Commanders You May Have Missed | EDHRECast 319
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 28 сен 2024
- Don't overlook these underrated commanders!
Want access to exclusive content, the Challenge the Stats spreadsheet, EDHRECast Discord, and more? Support the cast on Patreon! / edhrecast
Want to see the decks we play? Check them out here: edhrec.com/art...
Check out the Over/Under series on EDHREC: edhrec.com/art...
Follow the cast on socials:
@EDHRECast
@JosephMSchultz
@danaroach
@mathimus55
Right now, you can get 10% off your first purchase by going to ArenaClub.com/edh Wow, that’s a crazy offer. 10% off a $400 Slab Pack, that’s $40 right there.
General: bit.ly/EDHRECast
Apple Podcasts: bit.ly/EDHRECa...
Spotify: bit.ly/EDHRECa...
Google Podcasts: bit.ly/EDHRECa...
There is, of course, the sheer NUMBER of legendary creatures we've been getting.
Not only does this make potential commanders VERY easy to miss entirely, there simply isn't enough TIME to build/play a deck for any given number of commanders one might find interesting.
It's so awesome to get the shout out! I only recently am getting back into EDH as a format and the edhrec podcast and site have been awesome resources for me 😊
Kyle Massa’s series is one of the must-read articles on EDHREC.
Shoutout to Kutzil, Malamet Exemplar. Having the (far) better half of a grand abolisher in the CZ, and a way to draw cards, is wonderful, especially with something like True Conviction to give your board double strike. Still cannot believe they printed that effect at uncommon, honestly.
Kutzil has ended up in the 99 of a few of my decks, but I can see it being a pretty solid commander too
I have a Kutzil deck that's just commons and uncommons and paid like $6 for and I love it.
I run that in the 99 of my Selesnya +1/+1 counters deck, and it does work
Recently I made an Inquisitor Eisenhorn deck partially due to Joey recommending it, everyone told me it was a bad and boring commander, but it turned out to be very fun and I loved all the artifact/sacrifice synergies and how easily it could go out of control, it became the voltron commander I was looking for, so thanks for the suggestion Joey!
So glad it worked so well for you! Cheers!
Do you have a list for that Deck? I was starting to brew such a Deck too, but half way throught i questioned it so that i stopped :(
I feel like people overlook Losheel, Clockwork Scholar as a commander due to her once per turn restriction on her draw effect, but I have had a great time with the deck thanks to flashing in big artifact creatures on my opponents turns & being able to attack freely with her "prevent combat damage to attacking artifact creatures" clause.
My favorite underplayed Commander is the original Kefnet, the Mindful. He's got protection, evasion, a high power/cost ratio, and even forms one part of an easy to assemble three card combo making him an effective voltron commander or blue control finisher. Drawing cards is easier than ever so even his downside is easy to build a deck around.
I built out the original Oketra in the same vein. Sure, she's not great at making tokens, but she's never leaving the battlefield and is easy to enable. I also added some anthems, mostly for the token creatures, and like 4 or 6 auras that gave her flying in some form. What I came to quickly realize is that the deck wasn't a Tokens deck, it was a secret Voltron deck with token support - and a good one too.
I played Kefnet in one of the first decks I made (Siani and Eligeth) and it was always nice to see. The "downside" is very easy to work around in blue.
I can attest to Melek. He's pretty cool! Last game I played ended with me casting him, then Chandra's Ignition, which got a counterspell aimed at it. That's when I cast Soul's Fire, and dealt 52 to the countering player, bouncing the counterspell off the stack through sheer violence and winning with the Ignition.
Agreed, one friend also played it more on a fling focused deck and indeed it is cool
The coolest part though is killing it with graveyard hate, it is hilarious, killing by just playing a land, or kutzil's flanker jumpscare (my cat pet card)
@@xaropevic7918 yeah, that's a BIG weakness for the deck! My wife pre-gamed Leyline of the Void on me one time and it broke my heart Q.Q
Would you lean on those 5 cmc counterspells like they said in the video? I would be scared to lose melek and have a handful of expensive spells. Like how many spells do you run that kind of need Melek to be functional? I am asking because Izzet is the last guild I need to build a deck for and he sounds cool.
