Most Underrated Commanders of 2024

Posted on December 18, 2024

Over the past couple of years, I've looked back on the year that was and explored some underplayed and underrated Commanders. It's a fun thought experiment, as many players are often quick to check out the big flashy effects and usually leave a few cards in the dust as a result. Despite this, many of those often ignored cards may have some pretty interesting play to them. As such, I try taking a closer examination at every release of the year and see if any of them are worth a second look.

This year saw a monstrous number of set releases. We got five Standard sets, two major Universes Beyond releases, one minor one, Modern Horizons 3, and the newest installation in the Jumpstart series. That's ten whole sets (or products, in the case of Ravnica: Clue Edition) to cover! Given this, there's almost certainly bound to be a few gems along the way.

While in past years I've had multiple rules in how I go about establishing the commanders to discuss, those mostly pertain to sets with partners and reprint-exclusive sets. As there were neither of these, my evaluation is a lot simpler. For the most part, I'm going through each set release and looking for commanders on the lower end of EDHREC.com pages. Mainly the goal is to focus on commanders with less than 200 lists, though some exceed this quite a bit - particularly when it comes to Bloomburrow and Duskmourn: House of Horror.

Let's jump in and get right to it!

Tolsimir, Midnight's Light (111 Lists)

When you look at this iteration of Tolsimir that makes a Voja token, you're probably thinking the obvious: why not just make a Voja, Jaws of the Conclave deck? To that I answer, sure, that's probably the optimal way to go, but not everyone necessarily wants the optimal solution. Some want to play with cool, unique, and even budget friendly options, which Tolsimir easily represents.

If anything, this provides players with a great opportunity to build a wolves deck. Many of these admittedly aren't the greatest, often being little more than french vanilla creatures or some equivalent thereof. Still, we've gotten quite a few great options over the years. Consider cards like Cemetery Prowler, Wolfir Silverheart, and Hollowhenge Overlord for some powerful choices. You can also run powerful cards like Master of the Wild Hunt, Night of the Howl Pack, and Kessig Cagebreakers to put even more tokens into play. It might not be the greatest option ever, but there's a lot of fun to be had here that can easily be achieved on a budget.

Emissary Green (198 Lists)

I'm honestly a bit surprised that this card isn't seeing more play as a commander, because this seems like a house to me. You either get a metric ton of treasure tokens or you massively buff your entire board. It's simple, but effective. If you build your deck around this by finding ways to draw extra cards and dump a ton of creatures, this can get out of hand really fast. Yes, you need to attack, but that's hardly a problem when you have access to cards like Whispersilk Cloak that can make it unblockable with ease. A fairly basic card, but I promise if you play with this and build around it appropriately, it goes extremely hard and will win you games in no time flat.

Elder Arthur Maxson (141 Lists)

I'm a sucker for a good token commander and Elder Arthur Maxson seems criminally underrated for that kind of deck. Giving all of your tokens training provides them with a means of powering up your board turn after turn, with each of them improving along the way. Arthur doesn't exactly make any tokens himself, but let's be real here: tokens are a dime a dozen in Commander. Find some excellent token generators and go to town.

Making enough tokens means that you can attack with Arthur outright and not suffer much for it. Alternatively, you can look for other strong creatures to utilize instead. For example, sticking the landing on an early Serra Ascendant will provide you with a huge evasive beater that's almost assuredly going to ensure that your tokens get bigger. There's also plenty of indestructible creatures to make use of as well. I'm quite partial to Darksteel Sentinel as it provides a good attacker and blocker that can take your tokens up to 3/3s easily, but you can go as big as Darksteel Colossus and Blightsteel Colossus no problem.

Vial Smasher, Gleeful Grenadier (274 Lists)

Most of the really low commanders from Outlaws of Thunder Junction make a pretty solid amount of sense to me as to why no one wants to use them. In general, they're simply not interesting enough to make work effectively. So instead, I went with something that had a bit of a higher list count, but still felt low when compared to the top end of the set's options. This brings me to Vial Smasher, Gleeful Grenadier, as a fun typal build around.

If you run a high enough number of outlaws with Vial Smasher, it's certainly going to get out of hand, which seems particularly ideal for getting up to some nonsense. It does suffer a bit from dealing damage only to one opponent instead of everyone, but that's fine if you build your deck right. In Rakdos alone, there's 564 possible outlaw options, meaning that you can absolutely find some powerful cards to take advantage of. Tokens, damage doublers, and more can also take you far, making this a great choice for someone to take on an interesting deck-building challenge.

Emrakul, the World Anew (165 Lists)

It's extremely surprising to me to see an Emrakul have such a low representation. I'm enough of an old head amongst the Commander crowd to have played the format for the short window that the original Emrakul, the Aeons Torn was legal and it was something else. The simple fact is that this iteration of the classic creature doesn't hold a candle to past iterations. It lacks annihilator and the extra turn whammy of Aeons Torn and you don't get something quite as wildly impactful as Emrakul, the Promised End's Mindslaver effect.

