Call the Spirit Dragons sucks, but Commander isn’t really about playing the good cards and ignoring the bad cards. This new enchantment for Dragon Typal decks does offer a strong payoff combined with a janky win condition. As we all know, there’s no better place for making a janky card work than in Commander.
The good news is that Call the Spirit Dragon does have a decent upside to it. The win condition may not be hard to achieve, too, which is always nice. This ease, however, is actually part of the problem, as it’s wholly unnecessary.
Call the Spirit Dragons
Call the Spirit Dragons is a rather expensive Indestructible anthem for Dragons. Similar to many other Commander-focused enchantments, Call the Spirit Dragons provides no value on its own. In other words, other cards need to be played for this card to have an impact on the game. Almost all of these cards are not playable in competitive Magic.
The alternate win condition is very achievable, but kind of pointless. Dragon decks can easily dump a bunch of Dragons on board and win the game on their next upkeep, but in this situation… you’ll likely win the game anyway.
If you manage to untap with a board of five Dragons across different colors, there is little reason that those Dragons could not win the game without Call the Spirit Dragons. After all, winning this way means your opponents had nothing to stop your army in a whole rotation of the table. The only thing that Call the Spirit Dragons helps prevent is destroy-based removal. While this should help, it doesn’t stop opponents from having answers.
One place where this could play a different role is Changelings. While Dragons should generally be powerful enough to end games on their own, Changelings aren’t exactly known for their massive stats. Making your Changelings Indestructible and threatening a win the next turn is an interesting application for this card.
An Unban Hint?
Notably, this is a very similar win condition to another Commander card that has remained banned for a long time. Coalition Victory may apply to cards other than Dragons, but it’s three mana more expensive, requires basic lands of every type, and does not give an additional Indestructible buff. On the plus side, Coalition Victory wins the game on resolution instead of on the next upkeep, but players still have a small window to disrupt the card.
If anything, this could suggest that Coalition Victory could be unbanned in the upcoming Commander Bracket System changes. This wouldn’t be very surprising. The power level of the Commander format has left this card in the dust. Eight-mana haymakers should generally be winning the game at this point, and unlike other cards that boast game-ending potential, Coalition Victory has a chance of doing nothing at all.
Even though Call the Spirit Dragons isn’t good, it will see play in Dragon Typal decks. These fun win conditions are enjoyable for some to pull off. Expect your Dragon Typal friend to pull this trick on you in a future Commander game.