Top Throne of Eldraine cards for EDH
My top 5 Throne of Eldraine cards for EDH sans brawl deck exclusives. I’ll start with a couple of honorable mentions with a brief overview.
First up, Grumgully, the Generous. The card works best in the 99 I feel as you might want access to a third color to combo off more consistently. I personally like this in a naya deck. Having access to white provides another form of ramp in Land Tax, a way to add +1/+1 counters on ETB with Cathars’ Crusade, and Kitchen Finks. Being green also helps this combo with something like Woodfall Primus which would allow you to wipe out everything that’s not a creature.
The next honorable mention I have is kind of cheating on my part as it’s the entire common land cycle. They’re fetchable by the Zendikar/KTK fetches and they all do something relevant and on color. The major drawback I see is that in order for them to do that they have to come into play untapped which requires 3 other lands of the appropriate land type. If you end up with them in your first few turns you’re not happy about it as it’s now just a basic that enters tapped.
The final honorable mention I have is also a land. Fabled Passage is a better Terramorphic Expanse or Evolving Wilds most of the time. Like the common land cycle you’re probably not too happy to have it in your first couple of turns as the land you fetch comes in to play tapped unless you control 4 or more lands.
Now for the actual top 5 EDH cards from Throne of Eldraine and why.
5-I’m also kind of cheating with this one as I’m choosing the entire castle cycle. If you’re in that color, you’ll want the appropriate land in your deck. It most likely does something you want to try and do at some point throughout the game anyway. They all enter tapped unless you control at least one of the appropriate land type, so you’re not too upset if you have it in your opening hand usually. The real reason I like them is the utility they provide for the late game. They’re lands so they fill that slot, but they also have activated abilities which all are very relevant in the late game. Because of the utility they provide it kind of adds another card to the deck. Castle Garenbrig is probably the most talked about one of the whole cycle for various formats which is understandable. When you activate its ability it essentially taps for GG to cast creatures or activate abilities of creatures, both of which are very relevant in green decks. My personal favorite out of the cycle is Castle Lochtwain. It taps for B but for 1BB you can tap it to draw a card and you lose life equal to the number of cards in your hand. Most black decks like to play out of the graveyard so the number of cards in hand is usually fairly low. But also, your life total in EDH starts at 40. Your life is a resource, use it when you need to. The loss of life over the course of the game in black can also be somewhat irrelevant as the color gains life fairly well to counter act the life loss incurred by this and other similar effects.
4-Probably my favorite EDH card from the entire set is Fires of Invention. For 3R you get an enchantment that says you can only cast spells during your turn and no more than 2 spells each turn. It also says that you may cast spells with converted mana cost less than or equal to the number of lands you control for free. I especially like this card in some kind of Pramikon, Sky Rampart control deck. Being in a jeskai deck in general gives you the ability to play something like Fractured Identity. For those unfamiliar with this card it costs 3UW for a sorcery that allows you to exile a non-land permanent and give a token copy to each other player. So in essence, you play Fires on turn 4 then on turn 5 hopefully you can cast Fractured Identity for free making everyone else suffer and now you’re free to continue your game as you please. This card also works especially well with Land Tax as you’re basically guaranteeing your land drops by pulling the basics out of your deck into your hand 3 at a time so you have them to play keeping your expensive spells for free.
3-Deafening Silence is an enchantment for W that makes it so each player can’t cast more than one non-creature spell per turn. This card is high on a lot of people’s lists for a lot of different formats as a sideboard card against just about every combo deck out there because they typically rely on casting multiple non-creature spells in a single turn to reach their end goal. The same holds true in EDH. While extra turns are a big thing in the format, usually to reach your end goal you want to end up casting multiple spells in a single turn, most of which are not creatures. This puts those hyper aggressive combo decks on a more even playing field with the newer players to the game or those that just don’t have the means to go out and build a fully optimized EDH deck with all of the appropriate fetches and dual lands and other more expensive format staples.
2-This next card is great against a lot of infinite combos as they usually require creatures with enter the battlefield or death triggers. Hushbringer stops those on a 1/2 body with flying and lifelink for the low cost of 1W. The one drawback to this card is that it’s a creature and creature removal is rampant in commander. The fact that it’s in white helps that however, because there are tons of protection options in white or as artifacts that can help keep it alive. This card should be played in just about every deck in white in commander. Just make sure that it’s not of the board when you want to try to resolve a Sun Titan or anything though.
