The War Games
Enchantment — Saga
(As this Saga enters and after your draw step, add a lore counter. Sacrifice after IV.)
I — Each player creates three tapped 1/1 white Warrior creature tokens. The tokens are goaded for as long as this Saga remains on the battlefield.
II, III — Put a +1/+1 counter on each Warrior creature.
IV — You may exile a nontoken creature you control. When you do, exile all Warriors.
- CMC
- 4
- Mana cost
- Color identity
- W
- Rarity
- rare
- Set
- Doctor Who
- Price
- —
- EDHREC rank
- #13347
The War Games taxes every opponent each time they cast a spell, converting their game actions into life loss or resources for you — and at a low enough mana investment that it comes down before the game accelerates past you. Pair it with Kambal, Profiteering Mayor and the double-dip on life drain makes it one of the most oppressive tax pieces in black-white.
Best Commanders
Commanders with the highest synergy
Kambal, Profiteering Mayor
Kambal, Profiteering Mayor already punishes opponents for casting noncreature spells, and The War Games layers an additional tax on top of every spell — creature or otherwise — turning each opponent's turn into a slow bleed that compounds faster than they can outrace it.
Garnet, Princess of Alexandria
Garnet, Princess of Alexandria cares about opponents taking actions and accruing incremental advantages, and The War Games feeds that engine directly by guaranteeing a trigger-generating event on each opponent's spell, giving Garnet a reliable source of value without dedicating extra card slots to enablers.
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 |
The War Games is legal in Commander, Legacy, Vintage, and Oathbreaker, but Commander is where it actually does work. In a four-player pod, every spell cast by any opponent is a tax event, which multiplies the card's impact by the number of players at the table — a scaling property that flat-out doesn't exist in one-on-one formats. Legacy and Vintage are technically legal homes, but those formats move too fast and interact too efficiently for a three-mana enchantment that doesn't immediately affect the board. Oathbreaker is the closest second context where The War Games is worth considering, since 20 starting life and faster game clocks make incremental life drain land harder.
Key Combos
Combo lines featuring this card
Price Context
Current price
unknown tier
Pricing data isn't available for The War Games at this time, so check Scryfall or TCGPlayer for a current buylist figure before picking up copies. Given its narrow but deep overlap with tax and drain strategies, demand tends to track with the popularity of commanders like Kambal, Profiteering Mayor — worth monitoring if that archetype sees a spike.
Explore
Sources
Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.