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Seems Like We Have a Mystery on Our Hands!

Welcome to the Murders at Karlov Manor set review for the enemy and wedge colors of the set. The killer has left a bunch of clues and we'll need to review each card to get to the bottom of it. Come with me as we check out these new cards and solve this mystery!

Mythics

Agrus Kos, Spirit of Justice

The newest printing of Agrus Kos isn't as mechanically interesting as his previous form. When he enters or attacks, we can suspect up to one creature. We can suspect our creatures to give them menace, or we can target an opponent's creature to eventually exile it. However, that would be very slow and easily telegraphed. To be the commander, the deck would need ways to suspect creatures so that our commander can exile on the first trigger. The thing is, there's not enough support for suspect that you could reliably have creatures be suspected by the time you cast Agrus. Now, if the goal is to make an opponent's creature unable to block our double-striking commander, then that might be feasible. However, I think Agrus will end up in the 99 of Nelly Borca decks since the creatures you suspect will be goaded.

Feather, Radiant Arbiter

Feather, the Redeemed is still one of the top Boros Commanders of the format. Her ability to return spells that target back to your hand is extremely powerful. Our newest version ofFeather, appears to be less like the old feather and more like Zada, Hedron Grinder, allowing you to copy spells that target Feather and have those copies target your other creatures. However, at the price of two mana per creature, so maybe she's not as strong as Zada.

Unlike the original Feather and Zada, this Feather can copy any noncreature spells, like Auras for example. Why pay two mana for each creature for just a one-time instant or sorcery effect, when you can copy your Auras. Attaching each creature with an All That Glitters which then feed into each other sounds like a great way to close out the game. I can see Feather being not as broken as the first Feather or Zada, but she's still going to be a powerhouse commander.

Kaya, Spirits' Justice

This could've been a cool commander. Kaya falls in line with the "leaves the graveyard" strategy and turns tokens into copies of the creatures you exile. They won't trigger any enter-the-battlefield (ETB) triggers, however. Kaya's static ability is the real strength of this card. Her other abilities serve to feed into that first ability. +2 can exile a card, +1 can give us the Spirit, and -2 is Grasp of Fate that allows us to target a creature of our own to become a token flyer.

My first thought for potential commanders was Tormod, the Desecrator, who cares about cards leaving the graveyard and makes 2/2 Zombie tokens. Or part of an Abdel Adrian, Gorion's Ward deck that wants to exile permanents and make tokens. Kaya is a great way to get to reuse a creature in your graveyard that your opponents weren't expecting to see again on a token flier.

Kylox's Voltstrider

I've not been impressed so far by the collect evidence mechanic, but I do like its use here. We're incentivized to exile spells from our graveyard because we can then we use them when we attack with the Voltstrider. Once we've accumulated six mana value worth of spells, we can exile them and recast them throughout the game.

One issue I see with this card is that it's a noninstant or nonsorcery in a spellslinging deck. It's fighting against other recursion spells in the same category, like Past in Flames and even the new Return the Past, which costs more but is a static effect that doesn't require exiling the cards first or limited to attacking. Despite this limitation, Kylox's Voltstrider could find a home in any Spellslinger deck. More specifically, I think it can go into any deck that wants to enter combat. Balmor, Battlemage Captain can give the Vehicle trample and buff its power.

Melek, Reforged Researcher

A three-mana cost reduction is no joke. Having Melek out makes any four-mana spell with a single color pip cost one mana. Any bigger instant spells, like all those five-mana counterspells, such as Spell Swindle, become easier to hold up mana for.

Melek's power and toughness being equal to twice the number of spells in our graveyard will make him huge in the mid-to-late game. Chandra's Ignition is one of my favorite ways to win games, and Melek makes it cost two red. This might be one of the commanders from this set I end up building.

Nelly Borca, Impulsive Accuser

Nelly Borca gives an extra layer of complexity to the suspect mechanic. She can goad all suspected creatures, giving you an incentive for giving all your opponents' creatures menace. Even if she leaves and comes back, those creatures will still be suspected, and there are few ways to remove that. The creature itself would have to leave the battlefield and come back, or you'd need to run Absolving Lammasu or Airtight Alibi. And if Nelly does get removed, you probably have other ways of goading creatures in the deck, so those creatures having menace is still relevant.

Suspected creatures being unable to block is also nasty. If you've managed to suspect multiple creatures, your opponents can't block suspected creatures with their own suspected creatures, making combat more difficult for those with few creatures. This makes it easier to trigger Nelly Borca's last ability. While it does allow our opponents to draw cards as well, this becomes an incentive for them to attack without being goaded. She could draw up to three cards in a turn cycle and quicken the pace of the game.

