Is Astor, Bearer of Blades good in Commander?

Astor, Bearer of Blades in Commander — Combos, Decks & Price

Astor, Bearer of Blades cuts the cost of every Equipment and Vehicle you cast in half — that's the whole pitch, and it's a strong one. Kolodin, Triumph Caster and similar artifact-combat commanders treat Astor as an auto-include because a four-mana Swiftfoot Boots or a one-mana Smuggler's Copter changes the math on every single turn.

Best Commanders

Commanders with the highest synergy

01

Kolodin, Triumph Caster

66.4% of decks · synergy 0.60

Kolodin, Triumph Caster rewards stacking powerful, expensive Equipment on attacking creatures, and Astor, Bearer of Blades effectively doubles the number of pieces Kolodin can deploy in a single turn by cutting their mana cost in half — the synergy rate of 66% reflects how load-bearing that discount is to the engine.

02

Nahiri, Forged in Fury

58.7% of decks · synergy 0.53

Nahiri, Forged in Fury wants to cheat Equipment directly onto attacking creatures, and Astor, Bearer of Blades handles the rest of the hand — anything you draw and cast rather than cheat into play costs half as much, making the two a clean division of labor across about 59% of Nahiri builds.

03

Bruenor Battlehammer

35.9% of decks · synergy 0.30

Bruenor Battlehammer already makes equipped creatures cheaper to attack with; Astor, Bearer of Blades layers on top by making the Equipment itself cheaper to cast, so the two together compress a full turn of setup into a single explosive one.

04

Kellan, the Fae-Blooded

30.2% of decks · synergy 0.24

Kellan, the Fae-Blooded tutors and attaches Auras and Equipment for free when he connects, and Astor, Bearer of Blades handles everything that comes after — the pieces you draw into off combat triggers hit the board faster because Astor is already reducing their cost.

05

Amy Rose

28.9% of decks · synergy 0.23

Amy Rose cares about equipping and attacking with high-value artifacts, and Astor, Bearer of Blades plugs the setup tax directly — showing up in nearly 29% of Amy Rose lists because cheaper Equipment means more turns where the full combo is live before opponents can answer it.

Format Analysis

Where it lives, where it can’t

Format	Verdict
commander	legal
legacy	legal
modern	legal
pioneer	legal
standard	not legal
vintage	legal
pauper	not legal
oathbreaker	legal

Commander is where Astor, Bearer of Blades lives — a four-mana legendary that halves Equipment and Vehicle costs is exactly the kind of sustained value engine that thrives in longer games with bigger boards. In Modern and Pioneer, the card is legal but largely irrelevant: Equipment decks in those formats want to win on turn three or four, and a four-mana do-nothing-the-turn-it-enters doesn't fit that timeline. Legacy and Vintage have access to more broken tools than a cost-reducer provides, so Astor doesn't crack those formats either. Treat this as a Commander card through and through — it's built for the 100-card singleton format and almost exclusively deployed there.

Key Combos

Combo lines featuring this card

Price Context

Current price

unknown tier

Pricing data for Astor, Bearer of Blades isn't currently available in this dataset, so check Scryfall or TCGPlayer for a live number before buying. Given its consistent inclusion across multiple high-synergy Equipment commanders, it's worth picking up when you find a copy at a reasonable price — demand is spread across enough popular decks to keep it from bottoming out.