Over the past year, the massive influx of powerful Universes Beyond legends has created a significant shift in the Duel Commander metagame. Newer options like Cloud, Midgar Mercenary and Aang, Swift Savior have emerged as format all-stars.
While not as mainstream, Sonic the Hedgehog is also beginning to appear in the format. This Secret Lair printing is more than just an iconic and flavorful design. With the proper support, he can end games in a flash.
Gotta Go Fast
For those who have played Duel Commander for a long time, Sonic’s mana cost should be all too familiar given the popularity of Aragorn, King of Gondor. Yet, despite having the same casting cost, Sonic provides its value in a completely different way. Most of Sonic’s appeal rests with its Gotta Go Fast ability. In a deck filled with creatures that have either Haste or Flash, Sonic threatens to turn the corner in blistering fashion. Sonic’s high toughness then makes it difficult for the opponent to block him down, and thanks to his final ability, any trades or chump blocks your opponent makes involving your other threats give you additional value.
With this in mind, the goal with Sonic at the helm is to fill your deck with efficient creatures that feature either of the important keywords, using Sonic as your finisher. In the Haste department, creatures like Feldon, Ronom Excavator and Screaming Nemesis that further disincentivize your opponent from blocking make for elite inclusions. Of course, evasive threats like Malcolm, the Eyes also have merit, since they can accrue +1/+1 counters in conjunction with Sonic and keep the pressure on even versus go-wide decks. Once you’ve assembled a big enough board, Headliner Scarlett helps you present lethal in one turn alongside Sonic.
Part of what makes Sonic such a special Commander, however, is that you don’t always need to try to take the aggro role. With so many Flash creatures in the mix, you have a ton of agency over how matchups play out, and you have the luxury of playing reactively when appropriate. Creatures like Archivist of Oghma, Hullbreacher, and Tishana’s Tidebinder all punish your opponent for taking different game actions. This makes it extremely difficult for your opponent to play around everything you could have.
By throwing in elite tempo plays such as Aang, Swift Savior, you can easily go from playing reactively to proactively on a dime. This deck’s versatility is through the roof, which only becomes more apparent when you factor in all of your spell-based interaction.
Disruption Suite
To bolster your deck’s plan of turning defense into offense, most of your interaction is extremely cheap. Free spells like Pyrokinesis and Daze allow you to play to the board and mess with your opponent in the same turn. Given how tempo-oriented this deck is, it’s easy to maximize Mana Tithe and Force Spike, since your opponent will often be forced to play into them just to keep pace.
When it comes to answers for opposing creatures that hit the board, besides the top-tier efficient removal options like Swords to Plowshares, most of your options double as burn spells. From Lightning Bolt to Ghostfire Slice, having the option of pointing your removal at your opponent’s face goes a long way towards improving your position against combo decks with few small creatures in the mix.
Continuing the trend of versatile spells, Reverent Mantra not only functions as a free source of protection for Sonic, but it also makes it trivial to break a board stall wide open versus any mono-color aggro deck. Similarly, Parallax Wave can either clear a path of blockers out of the way or save your board from a sweeper. All of these factors give you a shot at succeeding in a wide variety of matchups.
Fighting Through the Top Tier
Overall, while Sonic does require some heavy deckbuilding restrictions to maximize, this style of deck has a lot of positives in the face of other tier one shells. Between your array of burn spells, free removal spells, and interactive threats such as Broadside Bombardiers and Phlage, Titan of Fire’s Fury, you have a lot of ways to keep Cloud and Phelia, Exuberant Shepherd decks at bay. As long as you can keep pace, Sonic’s ability to grow your squad will run away with the game in short order.
Things get even easier when you’re paired against the red aggressive decks. Sonic outsizes most damage-based removal spells, and once he hits the board, all burn spells your opponent points at your other Flash and Haste creatures nets you Treasure tokens. Then, any card with a mana sink from Aang, Swift Savior to Forth Eorlingas! becomes a huge problem for the opponent.
At the same time, though, your creatures with Haste shine bright versus Azusa, Lost but Seeking ramp archetypes since they threaten to get the game over with in a jiffy. They also do a wonderful job fighting over the monarchy when you’re paired against Aragorn, King of Gondor.
This doesn’t mean that Sonic doesn’t have weaknesses. After all, Commanders like Spider-Man 2099 feast on your wealth of small creatures, even with Sonic’s help. Still, for a legend that has hardly gotten much Duel Commander recognition up to this point, Sonic makes for a fun and competitive build-around.
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