Komainu Battle Armor
Artifact Creature — Equipment Dog
Menace
Equipped creature gets +2/+2 and has menace.
Whenever this creature or equipped creature deals combat damage to a player, goad each creature that player controls.
Reconfigure 
(: Attach to target creature you control; or unattach from a creature. Reconfigure only as a sorcery. While attached, this isn't a creature.)
- CMC
- 3
- Mana cost
- Color identity
- R
- Rarity
- rare
- Set
- Magic Online Promos
- Price
- —
- EDHREC rank
- #3290
Komainu Battle Armor turns a equipped creature into a political weapon — opponents who attack anyone but you are goaded, which means the armor generates chaos and card advantage without you spending a card each turn. The cost is real: you need a creature already in combat to trigger it, so it rewards aggressive or goad-forward builds rather than control shells. Karazikar, the Eye Tyrant is the natural home because the goading stacks directly with his card-draw trigger.
Best Commanders
Commanders with the highest synergy
Karazikar, the Eye Tyrant
Karazikar, the Eye Tyrant draws a card whenever a goaded creature attacks someone else, so Komainu Battle Armor turns every combat step into a card draw engine without spending additional resources.
Chishiro, the Shattered Blade
Chishiro, the Shattered Blade creates a Spirit token whenever an Aura or Equipment enters the battlefield or gets attached, so Komainu Battle Armor triggers that engine each time it equips — and the resulting tokens are happy recipients of the armor themselves.
Tetsuo, Imperial Champion
Tetsuo, Imperial Champion cares about stacking multiple Equipment on the same creature, and Komainu Battle Armor slots in as a politically disruptive piece that keeps opponents' creatures swinging sideways rather than at Tetsuo's controller.
Gilgamesh, Master-at-Arms
Gilgamesh, Master-at-Arms generates value by attaching Equipment repeatedly, and Komainu Battle Armor's goad trigger fires every time the armor changes hosts — making frequent re-equip loops progressively more punishing for the table.
Alexios, Deimos of Kosmos
Alexios, Deimos of Kosmos wants opponents' creatures attacking each other, and Komainu Battle Armor enforces exactly that mandate, adding a redundant goad layer that keeps Alexios's plan running even through targeted removal.
Format Analysis
Where it lives, where it can’t
| Format | Verdict |
|---|---|
| commander | legal |
| legacy | legal |
| modern | not legal |
| pioneer | not legal |
| standard | not legal |
| vintage | legal |
| pauper | not legal |
| oathbreaker | legal |
Komainu Battle Armor is a Commander card through and through — the goad mechanic only matters when there are multiple opponents to redirect, and the political value it generates compounds with every additional player at the table. In Legacy and Vintage, where it is technically legal, Equipment that costs two to cast and two to equip without a raw power-stat payoff simply does not compete; those formats reward immediate board impact, not multiplayer politics. Oathbreaker shares enough of Commander's multiplayer DNA that the armor is playable there too, particularly in goad-adjacent strategies. Outside of multiplayer contexts, leave it on the shelf.
Key Combos
Combo lines featuring this card
Price Context
Current price
unknown tier
Pricing data for Komainu Battle Armor is not currently available in our database, so check Scryfall or TCGPlayer for the current market rate before buying. Given its narrow home in goad-specific Commander builds, it tends to be an affordable pickup — but verify before assuming.
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Sources
Mentioned
Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.