When I'm looking to brew up a lower powered deck, which has been happening more often in recent years, there are few better places to look than Selesnya tokens. It's true that a well-built tokens deck can slap a table around, but in general more casual playgroups are looking for games that resolve in the trenches. A game plan built around going to combat is less likely to get your opponents to cry foul, even if other game plans are perfectly legitimate, fair, and playable at lower power levels.

I'm not saying that you should go out of your way to only build decks that fit neatly within the confines of what makes for a comfortable game for your opponents. Far from it. A healthy playgroup occasionally sees decks that land firmly outside of its comfort zone. Sometimes those games end up being an awful lot of fun.

Today I'm sharing a Selesnya tokens deck that should be able to pack a real punch. If all goes well, this deck should be able to push out a lot of tokens and draw into a way to turn that army into a win. Before we get into how I'll make that happen, let's look at today's commander.

This 3-power, 5-toughness Spider Human Hero costs four mana but can be cast for its web-slinging cost for 3 mana. That ability requires the additional cost of returning a tapped creature I control to my hand. Casting Silk for her web-slinging cost could be very helpful, as I'll want creature cards in hand. Whenever I cast a creature spell, I'll create a 1/1 Green and White Human Citizen creature token.

Silk, Web Weaver has an activated ability that gives this deck plenty of room to be powered up. For five mana, including a White and a Green, she can give creatures I control +2/+2 and vigilance until end of turn. Vigilance is great, but this also represents an infinite mana outlet. You just win the game if you have enough creatures to attack with at least one arbitrarily large, unblocked creature going at each opponent.

I'm not brewing today's list to combo off and swing for the win that way, but I will go into ways you can power this list up. Before we get into some of the crazy combos you could build for Silk, let's take a look at the list I ended up with.

Gather the People

Whenever I cast a creature spell, I'll be making a 1/1 Green and White Human Citizen token. That incentivizes me to run a lot of creatures and I was genuinely tempted to build a bracket 1 deck with 37 lands and 63 1-drop creatures just to see how it would play. In my heart of hearts, I'm not that into gimmick decks, but I did run a lot of my deck's core functionality as creatures. The first ramp spell I added was Sakura-Tribe Elder, I'm running a bunch of mana dorks, and I left out Sol Ring. My removal started with Caustic Caterpillar and Voracious Varmint. My card draw is similarly oriented around a creature-based strategy.

A few cards deserve special mention.

Deadly Recluse is just a 2-mana spider with reach and deathtouch, but it was an essential card to include in this list. I'd be hard pressed to build a Spider-Man deck without at least one actual spider, and an early deathtouch blocker can keep attackers at bay for longer than you'd expect. It isn't really worth using a removal spell on, but few opponents will choose to waste a valuable creature by attacking into it. They'll usually have someone else they can swing at, so they'll figure they can deal with it and with you later on.

With fifteen creatures costing less than 2 mana, Silk, Web Weaver should be able to push out a lot of citizen tokens. Creatures that grow as my army grows make a lot of sense, especially if they have some form of evasion. Burrowguard Mentor is a */* Rabbit Soldier with trample. Silverwing Squadron, a 6-drop White Human Knight with flying and vigilance is also in the list. The former only has trample, but the latter has an attack trigger that will have me create 2/2 White Knight creature tokens with vigilance equal to the number of opponents I have.

Today's list is running a lot of token doublers. Parallel Lives, Anointed Procession, and Mondrak, Glory Dominus will all both double the tokens I create. Ojer Taq, Deepest Foundation will triple my token production. The card I chose to spotlight is Rhys, the Redeemed. Not only can the OG of Selesnya tokens commanders tap to make a 1/1 Green and White Elf Warrior token, he can also tap to create a copy of every token you control. It cost three mana for an elf and a whopping six mana to double your tokens, but in the late game that second ability could be a big play if done on the end step before your turn.

