I've been covering a lot of mono-colored legends from Avatar this month and when I decided to pick my next topic, I was drawn to a legendary Human Mercenary that incentivizes me to draw cards. I don't really need that much incentive to add card draw to my decks, but sometimes that little extra nudge can get you to load in cards you wouldn't ordinarily run. That's very much what happened to me with this build, which turned into a mono-Black voltron equipment deck.

June, Bounty Hunter is a 2/2 for 2 mana in Black with two interesting abilities. I built around one of them and entirely ignored the other. I'm incentivized to play card draw because she can't be blocked as long as I've drawn two or more cards this turn. An unblockable commander in Black opens up all kinds of opportunities and pushes me in a voltron direction. Her second ability lets me pay a mana and sacrifice another creature to create a clue token. I can only activate this ability during my turn, and this does encourage me to run some token generators so I've got extra bodies lying around to use to generate clues.

This commander isn't pushing me in any crazy new direction, but it did lead me to run some interesting equipment to try to amplify her damage output. Adding equipment led me to add extra ramp, mostly in the form of artifacts, as equip costs can add up. Her low casting cost positions me to be better able to recover after boardwipes than players with more expensive commanders, so I ran a few more sweepers than usual.

I've also got a handful of mono-Black staples but until this deck has seen a few games I won't really know if I need to add some other possible threats. If my ramp is enough to really make big mana, should I be running Exsanguinate and Torment of Hailfire? As usual, the answer is maybe - depending on what power levels I want to play at and how the deck feels in an actual game.

Before I get ahead of myself, let's look at some of the themes of today's build.

Mono-Black Equipment

This deck has two basic themes for the equipment I'm running.

The first is simple: I want to pump up my commander so it takes less hits to actually knock a player out. I don't really want to be one-shotting an opponent on turn three, but I do want to speed things up a bit. At two power, with no built-in way to push out extra damage, June needs a little help. I'm running Strata Scythe and Blackblade Reforged, both of which will pump her based on my land count. The former will have me exile a card (a swamp) from my library and will ramp equal to the number of lands in play with the same name as the exiled card. The latter will simply pump the equipped creature equal to the number of lands I control.

The cards I want to spotlight today are ones that are particularly good for June.

I'm in mono-Black, so Lashwrithe is perfect for this deck. This four mana equipment has living weapon, an ability that will create a 0/0 Germ token when it enters and will automatically equip itself to the Germ. I have 33 Swamps in the list so this should be a reliably good amount of pump, and it can equip with two phyrexian mana, so I can pay life or mana to attach it to a creature. I'm also running Nightmare Lash, a four-mana equipment with an equip cost of "pay 3 life" that gives the same +1/+1 for each Swamp I control.

I'm running a lot of mana rocks, so Cranial Plating felt like a natural fit for June. This two mana equipment pumps equipped creature for +1/+0 for each artifact I control. It's notable because for two Black mana you can equip it to a creature at instant speed. That's a fantastic combat trick if you're swinging with a lot of creatures that don't have trample and you want to make sure that at least one of them hits for a lot of damage. Declare attackers, declare blockers, and before the damage step you pay two Black to move Cranial Plating to an unblocked attacker.

Any commander that has the ability to be unblockable is perfect for a set of really nasty pieces of equipment. Quietus Spike will give equipped creature deathtouch and whenever equipped creature deals combat damage to a player, that player will lose half of their life, rounded up. This is a great way to deal with lifegain decks, but that life loss won't count as commander damage so it's unlikely to kill someone on its own. I chose to leave out the five-mana Scytheclaw, which has the same ability to halve an opponent's life total, but I did include Vorpal Sword. That one mana equipment gives +2/+0, deathtouch, and has an eight mana activated ability. That's a lot, but if you pay eight, your equipped creature's combat damage trigger will cause the player you hit to lose the game.

With the ability to push out a ton of commander damage, halve someone's life total, or even knock someone out of the game entirely, the real question is how I'm going to get past blockers. June gives us a neat solution to that problem. All I have to do is draw at least one card after my draw step. She gives me the ability to create Clue tokens, which can let me draw cards, but I want a better solution than that.

While I have been deeply frustrated by the Fortnite-ification of Magic, with all kinds of crazy things mixed into our card pool, I'm not above suggesting cards that make sense mechanically, even if they make zero sense in terms of theme.