One cool spell I noticed for him is summary dismissal, stifle effects are good and the most common graveyard hate are abilities (the desert I forgot the name and bojuka bog), also works around uncounterable
Yeah I built Melek and he's a blast (no pun intended). Played him against my buddy's Mothman deck and was just like "yep sure go ahead and mill me", he got huge fast.
Grateful for everyone involved in the podcast for your efforts, candor, and consistency.
I'd like to nominate Baron Bertram Greywater for this. Only 50ish decks, but that card draw and sac outlet in the command zone goes way crazier than it reads. Especially with cards like Lotho giving you ways to make tokens off-turn.
I'm building him! Haven't played a game with him yet, but favorite card is ogre slumlord currently. Any suggestions for a low budget?
@@Werewolfoverlord12 I'm not gonna lie, I made mine pretty pushed, so I might not be the best source for that. lol
@@jodylester9118 fair lol
Some underrated commanders that I feel need more love:
Lagamos, Hand of Hatred: A very fun Rakdos aristocrat/sacrifice theme. For an uncommon from Dominaria United I feel her got overshadowed by the Jodah tier stuff but he's a lot of fun.
Arwen, Weaver of Hope: Is admittedly fairly normal mono green deck and is probably better in the 99. However she is so much fun, like having master biomancer in the command zone.
Rith, Liberated Primeval: Also from Dominaria United we have Naya dragons. I could stop there if you want a different dragon commander. But she let's you play the fun fight spells and get extra value. You could also build her as a more spellslinger focus.
As had, Lone Cyberman: From Doctor Who this guy can copy your best artifacts and make so much value that's it's very easy to run away with the game. Usually if he's allowed to exist for a turn or two it demands a board wipe. A friend plays him and his turns are always scary, even if he's just copying a bronze walrus.
Duke Ulder Ravengard: Not really underrated but I do wish I saw him more often. Let's you interact with the whole table during combat and you don't need to mull over who to attack or feel bad since all is equal to Myriad.
Huatli, Poet of Unity: A different commander for dino's. The first time I saw her I immediately wanted to abuse her saga side, removing counters to make a ton of dino's. Unfortunately it's adding the lore counter that triggers it so, unless you can remove the counter before you add the second, you can't abuse it how I wish. The etb ones that do it do not feel like they'd be consistent enough.
Celestine, the Living Saint: Again not underrated but as my personal mono-white deck she is a lot of fun. White graveyard reanimation is quite fun. But to be honest going with Rhudolf for access to black and the same exact playstyle is probably the better way to go.
Really loved this episode! I always enjoy hearing about more obscure cards and commanders.
As someone who normally despises Universes Beyond cards because they simply don't feel like Magic cards to me, the Cluedo cards are an exception for me: Cards like Headliner Scarlet feel exactly like Magic cards to me because the art and flavor is 100% centered on something already existing (and being popular, in this case) in Magic: The guilds of Ravnica. If more cards got this kind of treatment, I'd be all for Universes Beyond, personally. I'm aware that this is a tangent, but I wanted to mention it as someone who has ragged on UB in RUclips comments in the past.
[Rayne, Academy Chancellor] is an old classic that's super underrated imo, she takes some setup but the ability to effectively give your entire board "Ward - Let me draw two cards" is crazy. For bonus points, you can use target redirection shenanigans like [Spellskite] and [Redirect] to bounce the opponent's targeted spells around your board, drawing 2 more cards for every changed target.
I know it was challange the stats, but shoutout to Riku of many Paths - I built a deck that has wincos like other spellslinger decks (guttersnipe, fiery inscription) but also I've put Chrome Host Seedshark as most modal spells are X's commands, which have high mana value. The shark makes incubator tokens that for 2 mana can turn into at least 4/4 creatures. I would also avoid putting too many copy effects because Riku cares about cast trigger. But wait, there's more! Jaheira, Friend of the Forest and/or Growing Rites of Itlomoc can turn your birbs into mana advantage!
