Cards that are surprisingly effective

[bobthefunny]

Are there any cards that you have played with recently that just seem to perform better than you expected? I don't mean things like hidden gems that tend to be niche finds that fill a specific role for a Commander... I'm talking about cards that you slotted in, perhaps even well known ones,


I slotted Commit // Memory into a deck as I wanted a catch-all removal spell akin to Beast Within or Chaos Warp. Usually I prefer those catch-all cards to cost 3, but I figured I'd let Commit // Memory slide since it would also serve as backup card draw and hand replenishment.

What I found was far more favorable however. Since Commit pseudo tucks, it handles indestructible targets, which Beast Within or Generous Gift would not. Since it can also target spells, its counterspell capabilities have been quite clutch in preventing powerful effects. The hand replenishment has been quite useful, and since the deck I put it in has a propensity to excessively draw, the Memory half has saved me from decking out by re-shuffling my graveyard at key moments.


In similar vein Beanstalk Giant // Fertile Footsteps has been a solid addition to several decks. While 3 mana is a bit slow for a Rampant Growth effect, the ability to not be a dead card is valuable in the later game. I worried that the lack of any keywords at all would make him drastically pale in comparison to something like Ulvenwald Hydra, but granting Trample is practically second nature in green, and the Giant ends up being a prime target for Vivien, Champion of the Wilds or a mutate target for Gemrazer. The split aspect of the adventure allows me to increase both the ramp and threat density in a deck, as well as keeping an available 'free play' on the side should I ever need it.


I also have to give a strong approval to Once and Future. Initially I simply considered it as a Regrowth stapled to a Reclaim (with maybe an upgrade to a double Regrowth), but it ended up being so much more. Having twice the effect on a single card is quite large. Instead of simply replacing itself with another card, keeping your hand even, Once and Future actually gives you card advantage, not just quality. Even more important, the regrowth effect is now at instant speed. Whether it's getting back an important piece in response to grave hate, or being able to set up a play at the EOT and saving some mana from your main turn, or even getting back chief responses when needed, Once and Future has been more flexible than I initially anticipated.


Finally Kogla, the Titan Ape has been a nice package of value when played. Aside from just being a large fatty, the removal on entering means that he trades at least card for card, and the ability to break things on attack is fantastic. I've gotten good mileage out of him even without having humans to protect him. Haste obviously makes him that much better as well, should you run Surrak, the Hunt Caller, or splash into red for Rhythm of the Wild.

[toctheyounger]

Finally Kogla, the Titan Ape has been a nice package of value when played.

I'll second this, he's a beast. Jack of all trades, master of none, but that's fine. There's just a lot of options on one card with him, and all of them are relevant and helpful.

It's a little bit niche, but fits in more places than you'd think. Archfiend of Ifnir. It wrecks up the place, and all you have to do to make it happen is draw to more than 7 a turn or loot a little.

Otherwise, Mirrorweave is one of the most swiss army knife cards ever printed. It's nothing new obviously, but it's pretty underrated. You can blunt an attack on yourself, beef up your own attack, get you a whole lot of activated/triggered abilities, you can even nullify commanders for a turn, as well as whatever batsh*t chaos tStorm and his Zedruu build gets up to. It's seriously versatile.

[Outcryqq]

Mirage Mirror is way better in practice than on paper...and it's good on paper.

[frogchild]

Isperia The Inscrutable! She is one of my favourite commanders of all time and she is deceptively good. A 5 mana 3/6 that tutors if you have the generally bad hand reveal cards ain't great at first glance, but the deck gets running fast and is incredibly strong

[darrenhabib]

Mirage Mirror is way better in practice than on paper...and it's good on paper.

I'll second this. Mirage Mirror is one of those cards that isn't that tangible in theory-crafting, but just does really good work in games that you could never have planned for.
Always outperformed for me in games.

Cards that trigger on opponents discarding without needing to support them with your own cards.
Waste Not, Tinybones, Trinket Thief, Geth's Grimoire, Confessor.
It's no secret that Waste Not is an incredible card, but normally it's slotted into decks that look to force opponents to discard.
The thing is that commander games often work in ways where opponents are discarding cards for whatever reason and you can think of these type of cards as pure card advantage through no design at all.
I've come to playing Dark Confidant in most black decks these days. It draws you a card each turn, cool. But Tinybones, Trinket Thief surprisingly can draw you multiple cards a turn without needing support just because of the varied nature of commander that includes discarding.

