If you like to unite under a common purpose and form an Alliance to overwhelm your opponents, then Ally tribal is the right deck for you. Let’s see how with unity we can overcome every challenge.
I love tribal decks because they combine synergy and flavor and of course power. On top of that you can find many unique cards that support a tribe and can be great budget options as those cards work only on a specific tribal deck and are bad to unplayable to any other deck. That’s why I will try building and presenting a series of decks for all those who share the love for tribal decks.
Allies were first introduced in Zendikar, reused inWorldwake and returned in the Battle for Zendikar block. They represent individuals (people or creatures) that have joined together under a common purpose and fromed an Alliance. The natural leader of the Allied forces is no other than General Tazri, an Ally commander that has a 5-color identity and thus supports all Allies.
General Tazri on EtB becomes an Ally tutor that brigns any Ally into our hand, while by paying 
at instant speed, she buffs Ally creatures we control with +X/+X until end of turn, where X is the number of colors among those creatures.
Many Allies have powerful EtB effects or EtB triggers, so an EtB strategy can multiply our deck effectiveness. Another strategy that complement to the Ally Tribal + EtB strategies is Blink, as we can repeatedly bounce our creatures to get multiple EtB triggers. Moreover, blinking General Tazri let us repeatedly tutor the Allies we need into our hand so we can have great consistency.
Synergy Diagram
I always like to make a simple synergy diagram in order to deeply comprehend the potential and the strategy areas that are supported by the commander when I choose top-down building.
Let’s analyze the main goals of the deck:
- Add the best Allies. Our priority is to add the ones with powerful EtB effects or the ones that have powerful EtB triggers.
- Add EtB support. With our strategy build upon Ally EtB effects/triggers we need ways to multiply that triggers or cards that care about EtB.
- Add Blink strategy cards, as Blink is another way of getting EtB effects/triggers.
For the sake of flavor some of the choices are not optimal, but are (usually budget friendly) alternatives that fit greatly the Ally tribal theme.
The deck:
Ally Tribal
Comparative Analysis
Let’s see how the deck compares to the general ratios of my deckbuilding guide.
37 Lands
13 Ramp: Great Divide Guide, Harabaz Druid, Arcane Signet, Sol Ring, Beastcaller Savant, Patchwork Banner, Cultivate, Chromatic Lantern, Mina and Denn, Wildborn, Herald’s Horn, Tarnation Vista, Mai and Zuko, Boiling Rock Rioter
10 Target Removal: Tuktuk Scrapper, Murasa Pyromancer, Masked Vandal, Jet, Freedom Fighter, Jwari Disruption, Kabira Takedown, Hagra Mauling, Aang, Swift Savior, Aang, Airbending Master, Chomping Changeling
2 Board Wipes:Crippling Fear, Winnowing
3 Graveyard Recursion: March from the Tomb, Rally the Ancestors, Boiling Rock Rioter
3 Graveyard Hate: Bojuka Bog, Agadeem Occultist, Boiling Rock Rioter
2 Tutors: General Tazri, Munda, Ambush Leader
8 Protection: Ally Encampment, Hero of Goma Fada, Kabira Evangel, Lae’zel’s Acrobatics, Jwari Disruption, Hakoda, Selfless Commander, Appa, Steadfast Guardian, Aang, Swift Savior
9 Card Draw: Sea Gate Loremaster, Distant Melody, Reconnaissance Mission, South Pole Voyager, Smellerbee, Rebel Fighter, Hakoda, Selfless Commander (kinda), Herald’s Horn, Kindred Discovery, Invasion Tactics
6 Finishers/ Surprise /Alternate win conditions: Sokka’s Charge, General Tazri, Tajuru Warcaller, Appa, the Vigilant, Katara, Water Tribe’s Hope, Invasion Tactics
As we see form the comparative analysis, the rates per category are good. Card draw is at 9 and apart from that there is no score below the optimal low average and we see 4 categories that are above the optimal max average.
Deck Highlights, synergy and flavor options:
Ramp
Harabaz Druid has amazing synergy with our deck since it is an Ally that works as a mana producer but also as a color fixer. In a 5-color Ally tribal deck, adding X mana of any one color where X is the number of Allies we control, is powerful.
Beastcaller Savant is also a great Ally mana dork since it adds one mana of any color and it has Haste so we can use it right away. This mana can only be used to cast a creature spell, but at least in Ally tribal, our deck is creature-heavy.
Chromatic Lantern is a great color fixing mana rock that is optimal in 5-colored decks.
