Magic’s vast combination of cards, built upon decades of history, creates a depth that cannot be found in other trading card games. There are countless cards waiting to be discovered that can do incredible things thanks to new support. The card may not have been powerful during its time, but Magic as a game changes so much, even on a yearly basis. Arena of the Ancients is a great example of this. Legendary creatures, when the card was released, were rather weak. Nowadays, they run rampant all over Commander, making this far more powerful when you can break the parity.
Similar interactions have led players to rediscover a lot of forgotten gems from years past. Radiate is no different. For five mana and some strict timing, you can break a whole bunch of different cards that commonly show up in casual Commander games.
Radiate MTG
For five mana, Radiate turns a single-target instant or sorcery into something that targets absolutely everything it possibly can. This creates numerous absolutely ridiculous scenarios with many of Commander’s popular interaction pieces. With Chaos Warp, for example, what was a three-mana removal spell in Red gets turned into a Warp World. Similarly, cheap removal like Swords to Plowshares or Path to Exile gets turned into exile-based board wipes. The card is particularly problematic when used with some semi-common Commander removal, like Capsize. This creates a two-card Upheaval, a card banned in Commander.
Of the most common sorceries in Commander, this card works particularly well with the Game Changer Jeska’s Will. You’ll essentially get three copies of the card instead of one, exiling nine cards and adding red mana equal to every card in each opponent’s hand. You can also do this with an opponent’s Jeska’s Will, but you may not be able to play with the cards you exile since it will not be your turn.
We already mentioned most of Commander’s most common instants, but Radiate can create a huge mess when any player uses Beast Within or Generous Gift. This will ultimately destroy every permanent in play, granting players a number of 3/3 tokens. You can float all of your remaining mana to use some follow-up plays to get ahead of your opponents before the turn ends.
This card is fully capable of pulling off all kinds of deadly two-card combos in your spellslinger-based Commander decks, but what makes Radiate so powerful is the havoc it can wreak targeting common removal that your opponent is playing. In most games, Radiate can create an explosive game-changing effect using your opponent’s cards.
MTG Radiate’s Deadliest Combos
Radiate’s simplest combo to pull off only involves one other card. It costs a lot of mana to pull off, but using Part the Waterveil and Radiate together should be enough advantage to end most games on the spot. For a whopping 14 mana, you’ll turn all your lands into 6/6 beaters and take as many extra turns as you have lands. That will likely be in the neighborhood of 10 extra turns in most games, which is more than enough time to use your lands to take out all of your opponents.
Radiate is also extremely scary with cards that can copy any permanent. The new Final Fantasy Camp Comrades Scene Box card Flash Photography happens to fall under this umbrella. There are other cards that you can use for this effect, but Flash Photography is the only one you can cast at instant speed. If you use this with Radiate, you’ll get a copy of absolutely every card in play under your control.
Going infinite from there is pretty easy, and it involves cards that many Commander decks would play anyway. If there is a copy of a card like Eternal Witness in play under anyone’s control, as long as your original copy of Flash Photography doesn’t target it, you can make infinite copies of every card in play. Here’s how it works:
- Cast Flash Photography copying anything other than the Eternal Witness. Before it resolves, cast Replicate, copying Flash Photography.
- Radiate will create copies of Flash Photography copying absolutely everything in play.
- When your Eternal Witness copy enters, grab Radiate and add it to your hand.
- Cast Radiate again, spending mana from all the lands you copied. Target the original copy of Flash Photography targeting anything other than Eternal Witness. Rinse and repeat.
While we used Eternal Witness and Flash Photography as the examples, there are a bunch of different cards that can fill both roles, making this Radiate combo a lot easier to pull off than it sounds.
This Card Sees No Play
For a card that’s as easy to break as Radiate, you might find it shocking that the card, currently, sees very little play in Commander.
MTG Radiate only sees play in a few Commanders, and not at high percentages. Imodane, the Pyrohammer is the most common home for Radiate and, according to EDHREC, it only appears in 23% of decks using that Commander. It makes a lot of sense with Imodane since copying something like Lightning Bolt could just outright end the game. Radiate otherwise doesn’t see play with a lot of Commanders that heavily synergize with it. Parnesse, the Subtle Brush is a funny Commander to run Radiate with, but it doesn’t give you any advantages.
That said, Commanders that reward copying spells are likely fantastic places for Radiate to see play. Ashling, Flame Dancer, for example, accompanies Radiate perfectly with her Magecraft ability. You’ll trigger the second and third abilities easily, but Ashling will continually discard and draw cards for each spell you copy afterwards.
Radiate goes absolutely crazy with Veyran, Voice of Duality or Zaffai, Thunder Conductor in the Command Zone. Veyran will get extremely big after a resolved Radiate, and can double any other payoffs that using Radiate grants you. Zaffai, on the other hand, offers different rewards depending on how big the spell that Radiate targets is. You’ll Scry a ton of cards at worst, but targeting a spell with mana value five or higher will flood the board with 4/4s, while 10 or higher will end the game.
While it may be difficult to find a Commander that truly synergizes with Radiate, you don’t really need to. This card is naturally powerful with a lot of removal that the casual meta employs. You probably shouldn’t play Radiate if you don’t have a ton of your own cards to target with it, but between your opponent’s spells and your own, Radiate should be able to win you a lot of games.
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