Mayhem Devil has a similar effect in that you don't need to actually design around it all that much as sacrifice is such a keyword on cards played by opponents unwittingly. Machine gunning down mana creatures or utility creatures becomes the real deal in multiplayer games.

Winds of Change. Normally thought of for "draw" triggers, but no card imo can single handedly wreck opponents games, especially on the first turn for a single mana. Mulling into no lands or all lands often happens. It's amazing how often you'll be left without a game plan after this card is cast by an opponent. Get on that band wagon now.

[frogchild]

@darrenhabib Tinybones can only draw one card per turn. It's if an opponent discarded a card this turn, so it only triggers once. It can trigger multiple times a turn cycle though.

[darrenhabib]

@darrenhabib Tinybones can only draw one card per turn. It's if an opponent discarded a card this turn, so it only triggers once. It can trigger multiple times a turn cycle though.

Yeah turn cycle is what I mean't. My comparison is that Dark Confidant will draw you one card, where as surprisingly Tiny will draw you 2 cards (or more) for each turn (cycle) you get. Maybe he won't draw you any as well, but I've been pleased with amount of cards you'll get versus say Phyrexian Arena. I'm confident that Tiny will draw you more cards on average than either of the single draw per turn I've mentioned.

[MeowZeDung]

Otherwise, Mirrorweave is one of the most swiss army knife cards ever printed. It's nothing new obviously, but it's pretty underrated. You can blunt an attack on yourself, beef up your own attack, get you a whole lot of activated/triggered abilities, you can even nullify commanders for a turn, as well as whatever batsh*t chaos tStorm and his Zedruu build gets up to. It's seriously versatile.

Discovering Mirrorweave through these forums was an intense level up for my fun factor in Commander games. That card is sweet. Likewise for Knowledge Pool, though it lends itself to chaotic, zany gameplay if that's your thing.

Vanish into Memory has never been bad for me. It's amazing the situations you'll find to make it work in your favor. There's almost always a creature with some +1/+1 counters on it or a skewed P/T ratio, and even when there's not you often get a fresh hand and discard the chaff.

Mandate of Peace is another one that I was skeptical of when I first saw it, but it has been an absolute house for me. Incredible in a deck with Sunforger since you basically feel invincible with forger equipped.

Tragic Arrogance is a massively underrated board wipe.

Narset's Reversal kind of does it all. "Steal" an early ramp spell. Copy your own awesome thing. Counter a combo. Big time overperformer for me.

I suppose it can be a bit niche, but I find cards that make token copies of a creature without exiling/saccing EOT to be surprisingly good. Far better than they look at first, at least. Quasiduplicate, Fated Infatuation, Cackling Counterpart, Saheeli's Artistry, and the well-known Rite of Replication have all been super fun good timey cards in a variety of situations for me. I first really got into them in Brudiclad, Telchor Engineer because I wanted any and all token copies of Seven Dwarves I could get, but then I found that Saheeli's Artistry on something like a Precursor Golem was stupid good. Yeah, I guess that's the definition of "niche", but there's a whole lot of this "niche": Make a token copy of Psychosis Crawler or Consecrated Sphinx then wheel, or Archangel of Thune then gain some life, or Emeria Angel/Avenger of Zendikar then play and crack a fetchland, or Balefire Liege then start storming off, or Beast Whisperer then play a creature. On and on it goes. Really it's not even bad to do it with the temporary tokens from Mimic Vat, Heat Shimmer, Twinflame, etc.

[Hawk]

I just posted in my new deck's thread, but I was really impressed by Kraul Harpooner in my new "Samut Fires" deck. EDHRECs seems to indicate that it's mostly only played in dedicated Insect/Warrior/Undergrowth/Fight decks (only 600 some total), and I only included it due to being light on cards I wanted and needing a low-curve filler thing that said "EtB" (although there's also a very minor Warrior Tribal subtheme). The card was amazing though. Turns out, there's a ton of fliers in EDH. This thing natively kills Alela, Artful Provocateur and Jodah, Archmage Eternal and you only need 1 or 2 creatures in the 'yard to make it also kill popular commanders like Atraxa, Praetors' Voice, Korvold, Fae-Cursed King, Arcades, the Strategist, Kess, Dissident Mage, Brago, King Eternal, Feather, the Redeemed, and Niv-Mizzet, Parun for about half of the most popular commanders in the game. It hits less of the popular creatures list, but certainly not zero of it.

