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Commander Nexus
  1. Commander Nexus
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  3. The Wandering Minstrel

Command zone

The Wandering Minstrel

The Wandering Minstrel

Legendary Creature — Human Bard

The Wandering Minstrel wants a deck that makes an army of small creatures and attacks with all of them. It also suits a deck that plays cheap creatures and attacks from the first turns.

  • Mana costgreenblue
  • All five colors ()
  • Power / toughness1 / 3
  • RarityRare

Lands you control enter untapped.

The Minstrel's Ballad — At the beginning of combat on your turn, if you control five or more Towns, create a 2/2 Elemental creature token that's all colors.

3 genericwhiteblueblackredgreen: Other creatures you control get +X/+X until end of turn, where X is the number of Towns you control.

Build a deck with The Wandering Minstrel Find it in the app

Archetypes
Themes

Cards That Fit The Wandering Minstrel

Picked for what they do in The Wandering Minstrel's deck. When two cards do the same job, the one with the lower comes first. All of them fit The Wandering Minstrel's color identity.Mana ValueThe total amount of mana a card costs, all added up. A card costing two generic and one green has a mana value of three. Wizards renamed this from "converted mana cost" in 2021, so older cards and articles may still use the old name.Sol RingOpen the full glossary

plan6

The 6 Cards

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The 6 Cards

Rulings for The Wandering Minstrel

explain how The Wandering Minstrel works in tricky situations. They come from Wizards of the Coast, the company that makes Magic.RulingThe official answer to how a card works in a tricky situation. Most rulings are written by Wizards of the Coast, the company that makes Magic, and a few are notes from Scryfall, the card database Magic players use. A ruling explains a card. It does not change what the card says.Open the full glossary

Wizards of the Coast 6 Jun 2025

If a land has an ability that says it enters the battlefield tapped, you choose the order in which that ability's effect and The Wandering Minstrel's effect apply. This means you can choose to have the land enter tapped or untapped. If a land you control is simply put onto the battlefield tapped without a replacement effect being applied, it always enters untapped if you control The Wandering Minstrel.

Wizards of the Coast 6 Jun 2025

If The Wandering Minstrel would enter the battlefield at the same time a land you control would enter the battlefield tapped, that land still enters the battlefield tapped.

Wizards of the Coast 6 Jun 2025

The value of X is calculated only once, as The Wandering Minstrel's last ability resolves.

Wizards of the Coast 6 Jun 2025

The Wandering Minstrel's second ability checks at the moment it would trigger to see if you control five or more Towns. If you don't, the ability won't trigger at all. If it does trigger, the ability will check again as it tries to resolve. If you don't control five or more Towns at that time, the ability won't resolve and none of its effects will happen.

4 rulings, all written by Wizards of the Coast. Read the originals on Gatherer ↗

Similar Commanders

Commanders that share the most with The Wandering Minstrel, and what they share.

Color identityEvery color of mana symbol on a card, in its cost and in its rules text. Your commander's color identity sets the limit for your whole deck: every other card has to fit inside it. A deck led by a green and white commander cannot play a card with any blue in its color identity.Open the full glossaryWUBRGPlayers write colors as letters: W for white, U for blue, B for black, R for red, G for green. Blue is U because B was already taken by black.TokensToken decks fill the battlefield with small creatures made by their cards, then attack with all of them or make them all bigger at once. A token is a creature (or other object) that a card creates, not a card from your deck.Open the Tokens pageOverrunMakes your whole team bigger at once, usually with trample or another way past blockers. It turns a big group of creatures into a winning attack. Craterhoof Behemoth, Akroma's WillOpen the Overrun pageToken EngineMakes tokens again and again rather than once. A token is a creature or other permanent created by a card, with no card of its own. Something that makes one token gives you a body; something that makes them every turn gives you a board you can keep rebuilding after it is cleared. Grave Titan, Bitterblossom, OphiomancerOpen the Token Engine pageStat ScalingA creature whose power and toughness count something, so it grows as the game goes on. It might count lands you control or cards in your graveyard. Craterhoof Behemoth, Psychosis CrawlerOpen the Stat Scaling pageToken MakerCreates one or more tokens. Different cards make very different ones: creatures Grave Titan, Treasures Smothering Tithe, Clues Tireless Tracker or Food Gilded Goose. This is one of our largest tags, so pair it with an archetype or theme when you are hunting a specific kind.Open the Token Maker pageCombat TrickAn instant you cast during a fight to change how it ends: making a creature bigger or smaller, or keeping your creatures from dying. Boros Charm, Flawless ManeuverOpen the Combat Trick pageAggroAggro decks play cheap creatures early and attack every turn, trying to knock opponents out before their bigger plans come together.Open the Aggro page