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radramblog · 3 years ago

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Midnight Hunt Commanders (and Midnight Hunt Commander)

Another month, another new set release. This time: Innistrad 3 Part 1, Midsommar edition. I’m sure you’ve read all the jokes at this point.

Still, though, I like running through cards like this. I’ve heard some podcasters and other content creators lament the accelerating release pace because it means you only get to do so much “normal” content between set review stuff. But I like set review stuff! One of the handful of upsides of the hypercapitalist nightmare that is WoTC under Hasbro.

Anyway here’s some spooky things you can put in charge of a scary deck.

Adeline, Resplendent Cathar

While being strictly inferior to Adeline from Kirby, this card is a surprisingly aggressive beater. She’s going to be attacking for 4 commander damage on turn 4, and that’s assuming no ramp or other creatures on the board. Sure, those tokens are probably going to bite it, but that’s something you can take advantage of! Also, curving her into Cathar’s Crusade is both flavourful and also terrifying. White Token Aggro is far from a new concept, but Adeline is quite the efficient example of the trope.

Lier, Disciple of the Drowned

I cannot imagine that many people playing this as the commander. The number one thing you’re going to want to flashback in mono-blue is counterspells, which this card turns off. Sure, there’s some funky things you can do with slow blink effects, but that’s a lot of work for an extra Cancel. With that said, this is going to be in the 99 of so many decks, so I wouldn’t feel bad for Lier.

Gisa, Glorious Ressurector

I guess we’re seeing Geralf in the next set? Gisa is super cool- I’m not huge on just having a hate piece in the command zone, but Gisa justifies it by giving you a bunch of value. I’m not sure how I feel about Decayed as a mechanic, but flavour-wise it works really well, and considering how much you can get out of an ETB or just one attack in this format, she’s probably not complaining. I think you really need a haste effect to get the most out of her, though. But she’s cool as heck, another sick card for everybody’s favourite small zombie goth GF.

Gorex, the Tombshell

Gorex is interesting, as a pseudo-delve threat that slowly regains the value you put into it, and it is also a giant zombie turtle. On the other hand, it’s not especially interesting. I feel like a lot of these “lieutenant” creatures are really hit or miss, and I’m afraid to say I think this one’s the latter. You can’t even play it with Meandering Towershell!

Jadar, Ghoulcaller of Nephalia

This just kinda feels like a waste of a legendary slot. It’s somewhere between Ophiomancer and Dreadhorde Invasion, but significantly worse than both, and you want to put this in the zone? It’s kind of disappointing, especially considering this dude has been on flavour text since the original Innistrad block. Which was 10 years ago.

Jerren, Corrupted Bishop / Ormendahl, the Corrupter

As much as I love Westvale Abbey, the condition to flip Jerren is so utterly specific that I’m not going to bother considering it, so we kind of just have to ignore Ormendahl, powerful as he is. And Jerren isn’t much to write home about either. He wants to be in charge of a Humans deck, clearly, but there’s not really much to support that at all. Like, Xathrid Necromancer and Village Cannibals I guess? Probably taking the pass on this one.

Man there were 4 whole Mono-Black commanders in this one and like one of them is interesting. Gisa’s carrying the colour on her back this time around.

Kurbis, Harvest Celebrant

Kurbis is…eh. The thing with your big +1/+1 counter threats is that damage isn’t usually the thing taking them out, so they’d work better in a deck that tries to distribute the counters more evenly. But then, in order to get much from Kurbis, you’re going to need to shrink them a lot…I honestly can’t see playing this in either maindeck or command zone. It just doesn’t do enough. I do like the “counters equal to mana spent” text on cards like this, at least.

Saryth, the Viper’s Fang

Another 99er. Lot of those this time. Saryth is a great if somewhat awkward way to both abuse and protect things like Circle of Dreams Druid or Faeburrow Elder, or just as another Thousand-Year Elixir for commanders that like tap abilities. But I cannot imagine building this as a commander.

By the way, we’re done with all of the monocoloured commanders. And only 1/3rd of the way through all the cards. I know multicolour is more popular, but this set is kind of dire for those types of decks.

Dennick, Pious Apprentice / Dennick, Pious Apparition

This feels a lot like a fixed Temmet (since the back half gets to deal commander damage) but with a different flavour. He is a card you can get a lot of value from for fairly cheap, seeing as you only pay the tax half the times you’re casting him, and the abilities on both sides are solid enough. I’m not inspired by this commander in basically any way, but he’s pretty much decent on either side and with how cheap he is you could kinda just build the deck however. Sure?

Eloise, Nephalia Sleuth

Finally, a commander for the 6 Surveil Matters cards that were in GRN, which admittedly is more than I was expecting. Eloise is both a solid value engine for sacrifice-y decks that only really have had one Dimir commander in the past (that being Kels), and the trigger on the second ability is surprisingly flexible- it’s clearly meant to work with the Clue tokens she makes and the Decayed tokens from the precon, but it works great with Eldrazi Spawn, Treasures, and any other token creatures you’re deciding to churn through for value. The consistency and efficiency this adds to these kinds of decks is super sweet, and I’ve just checked EDHREC and literally nobody has built her. That is shocking to me, frankly, but I’m sure that’ll change.

