also, what happened to the color pie WOTC???

Sorceries

Kayla’s Command – it’s hard to believe any of the Commands are under a $1, but this one is. And it happens to do everything we want. The other 2 modes aren’t bad, either.

Lands

As every Commander player quickly learns, lands aren’t just for making the manas. We play several lands that synergize with our lifegain plan. These are some of our most efficient ways to trigger Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn, as they require no mana investment. In fact, they do the opposite, in that they increase the number of mana resources we have in play. These lands are best played after we have our commander out and some of our pieces on the battlefield. Look at them more as free spells rather than mana sources. We don’t want to play these lands early unless we absolutely have to. It’s not all upside, of course. The budget fetches put a land into play tapped, while cards like Radiant Fountain only tap for colorless.

Brokers Hideout – readers of my Budget Omnath deck already know the power of these fetch lands. Here, though, rather than getting us two landfall triggers in a single turn just for playing a land, it’s the 1 life they gain us that we care about. Sometimes we really just need a single trigger from Lathiel to start our counters-matter shenanigans. We play a total of four of these lands: Cabaretti Courtyard, Obscura Storefront, and Riveteers Overlook are the other three.
Radiant Fountain – 2 life equals 2 +1/+1 counters is how we want this land drop to play out.

If we put the +1/+1 counter on Basri’s Lieutenant, does Seraph Sanctuary see it as an Angel on ETB?

Seraph Sanctuary – we don’t play any angels to trigger the static lifegain ability, but we could… Here’s a question for my readers and one I don’t want to spend an hour searching for an answer to: if we have a Sigarda’s Summons and Seraph Sanctuary out and play Mikaeus, the Lunarch, will the Human Cleric count as an Angel entering the battlefield? My understanding of the rules is yes, it will be seen as an Angel and gain us 1 life. We play 2 such cards, the other being Kurbis, Harvest Celebrant. Now, another rules question: Sigarda’s Summons is on the battlefield and we play Basri’s Lieutenant. We target itself with its ability and put the +1/+1 counter on it. Can we stack the ETB triggers in such a way that Seraph Sanctuary checks Basri’s Lieutenant for counters after we’ve put them on? If so, then it should see the Human Knight as an Angel. However, I think the Seraph Sanctuary would see Basri’s Lieutenant enter as a Knight as a static ability, not as a triggered one, and so we wouldn’t be able to stack them. I guess I’ll have to ask a judge next time I get the chance. This complexity and unexpected interaction that have you researching an answer after more than a decade playing the game is just one reason I love Magic so much!

The Shire – for the low cost of and , we can gain 3 life each turn. There will be board states where this is not just acceptable, but actually game ending. Also of note, going the route of Food tokens as a source of lifegain is another budget-friendly angle for building a deck like this.

Ways to Abuse Lifegain

Other than growing our creatures via lifegain, either with or commander or built in cards like Ajani’s Pridemate, we have a couple of other ways to take advantage of the extra life we gain other than simply prolonging our life.

Gwaihir, Greatest of the Eagles – a budget version of Resplendent Angel with a lower hurdle to clear to get a weaker token. One of the best parts of writing these articles is realizing a card I’ve kept out of the 99 should be included. This is one of those times. The reason? I mean, the reason other than its obvious synergies with our lifegain strategy? Our top-end creatures aren’t very impressive on their own. Short of Verdurous Gearhulk and Trollbred Guardian, we don’t have a 5 drop bigger than a 4/4. A 5/5 flier for 5 mana isn’t a great rate in non-budget Commander, but it’s a bomb for us. Plus, it can grow its own army without counters involved, which gives us another angle of attack, as well as a workaround for Solemnity.
Well of Lost Dreams – one of our best ways to get back into a game after a boardwipe or to pull ahead via sheer card advantage.

Getting and Abusing Counters

Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn is a 4-mana, fragile creature. We really can’t rely on our Unicorn commander doing all the heavy lifting of putting counters on creatures, or we’d need to build the deck differently (and probably over budget). Furthermore, every good Commander deck should still function and be able to win games without its commander in play. Ours is no different. For this reason, many of our cards do Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn‘s job for it: they put counters on our creatures. We have a second reason for this aspect of our deck, however. We want to abuse the very act of putting +1/+1 counters on creatures beyond just growing them bigger than their original form. Many of our spells either do something else when a counter is placed on a creature, or they grant other creatures with +1/+1 counters additional powers. And, as with the best cards in this archetype, many do both.

