If you like celebrating with delicious food to support and empower your fellows to overcome your opponents, then Halfling Food Tribal is the right deck for you. Let’s see how we can organize a grand victory feast!
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.
Halflings is new tribe for MtG that firstly appeared in Magic in Dungeons & Dragons: Adventures in the Forgotten Realms. Halflings are humanoid creatures similar in shape to humans, but around half their size. The creature type was adapted from Dungeons & Dragons, which in turn took its inspiration from J. R. R. Tolkien’s Hobbits. With the release of The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle Earth, Hobbits came to MtG with the Halfling creature type and we got some iconic characters from LOTR and a bit of tribal support. I expect the tribe to get much more support in the future, either with the next Middle Earth releases, or with other D&D sets.
The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle Earth Commander deck Food and Fellowship, may be a good starting point for building Halfling tribal, even if the dominant theme of the deck is split between Food tokens (lilfegain) and Halflings. In fact Halflings as a creature type have little dedicated tribal support but they share Food and lifegain synergy (seems flavor and lore wise) so we can create a Halfling Food tribal build. Although you can call it a precon upgrade, you can start from zero and buy singles. The optimal building option depends on the price and availability of the cards.
The iconic heroes Frodo, Adventurous Hobbit and Sam, Loyal Attendant from LOTR are perfect to lead the tribe as partners since they have Food and lifegain synergy. They have an azban (
) color identity, support both Food token strategy and the Ring tempts you strategy and combine all with lifegain synergy. Sam creates free Food tokens, reduces activation cost of Food by 
and Frodo uses lifegain from Food to activate the Ring tempts you ability that makes Frodo a perfect Ring-bearer and a card draw engine.
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 Halflings. Our priority is to add the ones that have any synergy with Food, lifegain and the Ring tempts you strategy.
- Add Halfling tribal support. There are only a few cards that support Halfling tribal so they are almost an auto-include in the deck.
- Add Food token support/synergy. Food token strategy is vital for our build since many Halflings have great synergy with Food and produce Food tokens.
- Add lifegain support/synergy. Food tokens provide a stable source of lifegain, so some lifegain synergy cards provide us with great value.
- Add cards that synergize with our strategies. To make the best out of our strategies, we can further amplify them by adding cards that support many of our strategies and that is easy since those strategies collide.
For the sake of flavor some of the choices are not optimal, but are (usually budget friendly) alternatives that fit greatly the Halfling Food tribal theme.
The deck:
Halfling Food Tribal
Comparative Analysis
Let’s see how the deck compares to the general ratios of my deckbuilding guide.
16 Ramp: Sméagol, Helpful Guide , Sol Ring , Arcane Signet , Tireless Provisioner , Prosperous Innkeeper , Night of the Sweets’ Revenge, Heaped Harvest, Lobelia Sackville-Baggins , Elanor Gardner , Gilded Goose , Fae Offering, Academy Manufactor , Lotho, Corrupt Shirriff, Delighted Halfling, Prize Pig, Nuka-Cola Vending Machine
7 Target Removal: Swords to Plowshares , Hobbit’s Sting , Witch of the Moors , Bake into a Pie, Anguished Unmaking , Braids, Arisen Nightmare , Shire Shirriff
3 Board Wipes: The Battle of Bywater , Fell the Mighty , Dusk // Dawn
4 Graveyard Recursion: Samwise the Stouthearted , Samwise Gamgee , Witch of the Moors , Dusk // Dawn
3 Graveyard Hate: Lobelia Sackville-Baggins , Bojuka Bog, Restless Cottage
1 Tutors: Trail of Crumbs
3 Protection: Gyome, Master Chef , Banquet Guests (self-protection), Ygra, Eater of All(self-protection)
11,5 Card Draw: Peregrin Took , Savvy Hunter , Well of Lost Dreams , Fae Offering , Greta, Sweettooth Scourge , Dawn of Hope , Lobelia, Defender of Bag End (kinda), The Gaffer , Frodo, Adventurous Hobbit , Of Herbs and Stewed Rabbit (1/2), Braids, Arisen Nightmare , Academy Manufactor
8 Finishers/ Surprise /Alternate win conditions: Frodo, Sauron’s Bane , Felidar Sovereign , Sanguine Bond , Motivated Pony , Gollum, Obsessed Stalker , Pippin, Warden of Isengard , Bilbo, Birthday Celebrant (barely), Night of the Sweets’ Revenge
As we see form the comparative analysis, the rates per category are good. There is no score below the optimal low average and we see 5 categories that are above the optimal max average. We see Ramp at 16 and Finishers/ Surprise /Alternate win conditions at 8 to be highlights of our deck.
