I had every intention of writing at least one column about Assassin's Creed cards before we dove into Bloomburrow, but I found myself struggling to find an angle that would be interesting to me. I never played those video games, and Universes Beyond products have always been sets that aren't expected to appeal to everyone.

After some thought, I found my angle. One thing I enjoy about Magic is all the ways you can experience the game, from playing different formats to other ways of enjoying the hobby. During COVID I got into altering cards, and while I'm far from a professional alterist, I enjoy the challenge of putting a new face on old, familiar cards - especially when the alter is a funny one. A while back I put Donkey Kong on a Pongify, turning it into "Kongify", and recently did a Donkey Kong themed Ape token to go with it. Give me a card, a set of paints, a paintbrush and a "dad joke", and I'm in my element.

Today's column is going to be my personal top 10 Assassins from Assassin's Creed and how I would alter them, if I was going to take on such a project. I tried to pair each card with an Assassin from popular culture. When I'm actually altering cards I start out with a digital mockup, which I print out and then transfer the basic design of the new art onto a primed card so that I can get the look just right. These images aren't that far from an early step in my normal process of altering cards.

I would love for my honorable mention to go to Leonardo Da Vinci, who I would alter as the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle by the same name. I don't think Leo the elder is actually an Assassin in Assassin's Creed, and the "N" in TMNT is for Ninja, but I would still consider doing the alter just for fun. I actually prefer altering simpler designs like cartoon characters and muppets, as real portraits are still beyond my ability as an artist.

It's worth noting that any alter based on a still from a movie or TV show is unlikely to look exactly like the source image. Even a much better alterist than me will tell you that it won't look like a photo. It will probably look great, but it will look painted because it's an alter... made by painting on a Magic card.

You may not agree with my choices or the order I put them in, but I'll be impressed if you can go through this column and identify each of the characters I chose for these cards. Scroll down just far enough to see the artwork before you make your guesses for each set. Some are easy, but I expect very few of you will get 10 out of 10!

My Top 10 Assassin's Creed Alter Ideas

10 - Alexios, Deimos of Kosmos

This Human Berserker is a 4/4 for four in red. He attacks each turn if able, can't be sacrificed, and can't attack his owner. At the beginning of each player's upkeep, that player gains control of him and puts a +1/+1 counter on him. He's the gift that keeps on giving, and with the right build he can put real pressure on the table to find an answer to the constant drumbeat of damage he'll be pushing out.

The character I paired Alexios with is a robot assassin from the 1977 animated film Wizards by Ralph Bakshi. The robot's name is Necron 99, but he gets subdued and essentially reprogrammed for nonviolence by a wizard, and is renamed "Peace." Artwork is by Ralph Bakshi. The 1977 film Wizards was produced by Bakshi Productions and distributed by 20th Century Fox.

9 - Shaun & Rebecca, Agents

This Human Assassin Scientist pair is a 4/4 with vigilance that lets you search out a card named The Animus and put it onto the battlefield. It's also got a tap ability to make mana and self-mill for 2 cards. The Animus is a legendary artifact that lets you exile legendary creatures from your graveyard and then turn one of your legendary creatures into a copy of one of the exiled cards.

I knew I was going to pair Shaun & Rebecca with a pair of assassins, and it wasn't difficult choosing Mr and Mrs Smith for this card. I would have picked Brad and Angelina from the 2005 film, but I recently watched the 2024 TV series with Donald Glover and Maya Erskine and enjoyed it a lot. It's worth noting that I skipped over Evie and Jacob Frye, as they are siblings and I couldn't think of a pair of assassins who were brother and sister.

Mr and Mrs Smith is available to watch Amazon Prime.

8 - Desmond Miles

Desmond Miles has menace and gets +1/+0 for each other Assassin either under my control or in my graveyard. Whenever he deals combat damage to a player, I'll surveil X where X is the amount of damage he dealt to that player. Desmond Miles and many of the other cards in this list want to be in a deck with lots of other assassins.

What better character to pair with Desmond Miles than a real menace - Anton Chigurh from the 2007 film No Country for Old Men. It's a heck of a film, Javier Bardem does a heck of a job with the role of Anton, and if you haven't seen this movie you really should. I only wish I could have picked a Magic card that would have you flip a coin as part of one of its abilities.

No Country for Old Men was produced by Paramont and distributed by Miramax.

7 - Altair Ibn-La'Ahad

This Human Assassin has first strike and an attack trigger that will have you exile up to one Assassin from your graveyard with a memory counter. Then for each of those exiled Assassins, you'll create a tapped and attacking token copy of the card. You'll exile the tokens at end of combat.

I had to throw in some Marvel characters into this list and decided to use the Winter Soldier himself, Bucky Barnes, for this art swap. Bucky feels right for Mardu colors, and his history of being taken in and out of cryogenic stasis seems to fit this card, though it's certainly not a perfect fit. I just don't know the Assassin's Creed story and world well enough to feel confident in matching each of these characters with the exactly right Magic card.

6 - Layla Hassan

Layla Hassan is a rare Assassin in white. She's got first strike and she'll let you recur historic cards from your graveyard to your hand when one or more Assassins you control deal combat damage to a player.

While Black Widow from the MCU wasn't always on the side of the good guys, it feels right for her to be put on a white card. I tried to find a good picture of her in white, but ultimately decided upon the image above. I think it might be the best pairing of this entire set, though beauty is always in the eye of the beholder.

Captain America and the Winter Soldier (2014) and Black Widow (2021) were produced by Marvel Studios and distributed by Walt Disney Studios.

