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Superfriends is a unique archetype in EDH that is built around planeswalkers. The idea of a Superfriends deck is to flood the battlefield with powerful planeswalkers and get them to use their ultimate abilities as quickly as possible. This Commander archetype is one that can be difficult to pilot with how planeswalkers work, but rewarding if you can master the play style.
What Is A Superfriends Deck?
A Superfriends deck is the fan-made name for a deck built around planeswalkers, named after the show Super Friends (which involved superheroes teaming up together). Your Superfriends deck will consist of mostly planeswalker cards, with little in the way of creatures.
In a Superfriends deck, you won’t have many permanents that don’t relate to planeswalkers. Since you can’t defend with them, you need to stall out your opponents so they can’t attack them. As such, if you’re planning on playing a Superfriends deck, expect to be playing a defensive game.
What Colors Are Superfriends Decks In?
You can play a Superfriends deck in any colors. Planeswalkers have been around since 2007’s Lorwyn set, and have been included in nearly every set since then. As such, you have access to planeswalkers of all colors. Some planeswalkers can be used as your commander if you want to be fully on-theme, such as Commodore Guff and Sivitri, Dragon Master.
Superfriends Staples
Planeswalkers are a popular card type, so you have a ton of different staples to choose from. These range from planeswalkers themselves, to cards that give you more loyalty counters. There are a lot of staples that give you a lot of consistency as well as power to control the battlefield.
Planeswalker Staples
You can’t make a Superfriends deck without planeswalkers. Some planeswalkers stand out as the best that should be auto-includes in your Superfriends deck. So long as they fit in your commander’s color identity, they should be in all Superfriends decks.
Nicol Bolas, Dragon-God is one of the best, as it lets you use any loyalty ability from any planeswalkers. It’s a way to double up on all of your best loyalty abilities, and in some cases, ultimate twice. Vraska, Betrayal's Sting is fantastic, as the proliferate ability on it spreads extra counters to your other planeswalkers. If the ability is copied, you can take everyone out in the game by poisoning everyone with 9 counters than proliferating the last one needed. Vronos, Masked Inquisitor makes sure your best planeswalkers stick around. A downside of planeswalkers is everyone can attack them, but by phasing them out, your opponents never have the chance to. Kasmina, Enigma Sage is a unique staple that lets you get extra loyalty counters on your planeswalkers, since they’ll all be able to use its ability, which can let them use their ultimate abilities faster.
Instant And Sorcery Staples
While Superfriends decks consist primarily of planeswalkers, they’ll still have a handful of instants and sorcery spells. These usually add consistency to your deck to tutor for various planeswalker cards or provide protection to planeswalkers.
One of the best protection spells is Ripples of Potential. This puts an extra loyalty counter on all your planeswalkers, and phases them all out. This keeps them safe from any kind of threat, all while getting them closer to their ultimate abilities. Ignite the Beacon is a fantastic planeswalker tutor, getting two different ones directly into your hand. It is costly, but can be played at instant speed when you don’t need mana up for interaction anymore. Although it costs a lot of mana and is a sorcery, Deploy the Gatewatch can potentially get you a planeswalker two-for-one, and they go directly on the battlefield. For a more basic planeswalker tutor, you have Call the Gatewatch.
Ability Doublers
Mechanically, you can only activate a planeswalker’s ability once per turn. However, a handful of permanents let you activate them twice, getting you more loyalty counters on them and using their powerful effects more frequently.
Oath of Teferi is the easiest way to activate loyalty abilities twice, as there’s no extra hoops to jump through. It’ll also blink another permanent (which is mandatory), so just be careful you don’t blink a planeswalker with a lot of loyalty counters on it. The Chain Veil is similar, but needs to be tapped for mana to gain access to double activations. Leori, Sparktouched Hunter doesn’t necessarily give you two activations, but it does trigger the ability of a specific planeswalker type twice.
Counter Doublers
All planeswalkers use loyalty counters. These can be proliferated and doubled just like every other kind of counter. If an effect makes a permanent gain double counters, they enter the battlefield with double the amount of their starting loyalty. For example, if you cast Tamiyo, Field Researcher with one of these effects active, it’ll enter with 8 loyalty counters instead of 4. This is a great way to use a planeswalker’s ultimate ability the turn it enters.
Deepglow Skate gives all your planeswalkers (and other permanents) double the counters, although this is a one-time use unless you blink it or re-cast it somehow. Doubling Season, Vorinclex, Monstrous Raider, and a Level 3 Innkeeper's Talent all give you the same effect of doubling the amount of loyalty counters put on your planeswalkers. This can be from activating a plus ability, or just when they enter the battlefield.
Proliferate Enablers
Planeswalkers use counters, so cards that let you proliferate are vital. Generally, you want to rush to use your planeswalker’s ultimate abilities as quickly as possible. By proliferating, you can achieve this very quickly, potentially on the turn a planeswalker comes down.
