pillow forts: the most under used and undervalued strategy in EDH

The pillow fort strategy is in my personal opinion a very under used and undervalued strategy. It is a strategy that you might want to consider for your next EDH deck. I think it would be good for every commander player to at least try one game with a pillow fort deck and i will try and convince you of the greatness of the pillow fort.

the pillow fort strategy is described by the mtg wiki as: Pillowfort is a strategy for certain multiplayer formats, particularly the Commander format. The strategy is political in nature, attempting to make being attacked by an opponent undesirable or futile, thus making the rest of the opponents attack each other. This is achieved through cards that prevent damage or punishing players for attacking, so called Pillows. This also allows players enough time to assemble a combo or series of plays which let them win the game.

This explanation highlights some of the strengths of this strategy, which in turn allow it to be a fun play style. The pillow strat is characterized by the amount of defense it has. It's goal is to be encased in lots of pillows to protect yourself throughout the game. These protective measures are mostly enstated in the beginning of the game, this means that it is a slower playing style. The King of the pillow castle is however not deterred by a slow start, it can in some cases even be in your advantage( in certain playgroups). the slow start won't make you look like a treath. When you've got your setup going its time to make some moves.There are a couple of routes you can take from here on forward.

1 protect yourself even more.

This can be achieved by increasing the tax that has to be paid when you are being attacked\ targeted by spells.this strategy is in my opinion the least exciting, because it is a very passive style which does not give you a lot of opportunities to interact with or influence the game.

2 become a real king and enforce some more taxes.

Another common strategy is to start taxing them to play spells. This strategy plans to start taxing at the mid game and try to defeat the weakend opponents one by one. This is mostly achieved by using some kind of unblockable( or hard to block like flying) creature. This strategy is a lot more interactive , but it almost always becomes a 3 v 1 and you have to start taxing on the right moment or you will be beaten by 3 opponents at once.

3 share the spoils!

This strategy is my personal favorite. In this strategy you try to create chaos and division by gifting creatures to other people and forcing them to attack each other( or even better make deals with them). I personally believe that trying to make this strategy work will make you a better player. It forces you to try and politic yourself out of some sticky situations and will definitely make you a better commander player overall.

the last step for a successful pillowfort strategy is finish the game. So it is time to unleash the pillow monster

 

The easiest way to win in a pillow fort is by using an alternate win condition like Approach of the second sun(which recently got this cool 😍 new artwork in strixhaven) or Felidar sovereign. Another great win condition could be using unblockable creatures.

These are my two go to win conditions for a pillow fort, they are however a little bit boring. so sometimes i like to mix it up with Storm Herd and a couple of planes walkers with some strong ultimate abilities.

I hope this post will inspire some of you to try a pillow fort once in a while. If you just played your first game with a pillow fort deck then please let me know how you've experienced the game with it.