MTG: Commander Masters – Set List Reveal

Commander has cemented itself as Magic: The Gathering’s most popular format, enabling players to cast almost any card from the game’s history, in a fun and casual multiplayer setting. Commander is so popular that it doesn’t take long for the format’s best and most interesting cards to spike in price. Thankfully Commander Masters is here, full of much-needed reprints and some gorgeous new artwork of iconic legendary creatures that players will be desperate to put in their Command Zones.

What is Commander Masters?

The ‘masters’ sets we know today began almost exactly 10 years ago with Modern Masters – a set full of highly-desired reprints for the Modern format. We’ve had many iterations since then, and now it’s Commander’s turn, with Magic: The Gathering Commander Masters due for release on 4th August 2023. A set dedicated to the Commander format, it’s full of format staples that both new and existing players are going to want to get their hands on.

Notable Reprints

We’ve only seen a few cards from Commander Masters set list, but they are all bangers:

The Ur-Dragon – The Ur-Dragon is the ultimate five-colour dragon commander, with the ‘Eminence’ mechanic impacting the game even when the beefy dragon isn’t in play! As well as making all your dragons cheaper, late in the game you can drop The Ur-Dragon to draw cards and drop permanents into play, and the game is done!

Selvala, Heart of the Wilds – Selvala is both a powerful commander or strong in the 99, enabling you to do huge amounts of the most powerful things in commander – draw cards and mana ramp/fixing. You just need to make sure you’re playing creatures with high power (which green has in abundance)  

Jeweled Lotus – Commander’s own Black Lotus was highly controversial when it was first printed due to its huge power (and price!), allowing you to drop your commander way ahead of schedule or mitigate commander tax later in the game. Jeweled Lotus is especially strong in decks with highly costed commanders, those that want to drop their commander as soon as possible, and those that can keep recurring the Lotus (Muldrotha, the Gravetide, for example)

Capture of Jingzhou – not printed since Portal Three Kingdoms, Capture of Jingzhou adds another Time Warp option to your commander deck, enabling extra-turn and ‘turbo fog’ style strategies. Portal cards had a limited print run, meaning the cards often carry a higher price that you might expect, making this a very welcome reprint

Personal Tutor – just as with Capture of Jingzhou, Personal Tutor hasn’t been printed since Portal. Love them or hate them, tutors are incredibly powerful, especially in 100-card singleton formats like Commander. Personal Tutor only finds sorceries, but there are plenty of versatile and game-ending sorceries in the game, and for just one mana, Personal Tutor is very strong in the most competitive of decks.

New Legendary Commanders

In addition to the awesome reprints on the Commander Masters set list are the new cards that feature in the four new commander decks, including powerful new legends:

Zhulodok, Void Gorger – the powerful new Eldrazi legend helps things to snowball quickly, providing two cascade triggers for each colourless spell you cast costing seven or greater, working perfectly with mana ramp and a huge Eldrazi army (and colourless artifacts too!)

Sliver Gravemother – Slivers are one of Magic’s most popular creature types and Sliver Gravemother enables all your silvers to return from the dead (in multiples) for one last attack, while also allowing interesting cloning options for other legendary slivers

Commodore Guff – Guff is a Planeswalker commander, both in that he is a Planeswalker, but also cares about Planeswalkers too. Jescai superfriends is the way to go!

Anikthea, Hand of Erebos – Anikthea is an Abazan enchantment reanimator commander, enabling you to not only bring back powerful enchantments but also turn them into an army of zombies!

Collector’s highlights

As with Double Masters 2022, textured foil treatments return, alongside foil-etched, with both found in Collector’s Boosters, including amazing ‘profile’ artworks of the set’s iconic legends. Collectors and any players that want their commander decks to look their best – especially the commander themselves – are going to love them.

Conclusion

MTG Commander Masters is one of the most exciting sets of the year – bringing us reprints of highly sought-after, powerful and valuable cards in the game, with gorgeous card treatments. It’s the perfect chance to grab those expensive staples you’ve been coveting, and I can’t wait to try the draft experience too. Having been wanting to build both Sliver and Eldrazi decks for some time, I’m particularly excited about the release of the accompanying MTG Commander Masters Commander Decks.

What are you hoping for from the set, and what’s got you most excited so far? Let us know in the comments!