The 10 Best Proliferate Commanders in Magic Ranked

Last updated on December 26, 2024

Atraxa, Praetors' Voice | Illustration by Justin Hernandez & Alexis Hernandez

Proliferate is one of the most powerful mechanics in Magic: The Gathering. So, so many cards in Magic use a counter of one kind or another to track their power or otherwise generate value; +1/+1 counters are common buffs for all types of creatures in pretty much every MTG set, sagas track their progress with lore counters, planeswalkers add or subtract loyalty counters with their activated abilities… and players can lose the game for acquiring too many poison counters, or stack up the energy counters from Kaladesh and Modern Horizons 3.

Proliferating these counters is the best way to tick them up across the entire board at once, and the non-targeting effect can skip right past that Leyline of Sanctity and continue dealing out poison counters.

So, which commanders can proliferate the best? How can we put more dice on the table than ever before? Let’s check out all 10 proliferate commanders!

What Are Proliferate Commanders?

Brimaz, Blight of Oreskos | Illustration by Uriah Voth

For the purposes of our list, proliferate commanders are any Commander-legal legendary creatures with the proliferate ability. These commanders make great leaders for decks built around any kind of counter, including poison, +1/+1s, energy, charge, depletion, mine, and even the lore counters on sagas!

This isn’t to say these are the only commanders you can run if you need an infect commander, or a +1/+1 counters commander, or whatever. These are solely the commanders with the proliferate ability, rather than another counter-specific effect.

The best proliferate commanders will have the widest application for their proliferations; meaning they’re able to lead a deck built around poison, +1/+1s, verse counters, or whatever other weird counters you can find!

#10. Ezuri, Stalker of Spheres

Ezuri, Stalker of Spheres is probably better in the 99 of a proliferate Commander deck, rather than at its helm as a Simic commander. Its ETB trigger to proliferate twice is good, but the 7 mana required makes casting a 3/3 with no combat abilities a really tough sell. I suppose you could blink Ezuri in and out, but you’d still need to pay the 3 each time if you wanted the proliferation.

Ezuri, Stalker of Spheres does draw you a card whenever you proliferate, which is a fair rate for the advantage generation, but it’ll just serve you better as a complement to your consistent proliferates from Atraxa, Praetors' Voice.

#9. Roalesk, Apex Hybrid

Roalesk, Apex Hybrid hit the scene in War of the Spark, and its death trigger makes it difficult to build around as a commander. Despite its impressive 4/5 flying–trampler body, Roalesk can’t put those two +1/+1s on itself and won’t proliferate anything until it dies. In non-Commander formats, this is an effective way to keep yourself from being two-for-one'd and stick some power to the board, but recasting Roalesk from your command zone will quickly make the commander tax too expensive, especially in Simic () colors where you won’t be able to reanimate it easily from your graveyard.

#8. Brimaz, Blight of Oreskos

Brimaz, Blight of Oreskos was the face cat commander for the one of the March of the Machine Commander precons. Brimaz, once the proud and brave king of the Leonin on Theros, is now a corrupted Phyrexian cat, built to proliferate the +1/+1 counters on the Incubator tokens.

Brimaz proliferates once at the end of your turn, like Atraxa, but needs a Phyrexian to have died under your control first. This gated mechanic makes Brimaz a touch worse than any other generally free source of proliferation. However, this Orzhov commander does create its own payoff for the proliferation effect by creating Incubator tokens to transform into more Phyrexians. Brimaz is notably weaker than Atraxa at 4 mana, has access to fewer colors, and requires you run an at least semi-typal deck. Brimaz isn’t bad, it just requires some build-around that the other proliferators don’t.

#7. Venser, Corpse Puppet

Honestly, I was surprised to hear from Venser at all in Phyrexia: All Will Be One. Pleasantly surprised, I should say, because the now-corrupted Venser, Corpse Puppet is one of the most unique Dimir commanders. Venser does one of two things whenever you proliferate: It either creates a legendary 3/3 Phyrexian Golem artifact creature or gives one of your artifact creatures flying and lifelink until end of the turn.

What makes Venser, Corpse Puppet fun is the assortment of counters-based artifact creatures that synergize with it. There’s the whole cycle of Arcbound creatures from Darksteel, any of the sunburst cards like Etched Oracle, or even the classic Triskelion.

Best of all? Venser, Corpse Puppet is just 2 mana to cast, and has toxic built in. This helps you put poison counters on your opponents in the early game, so you can focus on proliferating them later and don’t have to worry about connecting with your fragile commander again.

#6. Tekuthal, Inquiry Dominus

Tekuthal, Inquiry Dominus takes each instance of proliferation and doubles it, making it very effective for quickly ticking up planeswalkers’ loyalty counters, opponents’ poison counters, and whatever else you need. Plus, this Phyrexian horror can protect itself with its second ability, gaining an indestructible counter for the low, low price of removing three counters from among permanents you control. This is easy enough to do, considering any self-respecting proliferate deck will have tons of permanents that enter with counters on them already.

Really, Tekuthal’s only downside is its mono-blue commander color identity. Locking into one color prevents Tekuthal from running many of the best poison and +1/+1 counter generators in the game, but it still has access to some of the most valuable proliferate spells. Experimental Augury, Tezzeret's Gambit, and Inexorable Tide all slot right into a Tekuthal deck and generate tons of advantage once it's on the field.

#5. Yawgmoth, Thran Physician

Besides its place as a staple of the Modern format, Yawgmoth, Thran Physician can also pack a wallop as a black commander at the helm of your proliferate deck. Its two activated abilities put counters on the board and give you a consistent source of proliferate effects.