Deck Highlights, synergy and flavor options:
Ramp
Elanor Gardner is an amazing card for our deck. The daughter of Sam creates a Food token on EtB and at the beggining of our end step, if we sacrificed a Food this turn she let us ramp with an ability similar to Rampant Growth. Such a repeatable ramp source is way too powerful and can easily be achieved in our Halfling Food Tribal build.
Sméagol, Helpful Guide is another repeatable ramp source, but this time we ramp with lands of our opponents! At the beggining of our end step, if a creature died under our control this turn, the Ring tempts us. Whenever the Ring tempts us, target opponent reveals cards from the top of their library until they reveal a land card. We put that card onto the battlefield tapped under our control and the rest into their graveyard. Amazing synergy with the Ring tempts you ability since we can trigger it multiple times and get more ramp. We can easily trigger it with Frodo, Adventurous Hobbit, love the synergy and flavor with our Halfling Food Tribal.
Tireless Provisioner is a great card in any green deck, but it has even more synergy in Halfling Food Tribal since we have to choose among Treasure (ramp) or Food (lifegain). Amazing flexibility and utility.
Prosperous Innkeeper is very valuable for our Halfling Food Tribal because of its lifegain ability (On another creature EtB under our control, we gain 1 life), but on EtB it creates a Treasure token so it helps a bit with ramp too.
Night of the Sweets’ Revenge works wonders with our Food token strategy since Food tokens become mana rocks providing us with extreme ramp. It even creates a Food token on EtB so we can get instant value. Moreover, by paying 
and sacrificing it, creatures we control get +X/+X until end of turn, where X is the number of Foods we control. With our Food strategy in Halfling Food Tribal it can become a great finisher.
Gilded Goose has great Food synergy since it can create a Food token on EtB and by paying ,
and also to turn Food into ramp, as with and by sacrificing it: we add one mana of any color.
Fae Offering is a great enchantment for Food decks and is especially good in our Halfling Food Tribal build that runs many low mana cost halflings, as it checks at the beginning of each end step, if we’ve cast both a creature spell and a noncreature spell this turn and then we create a Clue token, a Food token, and a Treasure token. Great value as it helps with card draw, lifegain and ramp.
Academy Manufactor is a perfect card for our deck, as it creates a Clue and a Treasure token every time we create a Food token and that happens very often in our Halfing Food tribal. Amazing value as it helps with card draw, lifegain and ramp.
Lotho, Corrupt Shirriff has “Whenever a player casts their second spell each turn, you lose 1 life and create a Treasure token”. It can be of extraordinary value in commander as we can get mutiple treasure tokens each turn. Great pick for our Halfling Food Tribal.
Delighted Halfling is one of the most sought-after cards in the LOTR set because it is a better Birds of Paradise for legendary spells since it also gives them “can’t be countered” and in worse case it still can for 
. An amazing mana dork that fits any green deck, but it is a halfling, so it has extra synergy in our Halfling Food Tribal deck.
Prize Pig is another great mana producer, but this one has great synergy with lifegain (and Food) since it has “Whenever you gain life, put that many ribbon counters on Prize Pig. Then if there are three or more ribbon counters on Prize Pig, remove those counters and untap it.” Since Food tokens provide us with 3 life, we can instantly get 3 ribbon counters, then remove those counters and untap it to tap it again for one mana of any color. Great utility card for our Halfling Food Tribal.
Nuka-Cola Vending Machine is an amazing card for Halfling Food Tribal as it offers both Food token creation (by paying ,) and exceptional Food token synergy (Whenever we sacrifice a Food, we create a tapped Treasure token). With our build, that is bonkers as it turns our waste into treasure (ramp)!
Heaped Harvest feels like a balanced ramp card with high Food synergy. Being a Food artifact itself makes it optimal for our Halfling Food Tribal as we can sacrifice it at instant speed with cards with Food sacrifice synergy and get quick ramp consistently (among other benefits).
Target Removal
Hobbit’s Sting has great synergy with both our main strategies since our Halfling Food Tribal is full of Halflings and Food creation cards, so we can get easily a good value for X damage, where X is the sum of Halflings and Food we control.
