Every couple of years, we get a Standard format with a critical mass of powerful and reasonably costed Planeswalkers that interact favorably with the board. Whenever that happens, someone inevitably assembles an awesome midrange deck featuring all of the best Planeswalkers, utilizing them to control the board and generate incremental advantages over the course of a long game. This format is particularly hospitable to this Superfriends style deck due to the presence of Oaths which make it easier to cast and generate advantages off of your Planeswalkers. Let’s take a look at an exciting build from SaffronOlive:

Naya Superfriends ? Shadows over Innistrad Standard | SaffronOlive, 5-0 Standard League

• Creatures (11)
• 2 Archangel Avacyn
• 2 Nissa, Vastwood Seer
• 3 Hangarback Walker
• 4 Sylvan Advocate

• Planeswalkers (10)
• 2 Arlinn Kord
• 2 Chandra, Flamecaller
• 3 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
• 3 Nissa, Voice of Zendikar

• Spells (14)
• 2 Angelic Purge
• 4 Declaration in Stone
• 1 Quarantine Field
• 3 Oath of Chandra
• 4 Oath of Nissa

• Lands (25)
• 1 Mountain
• 3 Plains
• 4 Forest
• 1 Canopy Vista
• 1 Game Trail
• 3 Cinder Glade
• 4 Evolving Wilds
• 4 Fortified Village
• 4 Needle Spires

• Sideboard (15)
• 1 Hangarback Walker
• 2 Chandra, Flamecaller
• 1 Nissa, Voice of Zendikar
• 2 Nahiri, the Harbinger
• 1 Pulse of Murasa
• 4 Radiant Flames
• 2 Tears of Valakut
• 2 Tireless Tracker

Buy This Deck

The key to this deck is the combination of efficient creatures and interaction, like Sylvan Advocate and Oath of Chandra, backed by powerful Planeswalkers which can stabilize and take over the board, like Gideon, Ally of Zendikar and Nissa, Voice of Zendikar. The combination of these effects lets you slowly accumulate incremental value while your Planeswalkers get ever closer to their game-ending ultimates.

The power of this deck is its ability to curve out with multiple Planeswalkers capable of controlling and stalling the board. Something like Oath of Chandra into Nissa into Gideon Is going to give you a great chance of keeping the board under control so you can continue deploying Planeswalkers or utilize additional removal and creatures to let you start gaining loyalty. Oath of Chandra is particularly important in this deck, because it means you don’t need to ultimate your Planeswalkers to win. Rather, you just need to get in chip damage with Oath of Chandra and a few hits with tokens or Archangel Avacyn here and there.

The Oaths are especially interesting in this deck because of the presence of Angelic Purge, letting you get additional value off of extra copies of the Legendary enchantments. Even if you can’t find an extra Oath to sacrifice, you’ll have plenty of Creature tokens to use as fodder.

All in all, this deck is very similar to G/W tokens, but which has the added value of Chandra, Flamecaller and Arlinn Kord to both take over the board and threaten Planeswalkers. You also have Oath of Chandra to pressure opposing Planeswalkers without having to break through in combat. This combination gives you an enormous edge in midrange, creature mirrors, which seem like a great place to be in the current Standard format.