Lorwyn Eclipsed officially releases on January 23rd. In addition to the main set, Lorwyn Eclipsed also has two Commander precons and those decks have some really great legendary creatures in them.
However, those aren’t the only cool potential Commanders in the set. In this article, I’m going to take a look at 5 legendary creatures in the main set that make for really cool Commanders. In particular, I chose 5 legendary creatures who make for the most unique experiences.
ABIGALE, ELOQUENT FIRST YEAR
Abigale has a really interesting “enters” trigger and it’s also very flexible and quite powerful. You can use it to nerf an opposing creature by taking away all of its abilities – although it has to have some pretty awesome abilities and a fairly small body for it to be worth doing, otherwise you might be giving your opponent a Baneslayer Angel.
That’s why it’s preferable to use Abigale’s trigger on one of your own creatures. And luckily, Magic has tons of creatures with great stats and abilities that are massive downsides. Being able to shut down the negative aspects of a card like Phyrexian Soulgorger, and then also turn it into the biggest threat on the board feels pretty great.
Not having to deal with the Soulgorger’s cumulative upkeep, Rotting Regisaur’s discard, or Nyxathid’s debuffing effect is already really good – but it gets even better when that creature can take to the air and become an incredibly imposing creature on just about any board.
DORAN, BESIEGED BY TIME
At first glance, Doran does not look like a particularly unique Commander. Mostly because we’ve seen several toughness-matters Commanders over the years. But it’s very easy to misread this card (I speak from experience, because I misevaluated it during my set review on YouTube) especially because the original Doran only cared about high toughness.
But he doesn’t. Doran’s “attacks or blocks” trigger checks to see if a creature has any difference at all between its power and toughness. In other words, he also offers a serious buff to creatures with power higher than toughness. And that’s not something we’ve seen on a legendary creature before.
This makes Doran a capable Commander in a wider variety of decks than it might seem at first. And if you really want to surprise people, you can just fill your deck with high-toughness and low power creatures.
With Doran in play Groundbreaker can attack as a 13/6. Kalakscion can attack or block as a 12/7. Force of Savagery needs some kind of anthem for it to stick around, but once you have that, it can attack as 17/9!
MARALEN, FAE ASCENDANT
Maralen, Fae Ascendant is a typal Commander and normally that wouldn’t be especially interesting, but she has a few things going on that make her one of the cooler Commanders in the set. First, the fact she groups Elves and Faeries together gives you a wider variety of choices when it comes to what creatures to include in your deck.
Second, her Sultai identity makes her the only Faerie Commander that can actually run almost every Faerie in Magic. Other Faerie Commanders don’t have access to the Green ones.
Third, her typal payoff is also more interesting than most. It’s not like she just buffs your Elves and Faeries. Instead, she lets you steal cards from your opponent and potentially cast them for free, making for more of a value engine playstyle.
To get the most out of her, you’re going to want cards that can generate multiple Faeries and/or Elves so that you can both trigger her exile effect more and more consistently cast the spells she exiles. This means Bitterblossom and Bitterbloom Bearer are going to be great ways to consistently trigger her, and cards like Faerie Slumber Party and Notorious Throng have the potential to single-handedly trigger her multiple times.
LLUWEN, IMPERFECT NATURALIST
One of my favorite cards from original Lorwyn-Shadowmoor block is Worm Harvest, so of course I’m going to love a Commander who is effectively Worm Harvest with legs, right down to the ability to use it every single turn. Lluwen also comes with the major upside of helping set himself and other graveyard nonsense up by milling cards when he enters.
To get the most out of Lluwen’s ability to generate Worm tokens, you’re going to want to build a very land heavy deck. That way you almost always have one in your hand to discard, and a massive chunk of the cards in your graveyard will also be lands.
While that might sound like a bad idea, it’s not like Lluwen is the only payoff around for having lots of lands in your graveyard. Cards like Life from the Loam, Six, and actual Worm Harvest all give you lots of other bonuses for having lots of lands in your deck.
You can also take a page out of the Legacy Lands playbook and run lots of land tutors alongside many utility lands that are good in particular situations. For example, you can grab your Bojuka Bog when you need to hate on the graveyard, or Mosswort Bridge when you’ve met the requirement to get a free card
Basically, Lluwen is a great Commander for overwhelming the opponent with land value and Worm tokens, and that sounds like a lot of fun to me.
BRIGID, CLACHAN’S HEART
Brigid, Clachan’s Heart starts out by giving you really good value for three mana – a 3/2 and a 1/1, but it’s her Shadowmoor self that most intrigues me. She can flip to that side fairly easily, and once she does she can produce some absolutely explosive mana.
While there are plenty of GW Tokens commanders out there, Brigid is the only one who can both help you populate the board with tokens and produce tons of mana. You can even use Brigid, Doun’s Mind’s ability and then transform her back into Clachan’s Heart when that interests you.
Obviously enough, you’re going to want to be able to go really wide to make the most of her mana production, and you’re also going to want some awesome stuff to spend all that mana on. The cards that are going to work the best are those that can do both of things.
There are lots of X spells out there that can make creature tokens, and those are a perfect fit for Brigid. Among the more interesting ones are For the Common Good, which pays you off for making tokens more broadly, and March of the Multitudes, which also has Convoke, making it even easier for you to crank out a ton of tokens.
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Lorwyn Eclipsed has lots of cool legendary creatures and I couldn’t possibly cover them all here. Which one do you think can make for the coolest Commander? Let me know over on X or Bluesky.
Jacob has been playing Magic for the better part of 24 years, and he especially loves playing Magic’s Limited formats. He also holds a PhD in history from the University of Oklahoma. In 2015, he started his YouTube channel, “Nizzahon Magic,” where he combines his interests with many videos covering Magic’s competitive history. When he’s not playing Magic or making Magic content, he can be found teaching college-level history courses or caring for a menagerie of pets with his wife.