Please tell me you're also using mob rule? Its red, it modal its BRUTAL
@@Werewolfoverlord12 YEEE and it's nasty
@@wunderbar5702 *fist bump* I saw a gameknights episode where it was used to solve a play- I mean problem, so yeah I know how nasty it can get. XD
Both the "Star" and "Sky" Dragon Spirit cycles from the Kamigawa sets are easily overlooked, and to be fair, having reliable ways to trigger and re-use their death triggers is a challenge with several of them. My favorite, however, is Kairi, the Swirling Sky. Since you're in mono-blue, you get to exploit a glitch in the system by constantly making token copies of him that than immediately die to the Legend Rule - resulting in a rather baffling loop, where you constantly mill 6 and grab back whatever spell you used to copy him, as well as something else. And in a pinch, you can control the boardstate with the other half of that ability.
A Riku shoutout!! I run him as token generation primarily with Brudiclad as the main wincon. Imodane, the Pyrohammer, Docent of Perfection, and commander damage are alternate wins
Cards like Haslin make vraska very fun to play, they turn into their creatures forms again and keeps their passive ability like a sheoldred
My most recent EDH deck is a Kresh build, it's nice having a deck that scales to the board somewhat. I feel like he's a bit overlooked for how swingy the deck can be, it also combines the options of Voltron with 'win on the spot' stuff that usually works with Kresh's ability.
A cistern is more of a holding tank, as opposed to a well. We installed one because we do a lot of gardening and use a well. Cisterns are more common in dry areas, or in areas where the well water needs to 'sit' for a time to improve drinkability, such as having traces of clay that will settle out.
Gretchen Titchwillow is one of my fav under the radar commanders from AFR. Her combo lines can be complicated and fun
One specific commander, that caught my eye was: Lazav, Familiar Stranger.
Not only gives he a lot of potential routes to go: Mill, Selfmill, Reanimator, graveyard Hate, Copies, +1/+1 Counters, Crimes..
But it finally gave me a commander for one of the most obscure draft archetypes i ever played.
UB Eldrazi Prozessors from Battle for Zendikar.
Crytic Cruiser especially is a versatile tool which repeatedly commits crimes to let me react with lazav at instant speed, it also allowes me to control what lazav becomes and stays for multiple turns, since it reuses creatures, i already exiled to lazav's ability.
Saw Ezrim in the thumbnail and clicked to say, it is one of the most versatile voltron commander I have played. Key cards are -
Merchant of Truth (gives Exalted to clue tokens)
Martha Jones (Makes Ezrim Unblockable just from sacrificing 2 clues.)
Alquist Proft (Allows you to refill your hand if you've played all you equipment)
Nettlecyst (Equipment that gives +1/+1 for each artifact you control)
Hope these help for anyone wanting to build him.
Can definitely second Ria Ivor. I made it an equipment deck, since the mites can't block anyway so it's free crew fodder, and it works real well. The mites get out of hand so quick, even without support.
Thinking an honest rutstein with umori companion zoo deck could be pretty nifty.
I built Rose from the fallout set because it was interesting aand I hadnt seen anyone build it locally and it has quickly become one of my favorite decks I think it solves the mono red issue of running out of gas, Its feels so good to pilot
I didn't realize nexus of becoming existed. That seems perfect in big mana artifact decks. I'm probably gonna slot it into my Drafna deck
An underrated commander I am building is Fifth Dr and Jamie McCrimmon as bant vehicles. I am still building it, but it seems fun
I'm running the same, but use Tegan (2W) to protect the vehicles, for a straight UW deck instead! So many fun ways to build just with that precon.
My friend have a RIa Ivor aristocrats deck and it slaps! The amount of mites he can create is enormous!
I built a honest rustein and umori deck with extra cards I had in my collection and it became a really fun deck that I surprisingly love!!!
My favorite deck at the moment, Ziatora, the Incinerator, is a deck I haven't faced yet and noone knows what she does. It's built around power doublers, sacrifice, and all the fun stuff I love with BIG creatures. It all goes together so we'll in this deck. It's my "I don't want to use my brain too much" deck and just stomp, chimp and fling people in the face.
I've never seen anyone else play Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn, and it makes me laugh every time I pull him out and he pops off. People skim over the ability (put +1/+1 counters on any number of target creatures equal to the amount of life you gained each turn), and don't realize that it's on EACH end step until my creatures are suddenly gargantuan. Spike Feeder is an absolute treasure in that deck for that reason.
Yes! Headliner Scarlett! I played against one of those decks once. It was so cool!
