Why do I play Oros?

"What does he do?"

I love that question. I'd have to love the question to want to play with a deck like this because that's all I ever hear, but I especially love it when people point at Oros and ask it. "Not a lot," I'll usually respond, "He can Sunlance everything for 2W when he deals combat damage to a player."

"Seems pretty bad."

Actually, Oros is far and away the best commander for this deck. I say that with full knowledge that Kaalia of the Vast and Tariel, Reckoner of Souls are, in fact, options for playing WBR. Oros is not the most powerful commander - he's not even powerful at all. He doesn't have any special abilities outside of Flying, you have to pay for his ability when he actually connects (and lack of Trample hurts those odds), and when you pull the effect off, you can't even hurt white creatures or kill things with toughness 4 or more. Everyone who has said he's bad is pretty much spot on. Oros is a bad creature, which is actually why I say he is the best commander for the deck - being a bad commander and a good creature are, in fact, two different things!

The advantage to playing a bad creature as my commander is simple - nobody cares about me. I know this fully from experience - Yeah, they'll see the cool shiny cards and sweet alter. Then they'll look to the right at the Sharuum player, and I can tell you instantly where all of their removal spells are going. No need for a soothsayer to solve that one!

Kaalia has her own playstyle and problems. Building your deck with tons of Dragons and Demons and Angels can be fun, but at the same time there are so many powerful cards in the WBR combination that it's frustrating to try and fit in everything you want and still keep your Kaalia effective. New creatures of each type are released with every set without fail, so it's even harder to keep up when you prioritize those. And the same problem exists with Kaalia that all build-around-me commanders suffer - if you lose the commander, your game suddenly gets a lot more uphill. At 2/2, she's not able to take much hate - and unfortunately, with your deck's potential, you are going to get it. If she gets killed a few times or tucked, you are going to have a tough game on your hands.

Tariel has issues too. At 7 mana, he (she?) is just beyond comfortable casting range, stepping into "high mana" territory. And without Haste, Tariel is slow and clunky to use. Random reanimate will usually be very solid, and 7 toughness will certainly help him live, but much like Kaalia, you are going to see the game shift just from sitting down at the table with Tariel showing on top. Some players will be more reserved with their graveyards, others may target you outright (depending on the threat other commanders are creating). Players know a potentially game ending effect when they see one, and despite it being slow and random, you will see players going after you to keep you from summoning or effectively using your angelic friend.

Oros is just a very mediocre creature. Almost nobody is afraid of his effect because most token decks are making lots of white tokens as well. "So he's just a 6/6 dragon?" He sure is. And because that's all he is, I don't get targeted or hated out right away. I am given the freedom to sit around and cast mana rocks while I develop a gameplan and eventually control over the board. Oros is cheap enough to usually be readily available once that has happened, and he provides me with a simple beater win condition in the cases where I haven't drawn from my shallow creature pool. Thus, he is actually the perfect commander for the deck - he's the only one who draws no hate. As the adage goes, in multiplayer, the player who does the least is the one who wins. That's the goal with Oros - don't do much until you can steal the game away.