Ways to Put Counters on Creatures

Abzan Battle Priest – the outlast mechanic is a slow and oftentimes mana-intensive way of growing a single creature. That being said, Commander may be the best place for it to shine, as it’s unlikely we are attacking with a 3/2 for 4 mana on the ground anyway.
Abzan Falconer – our second creature with outlast. The payoff for both of these Humans from Khans of Tarkir comes with the abilities they give creatures with +1/+1 counters on them, but more on that later.
Ajani’s Pridemate – this feels like it epitomizes our deck. We want to gain life and we want extra value out of that lifegain beyond not dying so fast. This Cat Soldier can grow large very fast.
Basri’s Solidarity – I misread this card the first time it was in my hand and thought it was an instant. Alas, it is not that good. Still, at 2 mana, it is competitively priced and scales up as the game goes long. Unfortunately, combat tricks are out of the question.
Captured by Lagacs – one of our removal spells that furthers our strategy in another way, this time by putting a +1/+1 counter on two creatures. The biggest drawback of this enchantment is that it doesn’t shut off activated abilities.

Citadel Siege – I love the sieges. They are wonderful flavor wins and they all offer really good value. We almost always pick Khans unless we’re dying to a single creature of our opponent’s, or we need to shut down cards like Kaalia of the Vast. Also, I’m pretty sure that’s Sunscorch Regent in the background, so that’s another flavor win for us.
Cleric Class – Level 2 is where we want to be at with this enchantment in order to make any of our creatures an Ajani’s Pridemate.

Now that’s a combo!

Evolution Sage – our first proliferate card, this mechanic is a subtheme of our deck as it is one of the best ways to grow our team quickly. It honestly doesn’t feel fair sometimes. With this Elf Druid on the battlefield, a single land drop does the same thing as a card like Supply Runners or Victory’s Envoy, both of which come at the cost of 5 total mana. Of course, proliferate only works if our creatures already have counters on them, which means it’s not a totally fair comparison, but our goal is to always have counters on our creatures. Proliferate also works with Cleric Class, which is a pretty sweet synergy.

Forgotten Ancient –  this card is busted in our deck and I’m honestly shocked it’s under $1. It was originally printed in Scourge, which came out in May 2003. That is also shocking to me, as I wasn’t playing Magic then and the card felt customed made for the Commander 2021 deck it appeared in. Anyway, I’m very happy we have access to this card, as both text boxes are amazing. It grows itself when any player casts a spell and then we get to distribute its counters among other creatures every upkeep. And while we may not really want to grow other people’s creatures much, we have that option. What a card!
Gala Greeters – we can only grow itself, but that’s enough. Add in the other two modes, and this card is an auto-include. If it wasn’t for the fact it was the buy-a-box promo for Streets of New Capenna, I’m sure this rare would be over $1.
Grateful Apparition – the riskiest of our proliferate cards and perhaps the first out when something better comes along. The dream is to play it on turn 2 and get in some hits with it before our opponent finds a blocker. Our nightmare is topdecking it in the late game on a board full of Angels or Demons when what we really need is something like Sigarda’s Summons or Abzan Battle Priest.

Huatli’s Raptor – proliferate is such a powerful mechanic in this deck, even a single trigger, like what we get from this Dinosaur, is worth it. We rarely want to play this 2/3 on curve. Rather, if it’s in our opening 7, we’ll most likely want to hold it until we’ve built up a big board state to get maximum value out of it.
Kayla’s Command – the +1/+1 counter this sorcery gives is nice, but it’s the double strike that creature gains that can steal us a game.
Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn – gaining a bunch of life with our commander out means we get to grow our whole team, not just a single creature.
Light of Hope – for a single , we get to put a +1/+1 counter on a creature. Seems like a good rate.
Luminarch Aspirant – a former Standard all-star, this Human Cleric gives us exactly what we want: a free and repeatable way to put a +1/+1 counter on our creatures.
Managorger Hydra – when I first looked into building this deck on a budget, Managorger Hydra was too pricey. Now, there are a couple of copies floating around for under $1 thanks to some recent reprints. Trample makes this a must-answer threat before it grows out of proportion. Our shenanigans are looking to reach this goal much sooner than our opponent is ready for.

