Happy Holidays everyone!

We're just days from Christmas and I'm happy to tell you that for the second week in a row I've got another double feature to share!

Last week I wrote up both a bracket two and bracket three list for Smellerbee, Rebel Fighter. This week I decided to brew up a decklist around a very powerful Bison Ally that seemed to keep popping out of my booster packs over the past few months. I'm not sure if I've got three or four of these bad boys in my pile of Avatar: the Last Airbender cards, but I took it as a sign that I should devote a column to him.

Appa, Steadfast Guardian is a four mana Bison Ally in White with Flash, Flying, and a pretty great ability. When Appa enters, I can airbend any number of other target nonland permanents I control. That means I can exile them and while each one is exiled I may cast it for 2 mana rather than its mana cost. That's really neat, but it gets better. Whenever I cast a spell from exile, I'll create a 1/1 White Ally creature token.

When I claimed Appa in our CoolStuffInc Commander writers' chat, fellow scribbler Mike Cummings let me know that he had a bracket 3 Appa combo list that I was welcome to look at for inspiration. With his permission I'll be sharing that list with you today, along with a bracket 2 list I brewed up for more casual play.

Last week I discussed what a bracket 1 Smellerbee list might look like, but I'm not going to bother doing that for Appa. You don't need help if you want to build a bracket 1 deck - just think of a silly idea, commit as heavily as possible to the bit, and make sure it doesn't have too much synergy or "good cards".

Bracket Two Appa

Building a bracket two deck isn't as simple as just leaving out game changers. You also need to commit to a build path that isn't going to be too fast, powerful, or consistent. Any combos you include should be a little more fragile, harder to assemble, and/or less lethal. I tend to make my bracket 2 decks a little less oppressive as well, though I lean away from those kinds of cards in bracket 3 as well. When I think about oppressive cards and play patterns in White I'm thinking about cards like Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite, stax pieces, tons of boardwipes, and that sort of thing.

An easy way to build a bracket two list is to pick a theme that isn't incredibly synergistic with what your commander brings to the game. Appa makes Ally creature tokens, but I recently built Aang, at the Crossroads as an Ally kindred list, so I'm not interested in building another Allies deck right now. I'm also not interested in building Bison kindred, as the four versions of Appa are the only Bisons ever printed in Magic.

There is one creature type that feels just perfect for an Appa, Steadfast Guardian deck, and it's one I'm excited about building around. Once upon a time I tried to build Narset, Enlightened Master as a Monk kindred deck. It was not a very good deck, but since then I've always had an interest in getting a Commander deck built around Monks to work.

With cards like Monastery Mentor and Serra Ascendant available in White, I think this time it might work. The former is a fantastic source of 1/1 creature tokens, and those tokens just happen to be White Monks with prowess. The latter might have been the best White 1-drop in Magic until Esper Sentinel was printed. It'll be a 6/6 flyer with lifelink, ready to attack on turn two as long as you've managed to keep your life total at 30 or higher.

I'm putting a spotlight on Rune-Tail, Kitsune Ascendant just to illustrate the fact that the Monk creature type includes some really interesting cards. This legendary Fox monk is a 2/2 that can flip into Rune-Tail's Essence, a legendary enchantment that prevents all damage that would be dealt to creatures I control.

There are plenty of White Monk cards that care about casting noncreature spells, but it's worth looking at a few that have helpful enter-the-battlefield triggers. Appa, Steadfast Guardian plays well with these guys, as airbending will let me cast them from exile for just two mana per creature.

I've got a little graveyard recursion in Wayspeaker Bodyguard and Monk Idealist. Wayspeaker Bodyguard will let me return target nonland permanent with mana value 2 or less from my graveyard to my hand. Monk idealist will let me return target enchantment card from my graveyard to my hand. Sun Titan might be a worthwhile addition, but that old staple isn't a Monk so I left it out of today's list.