1-My pick for the best commander card in Throne of Eldraine is Murderous Rider. It’s a 2/3 zombie knight for 1BB with lifelink and when it dies put it on the bottom of its owners library. It’s also an adventure card Swift End. For 1BB at instant speed you can destroy target creature or planeswalker and you lose 2 life. There’s multiple reasons why I’m so high on this card for edh. It’s a zombie, an already relavant creature type in the format. It’s a knight, a heavily supported tribe with this set that includes a pretty sweet commander in the brawl deck. It’s removal. It kills some annoying creature or a planeswalker that is making things difficult for you. The fact that it goes to the bottom of your library when it dies is probably the highest selling point for me though. In black, tutors are very prevalent, you can tutor for just about anything you want. If you’ve run out of tutors, there’s plenty of other shuffle effects to move it from the bottom to help you draw it again. The ruling with this card as with all of the adventure cards is a bit odd but it’s to not make them too easy to abuse. They’re considered creature cards in all zones except when you cast the adventure. While the adventure is on the stack it’s only an instant/sorcery, whatever applies to that specific spell you’ve cast. In short this means that you can’t tutor up an adventure card with something like Mystical Tutor. It has to be a creature tutor. Another thing that makes this card great is that even if you discard it, you’re in black. There’s ways to get it back to your hand or back on the field. Casting the same spell multiple times in EDH is always great when you have a way to do it. This card provides its own way of going back into your library to be cast again later in the game.
This set being the first to really support Brawl as a format is very commander friendly because of it. There’s a ton of cards I’ve found that would be of some use in commander in one way or another. Almost every card in this set with a few exceptions are very commander playable from budget kitchen table brews all the way to fully optimized competitive EDH decks. I’d recommend picking up as many cards as you feel you might play in commander from this set as possible while it’s in standard as we don’t know if or when these cards will be reprinted. Also depending on what other formats the cards are viable in will help determine the price point on them. They might be commander only cards, where they see little to no play elsewhere and will take a while to gain value or they might be something that turns out great for multiple formats and get expensive fast and stay there. The key to all of this though is to have fun and be happy with your deck overall. You may get all of these cards for your deck(s) and find they’re not as good in your strategy as anticipated. You may find that they greatly improve the deck and now you’re beating decks you used to struggle against. All I can say is have fun and happy brewing.
First up, Grumgully, the Generous. The card works best in the 99 I feel as you might want access to a third color to combo off more consistently. I personally like this in a naya deck. Having access to white provides another form of ramp in Land Tax, a way to add +1/+1 counters on ETB with Cathars’ Crusade, and Kitchen Finks. Being green also helps this combo with something like Woodfall Primus which would allow you to wipe out everything that’s not a creature.
The next honorable mention I have is kind of cheating on my part as it’s the entire common land cycle. They’re fetchable by the Zendikar/KTK fetches and they all do something relevant and on color. The major drawback I see is that in order for them to do that they have to come into play untapped which requires 3 other lands of the appropriate land type. If you end up with them in your first few turns you’re not happy about it as it’s now just a basic that enters tapped.
The final honorable mention I have is also a land. Fabled Passage is a better Terramorphic Expanse or Evolving Wilds most of the time. Like the common land cycle you’re probably not too happy to have it in your first couple of turns as the land you fetch comes in to play tapped unless you control 4 or more lands.
Now for the actual top 5 EDH cards from Throne of Eldraine and why.
5-I’m also kind of cheating with this one as I’m choosing the entire castle cycle. If you’re in that color, you’ll want the appropriate land in your deck. It most likely does something you want to try and do at some point throughout the game anyway. They all enter tapped unless you control at least one of the appropriate land type, so you’re not too upset if you have it in your opening hand usually. The real reason I like them is the utility they provide for the late game. They’re lands so they fill that slot, but they also have activated abilities which all are very relevant in the late game. Because of the utility they provide it kind of adds another card to the deck. Castle Garenbrig is probably the most talked about one of the whole cycle for various formats which is understandable. When you activate its ability it essentially taps for GG to cast creatures or activate abilities of creatures, both of which are very relevant in green decks. My personal favorite out of the cycle is Castle Lochtwain. It taps for B but for 1BB you can tap it to draw a card and you lose life equal to the number of cards in your hand. Most black decks like to play out of the graveyard so the number of cards in hand is usually fairly low. But also, your life total in EDH starts at 40. Your life is a resource, use it when you need to. The loss of life over the course of the game in black can also be somewhat irrelevant as the color gains life fairly well to counter act the life loss incurred by this and other similar effects.