Urgent Necropsy

A Decimate effect, but you have to exile cards from the graveyard equal to the mana value of permanents you want to remove. Casualties of War is probably a better comparison, but for six mana instead. Needing to have the cards in the graveyard is a big restriction. You'd have to be in a strategy that wants to fill the graveyard but also doesn't mind exiling cards in an emergency. Urgent Necropsy feels like a last resort in that case. Golgari already has plenty of unconditional removal spells for any permanent type, so I don't think this will make the final cut in those decks.

Unless they want cards to leave the graveyard. Exiling a bunch of cards in the 'yard is exactly what triggers Syr Konrad, the Grim. We also have commanders like Old Stickfingers that can fill the graveyard quickly. I'd say that if you want to fill the 'yard fast and care about cards like Konrad, this can slot into those decks for extra synergy.

Vannifar, Evolved Enigma

Now this is a Simic commander I can get behind. Cloaking a creature every turn and then getting to turn it face-up for a sneaky surprise sounds like a lot of fun. You can flip over a Cold-Eyed Selkie before combat damage and benefit from the counters Vannifar gives out. I think that this could be a powers matter deck that includes creatures like Wild Beastmaster and Cultivator of Blades that would most likely get removed before you can attack.

Another route is artifact creatures/modular that can mess around with the counters Vannifar gives to each creature, but the real draw for me is getting to hide creatures from your opponents until you're ready to attack or reveal when you need it most.

Rares

Aurelia, the Law Above

With the influx of more goad, Aurelia, the Law Above will be an excellent Forced Combat deck. Boros has been getting strong goad cards, like Taunt from the Rampart, which is a game-ender, especially if everyone is attacking with five creatures each combat. If everything is goaded with her out, that's a potential 12 damage in a turn cycle just from her last ability. In lower-powered games, she's more likely to trigger that last ability multiple times even if we're not goading creatures. I can also see this being a fun commander for a monarch/initiative deck that encourages opponents to attack so you can benefit from them attacking.

Doppelgang

X = 1, MV (mana value) = 5, 1 copy of 1 permanent

X = 2, MV = 8, 2 copies of 2 permanents

X = 3, MV = 11, 3 copies of 3 permanents

X = 4, MV = 14, 4 copies of 4 permanents

X = 5, MV = 17, 5 copies of 5 permanents

If I play this card, I'll need to review this cheat sheet so that I don't have to do the math to see how much mana I need to spend. This card is insane in decks that can produce a lot of mana, and this can target any permanent on the battlefield. At worst, it's five mana to make a copy of the strongest permanent or you can dump all your mana into it for an explosive turn. It's copies of a permanent, so if decks want to generate Landfall triggers then they'd be more than happy to pay eight mana to get four copies of lands or eleven mana and get nine lands into play.

Clone decks already want to make copies of other permanents, and this would be a way to do it on a mass scale. Simic does limit the number of Clone decks it could go into, but I can see this going into Miirym decks. Make even more copies of Dragons alongside Miirym's ability. Dragon decks already run a decent amount of ramp, so getting to spend eight or eleven mana is feasible. Adrix and Nev, Twincasters can also double any tokens we make, so even just copying one permanent is worth it if it's the best thing on the battlefield.

Ill-Timed Explosion

Four mana to draw two and then discard two isn't great, but you do get to sweep the board. You'll probably want this in a Spellslinger deck that won't have a lot of creatures on the battlefield. Most of the time, though, you can expect this to take out the token player. How often do you think you'd discard a six- or seven-drop spell to take out all the big creatures? Ill-Timed Explosion lets you loot, but if you're looking for a card that will sweep the board, I think Chain Reaction will be more efficient.

Izoni, Center of the Web

With all the random tokens that can be made, Izoni can take those and turn them into some real value. We can fill up the graveyard, draw two cards, and even gain incidental life throughout the game. The surveil 2 is almost necessary if we want to make 2/1 Spiders every turn, but I think the real goal is to run as many token-generators as possible to use Izoni's last ability multiple times. The lifegain shouldn't be overlooked, either. Since we're making 2/1 Spiders with menace, we can run Blossoming Bogbeast and give at least +4/+4 on attack.

Kellan, Inquisitive Prodigy

He's back! Our new version of Kellan is Simic this time. He's making his way around the planes and the color wheel. His adventure half, Tail the Suspect, bears a resemblance to Growth Spiral. Instead of drawing a card, you make a Clue token. While technically weaker, it synergizes better with other effects that care about investigating or making artifacts.

His creature half is artifact spot removal or card draw if you hit your own artifacts, so this is a Growth Spiral with extra steps. I can see Kellan being useful in the Morska, Undersea Sleuth deck as he can destroy the Clue token that commander makes and draw a second card reliably, though, as a commander himself, I don't think there's anything worthwhile here.

