Sephiroth, Fabled SOLDIERSephiroth, Fabled SOLDIER | Art by Wisnu Tan

This is Fire and Ice, the data-driven series where I go over cards that are becoming more or less popular for different Commander decks and talk about why they may be gaining or losing popularity. I'm Julia, EDHREC's Duchess of Data, and I'm super excited to jump into today's article!

EDHREC's got a ton of data. In this series, we draw conclusions from that data to understand how certain commanders' decks have changed over time, give insight into how the format's players are thinking about new cards, and hopefully provide some tech for your favorite commander's list. To learn more about the math behind this series, check out this page! We've made a few changes to our methodology recently, and you can read all about them here.

Today, we'll be focusing on one of the coolest cards from Final Fantasy: Sephiroth, Fabled SOLDIERSephiroth, Fabled SOLDIER! This commander is one of just two creatures in our format that can make an emblem (see also The Capitoline TriadThe Capitoline Triad), making Sephiroth a unique card.

Sephiroth, Fabled SOLDIERSephiroth, Fabled SOLDIER

What's Hot and What's Not for Sephiroth, Fabled SOLDIER

Sitting as the #32 commander on EDHREC, most Sephiroth decks focus on sacrificing as many creatures as possible to whittle down opposing life totals. Both sides of Sephiroth, whether he's transformed or not, provide us with a Blood ArtistBlood Artist-style life drain effect and a bit of card advantage. When transformed Sephiroth is also a 5/5 flying creature, making him a potent attacker.

Among the most popular cards for this commander are Forsaken MinerForsaken Miner (67% of decks), Accursed MarauderAccursed Marauder (80% of decks), and The MasamuneThe Masamune (62% of decks). I must admit I'm surprised that The Masamune isn't in more Sephiroth decks, it seems purpose built for him!

What's Fiery for Sephiroth Decks?

Bitterbloom BearerBitterbloom Bearer - Fire Score of 11.15

While BitterblossomBitterblossom may hold a special place in many Magic players' hearts, Bitterbloom Bearer is a fantastic modern take on it. This Faerie Rogue adds a 1/1 flying body and has flash, making it a perfect include for Aristocrats decks.

It does cost (as opposed to Bitterblossom's ), but that's a price that this monocolored deck can pay with ease.

Grave VenerationsGrave Venerations - Fire Score of 8.11

Monarch is a great mechanic. It encourages players to hit each other and accelerates the pace of play through steady card advantage. With all the dinky creatures we've got in this deck as sacrifice fodder, it's easy for us to defend (or take back) the monarchy. Plus, our commander becomes a 5/5 flying creature when transformed, all but ensuring our eternal reign.

Even if we can't keep the monarchy, though, this enchantment is still a neat Aristocrats payoff piece.

MoonshadowMoonshadow - Fire Score of 4.47

Sephiroth decks already want to sacrifice a ton of creatures in order to drain our opponents' life totals (and flip our commander over). This one-drop is therefore a natural fit for our 99, as it'll quickly become an evasive 7/7 creature.

While it's not a fantastic draw in the late game, where it's just a medium-sized body that can be blocked relatively easily, it's a great way to put pressure on our podmates in the early game.

Twilight DivinerTwilight Diviner - Fire Score of 4.00

The average Sephiroth deck has five creatures that recur themselves from the graveyard to the battlefield (like GravecrawlerGravecrawler), and four other ways to return creatures from the bin to the board (like ReanimateReanimate). All told, that means that Twilight Diviner is likely to make at least one or two token copies of creatures throughout the game.

I'd much prefer to play this new card alongside a commander that reanimates things, like Meren of Clan Nel TothMeren of Clan Nel Toth, to ensure that we're always getting value from it. Alongside Sephiroth, Twilight Diviner may occasionally feel like a dead card.

Realm of KohRealm of Koh - Fire Score of 3.19

This land taps to add , and can provide us with more sacrifice fodder if we find ourselves with extra mana available. Plus, because the majority of our mana base is made of basic lands, Realm of Koh will usually enter untapped.

This land can take the place of a SwampSwamp at very little deckbuilding cost, and is a great include for most any mono- deck.

High MarketHigh Market - Fire Score of 1.40

While we'd prefer that our lands tap to add colored mana, we do have space to run a few utility lands that add . High Market has a super easy to use sacrifice outlet built-in, and can even gain us a small chunk of life over the course of the game.