Witch of the Moors is a great repeatable removal and grave recursion tool, that can easily be activated at the beginning of our each end step. We can get amazing value out of it in our Halfling Food Tribal.
Braids, Arisen Nightmare can be a great tool for our Halfling Food Tribal since Food tokens are artifacts and we have numerous creatures so our opponents will not be able to keep up with us and eventually if it stays on board, it will drain them and let us draw many cards. Great for both removal and card draw, a high synergy piece.
Shire Shirriff is not an optimal removal, but it is a Halfling so we have some Halfling Food Tribal synergy.
Board Wipes
The Battle of Bywater fits perfectly both our Halfling (low power) and Food tribal theme. The best board wipe for Halfling Food Tribal.
Fell the Mighty can be a partly one-sided board wipe in our Halfling Food Tribal since our Halflings have low power and we can take advantage of that to clear only the big threats.
Dusk // Dawn also focuses on clearing the big threats since it destroys all creatures with power 3 or greater, while on the same time it can return many of our Halfings from our graveyard to our hand since many of them have power 2 or less. Great Halfling Food Tribal synergy!
Graveyard Recursion
Samwise the Stouthearted has Flash and on EtB it can return to our hand any permanent that was put in our graveyard the same turn. Moreover, then the Ring tempts you. Sam was always a fellow you can count on. Easy pick for our Halfling Food Tribal.
Samwise Gamgee is an amazing card for our Halfling Food Tribal deck since he has amazing synergy with both main aspects of our build. On another nontoken creature EtB under our control, we create a Food token and by sacrificing three Foods we return target historic card from our graveyard to our hand. He is an amazing Food producer and a repeatable grave recursion tool, a must-have card for our deck.
Graveyard Hate
Lobelia Sackville-Baggins has Flash and can be used, not only to remove target creature card from an opponent’s graveyard, but also as an amazing ramp source as we create X treasure tokens, where X is the exiled card’s power. Love the flavor and the utility! Easy pick for our Halfling Food Tribal.
Restless Cottage is a nice utility land for our Halfling Food Tribal, that has Food synergy and it can help with graveyard hate. By paying 
it becomes a 4/4 green Horror creature until end of turn and whenever it attacks, we create a Food Token and exile up to one target card from a graveyard.
Tutors
Trail of Crumbs works wonders with Food tokens and becomes a repeatable mini tutor by paying whenever we sacrifice a Food. It let as look at the top two cards of our library and put a permanent among them into our hand. With our Halfling Food Tribal build we can easily create many Food tokens so it can almost become a kind of card draw.
Protection
Gyome, Master Chef is a great free Food token creator (master chef indeed) but also with paying and sacrificing a Food, it gives indestructible until end of turn on target creature. Great utility card for our Halfling Food Tribal!
Banquet Guests has self-protection as with paying and sacrificing a Food, it gain indestructible until end of turn. In addition it has Affinity for Food and Trample and with a bit setup, it can enter the battlefield with quite the +1/+1 counters and thus becoming a big threat. Great example of Halfling Food Tribal synergy.
Card Draw
Peregrin Took and Savvy Hunter are sac outlets that can turn our Foods into card draw. Peregrin Took provides us a free Food token whenever we create any token and by sacrificing three Foods we draw a card, while Savvy Hunter create a Food token whenever it attacks or blocks and by sacrificing two Foods we draw a card. They are also great Food token producers so they refill our Food supply and refuel themselves. Great picks for our Halfling Food Tribal.
Well of Lost Dreams and Dawn of Hope are staples for lifegain decks because they can become great draw engines. They work quite well in our Halfling Food Tribal.
Greta, Sweettooth Scourge is a great flexible card that creates a Food token on EtB, it offers cards draw by paying and sacrificing a Food, and by paying and sacrificing a Food it let us put a +1/+1 counter on target creature at sorcery speed. Its flexibility and Food synergy make it a great inclusion for our Halfling Food Tribal.
Lobelia, Defender of Bag End may let us play cards of our opponents which is card advantage. She also has synergy with lifegain, she is a Halfling and is very versatile. Great utility card for our Halfling Food Tribal!
The Gaffer is a great card draw engine in our Halfling Food Tribal since Food tokens let us gain 3 life, so we may consistently activate his ability.
Frodo, Adventurous Hobbit as we explained on top of the article, can easily activate his abilities in our Halfling Food Tribal so he can also became a great card draw source.