Apparently June, Bounty Hunter has a side gig as a paleontologist. Who knew? Either that, or one of her bounties had this nifty Pick-Axe, but what matters here what it does. Whenever equipped creature attacks, I'll draw a card and then discard a card. That draw happens before declaring blockers, so she'll be unblockable every time she attacks. I can craft with one or more creatures for five mana to turn it into a Dinosaur Headdress, but this card is really in the list for that draw/discard trigger.

June has also picked up a Pip-Boy 3000 in her travels. This one-mana equipment has a modal attack trigger. I can draw and discard, put a +1/+1 counter on equipped creature, or untap up to two lands. That kind of versatility is great. I've got plenty of ways to draw cards, so she may already be unblockable. If so, the second or third option could make more sense on a given turn.

Those other ways to draw cards start with some instants like Deadly Dispute, Fanatical Offering and Village Rites, but also include some staples in hug decks. Temple Bell is a three-mana artifact that taps to let each player draw a card. I'll likely do it on my turn, but if I've already got my extra draw taken care of, I'll do it on the end step of the turn before mine. I'm also running Howling Mine, a two-mana artifact that has each player draw an additional card on their draw step. Repeatable card draw is great, and sometimes when you help other players out, they have a harder time deciding that you're the one they want to kill first.

Odds and Ends

It's no surprise that I'm running plenty of mono-Black staples. Black Market Connections and Phyrexian Arena can help with card draw. Withering Torment and Feed the Swarm will let me remove a creature or an enchantment. Damnation, Toxic Deluge, Mutilate, and Massacre Wurm all can clear the board if other players are getting out of control. Whip of Erebos gives me life gain and recursion, both of which could easily be pivotal in a game.

I've got a few cards in this list that are worth taking a closer look at.

Every Black deck should run recursion. It's plentiful in Black and there are lots of options available. It's also something I often overlook, but in this list Fortuitous Find feels just about perfect. I've got a lot of artifacts, and I've also got a lot of creatures that my tablemates are going to want to get rid of. Fortuitous Find is a three-mana sorcery that can return an artifact, a creature, or both to my hand. Whether I'm getting back Ornithopter of Paradise and a Solemn Simulacrum, or Skithiryx and a Blackblade Reforged, I'll always be happy if I'm getting two cards back to my hand for three mana.

I thought about leaning into a theme of creatures hunting or trying to cash in bounties. There is a four-mana sorcery called Grim Bounty and a creature from Tempest called Bounty Hunter. The former isn't great, but it's removal and I decided to run it. The latter is worse, and didn't make the cut, but would be great if you're really focused on building around this theme. My creature removal includes Ravenous Chupacabra and Big Game Hunter, shown above. The former could represent the weird creatures June rides around on. The latter could easily be seen as someone who accompanies June on her hunts - though I don't know Avatar lore well enough to know if that would make sense for her.

June's mount is Nyla, a blind shirshu, whose sense of smell is sensitive enough to "smell a rat a continent away". I knew I wanted to have token generators, so I decided to include Ogre Slumlord, a 3/3 Ogre Rogue that has me create a 1/1 Black Rat whenever another nontoken creature dies. Again, that might make zero sense for June to have friends like this. I also threw in Bitterblossom and Endrek Sahr, Master Breeder, as I knew I'd want extra creatures to sacrifice to draw cards, or just to throw in front of incoming attackers.

It's notable that Ogre Slumlord will give my rats deathtouch. If you haven't experimented in lower bracket play with having deathtouch blockers, you might be surprised at how well they keep people from attacking you. I decided to run Vampire Nighthawk because I don't have a ton of creatures, I don't have a ton of flyers, and one creature with deathtouch and flying (or reach) can sometimes buy you a few turns while an Angels or Dragons deck sends attackers elsewhere. It's no guarantee that they'll leave you alone, but nobody wants to attack and know their attacker will not only be blocked but will die when it takes damage.

Night of the Hunter

Apologies to Robert Mitchum, but I couldn't think of any quips with "June" in them. Night of the Hunter is a fantastic old B/W film you should go watch if you've never seen it. I am running Darkness in today's list, and even if it's a little slow, it's one of Steven King's favorite old horror films.

Today's list definitely has some of the issues you find with Voltron decks. There's a reasonable chance you'll knock one player out if you focus all your commander damage, and it's no fun for anyone to sit out if the table keeps playing for an hour or more. I know you should focus on one player at a time, but in practice I spread it around because I don't want my friends to get stuck on the couch when they'd rather be playing. It's a reason I like combo decks and decks that can explode and kill everyone at once, rather than ones that primarily use commander damage to win the game.