Mikaeus, the Lunarch – it’s not every day a budget deck gets to play a mythic rare (thought it’s since been downgraded to rare). This card is amazing in our deck. It comes in with a bunch of counters, can grow itself, and, best of all, can grow our whole team. And, as I’ve mentioned before, sometimes we just need a single +1/+1 counter on our creatures to turn the corner. Mikaeus, the Lunarch gives us this ability for the low, low cost of 2 mana.
New Horizons – another of our overcosted ramp spells, this one lets us put a +1/+1 counter on a creature on ETB.
Pledge of Unity – unlike Basri’s Solidarity, this card is an instant, so let’s blow some blockers out!

Pollenbright Druid – we always want to choose proliferate, but sometimes we’ll settle for the first mode.
Renegade Krasis – the evolve mechanic is reliant on a bigger creature entering the battlefield, but it is a way we can grow this Beast Mutant. We will reliably only do this once, maybe twice. The real payoff comes with the second text box, which we’ll discuss below.
Rishkar, Peema Renegade – we get to put a +1/+1 counter on two creatures. We can target itself, which is nice, as we often will play a 2 drop on turn 2 and can then follow that up with this Elf Druid on turn 3.  This will give us access to 6 mana on turn 4, or simply let us swing in for some early above-curve damage.
Ruinous Intrusion – some instant speed hate for artifacts and enchantments that also puts counters on one of our creatures. Like most other spells that function this way, it’s overcosted.
Serene Steward – for a single , we get an Ajani’s Pridemate effect once. Eh, not bad.
Scavenging Ooze – it can grow itself, assuming there are creatures in yards.
Smell Fear – now we’re talking! An undercosted fight spell since it also proliferates. The only drawback? It’s a sorcery.
Sunscorch Regent – the lumbering white Cookie Monster is back! I almost put the pictures in again. This is our third creature that grows itself with each spell cast, this time limited to only spells our opponents cast, unfortunately.
Tempered Veteran – to put a +1/+1 counter is where we want to be at, but the flexibility is nice, even if it comes at such a steep cost.
Trelasarra, Moon Dancer – a better Ajani’s Pridemate, this Elf Cleric is on the shortlist for alternate commanders for this deck.
Trollbred Guardian – For we can put two +1/+1 counters on it once, as long as it doesn’t have any counters already. This is different than the outlast mechanic, that we can activate again and again.

Together Forever – a repeatable source of recursion that puts counters on two of our creatures. This is the kind of card that can really help grind out value for us on a budget.
Unbounded Potential – another busted Modern Horizons 2 card… Well, maybe not, but compare the power level and flexibility of this card to Basri’s Solidarity. Instant-speed proliferate is our best use of this card.
Unbreakable Formation – effects that give all your creatures indestructible typically cost more than $1, with Heroic Intervention, Akroma’s Will, and Flawless Maneuver all being better and more expensive. Still, we are happy to have access to a protection spell and doubly happy that we can use it to grow our team.
Vastwood Fortification – a free inclusion since it’s a land on the back.

Verdurous Gearhulk – I find it hard to believe this mythic rare is under $1. It’s had a few reprints, including in a Commander Precon, but it was once a $20 card. Now, it’s in our budget deck as one of our better late-game draws or as a way to start the +1/+1 counters fun all over again after a boardwipe.
Victory’s Envoy – this Human Cleric is fragile, but otherwise she is one of our best ways to repeatedly put counters on our creatures.

Ways to Abuse Counters on Our Creatures

These are the different ways we are looking to take advantage of having counters on our creatures, other than the benefit we get from having bigger creatures. Not included in this list are the ways we have to proliferate (6). Instead, this list will include cards that either grant creatures with counters an additional ability or cards that have a unique ability that triggers anytime a +1/+1 counter is placed on them. Also included here are cards that care about creatures with +1/+1 counters in other ways.

