Modern Horizons 3: Top 10 Best Commanders + Decklists

Modern Horizons 1 and 2 are known as two of the most powerful sets Magic: The Gathering has ever released. They both focused on Modern, brought several new features for the formats that could use them, and thoroughly changed how they were played. Modern Horizons 3 will also bring many valuable cards for 75-cards constructed formats, but Commander also got many gifts - both for our command zone and the rest of our 99 cards!

In this article, we'll discuss the new commanders this set will bring us, and what they offer each player and their decks. We'll also consider the essence of the characters, new and old, that Modern Horizons 3 includes.

As usual, for this type of review, we won't consider reprints. Instead, we'll only discuss the legendary creatures from the main set and not the ones included in additional Commander decks, which are designed for EDH.

Rosheen, Roaring Prophet is a great commander who focuses on big spells that cost X. This Giant is everything we expect from a commander with such a specific theme: she lets us filter through our deck and add a card that makes sense with her abilities to our hand, and, on top of it all, she lets us cast this card more easily.

Rosheen will give you tons of mana if your hand is set up nicely according to her theme, and will let you cast your most powerful "X cost" cards. She is incredibly satisfying for players who appreciate big spells that greatly impact the game state.

And, of course, if you untap her with cards like Magewright's Stone, she will give you even more value.

Lately, Mono White commanders found comfortable places to occupy in Commander. Considering Wizards of the Coast themselves recognized their design weaknesses and promised to upgrade white as a color itself, it isn't all that surprising to see decks with this identity will finally get an upgrade.

That being said, comfort is not always a good thing, and, for Mono White decks, their most popular recent commanders, in some way, mostly doubled or triggered some "enter the battlefield" abilities an extra time. Preston, the Vanisher creates tokens that are copies of creatures that entered the battlefield, Delney, Streetwise Lookout copies triggered abilities of small creatures, and Elesh Norn, Mother of Machines is just ridiculously strong.

As for Phelia, Exuberant Shepherd, it gives you this type of recursion whenever it attacks with a Flickerwisp for non-land permanents.

Phelia, Exuberant Shepherd is a bit better than it seems. At first, it looks like just a way to move our permanents in and out of the board, but, in more complex strategies, you can use it to remove an important enemy resource, like a Rhystic Study, for instance.

When we talked about Phelia, Exuberant Shepherd, I mentioned how its design focused on recursion for triggered effects. Pearl-Ear, Imperial Advisor works with another philosophy in this color: auras.

If we analyze it closely, we quickly realize that this Fox is a Danitha Capashen, Paragon, only more aggressive and powerful. It focuses on discounting the cost of your powerful auras, like Eldrazi Conscription, and also draws you cards, so it corrects one of white's biggest flaws as a color.

Out of all the two-faced Planeswalkers in this set, this was the one that I liked the most. Grist, Voracious Larva, on its own, is a cute 1/2 creature with deathtouch. However, when any creature under your control returns to the board from your graveyard, like a simple Reassembling Skeleton, you may turn Grist, Voracious Larva into a planeswalker!

With its planeswalker form on your board, your game plan will be to fill your graveyard and, if possible, find some way to proliferate and get loyalty counters fast - like Carth, the Lion, for instance. Like so, your commander will activate its last ability, which copies all the creatures in your graveyard and turns them into 1/1 Insect tokens. They'll keep their abilities, so keep that in mind when you build this deck.

We don't usually include a colorless creature in this type of article because they tend to be quite limited (as they don't have a color). However, Ulamog, the Defiler is a clear exception - it is relevant even though it is limited as a colorless commander.

This card has an incredibly powerful ETB ability, exiles half a player's deck, and its Ward is also quite expensive. This Eldrazi may quite simply change the course of the entire game just by entering play, as everyone will target it. Furthermore, it might grow even bigger than it already is thanks to the fact it gains counters according to the "greatest mana-value among cards in exile". And the best of all: it gets annihilator X, where X is the number of counters on it.

This commander is perfect with a Lightning Greaves or similar equipment. If you give it Haste, it'll go in, exile half a deck, and attack an opponent right afterward as it also activates its annihilator.

Six, one of Planeswalker Wrenn's Ents, is another incredibly powerful card that is also limited as a one-color commander. Its main ability gives "retrace" to the permanents in your graveyard, as long as it is your turn. As a result, you can cast any permanent in your graveyard if you pay its mana cost and discard one land from your hand.

Another great feature this commander brings you is that it also gives you ways to get your lands back from your graveyard and add even more permanents to it: it lets you mill three cards from your deck any time you attack with it.

I've rarely seen, in all my years playing MTG, a commander with so much potential. The Necrobloom is a white, black, and green commander that focuses on lands. He not only gives lands in your graveyard Dredge 2 (which helps you get lands like Marsh Flats and Terramorphic Expanse back), but also fills your graveyard with cards that you could easily use for other strategies that are abundant in this set of colors.

Its other effect is a Landfall that is very similar to Field of the Dead, a card that was banned in Modern precisely because it creates many tokens from land drops. As incredible as it sounds, even though this effect really matches "dredge for lands", dredge itself is still this guy's main effect in Commander thanks to its great color combination.

This card only occupies our 3rd spot because its colors are a bit limited. According to MTG's color pie, the idea is that green has the best, bigger creatures, but it is still just one color - so its strategies aren't as varied as we'd like them to be.

Eladamri, Korvecdal makes the top of your deck an extension of your hand because it lets you play cards straight from there. Furthermore, its ability is similar to an Elvish Piper, but it also works on creatures that are on your topdeck.

The only thing it could have to be better was black, not only to bring even more value to the countless Elves that use this color, but to also let us use Umori, the Collector as its companion. This would let us build a deck with only lands and creatures.

This card's ability is one of those abilities that get stronger as you read the next line on it: it copies your auras and equipment any time the creature they're attached to attacks. It also doubles the counters on your creatures, but doubling your permanents is on an entirely different power level.

Doubling aura enchantments is, yes, interesting, particularly for cards like Ethereal Armor and All That Glitters, but, unfortunately, auras leave play with the creatures they're attached to. Equipment, on the other hand, doesn't, so they're even more valuable in this strategy.

Keep in mind that an aura with Bestow (enchantment creatures that behave like auras attached to permanents and can become creatures again when the enchanted permanent leaves play) is just an aura when it is copied, and won't become a creature again.

Finally, this card comes in great colors and can access great auras and equipment, besides several unblockable creatures. Its Ward cost is absurdly strong and, of course, it is a flying, lifelink creature, which is always helpful.

This is the strongest commander in this set. It reminds me of the golden age of Simic decks, around five years ago. It is also a bit similar to Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath; Nadu, Winged Wisdom brings the best this color combination can offer. With it, you'll either get more lands or draw more cards.

This works with its other ability, which gives all your creatures an effect you can trigger only twice per turn: "Whenever this creature becomes the target of a spell or ability, reveal the top card of your library. If it's a land card, put it onto the battlefield. Otherwise, put it into your hand".

At first, the fact you can only activate it twice per turn is a bit disappointing. However, this is no longer an issue when you see it means twice per turn for each creature with this ability. This essentially means you'll get a lot of value from a wide board and the right spells. It's also important to keep in mind that this ability also applies to Nadu, Winged Wisdom, so, any time your opponents target it, you'll also get value out of it, even if they do remove it.

We can see why some people called this set Commander Horizons when we see these legendary creatures and a few other cards released in this set.

Modern Horizons 3 will bring a lot to this format, including some fun cards we're all really excited to try out and play with. They might not see play in 75-card formats, but we know they'll shine in our Commander games.

See you next time!