On its face, Yawgmoth is an insane amount of value, with a manaless ability to draw cards and protection from the most common creature types in the game. Yawgmoth can infinitely sacrifice and return undying creatures by canceling out their +1/+1 counter with a -1/-1, reanimating them again to draw a card. If you stack the triggers correctly, you can sacrifice a Butcher Ghoul with Yawgmoth and return it to the battlefield before targeting it with Yawgmoth’s ability that you just placed on the stack, removing the +1/+1 counter the Ghoul gained, making it ready to die and return again.

#4. Xavier Sal, Infested Captain

Xavier Sal, Infested Captain is another beautifully designed card that satiates the Melvin in me. Xavier combines two mechanics I’ve always thought of as spiritually connected: populate and proliferate. This fungus pirate gives you the utility to create creature tokens when you need them, or sacrifice creatures for counters. The in-and-out of this Sultai commander is reminiscent of Ghave, Guru of Spores, in that it has almost everything you need to combo off built in.

There are probably a million ways to go infinite with Xavier Sal, Infested Captain, due in no small part to its manaless activation costs. Even when something as simple as Intruder Alarm and Scurry Oak hit the field, Xavier can keep populating your tokens infinitely.

#3. Cayth, Famed Mechanist

Cayth, Famed Mechanist is one of the best designed cards I’ve ever seen. The balance of abilities in the text box is beautiful poetry. First, this Jeskai commander fabricates when it enters, getting you either +1/+1 counters or a 1/1 Servo token. Then, each nontoken creature you cast gets the same, making Cayth one of the best fabricate cards in the game.

But wait, there's more! Cayth’s 2-mana activated ability to populate (making another copy of a token you control) or proliferate lets you double down on whichever one of those fabricate options you need.

Cayth’s activated ability doesn’t have a trigger you need to fulfill. Instead, you just need 2 mana and a way to untap it to really start grinding out the advantage. In a world where we can stick this dwarven artificer with Pemmin's Aura and generate infinite mana with a Deadeye Navigator, we’ll see Cayth proliferating an infinite number of times each turn. While this is an intense amount of set up, the ceiling for payoffs with Cayth is much, much higher than many of the other proliferate commanders.

#2. Agent Frank Horrigan

Fallout’s Agent Frank Horrigan is an 8/6 for 7 mana. Whenever Frank attacks, it becomes indestructible. Or rather, it has indestructible as long as it attacked this turn. This means Agent Frank Horrigan’s indestructibility can’t be Stifled, since it isn’t triggered and doesn’t use the stack.

This Golgari commander’s biggest boon is the double proliferate it triggers whenever it enters or attacks. Arguably a better proliferator than Atraxa, Praetors' Voice, its expensive casting cost bumps it down, but just barely. Even though Frank will hit the field a turn or two later than Atraxa, its double-proliferate should see Frank catch up in total number of counters placed on the field in no time.

#1. Atraxa, Praetors’ Voice

Atraxa, Praetors' Voice is one of the most popular commanders of all time, and the best proliferate card in the game. With something like 32,000+ decks logged on EDHREC, it’s no surprise that this 4-color commander 4/4 with a keyword soup and a consistent proliferate trigger dominates the field. Atraxa’s mana cost is four different colors of mana, but this is rarely a problem in the Commander format when you have access to so many ramp and mana-fixing spells.

Atraxa has dominated the proliferate landscape forever. There’s just too much value here for 4 mana. You’re gaining at least 4 life per turn when Atraxa attacks, without worrying about the punch-back since it’s got both vigilance and deathtouch, making it an unfavorable creature to block and a nasty rattlesnake to keep your opponents' attackers at bay. At the very least, Atraxa is a cheaper Serra Angel with deathtouch and lifelink. At its best, sticking an Atraxa just about ends the game.

Proliferate Commander Payoffs

Proliferate commanders won’t do much without some counters on the field to, well, proliferate. Here are some great counters to proliferate, the best ways to access them, and some synergistic choices.

Poison Counters

You know ‘em, you hate/love ‘em. Poison counters are the bane of many players’ existences, by virtue of being one of the easiest ways to lose the game since their update in the Scars of Mirrodin block. If you’re a particularly villainous player, you might enjoy using Atraxa, Praetors' Voice to draw your foes ever close to compleation by ticking up their poison counters for free each turn without worry of losing your creatures by swinging in.

Prologue to Phyresis and Infectious Inquiry are two great and cheap ways to sneak some poison onto your opponents in the early game, and enchanting your intimidating Atraxa with Phyresis turns up the clock significantly.

Depletion Counters

Running a proliferating commander is one of the only situations where you’d want to run the depletion lands in EDH. These taplands (like Remote Farm or Peat Bog) come into play with two counters on them, and can remove a counter to add 2 mana of a single color to your mana pool. You have to sacrifice those lands once they’ve lost their counters, but access to a consistent proliferate source can keep them around forever, generating advantage every turn.

Synergies

What do we do with all these counters on the board? I hope you brought your multicolored dice!

Cards like The Ozolith are great for catching counters on permanents that would otherwise lose them, and Luxior, Giada's Gift turns any counter-heavy creature into a wildly strong beater. Finally, consider Deepglow Skate and other generic counter-doublers to greatly increase your counter generation all at once.

Commanding Conclusion

Xavier Sal, Infested Captain | Illustration by Bryan Sola

If there’s one thing I know about Magic, it’s that you need to keep some dice on hand to represent counters of one kind or another. It’s been years since I last played a game where neither me nor my opponent put a counter of any kind on the board, so the ubiquity of proliferate commanders makes them eternally playable, and more often than not, fairly powerful!

Which is your favorite proliferate commander? And what are your favorite counters to proliferate? Let me know in the comments, or over on Draftsim's Twitter/X.

Thanks for reading! Keep those dice handy!