Abzan Battle Priest – gives each creature with a +1/+1 counter lifelink, which just so happens to synergize nicely with our commander.
Abzan Falconer – ditto to the Battle Priest, except the creatures get flying instead of lifelink. This will be one of our best late-game finishers after we’ve built up a massive board.
Basri’s Lieutenant – gives us some insulation from a sweeper.

Constable of the Realm – our best removal spell. The key to this card being so powerful is, unlike some other creatures with renown, the ability doesn’t trigger specifically when it becomes renowned. Instead, it’s any time one or more +1/+1 counters are put on it. For this reason, we can easily machine-gun down our opponent’s board with the right support pieces.

Herd Baloth – what a card for our deck! We can quickly build an army of 4/4 Beast tokens to close out the game.
Inspiring Call – a protection spell attached to card draw? Yes, please! This instant is quite the blowout against a sweeper, as we get to keep our board and refill our hand.
Kurbis, Harvest Celebrant – a creature that scales as the game goes long, it gives us a way to protect our other creatures from combat damage or damage-based removal.

Kutzil, Malamet Exemplar – an oddly phrased text box, which, for our purposes, reads, “Whenever one or more creatures with a +1/+1 counter on it deals combat damage to a player, draw a card.” Shutting down our opponent’s instants on our turn is a nice bonus.
Renegade Krasis – if we trigger evolve, we get to grow our whole team of creatures with +1/+1 counters on them. We have 16 creatures that can trigger Renegade Krasis when it’s a 3/2. The card would be a lot better if it was like Constable of the Realm, but even with the limitation of having to evolve to trigger, I think it’s worth it.
Rishkar, Peema Renegade – this card gives us the potential to make a lot of mana, given how many creatures we can put counters own. More often than not, we’ll use his static ability to cast two spells a turn sooner than our opponent and slowly pull ahead that way.
Sigardian Paladin – a card I’m on the fence about and want to see in action. That’s a lot of text and a lot of value. The part that has me intrigued is in the late game we can cast it and immediately activate its ability since it doesn’t need to tap to use it. And given how some of our games can stall out due to chump blockers and a lack of evasion, having another way to grant trample on a respectable body seems worth it.

Sigarda’s Summons – our all-star finisher, we get to turn all of our early drops into evasive 4/4s that still keep their counters. I’m very excited that this card is under $1.
Trollbred Guardian – giving all of our creatures trample is almost as good as giving them flying.

The Rest

We aren’t just playing ways to gain life and abuse counters. Like any deck, we want some removal, card draw, and ramp, among other things. As mentioned above, we’ve chosen cards that do these things while also furthering our primary gameplan. I won’t talk about each card, as I’ve discussed most above. Instead, I’ll just list them here to help you in making your own decisions of what to tweak for your meta.

Removal

This includes all nonland removal.

Captured by Lagacs
Constable of the Realm
Inscription of Abundance
Light of Hope
Ruinous Intrusion
Smell Fear

Card Draw

I’m lumping card advantage into this category.

Cleric Class
Dawn of Hope – comes with the added benefit of being a mana sink that can make us an army of lifelinkers.
Fountain of Renewal
Inspiring Call
Kutzil, Malamet Exemplar
Potion of Healing
Revitalize
Together Forever
Well of Lost Dreams

Ramp

I’m including spells that let us put a land in our hand.

Gift of Paradise
Kayla’s Command
New Horizons
Pristine Talisman
Verdant Haven

Protection Spells

Fight as One – we play 21 non-Human creatures and 10 Humans, so we will frequently only be able to keep one creature alive through a sweeper. Nerfing a targeted removal spell on our commander or our next best creature is totally acceptable.
Inspiring Call
Kurbis, Harvest Celebrant
Unbreakable Formation

Hate for the Hate

Shutting down our lifegain can hamstring our deck’s strategy. Cards like Erebos, God of the Dead, Tibalt, Rakish Instigator, or Grima Wormtongue can all ruin our fun. We play a full suite of removal in the sense that we have a way of directly dealing with all possible threats of this sort. The problem is we only have one or two such answers in our deck and so will need to find them in order to start our shenanigans again. That being said, we have plenty of ways of growing our team that are not connected to lifegain, so if our opponent thinks our deck will fold to a Forsaken Wastes, they will have a rude awakening. We don’t play any sweepers that could answer these kinds of cards, as most cards that say destroy all creatures (or anything else) are more than a $1 unfortunately, with the exception of Fumigate and End Hostilities. We could make room for one or both of these. It should also be noted that both Wrath of God and Day of Judgement have copies you can buy for under $2. Just saying.

