Whether you play Pauper, Pauper Commander, or you just enjoy rifling through the draft chaff of a set for hidden gems, Common and Uncommon are sometimes the most exciting cards in a set. Reality Fracture brings some great Commons and Uncommons, so let’s check them out.
REALITY FRACTURE PAUPER PICKS
The Top Commons first – let’s check out the cards most likely to see play in Pauper.
Surgical Precision is probably the most hyped card from the set for Pauper. Precision is really interesting for the current Pauper metagame, as it destroys top-end Cascade creatures in Gruul Ponza, along with Mono-Blue Terror’s Cryptic Serpent and Tolarian Terror, and Grixis Affinity’s Myr Enforcer. The fact that it’s also cyclable in poor matchups gives it a lot of utility. Though there isn’t a meta-defining lifegain deck yet in Pauper, this is another tool available for a potential lifegain deck to break the top ranks, perhaps based off of the White Aggro shell.
Looking beyond Pauper, Surgical Precision is a shoo-in for any lifegain based Commander deck. It gives removal and card draw that triggers any number of permanents that care about you gaining incidental life.
Empower Jace brings Pauper its first Planeswalker, and the card most likely to see any success in the format is Protege’s Awakening, with its massive Empower Jace 6. It’ll draw you up to three cards, and gives a life buffer. We think this’ll be the one that sees the most extensive testing, as it hits the sweet spot of achievable mana cost with strong effect.
Twinned Vision seems like it has Pauper potential, giving a nice mashup of Think Twice and Abandon Attachments. It’s not enough on its face to bring back a Sneaky Snacker in decks like Dimir Terror or Mono Red Madness but can do so from the graveyard or from exile. Either way, it’s still a highly playable draw spell that will see play outside of Pauper even if it doesn’t quite make a splash here. It has potential for Standard, and in Commander decks with impulse draw, you’re getting two cards off of it the first time.
PAUPER COMMANDER, YOU SAY?
While the Constructed 1v1 aspect of Pauper is the more popular Pauper variant (and regular Commander the more popular Commander variant), Pauper Commander (or pEDH) is slowly gaining more and more fans. There are two new potential Commanders for this format – a format with an uncommon creature as your Commander, and Commons in your 99.
First up we have the Pauper Voltron capabilities of Traxos, Academy Guardian. A four mana 1/5 flyer with vigilance is already a strong start, and the fact that you can deploy it starting at two mana before Commander tax helps you to build your board a lot quicker. Throw in the prowess trigger and you have a sizeable Voltron threat.
Elsewhere, Tomik, Izzet Sparkmage lends Pauper Commander its first truly attractive option for mono-red Spellslinger, uniting all manner of Guttersnipes and incidental burn with a two-drop Prowess creature that amplifies damage. This is also really interesting for the fact it buffs a lot of the early game damage sweepers to help take out more of the set-up creatures and popular Commanders of the format.
Tomik is also going to be great in regular Commander with a statline like that.
IT’S THEIR WAY OR THE HIGHWAY
Looking further afield now, we’ll turn to the Commons and Uncommons that will be highly playable in Commander.
The “Way” cycle of Empower Jace enchantments have some real potential. Way of the Pyromancer is two mana ramp, and a two mana Planeswalker with a {+1} ability – don’t underestimate it. Way of the Mind Sculptor and Way of the Paradox make up the best of the rest, slotting nicely into Superfriends builds, giving extra draw and land drops for just playing the game. That kind of synergy is always good.
Speaking of Superfriends, there are a full ten common dual lands, with the rider that they enter untapped if you have a Planeswalker in play. Atraxa players on a budget will be overjoyed, and so the WUBG lands in this cycle in particular should see decent amounts of play. They’re perfect for budget conscious Commander players.
Granting Planeswalkers extra abilities is cool design space, and Kiora of Salt and Sand is an interesting win condition to try in your Superfriends decks – essentially a way to win that isn’t combo. She grants all your ‘walkers the ability to conjure 8/8 Hexproof Leviathan tokens for {-8} loyalty, and has an early game ability if you draw into her sooner: attacking can untap a creature and give it unblockable if you’ve activated a loyalty ability this turn. She might have lost her spark, but Kiora hasn’t lost her edge.
