If you want to make a statement while playing Magic: The Gathering, you can’t go wrong with a unique commander. Maybe one that fills an extremely niche role, or a unique tribal-based deck that others might not have thought to use. No matter the case, you aren’t likely to see these legendary creatures next time you play Commander.
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Many of these Commanders might fit outside the mold when it comes to traditional deck building, but that gives you all sorts of freedom to explore new deck ideas. Maybe you’ll be inspired to take your favorite pet card, one that might not be the most optimal card at what it does, but something fun you can experiment with.
10 Hisoka, Minamo Sensei
Hisoka, Minamo Sensei has the unique ability to counter a spell if you discard a card and the converted mana costs of the two cards match. You can counter any type of spell, from creatures to enchantments.
A deck based around Hisoka will have to rely on plenty of card draw and mana ramp to fuel your hand, as well as a wide variety of cards with different casting costs to be able to counter any threat coming your way. Pair it with a ton of hard counters, and you’ll have a hard control deck with a neat Commander.
9 Veldrane of Sengir
If you’re looking for a Commander with plenty of style, you can’t go wrong with Veldrane of Sengir. As the only black creature with forestwalk, meaning it cannot be blocked if your opponent controls a forest land, Veldrane of Sengir can freely attack the unlucky opponent playing green.
Sure there’s a downside to giving him -3/-0, but you can supplement this with all sorts of equipment and enchantments.
8 Livonya Silone
This red/green Gruul commander might be the perfect card if you want a tricky way of sneaking in damage. With first strike, it may already be to difficult to deal with Livonya Silone through traditional combat. Giving it legendary landwalk is such a weird and quirky ability that your opponents will never expect it.
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If your opponent controls a legendary land, they cannot block Livonya Silone. Does an opponent not control a legendary land? Not a problem! Go ahead and give them one with Harmless Offering, and start swinging in with Livonya.
7 Hythonia the Cruel
Hythonia the Cruel is a little pricey as far as commanders go, she costs a total of six mana to cast and has another ability that costs another eight mana. The high cost of their ability though might just be worth it if you want a repeatable board wipe.
For eight mana you can activate her monstrous 3 ability, adding three +1/+1 counters to it, upgrading their stats to a 7/9, and destroying all non-Gorgon creatures in play. While you can only activate monstrous once, there are plenty of sacrifice and reanimation abilities in mono-black to reset her status and wipe the board again.
6 Maeve, Insidious Singer
Goad is a really interesting mechanic and one that you can build an entire deck around with Maeve, Insidious Singer. This mono-blue commander has the ability to goad a creature for just two generic and one blue mana.
When you goad a creature, you force it to attack a player that isn’t you. Maeve, Insidious Singer has the upside of allowing you to draw a card when that creature attacks. Add a bunch of ways to generate extra mana and maybe a few counterspells as backup, and you’ll have the whole table attacking everyone that’s not you.
5 The Red Terror
This Tyranid is a fair card for Commander. If a red source would do one or more damage to something, give it a +1/+1 counter. But what if you wanted to make it less fair? A four-card combo involving Goblin Bombardment, Animation Module, and Mana Echoes creates tons of mana, creature tokens, and damage, while making The Red Terror as big as you want.
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If you’re not looking for combos, try powerful synergistic cards like Manabarbs to deal one damage anytime anyone taps a land for mana, or Pyrohemia to trigger The Red Terror during other player’s turns.
4 Autumn Willow
A 4/4 creature with shroud is pretty good all things considered, as there’s basically nothing your opponents can do to it other than wipe the board.
Unfortunately, if there’s anything bigger than Autumn Willow in play, you can’t safely attack. Autumn Willow has the unique ability to allow a target player to get around shroud, giving you a turn to add any enchantments or equipment you want to power it up.
3 Kalitas, Bloodchief of Ghet
If there’s one thing that Kalitas, Bloodchief of Ghet is good at, it's making friends. In a big mono-black deck, Kalitas, Bloodchief of Ghet will need plenty of support to make this happen.
Add all sorts of mana accelerators to get it out quickly and then load up on ways to untap Kalitas like Umbral Mantle or Paradox Mantle to keep untapping and keep blowing things up. After a few turns of this, you’ll have a whole army of everyone else’s creatures.
2 Dragonlord Kolaghan
This big ol’ Dragon is a hasty, flying beater for six mana. But Dragonlord Kolaghan doesn’t like attacking alone, giving other creatures you control haste so they can join in the fun.
Kolaghan rewards players for playing bigger creatures with combat triggers like Etali, Primal Storm and Kroxa, Titan of Death's Hunger for immediate rewards.
1 Sun Quan, Lord of Wu
You will rarely see Sun Quan, Lord of Wu at your Commander group for a few reasons. Sun Quan was printed in Portal Three Kingdoms, a set designed to introduce Magic to countries in Asia with a very small print run of English cards. Because of their rarity, they are expensive and can be hard to find.
Sun Quan also has a unique ability called horsemanship, this ability is functionally flying, but since it was only found in Portal Three Kingdoms, your opponents will be very likely unable to block your attacks.
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