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Dion, Bahamut’s Dominant is one of the main characters in Final Fantasy XVI, and one of the many named Final Fantasy characters given a card inMagic: The Gathering’sFinal Fantasy crossover set. Dion is a noble knight (both in Final Fantasy XVI and quite literally his creature type on his Magic card) who supports the Knight creature type.
The Knight creature type has been around since 1995, so the amount of Knight support is very high. A Dion, Bahamut’s Dominant Commander deck is a Knight Typal deck, meaning it’s a deck that focuses primarily on one creature type, in this case, Knights.
Sword of the Animist
Honor of the Pure
x28 Plains
Three Tree City
War Room
The decklistcontains one planeswalker, 30 creatures, four sorceries, five instants, 18 artifacts, seven enchantments,and34 lands. Most of the creatures are Knights, with the nonland permanents either ramps or permanents to give boosts in combat.
Key Cards
Dion, Bahamut’s Dominant / Bahamut, Warden Of Light
The commander of the deck, Dion, Bahamut’s Dominant is great Knight support,giving them all flying during your turn. Since your deck is heavily combat-focused, flying is a great way to get in for damage, especially if your opponents don’t have ways to block flyers.
If you invest in transforming Dion, Bahamut, Warden of Lighthelps to permanently boost up your Knights with +1/+1 counter. Before returning to Dion, you’ll get to destroyany permanent on the battlefield,which can include lands if your opponent has a problematic utility land.
While Bahamut, Warden of Light is strong, it is not a necessary piece of the strategy. you’re able to easily win the game without ever transforming Dion. It is often better to spend the mana on other spells if you have them.
Knight Exemplar
Nearly every creature in your deck is a Knight, making Knight Exemplar especially strong. For just three mana, you canmake all your other Knights indestructible. This allows you to use them in combat without having to worry about them being defeated in it. Bear in mind,an indestructible creature can still be exiled, and Knight Exemplar doesn’t have indestructible itself.
Knight Exemplar also provides a minor +1/+1 stat boost. While this boost isn’t large,stacking multiple stat-boosting effects helps to make even your weakest Knights a big combat threat. There are plenty of ways to boost the stats of your creatures (including Bahamut, Warden of Light), and pair perfectly with Knight Exemplar.
Door Of Destinies
Door of Destinies is a staple of any deck that primarily plays one creature type. Forevery Knight spell cast, it gets a counter to give an increasing stat boost. It only costs four mana, so it can be played early, which is great asyou want to play Door of Destinies as quickly as possibleso it can start loading up counters.
Door of Destinies is an artifact, which is relevant becausesome colors simply can’t remove artifacts easily. Black and blue in particular don’t have any good ways to permanently get rid of artifacts. Depending on what decks your opponents are on, Door of Destinies may never be at risk of getting removed.
Greymond, Avacyn’s Stalwart
Nearly all the creatures in your deck are Knights, butKnights tend to also have the Human typing(especially in this decklist). This makes Greymond, Avacyn’s Stalwart fantastic, as it will giveall your Humans two keyword abilities of three(first strike, vigilance, and lifelink).
Greymond, Avacyn’s Stalwart was originally released as Rick, Steadfast Leader. They are considered the exact same cards despite having different names, so you can only play one of them, not both. Greymond is simply the Univeres Within version of the Walking Dead crossover card.
Yougenerally want to give your Humans first strike and lifelink,as they are usually stronger than vigilance. The exception would be if another permanent is giving your Knights one of the two other effects. As a bonus,Greymond will give your Humans stat boostsso long as you control four or more (and it counts itself as one of them, so only three extra Humans are needed).
How To Play The Deck
A Dion, Bahamut’s Dominant Commander deckis always casting Knight spells and attacking with them, providing extra damage with permanents that give stat boosts. Dion is the creature leading the charge, transforming into Bahamut as needed to provide +1/+1 counters. Notably,this will give flying to your few non-Knight creatures,unlike the Dion side of the card.
The deck is mono white, and you can take advantage of white support cards. Honor of the Pure, Crovax, Ascendant Hero, and Linden, the Steadfast Queen all provided benefits for attacking with white creatures. Peral Medallion and Oketra’s Monument help to discount the cost of your white creature spells.
Combat, Card Draw, And Win Conditions
The deckis creature-based,so combat is especially important as it’s your primary way to deal damage.There’s asub-Token themewith multiple cards creating Knight create tokens to raise the number of Knights you have.Moonshaker Cavalryis a great payoff for having a large battlefield, as it’ll give all your creatures a massive stat boost, usually enough to win the game the turn you play it.
White can struggle with card drawat times, but luckily, momo white in Commander has a lot of options. Endless Atlas gives you constant card draw so long as you have three lands with the same name,War Room lets you pay one life to draw a card, and Minas Tirith draws a card so long as you attacked with at least two creatures. These are great ways to keep your hand loaded with Knights to cast.
Theprimary win condition of the deck is winning through combat. You want to constantly be attacking, especially early in the game if you cast Dion after a few turns before your opponents can set up flyers. With all the stat boosts, the win condition is made even easier to achieve.
Weaknesses
Thebiggest flaw of the deck is its weakness to board wipes. As with all creature decks, once a large battlefield gets wiped, it can be hard to recover. Cards like Emeria, the Sky Ruin help to recur your best creatures, and Unbreakable Formation can save you from one board wipe, butit can be a struggle to rebuild depending on your board state.
