6 Fantastic Six-Drops You Should Try in Commander

When you think about what Haymakers to slot in at the top of your curve in Commander, you’re wanting a balance of power and efficiency, and solid raw stats. These 6 Fantastic Six-Drops tick all of the boxes. 

CHOOSING A GOOD SIX DROP

When you choose a good six-drop for your deck, you want it to be something you’re always happy to draw. It needs to be good in multiple stages of the game, such as the midgame and the lategame, and on different board states – whether you’re ahead, behind, or at parity. If you want to learn more about how Quadrant theory applies to Commander, we’ve got just the article. Otherwise, let’s look at some great examples of cards you’re always happy to see. 

6 FANTASTIC SIX DROPS

METAMORPHOSIS FANATIC

This one got a surge of interest on release (as a card in the Aminatou Duskmourn Commander deck), but has since not see the levels of play I expected it to. Outside of Aminatou decks (of which it features in 39%), Metamorphosis Fanatic sees surprisingly low play in decks like Henzie, Meren of Clan Nel Toth, Indominus Rex, Alpha, and Celes, Rune Knight, where inclusion rates vary between 3.5% and 12%. Personally, I think this card deserves better.

Instead of paying life with Phyrexian Delver to reanimate something, you’re paying a single mana more for a 4/4 with Lifelink and granting your exhumed target a Lifelink counter. Big life swings are what win casual games of Commander, so this is quite the tempo play. What’s more, being able to give a creature that doesn’t ordinarily have Lifelink the ability opens up some really interesting lines of play. Eidolon of the Great Revel? Kederekt Parasite? You can even build your own combo enabler for Sanguine Bond. 

ANGEL OF INDEMNITY

Recursion is always better when you’re filling your own yard. For the times when you’re not, good stats are essential, which is why I’m high on Angel of Indemnity. Having a 5/5 Flying Lifelink for six is also just… really reasonable? Much like Metamorphosis Fanatic it brings a lifegain tempo swing, but this time in the form of being able to Encore it from the yard. 

If you’re a cultured mono-white or W/x player, you’ll already be on board with why this card slaps, but in case you’re not – this is white ramp, baby. It gets you back fetchlands, so at the very least, you should be playing those to make sure you always have something to bring back.

ULVENWALD HYDRA

Sometimes your deck just wants an arbitrarily large creature, but often you don’t really care too much where it comes from. What’s more, that largeness doesn’t need to be infinitely large, or even as large as Yargle and Multani. You just need something bigger than a 7/7, ideally up to a 20/20, to help block or to use to sacrifice for mana or cards. 

Enter Ulvenwald Hydra. It immediately replaces itself by ramping you, and it has Reach, meaning it can shut off annoying Flyers completely.

It’s also not just a ramp */* creature – it’s a land tutor, into play. Whether you’re getting Yavimaya Hollow, Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx, Field of the Dead or Mount Doom, you’re going to be over the moon to get your best land into play. If you’re in black to recur it, white or blue to flicker it, or red to give it haste, you’re laughing. This creature is oft overlooked outside of landfall decks, but I play it in everything from Gruul stompy to Enchantress. 

FEAR OF BURNING ALIVE

I was alerted to just how much of a synergy piece Fear of Burning Alive could be in a game the other night. My opponent was on Jaxis, and their win conditions involved a mixture of burn and copying creatures that could enable said burn. When you look at this Uncommon, you mostly see a wall of text, and Red Dragon’s EtB trigger. I love a bit of Red Dragon, but fact of the matter is, Fear of Burning Alive is just better in a lot of decks.

Assuming you have delirium, you’re also burning out a mid-size creature on this EtB too. And, provided the rest of your deck is set up to sling out noncombat damage in consistent lashings, it’s going to be a one-sided boardwipe on a body that can eliminate most small to medium sized boards in a turn cycle or two. 

In the mid to late game when engines are set up and this comes down, you’re going to get a tasty tempo swing if all goes to plan.

VEIN RIPPER

Much like Wrathful Red Dragon, Vein Ripper kinda reads “play a boardwipe and win the game”. I love a boardwipe as much as… well, I would say as much as the next person, but that’s not true. I love them more than the average player, and I think we should all play more of them. Rather than bore you with regurgitating that take, though, I’ll stick to the topic at hand. 

Vein Ripper succeeds in the same way as Wrathful Red Dragon because it gives you actual incentive to run wraths. When you can threaten the table with a large life point swing if the board gets too big, you’re in a commanding position. Assuming there are 20 creatures in play when you drop this (which is a reasonable estimate), you could wrath and get twenty triggers, leading to a 40 point drain.

This works well, too, when you’re ahead, as it disincentivizes opponents from wrathing you. I should probably pick one of these up myself, to be honest.

FEAR OF SLEEP PARALYSIS

We need to round things off with a blue card to keep things balanced, eh? So, for that, let’s look to Fear of Sleep Paralysis – a very real fear of mine, I’ll tell you that. It’s not the sleep paralysis that gets to you – it’s the anxiety around falling asleep in the aftermath, knowing it might happen again. It’s exhausting.

Anyways, the card itself is a slam dunk in Enchantress decks, and if your Enchantress build is in blue, then… why aren’t you playing it?

Inclusion rates on EDHRec are pretty solid for the obvious builds (Aminatou, Marina Vendrell, Master of Keys) but then start to drop off pretty sharply. Personally I feel it’s a better than 19% inclusion rate in Lynde, Cheerful Tormentor builds, and certainly deserving to be in more than 4.8% of Tuvasa the Sunlit builds. Hell, there’s even an argument to put it into more UW stun counter builds than it currently sits in. Those decks know they can run a flicker suite, right?

END STEP

The six-drops we showcased today are among a new era of haymakers in Commander. They combine efficiency, power, and effect, and deliver on all axes. Have one we didn’t cover? Drop it in the comments on social.