It is important to note, Rona can only have one card exiled by her ETB at a time. every time she leaves the field it is a different card and does not remember previously exiled cards. However, she has some strange interactions with auras and equipment. If you can assemble some way to have her exile things via some ability, it still counts and they can be cast this way. This is notable as she works well with Kaldra Compleat, as if you exile an opponents creature, you can then cast that creature. It is a niche interaction, but it is cool.
There's usually rules about "linked abilities". Aggravating rules.607 in the rulebook. So Rona only lets you cast cards she exiled with her ETB or her 4-mana tap ability. Otherwise Mairsil could cage an Isochron scepter and do really silly things.
I think they mean: if Rona gets blinked or removed before she can cast the card(s) she exiled, the previously exiled card can’t be cast anymore because Rona is a new game object and doesn’t see them anymore.
The Jasmine Boreal of the Seven deck that I initially built as a gimmicky joke ended up pleasantly surprising me by how fun and effective it was. I think her mana ability is a trap, and vanilla creatures suck. However, her second ability makes most creature tokens functionally unblockable, and that has actually led to a really cool take on a Selesnya Tokens build focusing on saboteur effects, as well as the Monarch and the Initiative. There are a lot of go-wide commanders in that color pair that are probably more exciting, so it makes sense that she would be crowded out. But I definitely underestimated her, and I bet others are underestimating her too.
I have a Vohar reanimator deck. It’s especially sweet as a reanimator commander because not only does it give you cheap card selection, but it also can recycle your reanimation instants and sorceries in a pinch
And it doesn't even look that threatening. When commanders like Korvold and Kenrith exist, a 2-mana uncommon legendary creature with an activated ability that costs *mana* is super fair.
@@jordangroblewsky2087 And then there's Kinnan, who is two mana, in Simic, absolutely ridiculous static ability and a busted activated ability. If Kinnan was five or six mana, id still have built it. Silly commander.
One thing to note about Polukranos: it is in green, so it has some access to Shield Counters, and being able to put a shield counter on him can allow him to fight once without losing any counters
I've found a fun way to play a lot of underplayed commanders. I've built a couple "tribal commander" decks. Basically you pick a few commanders that are all sort of doing similar things, and build a deck that would work for any one of them. Include all those commanders in the deck as well. When you shuffle up and play, pick one of those to be your commander for that game, or do what I do and pick one at random. I currently have a Selesnya tokens and a Gruul stompy deck built this way, with I think 10-15 commanders in each.
My favorite underplayed commander is Kogla, the Titan Ape. Not only are there ways of making it combo, but there are lots of ways to use Kogla's second ability to destroy any one permanent on the board every time it attacks: Liquimetal Torque, Liquimedal Coating, Mycosynth Lattice, even Ashnod's Transmogrant.
Saw ledgermain in action last night. It saved the table from a jodah the unifier deck that was about to win on turn 5. The cool thing about jodah decks is that they don't really work when jodah is an egg token instead of jodah.
@@bryankopkin6869 it's just that it kind of needs the expensive staples to really make it work for me. Doubling Season and the like. I can proxy....but I don't like doing that when I don't own the card
Dana starting it off with literally my favorite deck, as Rona, Disciple of Gix leads my Tezzeret deck (most Tezzeret's, cards from the Magic 2012 Tezzeret deck and other thematic spells). Most games I may not cast Rona, but she fills a key role for me whenever she gets back a key planeswalker or artifact I need. And yes, I love her art as well, spot on Dana!
What's not to love about Rona being an Eternal Witness in the command zone? Plus a few more things legendary or artifact than one might think, and also Sagas. On MTGO I just had a Rona Grind time deck, Using her to recast and reuse all sorts of things like that that Dimir usually doesn't have access to in the graveyard.
Mimic Vat is a pet card of mine. For around 25 cents, it has the ability to shut down a key piece of reanimator, or just do massive damage for just 3 mana. A staple card in any list
I recently built a Syr Elenora, The Discerning deck with a focus on anything that lets me draw a huge amount of cards at instant speed. And holy cow is it so easy to build that as a hand size matters voltron deck where you are regularly clocking people for 15+ commander damage at once.
The problem with joint exploration is that it's not the second copy, it's the third. Explore is a card and ramping on 2 is more popular than ramping on 3.
Funny, I was just brewing up Eisenhorn and my approach was going to be using a ton of cantrips, village rites variants, and things that sac creatures to destroy other creatures. Buut now, I gotta add a little of this artifact support..
