Which is the best BO1 Azorius Soldier deck in Magic: The Gathering Arena?

In Magic: The Gathering Arena, sometimes you just want to hit other players hard and fast. No major strategy is involved, just constant, aggressive assaults upon your opponent’s life points. While Mono-White Soldiers is fun, Azorius Soldiers (Blue/White) offers far more potential options in gameplay.

Unfortunately, Azorius Soldiers didn’t really change much from The Brothers War to Phyrexia: All Will Be One. Only one creature was added to most decks in this archetype, and even that one’s a little on the contested side: Skrelv, Defector Mite.

While I personally think one or two of them could be useful, particularly with Serra Paragon, they will not be featured in this Magic: The Gathering Arena here. So which deck is going to carry players to victory?

---

Which Azorius Soldier deck should you run in Magic: The Gathering Arena?

One of the most powerful archetypes in Magic: The Gathering Arena’s BO1 scene (best-of-one) is aggro. You want to plow through the other player before they can have any chance to make a suitable defense against your assault. While there are plenty of great decks, like Mono-Black Aggro, another one that can easily grind to Mythic is Azorius Soldiers.

This archetype comes from popular Magic: The Gathering Arena player and content creator, CovertGoBlue. He designed an Azorius Soldier deck for MTG Arena that focuses heavily on low-cost creatures and high value.

Decklist

• 4 Adarkar Wastes
• 4 Brutal Cathar
• 3 Deserted Beach
• 1 Eiganjo, Seat of the Empire
• 4 Fortified Beachhead
• 4 Guardian of New Benalia
• 3 Harbin, Vanguard Aviator
• 4 Hopeful Initiate
• 1 Island
• 1 Make Disappear
• 1 Myrel, Shield of Argive
• 1 Otawara, Soaring City
• 9 Plains
• 1 Protect the Negotiators
• 4 Recruitment Officer
• 4 Siege Veteran
• 2 Skystrike Officer
• 1 Soul Partition
• 4 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
• 4 Valiant Veteran

Other than a few important counterspells and a removal spell, this Magic: The Gathering Arena deck is all creatures, all the time. In fact, one of these in particular needs to be kept on hand in case of a boardwipe. That’s the scariest part to deal with when playing aggro.

Protect the Negotiators, counters a spell, unless the controller pays 1 colorless mana for each creature you control. Since this deck boasts tons of token support, that’s going to be an amazing way to stop boardwipe spells.

Perhaps the most important creature to winning the game is Myrel, Shield of Argive. She prevents your opponents from casting spells or activating abilities of their artifacts, creatures, or enchantments while it’s your turn. Further, she creates a swarm of tokens whenever she attacks, based on how many Soldiers you have.

Thalia, Guardian of Thraben makes non-creature spells more expensive, and you also have a 2-drop lord, Valiant Veteran. If he dies, you can also pay a cost to exile him from the game and give all your soldiers a +1/+1 counter.

Harbin, Vanguard Aviator grants your attackers +1/+1 and Flying for the turn if you attack with five or more soldiers in your Magic: The Gathering Arena duels. Then you have Siege Veteran to give a +1/+1 counter to one of your creatures each turn, and when a non-token Soldier dies, you make a Soldier artifact creature token.

This is a deck that can quickly get out of hand, especially if you’re buffing your key creatures like Brutal Cathar, Myrel, and Siege Veteran. It’s a type where you just want to attack and attack with your ever-growing army of soldiers. If only there was room for Serra Paragon as well.

In Magic: The Gathering Arena's BO1 meta, this might be the absolute strongest Azorius Soldier deck to play.