15 decklists for Historic Brawl

Hey guys! Today's theme is Historic Brawl, the new format in MTG Arena which is basically Arena Commander. That said, I'll always refer to the format as Arena Commander, sorry purists.

A few weeks into the format's implementation, we have a reasonably defined metagame. We see that Esika, God of the Tree, Golos, Tireless Pilgrim, Kenrith, the Returned King, Kinnan, Bonder Prodigy, Niv-Mizzet Reborn and Omnath, Locus of Creation are the strongest commanders.

We also have Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath, Koma, Cosmos Serpent, Baral, Chief of Compliance, Yarok, the Desecrated among others at the top.

Winota, Joiner of Forces is strong in Historic, but in its Commander version it is weak because of the inconsistency of revealing humans at the top of the deck.

I'll show you some lists of the strongest decks and some more fun-oriented ones (not that generating 30 mana on turn 4 with Omnath isn't fun, but it's a more tryhard deck).

The Yarok, the Desecrated deck basically wants to cast creatures with effects when they enter the battlefield to trigger twice with Yarok at the board, generating more value than the opponent can keep up with.

Usually, it steals two permanents with Agent of Treachery, generate double tokens with Scute Swarm, which is the terror of Arena players, or double the blink of cards with Thassa, Deep-Dwelling, which will usually win the game.

The Golos Commander is pretty simple: try to ramp up to cast Golos on turn 4 and activate it on turn 5 to cast fo free some insane bombs like Ulamog, Ugin, extra turns, Kenrith and others.

It is, without a doubt, one of the strongest commanders in the format, as it searches for a land from the deck every time it enters the battlefield, being able to take The World Tree to fix the mana base and then Field of the Dead, card that wins the game and has few answers in the format.

Kinnan is perhaps the strongest commander in the format. His deck has several mana dorks to activate Kinnan to search of creatures like End-Raze Forerunners, Agent of Treachery, Craterhoof Behemoth, Koma and others. Its low cost makes it possible to cast it multiple times even if countered or destroyed, and its activations are always quite dangerous.

Niv-Mizzet Reborn has a similar idea to Golos. The difference is that the multicolored bombs go into your hand when you cast Niv. The important thing is to generate so much value that there aren't enough answers on the other side.

A deck that has been surprising is Sythis, Harvest's Hand, which generates a lot of card advantage and gains life for the initial turns and manages to lock the game in the late game with enchantments like Nine Lives, Solemnity, Sigil of the Empty Throne, Primeval Bounty, and Sandwurm Convergence.

The Arcades deck isn't really competitive, but it's a lot of fun, known as the famous walls deck. We have Arcades and High Alert for walls to attack and deal damage equal to their toughness.

Korvold is not a highly targeted commander in Arena, but he is powerful having synergy cards that play in the Jund Sacrifice of Historic and having enough synergy with sacrifice and mana generation to cast it early.

By itself, Korvold is a compelling card that can deal 25 damage in 2 or 3 turns depending on your board.

If you (like me) like free wins, play with this Baral deck.

Often, just by appearing that his commander is him, opponents concede because they know they'll never resolve any spells during the game and that's the deck's objective, Baral at 2 and at least one counter per turn alongside several cheap cantrips.

The Niv-Mizzet Parun has a "combo" plan. When untapping with the commander, we try to cast many cheap spells and draw cards to zero our opponent's life in a single turn.

With Curiosity this is easily possible, but even without it, we have many cheap cantrips and burns to go with Niv.

Nicol Bolas follows the same idea as Baral's deck: don't let the other side play, whether with counters, removals or discards. The difference is that we have better win conditions, like Nicol Bolas and the other planeswalkers.

Esika is considered the best commander alongside Kinnan. Casting the back of the card, Prismatic Bridge, and then placing one bomb per turn on the board usually wins the game without much effort.

The deck relies on several interactions to ensure that we can cast the 5-color enchantment and leave it on the board to generate enough advantage to win.

The Commander of Omnath is perhaps the one with the largest range of broken plays in the format. The plan is to put Omnath on turn 3 or 4, untap, generate 30 mana or more in a single turn, and win.

With 3 extra turns, Zacama, Primal Calamity, Vorinclex, Voice of Hunger and Lotus Cobra, among other cards, this becomes possible.

Another deck for those who don't like to let the other side play. In the Teferi, Hero of Dominaria deck we have almost infinite counters, many removals, some cantrips and Teferi, the most tiring win condition in the game.

The deck is excellent because it can hold the game smoothly until Teferi enters the battlefield, and we can usually protect him with some counterspells by activating his +1 ability.

As for the Goblin Commander, I, personally, prefer Krenko over Muxus because he is more consistent. Making multiple goblin tokens whenever possible gives you more winning margin than rolling the top 6 cards in a 99-card deck, with each Muxus costing 2 more mana in a deck with few lands. Maybe it's the best aggressive deck we have in the format.

Again, a deck for those who like not to let the other side of the board play Magic. With plenty of counterspells and tempo plays, but with a "low cost" and easily castable win condition, is Uro.

An important note is that when casting Uro from the command zone, we should leave it in the graveyard instead of returning to the command zone. That way we can escape the titan of nature and leave him on the board to bring victory. Basically, Koma's Commander is the same list as Uro with the difference that the cosmic serpent is the commander, while Uro is in the 99.

We also see that the top corner of the strongest decks is very similar with bombs like Koma itself, Ugin, Dragon Spirit, Ulamog, Ceaseless Hunger, Vorinclex, Voice of Hunger, all the 3 extra turns of the format, Finale of Revelation, Agent of Treachery and Sublime Epiphany.

That's it for today! I hope you liked the lists. Any questions, comments or feedback I'm available in the comments below.