Thalia, Heretic Cathar

📖 How to build Thalia, Heretic Cathar

Thalia, Heretic Cathar is a three-mana white creature with first strike that makes every creature and nonbasic land your opponents control enter the battlefield tapped. The game plan is to slow down opponents' development, since new blockers and utility lands cannot act right away. Her first strike helps her attack or block well in combat, so she can pressure the board while opponents scramble to deploy.

Build around her with cheap removal that clears blockers, such as Swords to Plowshares and Path to Exile, and with ways to protect your key pieces, like Teferi's Protection. Generous Gift can handle a problem permanent, and sweepers like Austere Command or Farewell can reset a board that has grown too wide. Enlightened Tutor can help find the card you need. Ghostly Prison and Smothering Tithe fit a defensive, tax-style plan.

Thalia's weakness is that her effect only applies to permanents entering the battlefield after she is in play, so creatures and lands already on the board are unaffected. She is also a single creature with a fragile body, so removal aimed at her shuts off the whole effect. Be aware that she does nothing against basic lands, and she gives no benefit against spells that don't put permanents onto the battlefield.

Deck guide written with AI assistance based on the card's rules text.