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You can never have too much life. That’s just as true in the real world as it is in the world ofMagic: The Gathering. But rarely is having a bunch of extra life points a path to victory. Sure, you can’t lose, but having more life than your opponents doesn’t necessarily mean you’re winning either.
Unless, of course, you’re playing with Linden, the Steadfast Queen. With Linden at the helm, every attack brings your life total higher while reducing your opponents, and there are many ways for white mages to gain power while simultaneously gaining life. Read on to discover how Linden could be your next commander.
The Commander: Linden, the Steadfast Queen
Linden is a pretty simple commander. For three white mana you get a 3/3 body that doesn’t need to tap to attack andgives you one life whenever a white creature you control attacks.
Obviously,the more creatures you have, the more creatures can attack, and the more life you may gain. Thus, any deck that revolves around Linden will want lots of creatures and also lots of ways to further enhance your aggressive life gain.
Besides already making any Linden deck feature mostly creatures, you canget even more creatures onto the table with token generators. The best ones will generate tokens whenever you gain life, producing a feedback loop where the more life you gain, the more creatures you’re able to attack with, resulting in more life.
There are also a bunch ofwhite cards that can trigger more life gain or token generation whenever you gain a creature, resulting in geometrically more life gained and creatures created. Eventually, you have so much life that the traditional path to Commander victory of dealing 40 damage becomes functionally impossible. Meanwhile, you’ve got so many creatures that you can overwhelm most defenses.
Remember,just because you have a ton of life doesn’t mean you’re invincible. Commander damage is still lethal, and you’re able to always run out of cards to draw in your library.
Building Your Linden, the Steadfast Queen Commander Deck
As previously discussed, a Linden life gain deck is going to need three things:lots of creatures, lots of ways to turn those creatures into life gain, and lots of ways to turn life into offensive power. There are also going to be a few great cards that turn life gain into more life gain, as well as cards that provide alternate win conditions based on the amount of life you have.
Besides that, you’ll wantthe usual white staple spellsto deal with threats, provide a few combat tricks, and clear the board.
Life Gain
Linden already provides some life gain whenever you attack, butwhite has many ways of making you gain even more life.Soul Warden is perhaps the best of the bunch, but there are other one-drops with either a life gain trigger or lifelink, such as Ocelot Pride, Lunarch Veteran, Soul’s Attendant, Speaker of the Heavens, or Guide of Souls.
A lot of these trigger whenever a creature enters the battlefield, which makes them even better when combined with the token generators later on.
At two mana, you’ve got cards like Daxos, Blessed by the Sun, Suture Priest, Lifecreed Duo, and Impassioned Orator. There are also cards likeAngel of Vitality, Rhox Faithmender, Leyline of Hope, andCleric Classthatprovide more life whenever you gain life.
Life To Power
Life gain alone isn’t enough to keep you safe. You need power, and that means having cards likeSerra Ascendant, Essence Channeler, Ajani’s Pridemate, Elenda’s Hierophant, Heliod, Sun-Crowned, and Nykthos Paragontoturn every point of life gained into power on a creature(usually in the form of +1/+1 tokens).
Archangel of Thune is particularly powerfulas it provides those +1/+1 tokens to every creature you control rather than just a single one.
Other creatures and enchantments canturn life gained into cards drawn.Rumor Gatherer, Dawn of Hope, Sigarda’s Splendor, and Well of Lost Dreamsall make gaining life and high life totals a potent source of spells.
Token Generators
Much of your life gain revolves around having or creating lots of creatures, and nothing helps that strategy more than token generators like Adeline, Resplendent Cathar, Mentor of the Meek, Defiler of Faith, Keeper of the Accord, Crested Sunmare, and Book of Exalted Deeds.More creatures means more life means more power.
Alternate Win Conditions
Life on its own doesn’t mean victory, but there area few cards that offer a path to victoryby achieving truly stupendous quantities of life points.
For creatures,Angel of Destiny and Felidar Sovereign provide different paths to success. Felidar Sovereign is perhaps the simplest ‘you win’ card as it states you need merely have 40 or more life, but gaining 15 more life than you started with is still relatively simple for Linden.
Aetherflux Reservoir provides a method of turning your life points into (usually) lethal damage for an opponent, and Halo Fountain can turn all your creatures into a victory that doesn’t even look to life points or damage dealt.
White Staples
There’s no reason to avoid playing staple white spells in a mono-white deck.Esper Sentinel, Welcoming Vampire, Mentor of the Meek, and Sun Titanall do good things for the deck.Swords to Plowshares, Path to Exile, Generous Gift, and Stroke of Midnightmake a solid suite of removal spells.
Fumigate, Austere Command, and Martial Coupall clear the board, as does Ajani, Strength of the Pride (some even produce tokens while they’re at it). Storm Herd will often produce so many tokens that your opponents' only hope is to clear the board themselves.
Finally,Akroma’s Will and Unbreakable Formationboth break stalemates, and Sol Ring, Mind Stone, Pearl Medallion, Knight of White Orchid, and Oketra’s Monument boost your mana production or make things cheaper to cast.
Speaker of the Heavens
Voice of the Blessed
Mentor of the Meek
Keeper of the Accord
Authority of the Consuls
Plains (26)
Budget Substitutions
Some of the cards above are out of the price range for more casual Magic players, sowe’ve got some budget substitutionslisted below.
Make a Stand, Your Temple is Under Attack
Halo Fountain
Horn of Gondor, Spear of Heliod, Court of Grace, Griffin Aerie