Mina and Denn, Wildborn, currently at 661 decks. A 4/4 for 2RG, it let's you play an extra land on your turn, and has "RG, return a land you control to your hand: target creature gains trample until end of turn." We have two creatures now that can turn your creatures into forests. Ashaya, and Greenwarden, I think. So not only can you do the typical Gruul landfall stuff, made better by bouncing them back to your hand, but there are board states that allow you to get more value out of your creature ETBs in Gruul!
Hey oh! I have 2 Rona decks! Rona is a good Stax commander btw Also, I definitely took Jarina off the top of that precon for General Kudro because the third color added almost nothing and General Kudro is much better.
I wanted to say thank you for your content. Your video on Favorite Underplayed Commanders helped me break out of my deck building rut. I built Nassari and Vohar and can't wait to break them out at my LGS. Have a wonderful holidays and thank you again for your content.
Flavorwise I like the Nephilim because they're weird and mechanically I like them because they're also weird (these are underplayed commanders because they do not say legendary on the card (even though they should (maro said so once so it must be true :P))). Having made and played decks for all five, gotta say that the one that activates my almonds the most is Ink-Treader, which plays a fair bit like Zada Hedron Grinder does with the bonus of copying spells to every creature on the table (not just yours) and being four color instead of monored. The wider color identity gives better options for spells that create more creature tokens for you to copy later spells onto such as croaking counterpart (zada only gets two, and both will kill any x/1 creatures (like most goblin tokens)) which lets it get out of control super fast, but my favorite FAVORITE part is that wurg gives access to enough Arcane spells for a splice build to be completely usable. The way Splice onto Arcane works is that as you cast an arcane spell you can pay the splice cost of any cards in your hand to add their effects to the spell you are casting. This is basically how mutate works except applied to spells and should be pretty self-explanatory. Kidding. Here's an example So let's say I cast Kodama's Reach (land ramp sorcery with the arcane subtype) and Splice the card Evermind onto it ('draw a card' card with splice onto arcane). By splicing Evermind I reveal it, but it stays in my hand (to be spliced another day) and the spell Kodama's Reach (now on the stack) has the effect of "land ramp + draw a card". Cool! DIY (overpriced) ramp that cantrips! Now if I had spliced Psychic Puppetry instead (tap or untap target permanent spell with splice onto arcane), I could have Kodama's Reach (+ Psychic Puppetry) target Ink-Treader, who would then copy it for every targetable creature on the field, which is the kind of wacky weirdness what makes this particular build stand out to me imho
> Underplayed Commanders - Alora, Merry Thief//Tavern Brawler Adventure spells featuring support from Lozhan (Dragons' Legacy), Lucky Clover, Passionate Archaeologist, Nalfeshnee, Wild Magic Sorcerer, Brainstorm, Brainstone, Conch Horn, Dream Cache, Riverwise Augur... and even the big mana value common adventure spell creatures.
I have a Polukranos deck! I actually put a load of self-mill/Dredge cards and payoffs in there as well as the +1 +1 counter stuff, just coz I thought Dredge didn’t see enough play in Commander. I love constantly bringing him back from the Graveyard as a beefcake.
Commanders that I find underplayed / want to see more: Grakmaw, Skyclave Ravager (252 decks) - Take everything Dana mentioned about Polukranos and apply it here. I think Golgari voltron / +1 counters would be very fun. I like Grakmaw with its die clause being able to replace itself with a X/X token version and doesnt feel as bad of a loss. Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet - I have a feeling its price tag of around 20 bucks is why its only at 210 decks. I like that it has graveyard hate on a body (sorry Joey), and you could do Vampire or Zombie tribal. I would lean to making it Zombie tribal and feed my zombies to Kalitas to make it bigger and go voltron style. Tromokratis (120 decks) - ok, I am finding I just want more voltron commanders lol. Pretty mana intensive 5UU for a 8/8 that's hexproof when attacking or blocking. And you can force defending player to block with all of their creatures. I want a deck where you run cards like Sleep and Flood, and so tapping people's stuff down and beating down with a 8/8 seems like a fun time.
I have a Lu Bu, Master-At-Arms deck, partly because of my love of the Dynasty Warriors franchise and partly because he's a solid voltron commander. There are 32 decks on EDHrec for him. He's a mono-red 4/3 with haste and horsemanship for 6 mana. The horsemanship makes him nearly unblockable while the haste makes him a threat the turn he comes into play. The deck is comprised of card advantage, ramp, and things that make help him rack up commander damage. It's one my favorite decks and one that really gets underestimated at first glance.