This is worst-case scenario a 3/2 Reach for 1G (a fine rate) or a sorcery-speed Plummet (also a fine rate), but with a floor like that it's also scary to think of the ceiling which is this is a cheap Ravenous Chupacabra in Green. The multiple mays in the text means it is really hard for opponents to "get you" with it; you can bail at almost any point of that fight looks sketchy. It also loves my mass-haste to be a "Ball Lightning" if I need it too. I don't know if it's quite staple territory for me, but I also previously would have pigeon-holded it as just a silly little theme card for silly theme decks, and I think it's actually just a really really good card that should be played a lot more often.

[Sinis]

Tamiyo, Collector of Tales has been surprisingly good for me. The +1 is only really exciting in self-mill decks or Shadowborn Apostles/Persistent Petitioners/Relentless rats deck, but the passive anti-discard/edict and -3 are totally reasonable for 2UG.

Probably not unknown, but Stunt Double has also been wild for me in every deck I've played it, while hard to quantify on paper. Somehow Clone with Flash is more than twice as strong as Clone without Flash.

Lazotep Plating has been really good to me. Someone tried to Bojuka Bog you? No. Someone targeted a creature of yours? Er, no. Someone played an edict that didn't target you? Okay, I'll sacrifice my 1/1 army token.

[toctheyounger]

Ooh, another one I've had incredible mileage from is Fires of Invention. I run it in Purph 2.0 where I don't overly need to cast a ton of spells per turn, so it probably fits best in a deck where you're leaning on activated abilities and mana sinks heavily. Maybe a superfriends build or similar.

Nonetheless, people side eye it all the time. 2 spells per turn? You're mad, that's way too restrictive. Thing is, for all intents and purposes it's a mana doubler and then some. If you have 5 lands in play you get a free, say, Acidic Slime and Zealous Conscripts on top of whatever else you want to sink your mana into otherwise. It's honestly really tremendous value. I was skeptical it would go the distance in this format, but it's basically been an 'I win' card in Bronze Purph.

[ConstantMists]

I find that Gather Specimens is a house when timed well. Watching someone else put a Living Death or an Avenger of Zendikar on the stack and see me play this is priceless.

Also fun is Ertai's Meddling to stop an "uncounterable" spell. Your opponent cast an Obliterate and you calmly exile it for a few turns. Most games turn into archenemy at that point as you all try to remove the caster from the game before that spell gets to resolve.

[Hawk]

Lazotep Plating has been really good to me. Someone tried to Bojuka Bog you? No. Someone targeted a creature of yours? Er, no. Someone played an edict that didn't target you? Okay, I'll sacrifice my 1/1 army token.

Ooh yeah, seconded - Plating has been everything I've wished Simic Charm to be in my UGx counterish decks. The fact that it Hexproofs you as well can give it a major leg up over not just charm but even Heroic Intervention, and it is less restrictive and more versatile than Hindering Light (the body is also very relevant in making it pretty playable) . It's a totally sweet card and I'd run it in any Ux deck that can take advantage of the body.

[Sinis]

It's a totally sweet card and I'd run it in any Ux deck that can take advantage of the body.

Edict effects are common my group (Oath of Liliana and Fleshbag Marauder are fairly common, and one of our players also plays Smallpox). So, the 1/1 body attached is pretty great, too.

[MeowZeDung]

I forgot to mention in my earlier post: Keep Watch has been really great for me (ty @WizardMN!). I run it in my Kykar, Wind's Fury token build where it can really be bonkers, but in any meta where creature decks are relatively common it's good. I mean, if any creature deck attacks with 3 creatures you've gotten 1 card per mana at instant speed, which is pretty good. Plenty of alpha strikes involve 10+ attackers though, and what's great about Keep Watch is that it can dig you into interaction before blocks. In my Kykar deck's case that means Mandate of Peace, Settle the Wreckage, Boros Charm, Mirrorweave, or Fight to the Death just to name a few great options.