My favourite new deck I've built is Brinelin//Gilanra UG partner. It's a really fun simic bounce deck with removal, card advantage and ramp right in the command zone. As of today, it has 399 decks on edhrec
My favorite deck built recently is Neyith of the dire hunt, and there's only like 2k decks for her. I've basically geared it all to tall creatures and fight spells. Feels almost like a control deck.
I have old Rutty in my Meren/Umori deck, he puts in work!
Nexus of becoming looks awsome for brudiclad because both trigger at boc. You can then stack them so that you get the nexus token and then make all you tokens into what ever and all tokens have haste too
I'm not certain, but I think Honest Rutstein is pretty big in PDH
Sekkuar is a commander i recently put together and no one has seen him in my local meta lol love how i have jund aristocrats and no one knows how it works!
I think Artistic Refusal is still strong in Riku decks, because Riku makes tokens, which can power up Artistic Refusal's Convoke. However, the other cards you mentioned probably should not be seeing the play that they do.
I think Ria has the potential to make the choice of how a player blocks really interesting. You could put the fog on a big guy, but all the other attackers also have really nasty combat damage effects. Or since you're WB, get something with first strike and deathtouch
That Ria Ivor deck sounds dangerous. Doesn't even need more than an anthem or so to really threaten blockers, not to mention Poison counts
Ezrim reminds me of a blackless Tivit. Also has combos like Tivit.
If there are any Riku of Many Paths players looking for fun/unusual wincons, I'm having a lot of fun running him as a Polymorph strategy - you've got a deck that wants as few creatures as possible to maximize instants and sorceries that synergize with your commander, and the commander makes disposable 1/1 tokens. My list is 48 modal spells, 5 polymorph effects, and 5 terrifying creatures to cheat out with them (plus a bit of non-modal 2 mana ramp to smooth out the early game)
Ooooh! What does your deck polymorph into
Ria Ivor can give that ability to other players' creatures as well. Now we just have to motivate them to attack.
Joey snagging "challenge the stats" segment ?!
What timeline am I in ?
Colonel autumn is sick, I love the exploit
You guys may have sold me on building new Malek. I did pick him up last week at a LGS because I'm still trying to find an Izzet commander that resonates with me as I don't have one yet. I just hate how all of them are Storm based. And I already have some cards for him already, mainly the high cost counterspells like Access Denied, Confirm Suspicions, Spell Swindle. The fact that I can actually cast them for the cost of the actual Counterspell as long as he's out is pretty cool. I'm just wondering how I want to build him right now.
Ria Ivor is a great commander for those old cards such as Bone Dancer and Farrel's Zealot.
That said, I can see why it's not more popular.
Ria has a fair bit of hoops to jump through.
The problem isn't that you have to fog your own creature.
The problem is that you have to guarantee the creature can get through for combat damage in the first place and THEN fog your own creature. Ria does a lot of nothing if your creature just gets chump blocked.
My silly "Gnostro, Voice of the Crags" is a bit unknown since its ability is "kinda what i wish, but in a lesser version".
Despite that, I'm building an __artifact storm__ deck to massacre my Stuffy Doll, Phyrexian Vindicator, Brash Taunter and so on to kill the table.
It will be a fun and creative challenge:D
Question? While the Nexus trigger is on the stack could
you return "Nexus of Becoming" to your hand and exile it
to make 2 copies of it?
Gen . E. Sequoia " Je ne sais quoi" :P
Or Jennie Ckoi (Ckoi is a big francophone radio in quebec, think)
Close to Honest Rustein is Urza, Lord Protector. I get away with way crazier stuff with the front side of that card than I do the back
A shout out for my favourite commander Endrek. My playgroup hate him! I love him!
Really good episode.
Very overlooked commander in my opinion is Darigaaz, the ignitor. Most of what I've found online for him is budget dragon kindred. But I built him as jund group hug to get more cards in people's hands so when Darigaaz hits them I can blast them for more potential damage
My problem with Riku has been win cons. Make a n Upping the Average video please!
I respect the amount of restraint and self control it must have taken to not say that there was more to Goldbug than meets the eye
I WAS SHOUTING IT
I've been really loving akawalli the seething tower out of LCI most people don't understand what it wants to do until it's a 7/7 and I give it menace then it's too late
I have increased my time with all sorts of weird commanders thanks to designing a commander cube list with a bunch of modular elements and support for a wide range of commanders.