General Marhault Elsdragon is kind of amazing. I have a deck that puts Lure effects on Stuffy Doll type creatures with General M in the 99 (Minsc is the commander just because that card fits better with the Stuffy Dolls), they make the strategy so much more viable by almost guaranteeing your blocked creatures survive combat. You can play the cheaper Lure effects that don't pump your creatures, which means you can Lure every turn (provided you have one in your hand). If I didn't want to do my Stuffy Doll idea so badly The General would be my choice.
My favorite commander that should see more play is quintorius field historian. A boros reanimate deck with a very similar ability to tormod, but also acts as an anthem for spirits. There are just a lot of cool and fun synergies that i found myself playing and it’s just a fun and fair commander
I generally scroll through EDHREC's 'Top Commanders' until I get past 500-600 and start looking for interesting commanders from there. My favorite hipster commanders I own and play are Triad of Fates rank #1074 (Orzhov ETB/blink/combo), Ob Nixilis of the Black Oath rank #1037 (Group Slug), Ludevic, Vial Smasher, & Obosh companion rank #1031 (odd tribal/extra turns).
I just built a gyrus waker of corpses deck, and while it's not completely there yet, I really enjoy the sort of, rough draft I have going. It's pretty fun and I've literally never seen it played before
I would love it if you'd cover Saverok, Deathbringer. I've switched Backgrounds for him from Criminal Past, to Cultist of the Absolute, to finally Raised by Giants. However, I've been wanting to change the deck around a little to maybe include a +1/+1 counter sub-theme. As my favorite character from the first PC game I ever played, Baldur's Gate, I really want to do him justice :D
Sarevok and Raised by Giants actually came up in a previous episode (went and checked, it's 224). Dana mentioned that in playtesting, it was a lot harder to reliably get the trigger than you might think, thanks to the abundance of sacrificeable tokens like treasures and the like that are floating around nowadays.
@@TheSilverFox442 I must have forgotten about that episode. Going back, I do remember it now but yes I was aware already that getting his trigger to go off would be nigh impossible mostly because of what you said, but also because there's no card that just outright prevents sacrifice. It's a shame.
As someone who has a Nassari deck, I love it. But I build it as an “I play your deck” style deck. Blue gives me all the clones I need to copy what’s on the battlefield, and Nassari and similar effects take it from the deck directly. And Joey directly called out like half the cards in the deck.
Dana talking about General Marhault Elsdragon and saying that there is nothing else that encourages you to play lots of Lure effects reminded me that I am literally right now building an Enkira, Hostile Scavenger deck for my son that runs multiple Lure effects. I am even running Tempting Licid, which I think should give me some hipster points. I realize that the Walking Dead Lair is regarded unfavorably and that the Universes within wasn't released until with WOE, but I still think it is underplayed at 86 decks. You have an indestructible in combat commander to make everything block and clear the way for your zombie horde. A sort of anti-voltron where you are trying to get everything except one creature through.
I’ve got a Torgaar, Famine Incarnate deck that I really enjoy. It’s somewhat standard mono-black aristocrats with a sac outlet in the command zone, but as well as halving people’s life total you can also increase you own. Plenty of ways to pay life for things in black, and you can then sac and reanimate your Commander to gain a chunk of life back. I’m surprised it’s only at 256 decks, presumably people are put off by the 8MV but I don’t think I’ve ever paid more than four mana to cast it.
It's crazy how many decks I say "I'll totally get to building this, right after I build these other 3 decks." Then repeat the process every month or so whenever there are new Commander cards printed
A friend of mine played empress galina for a while... and i really wasn't aware of that ANY legendary part... Really hit me hard :D It is REALLY strong though. It Steals all good stuff, counters the good stuff you can't steal and has lots of blue shenanigans... He's often the focus of the table because of that.
Among the underplayed commenders I build, I like Jadar as an alternative zombie tribal leader. The extra spare body you can sacrifice for value or just attack with every turn is kinda cool. Kura is also an awesome mono green variant commander with a land matters theme (Marit Lage, Field of the dead or just Urza lands with huge haymakers). I also have a Jon Irenicus who attempts to give other people old magic cards (up to Urza block). Also a bit less underplayed but a real blast of a commande : Delina ! Roll the dice and have a blast.
stenn, paranoid partisan. only has 275 decks. i recently discovered him while looking for cards for a vehicles deck i was building. he's pretty high powered artifact commander. i run him as a mystic top combo enabler. and u/w have the best arti tutors so it's pretty easy to get it out and blue has the counters for protection.