Now this is a beast of a different sort. Should our opponents stick a Solemnity, we will be in some trouble. Sure, we’ll still be able to gain a bunch of life, but infinite life doesn’t stop us from dying to damage from a commander. If this nightmare occurs, the best thing we can do is simply stall the board long enough to find an answer or hope to draw Gwaihir, Greatest of the Eagles and go wide that way.

Flex Spots

There are plenty of cards to choose from, even when building on a budget, so there is always room for tweaking, innovating, or simply playing a pet card. I would start looking for places to trim from our card draw and protection spells first when looking to make room for something that doesn’t synergize with our gameplan but that you want in the deck for whatever reason.

We play 30 different ways of gaining life, 40 ways of putting counters on creatures (including themselves), and 12 ways to abuse creatures with counters on them. Given these numbers, I would start trimming from the 40 ways we have of putting counters on creatures to find room for whatever you want. These numbers should also help you make choices when picking your favorite lifegain or counters cards to swap out with some of my choices.

This is not my first version of budget lifegain. I built the deck a year or so ago and have been toying with it ever since. I’ll provide the list of cards that have either seen play in earlier versions or barely missed the cut. Some of these cards could easily strengthen the deck but are left out for my own reasons, some of which are not very related to their power and performance in the deck. Instead, I may have cut something simply because I play the card in another deck.

Cards to Consider

Lifegain

Abiding Grace – repeatable lifegain or recursion from the graveyard. If we played more 1 drops, I could see finding room for this enchanment.
Clay-Fired Bricks – lifegain attached to putting a Plains in our hand is great. The craft mechanic gives us something to do with our mana in the late game.
Diamond Mare – just missed the cut. Its biggest plus is we can trigger it more than once a turn. Its biggest minus is approximately half of our deck won’t trigger it.
Environmental Sciences – mana-fixing for 2 mana attached to some lifegain? Seems good. This card is not ideally played on turn 2. We want our commander out, at the very least. Still, in a pinch, getting a land we need for 2 mana isn’t such a bad rate.
Faith’s Fetters – another overcosted spell, this time removal. That’s what happens when you’re balling on a budget. Faith’s Fetters targets any permanent, which means we can nerf non-mana abilities on lands even (think Maze of Ith or High Market). Mostly, we would be looking to shut down annoying creatures and Planeswalkers, but the flexibility helps take the sting out of the mana cost.
Field-Tested Frying Pan – we get some value up front on ETB, while the bonus it gives to the equipped creature can give us fast clock.
Ivory Tower – a bit too unreliable to make the cut. Perhaps if you’re going an artifacts-matter route it’s worth including.
Lembas – card draw plus lifegain is great. Some protection against Mill…some people play Mill in Commander, right?

Nykthos Paragon – a decent mimic of our commander. The once per turn clause coupled with the 6 mana cost is why it’s not in the deck.
Path of Bravery – even though we want to win through combat, I don’t like having to attack to gain life and trigger our commander. There will be plenty of board states where we really need to grow our team before attacking via lifegain or risk losing most or all of our attackers, making this a dead draw too often.
Omen of the Sun – 3 things in 1 is great value, particularly on a budget.
Riot Control – the lifegain is out of our control, while the prevented damage is only to us. We want this kind of effect to keep our creatures alive, at the very least.
Solemn Offering – some targeted removal attached to lifegain. I’d definitely consider it if Solemnity saw a lot of play in my playgroup.
Soulmender – just missed the 99. Having to untap with it before we can use it, rather than it being a static ability like Soul Warden means we can’t play it late game and immediately get value out of it.
Survival Cache – since we’re a lifegain deck, we should draw 2 cards off of this sorcery. Otherwise, hopefully we’re at least grinding out value with the lifegain. This one just missed the cut, too.
Time to Feed – 3 mana is just a lot for a sorcery-speed fight spell, even one that synergizes with our strategy. If we haven’t yet grown our creatures, there will be times when this is just a dead card.

