Commander 2014: Top 10 New (non-Planeswalker) Cards

The new Commander deck has been out for almost a week now, and I've had the good fortune to be able to play the decks in a Sealed environment. I highly recommend doing so if you can get 4 buddies together for a full day.

There are a number of exciting new cards released that are having me chomp at the bit to play them in a Constructed setting. I've drummed up a list of the most interesting new cards in the set. I've deliberately left the Planeswalkers off the list as they're in a bit of a category of their own, and fit great in specific decks. The cards in this list are ranked not only for power, but also for their versatility, potential Johnny usefulness (this is a Johnny blog, after all), as well as their long-term monetary value. I try to keep a keen eye on the ebb and flow of card values, and that's something I'd like to integrate into this blog. Essentially, these are cards that I suggest everyone add to their collection.

Decklist: WUBRG Elementals

Before wrapping up the mission I started with my post on building tribal decks, I had one last deck to share in that respect. This one's a bit more of a gimme, as Elementals are not without their innate support cards. I wanted to post a Commander tribal deck before capping things off however, and despite cheating on my part (this isn't that off-brand, as even the commander explicitly helps the tribe) the deck does have its own theme.

Decklist: WURG Tribal Changelings

Come on. Don't look at me like that. Changelings are a tribe too! Sure, they're every tribe, and technically I should be calling this a Tribal Shapeshifter deck. But aren't tribal decks so much fun when you can include tribal cues from any tribe??

Decklist: Monoblue Tribal Djinns

Here's a decklist that took some serious conceptual work to put together. You're probably thinking "But wait, Djinns don't have any tribal synergy!", and you'd be right. What this deck manages to do is weave together a mechanical theme through the tribe, giving us a nice, polished, and most of all thematic product.

Decklist: Monoblack Tribal Clerics

To cap off tribal week fortnight month, I'm going to share a trio of decks that will demonstrate different approaches to tribal deck building. First on the docket is a deck that has a bit of an identity crisis; a Cleric deck that wants to summon Demons and other abominations, but a lot of those Clerics also happen to be Zombies.

Decklist: RG Tribal Hellions

Continuing Tribal Week (more like Tribal Fortnight at this point, amirite), here's another deck I've mentioned in the main article: a Tribal Hellions deck.

Decklist: Monoblack Tribal Horrors

My earlier Off-Brand Tribal post mentioned tribal decks that have no overt strategy to gel it together, but rather more subtle cues that let us build something cohesive if we pick up on them. This is one of those decks.