Removing Enchantments

[Morganator 2.0]

I've always said that in commander, your artifact removal should hit enchantments when possible. However, I'm starting to see a lot more cards that only remove enchantments but still have good uses. Stuff like Barrier Breach that break parity or Light of Hope with additional utility.

Are there any cards that you use that only remove enchantments but are still worth using in your commander decks?

[Landale]

Aside from Light of Hope in my Rodolf Duskbringer deck, and planned for use in Will, Scion of Peace, there's Golgari Charm in pretty much every deck I have that can run it.
I don't have a reason to run it myself, but my Yenna, Redtooth Regent deck has caused a few people I play with to start packing Echoing Calm in their decks. Fair's fair though, I wouldn't want to let someone sit on a fat stack of Doubling Season, Defense of the Heart, Hydra's Growth, or Three Blind Mice either.

[anjinsan]

The problem with enchantment-only removal is that it's fairly narrow. It's rare not to see any enchantments and they are often high-impact, but not always. At least artifact removal hits mana rocks and things.

Otherwise, I'd be running Aura Blast in pretty much all my white decks. I don't think you can do much better than that for overall value (and that's not a new card).

Barrier Breach is pretty nice in that it cycles, so if someone's playing an enchantment deck, you're good, and if not, at least you can swap it for something else. Light of Hope being modal is similar but I think I'd only want to run it in a lifegain deck, something like Shanna, Will or The Gaffer maybe, where I know that one of the other modes is going to be useful most of the time.

[EMaxxi]

The problem with enchantment-only removal is that it's fairly narrow. It's rare not to see any enchantments and they are often high-impact, but not always. At least artifact removal hits mana rocks and things.

To be fair, cards that remove enchantments and nothing else (like Erase) are pretty rare because they are so narrow, and have been extensively power-crept.

Peace and Quiet is similar to barrier breach in that it kills multiple targets.
Allay has buyback, but it's pretty mana intensive.
Ray of Revelation is also nice but has a two-color identity.
Back to Nature and Tempest of Light if you need mass removal.

[anjinsan]

Indeed, Erase is pretty much the best you can get as pure enchantment removal, with Aura Blast being noteworthy for cantripping.

Once you get beyond enchantment-only things get dramatically less pushed (see e.g. True Love's Kiss vs Aura Blast). But then, personally, I would rather have the flexibility.

A special mention probably has to go to Break the Spell which is not good in most places but at least "cycles" for 1 if you happen to be in some kind of weird deck which has enchantments it doesn't care about (or even, potentially, which you want to remove - potentially symmetrical stax-type things, but Demonic Lore or Hatching Plans more likely). Or, like, for that sweet The Princess Takes Flight combo? Still, I'd rather just take Barrier Breach.

On the topic of destroying all, it would be remiss not to mention Cleansing Meditation.

[crimsonking]

If you're playing either white or green, I don't see the advantage of an enchantment-specific removal over artifact-enchantment stuff.
I didn't know about Barrier Breach, and on the surface it looks great, but when would you actually have 2-to-3 threatening enchantments on the battlefield to justify it?
If you're playing blue, you'd just go for nonland bounce spells, if you're playing black there's Feed the Swarm and that's all, if you're playing red you've just got no option.
So, in the end, my answer is: no, I don't think playing any solely-enchantmemt removal is worth it, in EDH.

[Landale]

If you're playing blue, you'd just go for nonland bounce spells, if you're playing black there's Feed the Swarm and that's all, if you're playing red you've just got no option.

Considering you're stepping out of just enchantment stuff here, that's not quite accurate for black and red.

Pharika's Libation, Extract the Truth, Debt to the Kami
Chaos Warp, Wild Magic Surge, Red Elemental Blast, Pyroblast

[crimsonking]

You're right: I forgot Chaos Warp.
Other black removals you're citing are pretty narrow (I didn't know about them, but I honestly don't think they're relevant anyway).
Wild Magic Surge looks like a second Chaos Warp, but I'd say it's too dangerous (you'd swap enchantment for enchantment, not enchantment for random land or even nothing).
It's true that Pyroblast and Red Elemental Blast could hit blue enchantments, but I'd say that's beyond the point (technically, we could include Anarchy as well, then).

[Landale]

You're right: I forgot Chaos Warp.
Other black removals you're citing are pretty narrow (I didn't know about them, but I honestly don't think they're relevant anyway).
Wild Magic Surge looks like a second Chaos Warp, but I'd say it's too dangerous (you'd swap enchantment for enchantment, not enchantment for random land or even nothing).
It's true that Pyroblast and Red Elemental Blast could hit blue enchantments, but I'd say that's behind the point.

The only thing narrow about them is "What if they have more than one enchantment?", which is a lot less narrow than "What if they have more than one creature?" Outside of being up against an Enchantress type deck, you should be able to pretty reliably hit what you're wanting with them.
I also wouldn't say being able to just hit blue enchantments is all that bad of a deal when you can't go for enchantments much in the first place. Rhystic Study, Mystic Remora, Propaganda, Omniscience, Training Grounds. Some of the most obnoxious and dangerous enchantments are blue.

[12aptor1nfinity]

All I know is that there is a card that brings back all enchantments from your graveyard back to play (maybe even for all players? Not sure)

I played against an almost all enchantment deck and didn’t know such a card existed. Dude was a new coworker so when I had a chance to kill him, left him and another guy with 1 life (the 4th and I had plenty) instead of killing him to be nice. Dude had like 10-15 enchantments in his GY that got there over the course of the game. He plays the card, brings them all back.

He won the game I think (I lost before him at least).

After that, I still don’t want to add any just enchantment removal to my deck. It would have been me chipping away at random enchantments that all did next to nothing until he got lucky enough to have a ton all at once. So I am not afraid of those (I should have finished the guy when I could, lesson learned).

I do fear Rain of Gore specifically, but if I see that, and someone didn’t slot it in for my deck specifically, I would just treat it as an amazing challenge and see if I can possibly deal with it or win around it.

All the newer enchantment creatures would have made me think twice, but all the best ones are gods with indesctructable so now I need an enchantment exiler…

[ApothecaryGeist]

All the newer enchantment creatures would have made me think twice, but all the best ones are gods with indesctructable so now I need an enchantment exiler…

Farewell 

[crimsonking]

All I know is that there is a card that brings back all enchantments from your graveyard back to play (maybe even for all players? Not sure)

I played against an almost all enchantment deck and didn’t know such a card existed. Dude was a new coworker so when I had a chance to kill him, left him and another guy with 1 life (the 4th and I had plenty) instead of killing him to be nice. Dude had like 10-15 enchantments in his GY that got there over the course of the game. He plays the card, brings them all back.

He won the game I think (I lost before him at least).

After that, I still don’t want to add any just enchantment removal to my deck. It would have been me chipping away at random enchantments that all did next to nothing until he got lucky enough to have a ton all at once. So I am not afraid of those (I should have finished the guy when I could, lesson learned).

I do fear Rain of Gore specifically, but if I see that, and someone didn’t slot it in for my deck specifically, I would just treat it as an amazing challenge and see if I can possibly deal with it or win around it.

All the newer enchantment creatures would have made me think twice, but all the best ones are gods with indesctructable so now I need an enchantment exiler…

The card is Replenish.
Any Enchantress deck plays it, except for budget reasons (it's in the reserved list).
Moreover, it's only one card (don't know if WotC recerntly created a replacement) and you should run some amount of graveyard hate anyway.