Best known for being a major part of the Modern Krark-Clan Combo deck (also known as "eggs"), Open the Vaults does see a fair amount of Commander (EDH) play, as well. Because of how well Open the Vaults can bring back so many things at once, it has been reprinted in the Call the Spirits deck for Commander 2015 and later in Commander 2016. Not only does it return all Enchantments to the battlefield under their original owners' control, but it also returns all artifacts. Notice that this effect affects all players, so timing this card correctly is critical.


Typically in Commander, Open the Vaults has been used to bring back artifacts more than Enchantments. Sydri, Galvanic Genius and Sharuum the Hegemon have made a place for Open the Vaults for quite some time. Hanna, Ship's Navigator has made the best use of Open the Vaults in the format, as she can bring back either an artifact or enchantment to your hand. Additionally, Kemba, Kha Regent likes the artifact reanimation, too, since Kemba revolves around Equipment, which happen to be artifacts. This puts them all into play, which for only 6 mana can be a devastating late-game play. .


To a lesser extent, Open the Vaults has seen play in some Aura-based decks for Commanders that need a way to get back their Enchantments quickly. Replenish from Urza's Destiny actually does that particular job better. Replenish only brings back Enchantment cards from your graveyard. But despite costing only 3W, it is a fairly rare card to get at this point and holds a high price tag.


Open the Vaults brings back more cards (albeit your opponents' as well) for 4WW, but it costs a fraction of the price. Commanders that don't mind having both this and Replenish in their decks include Uril the Miststalker, Bruna Light of Alabaster, and Zur the Enchanter. Other popular Commanders that use Open the Vaults include Breya, Etherium Shaper and Daxos the Returned.


While the Commander deck reprint depressed the price of the original Magic 2010 printing, the reprint did get copies of this very useful card into more hands. Also, Magic 2010 foils were unaffected by this printing. Interest in this card also increased, as is the case with many cards that are reprinted in a pre-constructed Commander deck. This is a great reprint and fits quite well into the deck which contains it.

Synthetic Destiny is an Instant-speed version of a card released in the Magic the Gathering 2011 Core Set called Mass Polymorph. Despite the crazy potential of a Magic card that can dump a whole bunch of creatures on the board in a hurry, at Sorcery speed, it just never really caught on. Will being at Instant speed, make Synthetic Destiny a card to watch in EDH?

Mass Polymorph only ever saw much play in Jalira, Master Polymorphist EDH decks. Jalira is a fun Commander who can flip utility creatures into huge creatures with big effects for crazy big value. Unfortunately, her ability doesn't allow you to hit Legendary creatures and the critical mass of good targets for Jalira to hit hasn't happened yet.

The other deck that Mass Polymorph saw play in were some builds of Talrand, Sky Summoner in EDH. Talrand typically plays very few creatures in exchange for a bunch of cheap instant and sorcery spells in order to create a whole bunch of 2/2 flying Drake Tokens. If you were to have a Talrand build which actually ran a fair number of big bomb blue creatures, the payoff could be decent.

Does the Instant speed version of Mass Polymorph actually make that sort of Talrand build possible? Can a functionally better version of Mass Polymorph for the same 6 mana give Jalira some extra fuel to be a better Commander? The answer to both questions is yes.

Is Synthetic Destiny a relevant card in EDH? Beyond the right builds of Jalira or Talrand, not really. However, some builds of Ezuri, Claw of Progress have given this card a shot, and he is a highly popular Commander. This card is definitely a consideration for EDH decks that pump out a bunch of tokens and can provide some surprise value for a relatively modest investment of resources.

Herald of the Host is essentially an upgraded version of the classic Serra Angel. The upgrade here is the Myriad mechanic. When a creature with Myriad attacks, for each other opponent, you create a copy of that creature attacking that opponent or a planeswalker that opponent controls. While Herald of the Host isn't incredibly exciting on her own, potentially having four copies attacking at once seems pretty sweet.

As Angels are an extremely popular tribe in Magic, the Herald of the Host should show up in a number of Angel tribal Commander decks, including Aurelia, the Warleader, Gisela, Blade of Goldnight, and Kaalia of the Vast decks all can find the Herald a functional upgrade over Serra Angel. However, in the case of Kaalia, Myriad doesn't activate when a creature is put into play already tapped and attacking, as would be the case with Kaalia's ability.

