JovenJoven | Art by Douglas Shuler | Leonardo, Big BrotherLeonardo, Big Brother | Art by InHyuk Lee

In the year 2024, Modern Horizons 3 hit shelves and featured a true oddity. Skoa, EmbermageSkoa, Embermage, a six-mana Goblin Wizard that enters play and deals four damage to any target, while also having an activated ability to deal another four damage, providing you're willing to sacrifice lands and discard another copy of this card.

On its face, this is a pretty unremarkable legendary creature, except for one key quality: it's a common.

Legends at lower rarity have been popping up more and more over the years, but primarily at the uncommon level. In the modern era, we started to consistently get these possible commanders with silver set symbols in Theros: Beyond Death, leading into a major uptick of them in the first Commander Legends. They are now a mainstay of recent Magic sets, usually acting as signpost cards for draft archetypes.

Common legendary creatures are a different story.

Strange Beginnings for Common Legends

It all began here, with these two renowned artifact haters.

ChandlerChandler and JovenJoven graced the packs of Homelands, and for the longest time, they held the distinction of being the only common legendary creatures in the game. Some sources out there may try to list cards like Ramirez DePietroRamirez DePietro and Tobias AndrionTobias Andrion from Legends as commons, however they only officially hold that rarity in the online exclusive set Masters Edition III.

While we would get a few draft supporting common legendary creatures with The Prismatic PiperThe Prismatic Piper and later Faceless OneFaceless One, it wasn't until the aforementioned Skoa, EmbermageSkoa, Embermage hit the scene that we got a standalone return of this peculiar type and rarity pairing.

But there was something on the horizon that would place a lot more cards like Skoa, Chandler, and Joven into booster packs: Marvel's Spider-Man.

The Universes Beyond Effect

With the release of Spider-Man, we suddenly had ten new common legends swing into the format! Each one featured a well-known character from the Spider-Man multiverse, and typically worked well with one of the main mechanics from the set. While these weren't the strongest designs imaginable, they were merely there to help bolster the limited environment, and not necessarily sit in the command zone.

The most built commander out of the bunch is Spider-Rex, Daring DinoSpider-Rex, Daring Dino, which has 184 decks to its name.

Not to be outdone, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TMNT) set hit the scene, and brought with it eleven common legendary creatures. Most of them fit a similar mold as Spider-Man, providing assistance with enhancing games of limited, including a cycle of creatures like Bebop, Warthog WarriorBebop, Warthog Warrior and Rocksteady, Crash CourserRocksteady, Crash Courser who can help with color fixing.

However, hidden in this list is a problem, which Wizards themselves knows about...

What's Wrong with Common Legends?

The problematic card in question is April O'Neil, Kunoichi TraineeApril O'Neil, Kunoichi Trainee.

A two-mana common legendary creature that scries two on entry and offers up some evasion to bolster your sneak effects. Both the Boros and Orzhov draft archetypes wanted this card in their ranks, but there's a problem: the legend rule. Having two Aprils on the field as early as turn three was totally doable, but many players had to limit themselves from casting their second copies, slowing down their game plans.

In a recent article on Wizards' site, one of the designers of the TMNT set Eric Engelhard goes into detail on how this version of April was created. In it, he stated:

"The most awkward part of this card (and we know it) is her being a two-mana common legend. Most legends at common are four or more mana to lessen legend rule problems, but this slot needed to cost two or three mana to be a good sneak enabler."

Now I know what some of you may be thinking: this article is on EDHREC, why should the legend rule concern Commander players? Well, you may be right, something that's an issue for 60-card formats usually isn't a problem for us (unless we're cloning). The concern that many players, myself included, have with these designs is that the term "legendary" and "common" don't tend to mix.

In that same article from Wizards, Eric went on to list the three qualities that have coalesced to make up the legendary supertype:

"1. You can't have more than one copy of a legendary creature on the battlefield.
2. If a card includes the name of a specific character, it has to be legendary.
3. A legendary creature can be a commander and lead a Commander deck.

For the record, Mark [Rosewater] and I both favor either removing the second rule (so we could put a common Leonardo in a set and have him not be legendary, as the commons generally don't make for exciting commanders anyway) or creating a new term or symbol that means 'I'm a specific character and can lead a Commander deck, but I don't trigger the legend rule.' Our quest continues..."

I agree that if a character is named, it should be legendary. Magic players are so accustomed to that formatting that even cards like Jarl of the ForsakenJarl of the Forsaken have been mistaken as a possible commander in the past, since Jarl seemed like this creature's name (it actually means Norse chief).

Another classic example of a line of cards that have made people ask the question "why isn't this legendary?" are the Nephilim from the original Ravnica block, which look and feel like they should be in the command zone. However, I do think there is a way to feature characters we know, without using the legendary supertype.

Starting Off Small

If we're capturing a well-known character at a common level, they should be at a point in their life where they're on the cusp of greatness. Featuring someone who is striving to become something more can be done with card design, and to showcase this, here's an example I put together:

Here we have the same legendary April card, but now we see her at a point where she is working on stepping up to the next level of her development. Notice that the name of the character could be featured in flavor text to drive the point home that this is in fact the character we know. Fans of different universes may appreciate these flashbacks, where they get to see popular heroes and villains as they're on the rise.

Now, I'll admit, this isn't a perfect fix. In this case especially, I would put April at a point where she is starting off as a journalist, to place her even further back in the story. Plus, I also know that there isn't always room for flavor text, so adding the character's name may be harder in some places. However, I would much prefer seeing people represented in this way, versus seeing versions of them relegated to a common level, and cause all the issues we've already covered.

This is also something that was mentioned in that Wizards article, where Eric said they had to turn some characters like Scumbug into Insectoid ExterminatorInsectoid Exterminator, and they even combined Muckman and Joe Eyeball into Putrid PalsPutrid Pals. Both of these feel great as commons, and show that the TMNT universe has more depth, and even if the characters have names, they don't always have to be in the title of the card.

Much like how Dock/Xu/Bushi became Merchant of Many HatsMerchant of Many Hats in the Avatar set, while still making reference to those names in the flavor text.

We've Seen Cards Like This Before

For years, there's been a debate in the Magic community on whether Stoneforge MysticStoneforge Mystic is actually a non-planeswalker version of Nahiri.

While there isn't a definitive answer on that (I looked for a very long time and couldn't find an official statement) it's a fun detail that keeps people engaged with the game. Theorizing on characters at different points in their lives makes them feel more three dimensional.

When I brought this topic up to people in my own playgroup, my partner Taryn mentioned how they originally assumed that Firebending StudentFirebending Student was just a younger (pre-blue fire) version of Azula. I think a lot of players have these small head canons, seeing a card that reminds them of someone else, and associating them with each other.

It helps us blend things together, and build connections between our game pieces.

My Final Thoughts on Common Legends

I want to make myself clear as I wrap things up today: I don't think we should never have common legendary creatures, I just think they should be rare (pun kind of intended...) As many of you know, I write about the best commons and uncommons from every new set in my article series Bulk Up, and something I've learned from doing that is just how important the cards in those slots are for a set's success.

They are the foundation that supports the bigger themes and mechanics that make an expansion special.

Common creatures are typically used to highlight the smaller parts of a world, helping things feel more alive and authentic. Like you're walking down a street, surrounded by everyday people, catching glimpses of greatness, but not noticing it outright. In those cards we see individuals with dreams to become more than they are, to rise ranks, ascend rarity, and eventually, become legendary.