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Top 10 Magic: The Gathering Final Fantasy Commanders You Must See

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The entirety of the ‘Magic: The Gathering‘ “Final Fantasy” series has been unveiled, giving us a glimpse into which of the freshly minted legendary creatures function optimally as commanders. With both the Standard set and its Commander supplement, “Final Fantasy” boasts more than 130 new commanders, each symbolizing significant characters. There are numerous promising choices to construct around, so if a commander isn’t highlighted here, it doesn’t automatically signify poor performance.

Since this collection boasts numerous distinct commanders, I opted not to incorporate any cards from the “Final Fantasy: Through the Ages” bonus sheet. This is because all these cards are essentially replicas of existing “Magic: The Gathering” cards that have been given a “Final Fantasy” facelift. Consequently, I’m concentrating solely on cards that are fresh introductions to the game in the Final Fantasy crossover set.

10. The Wandering Minstrel Is A Fantastic Budget Option

The Wandering Minstrel Saves You Money On Lands

Among some commanders not mentioned who might be more potent overall, The Wandering Minstrel is included due to its effectiveness in budget decks. This card’s unique feature of having all lands enter untapped can significantly reduce costs when constructing a five-color mana base, which can become quite expensive if aiming for quick mana production. Additionally, this commander boasts a relatively low casting cost, ensuring its ease of deployment, and allowing you to capitalize on its static ability more frequently.

One potential rephrasing could be: One potential drawback with this card is that its additional abilities primarily target ‘Towns’, a unique land type only present in the current ‘Final Fantasy’ set at this time. Future releases may introduce more towns, broadening this commander’s utility. However, at present, its second and third abilities might not be as applicable to many deck configurations. Despite this, I believe The Wandering Minstrel is an excellent budget choice for those constructing a five-color deck with a land focus, such as a Maze’s End deck, or simply a versatile “good stuff” deck.

9. Jenova, Ancient Calamity Adds Value To Sacrifice Builds

Green And Black Sacrifice Decks Are A Common Archetype

Jenova, Ancient Calamity could serve effectively as a Golgari sacrificial commander, primarily due to her reliable card-drawing ability. At the start of each combat phase, she allows you to transform one of your creatures into a Mutant. You can then utilize this transformed creature to engage with blockers or sacrifice it for a useful effect from one of your abilities. Upon its death, you’ll often find yourself drawing more cards than just compensating for the resources you’ve lost.

Commanders such as Jenova, Ancient Calamity are consistently valuable, not just due to their off-field impact on a deck’s functionality, but because of their inherent benefits. Jenova significantly enhances the power of any sacrifice cards in your deck with her unique ability. Moreover, strategies within Golgari allow for creature enhancement, so boosting Jenova’s power level also serves to amplify other creatures and generate even more card draws upon their demise.

8. Noctis, Prince of Lucis Allows You To Use Your Graveyard As A Constant Resource

Noctis Lets You Cast Artifacts From Your Graveyard With Little Restriction

The capability to play cards from your cemetery (graveyard) in Magic: The Gathering is consistently strong, as it essentially makes your cemetery an additional part of your hand. Notably, Noctis, Prince of Lucis’ interaction with the graveyard is exceptionally potent since you can utilize it multiple times during your turn. This trait is especially advantageous in Commander, where life is abundant. However, there is a downside: the artifact you summon from the cemetery comes with a Finality counter. But, there are various strategies to bypass this obstacle.

One choice is to operate O’aka, the Traveling Merchant, a card capable of eliminating a counter from one of your non-land permanents. Another option would be to employ a card such as Goldberry, River-Daughter, to maneuver one of your Finality counters for defensive purposes on the artifacts that are most crucial to you. Since Finality counters merely focus on whether their host card goes to the graveyard, you can utilize a Flicker effect (which is abundant in Esper) to expel your artifact before it’s destroyed and then bring it back without a counter.

