The Best White Cards In Commander Masters

Land Tax, Smothering Tithe, and Grand Abolisher in the same set? Magic: The Gathering's Commander Masters is great for anyone wanting a white deck.

White has a reputation in Magic: The Gathering's Commander format for generating tokens, taxing opponents, and presenting small but mighty creatures. It's only fitting that the best white cards printed in Commander Masters showcase the color's character, and they do that and then some.

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Indeed, some of Magic: The Gathering's most famous white cards of all time are returning with this set including a number of cards that haven't seen the light of print in a long time. Let's talk about them.

Mangara might just be the poster child for tax effects in Commander. Unlike most tax effects that pressure an opponent's mana, Mangara simply provides its controller with more cards in exchange for opponents trying to advance their game states.

It's relatively easy for most players to get around the first effect by refusing to attack you while Mangara remains on the battlefield. After all, the Diplomat is a very good blocker as it is due to his high toughness and lifelink. However, the second tax effect is much more harrowing to avoid. Chances are Mangara will at least replace itself. Even in cases when it doesn't, forcing opposing removal clears the way for your more threatening cards.

Speaking of poster children, here's one of the heroes of the Modern Hammer Time deck. Any strategy interested in cashing in on equipment cards will undoubtedly want to include Puresteel in their one hundred. Not only do all of your equipment cards replace themselves as long as you control this creature; it's highly likely that their equip costs become zero as well.

The Knight creature type here also happens to synergize perfectly with Sir Gwyn, Hero of Ashenvale as a commander. Human is another largely relevant creature type though equipment doesn't have a place in Human decks especially often. That being said, you can do a lot worse than including a couple of the Swords cycle cards in a Human deck to incentivize playing this creature.

While Land Tax was reprinted in Double Masters and Battlebond, it hasn't seen many more print runs than these. Couple this with the fact that it has always been printed at mythic rare rarity, and you've got a card that doesn't have a ton of copies running around.

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While Land Tax doesn't directly increase the amount of mana you have available, it does fill your hand with land cards and thin your deck so that future draws are more reliably playable. Land Tax is especially good alongside cards that require you to discard cards in order to access devastating effects. Scroll Rack and Mageta the Lion are a couple of great examples.

This enchantment God is great in any deck with a lifegain strategy as it's capable of spitting out an infinite number of counters with the right setup. It's also just a really cheap indestructible creature as long as your devotion to white is five or greater.

All of this being said, Heliod's biggest claim to fame is the ability to win the game instantly alongside either Walking Ballista or Triskelion. This two-card combo provides its controller with infinite life gain and infinite damage, allowing you to win the game in the blink of an eye.

Hate being interrupted by other players while it's your turn? Look no further than Grand Abolisher for the answer to your woes as this creature will prevent players from doing just about anything as long as it's your turn.

While Grand Abolisher goes best in a combo deck that wants to prevent its game-winning combo from being interrupted, the Human and Cleric creature types on this card make it a relevant playable for decks playing either of these creature types as well. Besides, the flavor text on this card is so good you might as well play it for that alone.

Now we're getting into the serious tax effects. You've never heard a collective groan from a bunch of commander players like the groan that follows someone resolving this enchantment. Smothering Tithe presents a lose-lose proposition to your opponents, as losing two mana will almost always prevent them from casting a card, and giving you a treasure token is asking for trouble.

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More often than not, players will let you have the treasure token if for no other reason than they want to play the cards in their hand. Consequently, Smothering Tithe is best in a deck that can take advantage of the treasures it provides. This enchantment is also notorious for resulting in game-winning combos alongside cards including Stasis, Underworld Breach, Windfall, Wheel of Fortune, and more.

This creature doesn't fit any of the criteria mentioned previously in this article, however, its ability to give all of your permanents indestructible has made it a Commander staple. There are many cards in Magic that destroy all permanents on the battlefield. If you have Avacyn in play when one of these goes off, you destroy everyone else's permanents while your own remain intact.

Avacyn is also one of the most popular characters in all of Magic lore which probably contributes to this card's popularity to some extent. Furthermore, the Angel creature type doesn't hurt. While not especially good, a fan favorite combo is equipping Avacyn with Worldslayer to wipe everyone's permanents from the board repeatedly, resulting in a rather disgusting win to witness.

Last but not least, Loyal Retainers has seen incredibly few prints with its last print run happening as an Amonkhet Invocation. If you aren't familiar with Invocations, just know that there are very, very few of them. Their rarity is many times higher than even that of mythic rare quality cards.

Consequently, it's nice to finally see this card get a run at a regular print. Retainers slots in just fine in any deck that's interested in reanimating creatures from the graveyard. However, it's important to remember that Retainers can only reanimate legendary creature cards. Thankfully, most of the biggest and baddest creatures in Magic also happen to be legendary. Go figure.

NEXT: Magic: The Gathering - The Best Black Cards In Commander Masters

Chris Stomberg is an avid gamer of all kinds. Board games, card games, tabletop games, video games: if its a game, it will pique his interest. Chris has written anchor stories for news broadcasts, modules for his D&D group, and is currently working on his first novel. His hobbies outside of gaming include yoga, reading, bar hopping, and spending time with friends old and new.