In casual play lifegain can be a very big deal, as decks are often less prepared to deal with an outsized life total. Commander damage, mill, infect, and combo can all end games easily enough, but lower powered decks are often less concerned with having an answer for everything. Creatures like Soul Warden and Soul's Attendant aren't going to catapult your life total into the stratosphere but they should give you a little help along the way. If you were to pivot this list to a combo build, you might want to add a few more "soul sisters" so that crazy lifegain became a real possibility.

Crazy amounts of card draw are a big help in winning games of EDH, and Silk doesn't provide any draw on her own. That's where cards like Esper Sentinel, Beast Whisperer, Guardian Project, Shamanic Revelation, Regal Force, Rumor Gatherer, and Mentor of the Meek come in. Mentor of the Meek is particularly good in today's list, as casting a creature spell will reliably see me create a 1/1 Human Citizen token. If I've got lots of cards in hand, I may not need to pay the extra one, but if I'm running low on options I should have that extra mana available.

Drawing cards helps to make sure I hit my land drops, pull into answers, and most importantly, draw into my wincons. I'm running Craterhoof Behemoth and Moonshaker Cavalry as potential wincons, as they are obvious staples in any deck that wants to go wide. Beastmaster Ascension is another way to increase my damage output when I go to combat, but my favorite card for this might be Jazal Goldmane. This 4/4 Cat Warrior has an activated ability that will give my attacking creatures +X/+X where X is the number of attacking creatures. Silk's activated ability gives vigilance, but her +2/+2 anthem pales in comparison to the boost that Jazal can give my army.

In the late game if I'm able to produce enough mana, I could see using both Silk and Jazal so that I'd have blockers to help deal with an attack from anyone I wasn't able to kill. The biggest reason I favor Jazal Goldmane over Craterhoof Behemoth and Moonshaker Cavalry is that his ability can be used multiple times. These are all great cards and are all capable of winning games, but a single fog is a much bigger problem for a win attempt on the back of Craterhoof or Moonshaker. Jazal Goldmane is happy to wait a turn and try again if he doesn't get removed.

Odds and Ends

In many ways this is a fairly standard Selesnya tokens deck. I didn't try to lean into the Spider Man set, nor did I build some weird 1-drop or spider themed deck. There are a few cards that are worth a special mention.

If all goes well, I'll be creating a lot of little creatures. Sidar Kondo of Jamuraa is uniquely suited to help those guys get past blockers. When this Human Knight is in play, creatures my opponents control without flying or reach can't block creatures with power 2 or less. That's a weird bit of text, but it simply means that any creature with power 2 or less is unblockable by anyone (other than me) who doesn't have at least one blocker with flying or reach.

Camaraderie is a card draw spell that I love to run in my Selesnya decks. Not only will it draw me X cards where X is the number of creatures I control, I'll also gain X life, and my creatures will get +1/+1 until end of turn. Sometimes an extra ten or twenty life is enough to weather a few more attacks, and get your army big enough to close out the game.

Making a lot of mana is really important for any EDH deck, and Silk, Web Weaver is no exception. While my list may not be set up to combo off and make infinite mana, Karametra, God of Harvests should help me get a lot of lands into play. Whenever I cast a creature spell, I'll search for a Forest or Plains card and put it into play tapped. With my creature count, there's a good chance my devotion to Green and White will be 7 or greater, so I'll also have an indestructible creature to block with.

Getting damage through blockers is a key to winning games through combat, and Champion of Lambholt is perfect for any deck that will be spamming out creature tokens. Whenever another creature enters play I'll put a +1/+1 counter on Champion of Lambholt, and creatures with power less than its power can't block creatures I control. That plays nicely with any of my anthem effects. Giving my creatures +2/+2 could result in a few key blockers no longer being able to block. A Craterhoof Behemoth or Moonshaker Cavalry trigger might well result in my entire army being unblockable, as Champion of Lambholt would share in that +X/+X boost.

