In multiplayer, you used to see tribal decks all of the time, but the influx of Commander decks has seriously reduced that number. Sure, you see the occasional deck, but they are often built the same. Very few tribes have good choices between more than two or three commanders. Some don’t even have that many. As a result, Commander has moved away from tribal decks, and I see them only occasionally.

Since I’m missing the tribal love, I figured I should do something about it. I looked at some tribal commanders, and I decided on one to build around. Sometimes, tribal blocks go to an odd place. It seems that a lot of tribal-themed set have a tribe that comes out of nowhere, such as Kithkin. Today, we are looking at one such tribe. Birds.

Of course, any deck that features Kangee as its Commander is going to want a bunch of Birds. Luckily, Birds have been around for a long time, so we have a lot of Magic’s history to pilfer. The first creatures I add are those that enable a Bird deck. For example, Keeper of the Nine Gales is great in a Bird deck. You tap it and some Birds to bounce any permanent with no expenditure of mana needed. You can bounce a creature token to slay it, bounce something with a powerful Aura, or bounce something to open up a defense for an attack. Sometimes, you just want to lock down a card you can’t answer right now. Whatever your reason, the Keeper is online for you.

Crookclaw Elder may be among the more expensive Birds in the deck, but you can tap two Birds to draw a card, and it doesn’t tap or anything to use it. With a repeatable ability that powerful, it’s a must-include in a Kangee deck. Another expensive but powerful Bird enabler is Aven Brigadier. It pumps all of your feathered friends, and if they happen to be Soldiers, it pumps them twice. Like a lot of older lords, it does pump enemy creatures that have the requisite creature types, so watch out for that. Another Bird helper is Celestial Gatekeeper. When it dies, you exile it, but you can bring back two dead Birds. That’s a two-for-the-price-of-one special, which none can dispute.

I ask myself what Birds are amazing in multiplayer, and that’s when I start adding to my feather horde. The first choice is Commander Eesha. The combination of a cheap cost, flying, and a great protection ability allows you to block and survive virtually any creature that comes your way while also slipping through any defense on the attack. She’s amazing. Another great Bird is Lieutenant Kirtar. Since he can sacrifice to exile an attacker, people who see the 2 mana and Bird up will simply head elsewhere with their big stompies. Another strong Bird is Glarecaster. While a bit pricey to play and to use, her ability is strong enough to save you or her. You’ll feel a lot safer with this Bird rocking the table.

Utility Birds are up next. They might be a bit pricey to cast, but the islandcycler Shoreline Ranger and general cycler Primoc Escapee give me the ability to find a precious land or draw a precious card when I can’t play them. Later, when you have enough mana, they are behind the curve, but having the ability to choose if I want to cycle or play them makes up for their lack of size. I play Escapees fairly regular, and you’d be surprised by how many people I slay with it. Mist Raven is a fine utility card. You can play it to bounce one of your own dudes to make another trigger (such as Raven Familiar’s or Brass Herald’s) or to offend an opposing creature. Either way, you have a nice addition to the deck with it. Finally, Major Teroh can exile all black creatures. This is great if you are facing them, and since we have none in our deck, it’s a free chance to blast a foe with black.

There are four Birds I want to talk more about. The first is Soulcatcher. It can grow bigger as any flyers die (including opposing Birds), and it potentially swings for a lot of damage. It has potential in a deck such as this. Rimefeather Owl can be very big, so I want to make sure that all of my basic lands are snow lands. I’ll also include a few other snow permanents to have a nice Owl. It’s the biggest creature in my deck, and since I can permanently pump it for 2 mana a pop, I can have a 15/15 or 22/22 very quickly. Aven Mindcensor is a great way to hose tutoring, and except for a few land-searching abilities, we have no tutoring in the deck at all. (We only have three land-searchers.) Feel free to flash this out to hose opposing tutor effects. Finally, Aven Mimeomancer is an odd way to bring down powerful creatures. You’ll feel much less threatened by creatures such as Darksteel Colossus and Akroma, Angel of Wrath when you turn them into 3/1 flyers. You’ll find that enemies often either underestimate how powerful it is or overestimate it and therefore make mistakes when playing it. The Mimeomancer has a clever trick in this deck. It puts a feather counter on the creature. Well, Kangee puts feather counters on herself to pump the fellow Birds. So, if you place another feather counter on Kangee via the Mimeomancer, all of your Birds will pump even more. Plus, you can use the Mimeomancer turn after turn to put another feather counter on Kangee; nowhere in the ability does it exclude creatures with feather counters from receiving more.

I like pumping my guys so much that in go several enchantments to do that even more. Glorious Anthem and Shared Triumph obviously help my team. Favorable Winds also is an obvious enabler for all of my flyers—and since most Birds fly, it helps them all. To these, I add the incredible late-game Marshal's Anthem. Not only will it act as a Glorious Anthem for your team, but the multikicker ability to grab dudes from your graveyard and place them onto the battlefield is incredible. It gives the deck a nice late-game kick.

Bird-enabling doesn’t end there. Take a look at Seaside Haven. This land allows me to sacrifice a Bird to draw a card. It gives the deck a little extra juice. A card that gives it a lot of juice is the common Airborne Aid. Count the number of Birds that are flapping about, and draw cards equal to that number. This can be a nasty number of cards for a 4-mana investment. (Note that it includes Birds your foes have). With its obvious power, I’ll also toss in a Distant Melody for an influx of Bird-based card-drawing. A final Bird enabler is Belbe's Portal. Tapping the Portal for 3 mana and playing any Bird at any time gives your deck a nice amount of flexibility. You can also play more expensive Birds for .

