Three Drops Often Quietly Win Games of Commander

The craziest finishers in Commander tend to cost quite a bit of mana. Whether it’s the Archangel Avacyn and Serra Emissary of an Angels deck, a Craterhoof Behemoth in a go-wide deck, or good old Insurrection, game winning spells often cost a lot of mana – at least when you’re not trying to win with a cheap combo.

As such, we don’t tend to see them earlier than turn 5 or 6 at the earliest in most games, unless someone is “cheating” the pace of a game; think reanimation, bursts of mana, or polymorph effects. 

In order to get to those game-winning turns, you need to play out the early to mid game, which is dominated by two, three and increasingly one-drop spells. Chaining multiple spells in a turn is often better than playing one big one, as it can give you combined effects, powerful synergy, and altogether more board presence.

There are also plenty of ways to get value off of casting multiple spells a turn; think Rammas Echor, or Stella Lee, Wild Card. You won’t get far using these cards if you’re only casting four and five drops. 

Some three drops in particular tend to take over games if they’re not answered. Today I’d like to talk about some of them, and why they should be on your radar; both to remove, but also to play with.

THREE DROPS THAT TAKEOVER GAMES

For veterans of the format, Rhystic Study is a menace. It resolves early, and if there are any players at the table who don’t realize how strong it is, then the Study player tends to get away with murder. As soon as they’re drawing 1-2 extra cards per turn cycle, this thing is paying dividends. When it gets to three or more cards a cycle, they’ve already gotten way too much value. 

Now, obviously some cards are easier to assess than others. Rhystic Study, because of the constant nagging of “do you pay the {1}”, occupies a lot more space on the “radar” of threat assessment, and anyone can see that it’s an absurd draw engine. 

I despise Academy Manufactor, for example, because it tends to let Food and Clues decks overperform. Food and Clue cards already accrue a lot of value by using those tokens, so getting free treasures alongside them is nuts, never mind the fact that it works the other way too. This is the kind of card that doesn’t necessarily win the turn it’s played, but snowballs value or pressure in such a way that you really need to answer it in one to two turn cycles. 

While you might be able to assess Rhystic Study as an immediate threat, and remove it (or failing that, encourage everyone at the table to pay and/or swing at the controller), not every player at the table has such good threat assessment. Manufactor, for many, has to be seen to be believed.

And therein lies the rub: threat assessment differs, per player, per deck, per boardstate, per their cards in hand, per their win condition, ad nauseum. You can’t say for certain how much any given card impacts your opponents. That’s what communication is for, and I encourage y’all to have good dialogue about threat assessment. Sometimes people have to take their lessons through defeat, though, so try not to color that experience with saltiness. We were all rookies once, and Commander has so many cards to evaluate that many new players don’t have that frontloaded knowledge from years of playing.

Second to communication though, is education, so I’m going to impart some thoughts about three drops that are a little less obviously busted.

THREE DROPS THAT QUIETLY WIN GAMES

First up, let’s talk about Braids, Arisen Nightmare. Braids is a fantastic card in the right build, because she nearly always provides a significant amount of card draw and a clock on opponents’ life totals. Unless you’re playing either a tokens deck, one with a lot of easy to access cheap reanimation, or a specific archetype like Enchantress or Artifacts-matter, then you’re going to be caught by Braids’ group-slug sacrifice trigger.

Most players are far too greedy to let go of their developing board state, and so you’re going to be drawing two to three cards every turn, while inflicting 4-6 damage. This is actually bonkers good for just three mana – just compare it to Phyrexian Arena. Braids goes under the radar because the Braids player is also “losing” something, and because it’s “just” card draw. Those extra cards will win that player the game. 

Calix, Guided by Fate is a value engine. In aura-based Enchantress, or enchantment decks with engine pieces, Calix amplifies the rate at which you progress to a win condition. He’s either copying your card draw and ramp (which hurtles you toward peak velocity that much quicker), or he’s copying removal (which slows opponents right down), or he’s copying game-winning Auras like Ancestral Mask.

 He’s often doing it in that exact order, because drawing more cards and ramping helps the Enchantress deck draw into protection spells and the Auras to win the game. Of note, too, is that the +1/+1 counters aren’t just flavor text. They impact attacks and blocks, and Modified checks. 

