MTG Arena Historic Brawl Format Guide

Last updated on March 6, 2023

Karn, Jhoira, and Teferi | Dominaria Key Art by Tyler Jacobson

The Historic Brawl meta is always in flux. With each set released on MTG Arena we have more options to build decks and more powerful cards, mana rocks, legendary creatures, and mana fixing options.

5-color decks have plenty of mana fixing available to them thanks to the tri-lands and Triomes, the shock and check lands, and artifacts like Chromatic Lantern. As such lots of 5-color commanders are at the top of the meta.

Today we’re going to take a look at the Historic Brawl format on MTG Arena and the decks that are at the top tier. Ready? Let’s get into it!

What Is Historic Brawl?

If you’re not familiar with this other format, Historic is a constructed, non-rotating game format introduced for MTG Arena in late 2019 that includes sets that have rotated out of Standard. It’s fair to say that players really enjoy the format as it’s become a pretty popular play mode in Arena.

As for Historic Brawl, as the name suggests, it’s a variant of Brawl format. It was first introduced on during the Festival: Erebos’s Memoir of Death event in March. It was even extended for an extra day because of how popular it was!

Basically, Historic Brawl is just what you would expect: the Brawl format (which otherwise uses only Standard-legal sets) with the added Historic card pool. That is to say, sets that are no longer Standard-legal due to rotation.

Historic Brawl was recently added to the regular game modes on Arena due to popular demand. It also switched from a 60-card format to a 100-card format meaning you now have more options to brew your decks that’s more similar to Commander.

It’s best of one and does not have a sideboard.

How to Play Historic Brawl

Originally there weren’t many events where you could test your beloved Historic Brawl brews. But as I just mentioned it’s now available indefinitely in the Arena queue! You can also try joining unofficial channels like the Brawl Hall discord channel or the Arena Brawl website to find other players who want to play Historic Brawl.

Top Tier Historic Brawl Decks

5-Color The First Sliver

The First Sliver | Illustration by Svetlin Velinov

A go-to deck in the Historic Brawl format since you can play all colors, mana fixing is good and The First Sliver will always give you an extra card when it’s cast. All you need is big haymakers in all colors as win conditions.

New cards in this build are Relic of Legends, The Cruelty of Gix, and The World Spell.

5-Color Go-Shintai of Life’s Origin

Go-Shintai of Life’s Origin | Illustration by Alexander Mokhov

Go-Shintai of Life’s Origin is a 5-color commander that‘s also a shrine and a card that encourages you to play shrines. Shrines are a kind of tribe present in Kamigawa sets and the main characteristic is that you’ll gain something the more shrines you control.

This deck will play the Hondens from old Kamigawa and the shrines from Neon Dynasty along with some new cards like Zur, Eternal Schemer, Spectrum Sentinel, and Jodah, the Unifier. You’ll slowly build an engine that will let you gain lots of life, make lots of tokens, draw a bunch of cards, and deal damage to your opponents if things go the right way.

Simic Kinnan, Bonder Prodigy

Kinnan, Bonder Prodigy | Illustration by Jason Rainville

Kinnan, Bonder Prodigy is a tailor-made card for EDH and Historic Brawl. Simic () colors are usually strong in these formats because they provide ramp, color fixing, and card draw, and Kinnan effectively generates one more mana whenever you tap a nonland permanent for mana, which are often mana dorks and rocks.

Kinnan is cheap to play starting at two mana and has a powerful mana sink ability that allows you find the powerful win conditions like Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger, The Tarrasque, and Jin-Gitaxias, Core Augur.

Izzet Niv-Mizzet, Parun

Niv-Mizzet, Parun | Illustration by Svetlin Velinov

Niv-Mizzet, Parun is an interesting Izzet () commander because you’re guaranteed to draw a bunch of cards. You’ll usually cast Niv when you have some counterspells to back it up, mana, and some spells like the new Shore Up, which protect your commander from removal spells while drawing cards and progressing the game.

This deck got lots of new toys like Impulse and Fires of Victory, a new land in Shivan Reef, and a new sweeper in The Elder Dragon War.

Jetmir, Nexus of Revels

Jetmir, Nexus of Revels | Illustration by Ryan Pancoast

Jetmir, Nexus of Revels is a Naya () commander related to tokens. It buffs your creatures the more you have. Jetmir is an anthem that can give +1/+0 to +3/+0 depending on the number of creatures you’ve got one the ‘field.

You’ll fill this deck with creatures and token makers since those are the most reliable ways to get lots of creatures. Scampering Scorcher gives you three while Anointed Procession and Wild Pair double the number of tokens generated. Planeswalkers like Basri Ket buff tokens and create more.

Building a Historic Brawl Deck

Slimefoot, the Stowaway | Illustration by Alex Konstad

Historic Brawl decks follows the same ruleset as Brawl decks, except for a single, important difference. Do you remember what it was? That’s right, you can use cards from the Historic card pool including the Anthologies and any other cards released during Brawl events.

When it comes to Brawl’s general deck building rules, you choose a legendary creature or planeswalker as your commander and pick a single copy of 59 other cards within your color identity to build your deck.

Your commander defines your color identity, which means that you can only use cards that have the same colors as your chosen commander. You don’t need to draw your commander since it waits patiently in the command zone looking over the battleground, and its’ cost raises by 2 mana each time you cast it.

Banned Cards

• Agent of Treachery
• Chalice of the Void
• Channel
• Demonic Tutor
• Drannith Magistrate
• Field of the Dead
• Gideon’s Intervention
• Lutri, the Spellchaser
• Meddling Mage
• Mishra’s Bauble
• Natural Order
• Nexus of Fate
• Oko, Thief of Crowns
• Phyrexian Revoker
• Pithing Needle
• Runed Halo
• Sorcerous Spyglass
• Tainted Pact
• Ugin, the Spirit Dragon

Wrap Up

Torgaar, Famine Incarnate | Illustration by Lius Lasahido

Historic Brawl is a diverse format and far from being stale since new cards and legendary spells affect the format immensely, bringing new deck and gameplay possibilities. A player can succeed by playing monocolored decks, but seeing the format’s big picture maybe there’s enough sweepers and mana fixing that the rainbow decks can be good without dominating.

Historic Brawl is a fun and casual format so pro players haven’t broken it yet, and the decks I mentioned here are sure to be competitive. What do you think about these lists? Let me know in the comments below or in the Draftsim Discord, where we discuss all kinds of things MTG related.

See you around, folks, and have a good time!