I've been thinking about Bello, Bard of the Brambles. I've heard a lot of chatter amongst people about this particular Commander precon being strong. I've played against it a lot and I have a lot of mixed feelings about it. Don't get me wrong, the mixed feelings have nothing to do with whether it's strong. It is strong. I've just always had a conflicted feeling towards Gruul decks and the ire they bring in the meta of Commander. Let's get into it.

The Historical Problem With Gruul

I might be a hater, but something I've noticed about Gruul Commander Decks is that they often bring too much attention. Xenagos, God of Revels makes a creature double in size and gives it haste, which with an Atarka, World Render deck is lethal to one player. The same is true with Halana and Alena, Partners. Faldorn, Dread Wolf Herald goes wide playing from exile super quickly. Raggadragga, Goreguts Boss plays mana dorks and at some point buffs them with a wide strategy with tons of mana, fairly early on.

What's wrong with going off first and big? Isn't that the point? Commander is about threading the needle of being the threat and others being threats. If you're consistently the threat, especially early on, all of the other player's removal tends to land on your threats. Someone else then swoops in for the win after the initial threat is handled, when no one has removal or interaction. Don't get me wrong, sometimes being scary fast enough means your opponents don't have enough time to get interaction to stop you before you win, but in my experience that's not the norm.

What happens is the same thing we all hear about a turn-one Sol Ring: you lose more often because you accelerate into the lead much earlier than everyone else and bring the ire of the entire table. You're dealing with three times as much card draw, removal, and creatures. It's tough to win as archenemy.

The further issue is that while Green has great ramp, draw, and single target protection spells, it struggles to survive board wipes, in a traditionally creature heavy strategy. Mono-Green could more effectively rebuild and protect their board with more Green consistency, but Red struggles with protection. Red has the most aggressive strategies that are more likely to get to remove the player most threatening to their strategy, but balancing both colors seems to me to be its downfall. I haven't forgotten Heroic Intervention as mass protection, but that's one in the 99. The greatest interaction in Gruul is to eliminate the player most likely to have interaction. However, how efficiently you can remove those players might be tough even in Gruul because there is likely more than one player who threatens you.

Bello Manages to Get Away With It

This is why I am so conflicted with Bello, Bard of the Brambles. It suffers from the same problem of becoming the threat far too easily, but it doesn't seem to be a problem. Playing Bello then an Unnatural Growth or a Gratuitous Violence or Fiery Emancipation means that one 4/4, haste, indestructible enchantment is going to hit for 8 or even 32 damage and then you DRAW A CARD FOR EACH ONE THAT CONNECTS.

That is absolutely threatening, but did you catch that they're indestructible? This creates an insidious interaction. Bello's artifacts and enchantments are only indestructible and creatures on that player's turn so after that it's shields down on other players. Why don't all the other players just swing in and remove the Bello player?

They can't. All blocks against Bello's enchantment and artifact creatures are unfair trades because they're huge and indestructible. Most players can't risk taking the damage and giving that player draw, so they chump block. Oftentimes they aren't able to retaliate effectively back because they used their creatures to block and survive. Even players that eat the damage and swing out might not be able to knock out the Bello player and now have the Bello player's ire. It becomes tough to decide to attack them.

Is Bello a Great Commander?

I have to give it to WOTC, Bello is one of my favorite designed Gruul legendary creatures. I used to be a severe hater of this card, and had to learn through bad assessment and game losses, just how insidious this deck can be. It creates a meta of its own. The value is absolutely insane. Having the ability to ramp into high heaven in Green, allows all the pricey enchantment and artifacts to be affordable for Bello. All the single target protection spells in Green just makes keeping Bello safe through so much interaction viable. If you don't have the protection in hand, you can always recast Bello, since he's a humble three mana. However, I feel that similar to Kaalia the Vast, that Bello is a kill on sight commander. The value is just too good.

What Do You Think?

Enough of me going on and on about how much I love Bello, give me your feedback. Am I just a huge Bello glazer or am I right to be afraid of them? What are some other considerations I missed? Hit me up at @Strixhavendropout at Bluesky.