5 - Aveline de Grandpre

Aveline is a green Assassin, though her color identity is Golgari. She's got deathtouch and when a creature I control with deathtouch deals combat damage to a player, I'll put that many +1/+1 counters on that creature. Green gives easy access to trample, and if I want to get tricky I can play her face down for 3 mana as a 2/2 creature with ward 2. Much like with morph and manifest, I can turn her face up for her disguise cost.

There is no color Yellow in Magic. If there were, The Bride from the 2003 Quentin Tarantino film, would have been easier to pair up with a card. I ended up pairing Uma Thurman's classic character with Aveline de Grandpre, and I think the colors work very nicely together. Sometimes an alter is as much about the look as it is about the mechanics or even the potential for a "dad joke".

Kill Bill Vol. 1 was written and directed by Quentin Tarantino, produced by A Band Apart and distributed by Miramax.

4 - Ezio Auditore da Firenze

I'm not sure if Ezio is one of the most important characters in Assassin's Creed, but he has Menace, gives your Assassin spells freerunning, and puts us in five colors with a fantastic final ability. That makes me think me must be pretty important. That final ability is that whenever he deals combat damage to a player, you may pay five and if that player has 10 or less life, they'll lose the game. That's more impactful in 20 life formats than in commander, but it is still pretty cool.

Who better to pair with a cool character like Ezio than Keanu Reeves' legendary hitman John Wick? As far as I'm aware, Ezio Auditore da Firenze never owned a dog, but I found lots of references to the Doge of Venice when researching this column, so maybe John Wick is a better fit than I realized. The Doge was the head of state and government in Venice, an office that existed from 697 to the fall of the Republic in 1797.

John Wick was produced by Thunder Road Pictures and distributed by Summit Entertainment in 2014.

3 - Shao Jun

Shao Jun is an Izzet Human Assassin with Leap Strike. Leap Strike, unlike "flample" (flying and trample) is a real thing in Magic - as long as it's your turn, she'll have flying and first strike. She also has Rope Dart, which lets you tap two untapped artifacts you control to deal 1 damage to each opponent. While neither of those abilities are likely to be repeated in other Magic sets, they both feel very appropriate for the character I picked.

Yor Forger from the anime hit Spy x Family seemed like the perfect match for Shao Jun. She was the only character from that series that I decided to include in today's column, but I could see altering a whole set of cards for that fun series.

Spy x Family was produced by Wit Studio and CloverWorks and is available on Crunchyroll.

2 - Roshan, Hidden Magister

Face down cards in a deck built around Assassins are much spookier than facing a bunch of manifest or morph cards and there is no better commander for this kind of deck than Roshan, Hidden Magister. This legendary Human Assassin turns all of your creatures into Assassins and gives your face-down creatures menace. When you turn a permanent you control face up, you'll draw a card and lose 1 life. This legendary creature needs to be in a deck where you'll be able to play cards face down, but if you're willing to be in mono-black, I think Roshan's card draw could be a real boon for a deck like this.

The order of this list is entirely based upon my own preferences and I really enjoyed Game of Thrones. Jaqen H'ghar is one of the Faceless Men of Braavos, an order of mysterious assassins with the ability to change their appearance at will. This character feels perfect for a card that cares about playing face down creatures and it should come as no surprise that my top pick is also from Game of Thrones.

1 - Aya of Alexandria

Aya of Alexandria is a Boros Human Assassin with menace and lifelink. She has a combat damage trigger that whenever a historic creature you control deals combat damage to a player, you'll create a 1/1 black Assassin creature token with menace. Aya isn't splashy, but with the right build she could help you make a decent little army of Assassins.

While it might not seem like next-level thinking for me to match Arya Stark with Aya of Alexandria, it works for me and that's what matters. She wasn't always an assassin, and she wasn't an assassin for all that long. In her words, "A girl is Arya Stark of Winterfell, and I'm going home." Game of Thrones wasn't perfect, but Maisie Williams' portrayal of Arya Stark was one of my favorite parts of the show. Last year I even got the chance to write about the Dr. Who Universes Beyond card Me, the Immortal, which featured a character she played in that popular BBC show.

Game of Thrones was created on HBO and was based on the works of George R. R. Martin. It ran from 2011 to 2019, with 73 episodes broadcast over eight seasons.

Final Thoughts

So how did you do? Did you guess 7 or 8 of the characters by looking at my mockups? DId you know who the characters were even if you didn't recall their names? I'm looking at you, Jaqen H'ghar.

If you had to put together a list of your top 10 assassins in Magic and what characters you'd pair with those cards, I'm sure your list would look very different from my list, but that's the fun of a list like this! I bet a ton of you would have Yor at the top and Anton completely off the list, but maybe more of you are cinephiles than I realize. It's also worth noting that I'm old and out of touch, so maybe you would have filled the list with a bunch of characters from anime or maybe other videogames.

This ended up being a lot more work than I expected, but hopefully it was a fun read and maybe I gave some of you ideas on getting alters done for your own AC Commander decks. If you are looking to find an alterist there are plenty of social media pages and groups out there where you can look around and find someone capable of delivering the result you want at a fair price.

I highly recommend getting alters to spiff up your favorite decks, but beware - you may find yourself with a deck you can't ever bring yourself to pull apart. Maybe that isn't an issue for you, but I've struggled with having decks that probably needed to be retired, but that had an alter in the command zone that made me reluctant to change up the deck.

I'm expecting to be jumping into writing about Bloomburrow in the next week or two. I like to have the cards in hand when I work, and I love writing about decks I'm actually building in paper, rather than imagining what I might build.

That's all I've got for today. Thanks for reading and I'll see you next week!