7. Kefka, Court Mage Is A Consistent Source Of Draw

Both Sides Of Kefka Will Let You Draw Extra Cards

Kefka, the Court Mage has a bit more mana than I’d usually prefer in a Commander, but its overall strength seems to compensate for that. Grixis offers means to safeguard Kefka, enhance it, or provide it with defensive abilities, making it simpler to use this card aggressively and draw additional cards from it. Nevertheless,

The true might of this card is unleashed when you transform it into Kefka, the Ruler of Ruin.

As a passionate film buff diving into the world of Magic: The Gathering, I must say that Kefka, the Ruler of Ruin is an exceptional choice for any deck. This character not only brings a multitude of cards to your arsenal but also offers some intriguing strategies.

Grixis decks, in particular, boast a substantial number of cards capable of dealing incremental damage, such as Underworld Dreams or Stormfist Crusader. These cards can help you amass an impressive card draw with Kefka, especially when targeting multiple opponents simultaneously. Given Kefka’s flying ability and robust stats, you’ll also have the opportunity to attack with him for additional card draws.

However, do remember that due to his commanding presence, Kefka will undoubtedly attract removal attempts. Therefore, it’s crucial to fortify your deck with a substantial number of protection spells to shield him from potential threats and keep him on the battlefield. In essence, be prepared for him to serve as a magnet for enemy removal spells!

6. Choco, Seeker of Paradise Helps You Stack Mana And Thin Your Deck

Choco Can Drop Multiple Lands From The Top Of Your Deck Each Turn

Choco, the Pursuer of Bliss, performs admirably as it assists in mana acceleration, rectifies your card draws, or inflicts substantial damage. It harmonizes rather nicely with other Chocobos from this collection, such as Black Chocobo, Roaming Chocobo, and Sazh’s Chocobo. To maximize its potential, it would be beneficial to include birds with flying abilities in your deck, enabling easier attacks and activation of Choco, Pursuer of Bliss’s skill.

Beyond having robust Bird cards like Derevi, Empyrial Tactician in Bant, there are additionally cards such as Murmuring Mystic and Flurry of Wings that can generate Bird tokens for you, thereby providing numerous ways to populate your battlefield with birds. This increase in bird creatures will significantly enhance Choco’s ability, as more birds mean a stronger effect. Flooding the board with lands using this ability won’t only provide an advantage in mana, but also streamlines your deck by discarding unnecessary cards, making it more probable that you draw the ones crucial for victory.

5. Celes, Rune Knight Can Create A Game-Winning Combo

Celes Can Be Combined With Two Other Cards To Create An Infinite Damage Loop

Among the Final Fantasy series protagonists, I’ve always admired Celes, and I was thrilled when I found that her Magic: The Gathering card was strong enough for my gameplay. As it turns out, Celes, Rune Knight serves as an alternate commander in the Revival Trance deck, functioning decently within the structure of the deck. However, what truly makes her stand out is her ability to form powerful combos.

As a movie enthusiast, I can tell you that any commander who is part of a trio or fewer cards is quite formidable. Essentially, you’ve got a key piece of your winning strategy always at the ready. To pull off a win with Celes, all you need is her, the card Goblin Bombardment, and a creature with Persist. You can use the Persist creature to deal damage to an opponent, which sends it to your graveyard but not out for good. When it returns from the dead, it carries a -1/-1 counter. However, Celes’ ability removes that counter by adding a +1/+1 counter instead. This means you can keep sacrificing it, dealing damage, and bringing it back repeatedly!

4. Sephiroth, Fabled SOLDIER Makes It Easy To Sacrifice Your Creatures

Sephiroth’s Attack Abilities Are A Consistent Way To Sacrifice Creatures

In a mono-black deck, Sephiroth, the Legendary SOLDIER, serves effectively as a commander for sacrificial plays, since consistently sacrificing your own creatures is crucial in this strategy. What makes him particularly appealing is that his ability to generate value doesn’t require additional mana expenditure. Notably, Sephiroth’s second skill shares similarities with Blood Artist, a card often seen in sacrifice-themed decks.

