Warhammer 40,000 Commander Decks and Decklists

Magic the Gathering is doing a big crossover with Warhammer 40k. There won’t be a regular MTG set, but instead we’re getting four Warhammer 40,000 Commander decks. In this article, we’ll talk about everything you should know about these interesting precons.

Here’s a quick overview of the decks.

	Deck name	Colors
	The Ruinous Powers	Blue Black Red
	Tyranid Swarm	Blue Red Green
	Forces of the Imperium	White Blue Black
	Necron Dynasties	Black

Warhammer 40k Commander Decks

In this section, you’ll find all four Warhammer 40,000 Commander decks. So far we know their colors, and main commanders, based on which we can make some educated guesses about the decks’ themes. Let’s take a look – we’re starting with a fascinating one.

The Ruinous Powers

• Theme: opponents losing life
• Colors: Blue, Black, Red (Grixis)
• Main Commander: Abaddon the Despoiler
• Ruinous Powers Upgrade Guide

The Ruinous powers was the first one that had its commander previewed. From it, one can safely assume that this deck will try to deal a lot of damage to the opponents. The deck also looks like it’ll offer a nice balance between aggression, and combo.

All things considered, it looks like a fresh take on the Grixis color combination, which is always welcome. If you’re a fan of this color combo, this deck probably won’t disappoint you.

The Ruinous Powers Decklist

You can find the new cards from The Ruinous Powers here.

Abaddon the Despoiler Review

As far as Abaddon’s stats go, it passes the test. 5/5 trampler for five mana is fine. However, in Commander, we’re more interested in the abilities.

As we can see, there is a caveat to its ability. Your opponents will need to lose life in order for it to do anything. However, that’s a pretty easy requirement, once you’re building around it. On top of that, the payoff is pretty amazing!

All spells you cast from your hand during your turn, can have cascade, provided you dealt enough damage to your opponents. This can make for some really explosive turns.

Final verdict is that Abaddon is a really great commander. It provides a nice deckbuilding challenge, and the reward is certainly there. It also promotes attacking, which in turn enables a more proactive game of Commander. Finally, it isn’t broken, so you don’t become the target number one, from the start of the game by default.

Tyranid Swarm

• Theme: +1/+1 and other counters
• Colors: Blue, Red, Green (Temur)
• Main Commander: The Swarmlord
• Tyranid Swarm Upgrade Guide

The deck doesn’t have the most original theme, as Tyranid Swarm focuses on +1/+1 and other counters. Nevertheless, not every deck needs to do something new. Many players enjoy playing with counters, and if you’re one of them, you’re going to really like this deck.

Tyranid Swarm Decklist

You can find the new cards from Tyranid Swarm here.

The Swarmlord Review

The Swarmlord is a 5/5 for six, which is a bit of a letdown, especially compared to the previous face commander, Abaddon. However, if you use it as a Commander, it’ll always come with a least a couple of counters, making it a 7/7 at worst. If your opponents manage to get rid of it, even if you do have to pay the Commander tax, it’ll come back bigger.

Furthermore, it has another ability, which draws you a card whenever one of your creatures with a counter (of any kind) dies. Now this can really enable various combos and synergies, namely aristocrats, which wasn’t a real deal in these color until now.

Forces of the Imperium

• Theme: tokens – not very focused
• Colors: White, Blue, Black (Esper)
• Main Commander: Inquisitor Greyfax
• Forces of the Imperium Upgrade Guide

Forces of the Imperium looks like an intriguing deck based on the face commander, plus it has perhaps the most exciting secondary commander as well.

Forces of the Imperium Decklist

You can find the new cards from Forces of the Imperium here.

Inquisitor Freyfax Review

Inquisitor Greyafax is an unusual Commander, and it was probably designed in a way that the mechanics fit the character’s flavor and not the other way around.

You basically get a version of Always Watching with Greyafax, which is nice in a multiplayer format. You get to attack without making yourself vulnerable. Its second ability can also come in handy occasionally, by enabling safe attacks that you wouldn’t otherwise have. Of course, Clues are always useful. They can be used for card advantage or for artifact synergies.

Greyfax is probably a weaker commander than the previous two, but nevertheless, she still provides a nice deckbuilding challenge. It’ll rarely be the strongest commander at a multiplayer game, which is both a benefit and a problem at once.

