A couple of weeks ago, I was lucky enough to get my hands on a Compleat Bundle, which contained an oil slick Mondrak, Glory Dominus, essentially obligating me to build a Commander deck around the gaudy goofball. The issue is that mono-White tokens pulls from a pretty limited and well-researched pool and thus builds itself automatically. Grab an Anointed Procession, a Divine Visitation, a smattering of Smothering Tithes and Smugglers’ Shares, and you’ve built a Mondrak deck (or a Myriel or Bennie Bracks, Zoologist or Adeline, Resplendent Cathar deck).
Scrolling through EDHREC, I found myself paradoxically stultified and still drawn to build around the Dominus. Eventually, I hit on the card that the deck crystallized around: Spawnsire of Ulamog. With a Mondrak out, you can pay (4) to create four Eldrazi Spawn tokens, and then sacrifice them all to repeat the process. I realized that, with an Anointer Priest or Soul Warden out, this allows you to gain infinite life, and I was off to the races.
I ended up with a pretty stock Mondrak list with an Eldrazi token sub-theme, which reminded me of fond days forcing Spawn in Rise of the Eldrazi Limited. It may still be under the solid but dull umbrella of “Mondrak tokens,” but there’s a charge to relying on a ten-mana creature to seal the game, and the experience made me revisit all of the Legendary Creatures from the non-Commander-exclusive cards in All Will Be One to see what pairings I could track down that might go beyond the first draft.
The set gave us twenty-eight Standard-legal Legends, and I wanted to give them all their due—not every set includes such a preponderance of interesting Commanders, particularly when they round out the complete panoply of colors.
The Domini Phyrexian Commanders
As mentioned, Mondrak is especially fun with Spawnsire of Ulamog, but I’ve also been enjoying her with Ancient Stone Idol. It’s not uncommon to cast the Idol for zero mana, since you’re apt to be attacking with a dozen or so tokens, and getting a pair of trampling 6/12’s if they deal with the Golem is excellent. You’d also be amazed at how quickly Lightning Coils gets out of hand, although it is a big situational.
Tekuthal, Inquiry Dominus—Anything Chisei, Heart of Oceans does, Tekuthal does much better. Skimming Cumulative Upkeep counters off Mystic Remora, managing your Sagas to get extra uses out of them, setting up pseudo-locks with Glen Elendra Archmage, or cracking open Thing in the Ice are all possibilities. But the most stylish thing you can do with Tekuthal—the most flavorful option for the Cthulhu squad—is animating a Dark Depths with Scatter to the Winds or Part the Waterveil and shaving off the counters for a speedy Marit Lage.
Drivnod, Carnage Dominus—Born to be in the 99 of a Teysa Karlov or Ashnod the Uncaring deck, Drivnod on his own is somewhat stale. Blood Artist effects and Pitiless Enforcer and Kokusho are the order of the day, and it’s a deck we’ve seen before—unless we add Eternal Scourge as fodder. A 3/3 is low impact in Commander, to be sure, but it’s a stylish move to skim the Scourge out of your yard to make Drivnod Indestructible and still have access to it. Some synergy is potentially game-ending; other examples are just cute.
Solphim, Mayhem Dominus—Mayhem, sure, but Solphim represents inevitability. Sulfuric Vortex is the easy pick, but as someone who played a fair amount of Core Set 2020 Limited, Chandra, Awakened Inferno is the card to fear here. Taking Chandra to eight and Shocking your opponents each upkeep is hard to deal with; ironically, it’ll minimize the mayhem as it most likely makes you a target.
Zopandrel, Hunger Dominus—A huge Unnatural Growth that can become Indestructible for no mana (unless you got an oil slick misprint), Zopandrel initially looks like just your standard Trample-enabling smash mouther. Best friends with Goreclaw and Old One Eye, but not exactly a Commander to inspire creative deck building—unless we focus more on the toughness doubling side of things. Assault Formation becomes the centerpiece, and we can run Silverback Elder, Silklash Spider, and Arasta of the Endless Web, along with Green’s multitude of high-toughness walls and, of course, Tree of Redemption.