Geist-Honored Monk is worth a look, as it's one of the few creatures in this list that might become a significant combat threat on its own. This Human Monk has vigilance along with a power and toughness equal to the number of creatures I control. When she enters play, I'll create two 1/1 White Spirit creature tokens with flying, so at minimum she'll be a 3/3, and she could easily get much bigger.

Githzerai Monk is the biggest reason I decided to build Appa as a Monk kindred list. When this Gith Monk enters play, I'll tap all creatures I don't control. It has flash, and between my airbending and the handful of flicker spells I'm running, I'm ready to tap my tablemates' creatures down again and again. I'm not running Subjugator Angel, which does the same thing, as I'm leaning into my chosen creature type. There are a few exceptions in the deck, but that Angel isn't one of them.

The most important thing to note about my list is that it's designed for a meta where games will generally be won in combat. You'll see that I'm running a bunch of White Fog effects, along with a few wincons like Cathars' Crusade and Akroma's Will that can get the job done in your average bracket 2 game.

Appa, Steadfast Guardian | Commander | Stephen Johnson

• Commander (1)
• 1 Appa, Steadfast Guardian

• Creatures (29)
• 1 Air Nomad Student
• 1 Archivist of Oghma
• 1 Dueling Coach
• 1 Enlightened Ascetic
• 1 Esper Sentinel
• 1 Geist-Honored Monk
• 1 Githzerai Monk
• 1 Golden-Tail Disciple
• 1 Half-Elf Monk
• 1 Lone Missionary
• 1 Master of Pearls
• 1 Monastery Mentor
• 1 Monk Idealist
• 1 Monk Realist
• 1 Monk of the Open Hand
• 1 Ojutai Exemplars
• 1 Poised Practitioner
• 1 Pride Guardian
• 1 Rhox Faithmender
• 1 Rumor Gatherer
• 1 Rune-Tail, Kitsune Ascendant
• 1 Sage of the Skies
• 1 Serene Master
• 1 Serra Ascendant
• 1 Snow Villiers
• 1 Solemn Simulacrum
• 1 Student of Ojutai
• 1 Venerable Monk
• 1 Wayspeaker Bodyguard

• Spells (18)
• 1 Akroma's Will
• 1 Cloudshift
• 1 Comeuppance
• 1 Dawn Charm
• 1 Ephemerate
• 1 Ethereal Haze
• 1 Flawless Maneuver
• 1 Flicker of Fate
• 1 Generous Gift
• 1 Holy Day
• 1 Path to Exile
• 1 Riot Control
• 1 Settle the Wreckage
• 1 Swords to Plowshares
• 1 Your Temple is Under Attack
• 1 Cut a Deal
• 1 Everything Comes to Dust
• 1 Fumigate

• Enchantments (4)
• 1 Cathars' Crusade
• 1 Far Traveler
• 1 Land Tax
• 1 Tocasia's Welcome

• Artifacts (10)
• 1 Arcane Signet
• 1 Glaring Spotlight
• 1 Idol of Oblivion
• 1 Nyx Lotus
• 1 Pearl Medallion
• 1 Skullclamp
• 1 Sol Ring
• 1 Staff of the Storyteller
• 1 The Wind Crystal
• 1 Thought Vessel

• Planeswalker (1)
• 1 Grand Master of Flowers

• Lands (4)
• 1 Emeria, the Sky Ruin
• 1 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
• 1 Reliquary Tower
• 1 Rogue's Passage

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You'll probably notice that I didn't include Moonshaker Cavalry. If you wanted to push your power level up a bit, the "White Craterhoof" is a fantastic way to push out a ton of damage. I don't think Moonshaker Cavalry is completely out of place in bracket 2, but to me it does feel a little more like a bracket 3 card.

I also didn't include Monk Gyatso. I wrote about that airbending master a few weeks ago, and outside of running Air Nomad Student, I decided not to dig into the TLA set for this list, not even running additional airbending cards. If you're going to build Appa and you have a bunch of Avatar cards, you could easily load in a bunch of White cards with airbending for a bracket 2 Appa list.

