OrzhovLegendary Creature — Phyrexian KnightRia Ivor, Bane of Bladehold
Mana value4Rank#9,549
The Commander
Battle cry (Whenever this creature attacks, each other attacking creature gets +1/+0 until end of turn.)
At the beginning of combat on your turn, the next time target creature would deal combat damage to one or more players this combat, prevent that damage. If damage is prevented this way, create that many 1/1 colorless Phyrexian Mite artifact creature tokens with toxic 1 and "This token can't block."
Guide
Gameplan
Ria Ivor turns one big attacker into an army of toxic Mites by converting that creature's combat damage into 1/1 toxic tokens each combat, then buffs the whole team with battle cry. You build a wide aggressive board, pump a single creature huge, prevent its damage on Ria's trigger to spawn a swarm of Mites, and swing for poison and damage. The deck snowballs through repeated combats, anthems, and token doublers to overwhelm tables fast.
Strengths
- Generates a wide toxic token army that wins through poison counters rather than life totals
- Battle cry plus go-wide tokens makes alpha strikes lethal quickly
- Damage-prevention trigger turns big trample/power creatures into more bodies instead of wasted damage
- Black-white access to the best removal, anthems, and recursion in the format
Weaknesses
- Relies on Ria connecting in combat; she's a 4-mana commander vulnerable to removal and chump blocks
- Board wipes are devastating to a token-centric strategy
- Toxic clock can be slow without extra combats or doublers, giving control decks time
- Limited card advantage engines compared to other BW strategies
Key Cards
- Skullclamp — Turns your endless 1/1 Mites into a relentless card-draw engine.
- Anointed Procession — Doubles every Mite token Ria's prevention trigger creates, exploding your board and poison output.
- Cathars' Crusade — Each Mite entering pumps the whole team, snowballing into a lethal swing.
- Aetherflux Reservoir — Alternate win backstop, but more importantly the deck wants payoffs; consider instead Coat of Arms to make the wide board lethal.
- Combat Celebrant — Extra combat steps mean another Ria trigger and another wave of toxic Mites.
- Ezuri's Predation — Mass token-style payoff; pair with creatures that have high power to feed the prevention trigger for huge Mite counts.
Upgrade Path
Add token doublers (Anointed Procession, Mondrak) and anthems (Coat of Arms, Intangible Virtue) to maximize Mite output and lethality. Include extra-combat enablers (Combat Celebrant, Aurelia) and protection for Ria (Swiftfoot Boots, Teferi's Protection) so combats keep happening. Round it out with Skullclamp and Bitterblossom for card flow and proactive token generation independent of combat.
Core Cards
The most-played cards for this commander, built from aggregated deck data (the Mythic Graph). Build public decks to seed it.
Win Conditions
- ▸Stacking 10 poison counters on opponents with toxic Mites
- ▸Wide alpha strike buffed by battle cry and anthems
- ▸Token doublers turning a single combat into a lethal Mite army
- ▸Aristocrats drain via Blood Artist / Zulaport Cutthroat sacrificing Mites
Archetypes
- Tokens / Go-Wide Aggro — Ria mass-produces Mites and battle cry rewards a flooded board.
- Infect / Toxic — Mites carry toxic 1, letting you assemble a poison kill across the table.
- Aristocrats — Endless expendable Mites feed sacrifice engines like Skullclamp and Blood Artist effects.
- Voltron-assist — Pumping one big attacker and preventing its damage converts overkill into a token swarm.
Combos
- Time Sieve + Ria Ivor, Bane of Bladehold
→ Infinite turns, Lock
Combos via Commander Spellbook.
Related Commanders
Same color identity (BW), by popularity.