The Non-Domini Monocolor Phyrexian Commanders
Elesh Norn, Mother of Machines—The MoM is generally going to be pretty self-built. Panharmonicon, Teleportation Circle, and the usual enters-the-battlefield value squad all show up, but what if we went another direction? What if we made the Mother of Machines just a bit more maternal? Hunted Lammasu, Charmed Griffin, Noble Heritage, and Wedding Ring would definitely help ameliorate the sting of the unilateral Torpor Orb. Shared Triumph lets you do a little “one for me, one for you” action, while Modern menace Solitude gets a little less menacing and a bit more versatile.
Kemba, Kha Enduring—Colossus Hammer, sure, various Swords of X and Y, certainly, but it’s a Standard-legal interaction that I’m most drawn to: Lion Sash. The quasi-Scavenging Ooze is good on its own, but when it can either pick up loose Equipment or snap on to another Cat that just hit the field, it really picks up some versatility. Simba—sorry, I mean Kemba—isn’t doing anything new, especially in her second iteration, but if you’re in the market for mono-white Equipment Cats, she’s up for adoption.
Skrelv, Defector Mite—Some cards simply aren’t designed for Commander, and this Wire Mother of Runes is one of them. Still, I did say we’d find a home for each Phyrexian legend, so we have to consider the Mite for a moment or two. Personally, the most appealing aspect of Skrelv is that they’re among the best one drops for the purposes of Ranger of Eos, Ranger-Captain of Eos, Abiding Grace, Proclamation of Rebirth, and Mox Amber. It suits Skrelv to be a tutorable familiar, I think—I wouldn’t want them at the head of a deck, but they punch above their weight class once they’re on the board.
Unctus, Grand Metatect—Vizier of Tumbling Sands or Aphetto Alchemist into Laboratory Maniac or Thassa’s Oracle and you’re home free. But we’re not here today to discuss level one thinking, but the deep cuts that inspire new builds; unfortunately, it’s a bit hard to see beyond those immediate combos with Unctus. Even the second impulses are old standards of Commander combos—the Liquimetal effect prompts thoughts of Dross Scorpion loops and the draw effect makes one reminisce on Banishing Knack and Horseshoe Crab.
Yet we soldier on with another Shadowmoor block card: Knacksaw Clique. Not the instant win combos that Unctus generally enables, this cute clique teamup lets you draw an extra card and carve one off your opponent’s library—not a big game, really, but it’s a fun interaction and a placeholder for if the untap symbol ever returns in force.
Geth, Thane of Contracts—I’m not going to lie: this was a tough one. As a kind of Urborg Shambler meets one-sided (and not the side you want) Night of Souls’ Betrayal with a mediocre body and a very restrictive reanimation effect, Geth is not setting any benchmarks. EDHREC has him with 42 decks, which seems high, but I respect those 42 trendsetters who won’t let unplayability stand in their way. Among those 42 decks, the common trend is using Geth to enable Gravecrawler, Pitiless Plunderer, Altar of the Brood, or Falkenrath Noble loops—a fine archetype, but you could probably just run Yawgmoth, Thran Physician as your Commander instead.
That said, it’s a welcome challenge, and one that allows us to turbocharge Stitcher’s Supplier. Slap a Supplier under a Soul Foundry, and you’re able to mill six cards a turn. What can we do with a fully-stocked graveyard, particularly when we can’t productively run Ichorid or Bloodghast or Dread Wanderer or Despoiler of Souls? Geth leads us in a reanimation direction, so supplement his temporary resurrection ability with Onslaught-era game-ender Sutured Ghoul. Putting all your eggs in a seven-mana basket is optimistic, but Geth thrives off jank and there’s something suitably old school about his -1/-1 drawback, making Sutured Ghoul just feel right.
