The Wilds of Eldraine Commander precon decklists are out, and they feature some cool new cards to build around. From a deck revolving around the Faerie Creature type to another with a centralized Enchantment theme, each deck has a very specific gameplan. While Faeries were much more of a focus in the Commander products than in the main set itself, Enchantments were everywhere thanks to the various Role tokens that could Creatures could obtain.
Not only were these Roles abundant throughout all colors, but both the primary and secondary Commanders from the “Virtue and Valor” deck played quite well with them. Ellivere of the Wild Court benefits from having lots of Auras in play, and Gylwain, Casting Director helped provide those Auras in the form of Role tokens to your other Creatures.
Given how impactful Auras can be across various MTG formats, we decided to focus on the best of the best. These Auras are very strong and can have major implications in Constructed and Commander alike. Without further ado, here are the top six best Aura cards in MTG.
#6 All That Glitters
All That Glitters does a lot for two mana, so long as you build around it. It’s a classic Aura that is used to provide a significant power and toughness boost to one of your Creatures. In decks with lots of other Auras, such as Pioneer Light-Paws, Emperor’s Voice decks, All That Glitters can provide a significant buff to your Creature. It now plays that same role in Pauper Bogles decks built around suiting up Creatures with Hexproof, thanks to its downshift to common.
While this may make the card seem like a worse Ethereal Armor, All That Glitters has one other significant bonus going for it: it counts Artifacts too. This key difference has completely warped the Pauper format thanks to the existence of the Artifact Lands, such as Ancient Den. This has helped make Affinity decks extremely powerful once again, despite tons of payoffs such as Atog and Sojourner’s Companion getting banned. Counting both Artifacts and Enchantments can also be a big deal in Commander, where the card can get out of control with Treasure producers like Smothering Tithe. All That Glitters may not be super flashy, but it does its job quite well.
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#5 Spreading Seas
Spreading Seas is an Aura with a rather unique effect. For two mana, you can turn an opponent’s Land into an Island and draw a card. Notably, this is not in addition to its other types, meaning that it can be quite effective at denying an opponent access to specific colors of mana that they might need. Spreading Seas is exceptionally strong against mono-green Tron in Modern, since hitting one of the three Urza Lands will shut off the ability for the others to tap for multiple mana at once. Its ability to mess with the opponent’s mana even got the card preemptively banned in Historic!
This card has additional unique synergy with various Merfolk as well. Beyond messing with the opponent’s mana, the fact that Spreading Seas specifically makes the Land an Island means that cards like Lord of Atlantis and Master of the Pearl Trident that grant Islandwalk to your other Merfolk become more reliable. That’s a lot for two mana, and the fact that Spreading Seas replaces itself by drawing you a card gives it a reasonably high floor even if it doesn’t end up messing with your opponent too much.
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#4 Treachery
Treachery is a very powerful Aura for a multitude of reasons. For five mana, you get to gain control of an opposing Creature for as long as Treachery remains attached. This alone has it on the level of Mind Control. However, the real power in the card comes from being able to untap five Lands when it enters the battlefield. This means that as long as you can resolve the powerful Enchantment, you can get a rebate on all the mana you spent to cast it.
In some cases, this can even net you mana, depending on what Lands you can untap. In Vintage Cube, for example, getting to untap Tolarian Academy can give you access to a ton of mana in one turn. Treachery is a solid Commander card too, letting you steal opposing Commanders without significant mana investment. This card doesn’t have a great home in Constructed, especially given that it was never printed in a Modern legal set, but that doesn’t take away from the fact that it can heavily swing a game in your favor.
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#3 Power Artifact
Power Artifact is a very strange card. On the surface, it doesn’t seem like a great card. After all, you are spending two mana and a card simply to lower the cost of activated abilities of an Artifact you control. However, this card is quite strong in Commander alongside Basalt Monolith and Grim Monolith. Both Monoliths can tap for three colorless mana, but then require an additional mana investment in order to untap them and use them again. While you can use the mana generated from Basalt Monolith to untap it, you don’t generate any extra mana in the process.
Power Artifact changes this completely, though. If you Enchant either Monolith, you can tap to add mana, then pay two less mana to untap the Monolith thanks to Power Artifact, tap for more mana, and repeat the process. This will generate infinite colorless mana. This is one of the easier infinite mana combos to pull off, earning Power Artifact a spot on this list.
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#2 Splinter Twin
Splinter Twin is as high on the list as it is for one reason: it’s an excellent combo card. When combined with Deceiver Exarch or Pestermite, two cards that can untap another permanent when they enter the battlefield, you can create infinite token copies of the Enchanted Creature. You simply tap Exarch or Perstermite to make a token copy, use the token copy’s enters-the-battlefield effect to untap the original copy, and repeat this process over and over.
This alone was strong enough to get the card banned from Modern many years ago, and it still remains banned today. Part of what makes the combo so strong is that Exarch and Pestermite have Flash and can tap down an opponent’s Land at the end of their third turn. This means that, barring free interaction like Solitude, the opponent always has to leave up extra mana for fear of losing to the combo. This prevents them from developing their board, buying you extra time. While this combo certainly is strong, Splinter Twin has nothing on the number one card on this list.
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#1 Animate Dead
Animate Dead is an extremely efficient reanimation effect. For just two mana, you can return a Creature in any graveyard to play under your control. Animate Dead is a staple in Legacy Reanimator decks. When combined with Dark Ritual and Entomb, which lets you search for a massive Creature such as Griselbrand and put it in your graveyard, it’s easy to cheat a potentially game-winning bomb into play as early as turn one.
Sure, the opponent can remove the Aura and get rid of Griselbrand in the process, but you already got to draw a bunch of cards and rebuild, likely allowing you to return that same Griselbrand to play again.
While Griselbrand is banned in Commander, there are plenty of other elite threats to get back. Animate Dead is truly one of the best reanimation effects ever printed, and the ability to return Creatures from an opponent’s graveyard is a nice bonus. Its sheer efficiency earns it a spot at the top of this list of the top five best Aura cards in MTG.
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