GolgariLegendary Creature — Insect // Legendary Planeswalker — GristGrist, Voracious Larva // Grist, the Plague Swarm
Mana value1Rank#4,286
The Commander
Deathtouch
Whenever Grist or another creature you control enters, if it entered from your graveyard or you cast it from your graveyard, you may pay . If you do, exile Grist, then return it to the battlefield transformed under its owner's control.
+1: Create a 1/1 black and green Insect creature token, then mill two cards. Put a deathtouch counter on the token if a black card was milled this way.
−2: Destroy target artifact or enchantment.
−6: For each creature card in your graveyard, create a token that's a copy of it, except it's a 1/1 black and green Insect.
Guide
Gameplan
Cast Grist for one mana as a deathtouch blocker, then transform it into a planeswalker by recurring or reanimating creatures from your graveyard. Once flipped, Grist grinds value—generating Insect tokens, milling to fuel the graveyard, destroying artifacts/enchantments, and threatening a massive ultimate. You win by going wide with Insects backed by aristocrat payoffs, sacrifice synergies, and reanimation that loops creatures to repeatedly flip and protect Grist.
Strengths
- One-mana commander that's cheap to recast and hard to punish for low tax
- Built-in flexible removal (-2 hits artifacts or enchantments) that most BG decks lack
- Generates token armies and self-mill that synergize with aristocrats and reanimation
- Game-ending -6 ultimate that can rebuild from a stocked graveyard
- Deathtouch on the front side makes it a strong early defensive body
Weaknesses
- The flip requires a creature entering from your graveyard, so you need consistent reanimation enablers
- As a planeswalker it's vulnerable to attackers and easily killed before ultimating
- Slow to set up without graveyard fuel; clunky in the opening turns
- Graveyard hate shuts off both the flip condition and the payoff
- Mono-removal -2 doesn't deal with creatures, leaving you reliant on other interaction
Key Cards
- Reanimate — Cheaply returns a creature from your graveyard, instantly triggering Grist's transform ability.
- Animate Dead — Repeatable-style reanimation that flips Grist while putting a big body on the battlefield.
- Skullclamp — Turns your endless stream of 1/1 Insect tokens into a card-drawing engine.
- Pitiless Plunderer — Converts dying Insects into Treasure, ramping toward more reanimation and recasting Grist.
- Meren of Clan Nel Toth — Recurs creatures from the graveyard each turn, reliably flipping Grist while building experience value.
- Dictate of Erebos — Sacrifice fodder plus Insect tokens force opponents to lose their board in an aristocrats shell.
Upgrade Path
Add fast reanimation (Reanimate, Animate Dead, Necromancy) and recursion engines (Meren, Mikaeus, Phyrexian Reclamation) to make the flip reliable, then layer aristocrat payoffs and free sacrifice outlets like Viscera Seer and Carrion Feeder. Improve mana with fast rocks and dual lands, and include tutors (Demonic Tutor, Vampiric Tutor, Buried Alive) to assemble loops. For higher power, build toward an infinite drain combo such as Mikaeus, the Unhallowed plus a sacrificial creature or a Gravecrawler engine.
Core Cards
The most-played cards for this commander, built from aggregated deck data (the Mythic Graph). Build public decks to seed it.
Win Conditions
- ▸Aristocrats drain via Blood Artist, Zulaport Cutthroat, and Bastion of Remembrance off dying Insects
- ▸Going wide with token swarms boosted by anthems like Cathars' Crusade or Coat of Arms
- ▸Grist's -6 ultimate copying your graveyard into a lethal army
- ▸Reanimating a large finisher (e.g., Sheoldred or Massacre Wurm) backed by recursion loops
Archetypes
- Aristocrats — Grist floods the board with expendable Insect tokens that feed sacrifice and drain engines.
- Reanimator — The flip mechanic rewards returning creatures from the graveyard, marrying transform triggers with big reanimation targets.
- Tokens / Go-Wide — Repeated +1 activations and the -6 ultimate build a swarm of Insects to overwhelm or fuel anthems.
- Combo — Recursion loops and sacrifice payoffs let Grist enable Blood Artist-style drain or infinite token engines.
Combos
- Grist, Voracious Larva // Grist, the Plague Swarm + Vorinclex, Monstrous Raider + Body Launderer + Phyrexian Altar
→ Infinite LTB, Infinite ETB, Infinite colored mana
- Grist, Voracious Larva // Grist, the Plague Swarm + Doubling Season + Body Launderer + Phyrexian Altar
→ Infinite LTB, Infinite ETB, Infinite colored mana
- Grist, Voracious Larva // Grist, the Plague Swarm + Vorinclex, Monstrous Raider + Body Launderer + Hidden Herbalists + Altar of Dementia
→ Infinite LTB, Infinite ETB, Infinite sacrifice triggers
- Grist, Voracious Larva // Grist, the Plague Swarm + Vorinclex, Monstrous Raider + Body Launderer + Hidden Herbalists + Ashnod's Altar
→ Infinite LTB, Infinite ETB, Infinite sacrifice triggers
- Grist, Voracious Larva // Grist, the Plague Swarm + Vorinclex, Monstrous Raider + Body Launderer + Hidden Herbalists + Carrion Feeder
→ Infinite LTB, Infinite ETB, Infinite sacrifice triggers
Combos via Commander Spellbook.
Related Commanders
Same color identity (BG), by popularity.
