The Gathering Final Fantasy Cards Are Already Some of the Best Commanders Ever

Magic: The Gathering’s Spider-Man set will be released in just over three weeks now, and with most cards still being unannounced at the moment, there is a good chance that it will have an impact on the meta in various formats. Yet, its predecessor set a high bar to clear, as Final Fantasy sales were over $200 million just on the day the set came out. Not only that, but several cards from the FF set went on to become game-changers for the TCG, like Magic: The Gathering’s Vivi Ornitier terrorizing the Standard format. Three different Final Fantasy cards are still great, but their impact has been most noticeable in one format: Commander.

Commander is often referred to as the face of Magic: The Gathering for several reasons, like the sales of Commander products, how engaged fans are with the format, the fact that it’s a multiplayer setting rather than the usual 1v1 scenario, and the fact that it can be relatively easy to get into with precon decks. However, precons are rarely great on their own, so one can either upgrade them or use them as a starting point for more complex Commander decks. For those looking to make Final Fantasy-themed decks, three cards are perfect for it because they can scale all the way to cEDH (competitive Commander). They are:

Kefka, Court Mage // Kefka, Ruler of Ruin

Terra, Magical Adept // Esper Terra

The Wandering Minstrel

How MTG’s Kefka Commander Decks Work

Kefka, Court Mage, is a powerful commander because of its Grixis color identity (Blue, Black, and Red) and its ability to become a draw engine while making every player discard. This can be very strong on its own because it means that opposing players will have to discard some of their cards if Kefka is left unattended, and the user can discard valuable combo pieces in order to later retrieve them with the Commander staple called Underworld Breach, particularly if comboed with Lion’s Eye Diamond to create infinite mana and then win the game.

In lower power brackets, Kefka can work as a combo enabler for Waste Not, an enchantment that makes its user create a 2/2 zombie token every time an opponent discards a card, which can be every time that Kefka attacks or enters. To further enable that, one can play cantrips and Displacer Kitten, creating an army of zombie creatures while emptying all opponents’ hands.

How MTG’s Terra Commander Decks Work

Much like Kefka, Terra, Magical Adept’s main strategy is to self-mill cards from the deck to fill the graveyard. This can then be used in combination with Underworld Breach and Lion’s Eye Diamond after storming Brain Freeze, but it can also find success with a Food Chain combo or the usual Thassa’s Oracle + Demonic Consultation.

In non-cEDH decks, Terra can be played with a ton of different enchantments to focus on that as the key win-con. This includes the various Final Fantasy summons in MTG, the many enchantment creatures in the game, or game-changing cards like Sythis, Harvest’s Hand, which is an enchantment creature itself and allows players to draw a card and gain 1 life whenever they play an enchantment.

How MTG’s The Wandering Minstrel’s Commander Decks Work

MTG’s The Wandering Minstrel decks are interesting because they can entirely forfeit the commander’s second and third abilities, and instead focus on the fact that lands come into play untapped. This makes it incredibly strong for land loops in cEDH, often combined with many powerful self-sacrificing lands like Barbarian Ring or combo pieces like Hall of the Bandit Lord and Hermit Druid with Underworld Breach.

Even in cEDH, this can be a relatively budget option because one can play many lands in the deck to get them with Ad Nauseam, and the deck doesn’t necessarily need all the top-end, old dual lands. Landfall combos, land manipulation for all players like extra lands per turn, playing lands from the graveyard, and mass land destruction all work in this type of deck. The Wandering Minstrel is a very adaptable Commander deck in MTG, and it can work with several gameplay routes.