In Commander there’s no shortage of big bombs to cast that can pull you super far ahead. If you’re going to fill your deck with haymakers, though, it’s essential that you have ways to accelerate towards them. Fortunately, Rowan, Scion of War makes this an easy task, despite being in a color pair that’s not well-known for ramp. Throw in its infinite combo potential as a bonus, and you’ve got a powerhouse legend.
MTG Rowan, Scion of War
Nearly all of Rowan, Scion of War’s value comes from its activated ability, which is capable of providing a massive discount to your black and red spells. The key to making this happen is to incorporate plenty of cards that allow you to pay lots of life at once.
The best of these options are those that can be activated repeatedly and require no mana input, like Necropotence
NecropotenceSkip your draw step.
Whenever you discard a card, exile that card from your graveyard.
Pay 1 life: Exile the top card of your library face down. Put that card into your hand at the beginning of your next end step.. K’rrik, Son of Yawgmoth and Treasonous Ogre are also extremely important inclusions, since they help you pay the colored pips on cards that Rowan’s ability doesn’t reduce.
Once you have your life payment options situated, you can then get even more mileage out of Rowan’s ability via untap effects like Thousand-Year Elixir
Thousand-Year ElixirYou may activate abilities of creatures you control as though those creatures had haste.
{1}, {T}: Untap target creature. or Magewright’s Stone. With activation-copying effects such as Rings of Brighthearth in the mix, you can easily get massive spell discounts.
From there, all you need are high-impact, expensive haymakers to cheat out, including Hoarding Broodlord and Valgavoth, Terror Eater. Vilis, Broker of Blood is particularly strong in this department, providing a steady stream of card draw alongside your life payment effects.
The only concern then is running out of life to pay, but luckily, life gain effects provide a solid buffer along the way. Sheoldred, the Apocalypse pairs nicely with your card draw elements, while Bloodthirsty Conqueror and Exquisite Blood synergize with your massive beaters. You can even utilize Magus of the Mirror to reset your life total and tank your opponent’s in the process.
After getting your engine chugging along, any number of X spells allow you to seal the deal, like Torment of Hailfire
Torment of HailfireRepeat the following process X times. Each opponent loses 3 life unless that player sacrifices a nonland permanent of their choice or discards a card. or Jaya’s Immolating Inferno. Exsanguinate is particularly strong here since it gains tons of life, offsetting the life loss that Rowan requires.
Infinite Damage, Storm, and Card Draw Combos
Beyond enabling massive Fireballs as finishers, Rowan also sets up some gnarly infinite combos. After losing at least three life during your turn, for example, you can use Electrodominance and Reiterate to deal infinite damage to your opponents.
To start, activate Rowan, then cast Electrodominance for X=3, paying RR thanks to your Commander’s discount. Holding priority with Electrodominance on the stack, you’ll want to cast Reiterate with Buyback targeting Electrodominance, once again paying just RR. Then, resolve the copy of Electrodominance, dealing three damage to an opponent, and choose to recast Reiterate with Buyback for free. This will create yet another copy of your burn spell, and you can repeat until each opponent takes lethal damage.
Interestingly, this isn’t the only infinite damage combo involving a Buyback spell. With Rowan and Storm-Kiln Artist in play and Searing Touch in hand, you can easily reduce the cost of Searing Touch to a single mana and cast it infinite times. Alternatively, swapping Searing Touch with Seething Anger can grow your creatures infinitely large or enable a Tendrils of Agony kill.
Going a different direction, you can even draw your whole deck with Acererak the Archlich and Relic of Legends. Simply activate Rowan, discounting Acererak by at least two, then cast Acererak. With Acererak’s enters ability on the stack, tap it floating a black mana, then resolve the enters effect, Venturing into a Dungeon and bouncing Acererak back to your hand. By repeating this, you can go through The Lost Mines of Phandelver infinite times, draining each opponent for 1 and drawing a card each time.
Surprisingly Cheap
While Rowan does see a decent amount of Commander play, given how easy it is to abuse Rowan’s activated ability, we’d argue it should be even more prevalent. After all, it has just over 9,000 decks to its name as a Commander, and appears even less in the 99 of other decks.
Luckily, this has helped keep the legend’s price down, available for just $0.43 despite being a Mythic. This makes it a great deal and a low-risk purchase, offering an extremely powerful combo-esque Commander for those who want to try her.
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