I threw Goldbug onto my Eowyn Shieldmaiden deck because he's pretty busted with humans. Haven't gotten to play him yet though
Oh my godddd I just realised that if I build Ria Ivor, I can call the deck “Knight makes Mite” 😂😂
Marisi, Breaker of the Coil...... The Goad is whatever but the ability to get your instants through during combat is so huge.... Anybody that hates Blue.... ANYTHING with Flash just says uncounterable.....
Saheeli, The Sun's Brilliance has really surprised me with how much fun she is to play. Really shocked she's barely gotten over 1k decks right now.
i had the same reaction to ezrim, because it's like ojutai but 1. you don't have to play ojutai anymore 2. i never liked the approach "give it vigilance and you'll win every game"
I too have opened a whole box of dragons maze
I actually have a melek deck. it's so much fun, and my pod likes it too
Are challenge the stats only for Patrons?
Yeah, I am building honest rutstein, at first he seems really boring, until you play with it, then you notice how cool it is, I will prob build one more self mill and other that is just "oops all creatures" both very tool kit like decks
Another one that I will say about 1000 times that is very cool is Lavinia, foil to conspiracy, you can do everything, classic control, clue focused decks, artifact focused, instant/flash decks, tap/untap stuff somewhat probably, deck that spam low cost cantrips, you prob can even focus around foods/lifegain (use her to activate the food) and so on!
I feel like there are some dominaria United legends which were just ignored
I have a ria Ivor deck because my friends and I were trying to make $100 or less deck to give to each other for xmas, and it slaps even for $100 or less.
Bonny Pall - I feel like I'm the only one playing her.
So does that mean that Parallel Lives with Vraska doesn't grant you two times the treasure with the effects of the creature that died?
It doesn’t. Vraska doesn’t actually make a treasure token, she returns the actual creature you killed under your control and turns that real card into a treasure. It’s like if you used Oko or Kenrith’s transformation to turn something into an elk, the card is still there just transformed!
I really wanna exile Joey's yard now
I was suprised in how few decks using the Coven Counter's precon face commander; Lenoire Autumn Sovereign. She has a unique and fun mechanic called Coven that wants creatures on the battlefield with different powers, allows you to add a counter to any creature on the battlefield, and as long as you have Coven, provides you card draw. I love just using counters in commander and fiddling with the amount of counters on each of my cards. This commander is a fiddlers dream come true!
I audibly cackled at Matt’s joke.
My LGS recently started a $40 budget league with randomly assigned commanders. I got Kellan, Daring Traveler and cannot completely disagree more with your Kellan, Daring Traveler recommendation. In a vacuum, Kellan is T1, Map token. T2, Kellan. T3, sacrifice the Map to ~34% draw a land or put a +1/+1 counter on Kellan, attack with Kellan, and then whatever percentage of 89 or 90 cards to put a
Why not Honest Rutstein with Umori companion… that could be interesting../
I find it really funny that they got sponsored by a trading card site... that doesn't sell Magic cards 😅
Starts @4:34
allegedly
Some of you have seen Me play her, and Lenny said it well.... "You took a bad card and made it good."
Dorothea vengeful victim. Azorius spirits aristocrats basically
While not completely overlooked, Gylwain was overshadowed by Ellivere. I've got an "enchantressless enchantress" Gylwain deck and it's a blast to play.
Also, Gylwain on the surface seems like a horrible card. Having all your creatures etb with +1/+1 and a mediocre keyword made me actually laugh at the card when I opened the precon. After a bit I realized he’s actually pretty cool, but surface level seems like a bulk legend
@@Lazydino59 Agreed. He's not particularly strong but there are lots of cool interactions: the auras are tokens so Jaheira taps them for mana; EIdolon of B and S Champion trigger when the token auras enter; the auras are nasty with Nylea's Colossus, Nessian Wanderer, and go bonkers with Kodama of the ET and Composer of Spring.
@@pauldyson8098 femeref enchantress and auratog is probably the number one reason I want to build the deck. I just have too many white decks now but he’s definitely super cool!
Since I have a copy of Femeref Enchantress from back in the day, I ran it in the original list. It's okay but, unless you have a reliable way to get rid of enchantments, it often doesn't do much. That said, if you also run your Auratog, it might be worth running both!
@@pauldyson8098 Don't forget to add Archon of the Wild Rose, Umbra Mystic and Xenk, Paladin Unbroken to do some Aura's Shenanigans
I absolutely LOVE these “cards you may have missed” episodes! PLEASE do more!
9:10 I actually tried this Melek, and relatively soon I tore it apart. Found out it was just too broken too easy to make it an enjoyable experience for everyone at the table. I guess that's the reason he's not as popular.
10/10 recommend Xolatotac, the Smiling Flood. Often overlooked until I’m untapping literally everything and players don’t notice no one has attacked me until my board is huge and overwhelms them
Headliner Scarlett is a great card in my Obeka Upkeeps deck. She not only makes it viable for Obeka to connect with an opponent for a turn, but also gives some pretty decent advantage with her upkeeps synergy.
Also in Vihaan, the secondary commander of the Outlaws precon. She is a Warlock so fits in the tribal, and the "oops you can't block this turn" is awesome
She's also huge in my Eowyn deck being a human as well!
Melek became one of my favorite decks. Less focused on the cantrip, tons of little spells kinda decks there's a ton of in izzet commander, but just ALL in on HUGE mana cost spells. Playing only 5-mana counterspells with big upsides that are hard to leave mana up for, but are busted counterspell (the UU card) with that discount. Just having a home for all these flashy haymaker spells has made me fall in love with the deck. I paired it with a suite of 'you can cast sorcery as if they have flash' cards to take advantage of that discount four times a turn cycle!
A fun synergy with Ezrim is powerstone tokens, since each one can both pay for and be sacrificed to the ability.
My hang up with Ria Ivor was having to choose the creature to fog before blockers are declared. That means to make my 4 drop commander work at all, I need a creature with reasonable power that someone isn’t willing/able to block and nobody is willing/able to remove at instant speed. There’s probably a line with strong mid size white flyers, though.
This was my hurdle with the card too. I didn't play it as a commander, but had it for a while in my Legends beatdown deck. The best it ever did for me was fog my own attacker to gain some mites that didn't live until my next turn anyways. I can imagine a scenario where Ria can run wild, but the floor for that card is just too damn low for me.
Oh, shoot, I haven't seen Kyle's articles in a while. I figured he'd have had to raise the threshold above 600 for awhile, but I didn't realize how "bad" it was until I look at the Modern Horizons 3 page and realized that today (the day of the MH3 prerelease), there are already five commanders over 600 decks! (three from the main set and both Eldrazi deck commanders)
I didn't realize everyone was making decks *this* quickly nowadays.
Can confirm, once made more than 60 toxic mites with Ria Ivor in a single combat.
I really, really want to pair her with Divine Visitation. Or Cathars' Crusade. Either would be so gross. Or Elas il-Kor with a good sac outlet. Gain a ton of life and take a ton at the same time.
You guys are the best
I added Nexus of Becoming to my partner's Adrix and Nev deck as soon as I saw it. So glad/scared to see this being shared with others.
Finally some love for Malek. He is great for Izzet decks in the 99, I added him to my Prismari deck as soon as I saw him. I have to say that I'm not sure I would build him as a commander because he kinda falls under commanders that provide their own answer in my opinion which limits the deck for me. I might be wrong though.
Arwen, weaver of hope. I’ve seen her run in a few 99 lists and she actually has accrued quite the price, but as a commander she is SO nasty, from the same set as her you get windswift slice, and once you’ve cast like 5 pump spells you’ll deal 20 damage and then make like 19 tokens that are all 21/21s. Not to mention she is budget because the best strat is to run pump spells like giant growth which are very cheap.
So hype to see Goldbug on this episode. Proud to say that I am one of the 523 decks!
Oji, the Exquisite Blade has been interesting because it doesn't just want to be ANOTHER blink deck
what's really funny about Dana's cistern joke is that "citerne" is actually a french word (which describe some kind of tank, often used to stock oil or gas)
Ria Ivor is really strong when she works but it's a lot of steps to make it happen. I had an aristocrats deck with her that was incredibly strong but you're also controlling a ton of variables.
I actually just built a Ria Ivor budget deck that does everything EXCEPT poison people out with the Mites.