Whether she becomes widely played in Commander or not, Herald of the Host will be sought after by Angel card collectors everywhere. There have been decks that certainly found a space for her, although not always Angel-themed decks as you might imagine. Commanders that have adopted the Herald include Kalemne, Disciple of Iroas, Daxos the Returned, Trostani, Selesnya's Voice, and Odric, Lunarch Marshal.

Originally printed in Alara Reborn, Necromancer's Covenant is an Enchantment that not only removes a target player's graveyard, but gives you a 2/2 Zombie for each creature that's exiled. Plus, all Zombies you control gain lifelink. With a new Commander like Karlov of the Ghost Council around to benefit from lifegain, this was a perfect card to include in the Call the Spirits deck for Commander 2015.

Before its Commander 2015 reprint, Necromancer's Covenant was included in decks with popular White/Black Commanders such as Teysa, Orzhov Scion, Teysa, Envoy of Ghosts (also in the Call the Spirits deck), Obzedat, Ghost Council and Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter. But in none of those decks has it been a staple. With Karlov loving any lifegain you can muster and Daxos the Returned caring about any Enchantment you cast, this Covenant would see more play.

While the Covenant has a bit of a narrow effect, late in Commander games, you'll usually find a player that has enough creatures in his/her graveyard to have this be worth casting. Plus, if you're already going the token route with Teysa, Orzhov Scion, having some extra Zombie tokens around will certainly help, especially Zombies with lifelink. If you're looking for another Enchantment to round out your 99, this is a good option.

Psychosis Crawler hails from the plane of Mirrodin, or rather the corrupted version of said plane today known as New Phyrexia. However, Niv-Mizzet met up with the Crawler in the past and the two have a very strong working relationship. However, the Lich King Nekusar, the Mindrazer has co-opted the Crawler's services time and again to burn his enemies to the ground.


Much to Arjun's delight, however, Psychosis Crawler has decided to take a leave of absence from the Zombie Wizard's campaign of un-fun Commander matches. He's decided, probably with the advice of Niv-Mizzet, to assist Arjun by making himself easily available in Arjun's own Commander 2015 deck, Seize Control. By affecting all opponents, the Crawler helps Arjun to certain victory by simply allowing our Sphinx friend to benefit from just being himself!

Shattergang Brothers is a powerful Commander from the Commander 2013. Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest is a Legendary Creature from Commander 2015 who can also be a fairly powerful Commander. As the Shattergang Brothers are concerned with forcing everybody to sacrifice a bunch of things, why not take advantage of all those sacrifices by also playing Mazirek alongside? That does seem like a pretty good plan, doesn't it?

This synergy has been pointed out more than a few times recently, but so far, Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest has been understudy to Commander 2015 mate Meren of Clan Nel Toth and Shattergang Brothers' good friend, Prossh, Skyraider of Kher. The synergy with Prossh is fairly obvious, as Prossh loves to sacrifice creatures and Mazirek gives him quite an extra boost, effectively doubling his own ability while also benefitting any other creatures you may still have out. But the synergy with Shattergang Brothers appears to be even more obvious, as you're getting 2-4 sacrifices at a time in a typical multi-player Commander game. That's a lot of +1/+1 counters you're racking up all of a sudden.

Shattergang Brothers' decks have plenty of creatures and plenty of ways to make more on a consistent basis. It's just a matter of working Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest into the deck. I'm sure plenty of Shattergang Brothers lists will find a way to incorporate this very abuse-able pump ability in the near future. He's not one of the more popular Commanders in the game, but this combination could make the Goblin Brothers much more of a threat than ever before.

Daxos the Returned is a Legendary Creature from Commander 2015 that I've briefly reviewed before. While Daxos appears to be more of a "build around me" card in that you need to be running a particularly Enchantment-heavy deck, that doesn't stop players from trying to fit him in their existing Commander decks.

In the 99, Daxos the Returned seems like he could be a good ally for Enchantment-abuser heavy-weight Zur the Enchanter. In fact, it's a question I see asked quite a bit. Can they really join forces and benefit one another?

