Hello everyone! I'm Levi from The Thought Vessel Show, and today we're diving into a mechanic that began as a flavorful way to show the slow spread of poison or power but evolved into a versatile Swiss army knife of gameplay. That mechanic I'm writing about, of course, is Proliferate. Let's start from the beginning.

The year was 2010, one year before Commander would become an official Magic format, and the debut year of Scars of Mirrodin. In this set, the Phyrexians returned to Magic's lore, attempting to overthrow the metallic plane of Mirrodin. This time, they brought with them a new keyword: infect--a mechanic that allowed players to give their opponents poison counters, knocking them out of the game once they accumulated 10. Because only 10 counters were required, most infect creatures were smaller or used -1/-1 counters instead of dealing regular damage. To enhance these cards and evoke the slow spread of Phyrexian oil, a new mechanic was needed--one that could affect both poison and -1/-1 counters simultaneously. And so, proliferate was born.

Proliferate, as a keyword, reads: "Choose any number of permanents and/or players, then give each another counter of each kind already there." This means it could pump creatures with +1/+1 counters, wither down those with -1/-1 counters, add poison counters to players, and more--all at once. Its ability to manipulate any counter in play made proliferate incredibly powerful. For infect decks, this provided a way to keep adding poison counters without needing combat damage. Proliferate was well-received because of its versatility and balance. A perfect example of its application comes from a card in the Zendikar block, released a year prior in 2009.

Typically, players trigger this card's ability after a few turns, especially with fetch lands in play. But with proliferate, you could accelerate the process by adding quest counters, making a same-turn activation possible. This flexibility extends beyond typical infect strategies, as it boosts many other cards that rely on counters. For example, cards like Beastmaster Ascension, which require multiple quest counters, can suddenly go online much faster with proliferate in the mix, turning what might have been a long-term setup into an immediate game-changer.

Beyond quest counters and poison, another popular application of proliferate is with planeswalkers and their loyalty counters. Since proliferate affects loyalty counters, you can cast a planeswalker and immediately boost their loyalty enough to activate their most powerful abilities. In recent years, Wizards of the Coast has supported this strategy with cards like Ichormoon Gauntlet, which grants planeswalkers a +0 proliferate ability. With a deck like Narset, Enlightened Master--often built with a high volume of planeswalkers--you can proliferate 5-6 times per turn, ensuring optimal activations from each planeswalker you control. This kind of setup creates a level of redundancy and power that makes planeswalker decks incredibly difficult to deal with in longer games.

My personal favorite way to exploit proliferate is with divinity counters. Take Myojin of Night's Reach, for example. Normally, it enters the battlefield with a divinity counter, granting indestructible and it would lose that status once you remove the counter to activate its powerful ability--in this case, making all opponents discard their hands. However, with proliferate, you can add more divinity counters, turning it into an indestructible discard machine.

This brings us to the most popular Commander of all time: Atraxa, Praetors' Voice. Though she's been knocked off the top spot a few times since her debut in the 2016 Commander preconstructed decks, Atraxa always finds her way back. What's fascinating is that out of nearly thirty-five thousand Atraxa decks, we see 14 or 15 distinct themes, each with over 100 decks. These themes range from Infect and Planeswalkers to more niche strategies like -1/-1 Counters and Sagas. Interestingly, despite Atraxa initially being a precon commander focused on +1/+1 counters, that theme ranks as the 4th most popular for Atraxa decks, showing just how much players love to brew with proliferate.

On Wizards' storm scale, which measures a mechanic's likelihood of returning, proliferate ranks as a 5. A score of 1 is for evergreen mechanics like "artifact creatures" or "equipment," while 10 includes effects like "cumulative upkeep" and "ante." A score of 5 means proliferate has a decent chance of returning in future sets. It's versatile, fits well with many mechanics, and creates intriguing synergies, all without feeling broken. Personally, I'm always excited for more proliferate cards. Whether you're playing casually or competitively, proliferate provides layers of depth that can fit into a wide range of decks, and there's always something new to explore with it.

Similar to the Phyrexians, Wizard of the Coast is always looking to recycle what is there to create something even better. In the case of Proliferate, the way it can improve is by simply letting the world around it grow into a new frontier of opportunity with every new counter that is designed. Until next time, happy gaming!