As a die-hard movie buff diving into the world of Magic: The Gathering, I can’t help but be captivated by the transformative power of this card turning into Sephiroth, One-Winged Angel. This metamorphosis will bring forth an emblem bearing the same Blood Artist effect, a game-changer due to the lack of cards interacting with them in the game. Once acquired, this potent emblem remains in play until the very end of the game.

Should you need to replay Sephiroth, One-Winged Angel, simply flip it back and add your accumulated emblems. The emblem’s effect will stack, amplifying its impact with each recast. Moreover, Sephiroth, One-Winged Angel becomes a formidable sacrifice outlet, one that is challenging to obstruct during combat due to its enhanced power.

3. Zenos Yae Galvus Makes It Easier To Win The Game

Zenos Yae Galvus Can Make It So You Only Have To Take Out One Opponent Instead Of Three

I haven’t fully made up my mind about Zenos yae Galvus being the most potent commander from this collection, but it certainly ranks high due to its distinctiveness. The initial side isn’t shabby and could inflict substantial harm on token decks lacking counter or anthem-buffed creatures. However, what truly piques my interest is the transformation into Shinryu, Transcendent Rival. I’m eager to observe how Magic players will strategize around this card and incorporate it into their gameplay.

When this card metamorphoses, you select one rival player. If that chosen opponent is defeated, then you emerge victorious in the game of Commander. With Shinryu boasting a substantial attack power and the ability to fly, vanquishing an adversary via commander damage becomes a tangible prospect. However, beware that this card will draw unwanted attention, potentially leading to entire decks centered around countering it being developed. Nonetheless, a clever strategist might find ways to exploit its potential, thereby bringing games to a swift conclusion.

2. Terra, Magical Adept Offers A Lot Of Enchantment Support

Terra Can Clone Enchantments And Make Sagas Resolve More Quickly

As a seasoned movie critic, I must say that Terra, Magical Adept is a versatile character, capable of adapting to various strategies – but there’s one crucial element that should never be overlooked: Enchantments. They form the backbone of your deck, providing the necessary foundation for Terra’s prowess.

Upon entering the field, Terra’s front side trims down your deck slightly and aids in locating beneficial enchantments. This aspect of her character is reminiscent of the intricate plot development in the classic game, Final Fantasy 6, where characters often needed to grow and evolve to unlock their full potential.

However, it’s when you activate Terra’s Trance ability that she truly transforms into Esper Terra – a powerhouse that leaves opponents dazed and awestruck. Just like in the game, Terra becomes exponentially more formidable once her hidden abilities are unleashed.

Esper Terra lets you duplicate one of your common enchantments for the current turn, grant it haste, and if it’s a Saga, you can also add lore counters to it. This makes Terra particularly powerful when used with this set’s Saga Creatures or Sagas in general, as many can activate their strongest abilities instantly due to this commander. As an alternative, you could duplicate an enchantment like City on Fire, allowing Terra to eliminate a player with commander damage in its enhanced form.

1. Vivi Ornitier Gives You Free Mana Each Turn

Vivi Has An Ability That’s Free To Activate And Gives You Mana

Vivi the Birdmaster could rapidly become a formidable opponent, and it has the potential to do so right from the start due to its low spell casting cost. By casting non-creature spells, you effectively gain an additional mana per turn with Vivi’s first ability. As Vivi’s mana ability can only be activated during your turn, you can utilize it to cast large spells, while keeping your lands free for defensive spells like counters or protection to ensure Vivi survives until your next turn.

In the world of Magic: The Gathering, Izzet is another top-notch color pairing for spell-focused decks. This means that, in addition to being strong on its own, Vivi Ornitier boasts a wealth of support that can help construct an extremely potent spellslinger deck. Frankly, it wouldn’t shock me at all if Vivi eventually finds its way onto the Commander’s Game Changers list, given its immense potential power.

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2025-06-01 05:59

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