Ichormoon Gauntlet gives all your planeswalkers the ability to proliferate as a loyalty ability. This is great for planeswalkers that only have minus abilities that you can’t use anymore. Flux Channeler profilerates for every noncreature spell you cast. Most Superfriends decks have primarily noncreature spells, so it’ll give you a ton of counters. Karn's Bastion is proliferation on a land that can be done at instant speed. Evolution Sage is one of the most consistent ways to proliferate, as you get the effect just by playing a land.
Complimentary Superfriends Cards
In a Superfriends deck, you aren’t going to have too many creatures outside of mana dorks and a few planeswalker support cards. As such, you want cards that make it hard for your opponents to attack your planeswalkers.
Onakke Oathkeeper and Baird, Steward of Argive make your opponents pay mana to be able to attack your planeswalkers. Propaganda and Ghostly Prison also tax your opponents for attacking, but only if they’re attacking you rather than your planeswalkers. These effects do stack, so if you control Onakke Oathkeeper and Baird, Steward of Argive, then your opponents need mana to attack. Silent Arbiter prevents all but one creature from attacking and blocking each combat, which can stall out your opponents so they can only attack one planeswalker per combat.
The Oath of X cycle consists of various planeswalker support cards. Oath of Ajani discounts planeswalkers by . Oath of Gideon makes your planeswalkers enter with an extra loyalty counter. Oath of Nissa lets you spend mana as if it were any color for planeswalker spell, acting as mana fixing. Oath of Jace scrys during all your upkeeps, making sure you only draw useful cards. There are a few other cards not named, but they are genearlly weaker and not worth running unless you’re building a flavorful Gatewatch deck.
All planeswalkers are legendary, so you can take advantage of all the legendary support cards. Gold-Forged Thopteryx gives them all ward , giving them all an extra layer of protection. Jodah, the Unifier essentially lets you cascade all your planeswalkers spells into other planeswalkers. Primevals' Glorious Rebirth is mass reanimation of all legendary permanents you control (but you do need a legendary creature or planeswalker on the battlefield to cast it).
General Gameplay
A Superfriends deck generally plays the defensive game. You rely on your planeswalkers to do all the heavy lifting with your various effects. The game plays more like a Control deck, utilizing board wipes like Supreme Verdict and Blasphemous Act to keep the battlefield clear of problematic creatures. You also want removal spells and counterspells to keep your opponents off of powerful creatures that might cause problems for your planeswalkers. The biggest weakness of a Superfriends deck is that three other players can attack at your planeswalkers. As such, you’ll have to pick and choose what planeswalkers are worth defending and which you’ll have to let go.
With a Superfriends deck, you want to be racing to get the ultimate abilities of them off. The best ones are ones (aside from ones that win you the game) that give you emblems since they can’t ever be removed. Teferi, Hero of Dominaria gives you exiled removal of any permanents for any card draw. Dovin Baan makes it so only two permanents can be untapped during your opponents’ untap staps, significantly slowing them down. Narset Transcendent can shut down entire decks by turning off the ability to cast noncreature spells for your opponents.
How Superfriends Decks Win
The primary way a Superfriends deck wins is through powerful planeswalker abilities. Ajani, Sleeper Agent and Vraska, Betrayal's Sting can both put poision counters on your opponents quickly. A player with 10 or more poison counter automatically loses the game, and with how much proliferating you do, this is easily accomplished. Nicol Bolas, Dragon-God requires some extra hoops, but so long as an opponent doesn’t have a legendary creature or planeswalker, it can cause all your opponents to lose. It’s best activated after a board wipe to ensure your opponents can’t save themselves from Nicol Bolas, Dragon-God‘s ability.
You also have planeswalkers that don’t technically win the game, but set your opponents back so much they basically do. The planeswalker side of Nicol Bolas, the Ravager has an ultimate that makes it so a player loses all but one card in their library. Chandra, Fire of Kaladesh puts an emblem on everyone that’ll slowly burn everyone out of the game (especially if you can get multiple emblems). Along with planeswalkers, All Will Be One can deal a ton of burn damage since loyalty counters are put on the planeswalkers when they enter.
Superfriends Commanders
With how many planeswalkers there are, you’re not limited to specific colors. You can use any combination of colors to build your Superfriends deck. There are countless Superfriends decks that could be shared, but for this article, we’ll be looking at three varied options for a Superfriends commander.
Commodore Guff
If you want to use a planeswalker as your commander, Commodore Guff is one of the best choices. You can get the base easily thanks to the Planeswalker Party precon, but you’ll need a lot of upgrades. While you can struggle with ramp in Jeskai , Commodore Guff gets you mana dork tokens, Chandra, Legacy of Fire gives you mana for every planeswalker you control, and Narset of the Ancient Way nets you a mana of any Jeskai color you can spend on noncreature spells.