Ludevic, Necrogenius / Olag, Ludevic’s Hubris

I heard y’all wanted a new Ludevic since the old one’s terrible? Fuck you he’s dead now. Ludevic’s front face is extremely uninspired, but the real commander is on the back side- he does at least enable the strategy. Olag is, unfortunately, kind of just a worse Mimeoplasm, something I have a lot of experience with seeing as I have a Mimeoplasm deck. It’s actually not cheaper, seeing as Ludevic is minimum 2+5 versus Mimeo’s 5, and you don’t get to play Green so that’s also worse for you. It does start as a 4/4 base, but you’re not getting smaller than that very often with Mimeoplasm, and unlike that card Olag can’t be used as graveyard hate. Exiling cards from your own graveyard in a graveyard deck feels terrible. The long and short of this is just…play Mimeoplasm. They’re underrated these days.

Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver

The first line of text on this dude is super flavourful, I really like the idea of this legion that just keeps getting back up. The second line of text is also really good, seeing as it works with either part of the first half and it generates value in what will be a board-based deck. And while it’s not exactly wrath protection, it does at least give you a pile of bodies for when you do get wrathed, ready to dogpile the guy that dared wipe your board. I’m always hesitant about precon face commanders, because they’re always a little too pushed for my liking, but I really don’t think Wilhelt is fuckbusted- just a very solid commander to helm a solid archetype.

Florian, Voldaren Scion

Excuse me, what the fuck is this Vampire doing in my Werewolf set? Get this shit out of here. Florian is an aberration, and also a frustratingly boring one. He takes significant deckbuilding effort to be good, and even then best case scenario it’s an exile-draw impulse once per turn cycle. Rakdos was doing real well for a while, and probably will keep doing well in future considering the next set coming up, so this is a bit of a disappointment.

Tovolar, Dire Overlord / Tovolar, the Midnight Scourge

I’ve already spent a bunch of time discussing Werewolves in EDH, so I’ll try to keep this brief. Tovolar is the epitome of “fine, here you go”. He’s a powerful Werewolf commander that compensates for the tribe’s weaknesses, gives you card advantage, and echoes an iconic card from the past. He is unquestionably the best Werewolf to helm your deck of the three total real options. I still kinda think you want Naya for this tribe, but if you don’t want to compromise on synergy or lose this effect (and to be fair it’s a lot) then here he is. It’s hard not to be cynical, seeing as I was one of the people fucking pissed at how nothing Ulrich was, but at least he exists now.

Maybe give us another one in Crimson Vow, WoTC?

Katilda, Dawnhart Prime

This is kind of interesting, a proper Human tribal commander for GW. Now, unlike previous, where your options were Sigarda 2 in GW (which isn’t very good) and some other stuff like the Kudros for other colour combinations, Midnight Hunt has a couple new options for this exact deck, but at the very least they all do it a little differently. Katilda is effectively a second Cryptolith Rite, but one that gives you something to do with all that excess mana, which is pretty cool and good- decks that need to commit to the board often run out of cards (on account of having things get broken) and this makes sure you always have something to do with that mana. So sure! If you have a haste outlet it makes Increasing Devotion insanely free and that’s super spicy.

Kyler, Sigardian Emissary

I find this substantially less interesting. Kyler is Thalia’s Lieutenant, but it works a bit better, but also its way more expensive. Anthem commanders are always underwhelming, because the effect is usually mediocre and also you can just…play anthems. But also, it doesn’t take much for this guy to make your team quite big. My biggest issue here is that I just think 5 mana is a lot for an aggressive commander like this, and in order to make him work you need to still be playing things afterwards- so the curve is going to be have to be super wonky.

Leinore, Autumn Sovereign

Our other face commander for this set, Leinore is here to support the Coven mechanic, both making it easier to get three creatures with different powers (especially since she has 0 power herself, which is fairly uncommon) and rewarding you for doing so. She’s another card on this list that basically says “meet condition, draw a card every turn”, but at the very least she’s pumping the squad a little at the same time and she’s not super expensive. I think she’s a lot less interesting than the other face commander, Wilhelt, but she’s inoffensive.

Sigarda, Champion of Light

Aside from immediately slamming into my cube, Sigarda part 3 looks a lot like Leinore in just drawing a card if you have Coven once per turn. The upside, Sigarda does a bunch of damage while doing it, and could feasibly finish someone off if necessary. The downside, she needs to get Humans, and she sure as -hell isn’t a Human herself. This off-tribe-ness is supremely awkward for what is effectively a tribal commander, and as a result I would be surprised if she saw much play in the zone. But seriously she’s so much better than the last one holy crap that card was mid.

