MTG’s Modern Horizons 3 features four unique Commander pre-con decks to choose from. With a variety of game plans and archetypes featured, it can be difficult to tell at a glance which Commander decks might appeal to you, especially with Commander Masters’ swinging for the fences in terms of complexity.
We’ll give you the rundown on how these Commander decks operate and which of them might appeal to your preferred playstyle, so you don’t have to pore over decklists before diving into what Modern Horizons 3 has to offer.
Eldrazi Incursion
This Commander pre-con is undoubtedly the star of the show in Modern Horizons 3, featuring powerful new Eldrazi titans, as well as sacrifice-based ramp to make getting to those big-mana casts that much quicker.
The Eldrazi have been beloved by MTG fans since their first appearance, and Eldrazi incursion is both powerful and reliable, making it a great choice for anyone but total newcomers to the game.
Additionally, the mana base included in this deck is pretty exceptional, as far as pre-cons go. Wizards appears to have learnt its lesson from the dismal reactions to the Sliver Swarm pre-con’s mana base, with a majority of the lands here coming in untapped. That’s especially significant for a 5-color deck, which usually have to sacrifice speed in the name of consistency.
The main sticking point for the Eldrazi Incursion is its price point. The majority of Modern Horizons 3’s marketing has revolved around the Eldrazi, with a huge amount of excellent archetype support in the main set as well as this pre-con.
Players have rightly been excited about this Eldrazi resurgence for some time, and while this has helped to make Modern Horizons 3 into an even more hotly-anticipated set, Eldrazi Incursion is tricky to get ahold of for anything less than a hugely inflated price.
The bottom line is that this is an extremely good pre-con deck, but it’s worth waiting for the hype to die down before investing.
Creative Energy
Creative Energy is perfect for players who enjoy additional resource mechanics and having a ton of options at their fingertips.
This pre-con deck brings back the Energy Counters mechanic from Kaladesh and gives it a new lease of life. Dozens of cards in this deck either amass Energy or can use it for powerful payoffs, often having the capability to do both.
Satya, Aetherflux genius heads up the Creative Energy deck, as is one of Modern Horizons 3’s standout Commanders. Not only does Satya generate Energy on attack, this card also creates token clone copies of nontoken Creatures you control. These copies can disappear after attacking or stick around and build up your board with a little investment of Energy.
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Jeskai colors have deserved a resurgence for some time, and Creative Energy is an excellent payoff for that, standing strong alone or combining into an Energy powerhouse with the aid of Universes Beyond: Fallout’s Science! deck.
Players who aren’t interested in keeping track of of counters, as well as those who prefer their decks to have one single clear gameplan should stay away from Creative Energy, but more flexible MTG fans are sure to get a kick out of this deck.
Tricky Terrain
For players who enjoy cooking up offbeat card combos and standing apart from the crowd, Tricky Terrain is a bold new deck that is easily the most nontraditional offering among the Modern Horizons 3 Commanders.
The deck’s Commander, Omo, Queen of Versuva, plays with typal strategies and unique land plays thanks to her key mechanic: everything counters. Through placing these counters, Creatures become every Creature type and Lands become every Land type.
Simic decks, by and large, have always been exceptionally good at generating huge amounts of mana. Tricky Terrain takes a roundabout route to achieve this result, by combining obscure land types with the aid of the Commander’s everything counters. Combos that would usually require stringent deckbuilding like Gates or the Urza’s lands can be assembled with just a small handful of counters.
If building up an engine to amass a huge mana pool and reaping the rewards sounds exciting to you, then Tricky Terrain is definitely worth checking out. But for players hoping for a more straightforward deck with clear win-cons, you may be better off looking elsewhere.
Graveyard Overdrive
Where most Modern Horizons 3 archetypes push into an experimental space, Graveyard Overdrive is a little more back-to-basics. This deck focuses on a reliably strong playstyle that is easy to recommend to newcomers, as well as longtime players looking to celebrate some of MTG’s most iconic monsters.
Graveyard Overdrive features payoffs for getting Creatures into your own grave, as well as a selection of reanimation tools and control through sacrifice and destruction. The deck’s Commander, Disa the Restless, creates hard-hitting Creature tokens and provides synergy for one of MTG’s classic Creature types: Lhurgoyfs.
This pre-con presents a solid skeleton to build out with upgrades. That being said, Graveyard Overdrive falls short of being a truly cohesive deck, with its reanimation options lagging behind what some players might expect. As a result, it’s harder to make a case for than the other standout decks in this set.
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