Hello and welcome back. Today I review the recently spoiled Outlaws of Thunder Junction Commander decks, focusing specifically on the new cards. I’ve been looking forward to these, so without any more rootin’ or tootin’, let’s go!

THE DECK: DESERT BLOOM

General overview: Desert Bloom is a deck that wants simple things; lands being played and going to the graveyard. As with most land centric decks these days, it creates a bevy of tokens when these effects go off among other triggers.

The face commander of the deck comes with some built in cost reduction if you have lands in your graveyard. This is good because an 8 mana commander is kind of steep. Luckily this ability counts any lands in the graveyard, not just desert typed ones.

This legend also provides some card advantage as long as you’re willing to sacrifice some lands to do it. It’s an interesting tug of war, trading one resource for another.

Lastly, if a Desert typed land is put in the graveyard from anywhere, you get a 4/2 plant warrior token with reach. The interesting thing about this ability is the token it makes, which is both offensively minded in stats and defensively minded in ability. I imagine a lot of people are initially going to forget that these tokens have reach, so flyers better beware.

Overall Yuma is a pretty easy to follow design and tells you what the deck wants to do overall.

The secondary commander for the deck is the little guy in Yuma’s art. This card also seems to have a offensive-defensive split. Kirri’s first ability gives a power buff to plant and treefolk creatures. The treefolk is an interesting include here, which got me thinking about them when we get back to Lorwyn next year.

The second ability is a free recursion effect, which brings back a Plant, Treefolk, or land card from your graveyard to your hand. This happens after combat, so a little bit of setup for what you might want to get back is something to keep in mind. Outside of Kirri themselves, it’s a great help to the deck to make the plant tokens Yuma makes even more threatening and helps gets your lands back to make even more tokens.

Doing a White of the Knight Orchid impression, this card grabs you a desert from your deck as long as you have less lands. Ideally you will since you might want to pitching lands to fuel getting Yuma to the battlefield.

The second ability cares about deserts as well, giving you a 1/1 Sand warrior token when a desert goes to the bin from anywhere, giving a decent Hazezon impression. This only triggers once per turn.

Overall a decent card but I think it will only ever find a home in decks like this that care a lot about deserts.

Here we have some generic good lands-matter effects and abilities. First I’d like to point out the creature has reach, which I guess is something Cactifolk just get at this point. Secondly, this card makes all your lands deserts, which as we’ve seen so far matters for at least a few cards in the deck. Third, it is color fixing, allowing your lands to tap for any color.

Its last ability helps you get lands into the graveyard, which is something Yuma wants. I’ll mention here that I don’t think the lands in the graveyard matter enough in this deck. Cards like Cavalier of Flame and Sprouting Goblin seemed like good includes to help that along.

The titan’s legacy continues with this card. This flying and lifelink creature brings back a permanent when it enters that has a mana value 4 for or less, which isn’t too bad considering the large swathe of cards available, including our lands.

What is even better is the Encore. Up to three hasty flyers to help finish the game and bring back up to three permanents from your graveyard seems really good. Overall I think this card will find the most homes outside of this precon.

RUMBLEWEED! RUUMMMBBBLLLEEEWWEEEDD! I just like saying it.

This card is definitely a finisher. Like I said in the general overview, almost all land matters decks make tokens, and this just helps them rumble over the opposition, especially the sizable tokens Yuma makes. Better yet it has cost reduction for lands in your graveyard and good keywords as well. The only reason I think this won’t see as much play as the angel is that this effect is more efficiently done by other cards. Specifically in this deck it’s going to do as much work or more than those because of the synergies within the build.

This is an interesting board wipe that refunds some of the cost if you use desert lands to cast it. Not too bad considering the mana it would take to take out the biggest threats on the board. I’m not too keen on treasure being everywhere, but I think this card design is fine.

As for use, it’s an okay card. Again, the desert use makes it really specific, and I don’t think it’s going to see much play outside of strategies that involve them.

This card is hard to judge on its own. Some decks are going to love having the extra impulse option, perhaps like Rocco, while others will pass with enough. I do like we keep getting cards with Retrace, which I think is a great ability to use dead late game lands and turn them into the gas you need to finish things up.

