Hello Everyone! I'm Levi from the Thought Vessel. It's good to be back. With the looming release of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, even more so with the accidental cluster of spoilers from Lorwyn Eclipsed pre-release kits. Even so, Ninjas, as a creature type, are about to get an extreme makeover of the turtle variety. Before everyone's Ninja deck lists get a lot more... reptilian, we're looking at the top ten ninjas for Commander. For ground rules, we are using the rubric as for ninjas that would be useful in a ninja typal deck. Before we get into the list, we have an honorable mention.

Honorable Mention) Changeling Outcast

Changeling Outcast is technically a Ninja, a Mutant, and a Turtle, for that matter. Down the line, I'm sure we'll get Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles as a subtype, and we'll get the full TMNT. This creature is the type of creature we want to load up on. They are the cement between the bricks or the gas in the engine. Cheap, small, and evasive creatures that we can bounce back to our hands to get out our ninjutsu abilities, firing is essential. If our opponents can hold up blockers, our damage triggers will do absolutely nothing. Only one mana makes it pretty easy to recast in the same turn we return it to our hand, so it is ready to attack again.

10) Silver-Fur Master

We're starting our list with a bang! Silver-Fur Master is a Ninja lord giving a +1/+1 to all of our Ninjas. Additionally, ninjutsu abilities are reduced by one. Being that ninja decks can be a bit mana hungry, that cost reduction does a lot of work for us.

9) Silent-Blade Oni

This is one of our heavy hitters. To start, Silent-Blade Oni is a 6/5 creature that bucks the trend of small ninjas that won't survive blockers. Silent-Blade Oni, upon connecting for combat damage, allows us to steal and cast a spell from our opponents' hands for free. We can burn a removal spell, sabotage a combo piece, or just add some value to our board. Getting threats out of our opponents' hands is always a good thing.

8) Fallen Shinobi

In the same theme of stealing our opponent's valuables, we have Fallen Shinobi. Instead of getting cards from our opponent's hands, we get the top two cards of their library. While it may not be as strong as Silent-Blade Oni, we can get multiple spells, and it costs two less mana to sneak into play. Getting this type of effect on turn three or four could be really devastating for our opponents to deal with, and they might not be ready for us to steal a dragon or a stax piece.

7) Sakashima's Student

Sun Tzu said it best when he wrote, "All warfare is deception" in The Art of War. Unfortunately for us, Sun Tzu never encountered a bazooka on the battlefield. As deceptive and tricky as ninjas can be, we can absolutely get outgunned by big creatures. Sakashima's Student can help us there. It will enter as any creature on the battlefield. If things are going well, we can double up on one of our ninja's abilities. If we are behind, we can copy the strongest creature on the board like an Eldrazi.

6) Thousand-Faced Shadow

Though it may not be as useful defensively, Thousand-Faced Shadow is excellent at wearing two different hats. In the early game, this is one of those cheap, small, evasive creatures we need to function as a 1/1 flying creature for only one Blue mana. Later on we can ninjutsu Thousand-Faced Shadow in as a copy of one of our blogger creatures at a mana discount. It's essentially like having two cards in one and there is no point in the game that it would feel bad to draw this card.

5) Satoru Umezawa

I am very conflicted on what to do with this card on the list. On one hand, Satoru is a fantastic ninja commander, providing us with fantastic card advantage and selection every time we activate a ninjutsu ability. On the other hand, I can see what lies ahead. These new ninjas don't have "Ninjutsu", they have "Sneak", which operates similarly, but it is a cast instead of an activated ability. Yes, Satoru gives every creature Ninjutsu for four, but if the sneak cost was only going to be 2 or 3 mana to begin with, it feels bad spending the mana premium. I don't think that at this very moment, if Yuriko didn't exist, there would be a very strong case to argue that this is the best in class for a ninja-themed deck.

4) Ingenious Infiltrator

Cards like Toski, Bearer of Secrets are phenomenal card advantage engines for decks that want to be attacking in combat. Ingenious Infiltrator is in the colors we want, Black and Blue, and can ninjutsu out for only two mana. Sticking this creature early will ensure that we won't be running out of cards.

3) Prosperous Thief

More important than card advantage for ninjas, however, is mana production. Ninjutsu abilities are not cost-effective a lot of the time, and we will still have cards that we want to cast on top of that. Being able to pick up one to three treasures per combat can go a long way for us. It also makes for a clone target to really scale things in our favor.

2) Higure, the Still Wind

This is a commander that I am very curious about once we get the full list from TMNT. It doesn't see a lot of play in the command zone because it is only mono-Blue, but it does everything you could possibly want in a Ninja Commander. Every time Higure deals combat damage to an opponent, we can tutor any ninja to our hand from our library. Additionally, we have the activated ability to make a ninja unblockable for two mana. Can we constantly tutor ninjas to our hand and connect for damage to get out triggers? Count me in!

1) Yuriko, the Tiger's Shadow

We all knew this would be number one. It's the only ninja to ever spend any time on the game changers list. We have Yuriko, the Tiger's Shadow. Most famous for its incredibly broken "Commander Ninjutsu" ability that gets around commander tax, this is an incredibly popular commander and is even used in cEDH. Every time one of our ninjas deals combat damage, we reveal the top card of our library, and we put it into our hand. Each opponent loses life equal to the mana value on the way. This is an elite way to whittle opposing life totals while we refill our hand to rebuild if a board wipe happens. In the command zone or in the 99, Yuriko is simply the best at what she does.

And that is our Top Ten Ninjas for Commander. If you have a creature type you would like to see get their own top ten list, send me an email at thoughtvesselshow@gmail.com, or you can reach out on Bluesky with @thought-vessel.bsky.social. Until next time, happy gaming!

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