Kylox, Visionary Inventor

Now this is a cool commander. For seven, we can have him come down and attack right away to trigger his ability. We'd have to strike a balance here between token/big creatures and spells we want to cast for free, but some cards I'd like to run here would be ones that can make free tokens each turn, like Urabrask's Forge or Rite of the Raging Storm, which I'd be happy to sacrifice to Kylox's ability. Another great token-maker would be Metallurgic Summonings, which makes Constructs with power and toughness equal to an instant's or sorcery's mana value.

All this to say that if you're going to cast Kylox, you're probably only going to get one shot at using his ability. The ward 2 will make Kylox harder to remove, but once you've cast a bunch of spells for free, he probably won't stick around for too long.

Leyline of the Guildpact

Is this an auto-include in every five-color deck? I think it could be since you get to fix your mana easily, and casting it doesn't seem that hard. Five-color decks will run a decent number of green lands since that's what you need to start casting Farseek to ramp and color fix anyway. However, I don't like that it makes playing a five-color deck easier when it should be harder given you're running every color.

That said, I would like to have this in a Domain deck since all the lands will have basic land types, but that's a niche example. The ability to make every nonland permanent all colors is only going to be relevant to those five-color commanders who care about all colors, like Jared Carthalion. But it's only permanents that are all colors, so this wouldn't work with Jenson Carthalion, Druid Exile or Ramos, Dragon Engine, which care about casting a spell with multiple colors.

Five-color decks already run ways to fix their mana. Otherwise, they wouldn't work. Chromatic Lantern is still ramp that makes the mana fixing easier, but it's not like the deck won't function without it. Leyline of the Guildpact just fixes mana in a deck that already planned to do that. I would say this is better for budget decks that don't run fetch lands and more expensive dual lands, but I don't think this will be a cheap card to get.

Niv-Mizzet, Guildpact

I think it's pretty funny that our only five-color legend in the set is a nonbo with Leyline of the Guildpact. Following the trend from Niv-Mizzet, Supreme, we get another rendition that only cares about spells with exactly two colors. Instead of instants and sorceries, this one cares about the number of color pairs we have among permanents we control. Even if we control two or three, he'll still draw two or three cards a turn and bolt something. Hexproof from multicolor doesn't stop most removal spells, however, so there'll have to be other ways to protect him if we're leaning on him to be the glue to this strategy.

This version of Niv-Mizzet is very open-ended. At least the previous five-color one led you into a spellslinger theme. But Niv-Mizzet, Guildpact is generic enough to be the leader of any type of strategy you want. Planeswalkers? Enchantments? I think a Legends matter deck would be pretty cool. Take all your favorite commanders from the past, find some synergy between them, and throw them all in a deck.

Take the Bait

In line with cards like Inkshield, this could be a huge gotcha card. It's a Fog that protects you and your creatures but still lets damage be dealt to your opponents. While not game-ending, if this is cast on the turn your opponent was planning on swinging for lethal, then this will at the very least knock out the other two players.

This is a pretty strong card in Nelly Borca with all the suspected creatures having menace and not being able to block. Plus, this will let you draw two cards off Nelly. I'm always a fan of combat shenanigans.

Teysa, Opulent Oligarch

Getting three Clues on our end step every turn is not a hard thing to achieve. Creeping Bloodsucker, Zulaport Cutthroat, and Cruel Celebrant are all ways that we can ensure we trigger Teysa. Plan A of this deck is simple, but what about Plan B? We can sac a Clue each turn to make a 1/1 Spirit. Doing this throughout a turn cycle means we'll have four 1/1 flyers by the time it gets back to us. But we can't just pay two every turn, so how do we sacrifice Clues?

Deadly Dispute can sac a Clue at instant speed. We can activate Sivriss, Nightmare Speaker on an opponent's turn to make a Spirit and get additional cards. Or Sivriss can be how we make opponents lose life and make them choose between giving us a card or giving us Clues on our end step. Lobelia, Defender of Bag End operates in a similar way. She can either give us cards or be an enabler to make more Clues. Bartolomé del Presidio is a free sac outlet that can also sac our Spirits if we want to drain the table with Zulaport Cutthroat.

Treacherous Greed

I like this card in decks making token flyers, like Teysa, Opulent Oligarch. Get in with a small creature and reward them with death. Drawing three cards for three is a good rate, and while I don't think it should replace Deadly Dispute in your decks, it can be a second copy of it. Treacherous Greed will find homes in Aristocrat decks that are already draining opponents. If the tokens you're making have evasion, like Spirits or the Assassin tokens Queen Marchesa makes, I think Treacherous Greed is a solid inclusion.

