Is Buried Alive good in Commander?

Buried Alive in Commander — Combos, Decks & Price

Buried Alive puts three creatures from your library directly into your graveyard for three mana — that's a tutor that skips the hand and goes straight to the zone that matters. Reanimator shells, graveyard combo decks, and commanders like K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth and The Beamtown Bullies run it because three cards of setup at instant-adjacent speed is simply the most efficient graveyard-loading spell in black.

Best Commanders

Commanders with the highest synergy

01

The Beamtown Bullies

82.5% of decks · synergy 0.71

The Beamtown Bullies needs specific high-power creatures in the graveyard to reanimate onto opponents' boards, and Buried Alive assembles that payload in one shot — 82% of Bullies decks run it for exactly that reason.

02

Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad

72.1% of decks · synergy 0.66

Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad cares about creatures dying, and Buried Alive pre-loads the graveyard with targets that feed his assassination triggers or enable immediate reanimation synergies.

03

Mairsil, the Pretender

68.3% of decks · synergy 0.65

Mairsil, the Pretender needs specific creatures with activated abilities caged in the graveyard, and Buried Alive is the fastest way to bin three of them simultaneously before Mairsil ever hits the battlefield.

04

Kathril, Aspect Warper

71.8% of decks · synergy 0.63

Kathril, Aspect Warper scales directly with the number of keyword creatures in your graveyard, so Buried Alive stacking three keyword-dense creatures before Kathril enters is as close to a mandatory include as the deck has.

05

Trazyn the Infinite

74.7% of decks · synergy 0.63

Trazyn the Infinite copies activated abilities of artifact creatures in the graveyard, and Buried Alive sets up the graveyard as a toolbox of abilities to copy — 74% inclusion across Trazyn lists reflects how central that setup is.

Format Analysis

Where it lives, where it can’t

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

Commander is where Buried Alive does its best work — the singleton format rewards tutors that find multiple pieces at once, and three-mana to bin three creatures is a well-understood axis of powerful graveyard decks. In Legacy, it's legal but rarely played outside fringe reanimator lists; the format's speed means opponents may win before the payoff resolves. Vintage likewise allows it, though the card sees minimal competitive play there given the raw power of available alternatives. Buried Alive is not legal in Pioneer, Standard, or Pauper, so its practical home is essentially Commander and Oathbreaker, where graveyard setups are a dominant and recurring strategy.

Key Combos

Combo lines featuring this card

2,772 decks