So, you bought a precon, you've jammed a couple games, you've tried your friend's Breya, Etherium Shaper/Krark-Clan Ironworks deck, and now you've got the fever. You're ready to upgrade your existing decks or start building something new from scratch. If you're anything like me, one deck will turn into two, which will, somehow, replicate like rabbits and suddenly be 20+ decks. So, you're gonna need some staples that will cover your bases across all of Magic's colors.
Commander decks need a few vital things to run: the grease for whatever engine you're building. Every deck needs removal and some card advantage, maybe some ramp and a sweeper or two, so that's what we're looking at here. What cards can you snag at your local store or online that you can use basically any time you build a deck with that color?
I've broken down this list of Commander staples by color pie and then colorless artifacts and lands. These are all cards I own multiple copies of, and most are cards I run in multiple decks.
Before we begin, however, let's establish a few ground rules:
- These are meant to be casual cards, so I'm limiting the list to anything < $2 at the time of writing this piece.
- With that in mind, we're going to include cards that are outright bangers (like Swords to Plowshares) and others that are prioritized for being useful and fun.
- Card power vacillates wildly as you move between brackets, so keeping the "casual" theme in mind, I'm looking at cards that will fit nicely in Bracket 2 and still feel relevant and useful in Bracket 3.
White
Swords to Plowshares
The most efficient removal spell ever printed. Get rid of any problematic creature for a single mana at instant speed.
Generous Gift
Got a problem that Swords to Plowshares can't solve? Generous Gift can destroy any permanent for the low cost of three mana and an elephant token for your opponent.
Austere Command
Got 99 problems? Make them go bye-bye.
Sevinne's Reclamation
When it comes to efficiently returning cards from your graveyard, few do it better than Sevinne. Sure, it's limited to lower mana value cards, but there are plenty of those to go around in Commander (especially in white), and the added bonus of flashback makes this is a strong draw to recur an important game board piece, or bounce back after a board wipe.
Unbreakable Formation
Got a big board you need to protect? Unbreakable Formation will save your weenies from a board wipe, and also has a handy secondary mode that can turn your army into an indestructible strike force to close out a game.
Blue
Negate
Your opponent's packing a board wipe? Maybe a spell to exile your indestructible commander, or a game-winning Omniscience? Negate says, "Nope," for two measly mana.
An Offer You Can't Refuse
Wanna say "Nope," for one measly mana, instead? An Offer You Can't Refuse gives your opponent two treasure tokens, which is certainly a cost, but for a single blue pip you can shut down any of their biggest threats, or protect your own. Particularly great in 3+ color decks that splash blue and can't hold up a lot of mana.
Treasure Cruise
This might be Ancestral Recall at home, but Ancestral Recall is one of the best cards of all time—earning a well-deserved spot in the "Power Nine" alongside Black Lotus, the Moxen, and other all-time bangers. Three cards for potentially a single blue mana. Gimme.
Aetherize
Facing down a terrifying army of tapped attackers? Game on the line? Zip 'em all back to your opponent's hand, potentially forcing them to discard to handsize at the end of their turn, and save your bacon in the process. You can even use it to save your own attacking creatures in a pinch, and it vaporizes attacking tokens.
Fact or Fiction
Blue's the color of drawing cards, and Fact or Fiction does just that while also injecting a good bit of politics and high-stakes decision-making into the mix. And, for decks that utilize the graveyard as a resource, you're basically drawing five cards.
Black
Night's Whisper
Drawing cards wins you games, and black offers a lot of efficient card draw at the low, low cost of a few points of life. You could just as easily swap Sign in Blood or Read The Bones in here. Or, better yet, load up on all three.
Infernal Grasp
Black's got a million great spot removal spells, so take your pick, but, for my money, Infernal Grasp is the one I reach for most frequently. Fast, efficient, and no restrictions.
Stitcher's Supplier
What does black love doing? Putting stuff in the graveyard. Doesn't matter if it's your opponent's creatures falling to a spell like Infernal Grasp, or a low-cost creature like Stitcher's Supplier milling your own cards into your graveyard, black's always doing something nasty with the ranks of the dead.
Dread Return
But, how do you get those cards onto the battlefield after they've hit the bin? Dread Return is a versatile graveyard recursion spell that also acts as a sacrifice outlet, keeping the engine going and putting pressure on your opponents.
Exsanguinate
Close out games with a bang, or recover all that life you've spent if you're in a pinch.
Red
Chaos Warp
It's not a clean removal like Swords to Plowshares or Infernal Grasp, and has the potential to backfire hilariously. Still, Chaos Warp is a staple in many red decks (even those with access to white and black) because of its versatility to hit any permanent and avoid sending it to the graveyard, where it might be reanimated.
