Zealous Conscripts

Commander is where Zealous Conscripts does its best work: a single copy closes games through the Kiki-Jiki combo, and the enters-the-battlefield trigger is never dead even without the combo because every table has something worth stealing. In Legacy and Vintage, five mana is too slow for a format where games are decided on turns one through three, and Zealous Conscripts sees essentially no competitive play there. Modern has enough efficient threats that a five-mana conditional steal rarely makes the cut outside of fringe creature toolbox shells. Oathbreaker is the one non-Commander format where Zealous Conscripts earns a genuine look, particularly in red spell-slinger builds that can recur or copy the enters-the-battlefield effect.