Our Top 10 Cards from Commander Masters
Masters sets are always a cause for excitement among Commander players because they’re one of the best places to search for reprints of desired cards. This means that Commander Masters (CMM) has pretty big shoes to fill because expectations were even higher than normal. In this article, we’re going to go over our favorite cards from Commander Masters. Since this set is such a big deal, we (Chief, Forcing White in CMM Sealed and Exxaxl, Casting Demonic Tutor to Find a Basic Island) are going to double our usual list to a full 20 cards. Surprise! Does this set live up to the hype? Read on to find out our thoughts.
We do want to clarify that it we have no plans to fill up the list with Jet Medallion and friends, the cycle of spells that includes Fierce Guardianship, or the long-awaited Jeweled Lotus reprint. We acknowledge that these are probably the best reprints in the whole set from an objective standpoint, but they don’t make for a terribly interesting list. Okay, let’s get started!
Grand Abolisher
Chief: While it doesn’t stop literally everything, this card is one of the best ways to make sure that you can take your big, exciting turn without interruption. This translates well into both casual and competitive tables, as there isn’t much functional difference between preventing your alpha strike from being blown out by a fog or protecting your combo turn from counterspells or removal. I’ve won many Commander games because of Grand Abolisher.
I started playing Magic in the 1990s, so seeing Richard Kane Ferguson’s artwork on this card really takes me back to those early days. The new flavor text also pulls absolutely no punches. Grand Abolisher was recently reprinted with new artwork and flavor text in the Artist Series: Randy Vargas Secret Lair, but I think that I’m already looking to replace that version with this one in my personal canon of preferred printings.
Darksteel Mutation
Exxaxl: This might seem like a weird pick to some, but ‘completely strip your best creature of anything it can do’ can be an incredibly impactful play on an opponent's board state. Outside of sacrificing it or destroying the aura, which not every color can meaningfully do, you’ve now disabled their most threatening creature, potentially for the remainder of the game.
Yes, they now have an indestructible 0/1 blocker, but you might have permanently dealt with their commander with no means of regaining access to it. In homebrew decks you have the luxury of slotting redundancy pieces, but in Limited that’s often not the case. Darksteel Mutation is a card I’ve been using since I started playing Commander and I'll continue to fall back on this card when sticking to mostly Battlecruiser to Low Power decks, where removal is less abundant and optimized.
Capture of Jingzhou
Chief: Excluding one promo card, this card’s only printing was all the way back in 1999. While there are plenty of other extra turn spells, Capture of Jingzhou is one of the most efficient versions of this effect without any additional conditions. Cards from Portal Three Kingdoms have historically been hard to reprint, because the flavor of the cards clashes with the Magic universe. This isn’t a problem for a set like CMM.
When a card isn’t even on the Reserved List, it shouldn’t be so difficult to get a reprint. There are still a few more extremely desirable chase cards from Portal Three Kingdoms that need to see good reprints, so I’m hoping that we can continue to see them trickle out over the next few years. Fortunately, we’ve seen a few others even within CMM. I do wonder when and where they’ll finally reprint Ravages of War…
Sun Quan, Lord of Wu
Exxaxl: Sun Quan is mainly a combat trick, something blue doesn’t easily have access to normally. It more often relies on bouncing your opponent’s board back to hand or tapping it down completely. In Limited, this could be your ‘win the game if it resolves’ card, and it’s readily available from the command zone. While there are benefits to having a stronger commander that draws cards, builds a board or generates mana, this has the tendency to build your deck to function with your commander, and you might not have access to all of the effects you would have liked or needed to make your commander shine in your Limited card pool.
Making your creatures harder to block might just be what you need in a Limited environment. I’m excited to see so many Portal Three Kingdoms cards getting reprinted the last few years, and everytime one shows up in previews anywhere I get my hopes up again for a Riding the Dilu Horse reprint.
Imp’s Mischief
Chief: Outside of creature removal, black isn’t typically known for its instant speed interaction. This card is a notable example of black trading life to gain access to an effect that you might not normally see within the color. In that regard, this card doesn’t even feel like a significant color pie anomaly. While it’s not quite as flexible as Deflecting Swat, this card can still put in a lot of work to protect your gameplan in decks that include black.