Faithless Looting
Draw cards, fill your graveyard, and repeat. Whether you need to smooth out your draws, fill your graveyard, dig for an important combo piece, or just trigger your commander's ability, Faithless Looting is never a dead card.
Disrupt Decorum
While goading all of your opponent's creatures might not be as ubiquitously useful as many of the other cards on this list, it's an iconic Commander moment and can help break board stalls and cause mass chaos as you reap the reward.
Shared Animosity
Red loves dealing damage, and if you've got any sort of typal synergy going on, Shared Animosity gets out of control incredibly quickly—a fun way to close out the game with any aggressive red deck.
Abrade
Maybe it's not as fun as Disrupt Decorum or Shared Animosity, but Abrade puts in work by dealing with so many problematic early-game creatures and artifacts.
Green
Rampant Growth
In the color of land ramp, few cards do it as cleanly as Rampant Growth. Sure, more expensive variants like Three Visits and Nature's Lore might be able to grab your shock lands, getting an extra basic land the color of your choice on turn two sets you up for an explosive turn three, which is often all green decks need to assure victory.
Farseek
What's better than getting a basic Forest? Getting any non-forest land in your deck. This scales with the number of colors you play (don't put it in your mono-green deck, like I once tried to!), but it's powerful turn two ramp that can fix your mana in decks with 3+ colors.
Beast Within
See: Gift, Generous.
Garruk's Uprising
Green loves to play big trampling creatures. You love drawing cards. It's a win/win.
Eternal Witness
Need something—anything—back from your graveyard? This little human shaman has you covered, letting you reuse a removal spell at a vital moment, or bring back your Genesis Wave that got countered when you played it into the blue player with two untapped islands.
Colorless
Arcane Signet
Does a perfect mana rock exist? Yes. Goes in any (every?) deck, fixes your colors, ramps you for turn three, and even worth running in some mono-color decks that lack good two-mana ramp options. The first card I add to any new decklist-in-progress.
Swiftfoot Boots
Though not as popular as they once were, these boots are still one of the best budget options for keeping your commander on the battlefield.
Sol Ring
Love it or hate it, Sol Ring lives at the core of the Commander format and leads to more explosive starts and opponent eyerolls than any other card in the format's history. If you're not playing, your three opponents likely are. So good, it probably belongs on the Game Changers list.
Expedition Map
It's not ramp, but it'll find the best or most important land in your deck at instant speed. Need a Bojuka Bog to deal with a pesky graveyard or a Maze's End to win a game? Expedition Map's got you covered.
Fellwar Stone
Even a limited Arcane Signet is still an incredibly useful card, especially if you don't have access to green's ramp and color-fixing. It's very rare that Fellwar Stone won't give you at least one of your colors during the early stages of a game.
Lands
Command Tower
I mean, just read the card. A must-play in basically any 2+ color deck. Just remember, your commander doesn't need to be on the battlefield for it to work, so it'll always be one of the best lands in your deck.
Ash Barrens
Just an all-around versatile land for budget decklists (and even some non-budget decks, too.) Whether I'm cycling it on turn one to fix my mana, or just playing it as a colorless land mid-game once I've got all my colors, I'm rarely upset to see Ash Barrens in my hand.
Path to Ancestry
It's like Command Tower, but has versatility in mono-color typal decks like Elves, Goblins, or Soldiers. The tapped ability makes it a little slow, but a few incidental scries throughout a game can be the difference between victory and defeat, even if you've only got a couple of other creatures in your deck that match your commander's sub-type.
Exotic Orchard
Sure, it gets more limited as the game goes on, but early on it's almost certain to provide you with one or two of your colors, and, at worse, can satisfy most of your colorless costs later in the game. Playing it often feels no different than playing Command Tower, especially if you're staring down a City of Brass or similar five-color land.
Scavenger Grounds
Always eat your veggies, folks. Packing graveyard hate is vital in every deck, and while sac'ing a land is a high price to pay, it's a great pressure valve when your opponent has Rise of the Dark Realms on the stack. Even if it's just a colorless land in nine out of ten games, you'll be thrilled to crack it and blow out one of your opponents in that tenth game. Might not win you the game, but it'll save you from losing.
The Full List
Commander players have access to so many cards, even (or especially) when building more affordable budget-friendly casual decks, so I could write this list a dozen different ways and still feel like I'm missing cards. So, what affordable staples do you put in every deck? And what newer cards are on your radar as future staples?
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