Doran, Besieged by Time

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Doran, Besieged by Time is a 4cmc Abzan legendary that reduces costs for high-toughness creature spells and grants +X/+X in combat where X is the toughness-minus-power gap — effectively making high-toughness defenders swing as major threats. Signature in toughness-matters midrange and Doran-style voltron/go-wide shells that run 0/4s and 0/5s; the cost reduction meaningfully accelerates those builds. Narrow outside of toughness-matters decks since most creatures have power ≥ toughness.

• The combat trigger uses the CURRENT toughness-minus-power difference at the moment of attack/block, so creatures that already have equal power and toughness gain nothing — build with naturally high-toughness creatures like walls and treefolk.

  tagging · claude-sonnet-4-6

• Doran's cost reduction applies to creature spells with toughness greater than their printed power, making 0/4, 1/5, and 2/6 creatures effectively 1 cheaper — this can enable powerful tempo plays on curve in a dedicated shell.

  tagging · claude-sonnet-4-6

• Unlike the original Doran the Siege Tower (which makes creatures assign combat damage equal to toughness), this version gives a +X/+X pump — creatures still deal damage equal to power, so they need the pump to actually hit hard rather than being base-power attackers.

  tagging · claude-sonnet-4-6

• EDHREC rank: #6,647