Instead, you get the opportunity to steal all the creatures from a single opponent. Not exactly the most thrilling effect when the same set's Ulamog, the Defiler gets some absolutely outrageous annihilator numbers for its big effect. Still, given just how crazy board states can get in games of Commander, even one mass creature theft is still going to have a sweeping impact on the game. I imagine most of the hesitation to try this one out comes from both the Colorless requirement and the fact that you can't easily take advantage of the madness cost. However, what Emrakul offers is still powerful enough that she deserves more than the meager number of lists she currently has.

Bayek of Siwa (60 Lists)

Excuse me, this card has how many lists?! That's so low it's absurd, and it really feels like more players have to try this one out. There's a metric ton of historic creatures throughout the game, which shouldn't be too much of a surprise given that this batching includes both legendary creatures and artifact creatures. In Boros colors alone, this accounts for over 1200 creatures! This includes powerhouses like Adeline, Resplendent Cathar, Akroma, Angel of Fury, and Winota, Joiner of Forces - just to name a few. Bayek plays fairly one-note as an all-in aggressive strategy, but sometimes simple makes for good fun and can be refreshing after several rounds of complex gameplay. Try it out and see how it works for you!

The Odd Acorn Gang (533 Lists)

By far this commander has the highest number of base lists of any card on this list. Most don't even crack the 300 list mark, yet this one is well into the 500s, so why is it here? Simply put, Bloomburrow was monstrous for Commander. Virtually every legendary creature from that set has hundreds, if not thousands of decklists already. As a set notably less impactful for competitive players yet wildly popular among casuals, it's a no brainer that it would impact the most casual format of all in such a big way.

As such, The Odd Acorn Gang sticks out like a sore thumb. It's one of the five lowest options in the set (and its accompanying Commander precons) and while I think there's merit to talking about Hugs, Grisly Guardian, I think this one's more noteworthy. The reason is simple: it's the squirrel commander. Most of the other legendary squirrels do cool things, but they're less focused on the typal aspects this card brings to the table. Given the long and storied history of squirrels, it's surprising seeing there aren't very many people trying to make it work. As such, I imagine it's due to the low number of in-color squirrels thus far, though as time goes on, more will certainly be printed making this a good commander to build now so that you can build it up over time.

Tyvar, the Pummeler (297 Lists)

Oh yeah baby, it's everyone's favorite himbo back in action! I adore Tyvar as a character and as an Elves die hard when it comes to gameplay, I've been just as much of a fan of his cards as well. So, imagine my surprise when I pull up the legendary creature list from Duskmourn: House of Horror and find him way toward the bottom of the list. After all, who doesn't love a good Overrun on a stick? I know I sure do!

The problem is how he compares to two other notable legends: Ezuri, Renegade Leader and Kamahl, Fist of Krosa. Ezuri is probably the most comparable, boasting similar stats, Overrun effect, and a regeneration ability of sorts. Ezuri is a better Elves commander because he grants trample and regenerates other creatures as opposed to himself. Similarly, Kamahl also gives trample and even makes little creatures for you to attack with. I don't think this should count Tyvar out, though, as he provides a great aggressive assault by coming down early, making him less a good choice as an Elves commander and is instead better as a general Green ramp strategy instead. Try him out and beat some faces in!

Kiora, the Rising Tide (134 Lists)

At first glance, I think it's pretty easy to see why Kiora, the Rising Tide is a bit underplayed thus far. The looting effect is only a one-time effect, and the only other ability is getting a big legendary creature? That means you can't even get multiples of it! Many players like having a commander that continually does things throughout a game, and Kiora doesn't exactly do this the best...on her own at least.

I think you can build a deck around her that performs fairly decently. A big point here is utilizing flicker effects to get multiple uses out of Kiora's looting effect. This includes cards like Conjurer's Closet and the very flavorful Thassa, Deep-Dwelling. This is especially good as it can effectively untap Kiora after an attack, netting you an 8/8 while also getting some damage through. Those attacks are even easier when using cards that make Kiora unblockable. With so much looting, you can also make good use out of flashback spells as well, of which there are certainly a decent number of. This just goes to show that you can build something solid out of even the more mundane looking commanders.

Hurska Sweet-Tooth (163 Lists)

I can't help but feel like this card's low list numbers is primarily on account of it being relatively new and difficult to acquire thanks to how Jumpstart releases are distributed. First off, the card art is absolutely adorable, and should easily draw players in. Second, it provides an outlet for doing something players really love to do: gain life. Using cards like Soul Warden won't gain you a ton of power ups since they can only go so far, but playing something like say Wellwisher with some mana dorks can go a long way.

Even without going the Soul Sisters route, just attacking with Hurska makes a food token, which means you're always going to gain some life and always going to get some buffs. These food tokens have their own synergies as well. Trail of Crumbs is an easy one right off the bat, as are cards like Killer Service and Academy Manufactor. Heck, even something as simple as a Gilded Goose can both provide you more ways to make food tokens as well as utilize the foods Hurska makes. There's a solid amount of versatility here and a good number of angles to play around with, and is one worth your time to check out.

These only represent a small number of the commanders that could be covered. I actually had several more I wanted to discuss, such as Codsworth, Handy Helper at a meager 67 lists, but wanted to limit things lest it get a bit too long. Don't be afraid to get out there and explore some decks and build around some legends you might not have ever considered before! You might be surprised at what they have to offer.

You can find my past Underrated Commanders articles here: