I'm going to give you a bit of an inside perspective.

One thing about writing about Magic: the Gathering (or Commander, specifically) is we, as writers, constantly try to make our content interesting. It's a challenge, really: when decks can often be built almost by themselves, when staples are so ubiquitous people assume you're just stupid if you don't run Sol Ring (though the second essay in my 100th article explains my theory on Sol Ring), when everyone measures the value of a game by whether or not they win, it is difficult to come up with new things every week.

The thing is, every Commander deck doesn't have to be innovative. It has to be fun. If it's not fun for someone, then it's not doing its job as a leisure activity. And while doing different stuff and trying new things can be fun, sometimes just playing good cards that work together well can be super fun.

As I was looking through the Midnight Hunt legendary creatures, I noticed something about a few of them. There are a fair number of Humans on Innistrad. I wondered what would happen if we jammed several of them in the same deck? I landed on Abzan (), and for that, there was only one commander.

She's in our colors, she has a couple relevant abilities, and she's above the curve as a 4/4 for three, plus she's a Human. Let's see what we can do with her.

Anafenza Humans | Commander | Mark Wischkaemper

• Commander (1)
• 1 Anafenza, the Foremost

• Creatures (29)
• 1 Abzan Battle Priest
• 1 Abzan Falconer
• 1 Adeline, Resplendent Cathar
• 1 Ainok Bond-Kin
• 1 Augur of Autumn
• 1 Basri's Lieutenant
• 1 Champion of Lambholt
• 1 Conclave Mentor
• 1 Dragonscale General
• 1 Drannith Magistrate
• 1 Elite Scaleguard
• 1 Esper Sentinel
• 1 Eternal Witness
• 1 Good-Fortune Unicorn
• 1 Grand Abolisher
• 1 Heronblade Elite
• 1 Ivorytusk Fortress
• 1 Jerren, Corrupted Bishop // Ormendahl, the Corrupter
• 1 Juniper Order Ranger
• 1 Kambal, Consul of Allocation
• 1 Katilda, Dawnhart Prime
• 1 Kyler, Sigardian Emissary
• 1 Leinore, Autumn Sovereign
• 1 Mer-Ek Nightblade
• 1 Opposition Agent
• 1 Reyhan, Last of the Abzan
• 1 Shalai, Voice of Plenty
• 1 Thalia, Heretic Cathar
• 1 Tuskguard Captain

• Planeswalkers (1)
• 1 Ajani, the Greathearted

• Instants (7)
• 1 Abzan Charm
• 1 Akroma's Will
• 1 Anguished Unmaking
• 1 Flawless Maneuver
• 1 Inspiring Call
• 1 Pledge of Unity
• 1 Utter End

• Sorceries (6)
• 1 Austere Command
• 1 Cultivate
• 1 Damn
• 1 Eerie Ultimatum
• 1 Kodama's Reach
• 1 Merciless Eviction

• Enchantments (10)
• 1 Abzan Ascendancy
• 1 Cathars' Crusade
• 1 Ethereal Absolution
• 1 Felidar Retreat
• 1 Guardian Project
• 1 Hardened Scales
• 1 Mirari's Wake
• 1 Paladin Class
• 1 Path of Discovery
• 1 Ranger Class

• Artifacts (6)
• 1 Bow of Nylea
• 1 Chromatic Lantern
• 1 Lifecrafter's Bestiary
• 1 Skullclamp
• 1 The Great Henge
• 1 The Ozolith

• Lands (40)
• 1 Swamp
• 4 Forest
• 5 Plains
• 1 Blossoming Sands
• 1 Bojuka Bog
• 1 Bountiful Promenade
• 1 Canopy Vista
• 1 Castle Ardenvale
• 1 Command Tower
• 1 Evolving Wilds
• 1 Gavony Township
• 1 Grasslands
• 1 Graypelt Refuge
• 1 Hissing Quagmire
• 1 Homeward Path
• 1 Idyllic Grange
• 1 Indatha Triome
• 1 Jungle Hollow
• 1 Karn's Bastion
• 1 New Benalia
• 1 Oran-Rief, the Vastwood
• 1 Reliquary Tower
• 1 Rogue's Passage
• 1 Sandsteppe Citadel
• 1 Scoured Barrens
• 1 Shambling Vent
• 1 Stirring Wildwood
• 1 Temple of Malady
• 1 Temple of Plenty
• 1 Temple of Silence
• 1 Temple of the False God
• 1 Terramorphic Expanse
• 1 Vault of the Archangel

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The creatures which drove this idea are Adeline, Resplendent Cathar, Jerren, Corrupted Bishop // Ormendahl, the Corrupter, Katilda, Dawnhart Prime, Kyler, Sigardian Emissary, and Leinore, Autumn Sovereign. Adeline likes us to have lots of creatures, and makes tokens for us depending on how many opponents we have. Jerren also makes us tokens, can grant our Humans Lifelink, and if we randomly wind up with 13 life we can get ourselves a big ol' Demon for our troubles. Katilda makes all our Humans Birds of Paradise, which should help with mana creation, and puts +1/+1 counters on all our creatures for 6 mana. Kyler is sort of a Human Lord, because he'll get a counter for each Human we play, then he gives a boost for each counter he's got to all our other Humans. Leinore is sort of wall-shaped, but puts a counter on something at the beginning of combat, then draws us a card if we control three or more different powers.

