Before the mending, planeswalkers were immortal and wielded god-like power. In the lore of today, they are now mortal and their power has been somewhat diminished. There are some that seek to regain their former glory like the scheming Nicol Bolas and the mistress of death, Liliana Vess. On the plane of Theros, there was born a planeswalker that would achieve godhood for a short time. Xenagos, God of Revels is a 6/5 that costs 3 generic 1 red and 1 green. Like all of the Theros gods, he is indestructible and requires your devotion to green and red be seven or higher for him to function as a creature. His unique ability allows you to basically double the power of one creature you control and give it haste. It’s a simple yet powerful ability. When used on a 5/5 creature, which is already quite sizeable, it becomes a 10/10. That is massive, but not enough to knock your opponent out of the game in one swing. This ability doesn’t grant trample so any amount of doubling can easily be chump blocked forever. It’s obvious that big creatures is what you want for this deck and they still need some other ways to boost their power and abilities even further. A big creature without trample is better off as a wall for your opponent to run into so every creature that is big should have trample or the deck should have plenty of ways to grant trample to those creatures.
Since this deck will utilize big creatures, it needs ramp. Mana dorks, mana rocks, ramp spells, whatever you want to use. It doesn’t really matter as long as it can generate mana or put lands into play during your first few turns.
Once you have enough mana you can start playing your big stuff like Quartzwood Crasher. This is a great creature for this deck; it takes all of the trample damage dealt to a player and turns it into a huge creature token which also has trample so the damage will add up quickly and those tokens will snowball out of control over the course of several turns. This is one of those creatures that your opponents have to answer if they can. Balefire Dragon deals damage to each creature the defending player controls when it deals damage. Its flying ability makes it hard to block and if it connects it deals at least 6 damage to your opponents’ creatures. With Xenagos, God of Revels in play, and the dragon is selected as the target for Xenagos’ ability, that’s a 12 damage board wipe; only a handful of creatures could survive those flames. Malignus is capable of destroying an opponent in one hit. It has power and toughness equal to half of the highest life total among your opponents, but with Xenagos doubling its power, it’s equal to that player’s life total. The only downside is that this creature has no evasion, but that can easily be overcome. Craterhoof Behemoth, which has haste, gives +X/+X and trample to all of your creatures for a sudden boost and powerful combat step. The more creatures you have, the better it is. Even if X only equals 5, the behemoth will be a 10/10 and then Xenagos will make it a 20/20. Probably the simplest creature in this part is Ghalta, Primal Hunger. Nothing too special here, just a 12/12 with trample that can cost only 2 green mana. It doesn’t stop here. There are plenty of big creatures to use in this deck.
The creatures above can certainly pack a punch, but let’s turn it up to 11. Beastmaster Ascension can give +5/+5 to your creatures if it has seven or more quest counters on it. That’s not hard to do. You can go to combat and if enough creatures are attacking it can get the rest of what it needs to activate. Asceticism prevents your opponents from targeting your creatures with removal and you can regenerate any creature for just 2 mana. Warstorm Surge lets your bigger creatures pick off a smaller creature when they come into play or just deal damage straight to a player. Aside from being a sizable creature in its own right, Aggressive Mammoth gives trample to all of your creatures. Likewise, Stonehoof Chieftain is also a sizable creature and grants trample as well as indestructible to other attacking creatures.
Now for some nice surprises that can suddenly win the game or at least swing it in your favor. Embercleave will forever be a staple that grants double strike and trample out of nowhere. Once your huge creature has dealt its damage, you can Fling it at your opponent to finish them off. Temur Battle Rage grants double strike and trample as long as you control a creature with power 4 or greater, but that shouldn’t be a problem for this deck. Unleash Fury doubles a creatures power, which can be a good thing. Late in the game, once blockers have been declared, you can cast this on an unblocked creature to push damage through or just double the power of your creature that Xenagos, God of Revels is already doubling.
Other helpful cards would be Guardian Project, Garruk’s Uprising, and Colossal Majesty for some card draw, Lurking Predators will make your opponents think twice about casting noncreature spells, and Rhythm of the Wild makes sure your creatures resolve and gives them riot which lets you choose between giving them an extra +1/+1 counter or haste.
Xenagos, God of Revels is a commander that wants to go big. Sure big creatures are targets for removal spells, but with proper support and planning it won’t matter and Wizards has been releasing some very good stuff this year with Jumpstart and Commander Legends, not to mention the ridiculousness that goes through Standard. That wraps up Xenagos, God of Revels. Let me know what Legendary creature you want to see next in the comments down below.