commander · Kaalia of the Vast
Heavenly Inferno (CMD).
A Mardu angel, demon, and dragon cheat deck from the original Commander set, led by Kaalia of the Vast, attack and put any angel, demon, or dragon directly onto the battlefield tapped and attacking without paying its mana cost.
The Commander
Heavenly Inferno is one of the original 2011 Commander precons, and Kaalia is about as notorious as commanders get. She's a 2/2 with flying and haste, so she attacks the turn she lands. Whenever Kaalia attacks, you may put any angel, demon, or dragon from your hand onto the battlefield tapped and attacking, no mana cost paid. A ten-mana demon can be tapped and attacking on turn four. The deck is stuffed with the biggest angels, demons, and dragons ever printed, all dropped in for free.
Kaalia of the Vast gives opponents a simple choice: kill her or lose. Every attack that connects drops a game-ending threat for no extra mana. Lightning Greaves is the deck's most important support piece. It gives Kaalia shroud and haste the moment she lands, and that usually buys at least one free threat before opponents can respond.
Key Cards
Gisela, Blade of Goldnight
All damage dealt to opponents is doubled. All damage dealt to you is halved. Drop her for free off Kaalia's attack trigger and she enters attacking right away, doubling every other attacker's damage on that same swing. The math gets impossible to survive: your team hits twice as hard, their swings back hit half. Gisela plus two other flyers can kill a forty-life opponent in one combat.
Rune-Scarred Demon
A 6/6 flying demon that tutors any card from your library to hand when it enters. Drop it off Kaalia's attack trigger and go grab another threat: Gisela for the next attack, or Lightning Greaves to keep Kaalia safe. It turns one free deployment into a free tutor and an attacking 6/6. Even if an opponent counters the tutored card, you still got a free 6/6 for no mana.
Master of Cruelties
Master of Cruelties can only attack alone. Whenever it attacks a player and isn't blocked, that player's life total becomes one. Kaalia deploys it as an extra attacker, and it makes its own solo attack. Connect and that player sits at one life, so any bit of damage finishes them. Lightning Greaves into Kaalia, attack, deploy Master, it gets through unblocked, the player drops to one, and any follow-up damage closes it out.
Lightning Greaves
Zero equip cost. Gives haste and shroud. The most important card in the deck. Kaalia's entire strategy collapses if she's removed before she attacks. Lightning Greaves enters for zero equip, gives Kaalia shroud from targeted removal and haste to attack immediately. Opponents must spend their removal before Greaves resolves or watch at least one free deploy. Against interaction-heavy pods, Greaves is what separates Kaalia generating value every turn from Kaalia never connecting.
Aurelia, the Warleader
A 3/4 flying angel with first strike and vigilance that gives you an extra combat phase after her first attack each turn, untapping all your creatures first. Deploy her off Kaalia's first attack trigger and her own trigger hands you a second combat step. Kaalia attacks again in that second combat and drops another threat for free. That's two free threats in one turn, two attacks, every creature untapped in between. In a Kaalia deck, Aurelia turns one attack into two full combat steps.
How to Play
Get Kaalia down as fast as you can: rocks by turn three, Kaalia on turn four, Lightning Greaves equipped right away. Her first attack drops the scariest threat in your hand. Rune-Scarred Demon tutors up the next one. Gisela doubles your damage on the second attack. The deck wins by dumping two or three game-ending threats in the first three turns Kaalia is active, with Gisela's doubled damage behind them. Master of Cruelties closes from any life total when it slips through unblocked alongside a Kaalia attack.
