Hello everyone! We have finished full spoilers for the soon to be released Phyrexia: All Will Be One which is the first Standard-legal release for 2023. Now I want to turn to this deep set for casual table play and look at my Top Ten as well as three Honorable Mentions. This list will be looking at great cards for formats like multiplayer generally, Commander and other Highlander formats, Five Color, and Type Four among others. This is a deep set, so we'll be coming back to this again over the next few weeks.

Ready?

Honorable Mention #1 (#13 Overall) - Atraxa, Grand Unifier

Atraxa is one of the most beloved Commanders ever printed with her four color identity and proliferating, and no new take could do that justice. But I do like the Grand Unifier and what It brings as a Commander. For seven mana you get an on curve 7/7 with four powerful keywords - flying (evasion), vigilance (very strong in multiplayer swinging at people in the air for Commander Damage and then holding the fort), deathtouch (no one wants to block) lifelink (nice double life swing for that 7 damage.). Nasty and very strong before looking at the ETB ability. Then you reveal the top ten cards of your library, and put one into your hand for each type. In a typical Commander deck that doesn't build around her, that will likely be:

• Land - pretty sure
• Creature - likely
• Sorcery or Instant - at least one, maybe both
• Then maybe an artifact, enchantment or planeswalker

That means you could easily draw four or five cards in a typical 10 set and choose the best one for the situation, like the best land your reveal. Nasty card flow. The only issue is that your foes will know what you just drew. It's sort of like a different take on Niv-Mizzet Reborn. It's also one of the best cards for Type Four with infinite mana but just one spell per turn where the mana cost on this won't matter you can always cast it when needed.

Honorable Mention #2 (#12 Overall) - Armored Scrapgorger

Check out this fun 0/3. This thing taps for any color of mana and you exile a card from any graveyard and put an oil counter on it. With three oils, this is now a 3/3. That's pretty strong. Any dork that taps for all mana is pretty heavily played at the kitchen table and formats like Standard. This one can attack and gets a nice sized 3/3 after three ramps. Drop this turn two, tap on turns 3-5 for mana and then on turn 5 you get a 3/3 to swing.

Compare to the beloved Werebear. Also a two-drop, started as a 1/1, then became a 4/4 after threshold. Nasty good. This is smaller after the pump, but taps for any color and more reliable. And you can have a 3/3 on turn 3 with proliferate tricks, but I'd prefer the ramping instead. Also, you can exile from your foe's graveyard as a break on their abuse and reuse, and on a four player game there should be enough to feed on just once a round rather than your stuff. Note that you don't have to exile to get a counter, it still happens with no graveyards. Good ramper, love it loads!

Honorable Mention #3 (#11 Overall) - Encroaching Mycosynth

This might be the best card in the set for Johnny and Jenny, although wait for my #1 before you push back. This is a four-cost artifact. All of your nonlands are now artifacts in play, and elsewhere as well like you your graveyard, hand, library, Command Zone and exile zone. Getting an artifact synergy is very strong with combos and synergies. For example, planeswalkers are now artifacts. Then you can animate them with effects like March of the Machines and swing with them, and now they can block.

And then you can use graveyard recursion like Open the Vaults to bring back all of your non-lands. And then you are in the color of Blue artifact tutors like Trinket Mage and Fabricate which will now search up anything. And then you can sacrifice anything to a Goblin Welder to return anything. Don't sleep on giving Commanders the artifact type as well, even in the Command Zone, since your things that help artifact dorks will help here as well. This is just so powerful and it's cheaper than Mycosynth Lattice, doesn't help your enemies, although this added a color so the Lattice is still #1 in non-Blue decks looking for this effect. Nasty!

And now the Top Ten proper!

#10. Koth, Fire of Resistance

Our third highest-charting planeswalker is new Koth. He also costs four, rocks four loyalty which is on curve, and then gets three abilities. The first is +2 search out a basic Mountain and put it into your hand. Note just basics. No ramping, just in your hand. Then he can -3 to shoot a dork equal to your Mountain count, so he's a Spitting Earth on a planeswalker body. Then he can -7 as an ultimate and then your Mountains will Lightning Blast on arrival to the battlefield. A win con and removal emblem. He seems like a red version of Liliana of the Dark Realms, a Swamp fetcher and destroyer equal to your Swamp count that was also a four drop. Although she could grab any Swamp, not just basics. The two Koths obviously want to be in the same deck as Mono-Red or two-color deck with enough basics to fetch out and enough duals to make the -3 work. I really like this in Gruul with ramp like Farseek to get your non-basic Mountains. Nice new addition to the canon.

