The Ruinous Powers
Enchantment
At the beginning of your upkeep, choose an opponent at random. Exile the top card of that player's library. Until end of turn, you may play that card and you may spend mana as though it were mana of any color to cast it. When you cast a spell this way, its owner loses life equal to its mana value.
- CMC
- 4
- Mana cost
- Color identity
- BR
- Rarity
- rare
- Set
- Warhammer 40,000 Commander
- Price
- —
- EDHREC rank
- #7546
The Ruinous Powers puts a permanent from any library directly onto the battlefield — no mana cost paid, no waiting — which is the kind of effect that ends games. The five-mana ask is real, but Abaddon the Despoiler turns that cost into cascade triggers, and a free permanent is almost always worth the spell slot.
Best Commanders
Commanders with the highest synergy
Abaddon the Despoiler
Abaddon the Despoiler cascades off spells that have mana value equal to or less than the damage dealt to opponents, and The Ruinous Powers at five mana sits squarely in that cascade window while also fetching a free permanent to compound the advantage. It's the engine piece the deck is built to chain.
Don Andres, the Renegade
Don Andres, the Renegade rewards playing spells from outside your hand and stealing value from opponents, making The Ruinous Powers a natural fit — pulling a permanent directly from any library aligns with the deck's philosophy of taking what it wants from anywhere on the table.
Laughing Jasper Flint
Laughing Jasper Flint wants high-impact instants and sorceries to generate bounty counters and fuel advantage, and The Ruinous Powers delivers a payoff powerful enough to justify its slot in that spell-forward gameplan.
Nathan Drake, Treasure Hunter
Nathan Drake, Treasure Hunter builds around acquiring permanents and generating Treasure, and The Ruinous Powers plugs directly into that by putting any permanent from any library onto the battlefield — the definition of acquisition.
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 |
Commander is where The Ruinous Powers belongs — three opponents means three libraries to raid, and the ability to pull any permanent without paying its mana cost is maximally abusive in a singleton format full of expensive haymakers. Legacy and Vintage allow it, but a five-mana sorcery that doesn't interact with the graveyard or generate instant-speed value has no realistic home in either format's tempo-obsessed landscape. Oathbreaker is a reasonable second stage: signature spell slots are restricted, but a one-shot game-ending tutor is exactly what that format wants from its spell investment.
Key Combos
Combo lines featuring this card
Price Context
Current price
unknown tier
Pricing data for The Ruinous Powers isn't available at the moment — check Scryfall or TCGPlayer for current market listings. Given the synergy density with Abaddon the Despoiler decks and 40%+ inclusion in that archetype, demand isn't going away.
Explore
Sources
Mentioned
- Abaddon the Despoiler
- Don Andres, the Renegade
- Laughing Jasper Flint
- Nathan Drake, Treasure Hunter
Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.