GolgariLegendary Creature — Human Warrior VillainKraven the Hunter
Mana value3Rank#14,694
The Commander
Trample
Whenever a creature an opponent controls with the greatest power among creatures that player controls dies, draw a card and put a +1/+1 counter on Kraven the Hunter.
Guide
Gameplan
Kraven turns opponents' biggest creatures into your card advantage engine: kill or force the death of the highest-power creature each opponent controls and you draw a card and grow Kraven, who can close as a trampling beater. You play a removal-heavy midrange/control shell, picking off threats and edicting boards, while Kraven snowballs into a voltron win. Use repeatable removal, fights, and forced sacrifice to trigger him every turn.
Strengths
- Card advantage stapled to interaction you already want to run
- Grows into an evasive (trample) commander damage threat for free
- Punishes the typical EDH table full of big creatures and other commanders
- BG gives access to the best targeted removal, edicts, and recursion
Weaknesses
- Trigger requires the creature to die AND be the greatest power its controller has, so killing small utility creatures won't trigger it
- Token swarms and go-wide decks dodge him since their best creature is often a small one
- No evasion beyond trample and no built-in protection, so he's removal-bait once big
- Three colors of fixing not available; can be slow if you brick on removal
Key Cards
- Fleshbag Marauder — Edict forces opponents to sacrifice, and they'll often lose their biggest creature, triggering Kraven.
- Plaguecrafter — Repeatable-style edict on a body that reliably pushes opponents' best creatures into the graveyard.
- Chaos Warp — Cheap, color-appropriate removal that kills the biggest threat to fire off Kraven's trigger.
- Ravenous Chupacabra — Targeted removal on a creature that lets you snipe the single greatest-power threat for value.
- Liliana, Dreadhorde General — Edicts plus card draw that synergize with sacrificing the table's heavy hitters.
- The Ozolith — Banks Kraven's counters if he's removed, letting him come back swinging.
Upgrade Path
Add more efficient repeatable removal and edicts (Sheoldred, Whispering One; Grave Pact; Dictate of Erebos) to guarantee triggers each turn, and lean into proliferate (Flux Channeler, Evolution Sage) and counter doublers to accelerate Kraven's growth. Improve protection with cards like Heroic Intervention and Lightning Greaves, and tighten fixing with dual lands and fast mana to deploy removal ahead of the table. For a higher ceiling, pivot toward a reanimator/sacrifice engine that fuels both Kraven and a backup finisher.
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
- ▸Commander damage from a counter-pumped, trampling Kraven
- ▸Grinding out the table on card advantage from repeated removal then closing with creatures
- ▸Combining edicts and removal to dismantle opponents while Kraven snowballs
Archetypes
- Removal Midrange/Control — Kraven rewards a deck packed with kill spells, fights, and edicts that target the biggest creatures.
- Aristocrats/Edicts — Forced-sacrifice effects routinely remove opponents' top-power creatures to trigger draw and counters.
- Voltron — With trample and steady counters, Kraven can become a one- or two-shot commander damage threat.
- Group Slug/Punisher — Punishing big-creature strategies and bleveraging Kraven's draw to out-resource the table.
Combos
No combos found for this commander on Commander Spellbook.
Related Commanders
Same color identity (BG), by popularity.
