IMO, MTG Reality Fracture is the BEST product WotC has put out since well before the Pandemic and I’m excited to get my hands on these new cards and play with them in my favorite format, Commander.
The set is so deep and so good that today I’m going to do a different type of set review than you are probably used to… I’m going to put my money where my mouth is and tell you the cards that I personally think are sweet enough to buy out of the gate and where I plan to use them. I’m less of a collector / investor and much more of a “buy to play with” gamer. These aren’t hypothetical picks that might see some play somewhere; these are picks that are making the cut and going straight into my favorite, tuned decks – and making them better.
I have three EDH decks I’ve played and tuned for years and this new expansion has a ton of different cards that I’m excited to try out in each deck. Outside of special sets, like Horizons or Commander themed releases, it’s very rare that I add many new cards – let alone multiple cards to ALL my decks.
Additionally, Fracture looks so good, fun and flavorful that it actually got me brewing a new deck that features 4 cards from the set that I’ll share at the end of the article.SPOILER ALERT: All 4 of my favorite cards made the cut in the new deck I’m putting together. The new cards really inspired me to put my brewing hat on and build a new deck to utilize some terrific new cards (and that’s saying something, I don’t just build new Commander decks willy-nilly… I prefer playing the decks I’m familiar with).
Let’s start with the elephant in the room for CeDH:
I love CeDH and Samut is going to be an absolute banger card in high bracket play, as it makes it nigh impossible for opponents to interact with your spells. People freaked out about Hexing Squelcher and Samut is even better!
I appreciate how the card plays offense and defense depending on what role you’re in at the table, since it essentially ensures your countermagic or spell threats will go through regardless of if an opponent has interaction in hand.
In CeDH I always play a spell-based Glarb deck with a lot of interaction and since I can take great advantage of the offense and defensive posturing Samut provides, the card is an easy addition to the deck that makes it better.
I also think this is a card that gets better the higher up in the brackets you go and players are able to interact with much more agility.
Let’s go from the single most impressive card in the set to a card that is significantly less broken but really cool nonetheless:
My absolute favorite Commander deck to play is Bracket 2 Rin & Seri. I’m a fan of this strategy to the point that I have my own custom version of the card in the Command Zone with my pets on in:
A fight spell stapled onto a creature is pretty cool, especially when my deck has a lot of uses for the small bodies and tokens that get left behind. I play a bunch of cmc =2 vanilla Changlings to get the double token ability from my Commander and I’ll gladly take one less token to pick off a creature. Removal that leaves a creature behind is great.
Another card that is on my radar as a possible RIn and Seri option. I don’t think this one will find a way into the deck because it’s incredibly tight on space, and doesn’t have a ton of ETB creatures, but I do think this is a really awesome creature that hypothetically would be worth playing in a lot of different decks based around blinking creatures to get repeats on their ETBs.
Who let the dogs out? Woof. Woof. Woof.
Another card that I’m excited to try out in my Bracket 3 Gitrog Monster deck…
Witchstalker is certifiably great. It mills and ramps which is basically everything a BG deck could ever ask for in a set up card and it leaves a body behind! I’m a big fan of getting the equivalent of a good spell out of an ETB and then having material left behind in the form of a creature. Fantastic Value.
Cheap tutors are always great but even better when they LEAVE A BODY BEHIND.
The best card in Gitrog Monster is a 2 mana enchantment called Squandered Resources so directly tutoring for a primary combo piece is nice. My deck also has a recursion / reanimator angle which makes this card quite useful and dynamic in the deck.
It’s cool with the reanimator angle that I can actually discard a big expensive creature and then tutor up Animate Dead with Pia’s ETB to return it to play.
Another sweet creature that will port nicely into Gitrog Monster builds. Tutors are great especially when they LEAVE A BODY BEHIND. I think this card is deceptively useful as an early drop in Commander. The Deathtouch makes it unlikely to be blocked which means it can quickly return the entombed land to hand. Also, Gitrog makes entombing a land draw a card if Cultivator is drawn later on.
Those are some fun ones that port immediately into decks I already have and enjoy and I think that is part of what makes the set so successful as a collection of new cards. There is a lot to love and a lot of cards that are useful all over the place!
Last but certainly not least are some of my actual favorite designs in the set. I didn’t really have a deck that could utilize them so I decided to build a new brew capable of featuring all four. Here’s the new deck I’ve been working on, since the Commander is Bristly Bill, Spine Sower the deck goes pretty hard at Landfall and +1/+1 synergies. The deck is currently Bracket 2 Legal but like all decks I build it plays heavy so it would certainly be a force even at a Bracket 3 table.
BRISTLY BILL, SPINE SOWER
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ARTIFACTS & ENCHANTMENTS – 16 Agatha’s Soul Cauldron Birthing Pod Earthcraft Emerald Medallion Hardened Scales Lotus Petal Mox Amber Necklace of Girion Ozolith, The Shattered Spire Sol Ring Sylvan Library The Great Henge The Ozolith Throne of Eldraine Utopia Sprawl Wild Growth INSTANTS & SORCERIES – 10 Archdruid’s Charm Awaken the Woods Genesis Wave Green Sun’s Zenith Harrow Heroic Intervention Inspiring Call Planar Engineering Scapeshift Skyshroud Claim LANDS – 37 Boseiju, Who Endures Dryad Arbor Fabled Passage 25x Forest Misty Rainforest Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx Prismatic Vista Roiling Canopy Shifting Woodlands Verdant Catacombs Windswept Heath Wooded Foothills Yavimaya, Cradle of Growth
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CREATURES – 35 Arbor Elf Avenger of Zendikar Badgermole Cub Birds of Paradise Boreal Druid Cavalier of Thrones Delighted halfling Druid of Purification Elvish Mystic Eternal Witness Evolution Sage Evolution Witness Formidable Speaker Fyndhorn Elves Hexhaven Invigoration Incubation Druid Joraga Treespeaker Kami of Whispered Hopes Kodama of the West Tree LLanowar Elves Llanowar Tribe Lotus Cobra Lumra, Bellow of the Woods Mossborn Hydra Oracle of Mul Daya Ouroboroid Sakrura Tribe Elder Scute Swarm Scythecat Cub Simulacrum Shaper Solem Simulacrum Springbloom Druid Triskellion Verdant Kraken Wood Elves
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Still have some cards to track down (including the new ones!) hence the sharpie proxies.
Green really got some sweet new cards in Reality Fracture.
While I don’t have a bunch of sweet combos with Invigorator in my deck (I think this card really shines when you’re able to fight more or cast Blasphemous Act, lol) I think the sneaky Vigilance on the card makes it playable in Mono Green EDH. Let’s be real, nobody is ever blocking this creature which means its chunking damage every turn, but also staying untapped which makes it difficult for the other players to ever attack you on the ground.
Of course, it dies to a lot of removal, and doesn’t have an ETB, but the deck is aggressive enough that it should earn its spot.
What goes well with 25 Forests? Green VALAKUT just dropped! Obviously combos with Scapeshift and the other cards that landfall my basic Forests into play. It’s also sweet that you can Scapeshift it with Yavimaya, Cradle of Growth to get a ton of extra damage triggers.
What if Solemn Simulacrum cost 3? Would it be good? Yes. Card is certifiably awesome value. And it LEAVES-A-BODY-BEHIND too.
