Expansion Algorithm card art

Expansion Algorithm

Sorcery MV 2

Tracked across real Commander games played through TurnZero HQ.

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What it doesCombosRulingsIn the 99Every version

What it does

Proliferate X times. (To proliferate, choose any number of permanents and/or players, then give each another counter of each kind already there.)

Combos with Expansion Algorithm

Lines this card is part of — what it needs alongside it, and what the two of them do. An infinite result is the one that moves a deck's bracket.

Combo data from Commander Spellbook, the community-maintained database of Magic combos. Mirrored nightly.

Rulings

6 official rulings, in the order Wizards published them.

  • 2026-03-20

    When you proliferate, you can choose any permanent that has a counter, including ones controlled by opponents. You can choose any player who has a counter, including opponents. You can't choose cards in any zone other than the battlefield, even if they have counters on them.

  • 2026-03-20

    If a player or permanent has more than one kind of counter on it, and you choose for it to get additional counters, it must get one of each kind of counter it already has. You can't have it get just one kind of counter it already has and not the others.

  • 2026-03-20

    Players can respond to a spell or ability whose effect includes proliferating. Once that spell or ability starts to resolve, however, and its controller chooses which permanents and players will get new counters, it's too late for anyone to respond.

  • 2026-03-20

    If you proliferate multiple times, you don't have to choose the same set of players and/or permanents to get additional counters each time.

  • 2026-03-20

    You don't have to choose every permanent or player that has a counter—only the ones you want to add counters to. Since "any number" includes zero, you don't have to choose any permanents at all, and you don't have to choose any players at all.

  • 2026-03-20

    While proliferating multiple times, players can't respond between proliferating the first time and proliferating the second time, and so on.

Rulings are Wizards of the Coast's own, mirrored from Scryfall and refreshed nightly.

In the 99

Every deck whose current list includes Expansion Algorithm, whatever its commander.

Decks running it 3
Games played 0
Win rate — Fewer than 5 completed games — not enough to publish a rate yet.
Confirmed on board 0 Games where a board photo caught it actually in play.

Most played under

Commander Decks Games Win rate
Helga, Skittish Seer 1 0 —
Zimone, Infinite Analyst 1 0 —

Colors it shows up in

  • Simic 1 deck
  • Bant 1 deck

Every version of Expansion Algorithm

2 printings, newest first. Prices are the market figures Scryfall publishes, refreshed nightly — a printing with no figure shows a dash rather than a zero, because Scryfall genuinely publishes none for some of them.

Prices from Scryfall, which tracks the TCGplayer and Cardmarket markets. They move daily and are a guide rather than a quote. Search TCGplayer for Expansion Algorithm — a name search across every version, for the printings TCGplayer publishes no direct link to.

Aggregated from Commander games tracked in TurnZero HQ. Every figure counts decks and games only — no individual deck list, player or playgroup is identified. Win rates are withheld below 5 completed games, where the sample is too small to mean anything.