ACROSS THE MULTIVERSE
Danitha, Sword of Hope gives Equipment decks another draw engine. While the most hardcore of Equipment decks won’t want this once-per-turn three drop, budget players or those with a more focused typal list, like Knights or Humans, will happily take new Danitha. Keep in mind that casting a Blacksmith’s Skill to protect her in an opponent’s turn will also draw you a card.
An Uncommon that might see more play than Danitha is Teyo, Lightshield Expert. Teyo comes in and gives a permanent hexproof until end of turn, and also a +1/+1 counter or loyalty counter, as a treat. This is a handy trick for Planeswalker led decks like Tomik, Wielder of Law, and works well in flicker shells as repeatable protection.
Divining Duelist is another in a long line of creatures that can combo off with cards like Splinter Twin. Decks that want to win with tap/untap combos will be happy to have another consideration, and Merfolk and Wizard typing give it some extra flavor.
Sphinx’s Approach is at base an instant speed Divination, which is about the baseline for three mana these days. If you do go for the “oops, all Sphinx’s Approach” kind of deck, ala Dragon’s Approach, you also get to exile four of them to tutor a Sphinx into play. It’s cool to have another option for this archetype.
Geist of St Thalia should see Standard play and even perhaps Modern play in the Spirits deck that refuses to die. She’s a two mana flyer than reduces your noncreature spell costs, after all. In Commander she should see a good amount of play in Spellslinger decks and artifact decks, and also in decks that play cheap evasive flyers.
Koth, the Geomancer is what happens when you give red access to Lotus Cobra. While it doesn’t come down as early (and it’s also restricted to triggering only off of Mountains), Koth is still a sweet card for red decks to boost their mana generation. It’s particularly interesting for the non-green landfall style decks that cycle fetchlands and tutor lands into play with equipment and recursion. If you’re playing Valakut Exploration, you’re probably interested in this.
Manadorks that can tap for more than one mana are always worth a look. Bloom Tender and Marwyn are heavily played for their mana generation, alongside Selvala, Heart of the Wilds. Getting a board of different power creatures in play is easy enough, and Loot, the Nexus is going to average somewhere between Bloom Tender and the higher mana producers like Marywn and Selvala. Solid.
Speaking of Marwyn, giving your lands Hexproof with Marwyn the Preserver is worth a look for decks that use highly powerful utility lands like Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx, Cabal Coffers, Glacial Chasm and Maze of Ith. The mana sink ability to return lands from graveyard to hand makes this one highly playable in decks like The Gitrog Monster.
Pia, Aether Ascetic is an enchantment tutor in green, which is pretty huge. The cost of discarding a card to do it is pretty reasonable (and forgettable). While Selesnya decks have some better options to tutor to top of the library (or grab an Aura), Pia represents a very competitive option at three mana, to hand, on a creature.
CHARMED, I’M SURE
Reality Fracture brings with it a new series of charms – how do they stack up to the originals? Fatehold Charm is decent, with a bounce or Remand and most of a Draw 2. Theorix Charm’s mill mode isn’t the greatest outside of mill decks, but the other modes are pretty okay to the point it becomes fine as part of an overall mill strategy. Stingerquill Charm can bolt face, or force bad blocks, or put more pressure on the board, which seems very good for aggressive decks in Constructed formats. Konstrari Charm seems the most Commander-worthy, rolling together a buff with evasion, removal for a flyer, and a ritual for those turns where you need “just one more mana”. Rounding things out is Vigorbloom Charm, which seems to me one of the stronger Charms with three relevant modes: protection, card draw with lifegain, and a fight spell.
The final card to talk about is this charming delinquent: Stingerquill Voxmancer. It has a one mana prepared spell that deals damage and triggers anything that wants you to cast an instant or sorcery or noncreature spell, or do damage to face, and it automatically prepares itself each turn. That’s on a one drop, too, which makes it quite attractive.
END STEP
These are the most useful and potentially powerful Commons and Uncommons from Reality Fracture. While we’ve made efforts to draw attention to the headline cards for Pauper and Pauper Commander, we’ve also covered cards that’ll be useful beyond those formats. Did we miss a hidden gem? Let us know on socials.
Kristen is Card Kingdom’s Head Writer and a member of the Commander Format Panel. Formerly a competitive Pokémon TCG grinder, she has been playing Magic since Shadows Over Innistrad, which in her opinion, was a great set to start with. When she’s not taking names with Equipment and Aggro strategies in Commander, she loves to play any form of Limited.