[GabrielleAngelfire]

Angel of the Dire Hour has been very good to me when games go really long. It's saved my butt multiple times, plus the look of horror on the face of an opponent who is on the receiving end is priceless. I've also used it before to save an ally, and as a political tool. (Something like "I can save you from those creatures if you do X")

[DirkGently]

Mirage Mirror is way better in practice than on paper...and it's good on paper.

Hard agree with this. My favorite is turning it into a land when someone tries to blow it up. So juicy.

One that I threw in a deck for lulz but ended up being insanely good was Orzhov Advokist. Your opponents have to telegraph exactly when they plan to go for your throat, giving you ample time to prepare - AND it's just a casual Citadel Siege for your own creatures. And since it's kind of upside for your opponents, it draws a really low threat profile. Excellent design for a commander card imo, exactly the kind of stuff I'd love to see more of.

[Cyberium]

Release to the Wind is one of my favorite. It protects your permanent and allow you to reuse its EtB/Cast trigger, or keep a threat away temporarily. After you ultimate a PW, you can Release it and use its ability again, a pain for those who want to get rid of your Ashiok, Dream Render/Narset, Parter of Veils.

[3drinks]

I'm sad to not see a mention of Mogg Salvage here. It's crazy just how often a free Smelt is a game changer.

[MeowZeDung]

I'm sad to not see a mention of Mogg Salvage here. It's crazy just how often a free Smelt is a game changer.

Never seen it before. Could be a nice inclusion in some decks. That flavor text is on point. Love me a good word play.

[3drinks]

I'm sad to not see a mention of Mogg Salvage here. It's crazy just how often a free Smelt is a game changer.

Never seen it before. Could be a nice inclusion in some decks. That flavor text is on point. Love me a good word play.

I picked up the foil when it was still bulk, now it's a $8 foil. Glad I did, though I'm not a foil hunter. Card is as live as REB, you won't regret grabbing it.

[WolfWhoWanders]

Always love me some mirrorweave, and mirage mirror. Both are incredibly solid additions to almost any deck. Lately I've seen Plunge into Darkness do a lot of work for me. Great for digging out an answer to someone threatening to win. Also Sword of Sinew and Steel has been a very effective sword. Removes artifacts from anywhere and pro black and red is very relevant.

[Guardman]

A card that has been really effective for me is Cinder Cloud in any mono-red deck. It is an unique effect for red that I've gotten a ton of great use out of since a lot of times mono-red has trouble dealing with large creatures.

[Sinis]

A card that has been really effective for me is Cinder Cloud in any mono-red deck. It is an unique effect for red that I've gotten a ton of great use out of since a lot of times mono-red has trouble dealing with large creatures.

I like it, though, how do you feel about Fissure or Aftershock? Not that I think those cards are a ton better (sometimes the direct damage is super relevant, especially if it's something like Zacama, Primal Calamity or The Ur-Dragon)...

Also Sword of Sinew and Steel has been a very effective sword. Removes artifacts from anywhere and pro black and red is very relevant.

Seconded on the Sword; Blue and black have such trouble with Artifacts, and this just lays waste to them. Also, eff them planeswalkers. Half the value people get on them is the pseudo-fog when you have to attack into them, and Sword of Sinew and Steel let's you just carry on like they're nothing.

[ISBPathfinder]

Pithing Needle / Sorcerous Spyglass / Suppression Field / Cursed Totem / Linvala, Keeper of Silence - Stopping people from activating their commanders has been HUGE for me lately. It seems really odd and probably a little meta dependent but ohhhhhhh boy I hate Kenrith / Azami / Yawgmoth / Urza sooooooooooooo much. I think its a bit worse given how many of these legends I mentioned released in the last year.

Monarch - I am a big fan of playing mono white and Monarch kind of snuck up and surprised me this year. Its not a new mechanic but I started playing it a lot heavier in a lot of my mono white decks. It turns out, white is very good when it comes to combat defense given sweepers and big vigilant creatures. One of white's weaknesses being card draw the mono white monarch cards came out and surprised me this year. Palace Jailer, Palace Sentinels, Protector of the Crown, and Throne of the High City.