This card is very good. 6 mana for getting three land back and 3 4/2 tokens with reach is a great ratio. Like the angel, it has a way to be reused from the graveyard with Flashback, which I think might be the fairer cost for the card honestly.

Also like the angel this can be generically good enough to find homes in other decks, potentially even ones that care about warriors because of the tokens produced.

The last new card from the deck is actually a land that attempts a Reflecting Pool impression. Unfortunately it comes into play tapped, probably negating the biggest upside Reflecting Pool has. It does however have the ability to become a creature with power and toughness equal to your commander’s mana value. Then, unfortunately it gets reach over an evasive ability, so this is probably better on the defense which is also probably why becoming a creature doesn’t tap it.

Overall I don’t think this will go too many places, but heavily Green or mono Green decks might not mind a surprise blocker for flyers or a beater that dodges board wipes.

DECK SUGGESTIONS:

The deck itself does the thing, which in this case cycles through lands to get mostly tokens. It definitely needs more strategy than token attack.

I’d add the Cavalier of Flame and Sprouting Goblin, just to have some extra burn and draw, plus the haste enabling from the Cavalier could help end the game. I’d also consider effects like Impact Tremors and Warleader’s Call to get burn going.

Phylath World Sculptor might also be a good include if you are making a lot of plant tokens and have the basic lands and Yasharn, Implacable Earth might be good if you face a lot of sacrifice decks but the card still allows you to sacrifice your own lands when needed.

If your group is okay with it, I’d add Aura Shards for some removal. If not, Sylvan Reclamation is always a good card and grabs you a land early if you need it.

THE DECK: QUICK DRAW

General Overview: Just looking at the deck list screams “cast the stuff, now!” and I can dig it. Luckily it seems well built enough that you get rewarded for doing just that. Whether or not you’d have the mana to do so is another story, but having not actually played the deck yet means I will reserve judgment.

Impulse draw with some setup to get the opportunity to copy an instant or sorcery you have. Not too bad, and while it seems linear at first the different spells you cast and in what order is where the fun really comes in. Kind of lives up to the name which is always nice.

While this could be another cantrip.dec, I think with the support this strategy has via things like Goblin Electormancer and those effects you can also run a bunch of larger impact spells. Or go with Dragon’s Approach. Whatever.

Alright before we get into this is that a Lorwyn flamekin? Probably not, but the card has me excited regardless. Like I mentioned with Stella, this could be a cantrip.dec but even more effective because it also gives you a bunch of tokens to win the game or tokens to get into a combo engine to win the game with instead.

Its cost reduction works well here too, as you can just keep your hand size up and discount the commander with those cantrips. Honestly, I hope I didn’t jinx this, but it would likely be a cheap build if you’re looking for something to brew with little money.

Before I move on, I do want to talk about the tokens. Being Dragons and Elementals are both relevant types that give this some extra oomph and synergies to consider if you don’t want to play like I described above.

This card will really get the deck going with casting instants and sorceries. It’s also an evasive flyer AND it can copy spells for you later in the game. Honestly I think this might be undercosted because this is worth more than the two mana of your initial investment.

Looking more closely at the last ability and with consideration to the new legends that can be the commanders for the deck, this could easily get to copy something 2-3 times if your commander just doesn’t stick around.

Speaking of enablers, the Stagecoach here can give your next instant and sorcery cascade, which means you might want to include some larger cost spells in the deck. Pay close attention to what I said though; the next instant AND the next sorcery. You could get two free spells of this if very lucky, but you can always cast one of each to get the bonus!

It also gets a power buff for each instant and sorcery in the yard which is helped by the cascade effect if you hit those kinds of cards.

A very rare effect given here with Storm. Considered very powerful, the wording on the card and its mana cost make it clear the designers are trying to not let shenanigans get too far out of hand. Only a little out of hand.

Flash is a great ability to have if you want to storm off if you’re saving something for another turn. The fact that it gives any instant or sorcery spell you cast afterward Storm is also interesting and should lead to some good stories to tell later.

You only get to give a spell Storm if you cast this from your hand, so no blink or reanimation will work here. Bounce spells might though.