My favorite thing to do with effects like this one is changing the target of a counterspell to Imp’s Mischief. This is a completely legal thing to do, even though it seems strange. This results in the counterspell not having a legal target when it tries to resolve because Imp’s Mischief has already left the stack by then. Show those pesky blue mages that they don’t have a monopoly on stack interaction with this card!
Grave Pact
Exxaxl: If you have a deck with Grave Pact in it, you know how strong this card can be. Granted, it needs 3 black pips to get cast, so obviously this card doesn’t go in every deck. ‘Any time you touch my board you’re going to lose yours’ is impactful in a regular EDH environment, and with the card pool and resources you have available in Limited, this sounds even more worrying for your opponents.
I will say I kind of hoped to see the grim reaper pointing at a grave going ‘no, get back in there, that’s where you belong’ art from Eight Edition on this card again. So, now that this reprint happened, when are we seeing Dictate of Erebos again?
Savage Beating
Chief: There are very few Magic cards that are more aptly named than this one. Double strike or extra combat? How about double strike and extra combat. That can really put the hurt on people. This is one of my favorite cards from the classic Mirrodin Block because of how much extra damage it lets you pack into your turn when you want to turn sideways. I’m a certified combat enjoyer, so I love basically every card that lets you do even more combat.
This is another card that just really needed a reprint. The only printing of this card before CMM was all the way back in 2004. That’s just way too long for such a desirable card to go without a reprint, so I’m honestly over the moon about it coming back. I also really enjoy the fact that you can cheat the casting cost on Savage Beating and still pay two mana to entwine it and receive both effects. I remember putting it on Spellbinder back in the day and doing just that.
Treasure Nabber
Exxaxl: At one point I played a Krenko, Mob Boss deck where I threw this card in as a joke, and it made for some weird game states where upon starting my turn, I had access to two Sol Rings, a Fellwar Stone, and an Arcane Signet that weren’t mine. Relying on your opponents to ‘have something useful’ will always be situational and suboptimal, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be fun and lead to some weird lines of play you didn’t plan for.
I wouldn’t hesitate playing this card in CMM Limited. Everyone is going to be color fixing and ramping and most of that will happen through mana rocks, if people don’t have access to green. Mana rocks that are now mine, for one turn. Even if you only get a single use out of a Chromatic Lantern or Fellwar Stone, that still means you were able to spend mana ahead of your expected curve.
If only it saw any and all artifact activations so you could steal your opponents Ashnod’s Altar or Sword of the Animist. Maybe that’s a card design for the future? A creature that steals all your non ‘tap for mana’ artifacts for a turn upon activation, something to fill the gap in between Treasure Nabber and Hellkite Tyrant.
Finale of Devastation
Chief: Overrun effects and tutoring creatures directly into play are two of my favorite things in green, so it stands to reason that I’d also enjoy a card that combines both of these effects. Finale of Devastation is on my short list of the most powerful green cards from the last several years. Green excels at making a lot of mana, so you’ll basically always be able hit X=10 to give everything haste in a longer game.
While it’s always nice to cast a huge Finale of Devastation, there’s still plenty of value to be had in casting this spell for a smaller number to pull out important creatures for the sake of value or as part of a combo. There’s even brand new artwork by Daren Bader with a whole pack of dinosaurs just in time for Caverns of Ixalan. I’m sure that most Commander players are ecstatic about this one getting a reprint.
Ohran Frostfang
Exxaxl: It’s finally back! Outside of some special printings, we have not seen this card meaningfully reprinted since Commander 2019. Deathtouch can be an important removal and protection tool in green, and the addition of card draw makes this card even that much better. Block my creatures and lose yours, or don’t block my creatures and let me draw cards, or both, if you have a creature with trample.
With limited in mind, Mirri, Weatherlight Duelist certainly won’t mind you playing this card, and with other trample cards such as Ghalta, Primal Hunger and Goreclaw, Terror of Qal Sisma, if you’re drafting green you’re going to get plenty of use out of Ohran Frostfang.
Champion’s Helm
Chief: I’ve predicted that this card would get a reprint multiple times in the past, so it’s good to finally see it. Being able to protect your commander is invaluable, but you don’t always want to play Lightning Greaves in decks where you might need to target your commander and you might not always need haste. Having ways to protect your commander that can be customized to meet your needs is just comfortable.