Mina and Denn, Wildborn let us play an additional land on each of our turns and has ,Return a land you control to its owner’s hand: Target creature gains trample until end of turn. The first ability is very powerful for ramp while the second provides an extra utility.
Tarnation Vista has great synergy with our Ally Tribal as it works wonders in 5-color decks that have multiple monocolored creatures, providing a great mana boost.
Patchwork Banner is one of the best cards for Tribal builds as it combines ramp and tribal support. Being both a mana rock and a Tribal Anthem gives us amazing value for its mana cost. Of course it is a top pick for our Ally Tribal!
Great Divide Guide is one of the best cards for Ally Tribal as it combines ramp and color fixing. Turning all our Allies into mana producers can really make a huge difference. A must-have card for every Ally build!
Mai and Zuko let us cast Ally spells and artifact spells as though they had Flash. That alone is great, but combined with Firebending 3, means we can cast Allies into combat for quite a reduced cost, combining utility with ramp. A top inclusion for our Ally Tribal!
Herald’s Horn is great for every creature Tribal deck. It works both as ramp and as a kind of card draw, so it is very valuable for our Ally Tribal.
Target Removal
Tuktuk Scrapper is exceptional in destroying artifacts since it triggers on Ally EtB and on top of that if that artifacts are put into a graveyard this way (which is the most usual) it deals damage to that artifact’s controller equal to the number of Allies we control. It can be a secret finisher in Ally tribal.
Murasa Pyromancer is exceptional as repeatable target creature removal as it triggers on Ally EtB and it deals damage to target creature equal to the number of Allies we control.
Aang, Swift Savior has Flash and on ETB airbends up to one target creature o spell. That works either as protection or as a way to get more ETB triggers. It’s worthy to note that bouncing a spell works as a counterspell, but its caster may cast it for 
. Anyway, that delay may prove quite important. Moreover, Aang has Waterbend 
and may become even more useful once we have enough resources to transform him, which is a nice bonus. A great inclusion for our Ally Tribal!
Jet, Freedom Fighter is a bit expensive for what he offers, but at least he has synergy with our ETB and going wide strategies and can offer us creature removal on ETB. In addition, when he dies, we put a +1/+1 counter on each of up to two target creatures, which is a nice extra. A nice inclusion for our Ally Tribal.
Chomping Changeling and Masked Vandal are great cards for every Tribal build as they combine artifact/enchantment removal on ETB with Tribal synergy. Must-have cards for every Ally Tribal build!
Board Wipes
Crippling Fear and Winnowing are great budget mass removals for tribal decks as they can clear the board of our opponents while leaving ours intact.
Graveyard Recursion
March from the Tomb is an amazing mass graveyard recursion spell for Ally tribe as it can return any number of Ally cards with mana cost 8 or less directly into the battlefield.
Rally the Ancestors works greatly with our EtB strategy as we can return a massive army of Allies from our graveyard to the battlefield at instant speed and many EtB triggers in our deck can turn the tides of a battle or even prove lethal for our opponents.
Boiling Rock Rioter is a great utility card for our Ally Tribal, as it serves many purposes. It can be either a graveyard hate card, or a graveyard recursion card and combining the latter with Firebending 1, it even help us by reducing the mana cost (of the recurred Ally by its ability) since that ability triggers whenever it attacks.
Graveyard Hate
Agadeem Occultist not only removes target creature card from an opponent’s graveyard, but with 
we put it on the battlefild under our control as long as we control enough Allies to match its mana cost. Great utility and can be used repeatedly.
Tutors
General Tazri is our commander and we can easily tutor any Ally into our hand with EtB, which is a powerful effect alone, that can be greatly amplified by our blink and EtB trigger multiplying strategies.
Munda, Ambush Leader has a mini tutor effect (look at the top four cards of our library for Ally cards and put them on top of our library in any order) but it triggers on Ally EtB so we can easily trigger it each turn.
Protection
Ally Encampment is an exceptional land for Ally tribe since it produces onle mana of any color for casting Allies and with 
, and sacrificing it, we return at instant speed an Ally we control into our hand.
Hero of Goma Fada gives creatures we control indestructible until end of turn on Ally EtB, a very welcome protection that encourages us being aggressive.
Kabira Evangel gives creatures we control protection from the color we choose until end of turn on Ally EtB, which is a very powerful protection.
Lae’zel’s Acrobatics is a great mass blink spell that may provide us with many EtB triggers. With a bit of luck, we can double those triggers and the value we get from them. Being at instant speed means it can protect our board too and that makes it a great inclusion for our deck.
