One thing I like about the 75% philosophy is coming up with ways to do a “thing” and deal with the opponents’ “things.” It doesn’t take much creativity to prevent things from happening, and it makes the game interesting when things happen. Couple my desire to make and allow things to happen with my desire to build 75% decks around a theme, and you have a recipe for a spicy brew.

The next thought I had was perhaps a better one, and that was to play enchantments. If your group will allow it, you can go fully creatureless and have Genju of the Realm be your commander. He gives you access to all five colors and isn’t a creature, and therefore, he sets the tone for how tough we’re going to be on ourselves, and he is capable of dealing 21 commander damage if need be. This is a very loose interpretation of the rules, and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if your playgroup forces you to pick an actual creature as your commander, so pick Child of Alara or Progenitus or whichever five-colored legendary creature you designate. Sliver Overlord could be a funny one—and confusing when you don’t summon a single Sliver. However, we’ll only run a creature in our commander slot if our hand is forced. Otherwise, we’re going fully creatureless.

So, how does this hurt us? We’re missing out on some great cards that interact with enchantments. Eidolon of Blossoms joins an already-impressive pantheon of enchantresses, including Argothian Enchantress, Verduran Enchantress, and Mesa Enchantress—cards that all happen to be in your colors. Purphoros, God of the Forge can certainly enable some shenanigans while being less of a liability than the painfully-symmetrical Pandemonium. Heliod, God of the Sun would be solid—really, any God would be a benefit to the deck, but I am ruling them out categorically. Even something harmless and cute like Auratog is out of contention. Remember: If I don’t have to, I won’t even jam a creature in the commander slot. Let’s do this all the way if we’re doing it at all.

The basis for this deck is one I played in Standard a very long time ago. The goal was to quickly ramp to an Enduring Ideal and then spend every turn building a deadly pile of enchantments and building a protective bubble of glamers around yourself. Have you ever wanted to murder someone in the mouth with Form of the Dragon? That’s right—we aren’t allowed to summon any dargons, but with this deck, we’re going to actually be a dargon, and this will fulfill a childhood dream of mine to someday be a dragon—something Game of Thrones (A Song of Ice and Fire to the readers) popularity isn’t attenuating.

I took to reddit to do a little research, and it wasn’t long until I found this reddit post in which /u/ensouled was going to town on the concept, laying out his picks for a three-colored Zedruu the Greathearted deck. Unfortunately, we can’t play a few of the cards he mentions, but we can play a lot of cards he doesn’t, so I think it will come out in the wash.

Let’s just get a decklist out of the way and talk choices after, shall we?

Genju of the Realm (or Karona, False God) ? Commander | Jason Alt

• Commander (1)
• 1 Genju of the Realm

• Spells (1)
• 1 Enduring Ideal

• Enchantments (58)
• 1 Abundance
• 1 Assemble the Legion
• 1 Aura of Silence
• 1 Bloodchief Ascension
• 1 Call to the Grave
• 1 Cloud Cover
• 1 Collective Restraint
• 1 Confiscate
• 1 Copy Enchantment
• 1 Decree of Silence
• 1 Detention Sphere
• 1 Dissipation Field
• 1 Dovescape
• 1 Dueling Grounds
• 1 Enchanted Evening
• 1 Enchantress's Presence
• 1 Energy Field
• 1 Exploration
• 1 Fertile Ground
• 1 Form of the Dragon
• 1 Future Sight
• 1 Ghostly Prison
• 1 Greater Auramancy
• 1 Humility
• 1 Karmic Justice
• 1 Luminarch Ascension
• 1 Maelstrom Nexus
• 1 Manabarbs
• 1 Mirari's Wake
• 1 Necromancer's Covenant
• 1 Nevermore
• 1 Night of Souls' Betrayal
• 1 No Mercy
• 1 Oblivion Ring
• 1 Opalescence
• 1 Paradox Haze
• 1 Phyrexian Arena
• 1 Polluted Bonds
• 1 Prismatic Omen
• 1 Privileged Position
• 1 Propaganda
• 1 Pyrohemia
• 1 Sacred Mesa
• 1 Sigil of the Empty Throne
• 1 Solitary Confinement
• 1 Sphere of Law
• 1 Sterling Grove
• 1 Sylvan Library
• 1 Teferi's Moat
• 1 Treachery
• 1 Vicious Shadows
• 1 Wild Research
• 1 Honden of Cleansing Fire
• 1 Honden of Infinite Rage
• 1 Honden of Life's Web
• 1 Honden of Night's Reach
• 1 Honden of Seeing Winds
• 1 Meishin, the Mind Cage

• Lands (40)
• 2 Mountain
• 2 Swamp
• 3 Island
• 4 Forest
• 4 Plains
• 1 Arcane Sanctum
• 1 Azorius Chancery
• 1 Bant Panorama
• 1 Boros Garrison
• 1 City of Brass
• 1 Crumbling Necropolis
• 1 Esper Panorama
• 1 Evolving Wilds
• 1 Golgari Rot Farm
• 1 Grixis Panorama
• 1 Jund Panorama
• 1 Jungle Shrine
• 1 Mana Confluence
• 1 Naya Panorama
• 1 Orzhov Basilica
• 1 Rakdos Carnarium
• 1 Reflecting Pool
• 1 Rupture Spire
• 1 Savage Lands
• 1 Seaside Citadel
• 1 Selesnya Sanctuary
• 1 Simic Growth Chamber
• 1 Terramorphic Expanse
• 1 Underground River
• 1 Serra's Sanctum

Buy This Deck

I wasn’t very far into this deck when I realized I could get away with having Enduring Ideal be the only nonenchantment card in the deck. I want to leave it—the entire impetus behind this deck was me wanting to relive the glory days of Enduring Ideal for slightly worse cards than are in this deck. Last time I played Ideal, I didn’t have Paradox Haze, but I sure welcome it! I tried to avoid having degenerate combos and focused on having answers instead.

Does this look like five-color good-stuff? I think there are a ton of synergies buried in here, and it’s fun to find all of them. I like Manabarbs and Pyrohemia with Sphere of Law, for example. Prismatic Omen makes Pyrohemia much easier to activate. Your tokens’ deaths trigger Vicious Shadows, allowing you to just win the game.

I like pillow-fort decks that run Luminarch Ascension. I tried to keep my token-producing enchantments in white since Serra's Sanctum is a powerful engine. Keeping yourself from being hurt is tough with so many other players, but if you are left alone for a turn cycle, go to town. You should make quite a few Angels between Ascension and Sigil of the Empty Throne.

I made the choice to run all five Hondens. Deal with it.

Was this deck too full of stuff I personally liked? Can you make a compelling case for cards like Vile Consumption and Breathstealer's Crypt? Are you going to brew an Ertai, the Corrupted enchantments deck based on cards like that? That’s not for me to say. Leave it in the comments section!

Thanks again to /u/ensouled and /u/Demonzero on reddit and to everyone who reads this noise, leaves me comments, tweets, posts on reddit, votes in my polls, or describes his or her decks as “75%.” You guys are the actual best. Until next time!