Making mana equal to the number of creatures I control will go a long way towards multiple activations of Silk, Web Weaver or Jazal Goldmane. Circle of Dreams Druid is in today's list as a Gaea's Cradle with legs, tapping to produce Green mana equal to the size of my army. Growing Rites of Itlimoc, and Evendo, Walking Haven are also in the 99. The former is an enchantment that flips into Itlimoc, Cradle of the Sun. The latter is a new Planet type land from Edge of Eternities that enters tapped, taps for a Green, or if stationed, can tap to produce Green mana equal to the number of creatures I control for the price of one Green mana. You station a Planet by tapping creatures to add charge counters.

I'm not yet sold on Evendo, but I think it's worth trying. Gaea's Cradle would be fantastic in a list like this, but if you're aiming for low-to-mid powered play, it's hard to explain including a thousand-dollar game changer.

Arachnogenesis isn't usually the first fog I put in a deck. Normally I start with Constant Mists, Moment's Peace, and Obscuring Haze, but there's no better fog to run in a spider deck than one that generates Spider tokens. Running a bunch of fog spells will decrease the number of creatures in my list. I could have thrown in Spore Frog and Kami of False Hope, but having a creature in play that has a fog effect removes the surprise factor entirely. If I don't have reliable recursion in my deck, I generally prefer to run instants to prevent combat damage over creatures.

Selesnya Citizens

Variance is a huge factor in any game of Commander, and I expect that this deck should have its fair share of good and not-so-good games. When everything goes well, it will feel like a bracket 3, or maybe even a bracket 4 deck. When things go poorly, it might feel like a bracket 1 deck. That is to be expected, but I also expect that Silk, Web Weaver should be able to reliably build a board and affect the game. In Green and White you're not likely to be doing a lot on the stack, but you should be able to grow an army and dodge or recover from boardwipes.

Silk, Web Weaver | Commander | Stephen Johnson

• Commander (1)
• 1 Silk, Web Weaver

• Creatures (37)
• 1 Arbor Elf
• 1 Avacyn's Pilgrim
• 1 Beast Whisperer
• 1 Burrowguard Mentor
• 1 Caustic Caterpillar
• 1 Champion of Lambholt
• 1 Circle of Dreams Druid
• 1 Craterhoof Behemoth
• 1 Deadly Recluse
• 1 Druid of Purification
• 1 Elvish Mystic
• 1 Esper Sentinel
• 1 Finneas, Ace Archer
• 1 Fyndhorn Elves
• 1 Heartwood Storyteller
• 1 Jazal Goldmane
• 1 Karametra, God of Harvests
• 1 Kutzil, Malamet Exemplar
• 1 Llanowar Elves
• 1 Mentor of the Meek
• 1 Mondrak, Glory Dominus
• 1 Moonshaker Cavalry
• 1 Ojer Taq, Deepest Foundation
• 1 Reclamation Sage
• 1 Regal Force
• 1 Rhys the Redeemed
• 1 Rumor Gatherer
• 1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
• 1 Selvala, Explorer Returned
• 1 Sidar Kondo of Jamuraa
• 1 Silverwing Squadron
• 1 Solemn Simulacrum
• 1 Soul Warden
• 1 Soul's Attendant
• 1 Springbloom Druid
• 1 Voice of Many
• 1 Voracious Varmint

• Spells (20)
• 1 Akroma's Will
• 1 Arachnogenesis
• 1 Beast Within
• 1 Clever Concealment
• 1 Curious Herd
• 1 Flawless Maneuver
• 1 Heroic Intervention
• 1 Path to Exile
• 1 Return to Nature
• 1 Rite of Harmony
• 1 Second Harvest
• 1 Swords to Plowshares
• 1 Unbreakable Formation
• 1 Camaraderie
• 1 Cultivate
• 1 Fell the Mighty
• 1 Kodama's Reach
• 1 Nature's Lore
• 1 Rampant Growth
• 1 Shamanic Revelation

• Enchantments (5)
• 1 Anointed Procession
• 1 Beastmaster Ascension
• 1 Growing Rites of Itlimoc
• 1 Guardian Project
• 1 Parallel Lives

