Doran, the Siege Tower

[Motsey]

Hi everyone, this is my first commander deck and i'm struggling to fit only 100 cards. I feel like i'm going in a lot of directions and it's not optimised. Sideboard is just a "maybeboard" section for now. Every suggestions and advices are welcome. Thanks in advance !

https://deckstats.net/decks/71865/556205-doran-thougness-is-stronger-xd

[CleanBelwas]

Hey! Cool deck. I love Doran, really interesting commander.

I've built him myself so have a little experience with him.

If you are looking for cuts, my advice would be:

Take out most, if not all, creatures with defender. There are enough good creatures that have low power and high toughness without having that limitation. In my experience, they're usually not worth it. Creatures with low power and high toughness tend to have a relatively low cmc. As such, this deck can make a really aggressive start.  Having to wait around until you find Assault Formation or similar means you can't make the most of your potential early aggression. Making this cut also allows you to remove a lot of the cards that allow your defenders to attack like Animate Wall and Rolling Stones. Assault Formation is good redundancy for Doran so is worth keeping.

This deck tends to be very cheap in terms of CMC, so you could probably comfortably cut a land. I'd cut Dark Ritual too. Black seems to be your lightest colour and almost everything is really cheap anyway so it probably won't provide too much benefit too often.

Personally, I think you may be playing a few too many boardwipes for such a creature centric deck. Doran decks tend to fair pretty well in combat. Your creatures are usually bigger than your opponents so tend to stick around. Definitely worth running a couple, but I think you could safely cut one or two.

I'd probably be tempted to cut one or two equipments too. In my experience, they can be a little redundant. Your creatures are most likely going to be the toughest anyway, so you're probably better off focusing on things that mess with your opponents rather than the slight gains that come from those. Things like Slagwurm armour are great because they buff is so huge for the cost, but I would personally cut at least one of either Spidersilk Net, Cathar's Shield or Ensouled Scimitar, depending on your meta and if any of the keywords they provide are relevant.

I hope this has helped, or at least given you food for thought. Whatever you decide, I hope you have fun with it. Doran is a really interesting and fun deck in my experience and I hope you get the same joy from it.

[Motsey]

Thank you very much, i had some thoughts similar to yours, i didn't know if defenders were worth it and i might have been in a halfway situation where they are not, might be keeping some that can accelerate mana pool. I agree with you on having too much removals and i can indeed cut 1 or 2 equipement. As you know Doran i got few questions:
Is it worth it to take some evasion/trample to avoid being block by tokens or else ?
And should i include some cards to allow me to draw as i play a creature card to have a "second breath" ?
Sorry for my english, and again thanks you, it was very helpfull !!

[CleanBelwas]

Thank you very much, i had some thoughts similar to yours, i didn't know if defenders were worth it and i might have been in a halfway situation where they are not, might be keeping some that can accelerate mana pool. I agree with you on having too much removals and i can indeed cut 1 or 2 equipement. As you know Doran i got few questions:
Is it worth it to take some evasion/trample to avoid being block by tokens or else ?
And should i include some cards to allow me to draw as i play a creature card to have a "second breath" ?
Sorry for my english, and again thanks you, it was very helpfull !!

No problem at all, glad I was able to help.

In my opinion, it is worth giving your creatures evasion or trample. This deck tends to be quite creature centric and because of Dorans ability, has the potential to do a lot of damage early on. Giving your creatures evasion or trample will allow you to keep up your momentum from the early pressure you apply and close out your games quicker.

In terms of draw, I would absolutely include those kinds of cards here. Things like Beast Whisperer or Soul of the Harvest are worth it in any creature deck. They don't synergise with Doran specifically, but you play enough creatures to make them worthwhile anyway. Like you say, it gives you a "second breath" and allows you to keep the pressure on rather than run out of steam.

[Motsey]

Alright that's what i thought, last question because i'm editing the deck, in your opinion should i also get ride of all walls ? The ones thats allow me to draw and the ones that give mana ?

[CleanBelwas]

Alright that's what i thought, last question because i'm editing the deck, in your opinion should i also get ride of all walls ? The ones thats allow me to draw and the ones that give mana ?

That's a more difficult question, and it somewhat depends on what else is in the rest of the deck.

The ones that tap for mana are awkward because if you tap them for mana, they are now no longer useful as blockers. They tend to cost 2 or more as opposed to the likes of Llanowar Elves et al. so there is certainly a strong argument for playing more land ramp instead as your creatures are vulnerable to board wipes. Personally I'd choose a Rampant Growth, Three Visits and a Farseek over walls that tap for mana as that method of ramping tends to be safer throughout the course of the game.

Walls that draw cards when they enter the battlefield are more worth keeping in my opinion. Creatures are a lot easier to recur or blink so you stand a decent chance of being able to use that ability multiple times. That said, if you aren't running many ways to recur/blink your creatures, you might be better off using things like Painful Truths, Read the Bones, Sign in Blood etc. as they will net you more cards total.

Your creatures are generally quite low in cmc, so in the mid to late game, if you draw wall of omens and play it, it replaces itself, but if you draw Sign in Blood and play it, you  likely draw another creature you can play (because this deck runs a lot of creatures at low cmc) and have another card in hand too. Given how many creatures you are running, having spells that net more cards per spell means you'll still likely end up with a decent amount of them, and if we only include ones without defender then they are all useful to us too.

[Motsey]

So i made somes changes and came up with this

https://deckstats.net/decks/71865/1964803-copy-of-doran-thougness-is-str