Warleader's Call

Boros, rejoice! A second copy of Impact Tremors has appeared. For one more mana, we get an Impact Tremors that's also a +1/+1 Anthem. Perfect for those token decks that are going wide with small creatures. It'd be disgusting to cast Call the Coppercoats on an opponent's end step, burn everyone for each Human that enters, and then swing with a bunch of 2/2s. We just got Anim Pakal, Thousandth Moon from The Lost Caverns of Ixalan, and while it doesn't give her counters, it does burn everyone for all the Gnomes she makes, and they come in as tapped and attacking 2/2s.

Uncommons & Commons

Detective's Satchel

This fits right into those artifact sacrifice strategies. Ashnod the Uncaring is all about sacrificing artifacts, and Detective's Satchel gives us Clues to draw two cards each and Thopters for sac fodder. However, in other decks, four mana to then get two Clues that also require mana to draw is slow. Most often, Detective's Satchel will be a way to get three artifacts on the board to then sacrifice to some other effect.

Flotsam // Jetsam

I'm sad that I can't put this in my Don Andres deck, but Jetsam will provide so much value. And it can be any spell too, unlike Breach the Multiverse, which can only get creatures or planeswalkers. While you will have to wait until there's something good in everyone's graveyard, Jetsam will always provide more than six mana value worth of spells.

Flotsam is fine. If you're looking to mill yourself and need the artifact, then it's not bad, but I would rather hold this in hand until I can cast the Jetsam half. Any Sultai deck wanting to mill should run this card. Muldrotha, the Gravetide and Sidisi, Brood Tyrant are both self-mill decks that would want to use either half of Flotsam // Jetsam.

Gleaming Geardrake

My thoughts on Detective's Satchel apply here as well. Gleaming Geardrake provides fodder for artifact sacrifice strategies while also being a payoff for it. In a similar vein to Sprite Dragon, in a deck that wants to sac artifacts like Treasures, this Geardrake will continue to grow.

Insidious Roots

For two mana, I would've been happy with just a budget Cryptolith Rite but Insidious Roots also gives us a way to make creature tokens as well. If we're recurring or reanimating our creatures, Insidious Roots will populate our board with Plant tokens. And they'll get +1/+1 counters each time we do it, so the Plant tokens aren't just there for mana. We can either swing with them or use them as sac fodder for any Aristocrat decks. Golgari has tons of synergy with the graveyard, and with how token-heavy the Commander format is right now, Insidious Roots will be a home run.

Repulsive Mutation

If you're running a +1/+1 counter strategy or big creatures in general, this is a nifty counterspell. There are a few counterspells of the power-matters variety, Stubborn Denial being easily the strongest, followed by Spell Rupture. Repulsive Mutation is a strictly better Spell Rupture, since we can pay mana to increase the power of a creature to make it harder to pay. It also puts counters on a creature, which will synergize with any other counters-matter cards.

Repulsive Mutation is actually a modal spell. You can use this as a straight counterspell and pay zero into X or pay mana into it and make a creature bigger without having to counter anything. While it allows an opponent to pay mana, this is a versatile spell that can be used reactively or proactively.

Wispdrinker Vampire

Most Vampires and Vampire tokens have power 2 or less, so if you running a deck that makes small Vampire tokens, then Wispdrinker Vampire is an easy way to drain opponents for simply playing your deck. Edgar Markov and Elenda, the Dusk Rose produce a ton of small Vampires. Elenda, especially, will turn Wispdrinker Vampire into a finisher.

The activated ability is negligible. It's seven mana and it stops working if you have anthems that make your Vampires bigger, which, if you're playing a bunch of small 1/1s, then you're running a few Anthems. Vault of the Archangel does the same thing for four mana, and Vito, Thorn of the Dusk Rose can give lifelink for five mana with a wincon attached to it. While I'm not sure if it makes the cut in my own Edgar deck, if you're looking to drain and gain life, I'd run this card.

Did You Find the Killer?

That wraps it up for the second half of the gold cards in Murders at Karlov Manor. This set has a lot of strong commanders; I'm already building a few that grabbed my interest, like Nelly Borca. Boros Forced Combat has been on my list of decks to build and now we've gotten more support for it.

Did any commander catch your eye? What new cards are you excited to put in your decks? Let me know down below and I'll see you next time!

Read more:

Murders at Karlov Manor Set Review - Black

Joshua Wood

Josh is a creative writer that started playing Magic when Throne of Eldraine was released. He loves entering combat and pressuring life totals, and to him, commander damage is always relevant. Outside of brewing many commander decks, he can be found prepping his D&D campaigns with a cat purring in his lap.