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Without family, you’ve got nothing. That’s just as true in the Fast and Furious franchise as it is in Family Matters, the new preconstructed Commander Deck inMagic the Gathering’s latest expansion,Bloomburrow. This deck focuses on the new Offspring ability to ensure you’ve always got a growing family of creatures to do battle with.
Simply having a lot of critters isn’t all a big family will do for Family Matters. You’ll also focus on getting as much value as possible through enter-the-battlefield effects that duplicate as your commander produces more Offspring. Read on to discover the power of family in Family Matters.
Family Matters Commander Deck List
For those wondering what you get in Family Matters, here areall the cards that come in the box.
Angel of the Ruins
Stolen by the Fae
Helm of the Host
Thriving Isle
Family Matters Commander Deck Themes
Just like in Fast and the Furious, Family Matters is all about family. Or more specifically,the Offspring keywordcourtesy ofZinnia, Valley’s Voice. With Zinnia, every creature cast can have an itty bitty baby (basically a token copy but with power and toughness of 1/1). This provides opportunities todouble up on various enter-the-battlefield or triggered effects.
Agate Instigator is a great example. With the Agate in play, every critters deals one damage to every opponent, then Zinnia creates an offspring and deals one more. And if that copied card is something like Thopter Engineer, now you’ve doubled that to four damage to each and every player.
Things get pretty intense when you’ve gotAgate Instigator,Jacked Rabbit, andZinniaall working together at once.
With so many triggered abilities looking for creatures, it only makes sense for Family Matters to try togenerate as many tokens as possible. Jacked Rabbit is perhaps the best example of a token generator in Family Matters, but Murmuration, Elspeth, Sun’s Champion, and Siege-Gang Commander are all great for making tokens.
Each creature with base power of one increases Zinnia’s power, so generating a lot of tokens can turn your commander into a game-ending threat.
Finally, Family Matters has atertiary theme of getting the most out of your enters-the-battlefield creatures, even outside of Zinnia’s Offspring keyword. Restoration Angel can blink a creature, Luminous Broodmoth returns the recently deceased, and Aether Channeler can bounce a creature back to your hand to be played again (if you don’t want to create a 1/1 bird token).
The only other potential commander,Arthur, Marigold Knight,plays into this last theme quite well. Once you dig out a creature, it returns to your hand to be played again, giving you double the enter-the-battlefield triggers.
Arthur is a great card that still works in Family Matters, butwe’re sticking with Zinnia as commandersince you’re able to’t grow a family without a ton of Offspring.
Family Matters Commander Deck Analysis
As you’d expect, Family Matters ismostly concerned with creatures. Zinnia wants to produce as much Offspring as possible to produce an overwhelming number of both creatures and effects to help win the game.
To that end, the deck’s35 creatures are a Swiss-army knife of abilities. Some help draw cards like Circuit Mender or Spirited Companion, some help save your creatures likePlumecreed EscortorSelfless Spirit, some remove problem cards likeHanged ExecutionerandInferno Titan, and some help your army of tokens to overrun your opponents, likeJazal GoldmaneandTetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive.
Family Matters also has a reasonable number ofsorceries and instants to support the mostly creature-focused strategy.Path to ExileandRapid Hybridizationprovide some instant-speed removal,Chart a Course,Cut a Deal, andRowdy Researchprovide card draw, andCalamity of Cinders,Dusk/Dawn, andTime Wipeare your requisite board sweepers.
What can provide sometruly explosive turnsareMartial Coup,Stolen by the Fae, andStorm of Souls. These all essentially provide a large influx of tokens that can boost Zinnia’s power and also trigger enters-the-battlefield effects multiple times.
With the right creatures on the table, a single large Stolen by the Fae can result in a game-winning play.
Three colors that aren’t green can be hard to play with, so most of the artifacts are mana rocks that provide some colored mana. The enchantments are a fine collection of token generators and/or card draw (outside of Fortun Teller’s Talent, which we’ll replace later), and Family Matters' lands are doing their best on a budget (suggestions to improve that will be found at the end of this guide).
In its base state,Family Matters is a solid deck—perhaps the most solid of all Bloomburrow’s preconstructed Commander decks. That said, they’re not all gold-tier cards, so we’re going to tweak the deck with a few budget upgrades.
Rowdy Research
a Plains
But first, let’s get rid of some junk.Junk Winder,Inferno Titan, andAngel of Ruinsare all somewhat middling for their mana price. There are better ways to remove things than Inferno Titan and Angel of Ruins, and Junk Winder just doesn’t do enough on its own.
Inspiring OverseerandThopter Engineerare fine cards, but there are better options at three mana.Chart a Course,Cut a Deal, andRowdy Researchall helpfully draw cards, but they only do it once and have no synergy with Zinnia. We’ll replace them with creatures that can provide repeated card draw.
Finally,Fortune Teller’s Talentis a great card, but being able to cast cards from your library is an abilitybetter suited to other commander decks. Family Matters can also afford to drop a singlePlainssince there are several creatures and a half-dozen mana rocks helping with ramp and mana fixing.
Family Matters Commander Deck Budget Upgrades
With some cuts made, it’s time tosubstitute some budget upgrades. Each of these will work better with Zinnia to help you grow your family in no time.
Reason
Aerial Extortionist
What’s better than one thieving bird?Twothieving birds! Zinnia’s ability to double your Aerial Extortionist means you’ll have unprecedented aerial control of the battlefield alongside a ton of extra card draw.
Cayth, Famed Mechanist
Cayth and Zinnia produce a feedback loop that can single-handedly win games. Adding Fabricate to every creature means Zinnia’s Offspring ability makes twice as many 1/1 Servos, while Cayth’s Populate ability will duplicate one of Zinnia’s Offspring while further increasing the number of Servos.
Guide of Souls
You’re going to be making a lot of tokens, which are creatures, and so Guide of Souls will provide a lot of life and a lot of energy to turn your 1/1 tokens into Angels.
Molten Gatekeeper
Essentially a more expensive Agate Instigator, but one that can bring itself back to life for a single turn. And since Agate Instigator is a great kill card, why not have two?
Mulldrifter
Evoke Mulldrifter, then use Zinnia’s ability to give yourself a 1/1 Mulldrifter. That’s five mana to draw four cards. Of course, it’d be better to keep Mulldrifter around so you could draw even more cards with Echoing Assault.
Nesting Dovehawk
Populate every turn means whatever Offspring Zinnia creats just keep multiplying, and Nesting Dovehawk becomes an ever-increasing threat. The perfect addition for Family Matters.
Trumpeting Carnosaur
Trumpeting Carnosaur is great on its own. Being able to create a little baby Carnosaur that can also Discover 5 is just fantastic.
Welcoming Vampire
Reliable, repeatable card draw. Quite a few creatures in Family Matters have less than two power, so you’ll even be able to draw cards from non-token creature spells.
Wingmate Roc
Once again, the multiplicative powers of Zinnia are on full display with Wingmate Roc. One 3/4 Roc begets another, and then Zinnia’s 1/1 Roc creates its own 3/4 Roc. That’s three 3/4 Rocs and one 1/1 Roc that can be Populated to keep creating more 3/4 Rocs. And if all those Rocs attack, that’s 16 life gained per swing.
Witch Enchanter
Four mana to blow up an enchantment or artifact is a tad expensive, but Zinnia makes the second artifact or enchantment that much cheaper. And if you’re able to’t afford it, the other side of Witch Enchanter is a land. Now that’s versatility!