Drawing a card for 2U hasn’t been good most of the time outside limited. Luckily this card grabs you extras if you cast it after having cast other spells. Even better, it has Plot, which means you can save it to cast for free later if you pay the Plot cost. Nice to save for a big turn and net yourself some new gas.

Speaking of drawing cards, why not give a buff to your creatures while you’re at it. This sorcery also has Plot so you can make those big plays later in the game when you’re ready. Discard some stuff you don’t need, grab some new stuff, hit harder. It’s all upside and I rather like it.

More Dragons and Elementals, and more Storm! Looking back to Eris, this card seems really good in builds where you can cast things often and cheap. I do think I forgot to mention the Eledragmentalons have Prowess. Prowess is interesting here as it doesn’t care specifically about instants and sorceries, but any noncreature spell. Something to keep in mind.

An interesting card that might work better in top deck matters and legendary matters decks, though I could see this in a number of other places as well that just want an extra mill with upside. Unless you’re very specific about your mill, this can go many places.

I do find the space Wizards is using for the 3 mana valued rocks to be some of the most interesting in every set. What WOULD a [insert color here] mana rock do? Luckily we get an answer fairly regularly.

This answer about a Blue mana rock is that you can store your used instants or sorceries for a later use. The spells do have to be 3 mana value or less, but the set up, like most other payoffs in the deck, is probably worth it especially when it’s repeatable like this one is. Reload and sling those spells!

DECK SUGGESTIONS:

I’m going to come right out and say it; I’m not very good at spell slinging decks. That might also be why this one intrigues me so much. I have a God-Eternal Kefnet sitting in my own boxes that I’d want to try out in here, and the whole deck seems interesting to me.

As for the deck itself, adding cards that reduce the cost of casting spells is always a good idea, and a lot of them like Jace’s Sanctum come with an upside that might synergize well with the deck. It really will depend on what kind of deck you want to build around which commander as both seem good for different reasons.

THE DECK: GRAND LARCENY

General Overview: At first glance this deck seems really cool, but if you take the time to look at the cross synergies, this deck can be downright mean. It does have better cards than others, so don’t think that out of the box it will always do amazing things. Some parts of the deck really rely on Gonti to do more, while other parts are good on their own.

He is, essentially, an add on effect to your creatures (including himself) to grab your opponents’ cards when they make contact with their faces. He also serves as a cost reducer for spells you cast but don’t own, which experience tells me because of my many attempts at theft decks will be really good. Remember that you can still cast those spells even if he leaves the battlefield, though you won’t get the one mana off if he is away on a vacation.

Something that I specifically like about this card is that it incentivizes you to attack everyone you can, not just one person. To be fair, sometimes there is just one deck that you can readily use stolen spells from, but I think that’s going to be the exception.

The way different life adapts on Thunder Junction is fun to see. Felix here is yet another doubling effect, but it ties in with what this deck is trying to do. If you hit someone, you get and extra trigger. It’s an effect I would’ve have expected in not-quite-these-colors, but whatever.

Felix is, like Gonti, a bit of a linchpin to the deck you build around it, but less like Gonti, Felix can leave the field and you likely still get your effects you were doubling but less. About half less.

Menace helps him connect for things like Bident of Thassa or the various Swords of X and Y, and Ward keeps him around. While I’m not a fan of ward, Ward 2 seems fair.

Magic’s first official Varmint, this tiny creature is decently hard to block if you don’t have a token lying around because of that deathtouch. It’s also a mana dork in Black. Not something seen often in Magic’s history, but like most others that do exist, there is a limitation. You can only use the mana this creature provides on spells you don’t own.

I wonder if Gonti brought them to Thunder Junction on purpose…

Snake with reach and deathtouch. That alone wins it for me, but then it does something very specific; it tutors for Commander Tower out of your deck or graveyard. Yep, the land that goes in every deck like Sol RIng. Well, except in mono-colored decks.

I’m not sure why this needed to exist, but it provides possibly the best mana fixing in Commander this way. Neat.

An interesting bit of recursion here. It might be better use in spellslinger or from exile decks since you get to cast the card you “recurred” from exile. However, it’s second ability to discount the mana spent to cast things from exile is going to be more important in the long run I feel.

