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Ten Unusual Blue Cards for Commander

Blue Signifies Change!

By Michael Peter ConinePublished 3 years ago 7 min read
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Hey again Commander fans!

I went over some cool white cards last week and artifacts a couple of weeks ago, this week I am focused like a laser on interesting blue cards. Not those staples that literally everybody plays, I am talking about some cool, unique cards with abilities that are hard to reproduce, and have interesting interactions with other cards. Blue has a lot of staples as we know, this makes it harder to fit some of these cards into our 99 (59 really as I usually run 40 lands, none of which are blue).

A little background, many years ago in the hoary early days of Magic, when Black Lotuses ran the fields in their thousands, I collected cards but didn't really play. My first deck I played was a loaner blue deck during a five-player, color-wheel match. As you are probably aware, blue was pretty weak during the '94-'95 era of 4th Edition, Fallen Empires, Ice Age, and Homelands until Alliances was released, bringing with it Force of Will. My best card at the time was Forget, a terrible uncommon (rare), from Homelands. I did have a Mahamoti Djinn in the deck too, but really? In hindsight, it was awful. A few years later I started getting sweet blue cards like Timetwister and Jace, the Mind Sculptor.

The cool kids all played blue for the Counterspells back then but there were actually a lot of sleeper cards that probably were underappreciated because there was no commander format at the time. I am cataloging ten (plus a few honorable mentions) here for your perusal:

10. Taniwha. This legendary creature seems like a beast. Five mana for a 7/7 trampler?!? Drawback? Phasing, "Oh so it's actually a 3.5/3.5 then...". But when it phases in, it phases out your lands. Maybe with some artifact mana (or even an Iceberg), you could be able to wipe out everyone's land (except yours) while those babies are phased. It's a bit of a longshot, but you could also wipe creatures while Taniwha is on walkabout. Not uber-powerful, but an interesting dynamic that has possibilities. Also, it's a reserved list card that could be a commander.

9. Tolarian Serpent. The thing about blue is big, tubby creatures. In this case why on earth would I want a 7/7 snake (sorry, "serpent") that mills me for seven every turn? I don't know, why would you? Maybe fill your yard to empty your library? Get some instants and sorceries in there to power up other (newer) creatures and effects? Or maybe just to mill your own land to draw cards with Pedantic Learning? Perhaps run a little graveyard recursion to put some other tubbies back on the field or Thassa's Oracle to simply win. There are actually a lot of possibilities. Plus it is a reserved list card.

8. Soul Barrier. This is one of the rare damage-dealing enchantments in blue. The damage is preventable, but it also gives you the ability to remind opponents, "Did you pay the 2?". Its two colorless and a blue to cast makes it fairly easy to fit in multi-color decks and helps slow down creature-heavy decks. With some other forms of creature slow-down, like Overburden and Evacuation, this could be a recursive method of damage-dealing/mana drain.

7. Teferi's Realm. This is an old-school enchant world. Funny thing is, it doesn't affect planeswalkers...It can however, affect itself! If you or an opponent chooses non-aura enchantments (the newer wording of "global enchantments"), it will then stay phased out until your next untap step and not affect any other players in the meantime. Then again, it might be used as a political tool to remove blockers, halt potential instants (by phasing lands) or other silly options. The fact that it is on the reserved list doesn't hurt either.

6. Winter's Chill. I will note that since its addition to the reserved list, this card has crept up significantly in value from the old 25¢ rare bin. This is because it is one of the very few blue cards that puts creatures in the graveyard from the battlefield. It is nice to be packing one of these when your opponent sends his (or her) team to stomp you immediately after they paid seven mana for that fatty with haste in a sudden death/finish-you-off moment and have no lands untapped. Oops.

5. Shifting Sky. This card can change all creatures into the color of your choice - forever! This can even turn multi-color creatures into mono-color losers. With a good number of color-hosers in the format, in addition to "color-matters" cards (like Wrath of Marit Lage and Decomposition, amongst others), this helps enable a lot of cards to get you an advantage. Combine it with a few other cards with similar effect, Darkest Hour and Painter's Servant and you get consistency as well as utility.

4. Fade Away. Another of the very few cards in blue that puts dudes in the yard. Timing is key to get the most use out of it. I add it to the list partly due to that, but mostly because it is a potential board wipe (or even mana-wipe!) in the right deck. The lowish cost gets it out early when many opponents may be tapped out trying to get to a decent board state.

3. Peer Pressure. This enchantment in a changeling (or even humans most of the time) deck could seal up nabbing dudes every turn. Honestly, I am surprised that this doesn't see more play considering the metagame. In a dedicated creature deck, it is very effective but in a deck with few creatures and a lot of "steal stuff", it could get ridiculous quickly. A reminder: if you control the creature due to a temporary effect (such as Chamber of Manipulation), this makes it permanent as it gains control of your creatures too.

2. Chamber of Manipulation. Speaking of the Chamber. This card is pretty useful, especially combined with madness or flashback (exactly as it was designed!). Or even cards like Squee, Goblin Nabob or even discarding with a Library of Leng in play, can make for a cute advantage. Additionally, this is one of the only methods of gaining control of an opponent's creature instantly. Sacrificing-for-effect options are also available...hmm.

1. Chronatog. I have this little reserved list guy on here, despite the apparently horrible downside for its ability, it may be kind of a boon depending on your metagame. If you have a bunch of opponents with aggressive creature decks, this card combined with Solitary Confinement, Glacial Chasm, Spiritual Asylum, Platinum Angel, Stasis, et al, the drawbacks of those cards become less prevalent when you just keep skipping your turn during your opponent's turns. A friend of mine came up with a deck using Timesifter (and all zero-cost spells plus Glacial Chasm) that was similar in effect.

I had a whole bunch of honorable mentions this time, but I will only go over two here:

Reality Twist. I put this under honorable mentions because it definitely couldn't be used in an all-blue deck, in fact, you would need a five-color commander to play this baby. It has a similar effect as Naked Singularity, but it doesn't affect blue mana. The cumulative upkeeps on both permanents make them a tad unwieldy as well, but having used it in a deck, it definitely had an impact on the game for a few turns. Use it with Dance of the Manse or Hall of Heliod's Generosity to get it back! This is also a reserved list card and despite two cards printed with almost exactly the same ability, I wouldn't expect to see this type of card again any time soon.

Homarid Spawning Bed. This is another sacrifice outlet if you have both Shifting Sky and Chamber of Manipulation (or similar effects) in play. "Draw a card, discard a card, get dude, sac dude, get more dudes." You could also use it to make a lot of little guys out of a relatively high cost, recursive critter, like Narfi, Betrayer King. Another use could be with Mimic Vat or Helm of Possession, possibly even Echo Chamber.

I had a rough time this week paring down this list as there truly are a wondrous amount of wierd blue cards that I wanted to talk about: Juxtapose, Planeswalker's Mischief, Sunken City, Duplicity...the list goes on -- without even going into color-hosers! Next week I will delve into my favorite color in Magic: Black! The color of power, demons, vampires, and graveyards (and Liliana, mrowr!). Until then, stay cool!

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About the Creator

Michael Peter Conine

Retired Navy vet, served eight years in the Army, then 17 more in the Navy. Married, two kids. I play cards, write and fix stuff. Maybe I will write more in here later...

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