Should You Buy the Brothers' War Commander Decks?

“Magictating” is defined as getting into the zone with your Magic the Gathering collection--thinking, planning, organizing, reminiscing about past games, and imagining future games. It is a combination of hard thinking about the game and calm meditation, reveling in the joy it brings you.

We are now looking at seven new Commander preconstructed decks coming out in the near future. Five new starter Commander decks, which I have more to say on at a later date, and the two new retro-themed Commander decks for the Brothers' War—an Urza deck and a Mishra deck. With so many Commander products being pumped out we have to ask ourselves if these decks are actually worth it. The truth of the matter might not be as obvious when you consider your collection, the potential value, and the price point. I'm here to assure you I have the answer to whether or not you should be ordering these unique Commander preconstructed offerings. So, if you're on the fence on whether or not to pick up one or both of these preconstructed Commander decks from The Brothers' War, then let me explain to you what you should do. Should you buy singles or buy the sealed product? The answer might surprise you. Let's go back in time, to the Brothers' War, and take a closer look at what these decks are actually offering us.

If you are thinking about scanning through this article to see if I offer advice at the end on what to do, let me save you some time… buy them and skip the singles fest. OK, now that I've got that piece of business squared away, let's talk about why you should be buying these offerings. When you scan through the list of creatures that Urza's Iron Alliance offers—it's a veritable list of heavy hitters. If you've ever built an artifact heavy deck for Commander, then you likely already own many of these rares and mythics that have been reprinted for this incredibly powerful offering. The synergies that this deck offers is truly a mechanical masterpiece. It's so well constructed that I'm a bit shocked to see just so many quality pieces turning up in a single product. The creatures include the age-old standby and staple that is Solemn Simulacrum, as well as the artifact deck all-stars of Etherium Sculptor and Master of Etherium. The rest of the creatures really reads a bit like an all-star roster for cards that you might want to include in a dedicated artifact deck. These powerful cards range from heavy hitters like Sharuum the Hegemon to card drawing utility cards like Baleful Strix and Losheel Clockwork Scholar. In short, Urza's deck packs some truly interesting and highly synergistic pieces. This is a deck that is going to function very well out of the box, and will lead to some easy upgrades and fun inclusions. Conversely, you can also tear this deck apart and easily start building several more decks from its pieces—you just have to have a wide enough collection to do so. The Brothers' War set definitely offers up several cards that will be easy swaps or upgrades if you happen to crack any of those cool artifacts in your packs.

The creatures in Urza's deck are solid, but the spells are spectacular as well. This set of spells is just packed with staples. Swords to Plowshares, Sol Ring, Skullclamp, Cranial Plating, Signets, and even Vindicate show up here. These are all fantastic cards. Sure, it's not an Anguished Unmaking, but Vindicate is still solid. The power level of the rest of the spells is excellent. Some of the game's best sweepers show up here in Austere Command and Urza's Ruinous Blast. I'm just not sure why Phyrexian Rebirth is in this deck, as it's definitely a total flavor punt. Urza wasn't causing that or involved in it, so I guess they just wanted another nasty artifact themed sweeper and couldn't give this white one to the Mishra deck, but I guess the Vorthos in me will have to grin and bear it (or swap it out ASAP for some other big bad spell from Brothers' War). Regardless of the one small flavor punt, this is a solid line up of spells. Just absolutely worth owning additional copies of any of these cards. Seriously, so much of the deck building work is actually done for us—and done really really well!

The mana base on Commander preconstructed decks can be a bit of crap shoot. Sure, you're not going to see shocks or fetches, but this time around we get plenty of excellent lands that are super functional and offer a very stable mana base for a three color deck. This might be the best mana base line-up I've seen since the Draconic deck. Artifact lands abound, and despite not having the original Urza lands in here (yes, that's another flavor punt I'm afraid), the deck's lands are solid. Having solid reprints like the original artifact lands and the indestructible artifact lands and Spire of Industry is exciting stuff. These are lands that an artifact deck thrives on. I'm sure one of the most common upgrades people will likely use will be one of my favorite Fifth Dawn cards—Mycosynth Golem.  I wouldn't be surprised to see that card balloon in price as it has only ever been reprinted as a “The List” card. Seriously, using that card in either of these artifact themed decks can be enough to flood the board to the point where you can easily crush all opponents left at once.

At this point I'm sure it seems obvious, but if you're looking to build a fresh artifact deck, then you should pick up this preconstructed beauty. If you're really only interested in the newer cards, then you should still probably just buy the deck. It is definitely cost effective and will give you so many useful pieces for any artifact-based deck you might build that you really should buy it. I didn't even go into the extremely cool retro-boarded new cards, but those alone are worth picking up the whole package. I don't love having useless copies of cards, but the number of cards you might deem “useless” in this preconstructed offering is incredibly low indeed. I am planning on buying at least one copy of each of these decks, and I'm definitely likely to snag extra copies of those new cards on release day as well. So many artifact decks to build, and so little time!

Mishra's Burnished Banner is an interesting offering. Whereas Urza's deck is a bit creature heavy, this one is a bit spell heavy. Well, it appears that way when you look at the creature vs. spell counts. However, several of the spells in Mishra's deck are token generators that happen to also be great sacrifice fodder. These are cards like Servo Schematic and Oni-Cult Anvil. The strength in Mishra's deck is, once again, all the synergies. While this deck is more focused on sacrificial synergies rather than overwhelming forces, it is no less tuned for synergistic plays. Overall, this is a powerful and fun deck to play. Looking over the list and reading over the creatures is, again, a who's who of previously powerful Commander artifact deck offerings. I feel that I'm likely to simply repeat myself about all the things that are going on with this deck. It's basically just a slightly differently tuned artifact deck, but done in a very efficient way! In short, the creatures are fantastic cards and many can helm artifact decks all on their own, and the spells are solid as well. The new cards, like Ashnod the Uncaring and Scavenged Brawler are really awesome, exciting, and definitely worth the price alone. Throw in all these other cards that most artifact heavy decks want to play anyway, and you truly have a special offering.

To wrap things up, you should buy both of these decks if you're at all interested in building or having dedicated artifacts matter decks. If you are looking for cool retro themed cards then you should buy this as well. I really only see people picking up singles from these decks because they literally already own and have built at least three or four other artifact decks. Seriously, if you're starting out, then these are an amazing value. If you're an intermediate, then these are still a great value. Heck, even advanced players like myself should seriously consider buying both of these, as these cards are all highly useful, and getting them all at once is just so much easier than hunting down all those singles. So, yes, even if you're planning on parting these decks out to build other decks, you should totally pick them up. The prices on these cards will dip on being reprinted, but their utility is unlikely to wane, even in the face of the new toys getting printed in The Brothers' War. I hope that you enjoy whichever side you choose, and that the artifacts and the cards remain ever in your favor!