I do like Green getting this kind of effect and Riftsweeper still seems like secret tech to me.

Oh this card is going to screw something up good and I’m here for it! One of the things I love most in Magic is turning my opponents’ stuff against them, and this does it very well. It does have to attack, but with flying that is a safer prospect than not.

The flash on the card makes it completely worth an include in many decks, including blink decks if you really want to lock stuff down. Be aware that only the newest Spelljacker counts to cast spells though if you do that.

Someone got kicked out of Jukai Forest.

New ninja is new, and in this deck having unbreakable or evasive creatures is the name of the game outside of stealing spells. This large snake being awards you for hitting opponents with treasure and new minions to hit them with. If those new minions happen to be better face up, then you can use your new treasure to buy an upgrade.

Love the design on this one. Goes in Ninja typal obviously, but fairies, rogues, and other on-hit decks might really enjoy this.

OOoooo. We haven’t seen Cipher in a while. Cast this spell, and then exile it and encode it onto a creature. As long as you hit with that creature, you can copy this spell and cast it again. Good stuff in a deck that wants to use hard to block creatures to hit for effects.

The card effect itself lets you steal an instant or sorcery from an opponent’s graveyard and cast it for free. Sure it gets exiled after, but free is a deep discount and four mana for a large spell isn’t anything to sneeze at either. Decks do tend to have a lot of creatures these days, BUT removal is plentiful and it’s always good to keep your options open.

This card will win games. I just don’t know if it can win them quickly. The shear number of things this could set up makes it really hard to tell, so I kind of have to leave it in the void of speculation.

However if you need to wipe the board away, especially with an eight mana sorcery, you are probably being threatened by something(s). Now those something(s) are yours to use at your leisure. It’s a good card no doubt, but the mileage you get will be dependent on what is happening at the time.

Gonti’s minion’s handkerchief. This on hit stealing effect could go in many decks I think, and being cheap equipment means it will. Not much more to say about it. Be the Gonti you want to be.

DECK SUGGESTIONS:

I honestly don’t have too many suggestions out of the gate here. The synergies in the deck can really build up if you can hit them consistently. In that vein, more card draw is always good. If you’re going with on hit, Bident of Thassa or Reconnaissance Mission might work well. If you prefer less mana needed, Aqueous Form or Curiosity also work.

THE DECK: MOST WANTED

General Overview: Welcome to the last deck, and there is so much to do here. It’s a real party! Well, not a real, real party. That’s a different mechanic. Here, there be outlaws.

This deck is a little all over, but only just so. A lot of cross synergies keep it riding along and the flexibility of this will add to its strength. It will overwhelm your opponents and ride away with victory. Or it will overwhelm you with its many things to do. Outlaws, treasure, counters, one of effects, little goad, more. Deck is as unruly as its denizens.

From the outset, this deck starts out showing you it’s potential. Olivia herself is a good flying creature, and her evasion leads to her second ability. Before we move on though, that lifelink isn’t tacked on willy nilly. It will help you survive being aggressive, and triggers a few other cards in the deck.

Now whenever an outlaw you control (Assassin, Mercenary, Pirates, Rogues and Warlocks are outlaws) deals combat damage to player, you get a treasure. Much like Gonti, this encourages you to attack more than a single player, but you don’t have to.

Her last ability gives two +1/+1 counters to your creatures on board at the time. Essentially the ability costs 3-5 mana, so the payoff is okay in a vacuum. It’s also limited to your own turn, so no surprise combat shenanigans. However, doing this on your turn messes with math enough anyway I wouldn’t worry about it.

Overall a good card that cares about a large chunk of creature types and keeps them on the wrong side of the law.

An Outlaw lord, but for keywords. That’s fine but then he makes bad money. When combat starts, all that glitters becomes sharp and unpleasant for your opponents if you want it too, and because the treasure you control become outlaws, Vihaan here gives them the Haste and Vigilance buffs. The first best thing is that it simply triggers, so he doesn’t need haste or anything himself. The second best thing is that treasure usually dodges board wipes.

My favorite thing about the card is the flavor. As long as he has treasure, he is never unarmed. Take that as you will.

