Lands are sacred in Commander, and for good reason. Unless you’re playing with no holds barred, mass land destruction is strictly against Commander’s social code. After all, nothing is less enjoyable than watching your opponents play a million spells when you’re unable to do anything.
While this rule has the best intentions, it has a flaw. This also means that mass land ramp and land-based synergies are extremely powerful at every level in Commander, since opponents cannot effectively counter them.
If you, like many others, are looking to punish green players for getting greedy for lands, there are a series of forgotten, budget MTG gems that can make your opponent’s life miserable without resorting to something like Armageddon or Obliterate.
MTG Tunnel Ignus
Red has, by far, the largest array of land hate options available for players, but Tunnel Ignus is one of the most interesting budget options in the color. Dealing three damage for each extra land your opponents play, Tunnel Ignus completely shuts down land-based combos. Splendid Reclamation and Scapeshift, commonly seen in Commanders like Hearthhull, the Worldseed, will often cause your opponent to take lethal damage in one instance.
Unlike most hate pieces like this, Tunnel Ignus has the added benefit of being asymmetrical. You’re free to play tons of lands while your opponents take Lightning Bolts to the face for doing the same thing. This can make universal ramp spells like Tempt with Discovery extremely painful.
While Tunnel Ignus is a decent land hate option in any red Commander deck, it’s a bit more synergistic in specific strategies that care about dealing damage. Valgavoth, Harrower of Souls, for example, turns Tunnel Ignus’s triggered effect into card draw. Ojer Axonil, Deepest Might and Torbran, Thrane of Red Fell can make Tunnel Ignus deal even more damage, severely restricting your ramping opponents.
Despite never seeing a reprint after its appearance in Scars of Mirrodin, Tunnel Ignus is currently available for $0.51, making this extremely easy to pick up.
MTG Confounding Conundrum
While there are a surprising number of ways to restrict lands in blue, Confounding Conundrum will always be able to do something. Thanks to replacing itself on entry, this card will always be a cantrip at worst, making it attractive in both Enchantress and Blink decks. That said, this ultimately allows any deck to take advantage of Confounding Conundrum regardless of its theme.
Bouncing any extra lands your opponents play, this enchantment basically undoes any extra land ramp that your opponents attempt to use. Notably, this affects Fetch Lands as well, forcing players to sacrifice their lands on their opponent’s turns. It may not seem like much, but making a land effectively useless for a turn can be a big deal for just two mana.
While it is possible for Confounding Conundrum to go wrong later in the game, this card forces your opponents to play at a fair pace, which is exactly what the doctor ordered. Meanwhile, this $0.20 card still lets you ramp, creating an opportunity to get disgustingly far ahead.
MTG Owlbear Cub
If your opponents want to ramp ahead of the rest of the table, Owlbear Cub can punish them by ending the game. Capable of dropping even the likes of Blightsteel Colossus into play for free, this innocent-looking Cub will have green players regretting their life choices.
Even if an opponent isn’t using a ton of land ramp, many Commander games have players naturally play up to eight lands in an average Bracket 3 game. This means that Owlbear Cub will be good in the average game of Commander, but a ramping opponent snowballs the card into an insane advantage.
Bizarrely, Owlbear Cub’s creature types make the card significantly more playable. Despite Birds and Bears not being the most popular MTG creature types, there’s actually some very powerful support for them. Ayula, Queen Among Bears makes Owlbear Cub significantly scarier to block, while Tawnos, the Toymaker can make copies of Owlbear Cub, doubling your trigger potential. Even without these synergies, this adorable $0.31 card is the perfect way for green to punish opponents who want to ramp a little too much.
MTG Archon of Emeria
Archon of Emeria is not for players trying to make friends. As a Rule of Law on a stick, this card already shuts down a lot of Commander strategies on its own. Forcing your opponent’s nonbasic lands to enter tapped is just added insult to injury, slowing the game down to a crawl.
Effects like this are powerful at every Commander table, regardless of how strong they are. For that reason, Archon of Emeria shows up in a lot of extremely powerful Commander decks, like Winota, Joiner of Forces and Thalia and The Gitrog Monster. You can put Archon of Emeria into play at instant speed in Tayam, Luminous Enigma decks, shutting down an opponent’s win attempt partway.
While this $1 is one of the most efficient hate pieces out there, don’t be surprised if you become public enemy number one until it gets removed.
MTG Damping Engine
Black does have a lot of strong ramp hate cards, like Opposition Agent and Ob Nixilis, Unshackled. Sadly, since tutor hate is extremely strong in Commander, these cards aren’t exactly a budget choice for black players to beat up on green ramp. If you’re looking for something a bit cheaper to try, consider Damping Engine.
While Damping Engine can certainly slow things down for someone who’s ramping ahead of the table, it has the added benefit of punishing players who make a few too many tokens. Sacrificing a resource to play the game isn’t always a massive cost, but it’s easy to make this card a lot more difficult to play around.
Flickering Damping Engine with effects like Emiel the Blessed after an opponent has paid the cost will reset the card, essentially making them pay the cost twice. You can also run this card alongside Commanders like Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest, and Tergrid, God of Fright, who will get additional benefits from opponents sacrificing permanents. If you do have an opponent who tends to get ahead of the table regularly, this $0.66 card is a relatively harmless way of slowing them down
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