Commander Deck Tech: Toph, the First Metalbender

The strongest earthbender and the first metalbender in the Avatar: the Last Airbender world, Toph, is once again the center of our Commander deck tech!

If you'd like to see more about Toph, Hardheaded Teacher, click here!

Toph, the First Metalbender is a Naya creature with a unique passive ability. With it in play, all your non-token artifacts will be lands as well as all their other types.

At the beginning of your end step, she also earthbends 2. This means you may put +1/+1 counters on a target land and then turn it into a creature with haste. If this land dies or is exiled, you'll return it to the battlefield, tapped.

Such a unique ability deserves a few decks centered around it. Let's see two of them!

The first list we'll cover focuses on artifacts, particularly those that trigger effects when they're sacrificed. The second is a bit more budget friendly and focuses on artifacts with ETB effects.

Get ready to metalbend with Toph!

The first person to ever metalbend in the Avatar: the Last Airbender universe naturally deserved a card in MTG that represents this incredible achievement.

This Toph, the First Metalbender list plays several artifacts that are quite evil in Commander matches. Take a look:

Buffs

This deck uses the artifacts it turns into lands to attack and defend. You may also sacrifice them whenever necessary to create an advantage from the many sacrifice effects in this list.

Because you don't have to worry about losing your lands (considering they come back from exile and the graveyard), this list plays buffs and other effects to set up powerful attacks.

As you can tell, this list plays a lot of cards from the Avatar: The Last Airbender set.

When Earthbender Ascension comes into play, it earthbends 2 and lets you look in your deck for a basic land, which will come into play tapped. Afterward, whenever a land you control enters play, you'll put a counter on this enchantment.

When it has four counters or more, you may put a +1/+1 counter on a creature and give it trample until the end of the turn.

This enchantment interacts when cards like Cycle of Renewal, Farseek, Harrow, Kodama's Reach, Shared Roots, Solemn Simulacrum, and Nature's Lore come into play. It also interacts when your commander is in play, turning your artifacts into lands.

To set up powerful attacks with land-creatures, this list plays Earthbending Student, Moraug, Fury of Akoum, and Toph, Greatest Earthbender. These cards give land-creatures vigilance, +1/+0 for each time they attacked that turn, and double strike, respectively. Moraug also creates extra combats.

Tale of Katara and Toph was also a must, as it puts even more +1/+1 counters on your creatures, and Sphere Grid, which gives creatures with +1/+1 counters reach and trample. Grid also puts counters on creatures that deal combat damage to a player.

As such, Sphere Grid is pretty self-sufficient in terms of buffs and counters.

Terra Eternal will make your opponents wish they had a Farewell in their decks, desperately. After all, it makes your lands indestructible.

Earthbended lands are already complicated to deal with. Once they're indestructible, your opponents will need a number of exile cards that very few decks play.

Another enchantment that interacts really well with Toph's strategy is Felidar Retreat. You'll often use it to put counters on your creatures and give them vigilance until the end of the turn. In emergencies, you can also use it to create 2/2 Cat creature tokens.

Ramp

Please note that Toph, the First Metalbender turns artifacts into lands, but it doesn't grant them the ability to create mana.

Luckily for us, there are many cards in MTG that make your artifacts create mana as if they were lands.

These spells will give you something out of the many extra lands you play every turn even if you don't have many nonartifact lands in play.

In this list, even Sol Ring is more than just a mana rock.

Besides the ramp spells we mentioned before, this list also plays Badgermole Cub and Solemn Simulacrum, which is an important source of ramp and card draw.

Artifacts

Artifacts are the heart of this deck, particularly those that have extra effects or those that can sacrifice themselves. Some of them are:

If you earthbend The Stasis Coffin, you can get protection from everything several times. Your opponents will have to figure out a way to win with these cards in play.

Another artifact that locks down the game is Mindslaver, which you can sacrifice to control a target player's turn. If you earthbend this artifact, it will return to play eventually, and you'll once again be able to use this extremely strong ability. Depending on the game state, using it can attract more attention to your board than you'd like to, but if you know how and when to use it, this artifact will win you the game on the spot.

Protection

Even though your earthbended artifacts and lands will return to your board eventually, you'll need to protect them from spot removals. You don't really want to earthbend your board all over again whenever you lose something.

Earthshape will protect your board and give you hexproof. This is relevant because it protects you from any enemy spell that targets you, the player, in particular. Classic spells and mechanics that target players are effects that force you to sacrifice creatures or burn your HP.

The Legend of Kyoshi is a very well-rounded saga, as it draws cards and earthbends. When she turns into a creature, Avatar Kyoshi also creates mana and gives your lands trample and hexproof. Please note that her text box says "lands", which includes those that weren't earthbended as well.

Sylvan Safekeeper is a very strong protection in this list because it lets you sacrifice any land to give a creature shroud until the end of the turn. You can use it to answer any removal and also return the sacrificed land to the board, if you earthbended it before.

Our alternative Toph, the First Metalbender list plays artifacts with various ETB effects. That means effects that trigger when they enter play.

In this list, earthbending is not the most important mechanic, but rather support for cards like Combustible Gearhulk. It will return them into play after they're removed.

This list might not focus exclusively on earthbending and landfall, but it still plays Badgermole, Avenger of Zendikar, Great Divide Guide, Ichor Wellspring, and Tormod's Crypt. Their effects are simply too interesting to not be in this deck.

It also plays some artifacts that cost a lot of mana, which made this mana curve a bit higher and this list a bit slower than our main one. However, it's just as powerful.

Toph, the First Metalbender deserves all the love she gets.

She is both in excellent colors for landfall and counters, and makes this list more resilient. You'll use earthbending to protect your most important pieces from removals.

What do you think? Tell us your thoughts in our comment section below.

Thank you for reading, and see you next time!