Arcane Foundry › Commanders › Gideon the Oathless
Gideon the Oathless
Legendary Creature — Human Mercenary · {2}{B} · Black commander
Ward—Discard a card.
Whenever a creature an opponent controls enters, Gideon deals 1 damage to that player.
Whenever an opponent activates a loyalty ability, Gideon deals 1 damage to that player.
Build a Gideon the Oathless deck →
What Gideon the Oathless actually does
Read off the card by the same engine the Forge and Analyzer use — this is the mechanical classification, not a summary.
- Triggered ability · etbWhenever a creature an opponent controls enters, Gideon deals 1 damage to that player.
- Triggered ability · otherWhenever an opponent activates a loyalty ability, Gideon deals 1 damage to that player.
- Keyword · wardward
- AbilityWard—Discard a card.
What a Gideon the Oathless deck needs
Plays as punisher. What the commander asks of the other 99 — read from the card and checked by hand.
- punisher pieces that make opponents' own actions cost them
The Gideon the Oathless deck plan
The roles the Forge fills for this commander, and how many cards of each.
- 16× Punishes the opponents' own actions — casting, drawing, searching, attacking cost them
- 12× A tax, lock or hoser aimed at the opponents — the deck's parity break
- 9× Actually remove one problem permanent — preventing its damage is not removing it
- 10× Find the exact card the plan needs
- 3× Answer a whole board at once
- 10× Refill your hand
- 5× Keep a permanent you control alive through removal
- 11× Get ahead on mana
Best cards for Gideon the Oathless
Ranked by an engine that reads what each card does — its real cost, its delay and how reliably it works — rather than counting how often other people play it.
Punishes the opponents' own actions — casting, drawing, searching, attacking cost them
- Kederekt Parasite1 mana
- Vexing Bauble1 mana
- Scrawling Crawler3 mana
- Sheoldred, the Apocalypse4 mana
- Underworld Dreams3 mana
- Fate Unraveler4 mana
- Mai, Scornful Striker2 mana
- Painful Quandary5 mana
A tax, lock or hoser aimed at the opponents — the deck's parity break
- Grafdigger's Cage1 mana
- Opposition Agent3 mana
- Cursed Totem2 mana
- Defense Grid2 mana
- Winter Moon2 mana
- Crawlspace3 mana
- Pithing Needle1 mana
- Petrified Hamlet0 mana
Actually remove one problem permanent — preventing its damage is not removing it
- Defile1 mana
- Tragic Slip1 mana
- Infernal Grasp2 mana
- Fatal Push1 mana
- Bitter Triumph2 mana
- Black Sun's Twilight1 mana
- Cut Down1 mana
- Erebos's Intervention1 mana
Find the exact card the plan needs
- Demonic Tutor2 mana
- Diabolic Intent2 mana
- Vampiric Tutor1 mana
- Imperial Seal1 mana
- Demonic Consultation1 mana
- Grim Tutor3 mana
- Tainted Pact2 mana
- Scheming Symmetry1 mana
Answer a whole board at once
- Toxic Deluge3 mana
- Damnation4 mana
- Bontu's Last Reckoning3 mana
- Sickening Dreams2 mana
- Crypt Rats3 mana
- Extinction Event4 mana
- Endemic Plague4 mana
- The Meathook Massacre2 mana
Refill your hand
- Skullclamp1 mana
- Black Market Connections3 mana
- Braids, Arisen Nightmare3 mana
- Morbid Opportunist3 mana
- Phyrexian Arena3 mana
- The One Ring4 mana
- Vexing Bauble1 mana
- Ayara, First of Locthwain3 mana
Keep a permanent you control alive through removal
- Lightning Greaves2 mana
- Swiftfoot Boots2 mana
- Eldrazi Monument5 mana
- Commander's Plate1 mana
- Mithril Coat3 mana
- Akroma's Memorial7 mana
- The Walls of Ba Sing Se8 mana
- Brotherhood Regalia2 mana
Get ahead on mana
- Sol Ring1 mana
- Palladium Myr3 mana
- Worn Powerstone3 mana
- Chrome Mox0 mana
- Everflowing Chalice0 mana
- Mox Diamond0 mana
- Mana Vault1 mana
- Wayfarer's Bauble1 mana