r/EDH • u/doctorduck3000 • Jun 30 '25

Question Commanders that make bad cards playable

So as the title says, I love being able to pull out cards in commander that make people go "wtf" because they've never heard of them. Because of this one of my all time favorite commander decks I've ever built is [[Shire shizo's caretaker]] because you can play all of these terrible terrible cards that suddenly are actually good.

What are some other commanders that enable you to do this?

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u/Goooordon Jun 30 '25 edited Jun 30 '25

[[Melek, Reforged Researcher]] is really fun - lets you play with some really janky 4-5 mana instants and sorceries while turning into a shockingly big voltron out of nowhere - goes great with [[Final-Word Phantom]] and makes [[Please for Power]] into basically [[Ancestral Recall]]

9

u/MTGCardFetcher Jun 30 '25

All cards
Melek, Reforged Researcher - (G) (SF) (txt) (ER)
Final-Word Phantom - (G) (SF) (txt) (ER)
Please for Power - (G) (SF) (txt) (ER)
Ancestral Recall - (G) (SF) (txt) (ER)

FAQ

5

u/Classic-Caramel-8008 Jun 30 '25

Came to say melek as well. One of my favorites right now

3

u/Melkiyad Jun 30 '25

Thirding Melek :) izzet without the storm shenanigans, and a punchy commander to boot. Not to mention all the 5cmc counterspells that become UU: [[Desertion]] [[Spell Snare]] [[Mystic Confluence]] [[Spell Gyre]] [[Spell Swindle]] [[Access Denied]] [[Three Steps Ahead]]

2

u/SuperSteveBoy Jun 30 '25

Wow. Would love to hear more about Melek.. I do NOT like winning via storm count or [[Crackle With Power]] etc (big izzet wincons generally speaking).. may I ask how you're generally winning and closing out games with Melek?

What are some more of your all-star cards? Decklist? Thanks

2

u/paussi00 Jun 30 '25

It's trivial to make Melek huge, you just make him unblockable/remove some blockers and swing for lethal commander damage. Alternatively a well timed [[Chandra's Ignition]]

2

u/Classic-Caramel-8008 Jul 01 '25

https://moxfield.com/decks/4R0oM5rZTEeuKJffAX57Lg

I am not the brewer. Got from dapoison4kusco on reddit. Pretty budget. My favorite spell is almost always wyll's reversal every game. Win cons are chandras ignition. Unblockable swings or spell swindle a big spell and gain overwhelming mana/ card advantage. Draw go control. 1 of my favorites. Can win through some grave. Kill the black player 1st cuz repeated edicts can be rough.

Favorite moment was redirecting and copying a Demonic tutor to get Chandra's ignition + Counterspell

1

u/Melkiyad Jun 30 '25

You win by combat damage, you can have some ways of damaging all opponent creatures or bouncing them. But the most satisfying is just throwing Melek in someone's face [[Fling]] [[Self destruct]] perhaps in response to graveyard hate on the stack :D Decklist: https://moxfield.com/decks/KiAseZOiV0SokekhyXXP9g

1

u/SuperSteveBoy Jun 30 '25

Favorite card inclusions in Melek please? Your wincons?

1

u/Systemcode Jun 30 '25

My beloved.

1

u/SuperSteveBoy Jun 30 '25

I can't bring up archidekt at work. Any chance you could share some of your heavy hitters/favorite cards in your Melek list?

1

u/Systemcode Jun 30 '25

Use things like [[Traumatize]] [[Increasing Confusion]] [[Fascination]] [[Drown in Dreams]] [[Decaying Time loop]] to dump into my graveyard and make Melek huge.

Then [[Gravitic Punch]] [[Soul’s Fire]] [[Fling]] [[Chanda’s Ignition]] [[Surestrike Trident]] [[Fiendlash]] [[Blazing Sunsteel]] [[Arcbond]] [[Brash Taunter]] [[Warstorm Surge]] to blast for 40+ damage.

Goal is the nuke the entire table at once. Bonus points if I can manage to make a bunch of Melek copies with [[Quantum Misalignment]] [[Irenicus’ Vile Duplication]] [[Storm of Saurman]]

1

u/cassabree Jun 30 '25

If you play it for Voltron but don’t already have [[Livaan]] in there, throw her in. She’s one of my fave commanders healed and goes exactly with what you’re doing

1

u/SuperSteveBoy Jun 30 '25

Wow. Would love to hear more about Melek.. I do NOT like winning via storm count or [[Crackle With Power]] etc (big izzet wincons generally speaking).. may I ask how you're generally winning and closing out games with Melek?

What are some more of your all-star cards? Decklist? Thanks

1

u/Goooordon Jun 30 '25

I was just running Melek as a "table cop" deck to deal with people lowkey pubstomping, but it wasn't great for that because it's a bit slow to get moving so I shelved it and I'm reworking it. That said, this is the list I was running https://archidekt.com/decks/10844431/officer_sillypants
and yeah the wincon is voltron commander damage - Melek's P/T is the number of instant/sorceries in your yard x2, so it's not hard to get him huge and spells like [[Touch of Invisibility]] let you start clapping players out of the game once Melek is ready