The First Four MTG Marvel Commanders Have Been Revealed

When Marvel Super Heroes launches next June, it will feature four pre-made commander decks packed with characters from Marvel comics of all kinds. Three out of these four decks remain a mystery to us. We have no clue what colours they will be or which characters they will feature.  Yesterday evening, though, the world got its first glance at the commanders for the first of these new precons, which is based on the Fantastic Four.  Appropriately enough, it will be a four colour deck. Mr Fantastic, and his three super powered pals, are all ready to stretch their way towards victory.

These four commanders all follow a similar template. They each have a triggered ability that activates at the beginning of combat every turn if you’ve cast a noncreature spell. Then they’ve got a powerful activated ability that requires a mana of every colour apart from black to be spent. Let’s take a look and see just how fantastic these cards are.

 
Every turn, the Invisible Woman can create a 0/3 wall token.  This will make you increasingly difficult to attack, since your opponents will have to batter down these barriers before they can get through to you.

Meanwhile, her activated ability grants a creature that you control +1/+0 and makes it unlockable for the rest of the turn.  She works well with massive creatures, so it’s fortunate that The Thing is included in the deck right alongside her.

The Invisible Woman combines offence and defence in a potent combination. Her walls keep you safe, while her ability to make attackers unblockable allows you to slip past your opponents’ defences. So you can turtle up, while beating everyone else down.

 
Mister Fantastic’s elasticity is demonstrated by the fact that he has both reach and vigilance, making him an effective blocker.

He lets you draw a card every turn when you’ve cast a non-creature spell. This helps you dig through your deck to access more noncreature spells so that you can keep digging deeper and grabbing even more cards.

Mister Fantastic’s activated ability synergises beautifully with the rest of the team. It duplicates a triggered ability twice. So, if you’re playing him alongside the Invisible Woman, then she would make three walls rather than just one. He might be the best member of the team to load into the Command Zone, since his first effect will help you draw the others, while his second effect makes them three times more powerful.

 
A 3/2 with flying, double strike, and haste for four mana is terrific. Even separate from the rest of the team, The Human Torch has a lot of build around potential. You can focus on maximising the payoff that you’ll get for his amazing suite of keywords, either by playing him alongside a selection of powerful combat tricks, or by gearing him up with your best selection of auras and equipment.

The combat potential of The Human Torch is further enhanced by his activated ability, which spreads the damage he deals out so that he hits every opponent, rather than just one. Appropriately for the red card in this set, the Human Torch can help you burn through your opponents’ life totals very quickly.

 
Finally, there’s The Thing. This bulky orange superhero starts out as a 5/5 and only gets stronger as time passes by. The Thing gains four +1/+1 counters every turn that you’ve cast a noncreature spell. If you do this on the turn when you play him, he’ll be a 9/9 when combat rolls around, and then a 13/13 on the turn after that.

If that’s not growing quite quickly enough for you, though, by sinking the mana into activating his ability you can double the number of counters of each kind on any number of permanents that you control. Not only will one activation make The Thing almost certainly the strongest creature on the table, but it also helps any other creatures you have gain more counters, and helps any planeswalkers that you’re running assemble enough loyalty to activate their ultimate abilities.