Ranking the MTG Cards of the Baldur's Gate 3 Companions

Wyll, Blade of the Frontiers occupies an interesting space as a legendary creature that cares about rolling dice. While Wyll is not unique in this (a few other examples include Vrondiss, Rage of Ancients, The Space Family Goblinson, and Mr. House, President and CEO), Wyll makes one of the best choices to slot into the Command Zone, since he lets you reroll all of your dice, effectively granting you the advantage mechanic from Dungeons and Dragons.

Wyll also gets stronger each time you roll any dice. This means you'll want to load your deck with as many effects that roll dice each turn as you can, set up a Netherese Puzzle-Ward and grab a Sword of Hours. Red has the most die rolling effects in the game, but blue is a close second, so you'll probably want to pair Wyll up with a blue background.

Wyll slots into 9th place on the list due to the fact that the theme he encourages, while certainly interesting, is also quite niche, and there's not as much support out there for die rolling strategies as there for is the tactics encouraged by some of the other companions.

Shadowheart, Dark Justiciar is a sacrifice commander that rewards you for getting rid of creatures with high power. By paying two mana, and tapping Shadowheart, she sacrifices another creature that you control and then provides card draw equal to that creature's power.

When it comes to background selection, there are several choices that synergise naturally with Shadowheart. By making her a Cloakwood Hermit, you'll never have a shortage of creatures to sacrifice to her effect. If Shadowheart is an Inspiring Leader, then the tokens that you sacrifice to her effect will draw you an additional two cards. Finally, making her an Agent of the Iron Throne damages each opponent every time you make a sacrifice, although it locks your deck into monoblack.

In contrast to Wyll, who exists in a narrow niche, there are plenty of other choices for sacrifice commanders out there. This is why Shadowheart only takes the number eight spot on the list, since she faces competition from everyone from Juri, Master of the Revue to Korvold, Fae-Cursed King.

Astarion, the Decadent is already a two colour commander, so you won't need to worry about picking a background for him. He certainly lives up to his decadent descriptor, since he rewards his controller for gaining life, and punishes opponents for losing life.

A 4/4 with deathtouch and lifelink, during each of their end steps, Astarion's controller can choose either "feed" or "friends". If "feed" is chosen, then target opponent loses life equal to the life they've lost this turn, while "friends" allows Astarion's controller to double the amount of life that they have gained this turn.

Feed can serve as a valuable wincon, and works excellently when paired up with effects that halve players' life totals like Blood Tribute and Revival/Revenge. Outside of instant win combos, you'll want to run Astarion alongside plenty of cards that heal you whilst punishing other players. Don't be afraid to exsanguinate the opposition.

While Astarion is undeniably powerful, at six mana, he's also quite costly, which is why he slides into this list at number seven.

Gale, Waterdeep Prodigy, as a wizard, encourages a deck based around casting an abundance of instants and sorceries. Whenever you cast an instant or sorcery from your hand, while Gale is in play, you're then able to cast another card of the same type from your graveyard. This allows you to cast a flurry of spells incredibly quickly, meaning Gale is great with storm cards like Grapeshot, Empty the Warrens, and Tendrils of Agony.

Since Izzet spellslinger is such a classic theme, it's a good idea to pair Gale up with a red background. If you load your deck with damaging spells, then Dragon Cultist can be a great way of helping you to build up a powerful board while also dishing out damage. Black also works well as a background colour, since it's great at dumping instants and sorceries into the graveyard for Gale to cast using his ability. Scion of Halaster works paticularly well, since it allows an instant or sorcery to be sent to the gravyard every single turn during the draw step.

Gale's certainly a capable commander, but there are no shortage of powerful legendary spellslingers out there, from Anhelo, the Painter to Bria, Riptide Rogue. Because of all of this competition, he doesn't quite break into the top half of the list.

Minthara, Merciless Soul gains an experience counter on the end step of each of your turns when a creature you control has died. Because of this, she lives up to her title as a 'merciless soul' since she gets stronger when you deliberately sacrifice your own creatures. For every experience counter that Minthara has gained, each of your creatures gains +1/+0, and after enough turns, that total can build up.

Minthara works great with cards that can proliferate like Grateful Apparition, Martyr for the Cause, and Karn's Bastion. These generate experience counters more rapidly than Minthara's effect alone, ensuring that you can build up the strength of your board incredibly quickly. You'll also want to use sacrifice effects that produce new creatures like Ghoulcaller Gisa and Denethor, Ruling Steward to ensure that you've always got plenty of creatures to buff up with Minthara's effect.

