Last time we looked at the best White cards you are not playing in Commander and we are back at it again with Red cards that you may have missed during the flood of new card releases this year. As always these cards have more and less utility depending on your strategy but they are still quite flexible for multiple Commanders. Let's just jump into it!

Honorable Mention

Let's get this out of the way, Breeches is not a super exciting card. It is, however, exceptionally good at being a strong, cheap, and efficient creature. As a 3/3 for 3, Breeches, Eager Pillager has decent power and toughness and first strike makes it incredibly awkward to trade with on the opponent's side. Then we have its other abilities. When a Pirate you control attacks you can choose 1 effect that has not been chosen. You can either make a treasure, make a creature unable to block or impulse draw one card. That means Breeches can function as ramp, card advantage, or an attack enabler. Also of note is that this effect happens whenever any pirate attacks. This means multiple pirates can trigger up to all 3 effects in a turn, which, my friends, is what we call value. Is Breeches a game-warping card? No. But play it at a table and watch how often people pick it up and say "Wow that's so good".

*We are not liable if people do not pick it up and say "Wow that's so good"*

Number Five

Red is good at one thing, treasure production combat. The Good news is Alexios, Deimos of Kosmos is REALLY good at combat. Alexios is a 4/4 for four mana with Trample. It must attack each combat if able, cannot be sacrificed, and cannot attack its owner. During each player's upkeep that player gets control of Alexios, untaps it and it gains a +1/+1 counter and haste. Alexios is designed to go around the table, forcing your opponents to swing at each other while it gets bigger and bigger. This card is strikingly similar to another red menace, Slicer, Hired Muscle. Unlike Slicer though, Alexios is far more reasonable to play in the 99 because it naturally has Trample and can make itself bigger over time making it a self-sufficient scaling threat as the game continues. Consider that if you play Alexios on turn four it will proceed to swing for five, six, and seven damage on your opponent's turns and you will get it back on your next turn as an 8/8. That is a whole lot of damage for 4 mana.

Number Four

Red is good at one thing, combat making floating mana. Crime Novelist has totally reasonable stats as a 1/3 for three but its ability gives it a +1/+1 counter and produces a Red mana whenever you sacrifice an artifact. Red's proficiency in treasure production makes it easy for this card to get out of hand quickly. All of a sudden your treasures functionally produce two mana each, sacrificing clues immediately refunds one mana spent on them, and even more obscure artifact tokens like food and junk become forms of mana production. It also has a home in any deck that uses or sacrifices artifact creatures like thopters, passively getting bigger and making mana for little cost. Note as well that you can sacrifice artifacts through abilities other than their own to trigger its effect. Sacrifice unused clues and food from an Academy Manufactor for instance with cards like Grinding Station, Krark-Clan Ironworks, or Koldotha Forgemaster and watch the mana flow.

Number Three

Red is good at one thing, making floating mana rummaging. Brass's Tunnel Grinder is a three-mana Legendary Artifact that, when it enters, allows you to discard any number of cards and then draw that many plus one. Already I love this card. The ability to fix your hand, enable discard and graveyard synergies, and replace itself with the plus one draw makes it very reasonable for three mana. You also get a bore counter on each of your end steps where you have descended. Once you hit three bore counters you can flip over the Tunnel Grinder into Tecutlan, The Searing Rift. A Legendary Land that taps for Red and allows you to discover X where X is the mana value of a permanent cast with its mana. It may take a bit of time to flip over but once Tunnel Grinder becomes a land it will provide a ton of advantage throughout a game. Note that because you are exploring and not cascading you can choose to put the discovered cards in your hand if you find it at an inopportune time. That means that each permanent you cast with this mana is just cold, hard value. The front side of the card may sit around for a while but the discard/draw allows for some immediate value in the form of hand sculpting. This card may read a little clunky but it plays surprisingly smoothly.

Number Two

Red is good at one thing, rummaging extra combat steps. Our first (and not last) spree card on this list, Great Train Heist opens the doors to a lot of possible effects and they are all pretty bad for your opponents. For you can untap all of your creatures and gain an additional combat phase, for you can give your whole time +1/+0 and first strike, and finally, for one you choose an opponent, and any time a creature you control hits them you make a tapped treasure. Being a spree card you can choose to pay for any combination of these three effects and that offers a lot of flexibility. At a total of four mana for an extra combat phase, it is already on par for other extra combat cards like Seize The Day and Relentless Assault. You also have the option to give your creatures first strike which makes them incredibly tough to block effectively. The final choice is also exceptionally strong, allowing decks that play go-wide token strategies to pump out a serious amount of treasures. If you pay for each one of these effects, the result is an absolute beatdown. Swing a board full of creatures in at an opponent, first strike kill everything that blocks, make treasures with everything that got through and then untap and do it all again with some number of blockers out of the way? Yes, please.

Number One

Red is good at one thing, extra combat steps copying spells. Return the favor is another spree card from Outlaws of Thunder Junction and for the life of me, I do not understand why people do not play it more. Its base cost is RR and for 1 you can copy an instant, sorcery, activated, or triggered ability, and also for 1, you can change the target of a spell or ability. Once again, flexibility is the name of the game here. Return The Favor is functionally worse than its contemporaries like Deflecting Swat, Dual Caster Mage, Twinferno, Bolt Bend, etc, but this jack of all trades is still the master. Copying Instants and Sorceries at instant speed is already very powerful. Copy and opponents' Torment Of Hailfire before it resolves or their Finale Of Devastation after they have dumped the mana into it. What makes this first option even more interesting is copying triggered and activated abilities too. Situationally there is a lot of clever stuff you can copy like somebodies Dockside Extorionist trigger or Ghalta, Stampede Tyrant ETB, or maybe cheeky activated abilities like Asmodeus, The Archfiend or Boromir, Warden Of The Tower. Its second effect is a simple redirect effect. If someone tries to exile your creature with a Path To Exile you change the target to their creature and all that jazz.

This card gets wild when you can use both effects at once though. For four total mana what if you changed the target of a Swords to Plowshares and also made another one? What if you changed a Peer Into The Abyss and copied it? Or my personal favorite, what if you changed the target of Aetherflux Reservoir and copied it? This card is not only functional but it's just plain fun with a seemingly never-ending amount of emergent scenarios where it exceeds all expectations.

Hopefully, this list will help you upgrade your favorite decks! I will be looking to continue this series with other colors! Till then, Thanks for reading!

"Be you, Be Free, Live Happily!"

@MulldrifterStan