The Best Commander Cards From... Odyssey
Auramancer by Rebecca Guay
Welcome back to The Best Commander Cards From..., a series looking at the most powerful Commander cards from across Magic: The Gathering's rich thirty-year-long history. Today's focus is Odyssey, the twenty-fourth expansion set, which was released in October of 2001, and is the first set in the Odyssey block.
Odyssey Lore
Truth be told, there's a lot going on in Odyssey, which picks up about a century after Apocalypse ends. A whole host of new factions are fighting the shadowy cabal, which is present throughout the set. There's a whole lot of cards to go through, so you'll forgive if I don't dive too much deeper into the plot. There's a book for that, after all, so let's get into the mechanics!
Odyssey Mechanics
Unfortunately, the Threshold mechanic doesn't feature a lot of especially strong cards for Commander. While it's cool that Odyssey paved the way for graveyard-themed sets in the future, this iteration of design feels like a product of its time. Worse still, there's quite a few cards that care about discarding from your hand, which is at its worst in a multiplayer format where your resources are spread thin. With that out of the way, let's get into the cards.
Deserted Temple
The bar for utility lands can be pretty high at times, but I think Deserted Temple has what it takes to excel in certain decks. While you don't get access to cards like Tolarian Academy, untapping any land that taps for three or more mana can be quite profitable.
Millikin
While it's not quite Ornithopter of Paradise, the incidental mill and mana production will serve certain decks nicely. You'll have to deal with the downside of being vulnerable to multiple types of removal, but two-mana accelerants that can block are invaluable for commanders like Saheeli, the Gifted.
Tarnished Citadel
Mana Confluence is a pretty expensive card, but I imagine it would be a lot more expensive if it could also tap for colorless mana. The problem is that Tarnished Citadel costs three life to activate for colored mana. Still, if you're willing to pay the price you can paint with all the colors of the wind.
The Signet Lands
These lands are all pretty good for two-color decks, and slightly cumbersome for most anything else. Like the signets after which they're named, they also require a mana investment to use at all, meaning you can't use them at all on turn one if they're your only source of mana.
Auramancer
Gone are the days where cards like this shine at most casual tables. These days, Auramancer exists as a marginal playable for any deck looking to rebuy specific enchantments that have gone to the graveyard on a strict budget. It's sad to see a classic fall from grace, but I'd feel bad not mentioning it.
Balancing Act
While Balance is banned, and Restore Balance is reserved for decks that can cast it for free on demand, Balancing Act is a very different animal. You lose the functionality of going through each card type individually, but you get a huge boost in power against decks playing to the board. It's worth considering if you're playing a spellslinger list without too much to lose.
Beloved Chaplain
Beyond the funny flavor of nobody wanting to hurt such a Beloved Chaplain, I think this has a lot to offer certain decks. In particular, you can suit it up with a bunch of equipment and get in an all-but-guaranteed hit, or you can block anything without trample or flying for free. That's a lot of utility for only two mana in white.
Devoted Caretaker
In truth, I don't think this is all that different from Mother of Runes or Giver of Runes if you use either of those conservatively. You won't get free blocks or attacks, but Devoted Caretaker can stave off single-target removal with ease, and that makes it worth considering for commanders that end up as high priority targets.
Earnest Fellowship
About five years ago, our own Elijah Klein wrote a pretty sweet piece about Earnest Fellowship. Since then, this card has gotten ten times as popular, which sounds like a lot until you realize that's still just barely into the quadruple digits with a meager 1,088 decks. Come on people, we gotta pump those numbers up!
Karmic Justice
Yes, Karmic Justice does trigger if someone destroys it, so you get a decent rebate if it immediately eats a removal spell. However, I expect that your opponents will want to point their removal spells at someone else if they can't immediately remove it, which is a nice bonus.
Battle of Wits
Yes, you read that right. For years, I have personally been wishing for some kind of way to make this card work in Commander. Yes, I am aware that this would require some weird way to create tokens that shuffle into your Commander deck, and we don't quite have that technology in paper just yet beyond Claire D'Loon, Joy Sculptor. I don't care. I want to win with Battle of Wits in the premier 100-card format without having to Rule 0 my commander. Please, Mr. Rosewater, stop ignoring my emails.
Standstill
If you couldn't already tell, I enjoy janky enchantments. I love every bit of Standstill, from the rage-inducing "Take your time." flavor text to the actual effect. Cube aficionados might also recall that it pairs especially well with Lurrus of the Dream-Den. Me? I just live for the look of despair and defeat on the face of an opponent that is forced to cast a spell into it.
Time Stretch
Truthfully, it barely feels like you're getting two extra turns worth of value out of this if you cast Time Stretch in an honest manner. That said, I never cast this card honestly. I'm either hitting it with a Mnemonic Deluge or getting it for free off of an Aminatou's Augury. Yes, I am that player.
Upheaval (Banned)
It shouldn't be a surprise that Upheaval is banned. If you've ever been frustrated by an overloaded Cyclonic Rift or Farewell, this is ten times worse. In two-player formats, this is often a good way to win the game. In Commander, it usually just serves as a way to reset the entire board, to the detriment of everyone. And it sucks.
Braids, Cabal Minion (Banned)
Plenty of people smarter than me have remarked upon whether or not this card belongs on the ban list. Personally, I think Sol Ring and Jeweled Lotus make this a bit too oppressive as a Commander. A turn two Braids, Cabal Minion can lock out a lot of casual decks, and in the 99, you can still get it on board rather quickly using all of the standard stuff like Reanimate. No thanks.
Entomb
Reanimate and Entomb go together like peanut butter and jelly. Notably, Buried Alive was reprinted in this set, but it's a lot harder to put an Archon of Cruelty onto the battlefield on turn two with that one. Entomb shows up in all kinds of decks, but one thing remains true: If you see Entomb hit the stack, trouble is on the horizon.
Mindslicer
The up-front cost and stats of Mindslicer might not seem very impressive, but once this lands on the battlefield, everyone will take notice. Very few decks want to discard their hand, and since the Mindslicer player is playing black, they're probably doing more with their graveyard than most.
Sadistic Hypnotist
Another black creature that taxes your opponents hands, Sadistic Hypnotist asks that you have some sacrifice fodder around to get the party started. It doesn't take a lot of creatures to really mess with one player, and with a handful of creature tokens, sadistic is an apt descriptor.
Tainted Pact
You'll find Tainted Pact *yawn* in a lot of decks alongside *yawns loudly* Thassa's Oracle, where it- *yawns even more loudly* What was I saying again? Oh yeah, Tainted Pact. This is a neat way to comb through your deck to find one particular card!
Traveling Plague
I don't think Traveling Plague is especially strong, but the politics of it intrigue me. At first glance, the player whose creature you first target has an incentive to retaliate, but you can always argue that there's a bigger threat at the table. -4/-4 across each turn cycle is nothing to sneeze at.
Chance Encounter
Alternate win conditions are always attractive to some number of players. Once you've found a way to get one counter, you can proliferate additional ones to speed up the clock. That said, if you're all-in on coin flipping, you might just do it the hard way if you're committed to the bit.
Price of Glory
Wow, now that's a real punishment for holding up that Counterspell. Realistically, besides turning off all but the most dire of counters, I expect that Price of Glory will usually just make players use their removal on their own turns. That might be enough for me, though.
Seize the Day
You might fool yourself into thinking this is the best extra combat spell you've ever seen, but look a bit closer. Seize the Day only untaps one of your creatures, which significantly narrows its utility in certain decks. It's still fantastic, but it's hardly an auto-include in go-wide decks.
Squirrel Nest
Unfortunately, Squirrel Nest is the only mono-green card I have to highlight this time around. It's not really that special outside of a few combos, mostly involving Earthcraft or some kind of Intruder Alarm shenanigans. Use at your own peril.
Shadowmage Infiltrator
Our first multicolor card, Shadowmage Infiltrator does a great job of pecking in for an extra card each turn. Unfortunately, it's been a bit outclassed by the wide variety of three-mana draw engines that don't require you to connect with an opponent, but I digress.
Decimate
If you've ever cast a Decimate before, you know that it's a strong card only held back by its targeting restrictions. Yes, there must be at least one of each of its targets for you to even cast it. These days, there's usually an enchantment or two sitting around to snipe, but I personally can't wait for a version of this that includes planeswalkers.
That's all I've got for you this time. It feels like the folks at Wizards of the Coast were really trying to zero in on a sweet spot for power level, and I can't help but feel like this set undershot things a bit. Then again, maybe that's just because of the contrast between Odyssey and what came not long before it.
At any rate, if you like a card that I didn't feature, like the atogs or something, I want to hear about it in the comments as usual. I've been Luka "Robot" Sharaska, and I hope you'll visit again when we cover... Torment.