• Lands (37)
• 13 Forest
• 13 Plains
• 1 Bountiful Promenade
• 1 Canopy Vista
• 1 Castle Garenbrig
• 1 Command Tower
• 1 Evendo, Waking Haven
• 1 Exotic Orchard
• 1 Krosan Verge
• 1 Overgrown Farmland
• 1 Reliquary Tower
• 1 Sunpetal Grove
• 1 Windbrisk Heights

Buy This Deck Export text

Dropping this list down in power is pretty simple - just remove some of the cards that let you really amplify your damage output. Removing Craterhoof Behemoth, Moonshaker Cavalry, Jazal Goldmane, and Beastmaster Ascension, and replacing them with Spore Frog, Kami of False Hope, Constant Mists, and Moment's Peace, will result in a very different deck that should still be fun to play but won't crush lower powered tables. I wouldn't suggest removing your card draw or interaction, but dropping your maximum damage output is a good first step. Removing some token doublers or leaning into a theme could also help. Playing exclusively 1-drop creatures might be a gimmick worth trying if you really want to get weird. Sometimes that can be fun, and there are plenty of good 1-drops in Green and White.

To increase this deck's power, you'd look at a few options. Making infinite mana unlocks a lot of things for this deck. You can pump your creatures to be arbitrarily large. With ways to bounce creatures to hand you can create an arbitrarily large army by casting them again and creating more tokens. Temur Sabertooth, Whitemane Lion, Kor Skyfisher, and Cloudstone Curio can help to return creatures to your hand so you can cast them again. In the absence of infinite mana, Aluren will let you cast creature cards with mana value 3 and under for free. Aluren and Whitemane Lion together lets you create an infinite army of Human Citizen tokens, as you'd have Whitemane Lion bounce itself so you can re-cast it.

Final Thoughts

I wasn't able to get this list into a game, but I'm still quite bullish about how fun it will be at the right table. With a low mana curve, you'll nearly always have something to do. As always, this list should be considered a starting point. My choices are just that - mine, and you should tweak this list to meet your playstyle and the power level of tables you generally play at.

It's worth mentioning that Silk, Web Weaver feels like a strict upgrade to Torens, Fist of the Angels, though Torens fans might disagree. I far prefer the infinite mana outlet on Silk even if you're not planning to build a combo deck. Torens makes Green and White Human Soldier creature tokens with training, and training as a keyword isn't as easy to break wide open.

Both Torens and Silk want to go to combat, so they're both built to play a relatively fair game. That's great, but I do feel badly for any Torens player who's wondering why Wizards of the Coast didn't just make a Magic set with Magic characters and stories and have a new version of Torens with that same overrun ability that is now on this Spider-Man card. Plenty of us really, really don't want to be faced with having to start playing UB cards that feel like greedy cash grabs in order to upgrade our favorite decks. I don't have a Torens deck, but if I did, I'd be very torn about this obvious (to me) upgrade that's tempting me to move over to a UB commander that simply doesn't feel remotely like a Magic card.

As I've waded through this Spider-Man set I had managed to avoid buying any product, and it was the first time in many, many years that I had planned to skip a major set. Superheroes just don't feel like Magic to me, and while Edge of Eternities also felt very weird, Edge at the very least was a Magic story, not some shameless cash grab sold to us as a way to bring more players into the game.

While my plan was to skip Spider-Man entirely, I ended up buying a box at an LGS just this past weekend. I ended up playing at a store that had more boxes than they were expecting to be able to move, and it struck me that it had been years since I've done a "deck in a box" experiment. For the uninitiated, that just means you build a deck with just cards from a single box. You end up with a janky, lower powered deck. It's a fun exercise and I've enjoyed doing it in the past. While I don't necessarily want to reward Wizards for making UB, I very much want to do what I can to help out local game stores.

Next week's Spider-Man "deck in a box" will probably be my last foray into this set, as Avatar, the Last Airbender is now looming on the horizon. Avatar has a lot of players very excited for its release. While my own childhood was not punctuated by listening to the words "everything changed when the Fire Nation attacked", I know they strike a chord with a lot of Magic players. I appreciate that for some reason Avatar feels more like Magic than a lot of other UB sets.

That's all I've got for today. Thanks for reading and I'll see you next week!