Sphinx of the Chimes

In Commander, Sphinx of the Chimes is a build-around that does nothing in a generic 99 — the singleton rule means you need explicit infrastructure like copy effects or cards that create duplicates in hand before the activation ever fires. Modern and Legacy have access to far more efficient card advantage engines, and the narrow discard condition means Sphinx of the Chimes never made a dent in those formats either. Pioneer is the same story: six mana for a conditional draw effect is simply too slow and too dependent on setup when the format has cleaner options. The hexproof body is legitimately hard to interact with, which matters in Commander where targeted removal is common, but that defensive upside alone does not justify the slot unless you are building the deck around the ability.