Life gain has long been a beloved MTG strategy. Even when these types of decks aren’t super competitive, you’re bound to run into them on the MTG Arena ladder or at your local FNM every now and again. With the right supporting cast, their synergies can feel overwhelming. This was certainly the case with Pioneer Amalia Benavides Aguirre Combo, whose dominance would eventually force the Vampire to get banned.
Following a strong finish in a 64-player event in France, it appears the potent legend is having a bit of a resurgence in Duel Commander. With the rise in aggressive decks in the format, Orzhov Life Gain is in a great spot to exploit the metagame at hand, and there’s no better Commander to lead the charge.
Life Gain Enablers and Payoffs
Back when Abzan Amalia was crushing in Pioneer, Wildgrowth Walker played an enormous role in the deck’s success. While you don’t have access to this two-card combo with Amalia in the Command Zone, she’s still capable of generating a huge advantage even when used fairly.
The easiest way to trigger your Commander repeatedly is to land Soul Warden or any similar ‘Soul Sisters’ variant. This deck features a whopping seven one-mana cards that all gain you life whenever you play a creature, as well as five one-drops with Lifelink. Any of these cards set you up perfectly to curve into your Commander turn two and immediately generate value.
These ‘Soul Sisters’ tools incentivize you to maximize token producers so you can set up a ton of life gain triggers at once. With the right support in play, Voice of Victory and Lingering Souls generate value and provide a life buffer to keep your head above water versus aggro decks. From there, you’ll also find a bunch of other life gain payoffs, including Karlov of the Ghost Council and Sorin of House Markov, that make it easier to close games.
As strong as these synergies are, relying on a ton of tiny creatures to pull ahead is risky. Pyrokinesis, Fury, and Toxic Deluge are all staples in Duel Commander that can singlehandedly decimate your board. Fortunately, this list comes prepared with a multitude of Aristocrats staples that give you incredible grinding potential.
Winning the Long Game
Your Aristocrats payoffs may be strong individually, but what makes them game-breakers is the presence of mass reanimation effects. The longer the game goes, the more threatening Raise the Past and Rally the Ancestors become. All you need is a slew of cheap creatures, a Blood Artist effect, and any cheap sacrifice outlet like Carrion Feeder in your graveyard. Suddenly, your opponent is taking lethal damage from drain effects, and the game ends.
All 36 creatures in your deck cost two or less mana, which not only maximizes all of your reanimation spells, but also enables you to play Lurrus of the Dream-Den as your Companion. Lurrus provides extra late-game fuel in the event you flood out, and you can always get it back with Unearth or Call of the Death-Dweller if it dies.
Thanks to all of these ways to bring back creatures from the dead, you’re free to use Skullclamp to its full potential. Most creatures in your deck immediately die when you equip them, allowing you to churn through your library at warp speed and find your win conditions. This is undoubtedly one of your best tutor options with Urza’s Saga as well as Demonic Tutor.
Strengths and Weaknesses
Thanks to all of your sources of card advantage and ways to take over grindy games, your matchups against midrange archetypes aren’t bad. The incremental advantages that Aragorn, King of Gondor or Kefka, Court Mage create with their triggered abilities are bound to get outclassed by Skullclamp or your mass reanimation spells. Slimefoot and Squee decks don’t even have counter magic, making the matchup even stronger.
Unsurprisingly, though, your absolute best matchups are against red aggro shells. Your consistent flow of life gain makes it nearly impossible to get burnt out, and you have no shortage of blockers for the small threats that Magda, the Hoardmaster decks will send your way. Even if your opponent has a removal-heavy hand, the value your Commander and Companion generate will bury them over time.
The tradeoff for playing such a high volume of low-powered creatures, however, is that your combo matchups suffer. Even curving Soul Warden into Amalia doesn’t present a super fast clock, which gives Lier, Disciple of the Drowned decks more time to set up their mana for High Tide. Your only meaningful sources of disruption for spell-based combos are Thoughtseize and Deep-Cavern Bat, which are unlikely to get the job done by themselves.
In this sense, Orzhov Life Gain’s matchups can feel quite polarized, hurting Amalia’s chances of bursting into the top echelon of Commanders. The good news is that there are a lot of aggro and midrange decks near the top of the totem pole which gives the deck a chance to compete. At the end of the day, it’s nice to see life gain strategies putting up results once again.
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