A creature that recurs a creature that can also then recur itself and recur another creature again. It’s fine in the deck, and being one mana less with a body than the usual suspects is nice. Don’t see it going to too many other decks, but rogues might like it.

Speaking of recursion, this card features a static effect for your dead outlaws with Encore X. You get to essentially pay their cost again and exile the card you pick, and suddenly you’re shaking opponents down with that outlaw again.

Not bad at all. Encore to get more enter and leaves effects, plus damage triggers and the like? Pretty good in this deck.

An angel mercenary is not a creature type I thought I’d ever see, though as a Capenna angel they may have a different world view with all they’ve gone through.

Anyway, a flying and vigilant 4/4 for 5 is a familiar body for an angel and is still a good one. It then provides some mercenary tokens whenever another nontoken creature enters under your control. Not too bad, since that helps with defense

The tokens created also can be tapped to give a target creature +1/+0 until end of turn, changing to an offensive stance and helping another creature deal more damage. This is especially good against Silent Arbiter and similar effects. Likewise, it’s just good with Angelic Sell-Sword because if their power is 6 or greater, you draw a card on the attack with the angel.

This card will probably see play in a number of decks, just like the Angel of Indemnity.

More recursion for outlaws specifically. It’s like the deck wants you to attack or something. It also means your guys are probably going to die a bit. I like the redundancy.

The card itself is fairly costed. A single returned creature is 4 mana, two creatures is 5, and so on. I think many decks that feature creature types under Outlaw will want this. It is a good reanimation spell for any of them.

Quite the ambush of a card. A full on shootout western style, but your opponents’ creatures can’t shoot back. With a wide enough board of outlaws this could clear a board, but more likely it will help get rid of a few problematic creatures. Still plenty good for removal, but it is board and creature type dependent.

Bounty counters are back! Honestly I thought there would be more this set, but I’ll take it!

It’s a 3 drop mana rock that fixes your mana, and that’s always nice even if the rate is high. Like most 3 cost mana rocks these days though, this does have another option. For 1 generic mana and a tap, you mark a creature with a bounty counter. Whenever a creature with a bounty counter on it dies (so a county counter for any other source as well), each opponent of the creatures controller draws a card and gains 2 life.

Really quite the bribe, and it continues the slow support for cards like Mathas, Fiend Seeker or Chevill, Bane of Monsters.

Legendary decks keep getting great tools, though I’m not sure this goes in every legendary matters deck.

This enchantment gives convoke (hi Kasla theBroken Halo!) to legendary creature spells. Generally okay to help cast your commander and get around some commander tax. That along is pretty good, but the enchantment also give you some tokens when your commander attacks. They’re Red so that might matter, but usually you can the tax or other symbols with them anyway.

I like this card, but it might be a tad slow, and some commanders don’t want to attack. Isshin Two Heavens as One and Caesar Legion’s Emperor might like it though.

Another outlaw specific card that any outlaw typal deck would love. The enchanted land gives more mana for outlaw specific spells or abilities, and give you a card when you cast an outlaw for the first time each turn. You do lose a single life when you do so, but Outlaw Arena Connections is fine.

The triggered ability for the card draw not being tied to the land tapping like Underworld Connections or another stipulation outside of casting an outlaw spell makes it a good card for the deck itself, and of course of outlaw typal decks.

DECK SUGGESTIONS:

Again, I don’t really have too many suggestions for the deck out of the box. I’d probably add ways to bring my creatures back more often under less specific circumstances, or ways to protect my board state because the deck is so creature focused.

You could also add Teysa Karlov or Drivnod, Carnage Dominus depending on how hard you lean into the death triggers.

BACK ON THE RANCH

Honestly, these decks seem to be a bunch of fun. I’m still leaning on trying out Quick Draw for myself, probably followed by Grand Larceny.

Even if the decks aren’t of interest to you, some of these cards are going to do well in other decks. I even joked that I should take my Feather deck and Quick Draw and slap them together under Narset Enlightened Exile, a prospect I’m actually considering.

Tell me what you think about these decks in the comments below. Too prickly with card selection, designers had too much time in the sun, or is it a cooling oasis to relax and enjoy some Magic?

Until next time, make sure to wear sunglasses when riding off into the sunset.