I’m obligated to mention that the brand new borderless artwork for Champion’s Helm depicts Commander players who were waiting around for the card to get a reprint... Paolo Parente knocked this one out of the park. I’ve been playing a lot of Diablo IV lately and this artwork almost looks like it could have come right out of that game series. It’s great to see so much artwork by classic Magic artists recently.
Silent Arbiter
Exxaxl: You don’t often get this effective a combat control tool in a draftable set and it can severely mess up your opponents game plans. There are a lot of go wide options available in CMM and Silent Arbiter is here to stop all of those. A fine card to draft if you happen to be going for a voltron playstyle, which this set has plenty of candidates for in the command zone.
Always remember that this limitation also applies to you, so be very mindful if and when you play this card. You don’t want to lock yourself out by accident. It’s crazy to think a colorless creature printed in Fifth Dawn would still be relevant in an eternal format 19 years later. Please run more Silent Arbiters and less Solemn Simulacrums in your voltron decks, thank you ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°).
New Card: Titan of Littjara
Chief: I recently wrote an article about Sun Titan that included a few jokes about Frost Titan, so I was excited to see a new take on this cycle in blue. Titan of Littjara really feels like a member of that cycle, other than the fact that it’s an Illusion instead of a Giant. I’m sure that this card can draw you plenty of cards in any deck focused on typal themes, which is why it fits so well into the Sliver Swarm precon.
It will be interesting to see if this card receives consistent reprints over time like Sun Titan or if it goes the way of a lot of other Commander cards that get printed at Mythic Rare and we don’t see an accessible reprint for years. I’m definitely hoping for the former. With this card and Blight Titan showing up recently, I wonder if we’ll also see more additions to this cycle in the other colors outside of blue and black.
New Card: Composer of Spring
Exxaxl: This to me seems like one of the strongest new cards printed in CMM. Note how it triggers on enchantments entering the battlefield, not casting them, just like Archon of Sun’s Grace and Setessan Champion. Being able to cheat out lands from your hand means you’ll have less moments where you’re investing your mana into enchantress-related draw effects and then run out of gas.
Having access to this with cards like Sythis, Harvest’s Hand in the command zone means you cast an enchantment, draw a card, the enchantment enters, and you can play a land from your hand. If you’ve played enchantress decks before, you know how many cards you draw once you get going, and being able to accompany each of those enchantments entering with another land from your hand is going to make your deck that much faster.
Should you get to six or more enchantments, having the flexibility between playing a land or putting a creature on the battlefield (tapped) for free feels incredibly strong. I don’t think this card will fail to deliver in the Enduring Enchantments precon and I’m sure we’ll see this one become a mainstay in our format in most homebrew enchantment focused decks.
Gisela, Blade of Goldnight
I love Angels, so it’s probably not a big surprise that I managed to slip one into my list. Gisela is one of my favorite bombs in Commander because she speeds up the clock on your opponents while also reducing the efficacy of aggro against her controller. Putting those effects on a 5/5 body with first strike goes a long way towards helping you make sure that she can reliably connect with opponents to help aggro them down.
I’m not the biggest fan of the borderless profile commanders in CMM, but I think that Alex Dos Diaz did a fantastic job on the artwork on this card and I’m honestly a huge fan. While they don’t always hit, I appreciate that Wizards is trying out new art styles and bringing in a lot of new artists to create interesting versions of new and classic cards alike. I’m looking forward to seeing more exciting showcase reprints in the future.
Exxaxl: I need to get some disclaimers out of my brain and into the article before my next card.
Chief: The stage is yours.
Exxaxl: If you haven’t caught on to it yet, I’ve mainly picked cards and based my decisions on why they’re great from a Limited point of view. I’ve mainly played Draft, Sealed, Pre-Release and Standard from Prophecy until Throne of Eldraine and Commander only started after that. I still think that I enjoy Limited more than EDH, though the latter is way more easy to consistently find people to play with.
In a regular Limited environment, focusing your picks around a gold card is exactly what you shouldn’t do. It hard locks you into those colors and you’re going to skew your decisions based around a multicolor card you might not even draw during any of your games. You don’t know which other cards are coming your way in the draft and you’re more likely to draft mediocre cards because your brain wants to ‘make the multicolor card work’ if you’re going to focus on a specific color combination way too early.
