If you don’t recognize the name, you’re probably not alone. Commander only appeared in a handful of issues, and then only in Volume 2 of New Gods. He led the forces at home on New Genesis, helping to protect the New Gods from the evil Apokolips threat on the home front. He also died fairly soon after he was introduced, so he didn’t exactly do a standup job. But what he was good at was military strategy, and that is reflected here:

Commander is a strong card that the New Gods will get in this set, and fans of the team will be happy. Count me in as one of those fans, as Commander is certainly a drop I’m considering for my New Gods burn deck.

Commander is a military leader—a general, if you will. And like any other commanding officer, his primary responsibility is to come up with neat-o battle plans to mulch the enemy and then delegate the plans to someone else. This way, if they fail, Mr. General stays alive and Mr. Delegated Cannon Fodder is the one who gets the ick.

So, here we have a mid-range character with an above average ATK to show his military prowess and a below average DEF to show that when his backside is exposed, it’s as vulnerable as the next. But it’s the power of delegation that is really important—you don’t play Commander as a beatstick, you play him as a power boost. His cosmic ability allows you to pay a paltry 2 endurance to put a cosmic counter on a character—a fair deal by any means!

And boy, does he have targets! Commander is a 4-drop. If you do the math, you’ll see that there are two particularly tasty targets that may not have a cosmic counter when Commander hits the table: Mark Moonrider and Big Bear. For my burn deck, playing Commander instead of Izaya on turn 4 means that my Moonrider can take a whack on turn 3, and I don’t have to waste cards using New Genesis to heal him and pop a counter on him. And, since Commander’s ability isn’t activated, you don’t even lose him as an attacker while using his ability!

On defense, while Commander is more likely to stun than Izaya, he’s also more likely to take his attacker down. In addition, those cards I saved by not using New Genesis on Mark Moonrider will come in handy later in the game when I need to save a bigger, juicier character than Moonrider.

For those who aren’t playing burn, Forever People decks just got nastier. You may decide that Moonrider isn’t the best target for the counter, as you can only use Commander once per turn (then he goes back to his desk and pops back some Wild Turkey before coming up with new strategies for the next turn. Being a General is hard work, after all!), so Big Bear may be the better option. Big Bear is big and can attack up the curve, leaving Commander free to attack a smaller target and stay alive and healthy to replace Big Bear’s counter again next turn. You may also consider Serifan for Commander’s magic, as there can be major advantages to giving everyone invulnerability. And, with other new tricks up their sleeves, you may find that the New Gods can make use of a character like Serifan in the later turns without worrying about missing the curve.

That aside, if you’re feeling really strategic, you may try to keep Commander from stunning or use New Genesis on him to reactivate Scott Free for an extra turn of attack evasion. His power to remove attackers is vicious on turn 5; using it on turn 6 as well is simply unfriendly! Or, try Commander on Metron to negate your opponent’s sneaky tricks twice in a row. After all, your opponent shouldn’t be allowed to employ sneaky tricks—that’s your job!

Commander is definitely a solid addition to the New Gods arsenal, and he’ll take strategy to employ. However, that arsenal is quickly filling to overflowing, and with the first Green Lantern–legal PC format being DC Modern Age, we may just see New Gods hitting Tier 1 in a few months at Gen Con Indy.

Also known by his screen name Kergillian, Ben Kalman has been involved in the Vs. community since day one. He started the first major player in the online community, the Vs. Listserv, through Yahoo! Groups, and it now boasts well over 1,300 members! For more on the Yahoo! group, go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Marvel_DC_TCG.

Tomorrow's Preview: