The Brothers War: Top 10 Best Cards for cEDH

Now that the spoilers for The Brothers' War have come to an end, and we are heading towards its official release, we will analyze its possible impact in Competitive Commander and what cards and abilities might be relevant.

Even though there are others who could see play competitively, I believe these included here are the most interesting.

If you have suggestions, we can also talk in the comments at the end of the article.

10 - Liberator, Urza's Battlethopter

Shimmer Myr has received not only a redundancy but also a nice upgrade, as in addition to the Myr's effect, the Liberator also grows according to the spells you cast, much to the bad luck of your opponents who play with Ad Nauseam.

Even though it's legendary, I don't see it being a commander because it's colorless, but with these new artifacts and artifact decks that are seeing play, I could see this card on some tables.

9 - Urza, Lord Protector

This Urza is half the Urza he could be.

He's a commander who works as a 3-type reducer, very useful for playing with Sensei's Divining Top combos. You can cast some artifacts for 0 and also save mana with instants and sorceries.

With the artifact tutors available in white and blue, it's possible to achieve consistency and a new way to play Top in cEDh, especially if you don't want to play with Elsha of the Infinite as a commander.

8 - Recommission

Now white has gained its Unearth effect, for an extra mana and no cycling, in addition to being able to return artifacts, which makes it much easier for decks with Thassa's Oracle and Walking Ballista to recover your wincon. Also, because of the +1/+1 counter, the Ballista doesn't die when it enters the battlefield.

7 - Meticulous Excavation

This enchantment is quite interesting, its main strength is making infinite mana with Dockside Extortionist, which is nothing new.

Outside this, it doesn't have much use, if you want to try to use it with Peregrine Drake, you would need means to increase your mana generated, demanding much more setup than this card really deserves.

Not to mention that Dockside is already a staple and decks with access to these two colors, and a commander who wins the game for you, if you have infinite mana, won't be a bad addition.

6 - Machine God's Effigy

This card is a hasteless Cursed Mirror that is still a copy.

In blue, we have better copy effects, like Phantasmal Image, but what makes this card a relevant card is being another way to make infinite mana with Devoted Druid, which is nothing new, but gives even more relevance to Thrasios, Triton Hero decks.

5 - Calamity's Wake

Calamity's Wake fulfills two roles within a deck: it has a Silence effect, and it's also a graveyard hate.

As a graveyard hate it doesn't leave anything to be desired, managing to deal with all opponents' graveyards. Unfortunately, it also exiles yours, which makes it impossible for it to be run on graveyard-focused strategies.

As a Silence, the card costs one more mana, but it doesn't lock all spell types, which helps the card to enter decks whose wincon only depends on creatures like Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker. Its weakness, however, is precisely this; if your opponent has a creature combo, the card does nothing against them.

It is still a sensational and strong card, but with its limitations.

4 - Haywire Mite

A reduction in the effect cost of Reclamation Sage/Caustic Caterpillar, the final cost of this creature's effect is . In addition to the cost reduction, Haywire Mite has another problem:

It doesn't deal with enchantment or artifact creatures, which is a problem, as it cannot remove some problematic artifact creatures like Esper Sentinel, Eidolon of Rhetoric and Ethersworn Canonist. Currently, the darling of decks that used to run Caterpillar is Outland Liberator, as it costs less colored mana and has the possibility to break artifacts, without being sacrificed.

But unlike other creature removals, it exiles the artifact or enchantment, making it impossible for those permanents to come back in any way.

3 - Defabricate

As a player, I'm the type of person who hardly plays without a good stack of counterspells in the deck, and who really enjoys thwarting my opponents' plans, so much so that Trickbind is one of my favorite cards.

In this way, Defabricate works as a counterspell for abilities, which is something specific but useful, and it also counters artifact and enchantment spells, exiling them, which takes away the hope your opponents can have of playing Underworld Breach and/or Lion's Eye Diamond.

So, this card is one of the ideal counters to use against opponents' wincons. You stop Thassa's Oracle and Dockside Extortionist, and this versatility makes me believe WoTC will improve counterspells in general. I'm not talking about a better version of a Force of Will, but versatile answers that won't be dead in your hand for some reason.

2 - Brotherhood's End

Brotherhood's End combines the useful with the pleasant, being a board wipe of the right size. For 3 mana, it deals with tons of important creatures, or destroys all artifacts with mana value 3 or less.

That is: you can delay your opponents by removing the mana rocks or take all the small threats off the field. This card will always be useful, so you should play it on lists designed not to be negatively affected by it.

1 - Gix, Yawgmoth Praetor

If you want to compare its effect, Gix has a similar card advantage to Edric, Spymaster of Trest, who was once a very popular commander in cEDH. However, each of his draws costs you one life, like in Tymna the Weaver, but he has no lifelink.

Unfortunately, he doesn't strike me as a powerful commander, not per se. His main problem is being mono black, which brings him a deficiency in protecting his wincon and dealing with spells on the stack.

Even if you want to build a deck for the line it lends itself to going, Gix has no evasion and dies to a Kraum, Ludevic's Opus, not to mention we don't have too many creatures with evasion in black.

After "badmouthing" him, I'll comment on the most interesting part of the card: with his second ability, he allows you to trade all the bad cards in your hand. If you're playing him as a commander, there will probably be many.

Using the cards on your opponent's deck, without paying mana for them and being able to play lands, this makes you able to circumvent the biggest weakness of a mono black, and as usual, you can steal an opponent's wincondition.

If you are interested in Gix, take a look at the article my friend Mateus Nogueira wrote about it clicking here!

This was my selection of the best The Brothers' War cards for cEDH. There are other strong cards, but these were the ones I thought were the best!

If you disagree with something or want to leave your opinion, I'm always available in the comments below. Until the next time!