You can turn all your planeswalkers into damage with Sarkhan the Masterless to win through combat instead of playing the slow, grind game. The deck can easily build up a lot of burn damage with Chandra, Awakened Inferno emblems and the ultimate ability of Chandra, Torch of Defiance. These Chandra abilities are great ones to copy, as that’ll give you an extra emblem to make your path to victory even easier. All Will Be One can help you toward the burn-based victory as well.
As with most Superfriends decks, you’ll have a low number of creatures. Norn's Annex, Archon of Absolution, Baird, Steward of Argive, and Onakke Oathkeeper all put a tax on your opponents that are attacking your planeswalkers, be it for mana or life totals. These effects all stack with one another, so having them all on the battlefield is great to make it hard for your opponents to attack you unless they have mana to burn.
A sample decklist can be viewed here. This Commodore Guff list is one built for the bracket 3 area. It’s an easy deck to build on a budget thanks to the core being in a precon. If you really want a budget build, you can trade out shocklands and triomes for more basic lands to easily craft the deck for under $100.
The Sixth Doctor And Romana II
A pair of partner commanders, The Sixth Doctor has a few different options for the companion he can tag along with, but Romana II is the best option. All planeswalkers (and artifacts) are historic permanents, which The Sixth Doctor will copy so long as it’s the first one cast that turn. The copies are tokens, which Romana II can make extra copies of. All of this essentially translates to being able to get three copies of a planeswalker on the battlefield instead of just one.
Since The Sixth Doctor only copies the first historic spell cast each turn, you want to make sure you play your best ones first. Vronos, Masked Inquisitor is the one you always want multiple copies of, as that’s more shrouding you can give your planeswalkers to keep more than just two safe. Late-game, copying a Ugin, the Spirit Dragon can be a great win condition with how much of a powerhouse it is. Jace, the Mind Sculptor is another good choice to copy, as you can use one copy to have Brainstorm on a body, one copy to make sure an opponent never draws a good card, and the last copy bouncing creatures to your opponents’ hands.
Since you get so many copies of planeswalkers, permanents that give them extra counters are especially strong. You have the suite of Vorinclex, Monstrous Raider, Innkeeper's Talent, and Doubling Season to make them enter with double loyalty. On top of that, City of Death can create more token copies of your planeswalkers. Brokers Ascendancy spreads +1/+1 counters and loyalty counters.
A sample decklist can be viewed here. This decklist veers toward the high bracket 3 and lower bracket 4 power level. It has a slow start, but it can be very explosive once you have your battlefield established and your commands on the battlefield.
Esika, God of the Tree // The Prismatic Bridge
For a five color commander, you have a few different options, but one of the best is Esika, God of the Tree. You will rarely cast the frontside, as the backside is much more useful for a Superfriends deck. Every upkeep, you get a planeswalker or creature onto the battlefield for free. While you can whiff and get a mana dork, you can also cheat around high casting costs. This lets you play high mana planeswalkers such as Ugin, the Spirit Dragon, Vraska, Betrayal's Sting, and Nicol Bolas, God-Pharaoh without ever spending mana on them.
Esika, God of the Tree is a five color commander deck, so mana fixing is vital to ensure you can always cast your spells. Permanents that turn your lands into every type like Leyline of the Guildpact, Dryad of the Ilysian Grove, and The World Tree all accomplish this. Oath of Nissa can be mana fixing too, but only for your planeswalkers.
The deck has a heavier lean on planeswalkers due to how easily you can get them on the battlefield. It can play the various win conditions on planeswalkers like Ajani, Sleeper Agent, Nicol Bolas, Dragon-God, and Vraska, Betrayal's Sting. Sarkhan the Masterless can make all your planeswalkers into Dragons, while Nissa, Ascended Animist and Liliana, Dreadhorde General can build up an army of creature tokens.
A sample decklist can be viewed here. This deck plays comfortably in the bracket 4 range. Since it is a five color deck, the mana base can be costly. You can bring the price down with more budget dual and tri-land options, but you’ll sacrifice consistency.
In Conclusion
Superfriends decks are for those who are fans of planeswalkers. They are often the main characters in Magic’s lore, so if you’re a fan of them, it’s a fun way to make thematic decks. Superfriends decks are very defensive and can be defeated by focusing on planeswalkers. It’s often a 3v1 when you play a Superfriends deck, as three different people can attack your planeswalkers before you can use their ultimate abilities.
However, with careful planning and by timing the casting of your best planeswalkers, you can get around the downsides. Ultimates of planeswalkers often win the game then and there with how powerful they are. So if you’re a fan of high-risk, high-reward decks, a Superfriends deck is for you.
