Hello folks! I hope your day is going well!

Let's begin looking at today's inspiration...

Hello X spells! I've been in an "X Spells Matter" place ever since I finished my Rosheen Meanderer Commander deck in real life. You can read about it here!

Unfortunately, the other X Matters dork, Zaxara, does not share the Gruul color identity of the Meanderer and thus cannot be used for burn spells like Comet Storm. But there are still lots of X spells that are awesome in its three colors.

Let's take a look and see what X spells I like the best for a Zaxara build!

We'll start with four cards that come closest to cracking my top ten and then slide to the Top Ten proper.

Honorable Mention #1 - Hydras

The first place we are going to unpack are X spell dorks. There are a number of these that are mostly, but not exclusively, Hydras. The ability to slam down a creature that is roughly equal to your mana in size is flexible at different states in the game. They are brilliant top decks in the late game. Note that in addition to the Hydras proper in Green, we have some colorless ones like Endless One that don't have an entry cost to drop, so they are bigger as result. The best of these is likely Stonecoil Serpent with its three abilities, and it's good at any curve of the game from a powerful 2/2 on the 2nd turn to a 5/5 on the 5th turn.

Honorable Mention #2 - Stealing

Admit it fans of Blue. You like to steal things. Well here you go - steal away with Mass Manipulation or Dominate effects. The benefit of these steal effects is that there is no enchantment or dork to kill, like there are with most stealing effects such as Sower of Temptation and Control Magic. Nope. Just steal and keep. The card advantage in stealing is obvious and brings a lot of power with it to the table. Don't forget that you can tap your leader to help with the heavy Blue cost of this pair as well.

Honorable Mention #3 - Diabolic Revelation

Card advantage matters. Tutoring for the perfect card for now matters. These effects put together? Nasty! Welcome to Diabolic Revelation. This nasty bad boy can grab a few perfect cards for the team while you are finding the right answers or the right problems. You can also grab the best X spell from your brew to activate your leader once more and make more Hydra tokens. Now due to its cost it hits back here, but I think you can see its power.

Honorable Mention #4 - Hurricanes

Ever since the game debuted, Green has had answers to flying, something very ubiquitous at the kitchen table. Many mechanics have shifted colors or stopped being supported, but Green's ability to handle flyers has never been. There are builds out there, such as Kaalia of the Vast, where almost every dork flies. You can take advantage of this weakness by running Hurricane and variants. Because your leader and Hydra are on the ground, you could easily run only a few flyers and then some flying removal like these guys. Even one Windstorm for you to Tutor for is valuable (and it's an instant). Drop them from the skies to the graveyard!

10. Profane Command

The Command cycle created a powerful group of options for the kitchen table. My favorite in multiplayer is not the overplayed Cryptic Command but this one. It can substitute for a burn spell in this build as it'll drain a player as well as dropping a dork in size into death (which will kill dorks with indestructible). It can do both! Give some fear and swing! Return a cool card! It's amazing in any build, but in this one it can be maximally flexible, thus it's entry at the ten spot on my list.

9. Spell Burst

In addition to lovers of Blue's ability to steal is its ability to counter! Here we have Spell Burst, an X counter that does cost mana to use, but can reload with buyback. Tap your leader to help with the mana and this is essentially buyback 1. Cast. Counter. Make a Hydra. Repeat. The buyback on this thing gives it a recursive engine that makes this the most synergetic counter for your brew.

Also don't forget other X Spell counters like Spell Blast as well as Power Sink style stuff.

8. Wildest Dreams

One of my favorite songs by The Moody Blues is "Your Wildest Dreams" which I sing every time I see this card. Often in my head. From Tutors, Counters, and Controls and now we slide to the power of Regrowth. Tap your leader and a single Green mana. There's a Regrowth and a 3/3 Hydra. Awesome! Two more mana? You cast Restock and netted a 5/5 and two key cards from your graveyard. Two more mana? Three cards for your trouble and powerful 7/7. That sort of mad scalability twinned with the power of a Regrowth effect is intoxicating in this brew!

7. Nylea's Intervention

And we slide from Green's classic Regrowth effects to Green's classic land-searching. This thing can search for your library for any land. Volrath's Stronghold? Maze of Ith? All three entries in the Urzatron (Urza's Mine, Urza's Power Plant, Urza's Tower) which is a good idea to break these X spells. Solve any mana issues your three-color deck may have with Command Tower and similar cards. It's good on turn three to turn thirty.