June, Bounty Hunter | Commander | Stephen Johnson

• Commander (1)
• 1 June, Bounty Hunter

• Creatures (16)
• 1 Big Game Hunter
• 1 Brass Squire
• 1 Crypt Ghast
• 1 Endrek Sahr, Master Breeder
• 1 Gray Merchant of Asphodel
• 1 Leaden Myr
• 1 Massacre Wurm
• 1 Morbid Opportunist
• 1 Nirkana Revenant
• 1 Ogre Slumlord
• 1 Ornithopter of Paradise
• 1 Phyrexian Obliterator
• 1 Ravenous Chupacabra
• 1 Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon
• 1 Solemn Simulacrum
• 1 Vampire Nighthawk

• Instants (6)
• 1 Darkness
• 1 Deadly Dispute
• 1 Fanatical Offering
• 1 Heartless Act
• 1 Village Rites
• 1 Withering Torment

• Sorceries (8)
• 1 Bubbling Muck
• 1 Damnation
• 1 Epic Downfall
• 1 Feed the Swarm
• 1 Fortuitous Find
• 1 Grim Bounty
• 1 Mutilate
• 1 Toxic Deluge

• Enchantments (5)
• 1 Bitterblossom
• 1 Black Market Connections
• 1 Phyrexian Arena
• 1 Vow of Malice
• 1 Vow of Torment

• Artifacts (26)
• 1 Arcane Signet
• 1 Blackblade Reforged
• 1 Bontu's Monument
• 1 Cranial Plating
• 1 Expedition Map
• 1 Fellwar Stone
• 1 Gilded Lotus
• 1 Howling Mine
• 1 Jet Medallion
• 1 Lashwrithe
• 1 Mind Stone
• 1 Mithril Coat
• 1 Nightmare Lash
• 1 Nyx Lotus
• 1 Paleontologist's Pick-Axe
• 1 Pip-Boy 3000
• 1 Quietus Spike
• 1 Skullclamp
• 1 Sol Ring
• 1 Strata Scythe
• 1 Swiftfoot Boots
• 1 Temple Bell
• 1 The Darkness Crystal
• 1 Thought Vessel
• 1 Vorpal Sword
• 1 Whip of Erebos

• Lands (38)
• 33 Swamp
• 1 Bojuka Bog
• 1 Bonders' Enclave
• 1 Cabal Coffers
• 1 Cabal Stronghold
• 1 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx

Buy This Deck Export text

If you wanted to drop this list in power, you'd probably want to replace some of the equipment that really turns June into a big threat. Replacing a card like Strata Scythe with something like Loxodon Warhammer gives you less of an impact in terms of commander damage and will make for longer games. You can shift your priorities away from raw damage and over to life gain, vigilance, deathtouch, hexproof, or whatever suits your preferred playstyle. I like being able to hit hard, but that might not be appropriate for some lower powered playgroups.

To tune this list up, I think you would probably want to spread out your strategy beyond just commander damage as a main point of attack. This list has a lot of mana production, from Nyx Lotus to Cabal Coffers, so being able to play out a late game Exsanguinate or Torment of Hailfire might make sense. Mono-Black Valgavoth, Terror Eater, Sheoldred, Sheoldred, the Apocalypse, or even Sheoldred, Whispering One might fit in nicely. Staples like Dauthi Voidwalker and Orcish Bowmasters could also work well. Adding tutors and streamlining your equipment package to just a few really impactful pieces would also make a lot of sense.

June, Bounty Hunter isn't about to make a splash in cEDH, but if you're trying to tune this list up a lot, you may just want to switch commanders. That's always an issue when you're optimizing a deck, as you eventually have to ask if you need to optimize your commander to get the most out of the deck. June is built to do silly things with an unblockable commander, but that's about it. You could probably turn infinite mana into a win if you had a creature you could pay to bring back from the graveyard. You'd just keep sacrificing the poor chap, making clue tokens, and drawing cards until you hit an X spell you could use to actually threaten the win.

I like combo well enough, but I've been playing in lower brackets and making infinite mana and then working your way through to your wincon while everyone sits there watching you isn't a lot of fun for anyone.

Final Thoughts

I'm three commanders into writing about a mono-colored commander from Avatar: The Last Airbender for each color. I hadn't intended to take a trip around the mana pie, but at this point I think I'm going to keep going. Next week I'll be writing about the mono White Monk Gyatso, a really spicy new airbender that has a ton of potential as a combo commander.

After that I will likely be hitting Green, and after that I may be looking at building some decks out of cards I open from boosters. I've always enjoyed letting a little luck guide my hand when choosing what to write, so in nearly every set I write at least one column about a deck that was inspired by a good pack pull.

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