If Throne of Eldraine and Theros: Beyond Death were known for their handful of power outliers, Ikoria was known as the straw that broke the camel's back. Companion broke just about every format in half and made things even less recognizable than they'd been since the pre-War of the Spark days. Couple this with it being the first set of the pandemic and the inclusion of complicated mechanics like mutate and you've got yourself one heck of a weird and wild expansion. Naturally with such a set comes plenty of equally weird and wild mythic rares, and today we're going to rank them all!

16. Snapdax, Apex of the Hunt

Of the five mutate legends, Snapdax is easily the one with the least overall impact in the game. While it can be a very swingy effect, the cost factor made it difficult to pull off effectively, especially when the majority of mutate effects were limited to this set. That means there's not many ways to make good use of it, and as such, Snapdax was simply left in the dust.

15. Brokkos, Apex of Forever

Brokkos is far better, as you can bring it back whenever you want. Typically there aren't a ton of ways to make good use of this card, but putting it on a small creature can be very engaging. More importantly, though, this card plays well even when it's the only mutate card in the deck, unlike most of the other legendary mutate mythics. This one's so low simply because it's sort of bland outside of being something that you can recur multiple times.

13. and 14. Illuna, Apex of Wishes and Vadrok, Apex of Thunder

Conversely, these two cards both require you to make use of a lot of mutate creatures to be good, which - as noted with Snapdax - are few and far between. Both of these creatures provide so much value for their effects, though, that it's much more worth running them compared to Snapdax. The lack of mutate options hurts them and keeps them lower on this list as a result, but if you build your deck right they can be excellent options for something like Commander.

12. Zilortha, Strength Incarnate (aka Godzilla, King of the Monsters)

Players were a big fan of Doran, the Siege Tower for its unique ability to dish out damage with its toughness - a popularity that persists now with Arcades, the Strategist. Zilortha, Strength Incarnate provided a great opportunity to provide the inverse: making your creatures take damage with their power rather than their toughness. Most players didn't gravitate quite as hard to this, but the ability still proved novel, and provided an excellent opportunity to show off the Godzilla tie-in for the set.

11. Chevill, Bane of Monsters

Having yet another legendary creature that does bounty counters? Awesome! Having it not be in the colors as one of the only two other creatures that use bounty counters in Mathas, Fiend Seeker? I cry loudly. Despite the unfortunate incompatibility with Mathas that bugged many a player on release, Chevill managed to be a solid card in his own right and provided a great gameplay experience largely for those playing in a more casual setting. He did see some modest Standard play as a decent little body and effect for the decks that could play him.

10. Rielle, the Everwise

I was a little surprised at just how much play Rielle saw back in the days of Standard. When you read a card like this, it seems like the type of thing you'd see popping up more in Commander than anything, where it has, usually alongside various wheel effects. Remember, though, that Ikoria brought with it a set of cycling cards so good it dominated Limited. As a result, this bled into the Standard format and Rielle saw play in those decks. She's a lot more niche than some of the other Constructed cards of the set, but you'd be surprised at how useful it turned out to be.

9. Narset of the Ancient Way

If you were playing a Jeskai colored deck in Standard when Narset was around, you were likely playing her in your deck. The card seems a bit innocuous at first blush, but gaining life and mana to cast spells was big game to keeping yourself in the game and you could then follow it up with solid card selection as well. Not a bad little package for this iteration of an iconic planeswalker!

8. General Kudro of Drannith

Humans were a fairly popular deck in Modern for some time in 2017 and 2018, but it quickly started getting pushed out of the format. General Kudro gave the deck a bit of extra resilience, providing a lord and graveyard hate all in one package. This would also provide the backbone for various Humans builds in Pioneer and Standard as well, and he remains an excellent option for any Humans Commander deck that can run him to have in their deck.

7. Nethroi, Apex of Death

Nethroi is far and away the best of the legendary mutate mythics. Much like Brokkos, you can play this when it's the only mutate card in your deck, just because it generates so much value on its own. Many players have made all kinds of combo nonsense with the card, which has made it a favorite in Commander. It also helps that the color combination has some extremely powerful mutate options such as Auspicious Starrix, Boneyard Lurker, Necropanther, and Sawtusk Demolisher. That makes it worth running some additional mutate cards just so you can get that many more activations of its combo-rific ability online.

6. Luminous Broodmoth

If you ask your average Commander player what their favorite card in the set is, Luminous Broodmoth is probably a very strong contender. Allowing each of your creatures to essentially have undying but for flying counters instead of +1/+1 counters is huge and made it an instant casual favorite when it came out. Other cards in the set may have had a more widespread impact, but as far as Commander goes, it's hard to beat this one for the greatest appeal there.

5. Vivien, Monsters' Advocate

Vivien's third major outing provided an excellent planeswalker with a ton of flexibility. Getting a 3/3 every turn was huge, but the fact that you got to choose what keyword counters the creature got meant that it offered a variety of options for whatever situation the game threw at you. Additionally, the fact that you could cast creatures from the top of your deck and grab a second creature with her minus made her quite potent in a variety of formats. Even now, you can still sometimes see her pop up in Pioneer and Cubes everywhere.

4. Kinnan, Bonder Prodigy

While I think Luminous Broodmoth is far and away the best card in terms of casual appeal for Commander, it's not far to say Kinnan is the most powerful card for the format. It's one of the top commanders in the format, clocking in at rank 54 according to EDHREC.com for the simple combo shenanigans it enables. This has also extended to Constructed formats as well, where players have brewed all kinds of nonsense decks in a variety of formats centered around Kinnan's abilities. It's rarely a top contender of those formats, but it's always been a fun strategy for the brewers of the world to take to events with respectable performances.

3. Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast

Until Fires of Invention was banned, Lukka provided the deck with a way to search up copies of Agent of Treachery and shut opponents out of the game. This led to him also being played in Pioneer to do very similar things. As a result, Lukka never really did anything fair, but he was so heavily present in the formats where he was played that he deserves a high spot on this list for that reason alone.

2. Fiend Artisan

Players love a good toolbox card, and that led to Fiend Artisan being yet another major multi-format player. While its appearances in Standard, Pioneer, and Modern have been somewhat minimal, this is largely due to the fact that it held a lot of early power thanks to Lurrus of the Dream-Den. When companions changed (and Lurrus was banned), the card's usefulness waned rapidly. Still, it has continued to make regular showings in formats like Legacy and Commander thanks to its toolbox nature, and can continue to be found in other format brews quite regularly.

1. Winota, Joiner of Forces

Without a doubt, Winota is easily the strongest mythic of the set. The card did absurdly powered things with such efficiency that it was banned in several formats for being too high roller and killing people with ease. That was especially true in older formats where you could flip over copies of Angrath's Marauders and one-shot opponents. The card saw bans in Pioneer, Brawl, and Historic, and was also a solid option in the Standard format of its time. Every so often you'll even see it in Modern and Legacy, which just goes to show how silly the card could be in the right environment.

Paige Smith

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