Bracket Three Appa

Aside from the aforementioned Moonshaker Cavalry, if I were to build Appa for bracket three, I would probably build it as a flicker / ETB combo list. There are plenty of cards in White that can enter the battlefield and flicker another creature, and when you combine them in just the right ways, you can generate insane amounts of value. I dug into that a bit with my Monk Gyatso list, and I'm very happy to be able to share a bracket 3 Appa, Steadfast Guardian combo list from fellow CoolStuffInc writer Mike Cummings.

The first thing I want to look at in Mike's list are the heavy hitters. These are cards you might not find in a bracket 2 list, but they feel perfectly at home in brackets 3 and 4.

With all of my talk about the "White Craterhoof" I would be derelict in my duties as a writer if I didn't show you the card. This Spirit Knight costs a whopping 8 mana, but once it's in play, you'll probably be airbending it and casting it for 2 mana if things are going well. You might even be able to nail down a win by flickering or airbending it multiple times in the same turn. Moonshaker Cavalry doesn't give haste, but it's about as good as you can get for a combat finisher in White.

Avatar's Wrath is one of the cards I wish I had pulled from an Avatar booster this Fall. This four-mana Sorcery has you choose up to one target creature and you airbend all other creatures. To keep everyone else from rebuilding too easily, your opponents won't be able to cast spells from anywhere other than their hands until your next turn. This card is so powerful, it has you exile it once it has resolved so you can't do it again.

The smartest artifact to run in any deck devoted to airbending might be Aetherflux Reservoir. I'm a little embarrassed that I left this amazing wincon out of my Monk Gyatso list, as the ability to set up a turn with a bunch of 2 mana spells from airbending your creatures should work really well. If you start a turn at 30 life and you're able to cast five spells, you'd end up at 45 life - achingly close to being able to zot someone for 50 damage. If you go infinite, you just win the game. Mike is running a bit of a Soul Sisters subtheme, running cards like Soul's Attendant and Soul Warden. That should let him play a lifegain game and occasionally close out his final opponent with an Aetherflux Reservoir activation without even hitting a combo.

If you're wondering where the "combo" aspect of this bracket three deck comes in, it's through cards like these.

Permanents that let you copy enter-the-battlefield triggers are one piece of the combo puzzle this deck is hoping to put together. Panharmonicon does this beautifully. Preston, the Vanisher does much the same thing, but by making a token copy of the nontoken creature that entered play. Delney, Streetwise Lookout will copy your triggers, but only for creatures with power 2 or less. Elesh Norn, Mother of Machines isn't in Mike's list, but could also be run in this list as another way to get extra ETB triggers.

Restoration Angel and Felidar Guardian let you flicker other creatures when they enter the battlefield. If you had both of these in play, you could have them go back and forth, flickering each other endlessly. Mike is running a lot of creatures that gain you life when a creature enters play, so the first likely outcome is that he'd gain an arbitrarily high life total.

If Mike has ways to copy those triggers, he can start to flicker other creatures like one of the many that will draw him a card when they enter play. He might also be able to make his creatures arbitrarily large, or even put all of the lands in his deck into play by flickering a Solemn Simulacrum.

If Semblance Anvil or both Pearl Medallion and The Wind Crystal are in play, Mike should be paying 2 mana less for his White creatures. If he's managed to pull that off, he'll be able to re-cast any creatures he's exiled with airbending for free. Normally they would cost 2 mana, but if they're going to cost 2 mana less, that opens up all kinds of possibilities! Appa can't airbend himself, but this deck has enough random flicker goodstuff in it to make an Appa combo with free castings of airbent creatures possible.

