Foundation's Best Poor Commander

Magic: The Gathering's Foundations set features a ton of rare creatures and even comes with a toy to play with in the form of Pauper Commander. In Pauper Commander, any uncommon creature can be used as a commander (it doesn't have to be legendary), and the other 99 cards must be common.

Unlike the original Commander, in Pauper Commander you start with 30 health and only need 16 Commander damage to be defeated. Everything else is exactly the same as Commander. Foundations has over 100 Pauper Commanders available to players, some new and some old. They all vary in power, but some stand out from the rest as being the most powerful in the set.

10

cat collector

kitten saving life

Cat Collector is a simple commander. The first time you gain life on your turn, you will receive the appropriate 1/1 Cat token. This only happens on your turn, but as the game progresses the battlefield can easily become overrun with cats.

The Cat Collector deck is a deck based on life gain. There are many common cards that can gain life when a creature enters the battlefield, so the Cat Collector trigger alone can give you a ton of triggers. The lower the Pauper Commander's life total, the more powerful his life gain becomes, making the Cat Collector a more powerful commander than other commanders.

9

Needle Tooth Pack

remove with counter

Needletooth Pack is a unique commander that perfectly fills the role of focusing on +1/+1 counters. Pathological abilities cause all creatures to die, not just yourself, so you can utilize a combat spell as a way to cause a creature to die, and Needletooth Pack's abilities go off.

There are a few ways to build a Needletooh pack deck. You can choose a more Voltron build (loaded with auras, equipment, and +1/+1 counters), or a more generic counter deck that spreads the +1/+1 counters across several different creatures.

8

mischievous mystic

drawings for fairies

Mischievous Mystic is a great commander choice if you like drawing cards. There are endless ways to draw the second card in blue. Doing so will create a 1/1 Fairy with flying. Mischievous Mystic procs every turn, so if you have a lot of ways to draw cards at burst speed, you can potentially get three procs before your turn comes.

Mischievous Mystic is a game where you slowly build up an army of flying fairies by filling your hand with cards. It has to be a mono-blue deck, but since the best card draw spells are blue anyway, this limitation isn't too hard.

7

Clean Quant Sky Mage

Drawing with Voltron

ClinQuant Skymage is a different take on Voltron, where you get a +1/+1 counter every time you draw a card, so you have to draw as many cards as possible. This includes a draw per turn, so ClinQuant Skymage gets at least one +1/+1 per turn cycle.

All you need is a few protection spells to make targeting a CleanQuant Skymage more difficult, if not impossible. Most of them are available in blue. Although a bit slow, this can snowball very quickly once ClinQuant Skymage reaches the battlefield.

6

vampire gourmet

an unstoppable sacrifice

Vampire Gourmand is an interesting commander. Because they want to be the main source of damage. You can grant them stat boosts and equipment to deal massive damage. Around you, you want to draw cards while also sacrificing other creatures to chain for damage.

Vampire Gourmand Pauper Commander decks want both a way to grow the Vampire Gourmand's stats and a way to generate a lot of sacrifice fodder. This works especially well with other sacrifice rewards that can deal damage when a creature dies.

5

watcher of the cycle

death for profit

Watcher of the Cycle rewards creatures for dying by either gaining some life or putting a card in their hand during the final phase. Golgari (black/green) is one of the best color combinations for clearing out creatures and making sure they kill them, so triggering the Morbid ability is rather easy.

Wardens of the Cycle work best as commanders who help build advantage rather than being the main source of damage. This is a great value engine, and the remaining 99 cards do more of the work needed to finish the game.

4

perforation artist

attack and burn

Raid is a great ability because it triggers not only when the creature attacks, but whenever it attacks. This is why Perforating Artist is great. Once you're on the battlefield, there's no need to put yourself at risk in battle. The lower your life total, the more dangerous it is to deal 3 burns in the later stages of the game, allowing the raid to exhaust your opponents quickly.

Perforating Artist also has a critical strike ability, allowing you to prevent your opponent from attacking your best creatures, as you can offer a trade as long as Perforating Artist deals 1 damage to whatever it blocks. This deck benefits from not requiring a commander. Makes it easier to quit the game.

3

devil panda

grow with life

Fiendish Panda is an interesting commander in that you can play with a focus on health regeneration with the first effect, or come back to life with the second effect. Often it is better to focus on gaining life and increasing your Fiendish Panda's stats. In general, resurrecters are much weaker in Pauper Commander.

Orzhov (white/black) is one of the best color combinations you can ask for when it comes to lifegian, so you can easily make sure you're getting lifegian at all times. If multiple instances of life gain occur, each instance will individually give the Fiendish Panda a +1/+1 counter, making it grow quickly.

2

A vengeful blood witch

from death to life

Vengeful Bloodwitch is not only one of the best Pauper Commanders, but one of the best cards of the Foundations era. It can quickly burn your opponent while gaining your life, and causes all creatures you control to die. Black is the default color for sacrifice, so it's trivial to sacrifice a creature for what it's worth, gaining life with Vengeful Bloodwitch and burning your opponents.

Due to Pauper Commander's low life total, the life total change that Vengeful Bloodwitch provides is fantastic. Because it's a way to keep the game going while your opponent starts to struggle.

1

Dwinnen, Gilt Leaf Daen

Grow your elf and gain life

Pauper Commander has a ton of powerful elves, and Dwynen, Gilt-Leaf Daen gives them all some stat boosts. The main attraction is that when Dwynen attacks, he gains the life of every Elf he attacks. Elves are known to flood the battlefield, so you can often gain a lot of life with Dwynen.

Although Dwynen is only a 3/4 and can die in combat when he attacks, Elves can easily generate large amounts of mana, so recasting Dwynen is not easy. The amount of life you gain is incredibly high, making it much more difficult to get out of the game without any damage from your commander.