Budget Alternatives to Expensive Commander Staples

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A few Commander cards show up in almost every list and cost more than the rest of the deck combined. You don’t need them to have a good deck. For each expensive staple below we explain what it does, then give three cheaper cards that cover the same role, with a current price and a short note on when each one shines.

Prices are the cheapest English printing via Scryfall as of November 1. Cards marked Game Changer raise your deck’s bracket; none of the alternatives are on that list.

Cyclonic Rift

Cyclonic Rift Game Changer. Overloaded at seven mana it returns every nonland permanent your opponents control to their hands, and only theirs.

• Aetherize ($0.33): An instant that bounces every creature attacking you. It answers the big swing at you instead of the whole table.
• River’s Rebuke ($0.59): Returns all nonland permanents one opponent controls. It is a one-player Rift you can aim at the leader.
• Evacuation ($0.33): Bounces every creature, yours included. Cast it when you can replay your board faster than everyone else.

Rhystic Study

Rhystic Study Game Changer. Draws you a card every time an opponent casts a spell and won’t pay one extra mana.

• Mystic Remora ($11.40): The same tax for one mana. Keep it for two or three turns, draw a handful, then let it go.
• Fact or Fiction ($0.19): Four cards for four mana at instant speed. You always end up with the two best.
• Midnight Clock ($0.31): A mana rock that later shuffles your hand and graveyard away and draws you a fresh seven.

Smothering Tithe

Smothering Tithe Game Changer. Makes a Treasure whenever an opponent draws, unless they pay two.

• Monologue Tax ($1.29): Makes a Treasure whenever an opponent casts their second spell in a turn. Busy tables pay for your ramp.
• Archivist of Oghma ($5.95): Draws you a card whenever an opponent searches their library, which most green decks do every turn.
• Knight of the White Orchid ($0.86): Fetches a Plains onto the battlefield when you are behind on lands, so white keeps up with green ramp.

Fierce Guardianship

Fierce Guardianship Game Changer. A free counterspell for noncreature spells while you control your commander.

• Swan Song ($11.58): One mana to stop an instant, sorcery or enchantment. The 2/2 Bird you give away rarely matters.
• Arcane Denial ($1.83): Counters anything for two mana. Your opponent draws two, but they lose the spell that mattered.
• Negate ($0.15): The plain version: two mana, any noncreature spell, no downside.

Demonic Tutor

Demonic Tutor Game Changer. Two mana to put any card from your library into your hand.

• Diabolic Tutor ($1.26): The same effect for four mana. Slower, but it still finds your best card.
• Scheming Symmetry ($7.85): One mana to put any card on top of your library. The opponent you pick also gets a tutor, so choose carefully.
• Increasing Ambition ($2.47): Five mana to tutor, and you can flash it back later for a second search.

Toxic Deluge

Toxic Deluge Three mana to shrink every creature by as much life as you choose to pay.

• Crux of Fate ($0.29): Five mana to destroy every non-Dragon creature, or every Dragon if that suits you better.
• Blood on the Snow ($0.33): Wipes the creatures or the planeswalkers, then returns one of yours from the graveyard if you paid with snow mana.
• Pestilence ($0.29): A repeatable wipe that also drains every player. Great with tough creatures or a big life total.

Teferi’s Protection

Teferi’s Protection Game Changer. Phases out everything you control and makes you untouchable for a turn.

• Unbreakable Formation ($0.84): Your creatures become indestructible for the turn. Cast it on your own turn and they get a +1/+1 counter and vigilance too.
• Make a Stand ($0.14): An instant that saves your whole board from a destroy wipe and pumps it slightly.
• Brave the Elements ($0.33): One mana to give your white creatures protection from a colour, which stops most targeted removal and blockers.

The One Ring

The One Ring Game Changer. Protects you for a turn, then draws more cards every turn after.

• Mind’s Eye ($0.32): Pay one mana whenever an opponent draws to draw a card yourself. Slow to start, very strong in long games.
• Hedron Archive ($0.20): Ramps you by two, then cashes in for two cards when you have nothing else to do.

Doubling Season

Doubling Season Doubles both the tokens and the counters you put on your permanents.

• Parallel Lives ($28.16): Doubles your tokens for four mana. The token half is what most decks need.
• Anointed Procession ($59.23): The white version of Parallel Lives, for decks that are not green.
• Primal Vigor ($5.40): Doubles tokens and +1/+1 counters for everyone. Symmetric, but you built your deck to use it.

Craterhoof Behemoth

Craterhoof Behemoth Turns a wide board into lethal damage in one attack.

• Overwhelming Stampede ($1.00): Your creatures get +X/+X and trample, where X is your biggest creature’s power. Often just as lethal.
• End-Raze Forerunners ($0.37): An eight-mana 7/7 that gives everything +2/+2, vigilance and trample when it enters.
• Triumph of the Hordes ($11.28): Four mana for +1/+1, trample and infect. Ten poison counters arrive much faster than forty damage.

Grave Pact

Grave Pact Every time one of your creatures dies, each opponent sacrifices a creature.

• Dictate of Erebos ($15.05): The same trigger, with flash so you can cast it in response to removal or a wipe.
• Butcher of Malakir ($0.31): The same trigger on a 5/4 flier, which also counts itself when it dies.

Deflecting Swat

Deflecting Swat Free redirection of a removal spell while you control your commander.

• Bolt Bend ($3.47): Costs one red mana if you control a creature with power 4 or more, and redirects any single-target spell or ability.
• Wild Ricochet ($0.25): Redirects an instant or sorcery and copies it, so you get the effect too.

Vorinclex, Monstrous Raider

Vorinclex, Monstrous Raider Doubles the counters you put on anything and halves your opponents’ counters.

• Hardened Scales ($1.66): One mana to add an extra +1/+1 counter every time. In counters decks this is often better than doubling.
• Branching Evolution ($7.65): Doubles the +1/+1 counters put on your creatures for three mana.
• Corpsejack Menace ($0.32): A 4/4 body that doubles +1/+1 counters, for Golgari decks.

Coat of Arms

Coat of Arms Every creature gets +1/+1 for each other creature that shares a type with it.

• Door of Destinies ($2.33): Grows your chosen creature type each time you cast one. Starts small, ends huge in typal decks.
• Vanquisher’s Banner ($3.52): A permanent anthem for your type that also draws a card for every member you cast.

Gaea’s Cradle

Gaea’s Cradle Game Changer. A land that taps for one green mana per creature you control.

• Priest of Titania ($1.16): Taps for one green for each Elf. Two mana, and the same explosive feel in Elf decks.
• Elvish Archdruid ($0.49): Pumps your other Elves and taps for green per Elf.
• Circle of Dreams Druid ($12.92): Taps for green per creature you control, which makes it a Cradle on legs for any go-wide deck.

Mox Diamond

Mox Diamond Game Changer. Free mana on turn one by discarding a land.

• Arcane Signet ($0.33): Two mana for any colour in your commander’s identity. The best cheap rock in the format.
• Fellwar Stone ($0.79): Two mana for a colour an opponent’s land could make, which in practice is almost always yours.
• Mind Stone ($0.19): Ramps you early and cycles into a card late.

Heroic Intervention

Heroic Intervention Two mana to give your permanents hexproof and indestructible for a turn.

• Tamiyo’s Safekeeping ($3.79): One mana to save your best creature from removal with hexproof and indestructible.
• Snakeskin Veil ($0.17): One mana for hexproof and a +1/+1 counter. It protects and grows your commander.
• Wrap in Vigor ($1.27): Regenerates every creature you control, which still saves your board from a destroy wipe.

Sword of Fire and Ice

Sword of Fire and Ice Protection, damage and a card every time the equipped creature connects.

• Bonesplitter ($0.13): Plus two power for one mana. Cheap equip and it fits every Voltron deck.
• Blackblade Reforged ($2.76): Grows with your land count and equips your legendary commander for three.

How to pick the right alternative

• Look at why you wanted the staple. Rhystic Study is card draw, so any strong draw engine can replace it, not only another tax effect.
• Check your colors and curve. A cheaper card that costs one more mana is often fine in a slower deck.
• Run your list through the Deck Checker after swapping, to make sure you didn’t drop below your targets for ramp, draw or removal.