6a. Black Sun's Zenith

Now, from land searching to mass removal, let's turn to Black Sun's Zenith. Creatures are how most people win the game. Take them down and out! This is also flexible and you can play with it to get maximum sweepage. Although sometimes you just want a Wrath of God, and this will suffice. It also kills in a way that slips past the incredibly common indestructible dorks or effects such as Heroic Intervention that give it for a turn.

Note that when you cast this with your leader, you'll always wind up with a 2/2 Hydra token as it costs two more for this than X spell. You'll build your board position while wiping out theirs!

Need a Scalpel instead of this hammer?

Check out 6b below!

6b. Gaze of Granite and the Punishment Half of Crime // Punishment

These two have the ability to just take out stuff with a specific casting cost. As long as X isn't zero, you'll keep your tokens. Punishment is cheaper that Gaze but misses planeswalkers. You may find value in one or the other. Or both!

All right, now let's review the top five!

5. Discard X Spells

Scalable discard? Awesome! Having it be random? Nasty! Mind Shatter is a powerful intoxicant of awesome for your brew. This effect used to be much more common than now, as most discard today has been recast as the player choosing the card. This can really chase someone around the bin. Don't forget the original Mind Twist, if it's legal, either.

4. Torment of Hailfire

In Commander or other multiplayer formats, the ability to smash everyone with a Torment of Hailfire is incredibly powerfully good. Just put five mana into this on the 5th turn. Now they are losing 9 life, sacrifice 3 permanents, discarding three cards, or some variant thereof. The bigger this is the fewer options they'll have. If they only have two cards in hand, four non-lands, and such you can break them with a Torment of Hailfire. Use it. Abuse it. Just don't refuse it!

3. Braingeyers

Another classic! From Hurricane to Mind Twist and now to Braingeyser we are really smashing the Alpha roster today aren't we! Much like Green's hatred and removal of flyers, Blue has often rocked these X Card draw spells. Braingeyser used to be restricted it was that good. Now we have a number of Brainsgeyer variants like Stroke of Genius and Mind Spring. Because someone dies from being decked, the clever player will turn these (that can be) on a foe to kill them as their deck runs low. I really enjoy Finale of Revelation as a modern take on Braingeyser that you can lean on and into for warmth and protection. Modern Braingeysers aren't targetable, but will often add something else to the conversation.

2. Chord of Calling and Green Sun's Zenith

Forget Tutorings or raw card drawing. Searching your library for a dork and putting it onto the battlefield has immediate power. If you control Zaxara you can load up a bigger Hydra by tapping out for these, and netting the best creature (or Green creature). Since the effect grabs "X or less" you can put extra mana into the X for your trigger and still get what you really want or need from your deck, even if it's cheaper. The convoke on Chord can really increase that X up until the stratosphere. And all of these happens while you fetch the best creature from your build for the situation.

But it's didn't make my top spot...

So, what did?

Ready?

1. Villainous Wealth

Get ready for the 2nd Era of the Villainous Wealth! This forgotten card from Khans of Tarkir was just reprinted in Commander 2020 and as someone who loves this in my epic five color thousands of cards big Abe's Deck of Happiness and Joy, trust me, it shouldn't be forgotten anymore! Let's look at it. Choose a foe. They exile a bunch of stuff from their library. For the rest of the game you can cast them for free. Did you exile a counter? Use it later! Did you exile a Solemn Simulacrum? Drop it! Mulldrifter? Cloudblazer? Eternal Witness? Flametongue Kavu? Ravenous Chupacabra? Drop them! Bigger threats? Now yours! If you flip removal and there are no targets worth your time, save it. As long as your X is big enough for that card, you'll get a powerful free spell! Unlike many of these effects, this one does not last until the end of the turn, you can use and keep using as long as you are in the game (and your target too, by the by. In a multiplayer game their stuff goes with them when they die).

And there we have it! From Hydras to Villainous, those are my favorite X Spells in a Zaxara shell. Anything in here that I missed or that you liked? Anything in here inspire your builds? Just let me know, and have an awesome day!!!

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