11:30 I built Nassari after the last time you guys talked about them, the deck is SWEET! I feel like they encapsulate everything I’ve come to love about Prismari’s aesthetic and strategy, and since building it I’ve also built and enjoyed so many more decks with both blue and red color identity. In my experience with the deck though, it’s kind of exhausting to play, and a real challenge to build. Trying to piece together a winning board state from your opponents’ cards while also having to carefully navigate when you should try to kill them is a challenge, because then you lose their stuff. Not to mention people don’t always appreciate you top-decking their cool things, and there are turns where you flip lands off the top and have nothing to spend your mana on. Glad to see them get the nod from you guys again though, it’s very well-deserved for how powerful and slept-on Nassari is!
Dang it, now I have to build rampage/lure tribal. One of my favorite underrated commanders is Subira, Tulzidi Caravanner. There are a lot of attack triggered pumps and damage doubling effects in red. You make your little 1/1 goblin unblockable for just a single mana, then pump it up to a 7/1. Oh, and it has double strike, and red sources deal double damage. Enjoy taking 28 damage from a 1/1. And that's not even taking her ability to draw cards or the fact that there are several red or colorless cards with infect. (Also, Joey, don't complain about my Cultural Exchange challenge. I challenged it as a Wilhelt addition. You should be stealing Matt's stuff.)
My pick for favorite underplayed commander: Korona, False God. Add: a few Vows so it can't attack you, a Blazing Archon, a Karazikar, the Eye Tyrant, a Fumiko the Lowblood and the like, then watch as shenanigans ensue. Fun stuff. Why yes i do love janky decks.
Just on the note of General Marhault Elsdragon I'll mention that Neyith of the dire hunt from the first jumpstart set can actually get similar benefit from lure effects but in card advantage instead of a stat buff
I play a Rune-Tail, Kitsune Ascendant deck and it is based around making your board unstoppable with help from The Wanderer and other plainswalkers the give you hex proof and making your permanents invisible. The creatures I play either give me life points or can block any number of creatures.
My Eisenhorn deck is actually pretty fun. Just make mechanized production your win con, and enjoy pumping out Clue tokens. Stuff it full of recursion instants and boom
I have a Nassari deck (never cast Uvilda) and it is quite fun to play. Stolen Strategy on a stick makes for interesting games, but as Joey said, it's a classic deck archetype in a different color identity. I love that all the red color pairs have at least one exile-matters commander: Uvilda/Nassari in Izzet, Prosper in Rakdos, Faldorn in Gruul, and Bell Borca in Boros (Liara Portyr is more popular, I suppose, but I had to look that up). Another unusual deck I have is an Azorius infect/proliferate deck. Not a great color for that strategy, but that's part of the novelty (and makes an infect deck much more palatable imo).
Many of my decks are helmed by fairly popular commanders, but two of my favorites are pretty unique: My newest deck is Imoen, Mystic Trickster//Far Traveler, focused on Initiative and blink. Imoen turns the Initiative into a better Monarch, and her Ward makes it inconvenient for opponents to deal with her. Cards like Tomb of Horrors Adventurer get MUCH better when you have ways to quickly and consistently clear dungeons. I've won most of my games with the deck, and mostly because my opponents concede in the middle of my 5th time going through the Undercity THAT TURN. My oldest deck is Teysa, Envoy of Ghosts. This one's been through a lot of iterations, but currently it's a hard-line control deck that relies on reanimated creatures to win the game. Teysa herself is a wincon if things go poorly, but is also an extremely effective defender, as she destroys everything that hits you and has protection from creatures to block the things you don't want to hit you. Teysa's only got 377 decks right now and Imoen//Traveler only 46, and while I understand why, I think both could be higher.
I run a Reyhan Last of the Abzan & Gilanra, Caller of Wirewood deck as a golgari +1/+1 deck that is also Hydra tribal. Super powerful because most people run single target removal nowadays and less creature boardwipes, so killing a 12/12 Polukranos just puts those 12 counters onto any other creature. Combine with Master Chef/ Raised by Giants, Pridemalkin for trample, they go ham. Granted, Slurrk is more popular because it pushes ooze tribal, but Reyhan does so much mechanical work that Gilanra being a mana dork that also can draw cards when you play 6 drops, it’s a really good deck basis. I play hydra tribal, but you don’t have to. Also, hipster notice, there’s only 1 deck on EDHREC for Reyhan/ Gilanra. Reyhan/ Sluurk is way more popular, but I wanna flex ahah.