Appa, Steadfast Guardian | Commander | Mike Cummings

• Commander (1)
• 1 Appa, Steadfast Guardian

• Creatures (33)
• 1 Aang, Airbending Master
• 1 Appa, the Vigilant
• 1 Beza, the Bounding Spring
• 1 Charming Prince
• 1 Circuit Mender
• 1 Claim Jumper
• 1 Delney, Streetwise Lookout
• 1 Enduring Innocence
• 1 Esper Sentinel
• 1 Felidar Guardian
• 1 Helpful Hunter
• 1 Inspiring Overseer
• 1 Kindly Customer
• 1 Knight of the White Orchid
• 1 Lantern Scout
• 1 Loran of the Third Path
• 1 Momo, Playful Pet
• 1 Monk Gyatso
• 1 Moonshaker Cavalry
• 1 Phelia, Exuberant Shepherd
• 1 Preston, the Vanisher
• 1 Priest of Ancient Lore
• 1 Recruiter of the Guard
• 1 Restoration Angel
• 1 Solemn Simulacrum
• 1 Soul's Attendant
• 1 Soul Warden
• 1 South Pole Voyager
• 1 Spirited Companion
• 1 Sun Titan
• 1 Wall of Omens
• 1 Welcoming Vampire
• 1 Witch Enchanter

• Spells (10)
• 1 Avatar's Wrath
• 1 Day of Judgment
• 1 Tale of Momo
• 1 Airbender's Reversal
• 1 Airbending Lesson
• 1 Cloudshift
• 1 Eerie Interlude
• 1 Path to Exile
• 1 Swords to Plowshares
• 1 Ultimate Magic: Holy

• Artifacts (16)
• 1 Aetherflux Reservoir
• 1 Arcane Signet
• 1 Archaeomancer's Map
• 1 Commander's Sphere
• 1 Conjurer's Closet
• 1 Halo Fountain
• 1 Mind Stone
• 1 Oketra's Monument
• 1 Panharmonicon
• 1 Pearl Medallion
• 1 Semblance Anvil
• 1 Skullclamp
• 1 Sol Ring
• 1 The Wind Crystal
• 1 Throne of Eldraine
• 1 Wayfarer's Bauble

• Enchantments (3)
• 1 Airbender Ascension
• 1 Dazzling Theater // Prop Room
• 1 Tocasia's Welcome

• Lands (37)
• 32 Plains
• 1 Abandoned Air Temple
• 1 Ishgard, the Holy See
• 1 Myriad Landscape
• 1 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
• 1 War Room

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Mike graciously invited me to make edits to his list before posting it. While I have shared it without any changes, you should know that any list you find in articles here on CoolStuffInc should be seen as a starting point. You should tune it up or down to meet your preferred power level and playstyle. If you've got "Elesh Mom" sitting around, by all means throw it in. If you liked my Monk kindred approach but want something in between that and Mike's more potent combo list, by all means tinker with them until you have a deck you are happy with.

I should note that I'm far from an expert on building and playing mono-White flicker combo. I know enough to be nervous when a Felidar Guardian or Karmic Guide hits the table, but I've never seriously dug into this particular archetype. It's quite possible I've missed some key synergy or combo that I should have explained here. If you build this and stumble upon some new wincon you didn't realize was there, feel free to blame me. To some extent that's part of the Commander experience - realizing a deck does something you never imagined it could.

Final Thoughts

I live up in New England (USA) and while it doesn't look like it's going to be a White Christmas for us, I liked being able to share a couple of White decks with you today. I'd like to thank Mike Cummings for letting me share his decklist and freeing me up to put together a bracket 2 list in today's column.

I'm not sure if I'm going to take that extra step and build Appa in paper, but I'm thinking about it. I've got a Light-Paws, Emperor's Voice deck that has a dozen alters that I'm don't play that often, and I've definitely thought about taking it apart to build something new. I have a hard time taking apart decks I enjoy, and I really enjoy Light-Paws. I also have a hard time taking apart decks with an alter in the commander slot, and my Light-Paws list has that plus another 10+ alters in the 99.

Still, if I'm not playing it...

That's all I've got for today. Thanks for reading! I'll see you next Monday for one last column before we jump into 2026.