Of Herbs and Stewed Rabbit helps with Food token creation and on II it provides a minor card draw, but on III it can create an army of 1/1 white Halflings if we have enough Food tokens. Great synergy with our Halfling Food Tribal deck!
Finishers/ Surprise /Alternate win conditions
Frodo, Sauron’s Bane can be really scary in his last form (halfling Rogue) as he can one-shot opponents on dealing combat damage to them as long as the Ring has tempted us four or more times. The latter is not hard to reach with the help of our commander Frodo, Adventurous Hobbit and other cards of our Halfling Food Tribal build.
Felidar Sovereign gives us an alternate win condition and has synergy with our lifegain and Food strategies. At the beginning of our upkeep, if we have 40 or more life, we win the game. A nice alternative for an easy win in our Halfling Food Tribal build.
Sanguine Bond can drain our opponents turn after turn or even be a finisher in our Halfling Food Tribal if we use many Foods the same turn.
Motivated Pony on attack trigger gives attacking creatures +1/+1 intil end of turn but if a Food entered the battlefield this turn in untaps those creatures and they get an additional +2/+2 until end of turn. Trample and haste makes it much better since we can activate the ability on the same turn and itself becomes a 6/6 trample which is not bad at all. With many Halflings on board, it can make a huge difference and even become a finisher in our Halfling Food Tribal.
Gollum, Obsessed Stalker is a lot better than what it seems to be at first glance. Skulk makes it unblockable by big creatures and it can become a draining source since it checks at the beginning of our end step, if an opponent was dealt combat damage this game by Gollum, Obsessed Stalker, to drain them life equal to the amount of life we gained this turn. Another great card for our Halfling Food Tribal.
Pippin, Warden of Isengard has great synergy with our Halfling Food Tribal build, since with , he creates a Food token, while by and sacrificing four Foods, other creatures we control gain +3/+3 and haste until end of turn at sorcery speed. His last ability cas easily be a finishing move in Halfling Food Tribal.
Bilbo, Birthday Celebrant is mostly used in our Halfling Food Tribal for his lifegain ability, the Halfling synergy and the flavor and not his overly optimistic last ability. Even so, if we manage to reach 111 life or more, by paying , we can exile him and put all the creatures of our library to the battlefild which is a totally finishing move.
Other synergy pieces
Great Halflings
Farmer Cotton has amazing synergy with our deck, as on EtB, we create X 1/1 white Halfling creature tokens and X Food tokens. He is a top card for Halfling Food Tribal.
Feasting Hobbit has great Food synergy as he has Devour Food 3 and can become a huge threat if you consider his last ability that it is unblockable from creatures with lesser power. He can even become a hidden finisher in Halfling Food Tribal.
Meriadoc Brandybuck is one of the few Halfling tribal support cards, as on Halfling attack trigger, we create a Food token. One of the best cards for Halfling Food Tribal.
Merry, Warden of Isengard have partner with Pippin, Warden of Isengard which is a very important piece for our Halfling Food Tribal deck, so it works as a tutor for Pippin. Apart from that, he creates a 1/1 white Soldier creature with lifelink (lifegain synergy) on artifact EtB, but this ability triggers only once per turn.
Rapacious Guest is a great Food token creator, it grows every time we sacrifice a Food and on death trigger it can deal a considerable amount of damage to target opponent (equal to its power). Even the fact that it has Menace, which is a form of evasion makes it great, as over time it has the potential to become a big threat with our Halfling Food Tribal strategy.
Saradoc, Master of Buckland is another one of the few Halfling tribal support cards, since on creature EtB with 2 or less power under our control we create a 1/1 white Halfling creature token. In addition, by tapping two Halfling he gets +2/+0 and lifelink until end of turn so he also has lifegain synergy. A great inclusion in our Halfling Food Tribal deck for going wide with Halflings.
Infinite Combo
Rosie Cotton of South Lane is a great Halfling as it creates a Food on EtB and buffs an other target creature we control with a +1/+1 counter on token creation (and we create many tokens in our build). She is also a part of a two card infinite combo with Scurry Oak, that results in infinite creature tokens, infinite +1/+1 counters on Scurry Oak and infinite ETB. The combo can be explained in detail here (EDHREC)
Other
Experimental Confectioner creates a Food Token on EtB and offers a great Food sacrifice payoff: Whenever we sacrifice a Food, we create a 1/1 black Rat creature token with “This creature can’t block”. With our Halfling Food Tribal we create numerous Food tokens so it has the potential to provide us with numerous Rats. Great utility that makes sacrificing even sweeter!
Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn, Nykthos Paragon and Treebeard, Gracious Host are cards that greatly benefit from our Halfling Food Tribal lifegain strategy and can easily turn our small Halfling Army into a respectable fighting force. Treebeard, Gracious Host can even buff himself and also creates two Foods on EtB and on top of that he has Trample and ward so he has can be a great threat that is hard to be removed.
Gwaihir, Greatest of the Eagles also benefit from our Halfling Food Tribal lifegain strategy, but this time to create a 3/3 white Bird creature token with flying that on attack trigger, it can also give flying to target attacking creature until end of turn, just ike Gwaihir himself. The great Eagles were always a helping hand for our Halfling heroes. Love the flavor and the utility.
Apothecary White is both a great Food token generator and a creature token creator due to Food synergy. Whenever we attack we create a Food token for each player being attacked and by paying , and tapping X untapped Foods we control we create X 1/1 white Human creature tokens. Unfortunatelly it does not have Halfling synergy, but the Food synergy alone is enough to make it a valuable tool for our Halfling Food tribal.
Agent of the Iron Throne can consistently drain our opponents with Food sacrifice and partner commanders double the amount of life drained as long as they are both on the battlefield. Mirkwood Bats also drain our opponents but this time both on creation and on sacrifice of tokens. Amazing utility and synergy with our Halfling Food Tribal build.
Ygra, Eater of All is an amazing card for Halfling Food Tribal as it turns all creatures into Food artifacts, providing our build with exceptional Food token synergy. In addition it can turn into a huge threat very easily, as it get buffed by two +1/+1 counters every time a Food is put into a graveyard. Moreover, it comes with Ward-Sacrifice a Food which is a welcome self-protection. A great pick for our deck!
Access Tunnel and Rogue’s Passage help Frodo, Adventurous Hobbit to get unblockable and that is very important for our Halfling Food Tribal build, since his abilities are behind an attack trigger that makes him vulnerable. The Ring tempts you ability also helps to become harder to be blocked if he is chosen as a Ring bearer, but unblockable is superior and offers consistency.
Lifegain Cards : 7 cards
The Ring Tempts You Cards : 4 cards
Food Token Creators : 28 cards
Gilded Goose, Farmer Cotton, Meriadoc Brandybuck, Pippin, Warden of Isengard, Samwise Gamgee, Academy Manufactor, Peregrin Took, Rapacious Guest, Rosie Cotton of South Lane, Sam, Loyal Attendant, Savvy Hunter, Tireless Provisioner, Experimental Confectioner, Elanor Gardner, Gyome, Master Chef, Treebeard, Gracious Host, Bake into a Pie, Nuka-Cola Vending Machine, The Battle of Bywater, Trail of Crumbs, Fae Offering, Of Herbs and Stewed Rabbit, Gingerbread Cabin, Restless Cottage, Night of the Sweets’ Revenge, Greta, Sweettooth Scourge, Apothecary White, The Shire
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 shows there are plenty 2-3 drops with a big spike at 3 drops. There drops at positions 1 and 4-6 are close to average and we notice an absence of high mana drops ( positions 7-8). In general, the mana curve is higher than average on the low mana drops and that is the result of the many low mana costed Halflings. Our Halfling Food Tribal strategy does not depend on high mana drops to finish the game but on alternate win conditions and surprise attacks.
Card Type Distribution
The Halfling Food Tribal Card Type Distribution shows the dominant tribal creature-heavy theme with 46 creatures. All other categories have a small presence with Enchantments at 7, Artifacts at 5 , Sorceries at 3 and Instants at 4. 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 Frodo, Adventurous Hobbit and Sam, Loyal Attendant and the massive amounts of Food produced, the true potential of the deck is not reflected in statistics as Food and lifegain strategies collide providing great consistency. Moreover, Sam, Loyal Attendant provides great cost reduction in Food which although it is not counted as ramp, it helps reduce the mana cost in one of the main aspects of the deck so he greatly empowers deck utility and consistency.
Update v1 (Wilds of Eldraine)
Update v2 (Fallout)
Update v3 (Bloomburrow)
Now you can buy the whole deck list with a click of a button!
Great news! Now you can buy the best custom Halfling tokens, Food tokens and Treasure tokens made by Mystic Tokens to accompany your Halfling Food Tribal deck! Buy now on Cardmarket at a special price!
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.