16:10 I got mine from the two-card Collector Booster sample packs in the Brother's War Mishra precon, so if nothing else, just keep buying precons until you get a certain mythic from a two-card pack covering Lord knows how many cards?
Ghost council of orzhova needs to see more play especially as a blink deck. It has a sac outlet built in and it blinks itself to deal 1 damage to a player but built with a reanimate sub theme it does work.
Hitting the end of the video (sorry my other comment I got excited by rona). Akuta, Born of Ash is a really underrated commander for discard decks. While tiny bones and Tergrid are kill on sight type of commanders, the Inherent reanimation of Akuta lends it's self to being a pretty good voltron commander with both of the aforementioned legends as secret commanders in the 99. Equipping Akuta with just an equipment or two makes it lethal in 2-3 hits and people will be forced to use removal on it just to see it come back the next turn. And at the point where Akuta becomes too expensive you reach the point where Tergrid and Tinybones are almost unstoppable.
Lulu, Loyal Holiphant +Guild Artisan is just a powerhouse. Build it around of the Abzan outlast bonus creatures, and other rappers, swing with Lulu against the player with most health, just sad the treasure, and your board gets ridiculous in no time flat. I love this Commander, and it takes little effort to make it great.
I like Donal, Herald of Wings, mono blue that copies non-legendary flyers as 1/1 spirits. It’s versatile, you can go the spirit route, but I just went for the general flyers. There are a lot of great 2-of’s some have great synergy as a duo. Some have just great etb of ltb.
There were 328 non-reprint commanders in 2022, up from 192 in 2021, 184 in 2020, 78 in 2019, and 95 in 2018. That is a lot of commanders. Thats 877 unique commanders since 2018, out of the 1575 commander legal legendary creatures, which means about 56% of the eligible legendary creatures have been printed since 2018. (not:reprint legal:commander year>2017 t:legendary t:creature) / (not:reprint legal:commander t:legendary t:creature). I think this is what people are referring to when they talk about "product saturation", or "overwhelming amounts of spoilers". I think the limited review shows have it easy now! More than a third of all the cards ever printed have been printed in the last 5 years or less.
I’ve been struggling to pick a mono red commander, never thought to consider something like Nassari with two sides. That seems like it would be awesome!
So I have a Voltron +1/+1 Counters Polukranos Unchained deck! I'm ecstatic to see you guys talking about it! Very underplayed and wish players could see the potential! Great video guys!
Currently have a Vohar Cpedh deck and he’s a monster. He’s just straight value and you don’t need to rely on him. And currently I’m building a human tribal Kudro Midrange/Go Wide
My suggestion for underplayed commander would be Zalto, Fire Giant Duke dungeon deck. If no one ever realised he is basically BDSM commander with his own dungeon. Pingers are self explanatory. There is handfull of stuff like Leather Armor etc. But you get bonus points if you persuade your friends to let you play Rod of Spanking which is not legal, does absolutely nothing but is thematic af.
I have him as a backup wincon in my Eloise, Nephalia Sleuth deck cuz that deck can also create an insane amount of clue tokens, food and treasure too with the right cards.
The strixhaven flip legends make me sad…. I really think they should’ve been separate cards that partnered with each other. I think they would be more played if that were the case
Volrath the fallen as a Voltron / mass reanimation commander Fill your graveyard with massive creatures and give him fear / intimidate to kill someone. Then if he gets removed start reanimating big black flyers from your graveyard :)
I built Mina and Denn as a valakut deck. Just hide behind a glacial chasm and with M&D and storm cauldron you never don’t have a mountain to play. Copy valakut as many time as you can and you totally chip damage people out slowly or go for blowout wins with cards like boundless realms/reshape the earth/new frontiers/collective voyage/scapeshift
One of my favorite decks is my Nihiloor theft/blink deck. It's ranked at #640 in edh rec, my play group absolutely hates this deck, so I naturally like it even more. Has a focus on theft/blink but also sanguine bond types of effects as well since i gain life and they lose life every time i attack with something they own. It's very fun to play with.
Anax and Cymede + Crown of flames/ flickering ward + tons of mana = Boros overwhelming stampede. Put in a ton of mana rocks. Put in a ton of token generating cards. God eternal oketra, all the krenko’s, a secure the wastes
This Sunday!!! Titania-Mania!!! Watch this avatar crush Crush CRUSH the competition with an unrelenting pounding of 5/3 elementals. Be there as lands are played from graveyards, go into graveyards or just plan exile themselves!!!
