Heyo, let's get into a couple examples this week. I wanted to focus on the non-legendary side of things, but we couldn't help but sneak in a cool card from @stormtide-leviathan. @mistershinyobject brought some terror with the conquerors, and I made me a little uncommon to round things out.
It was actually @gollumni who brought up Alara this week and not me, I swear. All the same, I wanted a color pair not of these colors to round things out, and thought of the mechanical intersection. Immediately this came to me, because a variety of powerful tokens can make the early game feel much fairer, and everyone loves some extra card draw. Some players running more creature-based strategies with auras and equipment might like having an evasive token if you got that, so populate carefully!
For art direction, I'm imagining an abstract Nayan elf, perhaps the same one as depicted in Keeper of Progenitus, waving a staff over rippling roots and leaves as a variety of Alara's tokens follow their wake. Mood: there is so much more to this world than any individual can know.
Black's various nonblack destruction spells have never been so mean. We were all enamored with how to work the numbers here, but this card is a one/two color blowout in limited for sure. If you're running a constructed monoblack deck, you'll have an awesome time, but even with two colors there's a non-zero chance you can hit something. And it even hits multicolored creatures if at least one color isn't shared!
We didn't discuss art direction as much for this, but I imagine maybe a legion of Kaldheim demon berserkers standing in formation over a ruined battlefield under a bloody sky. Alternatively, the original direction was more of an executorial thing, so a throne room with 2-3 rulers staring down at a hapless victim may be fun too!
- Temmet, Vizier of Bolas
This one I just wanted to include because it was good. Grixis Zombies isn't anything new, but having Temmet care about tokens considering his fate and his card... It feels like Amonkhet, it's tragic in a way without being overbearing, it's got lots of cool builds to go with it, it encourages aggression—and so on and so forth. It's not hard to imagine a Lazotep'd Temmet standing at the helm of his army as well either.
The thing to keep in mind is that a good Commander design is specific enough that you understand its purpose, but broad enough to think: what can I brew with this card that would fit this purpose? How much fun can I have here with the other tools from Magic's history?
Hopefully these give you an picture of the kind of cards we're looking for! Jump start some ideas and have fun submitting.
