Top 10 Best Commanders from Murders at Karlov Manor - with Decklists!

Murders at Karlov Manor is the newest Magic: The Gathering set. Set in Ravnica, this set doesn't really focus on the disputes between the guilds in this plane, which are so iconic and common, and instead highlights the mysterious murders that have been going on.

Just like every detective story and 'whodunit' tale, this set gives us several important characters, new and old, to develop its story, which can only mean one thing: legendary creatures. And, where there are legendary creatures, there are always new commanders.

In today's article, we'll evaluate the new commanders in the base set, and disregard the exclusive commanders in extra products, such as precon Commander decks and the special set based on Clue, the game, which uses MTG characters. We'll see their pros and cons and the best strategies we can build for them. This will all help us solve a mystery that is perfect for MTG players: Which are the best commanders from Murders at Karlov Manor?

This commander is quite direct, so we'll be brief. Alquist Proft, Master Sleuth has Vigilance and creates a Clue token when he enters the battlefield, which is relatively common and simple.

His greatest asset is his second ability: it is similar to a Sphinx's Revelation, but it has recursion and works as long as you have Clue tokens available. The fact it has such a powerful ability and Vigilance to attack whenever possible can create incredibly interesting game situations, particularly in a competitive deck with several cards that are efficient or powerful, but don't have that much synergy between each other.

Still, this commander is the worst commander in this list and is probably better as one of the other 99 cards in your commander deck.

The Pride of Hull Clade, at a first glance, looks like a casual card, and already pushes us to a classic situation in which we'll use Assault Formation to make our creatures attack with their toughness. However, it turns into a different, better, commander when we read one of the sentences in its text: "Whenever this creature deals combat damage to a player, draw cards equal to its toughness", which, in this case, for instance, would mean drawing fifteen cards.

This commander's greatest asset is precisely that it converts toughness into card advantage. Otherwise, it would be a simple Arcades, the Strategist but without one of its most important colors.

Still, even with its incredible card advantage, this type of deck provides us with more strategies to draw cards than strategies that use them. It creates a lot of value, but it loses this same value because it has no way of using it, which restricts this Crocodile Elk Turtle into our ninth spot.

And, of course, if we buff its toughness just a little bit more, it can attack directly with commander damage, which is always a bonus.

I won't lie: to me, this is by far the most boring commander in this set, but, at the same time, I have to admit she deserves a spot in our list. Everyone who sees her thinks the same thing: "I'll use Blasphemous Act to get a million health points", or "with her, End the Festivities becomes a Wrath of God and will also give me a lot of health points", which gives this legendary creature numerous fans who think she'll reinvent the wheel.

If we analyze her objectively, Judith, Carnage Connoisseur is nothing more than a Firesong and Sunspeaker which uses different colors, and these commanders aren't that popular nowadays, even if they are strong. This deck's performance depends on how much this different color affects this strategy.

Do you remember when Elesh Norn, Mother of Machines came around? A powerful creature that served as a Panharmonicon and, on top of it all, was represented by one of the most beloved characters in MTG? Even though she was incredibly strong, her limitation was that she only worked with effects that were triggered when permanents entered the battlefield, and therefore would lose her rhythm when you emptied your hand or didn't have Stax pieces, such as Hushbringer, for instance.

Delney, Streetwise Lookout tries to be a balanced version of this effect because it doubles all triggered effects in creatures with two or less power, be it when creatures enter the battlefield, such as Novice Inspector, or with effects like Wojek Investigator, which triggers at every upkeep.

This deck will use small creatures, a la White Weenie, once this commander's second ability makes creatures with two or less power Unblockeable to creatures with three or more power. Therefore, creatures like Spirited Companion and Mangara, the Diplomat fit this strategy really well.

Unfortunately, everything that is fun in this strategy is also restrictive, considering only small creatures get the benefits of these effects.

At first, Aurelia, the Law Above seems to be an extremely aggressive commander that focuses on clearing the board, and brings a very simplistic Boros strategy that attacks with a true battalion at each combat phase. However, this changes when we notice a particular phrase in her text: her effects trigger when any player attacks with a specific number of creatures, not only when the player who controls her attacks.

Indeed, these abilities work incredibly well if you choose to put all your creatures forward in an ultra-offensive strategy, but maybe using a Disrupt Decorum to Goad all creatures you don't control is much more interesting. Or perhaps even bringing Stax pieces in White to protect ourselves would be better. There are countless ways to cause discomfort and intrigue at your Commander table with this commander!

Niv-Mizzet, Guildpact works like Niv-Mizzet Reborn, her other half from the last time we visited Ravnica, and focuses individually on each card with precisely two colors, which symbolizes each guild in this plane.

It is a simple effect that heals us X health, draws X cards to a target player, usually us, and deals X damage to any target any time Niv-Mizzet, Guildpact deals combat damage to a player. What decides the value of X is precisely the number of different color pairs on the two-color permanents you control, that is, how many of the ten Ravnica guilds you have, which can go from 0 to 10, depending on how developed your board is.

The simplicity in this Dragon's effect is what makes it strong, considering it becomes stronger according to its X value and not because of its complexity. At the end of the day, Niv-Mizzet, Guildpact is one of the most fun and powerful commanders in this set, and is perfect for Ravnica's greatest fans!

It is not surprising to see this creature in our list. Besides its incredible creature type (Mole God), Anzrag, the Quake Mole is also powerful on its own.

It is a Gruul commander with impressive stats for its cheap cost, and it focuses quite heavily on extra combat phases. However, Anzrag, the Quake Mole goes beyond its classic Gruul conduct, which focuses on combat: it smells like a combo strategy, and can create several combat phases in a row, or even force a tie in very specific situations.

By activating the ability that forces our opponents to block Anzrag and giving it Indestructible with a Withstand Death, for instance, we can defeat our opponents and create several combat phases in a row. We can do this even if we equip it with a Lure.

This Mole God can be used in several fun ways and bring incredibly interesting decks, which makes it an excellent choice both for combos and aggressive strategies. Unfortunately, it didn't make our top 3 precisely because it is a bit too linear, regardless of how we use it, and therefore it doesn't bring us many options besides what we've already discussed.

This commander brings us a lot of card draw and removal. Massacre Girl, Known Killer works really well when we use spells that reduce the stats of enemy creatures by -1/-1, be it with this commander or through counters like the ones Black Sun's Zenith gives us, for instance. Whenever a creature your opponent controls dies with 1 or less toughness, Massacre Girl draws you a card.

All of this is already quite promising, but her design can shine even more: this legendary creature gives your creatures Wither, a forgotten mechanic that allows your creatures to deal damage in the shape of -1/-1 counters, which encompasses all the cogs in this engine.

When I read this card, I already considered combining it with Necroskitter, which revives enemy creatures that died with a -1/-1 counter, which brings more value than a simple card draw any time your opponent loses a creature. Nest of Scarabs and Spitting Dilophosaurus can also make a deck with this commander fun.

Massacre Girl, Known Killer undoubtedly deserves this spot in our top 10, considering it brings us a fun deck with a lot of space to explore different mechanics. And, on top of it all, she is also a character that is beloved by many players.

Vannifar, Evolved Enigma allows us to revisit the mechanics that involve face down cards and that existed in other sets; they last appeared in the Tarkir Block, with Morph and Manifest. This commander is quite flexible, considering she allows us to use Cloak, a version of Manifest with Ward 2, or use colorless creatures, to which she can add counters effortlessly.

Vannifar's game plan is quite sophisticated and focuses on different cards according to the strategy we use with her. Once this article is about Murders at Karlov Manor, for instance, we can use Ixidor, Reality Sculptor to boost our face down creature cards, which allows us to untap a Portal to Phyrexia, for instance.

Unfortunately, there's still something missing in this card. And, fortunately, we have another card in this set that shows the true potential of face down cards...

When I saw this card, I thought about a crazy idea: one deck that only has permanents, doesn't use instants or sorceries, and uses Adventures as best as it can. I'd use engines that allow me to use Cloak and Manifest recursively, such as Whisperwood Elemental, for instance, and at the end we'd have an entire deck focused on destroying and sacrificing face down cards that will come back as very expensive permanents, such as Blightsteel Colossus, Pathrazer of Ulamog and Earthquake Dragon.

This is an extremely wild idea, but, with Yarus, Roar of the Old Gods on the board, we can create several situations that focus on mental games, in which your opponent will have to choose the least terrible situation possible when it's time to block and remove face down cards. This makes this commander so strong that it can distort the fabric of Magic: the Gathering rules and transform every match into a Yu-Gi-Oh! TCG match.

We can build several Yarus, Roar of the Old Gods decks with fun, powerful abilities and draw countless cards with its ability, if the idea is to be as aggressive as possible. It is definitely the best commander in this set.

I was impressed when I saw two commanders that work with face down cards at the top of our list. However, we shouldn't get ahead of ourselves and think Disguise fixes all our problems with face down cards with just Ward 2. These cards are in our list because they have strong, interesting abilities, and not because this mechanic is suddenly strong.

See you next time!