Liesa, Forgotten Archangel

I still don’t know why Liesa is…alive… but here she is again. I wasn’t a huge fan of the first card, and unfortunately the second one doesn’t change that. She takes a classic Orzhov commander in Athreos, removes the fun politics and play angle from it, gets more expensive, gets graveyard hate, and loses indestructible. I imagine some Athreos players will switch over since she guarantees a return, but she’s surprisingly boring for such a potentially interesting character. Liesa was one of the defenders of Innistrad along with her sisters, but one that was willing to actually interact with the darker creatures of her world and try to understand them rather than murdering them on sight. When Avacyn got created, she killed the fuck out of Liesa since that shit’s heresy, apparently, and had her name effectively wiped from the records- that she’s apparently been alive secretly the whole time begs a lot of questions and has a lot of potential flavour that this card does not represent. The card certainly can’t bring itself back from the dead.

Vadrik, Astral Archmage

I wasn’t sure about this one, but LoadingReadyRun’s recent deck tech video on it did sell me on it a bit. Vadrik obviously invites comparisons to Mizzix, which is a well-known, kill-on-sight Commander at this point- while I don’t think he’s nearly as powerful as she is, he’s a different flavour of interesting and he is a whole mana cheaper. As well, I do like a lot that he grows himself in the process, giving the deck a board presence that Mizzix’s 2/2 stats don’t really contribute to. I’m still not sure how well day/night will play in the format, but with a deck full of instants you can probably get 2 counters per turn cycle without sacrificing your own tempo, which is decent enough.

Old Stickfingers

I’m not sure where to be on Stickfingers. I love the flavour of this card, just being a scary forest monster that’s just a new but established in-universe part of the world, much like The Gitrog Monster. The card is kind of medium, though, and its text does really confuse me.

Okay, no, turns out I just misread it completely. You know when your brain just fills in the gaps with what it thinks is right? That’s what I did. I thought Stickfingers looked at the top X and just milled the creatures, but it reveals cards until it hits X creatures, which is muuuuuch better. The X cost effectively does act like it does on many a Hydra, but with added value for the graveyard decks it’s sure to lead. That and it can serve as an effective combo commander- just grab Necrotic Ooze and its combo pieces and some Regrowths and you’re good to go. I don’t think the card is going to be particularly interesting for more casual play, but I can at least admit that it’s much better than I’d assumed.

Rem Karolus, Stalwart Slayer

He doesn’t explicitly say as much, but Rem is secretly a spellslinger commander, and one that gives other red decks a lot of trouble with you. Dealing one point of extra damage is rarely going to be game-changing, but it makes many a spell that little bit more efficient, and that prevention ability is the real deal. It’s never that hard to protect a single creature from damage, and if you find a way to do that with Rem, you’re basically immune to damage-based boardwipes, and in a great position to abuse the fuck out of them yourself. The card doesn’t really solve any of Boros’s shortcomings, but it is at least Doing A Thing, which is more than I can say for a lot of the combination’s commanders.

Slogurk, the Overslime

Because Simic didn’t have enough of a lion’s share of the colour pie, here’s Simic doing what is really more of a Golgari or Gruul thing. I don’t hate getting to play with land stuff in blue (beyond Tatyova/Aesi style landfall), but this does feel like an overstepping. Besides the meta angle, the card…I dunno. It’s got a lot going on, but maybe I’m just burned out on playing around lands decks at this point. Slogurk bores me. I do kind of like the idea of hitting yourself with a Traumatize and just killing someone with this, though.

Lynde, Cheerful Tormentor

Our closing act is one that is undeniably extremely cool. Not only is Lynde mechanically interesting, she’s also a new character that is tied to the surprisingly popular “unluckiest planeswalker” guy- I guess it might not have been luck this whole time. Curses are a really interesting build-around idea, and considering there are 29 (30 if you include Accursed Witch) of them in Grixis for Lynde to play with at this point, you do actually get to pick and choose a bit. She does somewhat suffer from being in the colours that basically don’t get to really play around with Enchantment synergy, but between her 3 colours I reckon there’s enough to keep her going- you can run some of Theros’s Constellation things. And she’s just….really cool. Putting the curse on you before you get to move it off to someone else feel so playful, the two cards a cackling compensation from this cruel master of cursecraft.

And that’s the lot of them. Unfortunately, much of the Legendary offerings from Innistrad: Midnight Hunt are seriously mediocre. Many of the cards feel more fit for the deck itself than the commanding seat, and a fair few of them don’t even have much going on for that. There are a few real highlights- perhaps me being so into Lynde, Eloise and Gisa says something but I’m refusing to analyse that- but there’s just so many misses that I can’t help but feel underwhelmed. I think it’s somewhat telling of modern Magic design that there are more commanders in this release than were in the previous two Innistrad blocks combined, and yet despite predating the era when legendary creatures were designed for Commander, most of those cards will be better remembered for the format than this new batch.

#ramble #mtg #mtgmid #innistrad midnight hunt #commander #edh

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