#9. Mirrex

Our top land is this fun colorless one. On arrival to the battlefield, this will tap for any color of mana but just that turn. Then after you can tap it for colorless. I like that with self-bounce lands like the Karoo Cycle like Azorius Chancery that will pop it up for another color land while giving you more landfall. Then this can tap with three mana to make a 1/1 colorless artifact dork with toxic one that cannot block. You don't need to care about poisonous win cons to care about what that does. Tap for three? In any color? To make a 1/1? Although it cannot block. That works so well in so many decks - here are a few:

• Artifacts - This does make artifacts. That's the most common archetype in Commander according to EDHREC.com
• Control - Need a win con that can kill faster with toxic in a control deck in your land base? Like a better Inkmoth Nexus, although you'd toss that in too.
• Tokens - To make a free 1/1 token from your land base.
• Deathtouch Enabler - No one wants to chump block a 1/1 deathtouch token and trade down mana and a card, so with a deathtouch enabler this will force bad trades with non-cards or take a poison counter.
• Proliferate Decks - In decks like Five Color Planeswalkers with a bunch of proliferating to raise the loyalty counter count, this can be used as a win con with just one or two hits turning into wins.

#8. Kaito, Dancing Shadow

This is our middle planeswalker. Kaito is four for three loyalty, a bit low. Then when one of your dorks deals combat damage to a foe you can bounce and get two loyalties of Kaito this turn. Since Kaito's middle 0 ability draws a card, you can always just draw two as the base line, nasty for a four drop. The +1 of our Cyber Ninja prevents a dork from blocking or attacking for a turn. You can do this to help ensure that a dork slips through for the bounce and draw. Nice synergy. Then you can -2 to make a 2/2 colorless artifact with deathtouch and when it leaves play drain two life from your foe, so you can draw and then make the -2 in one turn. This loves Ninja decks since getting one back for reloading a Ninjutsu trigger is awesome, I wish that he could be played as Commander. That would be very strong. Love him loads!

One planeswalker left, and she's next. Who is it?

#7. Vraska, Betrayal's Sting

This is my favorite planeswalker in the set, and she's pretty great! Her first ability is an awesome 0 - draw, lose a life, and then proliferate, that will really be a +1. Compare that to Ob Nixilis Reignited's +1 to also lose a life and draw a card. And he's a Commander Staple, but his card draw ability doesn't help other permanents in your brew.

Then you can -2 Vraska and turn a creature into a Treasure. That's just like Nixilis's second ability, although worse since they get mana, and better since it's just -2 to -3. And then her ultimate is very high -9 and she can give a player a cap of 9 poison counters, and then 0 and kill next turn if she is still alive. That's a win con if you get her to that point. Her 0 is where it's at. Strong card flow, no one cares about life loss in Commander, and you can add loyalty counters to your other 'walkers without pulling planeswalkers and then you can add in +1/+1 counters to your stuff and counters onto Helix Pinnacle to win and then poison on foes and then also -1/-1 on their stuff. It's very strong. And she is only black unlike her normal color identity, and she can be played in way more decks, and unlike Koth she's in any black deck you have rather than needing the perfect deck and she is better than Commander Classic Ob, she why's she's here at my top spot overall? I hope so!

#6. Conduit of Worlds

You can play lands from your graveyard as normal. This is Crucible of Worlds moved into Green with another sorcery speed tap ability that doesn't use any mana. You can cast a spell from your graveyard if you haven't cast anything this turn. We all know how good Crucible is with all of the fetch lands it can bring back and sacrifice lands like Wasteland and then the cycling you can discard for a card and then play so you get both, and so forth. It's very strong, and then they added the free cast from your graveyard, so it's added card advantage. Note that you'll likely do this rather than from your hand since you can always cast from your hand after this is invariably destroyed. The only time I'd cast from hand is if I needed to cast to keep from discarding or I needed something like a Vindicate to answer a massive problem that my foe has without the answer in my graveyard. It's very strong in kitchen table play.

#5. Unctus, Grand Metatect

Check out this mono-Blue legendary dork that can be your Commander. This is the third-highest Commander in today's countdown. Your other artifact dorks get +1/+1, so it's a nice Glorius Anthem for artifact creatures in the Command Zone. You'll want to emphasize things like Silver Myr in this brew. Then when your other Blue creatures are tapped, you draw and then discard. With that you are going to love Blue stuff that beats, like Invisible Stalker that cannot be blocked and its often run as an Aura or Equipment dork to swing with due to it's hexproof, or tappers like Arcanis, the Omnipotent that taps to draw three and now four and discard one. Then at sorcery speed you can spend one Phyrexian mana to make a dork you control both Blue and artifact, so you can make that Silver Myr now draw and discard when it taps for mana, or that Stalker is now a 2/2 base with boosts. But I really like this with just Blue artifact dorks in mono-Blue like Acquisition Octopus and Torrential Gearhulk and Thought Monitor as there are a strong 48 options that are just Blue. I'm sure you can find enough to build around. It's also strong in the 99 of many other Commander brews that have dorks to help out. Nice!