Necron Dynasties

• Theme: Self-mill, artifact creatures & vehicles synergies
• Colors: Black
• Main Commander: Szarekh, the Silent King
• Necron Dynasties Upgrade Guide

This is the only one of the Warhammer 40,000 Commander decks, that doesn’t have three colors. Instead, this one features a mono Black commander.

Necron Dynasties Decklist

You can find the new cards from Necron Dynasties here.

Szarekh, the Silent King Review

Szarekh is a four mana 3/4 flyer. Its ability isn’t particularly strong. First you have to attack with it, and then you mill three cards. You can return one artifact creature or a vehicle among the milled cards to your hand.

So you have to attack, and then hit a correct card type on among the next three cards of your deck in order to essentially just draw a single card. All in all, Szarekh truly looks the most disappointing commander of the bunch. Hopefully, there is something good in the rest of the deck, because this ain’t it.

MTG Warhammer 40k Spoilers

This time around we’re doing the spoiler section a bit differently. Instead of lumping all the images together, there are four separate pages, one for each deck. Each page has all the new cards from each deck. (There are 42 new cards per deck, so 168 total.) Here are the galleries:

• The Ruinous Powers New Cards
• Tyranid Swarm New Cards
• Forces of the Imperium New Cards
• Necron Dynasties New Cards

More MTG Warhammer 40k Information

What is Warhammer 40,000?

Warhammer 40,000 is a miniature wargame, produced by Games Workshop. In fact, it’s the most popular miniature wargame in the world. Just like Magic the Gathering, it also has a long history, as it has been around since 1987.

With this collaboration, we’re getting Magic the Gathering cards set in the Warhammer 40k universe. This is a part of the Universes Beyond – series in which MTG works with other intellectual properties.

Intro Decks or Full Versions

Usually, when a new Commander precon comes out, players wonder if it’s going to be a cheaper, lite version (like the Kaldheim ones) or a more powerful and more expensive version (like the New Capenna Commander decks).

It certainly looks like the Wizards aren’t planning on bringing back the lite versions any time soon. It would be especially weird to bring them back with a set that only has Commander decks, and no regular boosters.

That’s why it’s highly likely that these will be your regular Commander precons with new powerful cards and with exciting reprints.

Products

As we mentioned before, there will be four Warhammer 40,000 Commander decks. These will be multicolored, and the colors won’t be evenly distributed, since the Warhammer universe wasn’t made with the color pie in mind. In fact, three out of four decks are black!

Besides the four decks, there will also be three Secret Lairs, but there will be no boosters of Warhammer 40,000. This means no Draft, Set, nor Collector boosters.

Release Date

The official release date for Warhammer 40k Commander decks was supposed to be August 12. However, due to ongoing global supply chain challenges and delays in production, the release was pushed further into the future. The official release date is October 8, 2022.

Game stores will be able to host launch weekend events on October 8-10. The Secret Lair Drops will be available between October 8-18.

Missing Cards

If your Warhammer 40k Commander deck seems to be missing cards, make sure to double-check the tokens. Due to the placing error, some cards ended up in the token portion of the deck, as per Wizards’ statement. The affected cards seem to be Epistolary Librarian in the Forces of the Imperium precon and Exalted Flamer of Tzeentch card in The Ruinous Powers deck.

Warhammer 40k Commander Decks – FAQ

Here are the answers to some questions you might have about the Warhammer 40,000 Commander decks. If we didn’t answer your question, leave a comment below, and we’ll get back to you, as fast as we can.

Warhammer 40k Commander Decks Collector’s Edition

Before we wrap up, here’s another thing we absolutely have to mention – the Collector’s Edition of Warhammer 40k Commander decks!

These four decks will contain the same cards as their regular counterparts. The only change is that all the cards will have the special surge-foil treatment. Of course, the price of these is therefore higher, and you can check it on Amazon.

These are something quite unique that Wizards are doing, and they might be worth more in the future, once that they’ll no longer be available in print. However, that depends on many factors and is never a 100% sure.

Conclusion

That’s all about Warhammer 40k Commander decks so far. Once more information becomes available, we’ll update the article, so make sure to check back soon. You can also follow us on Facebook or Instagram, where we post whenever something new and interesting comes up in the world of Magic the Gathering.

Furthermore, if you’d like to explore more about new Magic products, you can take a look at the following articles:

• Upcoming MTG Sets
• List of All Commander Precons
• Dominaria United Commander Decks

Until next time, have fun and may your starting hand always contain a Sol Ring.