Karumonix, the Rat King—There are two immediate ways to take Karumonix: Rat decks and Thrumming Stone/Rat Colony shenanigans (or probably both fused, like some sort of—well, like a rat king). These sorts of decks have been around for almost twenty years, and they’re fun for the first three games, after which they have all the appeal of playing solitaire at a birthday party. So we’re going to take our Rat King in a different direction: Ichor Rats plus Mortuary plus any sac outlet lets us poison all the players at the table, including ourselves. Add a Conjurer’s Closet to flicker Karumonix, and you have a fragile loop that’s fatal to everyone equally. Look, you lie down with the Rat King, you’re going to wake up with fleas.
Kinzu of the Bleak Coven—What to say about a Jumpstart legend that’s basically a worse version of Nightmare Shepherd? We’ve already said a fair amount about this style of deck already, as any Kinzu deck worth its salt is going to run Kokusho, Pitiless Plunderer, Drivnod, Carnage Dominus, etc. Set Jumpstart cards are the equivalent of boxed macaroni and cheese—everyone, from Commander players to cooks, has to start somewhere, and sometimes it’s nice to revisit something simple and comforting, but I’m not writing Yelp reviews for Kraft dinner and I’m not building a Kinzu deck anytime soon. That said, Kinzu is dear friends with Cavalier of Night, so I would start there.
Vraan, Executioner Thane—The quintessential 99’er, Vraan has been loaded down with several disadvantages to keep him fair and cheap: “one or more, “other” and “once per turn” really do limit his potential as a backup Blood Artist. I truly can’t imagine a deck with him at the helm—and I’m not alone, as he only has 49 lists on EDHREC currently. That said, he’s a solid roleplayer in Teysa Karlov, Savra, Queen of the Golgari, Braids, Arisen Nightmare, Edgar Markov, and a whole slew of decks that benefit from creatures dying, even if he has more artificial encumbrances than Harrison Bergeron.
Rhuk, Hexgold Nabber—Godito here is a surprisingly interesting puzzle. While he’s good in a general monored Equipment deck, like Godo before him, and can happily pick up Lizard Blades and The Reaver Cleaver, he shines best when he’s scavenging Phyrexian technology. Living Weapon cards snap on to Rhuk, from Mortarpod to Nettlecyst to Kaldra Compleat, and Ogre-Head Helm is especially spicy. If the Jumpstart legends are mac and cheese, this guy at least is the sort of upscale béchamel and panko version you get at places that insist on referring to themselves as gastropubs.
Slobad, Iron Goblin—Slobad slots right in—or deposes—Daretti, Scrap Savant in decks that seek ways to cheat out artifacts via Goblin Welder, Scrap Welder, Goblin Engineer, etc. He’s quite good in that role, but there’s not a lot else he does, other than swing for three. He’s certainly fun with Skitterbeam Battalion and Prized Statue, but Slobad is just a bit slow and bad for your average Commander game.
Thrun, Breaker of Silence—We close with a card that would have set the nascent Magic internet aflame twenty years ago, but now is relegated to a Limited bomb and new player bait. He essentially demands to be the core under a stack of Auras and Equipment, particularly a Staff of Titania or Bear Umbra, but is interchangeable with a variety of other Legendary threats. A fun callback to Mirrodin’s Troll Ascetic, once a tournament staple, and a powerful evolution of Mirrodin Besieged’s Thrun, the Last Troll, this new Thrun belongs to the Carnage Tyrant or Tyrranax Rex school of enormous and hard to deal with threats. Still, I’m not immune to the appeal of slapping a Blanchwood Armor on the big guy and entering the red zone.
All in all, Phyrexia: All Will Be One brought a decent crop of monocolored legends—a handful of duds, but even those are role-players in certain archetypes. Next week, we’ll be tackling the multicolored and artifact legends of All Will Be One, a host of cards that includes callbacks to 2003’s Mirrodin, an unassailable reigning Commander champion, and the hollow shell of a former hero.
Rob Bockman (he/him) is a native of South Carolina who has been playing Magic: the Gathering since Tempest block. A writer of fiction and stage plays, he loves the emergent comedy of Magic and the drama of high-level play. He’s been a Golgari player since before that had a name and is never happier than when he’s able to say “Overgrown Tomb into Thoughtseize,” no matter the format.