This perspective changes with a set like CMM, since you can put legendary multicolor creatures in your command zone, meaning you have immediate access to them. You also get two picks per pack, not one, so you’re able to grab a complimentary card with your multicolor one and are able to skew the results of your draft in your favor that way. Nekusar, the Mindrazer becomes way less niche to draft if you’re able to also take the Bloodchief Ascension, Day’s Undoing, or Magus of the Wheel from the same pack.
Kykar, Wind’s Fury
Exxaxl: It’s hard to explain why I like Kykar. It’s the only deck in my collection with access to red that has survived my ‘I don’t play this deck a lot, I should take it apart’ purge I do two to three times a year. There are several commanders that make tokens in those colors and yet ‘bird wizard makes friends on noncreature cast trigger trigger trigger’ is something I can’t seem to put down.
There is enough token support to make Kykar viable for Limited, and you now have a source of generating mana and a creature boardstate in your command zone, which feels strong in a Limited environment. Mana sources and board building are very luck dependand on what’s in your packs, and having the ability to guarantee both in the command zone feels rather strong.
In white you have access to Intangible Virtue to buff your board, Jazal Goldmane to overrun and Sephara Sky’s Blade to make your entire board indestructible. Blue gives you Murmuring Mystic —downshifted to common—and Talrand, Sky Summoner for more token generation and Tetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive will make your tokens harder to block. Red would mean Guttersnipe —also downshifted to common!— and Purphoros, God of the Forge could shoot down life totals and Storm-Kiln Artist gives you another mana accelerant on top of your commander.
It’s important to remember that CMM Limited is not a singleton format. If you happen to get 3 Guttersnipes and 2 Murmuring Mystics then you can slot all of those in your deck. Also of note, Kykar triggers on every noncreature spell you cast, not just instants and sorceries, meaning your mana rocks and supporting enchantments will make Kykar just that much more useful.
The one thing I feel is missing in the set are reliable big X spells to close out the game, to capitalize on the sacrifice a token to make mana aspect of Kykar, but that doesn’t outweigh the benefits I see in being able to create tokens and mana straight from the command zone.
Selvala, Heart of the Wilds + Jazal Goldmane
Chief: In Commander Masters Limited, all mono colored legendary creatures have the Partner ability, so we thought it’d be fun to highlight what we could consider to be the ultimate partner pair. What can I say? Selvala is pretty much the ultimate mana dork and Jazal is a fantastic mana sink that offers additional synergy with Selvala. Selesnya is a great color pair for go-wide strategies, so I really think that these two could be a good match in the CMM draft setting. I’m sure that there are other more broken ways to use Selvala, but this partner pair definitely seems like the most fun out of the available options.
What I like most about this pair is that you can activate Jazal using mana from your lands during combat and then you’ll likely be able to tap Selvala to activate him at least two more times if you have a substantial board presence. Decks that can put a lot of creatures on board—tokens or otherwise—will likely see an easy path to victory if they can hit the proper density of creatures to start activating Jazal multiple times per turn.
Krenko, Mob Boss + Purphoros, God of the Forge
Exxaxl: I went with Krenko and Purphoros. Krenko makes an insane amount of creatures over the course of a game, and having an indestructible second commander that shoots damage and is able to give firebreathing to your entire board seems like it’s going to shoot out a lot of damage.
While I realize there’s likely not enough goblin support to make Krenko consistent enough to the point of being broken, and drafting a singular color in a set like CMM is likely not smart, Krenko and Purphoros being in the command zone together seems like something you really don’t want to happen. Tap Krenko, make eight Goblins, lose 16 life please. Sink all my available mana into Makeshift Munitions. Game two?
End Step
Exxaxl: I’m glad we were able to find not just our own ‘favorite color’ bias picks for this top 10. I feel we often highlight white, blue and black cards more so than others so I’m happy we were all able to find one mono colored card each, one colorless card, one multicolor card and 1 single-color partner pair.
Chief: I agree. It’s nice to venture outside of your comfort zone and do weird, fun things like trying to think up partner pairs for Limited. Overall, I think that Commander Masters has a lot to offer, even though I have my own personal nitpicks with some of the card choices and the accessibility of the product. It was also a highlight for me that we both picked cards originally from Portal Three Kingdoms and reprints with Richard Kane Ferguson art.
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