+1/+1 counters synergies are plentiful, and there are at least a dozen at three mana value or less that you want to nix from the board as soon as they come into play, if you can. We’re talking three drops today though, and those that are most threatening to your chances of winning a game. One in particular that almost single-handedly ruins days is Evolution Sage.

In a counters deck, this thing is best friends with Fetchlands. It can come down and immediately trigger at least two landfall proliferates the turn it is played (and potentially more, if you sequence correctly). With other counter modifiers, this can mean growing the team substantially.

While those huge plays are the ones that stick out, its the incremental advantage, turn by turn, that wins games for Evolution Sage. Oh, and good luck if they’re playing Planeswalkers or Infect.

Another along similar lines to the last is Kami of Whispered Hopes. You’ll often see them together. While it adding on more counters is good, the mana ability is ridiculous. You really need to be careful about this card, because in no time it’ll be tapping for five or more mana, which is the kind of mana advantage that propels decks to the late game in record time.

THREE DROPS AREN’T JUST “TOKEN” CARDS TO FILL A CURVE

Moving on now to look at token-related cards, the first of which is Adeline, Resplendent Cathar. Adeline can put in impressive reps in basically any deck, given her ability to grow large and dump vast amounts of tokens into play. While those tokens are easy enough to chump block, they can still draw cards and trigger other abilities. What’s scary about Adeline is that she tends to grow really quickly.

With ready access to evasion – like the new Brotherhood Regalia – Adeline can end life totals fast. I’ve never been more wary of her in the command zone.

Tokens don’t have to attack to end games. Nadier’s Nightblade coming down can spell doom without going to the combat step. While this is one that you’re less likely to see super early (and not be removed on the way), it’s still going to quietly win games by merit of how much drain you can accomplish with very little setup. It works off of creature tokens, but also treasures, and the various other non-creature tokens in the format. Be very wary.

Tokens can be turned into mana, too, with Jaheria, Friend of the Forest. Jaheria is honestly a busted little Magic card, and one that I feel could easily have been written as “creature tokens you control”. Because, to be frank, having it let you tap your noncreature tokens for mana is absurd. Jaheira is like having a mana doubler in the CZ, and she should be treated as such. In the 99 of any tokens based deck, she’s also going to act like a token doubler. We all know how good Jeska’s Will is, but until you play against Jaheira, you won’t realise quite how good she can be.

THREE DROPS ARE YOUR TICKET ON THE VALUE TRAIN

Sword of Hearth and Home being on this list pains me, because it’s a card I love to play. That said, I can’t write a list of three drops that quietly win games in good conscience without including it.

While ramping and flickering for value is good, it’s the repeated flicker that makes this so strong. Stoneforge Mystic being flickered multiple times, or Heliod’s Pilgrim, or Skyclave Apparition… you name it, and it’s going to be absurdly good to flicker. Protection from green is also very, very good, as it allows good attacks and blocks.

Speaking of repeatable value, Professional Face-Breaker is one that I feel is practically an auto-include in most red decks at this point if you’re playing with creatures. You play it when you already have two or more attackers and it’s basically free the turn you play it. From then on, you’re able to keep yourself topped up on treasure and occasionally peek at an extra card or two if you’re desperate.

This gets much better the more evasive creatures you run, and significantly stronger if you’re on double strike or extra combats. Face-Breaker with double strike was one of the strongest plays in my Neyali tokens deck, and it made me far more wary of the snowballs this card is capable of enabling.

Another treasure maker takes the last of the limelight today: Tireless Provisioner. Seeing this card makes me twitchy, much more so than many Commanders in the format. It’s a treasure engine that doesn’t require spending mana once you’ve paid the three to put it into play.

Part of good threat assessment is knowing when to knock out the foundations versus when to wait for the payoff. In a great many decks in Commander these days, it’s the foundations that need kneecapping. Especially because it’ll punish those who play too few lands. 

END STEP

Threat assessment is hard, and there’s only ever so much removal to go around. You can counteract this by learning more about the types of cards that takeover games. Three drops are more than capable of quietly winning games, so pay attention to them.

You can also respect the power of early drops by playing more board wipes, which I’ll always advocate for, especially as most three and four mana wraths will knock out the vast majority of the cards spoken about today. 

What other three drops take over games? Let us know on BlueSky.