It’s that time, another set release is here, and new commander decks along with it. This month, we welcome Outlaws of Thunder Junction to the Magic world, with its pre-release date set for April 12th. To celebrate, we have a review and upgrade guide for a brand new pre-constructed Commander deck: Most Wanted.
Most Wanted Commander Review
As always, we start with a look at the potential commanders for the deck that have been included. There is our face commander, and an alternate commander, as well as a reprint of a legend in our color identity.
Our face commander is Olivia, Opulant Outlaw. It’s a fresh look for Olivia, as she doesn’t care about vampires this time. Instead, she cares about Outlaws, a batch made up of assassins, mercenaries, pirates, rogues, and warlocks. She converts them damaging players into treasure, and treasures into team buffs, serving as a solid engine for everything Most Wanted cares about.
Our alternate commander is Magic’s first three-color dwarf Vihaan, Goldwaker. Vihaan gives Outlaws haste, and vigilance, while also turning treasures into 3/3 Construct Assassin creatures on your turn. While potentially more interesting to build around, his inability to make treasure makes him worse at leading this deck.
Our last option for a commander is the reprinted Queen Marchesa. While a decent inclusion, she isn’t really suited to being our commander, as her abilities are less a match with the deck.
With all of that said, I am sticking with Olivia as our commander here.
Most Wanted Review
In Most Wanted, we have ten new cards, as well as a few Outlaws of Thunder Junction cards, and the rest are all reprints. It comes together for a coherent two-part plan: Outlaws and Treasure.
There are a lot of Outlaws (assassin, mercenary, pirate, rogue, or warlock) who already care about or make treasures, so there’s a high amount of synergy here. The choice to use a batch rather than a new creature type means Most Wanted can draw on Magic’s 30 years of cards in it, and for upgrades.
Many strong treasure cards were omitted from the deck, which is a shame. Some of them are almost glaring oversights, especially when considering that the deck has mediocre reprint value. There are maybe 7 cards with a value of $5 in Most Wanted, and only one that reaches $10. Command Beacon, while needing a reprint, isn’t a great fit for the deck as Olivia is a lowish-cost commander.
Overall Most Wanted has a fair amount of synergy, but has some odd omissions from it, and is lacking in reprint value for the deck. This leaves us a lot of room to make improvements though!
Most Wanted Upgrades
With Most Wanted we’re wanting Outlaws, and Treasure elements here, so we’re looking for cards that fit into our plan of doing both well. Note: I’m excluding Dockside Extortionist, as that $90 card has extorted enough money from people. If you have it, run it here as a great fit.
Let’s start off with a few Universes Beyond creatures that fit perfectly into Most Wanted. Kelogg is perhaps the one card I would first recommend to folks here, as he’s cheap, and a perfect fit for what you want to do as an aggressive outlaw, who makes treasure and makes use of them.
From the D&D movie Secret Lair, Forge, Neverwinter Charlatan makes treasures when creatures are sacrificed, has evasion, and grows based on how many treasures you have, making him great. Wait what’s that? A protection ability that even triggers his treasure making too? Perfect.
Our final Universes Beyond creature, The Master, Multiplied is a different pick, but he is an Outlaw as a Rogue (and an outlaw Time Lord at that). The key here is that he has myriad, which is great for hitting all your opponents to trigger Olivia multiple times in a turn.
A definitive treasure card, Revel in Riches can make you a lot of treasures, and provides an alternate win condition.
Doing everything you could possibly want from a card in this deck, you are left wondering, why isn’t Black Market Connections already in Most Wanted.
This is one of the oddest omissions, as Grim Hireling is a perfect fit for the deck, as a rogue who makes treasure when you damage players, and can use treasures as removal.
An Elemental from Adventures in the Forgotten Realms, Xorn makes you an additional treasure each time you make one. While not an outlaw, the level of synergy with the treasure side of things is too big to ignore.
From the main Outlaws of Thunder Junction set, this Posse Boss gives your Outlaws haste, and brings with him a bit of help to push the pace forward.
This swashbuckling rogue lets you give double strike to your Outlaws, letting them make more treasure for you, fight better in battle, and do so for only three mana
Our last addition idea here isn’t an Outlaw, but it does maximize treasures, and creature growth. With Marionette Master each treasure sacrificed drains an opponent for a potentially growing amount of damage, giving you some finishing oomph
Most Wanted Cuts
To fit these cards in, we need to make some cuts. While there are a number of options for cutting, here are ten options I see for removal:
- Aetherborn Marauder
- Dire Fleet Ravager
- Heliod’s Intervention
- Humble Defector
- Mass Mutiny
- Ogre Slumlord
- Rankle, Master of Pranks
- Shiny Impetus
- Temple of the False God
- Tenured Inkcaster
These aren’t all bad cards, but not ones that are all strong fits for the deck, and are easy enough to move on from.
That's how I Most Wanted, so share what changes you would make in the comments below, or check out oour last deck tech: Mutant Menace.
Have a tip, or want to point out something we missed? Leave a Comment or e-mail us at tips@techraptor.net
A longtime lover of speculative fiction, in almost all its forms, Don joined TechRaptor in 2014 on a whim sending in an application as he was looking for… More about Don