Wingmate Roc – another of my favorite cards, I have a Bird Tribal deck and so am reluctant to include this card here. Your deck should probably have it, though.

Counters

Arcus Acolyte – I really like this card and am sad to have had to cut it. Look at all that text! Also of note, it’s from Modern Horizons 2. Of course it has a lot of text. Anyway, the lifelink plus outlast combines our two primary goals in one creature, which is ideal. The third line of text at first seems like a no-brainer in our deck, which is why I included it in an earlier build. However, those creatures only gain outlast until they have counters put on them. Once they have a counter, they lose the ability to grow themselves further. In the best of all possible worlds, we use Arcus Acolyte to put counters on a whole bunch of creatures to turn on all of our counters-matter synergies. Don’t get me wrong, this is important. But we have other, less mana-intensive ways of doing the same thing that don’t require us tapping our creatures to do it. I still think this card isn’t a bad inclusion in our deck, but I wanted to make room for more impactful cards and there is some fierce competition for our 2-drop slot. Is Arcus Acolyte really better than Ajani’s Pridemate? Gala Greeters? Trelasarra, Moon Dancer? It was a hard decision letting the Human Cleric Archer (3 card types!!!) go, but I think it was the correct one.

Curse of Predation – I love the curses as a concept. Building a deck full of them is on my to-do list. Curse of Predation is at its best when we have cards like Doubling Season or Hardened Scales to immediately increase the number of counters we put on our creatures. This maximizes our chances those creatures win in combat. With only a single +1/+1 counter added per attack, we will often be left unable to attack until we don’t really need the additional counter anymore or we’re about to die and want to go out on our own terms.

Dueling Coach – 4 mana is a lot, but the upside could be worth it. We get some immediate value on ETB, while it’s activated ability gives us some inevitability in a long, stalled game. Notice that she only puts counters on creatures with counters already on them. This is another example of why we want multiple ways to put counters on our creatures.
Expedition Raptor – too much mana for this effect.
Fall of Gil-galad – the sagas are all so deceptively good, I almost always want to include them. But we have to judge cards like this (and any card, really) in the worst-case scenario, not just in magical unicorn land. What’s the worst-case for this card? A 1-time, 2-mana scry 2. A more likely scenario is we get the scry and the two counters on a creature, but we don’t want that creature to die or we can’t use it to kill an opponent’s creature. Everything has to go just right to get all that sweet, sweet value from Fall of Gil-galad. Unfortunately, there is too much room for everything to go wrong.
Fall of the Impostor – ditto above. The third chapter is the big lure here, though, as exiling our opponent’s biggest creature is very appealing.
Gird for Battle – a 1-mana spell that puts a +1/+1 counter on two creatures? Yes! This is more like it. I could see finding room for this sorcery.

Hamza, Guardian of Arashin – another contender for commander of this deck, the dream is to cast the Elephant Warrior on turn 4 at a reduced cost. I cut the card mostly because if we have so many creatures that his cost is reduced considerably, there’s a good chance we don’t have many (or any) cards in hand to take advantage of its second text box. I think a non-budget build that has better card draw and ways to survive sweepers can take proper advantage of Hamza. We can’t.
Heroes’ Bane – a great budget option for a finisher. I have a Hydra Tribal deck that is one of my babies and so try not to play hydras elsewhere.
High Sentinels of Arashin – another card that could find a home in this deck. It’s been in earlier versions and probably should be in your deck, assuming you don’t have a Bird Tribal deck of your own.

One creature, plus one counter, equals three mana… Now that’s some math the Underground Man would agree with!

Incubation Druid – nothing like following a turn 2 Incubation Druid with Rishkar, Peema Renegade to make a turn 3 Gilded Lotus.