Previously in my brief initial review of Daxos, I noted that Zur’s ability to put an Enchantment directly into play doesn’t synergize well with Daxos’ experience counter ability. That being said, Zur has a great deal of cheap enchantments (converted mana cost 3 or less) in his deck, many of which you will probably find yourself casting at one point or another.

On paper, it does seem like Daxos the Returned could find a little niche to carve out in this deck. Even if Daxos only nets you a small handful of experience counters while he's on the board, creating a bunch of 3 mana Enchantment creature tokens can't hurt. But the issue is that Daxos's ability makes him far better as a Commander, as once he's removed from the board, Zur doesn't really have an easy way to get him back. So while there is some loose synergy as far as how many Enchantments you would end up casting in a Zur deck, the token plan doesn't really mesh with what Zur is trying to do. That is, lock other players out of the game with a bevy of cheap but effective Enchantments and slowly but surely whittle away your opponents with a protected Zur himself.

Are there other Commanders that could use him effectively as an Ally within the 99? Teysa, Orzhov Scion seems like a good fit, as she's often looking for white creatures to sacrifice in order to exile opposing creatures. Also, because the tokens re both white and black, these tokens benefit from her second ability, as well. In sacrificing those tokens, they become replaced with 1/1 white Spirit tokens with flying. So there is some loose synergy there.. But it's unlikely that you'll amass many experience counters as Teysa only runs a modest amount of Enchantments in her decks.

Daxos's mate from Commander 2015, Karlov of the Ghost Council, does like a bunch of Enchantments in his decks, although the synergy outside of the pure amount of Enchantments you'd be casting isn't obvious. There aren't any other decks in either White/Black or White/Black/Blue that are obvious homes, either.

In White/Black/Green (Abzan), however, there are the popular token-happy Commanders Daghatar the Adamant and Ghave, Guru of Spores. Both decks play a fair amount of Enchantments, and Daxos the Returned could prove to be a useful token generator. Still, it's sort of an awkward combination.

Like a good many Legendary Creatures created specifically for the Commander format through the pre-constructed decks, Daxos the Returned is best utilized when built around as a commander.

by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

Blade of Selves is an Equipment that features the Myriad mechanic, new to Commander 2015. While the effect of Myriad is useless in one-on-one Magic, in multiplayer Commander games, this Blade can be extremely powerful if equipped to the right creature. This Blade gives the equipped creature Myriad, which means for each player beyond the creature the equipped creature is attacking, you make a token copy of that creature which is tapped and attacking each other player (or a planeswalker that player controls). This seems all well and good. Being able to attack every player at once in multiplayer is pretty cool. Getting one or two (or more) extra enter the battlefield effects is just gravy.

The main downside to this is it doesn't work well on a Legendary creature, correct? Actually, despite having to sacrifice the new token copies that enter, any enter the battlefield abilities still trigger. Because of how the Legendary rule works, you can choose to keep your original Legendary on board. Also, because these tokens are forced to be sacrificed, they trigger “when it dies” effects, which for certain Legendaries, such as Kokusho, the Evening Star and Vela the Night- Clad, is a big deal. Ordinarily, you wouldn't get "when it dies" effects since the tokens are exiled at the end of the turn. But with Legendary Creatures, the rule actually benefits you with the Blade.

Most of the time, however, you’ll want to use this Equipment on non-Legendary creatures that have enter the battlefield abilities that you can abuse. Four mana seems like a bit of a steep equip cost, but it’s worth making free copies of creatures. With Eternal Witness, you can get one, two, or more extra cards back from your graveyard each time that Witness attacks! Being an artifact, there are hundreds of creatures that this Equipment will work well with and it can fit into any deck. Since these tokens must be exiled at end of turn, decks that have sacrifice outlets can benefit, as well.

There are so many options with Blade of Selves. Yes, this Equipment is only good in multiplayer games. But this includes any multiplayer format that supports Legacy-legal cards such as Archenemy or Planechase, not only Commander. Since it can fit into any deck being a colorless artifact, this is a super fun, sometimes game-ending, inclusion in a wide array of decks.