Minthara also synergises with other creatures that care about experience counters. You can slot Azula, Ruthless Firebender into a Minthara deck essentially effortlessly, and Daxos the Returned can contribute spirit tokens as well.

By combining a sacrifice strategy with counter generation, you can forge some truly unique Minthara decks, earning her a place exactly halfway up this list.

Jaheira, Friend of the Forest effectively turns every single one of your tokens into a copy of Llanowar Elves. This doesn't only effect creature tokens, it also supes up your clues, treasures, and any other tokens that you've got in play. This makes it easy to ramp up and play some massive late game finishers like Craterhoof Behemoth, Gigantic Big Bear, or Titan of Industry.

Inspiring Leader pairs up naturally with Jaheira, since both cards work perfectly with small creature tokens. Inspiring Leader also grants access to white's wide range of token producing cards to Jaheira, so you can hop to it. You can also take Jaheira along a more sacrifical path by pairing her up with the Street Urchin or Clan Crafter background.

Because of her unbridled mana generation, Jaheira has risen up to position number four here.

Lae'zel, Vlaakith's Champion offers a similar effect to Hardened Scales, except accessible from the Command Zone and it can be used on counters other than +1/+1 counters. This provides a lot of freedom when it comes to deckbuilding with Lae'zel.

You're more than welcome to try out a standard +1/+1 counter deck with Lae'zel, rapidly pumping up your board by playing counter-based cards like Anafenza, Kin-Tree Spirit, and Luminarch Aspirant. She also works great in a superfriends deck alongside a suite of powerful planeswalkers. They'll gain loyalty incredibly quickly, allowing them to unleash their ultimates readily.

Master Chef feels as though it was tailor made to serve as Lae'zel's background. Its ability to put counters on your creatures when they enter play is twice as powerful when used alongside her, granting every creature you control +2/+2 from the moment that they enter the battlefield.

As a proud Githyanki warrior, Lae'zel can be pleased that she's earned a place in the top three.

This next card is a bit different compared to the rest of the list: Minsc & Boo, Timeless Heroes is a planeswalker and not a creature at all, despite that fact it still functions as a commander.

When Minsc & Boo, Timeless Heroes enters play, and during every upkeep that it remains alive, you create a 1/1 red hamster token with trample and haste. You can use the +1 ability on this card to pump that hamster up with three +1/+1 counters. Then, later on, once Boo has grown sufficiently big, you can use the -2 ability on this card to sacrifice it in order to deal damage equal to its power to any opponent and then to draw that many cards. Not to worry, though, Boo will just come right back into play during your next upkeep.

You don't just have to buff Boo, though, this card can power up any creature with haste, and sacrifice any creature at all. You'll still deal the damage, but you just won't get the card draw unless the sacrifice is a hamster (or possibly a changeling).

As a legendary adventuring duo, it's appropriate for Minsc and Boo to earn second place, but there is one other Baldur's Gate party member that eclipses them...

Karlach, Fury of Avernus brings the rage of the nine hells to the table, by granting her controller an additional combat phase every single turn. Not only that, but Karlach also provides all of their creatures with first strike when they attack during this second combat phase, helping them to punch through if the board was stalled out before.

Naturally, with Karlach in your Command Zone, you'll want to build an aggresive combat focussed deck to take as much advantage as possible of all the extra attacks that she grants you. The background raised by giants will provide access to all of the powerful creatures available in green, while also pumping Karlach's stats up significantly by making her a 10/10. Sword Coast Sailor will make her unblockable, ensuring that she won't die fighting, and can continue granting you extra combat phases turn after turn. Finally, Flaming Fist will grant her double strike, helping you put together a voltron build where you kit Karlach out with a suite of powerful auras and pieces of equipment. Karlach's just not Karlach unless she's wielding several swords simultaneously.

Because of the incredible utility Karlach provides by granting multiple combat phases in a turn, she's the natural choice for the best Commander that's also a party member in Baldur's Gate 3.

So there you have it, Karlach claims a win thanks to her mastery over the art of combat. It could easily have gone another way, though. Lae'zel's counter production isn't to be underestimated, and Minsc and Boo are one of the most powerful choices when it comes to picking a Planeswalker to be your commander.

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