While we can't run every utility land in Commander, exceptional ones like High Market are certainly worth a slot.

What's Icy for Sephiroth Decks?

BitterblossomBitterblossom - Ice Score of -1.70

This enchantment has likely been swapped out directly for Bitterbloom BearerBitterbloom Bearer in many decks. While I could make the case for including both cards, the newer version is a better inclusion if we've only got space for one.

The addition of a 1/1 flying body is nice, but the fact that the creature version of this effect also has flash is what really seals the deal.

Nykthos, Shrine to NyxNykthos, Shrine to Nyx - Ice Score of -1.57

The average mana value of a Sephiroth deck on EDHREC is 2.79. With all the cards we'll be drawing, we'll often have a full grip of spells that we'd really like to cast. Mono- decks may lack the mana acceleration necessary to dump our hand onto the board, but Nykthos fixes that problem by providing us with all the mana we could possibly need.

That said, Nykthos may not be a great include if we've got a board full of creature tokens. We need at least a few nontoken permanents on board to make this land worth it, and many of our permanents will often be tokens without any symbols to add to our devotion.

Reliquary TowerReliquary Tower - Ice Score of -1.58

It takes a lot of card advantage to merit the inclusion of Reliquary Tower. It often replaces a basic land in many mana bases, but oftentimes having access to an extra colored mana is more important than having access to and an extra card or two in hand.

In Sephiroth decks, though, we'll be drawing tons of cards from his God-Eternal BontuGod-Eternal Bontu-style trigger. That makes this utility land a fine inclusion. But, we've also got access to a ton of recursion effects given Sephiroth's color identity.

It'll often be better to discard the extra Reassembling SkeletonReassembling Skeleton or Nether TraitorNether Traitor during the cleanup step so that we can bring them back later.

The Darkness CrystalThe Darkness Crystal - Ice Score of -1.39

This artifact seems like a perfect fit for our 99. It reduces the cost of almost all of our spells, ensures our opponents can't bring back the creatures they sacrifice to our edicts, and even lets us steal those creatures once we've got enough mana.

But it costs too much. We want our four-mana spells to have an immediate impact on the game, and possibly help us flip our commander to create an emblem. While The Darkness Crystal is a fantastic card, it's a bit too slow for this list.

Toxic DelugeToxic Deluge - Ice Score of -1.34

While Toxic Deluge is a fantastic board wipe, there's a few options that work slightly better for Aristocrats lists. The Meathook MassacreThe Meathook Massacre provides us with another life total manipulation tool, Blasphemous EdictBlasphemous Edict can be cast for just if we've got a few tokens on the board, and Withering CurseWithering Curse can be great for decks that gain life (like this one)!

Point is, there's a few better options out there. Toxic Deluge is still in nearly 6,000 Sephiroth decks, but there are a few other sweepers that are beginning to replace it.

Urborg, Tomb of YawgmothUrborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth - Ice Score of -1.32

Tomb of Yawgmoth is a natural pairing with Cabal CoffersCabal Coffers. Unfortunately, it can also provide some advantage to any opponents that use . It's possible that this land is being swapped for Realm of KohRealm of Koh or High MarketHigh Market, both of which provide more consistent utility throughout the game (and don't help our opponents at all).

Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth is far from being a bad card, but it loses a lot of its luster if we don't also have Cabal CoffersCabal Coffers on the field. Pilots may be looking towards other nonbasic lands to fill its slot.

What's in a Sephiroth, Fabled SOLDIER Deck?

Here's a Sephiroth list with all of his Fiery cards and none of his Icy cards.

Conclusion

It's amazing to see so many powerful abilities slammed onto one card. I remember when Vraan, Executioner ThaneVraan, Executioner Thane released, and I thought it was remarkable to see a Zulaport CutthroatZulaport Cutthroat variant in the command zone (even if Vraan is a bit underpowered). Now, a few years later, we've got that sort of effect tacked on to an already super powerful card advantage engine.

Is this sort of power creep a bad thing? Not necessarily, we get tons of interesting designs that we wouldn't have seen otherwise. What's your take on Sephiroth? Does this version of him advance Aristocrats strategies in a meaningful way, or is the card too generically good? Let me know your thoughts in the comments below, and I'll be back next week with another cEDH-focused edition of Fire and Ice!