4-Probably my favorite EDH card from the entire set is Fires of Invention. For 3R you get an enchantment that says you can only cast spells during your turn and no more than 2 spells each turn. It also says that you may cast spells with converted mana cost less than or equal to the number of lands you control for free. I especially like this card in some kind of Pramikon, Sky Rampart control deck. Being in a jeskai deck in general gives you the ability to play something like Fractured Identity. For those unfamiliar with this card it costs 3UW for a sorcery that allows you to exile a non-land permanent and give a token copy to each other player. So in essence, you play Fires on turn 4 then on turn 5 hopefully you can cast Fractured Identity for free making everyone else suffer and now you’re free to continue your game as you please. This card also works especially well with Land Tax as you’re basically guaranteeing your land drops by pulling the basics out of your deck into your hand 3 at a time so you have them to play keeping your expensive spells for free.
3-Deafening Silence is an enchantment for W that makes it so each player can’t cast more than one non-creature spell per turn. This card is high on a lot of people’s lists for a lot of different formats as a sideboard card against just about every combo deck out there because they typically rely on casting multiple non-creature spells in a single turn to reach their end goal. The same holds true in EDH. While extra turns are a big thing in the format, usually to reach your end goal you want to end up casting multiple spells in a single turn, most of which are not creatures. This puts those hyper aggressive combo decks on a more even playing field with the newer players to the game or those that just don’t have the means to go out and build a fully optimized EDH deck with all of the appropriate fetches and dual lands and other more expensive format staples.
2-This next card is great against a lot of infinite combos as they usually require creatures with enter the battlefield or death triggers. Hushbringer stops those on a 1/2 body with flying and lifelink for the low cost of 1W. The one drawback to this card is that it’s a creature and creature removal is rampant in commander. The fact that it’s in white helps that however, because there are tons of protection options in white or as artifacts that can help keep it alive. This card should be played in just about every deck in white in commander. Just make sure that it’s not of the board when you want to try to resolve a Sun Titan or anything though.
1-My pick for the best commander card in Throne of Eldraine is Murderous Rider. It’s a 2/3 zombie knight for 1BB with lifelink and when it dies put it on the bottom of its owners library. It’s also an adventure card Swift End. For 1BB at instant speed you can destroy target creature or planeswalker and you lose 2 life. There’s multiple reasons why I’m so high on this card for edh. It’s a zombie, an already relavant creature type in the format. It’s a knight, a heavily supported tribe with this set that includes a pretty sweet commander in the brawl deck. It’s removal. It kills some annoying creature or a planeswalker that is making things difficult for you. The fact that it goes to the bottom of your library when it dies is probably the highest selling point for me though. In black, tutors are very prevalent, you can tutor for just about anything you want. If you’ve run out of tutors, there’s plenty of other shuffle effects to move it from the bottom to help you draw it again. The ruling with this card as with all of the adventure cards is a bit odd but it’s to not make them too easy to abuse. They’re considered creature cards in all zones except when you cast the adventure. While the adventure is on the stack it’s only an instant/sorcery, whatever applies to that specific spell you’ve cast. In short this means that you can’t tutor up an adventure card with something like Mystical Tutor. It has to be a creature tutor. Another thing that makes this card great is that even if you discard it, you’re in black. There’s ways to get it back to your hand or back on the field. Casting the same spell multiple times in EDH is always great when you have a way to do it. This card provides its own way of going back into your library to be cast again later in the game.
This set being the first to really support Brawl as a format is very commander friendly because of it. There’s a ton of cards I’ve found that would be of some use in commander in one way or another. Almost every card in this set with a few exceptions are very commander playable from budget kitchen table brews all the way to fully optimized competitive EDH decks. I’d recommend picking up as many cards as you feel you might play in commander from this set as possible while it’s in standard as we don’t know if or when these cards will be reprinted. Also depending on what other formats the cards are viable in will help determine the price point on them. They might be commander only cards, where they see little to no play elsewhere and will take a while to gain value or they might be something that turns out great for multiple formats and get expensive fast and stay there. The key to all of this though is to have fun and be happy with your deck overall. You may get all of these cards for your deck(s) and find they’re not as good in your strategy as anticipated. You may find that they greatly improve the deck and now you’re beating decks you used to struggle against. All I can say is have fun and happy brewing.
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