The first draftable Commander set
Commander Legends is the first Magic set built to be drafted into Commander decks. Packs are twenty cards with two legendary creatures in each, you draft eight players as usual, and what you build at the end is a singleton deck with a commander rather than a 40-card Limited deck.
Partner is what makes the draft work. Forty of the set's mono-colored legends have it, plus one colorless, and two partners together set your color identity. That means a first-pick commander does not lock your colors the way it would otherwise, so you can stay open through most of a draft.
The set also carries a deck-size rule of its own: a Commander Legends draft deck is a minimum of sixty cards rather than a hundred, singleton apart from basic lands. That is the compromise that makes drafting one possible at all.
Themes
Encore
Exile the creature from your graveyard and pay its encore cost to get a token copy attacking each opponent, which is sacrificed at end of turn. It is unearth pointed at a multiplayer table, so it scales with how many opponents you have.
Partner
Two commanders instead of one, combining their color identities. Forty mono-colored legends here carry it plus one colorless, which is far more than the mechanic had ever had and is the reason the draft format functions.
Where You Can Play It
Commander Legends was built for one format and printed for three. It was never Standard- or Pioneer-legal and never intended to be.
Standard was never in play for this set, so no rotation has ever touched it. Nothing here leaves Modern, Legacy, Vintage or Commander either. Commons from any set are Pauper-legal; that isn't listed per set here.
Limited
Not a ten-pair format in the usual sense. What you are drafting toward is a commander, a color identity and sixty singleton cards, so the decisions are different from the first pack onward.
Take the legend, stay open
Because partner exists
A mono-colored legend with partner commits you to one color rather than two, so early legends narrow you far less than they look like they do. Pairing two later is what sets your identity.
Sixty cards, singleton
The deck you are building
Minimum sixty rather than a hundred, one of each card apart from basics. That is a much larger deck than a normal draft produces, so filler matters and a card you would cut in Limited often makes the deck here.
Multiplayer maths
How to evaluate cards
Drafts are played out as multiplayer games, so effects that scale per opponent are worth more than their Limited rate suggests and one-for-one removal is worth less. Encore is the clearest example.
Commander
Sold alongside the boosters as on-ramps, with three new cards each and reprints filling the rest.
Arm for Battle
Wyleth, Soul of Steel
Boros Equipment and Auras, drawing a card for each thing attached to Wyleth when he attacks.
Reap the Tides
Aesi, Tyrant of Gyre Strait
Simic landfall and ramp, and the more played of the two by a distance.
Building one of these into something of your own? The precon buying guide covers how to judge a deck, and the Commander deck template is the shape to build toward.
FAQ
You draft twenty-card packs with eight players as usual, and each pack contains two legendary creatures. What you build at the end is a singleton Commander deck with a minimum of sixty cards rather than a hundred, and games are played out multiplayer.
No, and it never was. It was built for Commander and printed for the eternal formats, so its cards are legal in Commander, Legacy and Vintage.
Two commanders instead of one, with their color identities combined. Forty of the set's mono-colored legends have partner plus one colorless, which is far more than the mechanic had before and is the reason an early legend does not lock your colors.
Exile the creature from your graveyard and pay its encore cost to get a token copy attacking each opponent, sacrificed at end of turn. It is unearth pointed at a multiplayer table, so its value scales with how many opponents you have.
Two: Arm for Battle, led by Wyleth, Soul of Steel, and Reap the Tides, led by Aesi, Tyrant of Gyre Strait. Each has three new cards with reprints filling the rest.
No. Both are drafted Commander sets, but Commander Masters came in 2023, is entirely reprints, and is drafted two cards at a time. Commander Legends came first and drafts like a normal set.
All card names, art, and mechanics belong to Wizards of the Coast. Commander Legends released on Nov 20, 2020; details reflect the set as published. Sources: Wizards of the Coast set pages and release notes, Draftsim, Untapped.gg.
TurnZero HQ keeps deck records, MMR, and moments for every Commander night, so you can see which new cards are actually earning their slot.
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