Card Draw
Sea Gate Loremaster can be an amazing repeatable card draw source since it has “: Draw a card for each Ally you control”
Distant Melody is great in any creature tribal deck with blue color as all of them run a good number of creatures, thus providing us a good number of card draw.
Reconnaissance Mission is an enchantment that greatly help us with card draw since we can expect to attack with many creatures and deal many times damage to a player and thus draw many cards from it.
Kindred Discovery is also great in creature tribal decks and works greatly with EtB multipliers too. It also provides card draw on attacking, so it promotes aggro and can give us amazing value.
South Pole Voyager is a cheap Ally that help us gaining 1 life on Ally ETB and can become a draw engine if we manage to trigger this ability for a second time in a turn. A great inclusion for our Ally Tribal!
Hakoda, Selfless Commander is an amazing Ally Tribal support card as he let us look at the top card of our library and cast Ally spells from it. He can really shine because of the ETB strategy and the creature-heavy theme. Moreover, he offers great protection from board wipes as by sacrificing himself, our Allies become indestructible and get +0/+5 (which also protects our board from more -X/-X spells). A must-have card for our build!
Smellerbee, Rebel Fighter has great synergy with our Ally Tribal as he can be a draw machine. Whenever Smellerbee attacks, we may discard our hand to draw cards equal to the number of attacking creatures. That sounds great along with our very creature-heavy build. Moreover, it gives Haste to all other creatures which is always great for a combat oriented deck.
Invasion Tactics is a bit expensive, but it works wonders in our Ally Tribal providing us both as a finisher (on ETB creatures we control get +2/+2 until end of turn) and a draw engine that synergizes with our Ally Tribal (Whenever one or more Allies we control deal combat damage to a player, we draw a card).
Finishers/ Surprise /Alternate win conditions
Tajuru Warcaller gives our creatures +2/+2 until end of turn on Ally EtB, en effect that alone is good, but if we trigger it many times can be devastating for our opponents.
General Tazri is our main finisher since we have constant access to her and she can easily buff our creatures to a point where every Ally becomes a great threat. A fitting role for our general. For the Alliance!
Appa, the Vigilant has high cmc, but provides us with great Ally Tribal support and it is by itself a considerable threat. Whenever Appa or another Ally we control enters, creatures we control get +1/+1 and gain Flying and Vigilance until end of turn. With few Ally ETB triggers, we have an amazing finisher. A great inclusion for our Ally Tribal!
Sokka’s Charge is a great Ally Tribal support Enchantment, as it provides Allies we control with Double strike and Lifelink during our turn.
Katara, Water Tribe’s Hope has Waterbend
: Creatures you control have base power and toughness X/X until end of turn. That works wonders with our going wide strategy and can be a great finisher. Moreover, on ETB she creates a 1/1 white Ally creature token which is a nice bonus. A great inclusion for our Ally Tribal!
Other synergy pieces
Great Allies
Jwari Shapeshifter is a cheap Ally clone that copy any Ally on the battlefield. We can copy our best one depending on the situation and optimize our play.
Kalastria Healer is great for draining our opponents since we can have multiple EtB triggers.
Ondu Cleric can provides us with great amounts of life, since on Ally EtB we may gain life equal to the number of Allies we control, which is always important.
Hagra Diabolist can be a secret finisher as on Ally EtB we can have target player loose an amount of life equal to the number of Allies we control.
Kazuul Warlord can buff our Allies with +1/+1 counters on Ally EtB and what matters is that those counters stay on our Allies so they can stack an make our army powerful.
Earth King’s Lieutenant is a cheap Ally that has amazing synergy with our Ally Tribal build. It has a strong ETB (we put a +1/+1 counter on each other Ally we control) and also synergizes well with our ETB and Blink strategies and can become a secret finisher as he gets +1/+1 on another Ally ETB and he has Trample, so on mass Blink he can become a huge threat. A great inclusion for our Ally Tribal!
Wartime Protestors is a top option for Ally Tribal, as on Ally ETB, we put a +1/+1 counter on that creature and it gains Haste. A great inclusion for our build!
Aang and Katara is a top Ally token creator for our Ally Tribal. On ETB and on attack trigger, we create X 1/1 white Ally creature tokens, where X is the number of tapped artifacts and/or creatures we control. A top inclusion for our Ally Tribal!
White Lotus Reinforcements is an Ally Lord that provides our Allies with +1/+1. A nice inclusion for any Ally Tribal!
Allies That Provide Keywords : 6 cards
Allies that provide keywords are great for our deck. Some are better than the others, but all contribute to a deck with amazing synergy and power.
