"Benalish Commander" is an X/X human soldier lord printed for the Magic the Gathering expansion set known as "Planar Chaos." This is a card meant to be played in a white deck let alone with a bunch of soldiers. So far, this has a bunch of great abilities that help out many soldier creatures. Should you be building around the theme or "tribe" of soldiers, you may want to have Benalish Commander in your deck.

The converted mana cost for the Benalish Commander is four. You are going to need one white mana and three colorless mana to play Benalish Commander from your hand onto the battlefield. For what the Benalish Commander can do, the converted mana cost is well worth it for the most part if you are building around the theme of soldiers. This is a creature with many useful abilities. It is something that would entice players to build around soldiers.

What does the Benalish Commander do in the first place?

The first thing about Benalish Commander is that its power and toughness are equal to the number of soldiers on the battlefield under your control. If there are seven soldiers on the battlefield, then the Benalish Commander would be a 7/7 creature. While this seems to be good initially, Benalish Commander is dependent on the number of soldiers that you have. Every time you lose a soldier, the Banalish Commader's power and toughness will gradually decrease. In this respect, the power and toughness of the Benalish Commander will gradually fluctuate up and down.

However, there are other features to the Benalish Commander. By paying two white mana and X colorless mana, while X cannot be zero, you give the Benalish Commander the ability of Suspend X. Say that you have spent eight mana on X, you put eight time counters on the Benalish Commander. Instead of paying the actual mana cost, you can give Benalish Commander Suspend X. You may want to use this method instead of paying the actual mana cost. You remove a time counter at the beginning of your upkeep.

By removing a time counter from Benalish Commander, you get to put a 1/1 white soldier token onto the battlefield. That pretty much increases the power and toughness of the Benalish Commander. When all of the time counters are removed, Benalish Commander comes onto the battlefield with Haste. Haste means that the Benalish Commander is unaffected by summoning sickness.

In a soldier themed deck, you can use it with "Cenn's Tactician." You can use Cenn's Tactician to gradually beef up your soldiers. This includes the Benalish Commander. In this respect, Benalish Commander will not have to rely much on other soldiers being on the battlefield.

You can add in "Captain of the Watch." It would give Benalish Commander and other soldiers +1/+1 and Vigilance. In this respect, you can use cards that help out other soldier cards. That in turn helps out creatures like the Benalish Commander.

Overall, Benalish Commander seems to be an interesting card to have if you are building a white deck built around soldiers. If you are playing black and white, you can use "Vampire Hexmage." You sacrifice Vampire Hexmage and remove all of the time counters from Benalish Commander.

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