An unfortunate side-effect of Commander’s greatly increased popularity in recent years is that players know exactly how good most legends are. Most hidden gems don’t stay hidden for long, and their prices tend to rise along with their play rates. That said, reprints can counteract these increases, especially reprints in the controversial new styles Wizards has been pushing lately. Winota, Joiner of Forces is a perfect example, as a competitive MTG powerhouse pushed into budget range by a recent reprint.
Winota, Joiner of Forces MTG
While most players associate Winota with cEDH, and therefore exorbitant costs, there are actually much more affordable routes to victory for the deck. These are often overlooked by players, but this week they’ve been raised in a new video from Goblin Grounds.
Perhaps the best of these routes is to stick to the basics and use Winota as a way to cheat out big Humans for free. There are some fantastic aggressive options in the budget range here, including Angrath’s Marauders and Boarding Party. You can also nab value creatures, like Champions of Minas Tirith, and Gilgamesh, Master at Arms. Getting creatures on this scale for free is massive, especially since you can easily do so starting turn three if you ramp Winota out.
For this plan to work, you’ll also need to stack your deck with cheap non-Human creatures, ideally with Haste. There are a ton of great budget picks in this category, including Bomat Courier and Fanatical Firebrand. You can also use non-Haste creatures you can get down before Winota, like Ornithopter, so they’re ready to attack immediately once she drops.
Using Winota as an engine for mana cheat is powerful, but it’s also fairly risky. If you draw your big Humans before your small non-Humans, then the whole thing falls apart. For this reason, you’ll also want to include rummaging effects, like Faithless Looting and Greasewrench Goblin, to smooth things out. You can add white reanimation effects like Breath of Life, too, to get these creatures back later.
Since these recommendations are still pretty fair as far as Winota is concerned, all of the cards needed for this brew are available on the cheap. You can even get Winota herself for just over $1 these days, too, thanks to a bonus sheet reprint in Final Fantasy.
Kicking It Up A Notch
While budget Winota, Joiner of Forces MTG decks like the one proposed above can be powerful, the card truly shines when you can put a bit more money behind it. In fact, with the right support, Winota is a viable option all the way up in cEDH.
Your base gameplan is still the same here, but the Humans you’re cheating out are a lot nastier. Winota naturally supports lots of powerful Stax pieces, like Drannith Magistrate, Magus of the Moon, and non-Humans like Ethersworn Canonist. This gives the deck the type balance it needs while locking opponents out of the game, all wrapped up in an aggressive game plan.
Speaking of aggression, what’s really interesting about Winota is that it’s one of the few cEDH decks that doesn’t focus on combo wins. Instead, it prefers to lock down the board with Stax pieces, then attack with huge threats like Lightning, Army of One and Alexios, Deimos of Kosmos. While this makes it less explosive than the other top cEDH decks, it also gives it a unique edge. If you want a traditional Magic experience in cEDH, then Winota is your best bet.
That Winota can be a serious cEDH threat and a fun brew on a budget is its greatest strength. This combination makes it a great Commander option for any player, in pretty much any pod. While it’s hardly a hidden gem, showing up as a Commander in 11,789 decks according to EDHREC, its sheer flexibility means it could easily warrant success far beyond that figure.
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