EtB Trigger Doublers : 4 cards
EtB trigger doublers are a powerhouse for our deck since we run many powerful EtB effects.
Katara, the Fearless is one of the best cards for Ally Tribal as it doubles the triggers of Allies. A must-have card for every Ally build!
Blink/Airbending Strategy : 5 cards
Brago, King Eternal is worthy of a special mention since he can repeatably mass blink our Allies whenever he deals combat damage to a player and we can get amazing value from it. Another Round is a mass blink spell that has flexible casting cost and the more mana we can dump, the more value we can get out of it, in the form of mulitple mass ETB effects. Great synergy with our Ally Tribal Blink strategy! The other cards have already been analized earlier in the article.
Appa, Steadfast Guardian has Flash and on ETB let us airbend any number of other target nonland permanents you control. Works great both as a protection option and as part of our ETB strategy. Moreover, whenever we cast a spell from exile, we create a 1/1 white Ally creature token, so it can be a great Ally token creator. A top inclusion for our Ally Tribal!
Ally Token Producers : 10 cards
Ally token producers provide us with more Allies which means more EtB and we can get amazing value from them.
United Front scales well with our mana letting us create a bunch of Ally tokens, and on top of that, we put a +1/+1 counter on each creature you control . A great pick for our Ally Tribal!
Sokka, Tenacious Tactician is another top Ally token creator for our Ally Tribal. Whenever we cast a noncreature spell, we create a 1/1 white Ally creature token. In addition, he is a great Ally support card as it gives Allies we control Menace and Prowess. A top inclusion for our build!
Suki, Courageous Rescuer is a great pick for our Ally Tribal, as it works both as a Ally Lord (providing our cretures with +1/+0) and as a great Ally token creator that works both with our Blink strategy and whenever any Ally dies. Her ability triggers only once each turn, but it is still of great value.
Aang, Airbending Master works wonders with our Ally Tribal build, as it can be an unstoppable Ally token creator. With a mechanic build around experience counters on LTB without dying, he can create a 1/1 white Ally creature token for each experience counter we have at the beginning of our upkeep. By himself, on ETB he airbends another target creature, so he starts with 1 experience counter. Combined with our Blink strategy, he can instantly get multiple experience counters and creaty a very high number of Ally tokens each turn. He can really get out of hand combined with Brago, King Eternal as we can Blink our entire board (excluding tokens) each turn. A must-have card for our build!
Allied Teamwork is a great Ally Tribal anthem. Not only does it buffs our Allies with +1/+1, but on ETB we create a 1/1 white Ally creature token (which becomes a 2/2) so we get great value out of it.
Land Color Fixers
Unclaimed Territory, Secluded Courtyard, Path of Ancestry, Jasmine Dragon Tea Shop and Ally Encampment are important color fixers for our 5-color identity.
Jasmine Dragon Tea Shop is one of the best Lands for Ally Tribal as it combines Ally color fixing and Ally token creation. A must-have card for every Ally build!
Let’s see some more statistics about our deck. Some important info to care about is the mana curve and the card type distribution, as it can help us understand better our deck and may indicate where there is space for improving it.
Mana Curve
The mana curve seems more middle-range centered that usual, with many drops on 4-5 drop positions, a spike at 4 drops and an absence of 8+ drops. That reflects the fact that we count on Allies with strong EtB effects that mostly exist in that range.
Card Type Distribution
The Ally Tribal Card Type Distribution shows the dominant Tribal creature-heavy theme with 42 creatures. Other categories have lesser presence with Sorceries at 6, Artifacts at 6, Enchantments at 7 and Instants at 5. No Planeswalkers or Battles are present for the time.
Of course statistics and comparative analysis are great tools but they don’t always tell the whole truth, since many factors like synergy and combo pieces are hard to be measured numerically. For example in this deck, with all the deck build around General Tazri that can consistently tutor our Allies, the true power of the deck lies in synergy and that is not reflected in statistics.
Update v1 (Outlaws of Thunder Junction)
Update v2 (Bloomburrow)
Update v3 (Avatar: The Last Airbender)
Update v4 (Lorwyn Eclipsed)
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If you liked the deck, don’t forget to revisit the article after every major new release as I will try to keep my decks updated and examine any potential upgrades. If you want to keep being updated, you can follow mtgbudgetcommander.com on social media (facebook, twitter, instagram, pinterest, linkedin, reddit, tumblr, medium).
If you like my tribal series, you can check my other tribal decks.