Ivy Lane Denizen – I always look long and hard at this card before deciding we just won’t be able to trigger it reliably enough. However, I think it’s worth testing out. We play 17 green creatures. Is that enough? We don’t play Diamond Mare, which triggers any time we cast a spell of the chosen color, not just creature spells. But lifegain that synergizes with cards that may or may not be on the battlefield is different than a guaranteed counter for each green creature. And round and round my thoughts go as I try and decide if I should make room for this Elf Warrior. Who knew that even with a $1 restriction, there would be such hard choices???
Jugan, the Rising Star – a 5/5 flier for 6 mana is overcosted, even in a budget build, and that’s the worst-case scenario for this card. Sure, we could live the dream in which our opponent kills this Dragon Spirit in combat to protect their life total and we get to grow our team enough to swing in for lethal the next turn, but if we have a board full of creatures to target with Jugan’s death trigger, there’s a good chance we’re already winning or, more likely, that our opponent uses a boardwipe to kill everything.

Meadowboon – I like this card and could see finding room for it, particularly if we want to up our creature count some. The flexibility evoke gives us means we can cast it as a sorcery and not rely on our opponent to kill it on their time in order for our team to get the counters.
Star Pupil – an auto-include if you’re running Hamza, Guardian of Arashin as your commander. This Human Wizard has modular 1 and barely missed the cut for this reason.
Stormwild Capridor – hey, we’re on a budget and this card has some +1/+1 counter potential!
Supply Runners – a flavor win, these dogs bolster those they have come to help with the supplies they bring. I love it! 5 mana is a lot, but the counters go on all our creatures, except themselves. They’re such good doggies…(watch Letterkenny, if you haven’t already!). This card only just missed the cut.

Swarm Shambler – another auto-include with Hamza, Guardian of Arashin as your commander, this Fungus Beast is another siren song otherwise. The biggest problem with this card is that it triggers only when an opponent targets it with a spell, rather than spell or ability. Commander players only play so many targeted removal spells and we’re a budget deck, so…I’d guess we could reliably count on getting a single 1/1 green Insect token out of this card. Oh boy. Still, look at all that text! All that potential value! Get the beeswax and don’t fall victim to the beautiful melody!
Unruly Mob – another favorite card of mine since it plays well in an Aristocrat style deck. Without a reliable way or reason to kill our own creatures, this card just doesn’t do enough.
Vastwood Hydra – another Hydra that should probably be in your deck. You may be thinking, why not play Jugan, the Rising Star then, aren’t they the same? Short answer is, no. Long answer is, Vastwood Hydra scales up as the game goes long, but can come down as early as turn 3 to start our counters-matter shenanigans. Then, instead of only giving us 5 +1/+1 counters to distribute when it dies, we get as many as are on it. Of course, the problem with exile effects and sweepers that make Jugan unplayable are in play here, too.

Venerated Loxodon – I’m on the fence on this card and probably need to test it out to see how good it is. It seems like it would be perfect in our deck. We can play a 1-drop, 2-drop, 3-drop and turn 4 grow each of them with counters and get a 4/4 for 2 mana. Is this ceiling high enough? I’m leaning towards no.
Yorvo, Lord of Garenbrig – similar to Ivy Lane Denizen, this Giant Noble grows itself with each green creature cast. 3 mana for a 4/4 with counters already on it and the potential to get bigger? Sounds great. , though, is rough on turn 3 and is this card really powerful enough that we’d want to draw it in the late game? Perhaps, but even once we have , this kind of mana restriction can prevent us from casting two spells in a turn when we need to in order to pull ahead or turn the corner.

Cards that Combine Lifegain and Counters

Gladehart Cavalry – 7 mana is the main reason this card hasn’t made the cut, but it does do everything we want otherwise.

Ways to Abuse Counters

The three creatures pictured above all give creatures with +1/+1 counters trample. We play one such creature already in Trollbred Guardian and another creature that can give trample in Sigardian Paladin. Should we play more? I’m on the fence, but I don’t think including either Gnarlid Colony or Tuskguard Captain would significantly harm the synergies of the deck. They both can put counters on themselves and keep our curve low. Crowned Ceratok doesn’t have these benefits. Is one of the two trample-granting creatures better than Grateful Apparition? I’ll test it out more and decide. Let me know what you think in the comments!