Add this together with Anafenza and we have a clear +1/+1 counters theme. Rather than go over the top trying to figure out something new to do, I figured let's just have some fun making a cool deck which does some fun stuff and does it well. Abzan Humans Goodstuff.

Our mana curve is actually pretty good; we have a ton of 3-drops, but it tapers off nicely after that. We do have use for our mana when we don't cast spells, because Outlast costs mana, and we have several other abilities worth activating when we have time, but we don't have to rush to massive mana. We have a couple of ramp spells to help fix in case the mana requirements get tough, and a Chromatic Lantern to do the same. The Great Henge will ramp us a bit more, and Mirari's Wake doubles up our mana from our lands, but really we'll rely on the 40 lands we're running to get us there.

We definitely want to keep cards flowing; adding Humans to the 'field will be key for our success, so we have to draw 'em if we're going to play 'em. Skullclamp is a classic in decks which make a bunch of tokens, and we've already mentioned Leinore, but check out Esper Sentinel. It's like a weird Rhystic Study that only gets better as he gets counters. Opposition Agent gives us our opponents' cards to play. Guardian Project will always trigger, and Path of Discovery filters mana and lets us pitch the card if we don't want it. Abzan Charm can be a draw-two and Inspiring Call should be a draw-a-whole-bunch. Lifecrafter's Bestiary Scrys for us every turn, and lets us draw if we have a bit of extra mana as we play our creatures.

To keep our opponents' life totals going down, our object is simple: play Humans, put counters on them, and swing for the fences, making tokens which also attack as we go. We have a few ways to keep our creatures relevant in a format which often has lots of massive creatures. Paladin Class and Ranger Class both scale as our mana increases, offering power and toughness bonuses. Hardened Scales and Conclave Mentor (one of our few non-Humans) both add extra counters when something gets one. Ethereal Absolution pumps ours and reduces theirs, and Mirari's Wake, as mentioned before, gives us a boost in power and mana.

We also have a number of ways to add counters, both individually and across our whole board. Ajani, the Greathearted gives a blanket counter, as does Shalai, Voice of Plenty and Gavony Township. Good-Fortune Unicorn gives a counter to every creature entering the battlefield, just like Juniper Order Ranger. Our numerous examples of Outlast add counters, and Pledge of Unity does it at Instant speed plus gives us a life boost. And Felidar Retreat gives a counter to the whole team just for playing a land!

We've also got a bunch of creatures which care about creatures with +1/+1 counters. These are cool, because they act as pseudo-Lords in our deck. They all have Outlast, and they give a keyword ability to all creatures with counters. Take a look at Abzan Battle Priest, Mer-Ek Nightblade, and Tuskguard Captain. Most of them are Humans, but the ones who aren't are worth it for the bonuses.

Probably our biggest one is Cathars' Crusade, which gets out of hand very quickly. Every time we make a token or play any other creature, we put a counter on each part of our team. This can make for a very large power boost, and something like Adaline on the battlefield becomes a permanent Giant Growth to every creature we've got.

To stay alive, we're running a bit of removal and a few tricks. We have three mass-removal spells: Austere Command, Damn, and Merciless Eviction. These were chosen carefully. Damn pinch-hits as a spot removal spell, and the other two give us options; sometimes we may not want to kill our stuff, and these give us the option. We also have a few spot-removal spells (choosing to go with spells which exile permanents rather than creatures, because we are in the colors to do it), though we're going to spend most of our time and energy developing our board state.

Because of that, a Day of Judgment from an opponent can be a real problem, so we have Flawless Maneuver and Inspiring Call to stay alive. Nerfing an opponent's board wipe is a powerful play, and doing so with a deck like this is especially effective.

There are a few more fun cards in the deck. The Ozolith should make some of our work with counters even better, since we'll get to keep them around and use them again. Bow of Nylea can put a counter on something, sure, but it also gives us other things to do, which can occasionally be important, plus all our stuff having Deathtouch can really screw with the combat math. Thalia, Heretic Cathar and Grand Abolisher are examples of hate cards we've got, intending to slow down the effectiveness of other decks while adding to our board. Drannith Magistrate combines with Anafenza to shut down Graveyard decks quite nicely. Then there's Eerie Ultimatum, which should turn a game around right quick if used correctly.

One substitution you could consider: The Great Henge is really expensive. If you want to keep the cost down a fair bit with a single card, consider replacing it with a copy of Ready // Willing, which is much cheaper and functions as a six-mana I Win card if there's any sort of reasonable board state.

What's your deck which is trying to do nothing other than be good and fun? I'd love to hear about it, and any suggestions you have for this one, in the comments!

Thanks for reading.