Unleashing the Power of MTG: Commander Masters

Understanding the Commander Format

The Commander format has boomed in recent years and is now many players’ favourite way to play the Magic: The Gathering trading card game. Unlike Standard, Pioneer, Modern and others, Commander is multiplayer – typically four players – where almost all the cards from the game’s history are legal. It’s a singleton format, meaning no more than one copy of any card is allowed (except basic lands) within decks consisting of 100 cards – 99 plus the commander.

The commander is a legendary creature (or Planeswalker if the text of the card allows, such as Commodore Guff) that leads your deck, and has special rules. Every card in a Commander deck must be a colour in the commander’s identity, so in Guff’s case that’s either red, white or blue, and nothing that’s green or black. Games begin with the commander in the ‘command zone’, a special area of the game which is much like your hand, allowing you to cast your commander whenever you like. If your commander would leave play, they return here instead ready to be played again, but cost an additional two generic mana to do so each time.

Players start on 40 life, but there’s a special rule called ‘commander damage’, which means a commander only needs to deal 21 to a player for them to lose. While it may seem that 21 is an arbitrary number, remember that Commander used to be called EDH (Elder Dragon Highlander) and the first iteration required you playing with one of the five original elder dragons as your commander – all of which were 7/7s, meaning it was exactly three unblocked attacks to finish an opponent off.

Building a Powerful Deck for Commander Masters

Building a deck for the Commander format can be a daunting experience, but there are a few structural guides to make it easier. Firstly, you want somewhere between 37 and 40 lands, depending on your mana curve. These numbers can be eased slightly with ramp such as Rampant Growth, Modal Double Faced Cards (MDFCs) such as Bala Ged Recovery, mana producing creatures like Birds of Paradise and land cyclers, of which there’s a cycle in The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle Earth, including Lorien Revealed.

Second, you need a mix of card draw, mana ramp, removal, and board sweepers – typically around 10, 10, 5 and 5 respectively, although these days sweepers are a little less effective and players opt for more single target removal instead. The rest of the deck is free for you to build around your theme, typically exemplified by your commander.

As mentioned, each card in your deck must have the same colour identity as your commander, meaning if the colour doesn’t appear on your commander, you can’t play it. Also thinking about mana, it is vital that decks have a balanced mana curve – have the bulk of your deck in the 1-4 mana slots, with not too many cards costing 5 or more. You don’t want to draw all your expensive cards and be effectively out of the game while your opponents develop their boards.

Lastly, make sure you’ve got clear ways to win. Subconsciously when building commander decks, players can be so focused on synergy and the ‘cool thing’ the deck does, they forget about how to actually win the game!

Exploring Multiplayer Dynamics and Strategies

A unique element to games of commander is that it’s multiplayer. No matter how strong your deck is, it’s unlikely you can take on the whole table alone, so politics play a key role in gameplay. Consider making deals at opportune moments, e.g. when one of your opponents is near death, maybe you can save them. Or perhaps work together to take out problem permanents. Also try not to annoy anyone either – most Commander players are there for a good time and to show off their decks. If you stifle them too much, the table could turn on you.

Table management is important to ensure no one player pulls massively ahead. Being vocal about how you see the game state and why you’re doing what you’re doing – even in just a light and jokey way – can help get others on the same page too. A key element of this is threat assessment: who is the biggest danger, what combos could be lurking, and when is it important to hold up that counter or removal spell.

Likewise, you need to balance out developing your board and gameplan while not putting a target on your own head by clearly pulling way ahead, so consider holding things back sometimes. Stats have shown that the person who gets the early Sol Ring rarely ends up winning for that exact reason.

Key Cards and Strategies for Success in Commander Masters

Because in Commander you have three opponents, each with 40 life, and decks that could contain almost anything, your cards need to have a balance between versatility and power. Thankfully, MTG Commander Masters is full of format staples to ensure your success.

Let’s start with the commanders themselves. Included in the set are many of the most popular legendary creatures of all time, each enabling powerful strategies. The Ur-Dragon is the go-to five-colour dragon commander, with lots of his draconic buddies returning too. Urza, Lord High Artificer is ready to bring his questionable morals and an army of artifact tokens, while Ghalta, Primal Hunger is a hugely dangerous threat lurking in the command zone for anyone that wants to keep it simple with mono-green monsters. We’ve Krenko, Mob Boss for goblins, Karador, Ghost Chieftain for value-reanimator and Aryel, Knight of Wingrace for Knights-matter.

Some commanders are less linear on how they can be built and provide more options. Queen Marchesa is one of my favourites – allowing you to go for a tokens approach, a pillow-fort, or just Mardu good stuff! Morophon, the Boundless provides a five colour commander for any creature type you like, whether it’s squids, assassins or beasts, and everyone’s favourite meme, Yargle, Glutton of Urborg can be anything you want it to be! The Scarab God is a monster regardless of how you want to play, whether it's zombie tribal, mill or simply Dimir control.

As for the rest of the 99, perhaps most notably are ‘free if you have a commander’ cycle of Fierce Guardianship, Flawless Maneuver, Deflecting Swat, Deadly Rollick and Obscuring Haze, which are among some of the best cards in the format. This cycle rewards you for having your commander in play, which you want to do anyway, while enabling the potent combination of letting you develop your board while still holding up a form of protection.

Each colour is bringing its own staples – from the mana producing Land Tax and Smothering Tithe in white, heavy hitting Balefire Dragon and Purphoros, God of the Forge in Red, and the versatile Demonic Tutor and Imp’s Mischief in black. Blue brings staple Cyclonic Rift, and much needed portal reprints including Sun Quan, Lord of Wu which can make your whole board unblockable thanks to his trusty horses. Craterhoof Behemoth, Doubling Season and The Great Henge are among green’s game winners, and Jeweled Lotus and the medallion cycle – including Sapphire Medallion – are among the incredible artifacts reprinted in the set.

Tips for Navigating the Commander Masters Mata

Unlike other formats for the trading card game, Commander’s metagame is much less defined. The card pool is so massive and varied that it’s hard for any card to make a widespread impact. Plus the multiplayer and singleton nature of Commander, with an emphasis on fun and self-expression, means decks are unique to the player piloting them and even those sharing a commander can be widely different.

As MTG Commander Masters is mostly a reprint set, full of powerful and expensive cards, the main impact it will have is around card availability. Suddenly bombs like Jeweled Lotus and Cyclonic Rift are more affordable, and so will be put in more decks. Generally, then, we can expect decks to get more efficient and powerful, and players need to ensure they are tuning their 99 too so as not to be left behind.

This is emblematic of a wider trend seen in commander – power creep. As time goes on, the new cards that are printed are simply stronger than the old ones, meaning that efficiency is key. No longer can Commander players get away with those 8 mana sorceries and instead need to prioritise cards that cost less and hit harder. This has only been exacerbated with the printing of straight to modern sets like Modern Horizons 2, with new cards no longer having to be at the Standard power level.

As well as general card availability, we can also expect to see an uptick in the strategies supported in the set, especially those with exciting reprinted commanders that players will want to build, either because they’ve come down in price (like The Ur-Dragon) or because of the gorgeous new profile treatments (as seen here on Mikaeus, the Unhallowed). This will especially be the case with the themes supported in the four new commander decks – most likely colourless/Eldrazi and Slivers, but also enchantment-reanimator and Planeswalker super-friends too.

What can players do to succeed? Take a look at the full card list for MTG Commander Masters to see how your decks can be upgraded, and bear in mind your opponent’s will be doing the same. Any card reprinted in the set is more likely to make an appearance across the table from you, so make sure you’re ready!