I like removal as much as the next Commander player. I don’t want to kill your Birds, so in goes Harsh Mercy. Everybody gets to save their best creatures, and any tribal deck can save the whole team. Even still, you will kill enough creatures for it to matter. With a deck that has a smaller creature base (in terms of size), you can find yourself overwhelmed by bigger creatures. Retribution of the Meek slays all of those annoying high-power creatures! No matter what you need to sweep, Austere Command is here to ensure that you don’t kill the wrong stuff of yours. Perhaps you want to kill creatures that are expensive and artifacts. Or maybe you just want to use it as a Purify or Day of Judgment. Whatever you need, it provides. Exiling creatures is important to end any recursion-based shenanigans. Crib Swap, Path to Exile, and Swords to Plowshares each exile an opposing creature for very little mana on your part. Finally, you can slay attackers with Wing Shards. If enough spells have been played, you can kill a lot of creatures with this one spell. Even if you don’t, you often find that an Edict for attacking creatures is much better than a normal Edict because people leave back the small or utility creatures they don’t care about and would normally sacrifice to an Edict. You will hit a business creature. My final removal spells are Dismantling Blow and Return to Dust for artifacts and enchantments that become problematic.

Since this deck lacks some late-game charm, I’ll give it counters. We can stop opposing counters! Desertion counters anything, and it takes its target if it’s a critter or artifact, and it drops it right into play on your side of the field. Dismiss draws you a card, Dismal Failure forces the caster to discard, Dissipate exiles the card you counter, Cryptic Command can do two of many things, and Forbid can either be a Cancel or a powerful buyback counter based on your need. These give you some late-game play. Another card to do that is Take Possession. You can steal any permanent, and with split second, players can’t respond. You can take an untapped Nevinyrral's Disk or a big creature. Whatever players have, you can steal.

I’ll round out the deck with some utility. We need mana, so both Sol Ring and Coldsteel Heart will accommodate. We need a bit more card-drawing. Tidings is great, Fact or Fiction is established as amazing, and I really consider Recurring Insight to be perhaps the best card-drawing spell of all time for multiplayer. Unlike duels, this is a format where people hold onto their cards, and you can easily draw eight or thirteen cards with it after it plays twice. If all you draw are six cards—from someone who has three cards in hand—it’s two more cards than Tidings for 1 more mana; that’s worth it.

With lands, I’ll keep it mostly to snow-covered basics. Also moving in is the snow land Boreal Shelf because it gives you both colors of mana and is a snow land. Mouth of Ronom is here as an additional way to off a creature if needed, and Scrying Sheets can draw you a land. Even though almost every snow card in the deck is a land, it still has thirty-two snow permanents in it, so the Sheets is pretty good here just as a way of finding you lands. Other than Command Tower for mana and two fetch lands, the rest are basics. Anyway, here’s the deck!

"Bird Beats"

• Commander (0)

• Creatures (28)
• 1 Arctic Aven
• 1 Augury Owl
• 1 Aven Brigadier
• 1 Aven Mimeomancer
• 1 Aven Mindcensor
• 1 Celestial Gatekeeper
• 1 Crookclaw Elder
• 1 Emeria Angel
• 1 Glarecaster
• 1 Gustcloak Savior
• 1 Keeper of the Nine Gales
• 1 Mindshrieker
• 1 Mirror Entity
• 1 Mist Raven
• 1 Murder of Crows
• 1 Primoc Escapee
• 1 Raven Familiar
• 1 Shoreline Ranger
• 1 Soulcatcher
• 1 Thieving Magpie
• 1 Windbrisk Raptor
• 1 Adaptive Automaton
• 1 Brass Herald
• 1 Commander Eesha
• 1 Lieutenant Kirtar
• 1 Major Teroh
• 1 Soraya the Falconer
• 1 Rimefeather Owl

• Planeswalkers (3)
• 1 Ajani Goldmane
• 1 Jace Beleren
• 1 Venser, the Sojourner

• Spells (34)
• 1 Akroma's Blessing
• 1 Cryptic Command
• 1 Desertion
• 1 Dismal Failure
• 1 Dismantling Blow
• 1 Dismiss
• 1 Dissipate
• 1 Fact or Fiction
• 1 Forbid
• 1 Path to Exile
• 1 Prismatic Strands
• 1 Return to Dust
• 1 Swords to Plowshares
• 1 Wing Shards
• 1 Crib Swap
• 1 Airborne Aid
• 1 Austere Command
• 1 Battle Screech
• 1 Distant Melody
• 1 Harsh Mercy
• 1 Recurring Insight
• 1 Retribution of the Meek
• 1 Tidings
• 1 Favorable Winds
• 1 Glorious Anthem
• 1 Marshal's Anthem
• 1 Shared Triumph
• 1 Soulcatchers' Aerie
• 1 Take Possession
• 1 Belbe's Portal
• 1 Door of Destinies
• 1 Riptide Replicator
• 1 Sol Ring
• 1 Coldsteel Heart

• Lands (34)
• 1 Command Tower
• 1 Evolving Wilds
• 1 Seaside Haven
• 1 Terramorphic Expanse
• 13 Snow-Covered Island
• 14 Snow-Covered Plains
• 1 Boreal Shelf
• 1 Mouth of Ronom
• 1 Scrying Sheets

Buy This Deck

The last cards cut include Sawtooth Loon, the three Cloudchasers, Akroma's Memorial, and Volrath's Laboratory. Birds are cool! I hope you enjoyed today’s Kangee deck. Let me know what you thought!

See you next week,

Abe Sargent