Ideal Hand and Game Play

We are a hybrid combo-aggro deck looking to go wide and go big in order to finish off our opponent. Like any combo deck, we want the pieces in our opening hand and the lands to cast them. Ideally, we would have 3 lands in hand, a way to gain life consistently, and a way to put counters on creatures. Among our 4 non-land cards, we want at least 2 creatures we can cast early in order to start growing them to massive proportions. If we are able to stick 2 or 3 creatures with the necessary cards to gain life and put counters on them, then we can wait for our opponent to answer this first round of threats while we steadily refill our hand for a second and third wave. We don’t have any tricks or I-win-the-game cards like Test of Endurance (which does have a copy for $1), so we have to win through combat. We don’t even have a way to gain infinite life, even if this doesn’t matter as much in Commander.

Here are some of our best 1 drops we’d love to see in our opening hand:

In the 2-drop slot, our best follow-up plays are:

Luminarch Aspirant and Gala Greeters are some of our best 2-drop creatures, as well. Scavenging Ooze and creatures with proliferate like Pollenbright Druid or Huatli’s Raptor are best in the late game.

Some 3-drop creatures that help get us off to fast starts are the following:

We would love to see any of our support pieces along the way, whether it’s removal or card draw or additional ways to put counters on creatures.

Our best and most efficient late-game bombs to help us close out a game are:

And that’s the ideal hand and opening few turns in pictures! Let me know in the comments if you like this style of presentation, or would rather simply have a list of cards as I’ve done in the past.

Weaknesses

Any time you have budgetary restrictions, this constitutes your deck’s biggest weakness. We simply do not have access to certain kinds of cards that take decks from a 4-5 to a 6-7 or higher power level. Of notable absences, we lack tutors and sweepers, the first of which is so crucial to making a combo deck run smoothly, while the latter is good to have in any deck, as there will be games where you inevitably fall behind and need to hit the reset button. I’ve recently looked up some of the lesser-played sweepers and was pleasantly surprised to find both Fumigate and End Hostilities are under $1. The former even synergizes with our lifegain plan! I’ll have to do some more testing before I decide to make room for one or both of these.

Beyond this obvious weakness, since we are a combo deck, it is possible that we don’t draw the pieces to function properly. We may have ways to abuse counters on our creatures, but lack the ability to put counters on those creatures to begin with. We may get to untap with our commander early, only to fail to find any way to gain life to trigger it. This is variance, of course, or, more often, our opponent interacting with our gameplan. If we can’t get our synergies online, then we are left playing woefully underpowered creatures.

Another big weakness of the deck is the fragility of our commander coupled with its mana cost. 4 mana isn’t too bad, but if we’re left having to wait until turn 6 to recast her, then we will often be too far behind. For this reason, it is probably wise not to cast Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn on curve, but rather to wait until we can cast her and trigger her static ability in the same turn. That way we force our opponent to have an instant speed answer to stop us from getting at least some value from her. As I’ve mentioned and as the picture at the beginning of the article demonstrates, we do not need our commander to grow our team and win games. But, our deck is more fun and more explosive with Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn on the battlefield.

Conclusion

This deck is a lot of fun to play, especially if you enjoy synergistic creature-based strategies. It’s a midrange deck looking to amass an army of creatures, grow them huge, and attack for the win. If this is your style of play, then give this deck a try! I’ll post an article on my non-budget version of this deck in the coming weeks. For now, though, there are plenty of ways to upgrade this deck, ranging from the pricey (Doubling Season is $40) to the just-out-of-our budget (Hardened Scales is under $2). There are also other avenues you can explore connected to lifegain, whether it be cards like Test of Endurance that win you the game or those that use lifegain to power up your creatures even more (Field-Tested Frying Pan).

How do you abuse Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn? What budget-friendly cards have I forgotten? Let me know in the comments! Now that I’m making videos, I’m going to try out Commander on MTGO and hopefully post a video of game play with this budget deck soon.

Thanks for reading!