#4. Mondrak, Glory Dominus

Our second-highest scoring White card Commander-eligible option is this four-drop 4/4. When tokens are made under your control, you get double. That's an Anointed Procession in the Command Zone, nasty! Then you spend three mana, two Phyrexian white so that could be 1 and 4 life or 2 and 2, and then sacrifice two artifacts, to place an indestructible counter here. And that's not at sorcery speed or once per turn, you can do it in response to removal and just once. The Procession is registered in a massive 87,143 decks over at EDHREC.com in 9% of white decks, so that's something strong, and just making another for the same cost would make my top 5. But on a legendary eligible dork? That's nasty! There are a few archetypes where this will work.

• Treasures Matter - Third most played archetype with a massive 60,488 decks
• General Tokens - Eighth most played archetype with 39,307 decks
• Clues - 4,558 decks

And then these tribes:

• Zombie Tokens - Probably not unless you stretch white with adding in the Amonkhet sets with white Zombies - 16,878 decks
• Saproling Tokens - Golgari likely, 6,808 decks
• Goblin Tokens - Boros would work here, 3,611
• Spirit Tokens - Azorius --947 decks
• Soldier Tokens - 1,914 decks, all have White

And then don't sleep on the sacrifice of artifacts to give this indestructible, just make sure your token options include enough artifacts like Food or Treasures or Servo tokens that are artifacts to sacrifice away. Enjoy the frivolity of this.

And then there were three, one creature that's White, and two colorless artifacts. Ready?

#3. Sword of Forge and Frontier

Let's knock off an artifact now. This three-drop two equip equipment is the next in the very powerful Swords of X and Y cycle. It gives a +2/+2 boost, pro Red and Green, and then adds two Red and Green themed combat damage triggers. One is to exile two from your library and then you can play them this turn, and then the other is to let you play an additional land. If you exiled a land, you can drop it and your land from your hand, or if you exiled two lands, you can drop them both. It's repeatable ramp and card flow in one combat damage punch. Roughly 40% of dorks will be Gruul colors, so that protection can really help you slip past defenders. And then we can get both triggers!

This also loves things that ensure punch-ability like Rogue's Passage and Whispersilk Cloak. It also is strong with Commanders that already have a combat damage trigger you are building around, like Brago, King Eternal. Since you have the infrastructure to hit already, why not add in two more combat damage triggers that also boost the power by two and thus the Commander Damage clock is sped up as well and giving two key protections from targeted removal like Beast Within and burn like sweeping Blasphemous Act. This is also an auto-play in many equipment and Voltron Commander brews as it's better in those two brews than then some Swords in this cycle like Sword of Body and Mind or Sword of Truth and Justice, which are fine in other archetypes as well as fine for decks like Voltron/equipment, but if you need space, this is better.

#2. Elesh Norn, Mother of Machines

This five-drop 4/7 legendary dork has vigilance, which is better in multiplayer since you can swing at the open player without opening yourself up to multiple counter attacks from everyone. Then you get two abilities. If a permanent entering the battlefield triggers a permanent, then it happens again! Nasty. Then permanents entering under your foe's control cannot get ETB triggers. So that's a Torpor Orb in the Command Zone that doesn't work on you. Nasty! That's a major reason to make my top Commander option here. It's very powerful in Commander since so many things care about ETB stuff from the heavily played Mulldrifter and Eternal Witness with their ETB triggers to win cons like Impact Tremors. All shut down. And then yours is doubled, so I like her as a midrange white Commander leading with ETB stuff like the recursive Sun Titan and card draw in Inspiring Overseer and removal in Loran of the Third Path, and then triggers like Soul Warden and Angelic Chorus. She's also strong with blink that gets 4 triggers for the initial arrival and blink effect rather than two. Nice #2!

What colorless artifact hit my top spot?

#1. Mirran Safehouse

This three-drop artifact! While this bad boy is on the battlefield, it'll have the abilities of all lands in the graveyard. And this is something that has never been in print before! How is this useful? Let's start with a fun little synergy - cycling lands. You cycle a land in your color like Polluted Mire that normally taps for black. Now tap this for Black too.

Note that this works on all graveyards, not just yours. Now let's say your foe cycled a Triome. Now this taps for all three colors. That's one use - cycling and then tapping this like a mana rock. Here's another common synergy - fetch lands. Someone has cracked an Evolving Wilds. Sacrifice this to fetch up a key land. Great! Get that land! Another use is other sacrifice lands like Wasteland or Ramunap Ruins or Scavenger Grounds and get another crack from this. Another use is to use a Commander that discards cards or lands for effects that you can tap for, like Lord Windgrace.

This is also great against land removal for you or others as your stuff dies you can still tap for it, so if your foe uses Vindicate to destroy your Cabal Coffers when you control Urborg you can just tap this to make that mana. Ditto Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx in mono-color brews as removal protection. You can Wasteland a foe's land and then use it yourself. That's a powerful synergy and a brand-new card that has a brand new ability for a reasonable three mana that fits into any deck. And that's my top card!

What did you think of my list? Check with us next week when I grab another 13 cards from this set!