All Aragorn Cards in Magic: The Gathering

A lot of Tolkien characters made their way into Magic: The Gathering. In The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth expansion in MTG, Aragorn shows up on five Creature spells. All are viable—but some more than others. It’s time to pick the most charismatic Commander!

Aragorn, Company Leader

Aragorn, Company Leader is a Legendary Creature—Human Ranger with 3 power and 3 toughness that has a mana value of one green, one white, and one of any color. It has two effects:

Whenever the Ring tempts you, if you chose a creature other than Aragorn, Company Leader as your Ring-bearer, put your choice of a counter from among first strike, vigilance, deathtouch, and lifelink on Aragorn.

Whenever you put one or more counters on Aragorn, put one of each of those kinds of counters on up to one other target creature.

Pros and Cons

Pro: If you’re using The Ring Tempts You mechanic in your deck, Aragorn, Company Leader could be a useful card. Choosing a Ringbearer other than Aragorn gives it, and another Creature you control, First Strike, Vigilance, Deathtouch, or Lifelink. All of these abilities are useful, making Aragorn versatile.

Pro: The goal should be to eventually get all of these abilities on Aragorn and other Creatures you control. However, which one you should start with depends on your deck composition and the situation of the current game. Arguably the best first pick is First Strike thanks to its general usefulness for offense and defense. Next would be Vigilance for keeping Creatures untapped. Deathtouch and Lifelink can be more situational, though both are helpful for defense and niche strategies.

Con: On the downside, if you aren’t using The Ring Tempts You, this card loses half of its combat value. It’s still viable in decks focused on placing counters (such as the +1/+1 kind) on Creatures. However, for efficiency, you’re better off choosing other cards that make full use of their effects rather than half.

Con: What’s more, Aragorn’s effects need another Creature under your control for true viability. If it’s by itself, it’s nothing more than a regular 3/3 Creature.

Potential as Commander: Low

When choosing a Commander for your deck, you want something that’s always going to be a threat to your opponent. For that, Aragorn, Company Leader, is not a great choice for the Commander format in MTG. By itself, it’s not that powerful. On top of that, you need at least two turns after casting it to make it dangerous—which is too slow. Furthermore, at 3/3, Aragorn is very vulnerable to fireball variants and instant-death spells.

Lastly, a color identity of only green and white isn’t the best for this format. Most good Commanders have three colors—which gives you way more options when building your deck. It’s not unusable by any means, but it is less than ideal.

Aragorn and Arwen, Wed

Aragorn and Arwen, Wed is a Legendary Creature—Human Elf Noble with 3 power and 6 toughness that has a mana value of one green, one white, and four of any color. It has one effect in addition to Vigilance:

Whenever Aragorn and Arwen, Wed enters the battlefield or attacks, put a +1/+1 counter on each other creature you control. You gain 1 life for each other creature you control.

Pros and Cons

Pro: Vigilance is always nice to have on something with high toughness. With 6 toughness, Aragorn and Arwen can attack more often than not at low-risk levels. For similar reasons, it can act as a decent defender as well.

Pro: Its only effect stacks nicely with its stats, as you’ll likely be attacking frequently with Aragorn and Arwen. Additionally, putting a +1/+1 counter on and gaining 1 life for each Creature you control can be powerful. This is especially true in a green and white deck, as such tactics are common among these colors.

Con: Paying six mana total is fairly expensive. You likely won’t be able to play this card until sometime between your third and sixth turns even if you have ways to get mana besides tapping Lands.

Con: 3 power isn’t impressive and can be blocked easily by opponent Creatures. However, this can be remedied by putting +1/+1 counters on Aragorn and Arwen.

Potential as Commander: Low

At a mana value of six total, you won’t cast Aragorn and Arwen, Wed until well after your opponent can prepare for it in an MTG game. Commanders that have a greater mana value than five need to be game-enders in some way. If not by themselves, then by buffing your tactics in a meaningful manner. Plus, a dual-color identity is less than ideal for a Commander in most cases.

By design, Aragorn and Arwen need time to ramp up its power. This takes a few turns on the battlefield, which follows the time it takes to cast it. In most games, this is too slow for you to gain an advantage through using this card. Then there’s the recasting costs for each time Aragorn and Arwen are destroyed—eight, then ten, and so on. Replaying it will get expensive quickly.

Aragorn, Hornburg Hero

Aragorn, Hornburg Hero is a Legendary Creature—Human Soldier with 4 power and 4 toughness that has a mana value of one red, one green, one white, and one of any color. It has two effects:

Attacking creatures you control have first strike and renown 1. (When a creature with renown 1 deals combat damage to a player, if it isn’t renowned, put a +1/+1 counter on it and it becomes renowned.)

Whenever a renowned creature you control deals combat damage to a player, double the number of +1/+1 counters on it.

Pros and Cons

Pro: Out of all the Human subtypes, Soldier is one of the most viable. There’s tons of Human Soldier support among white spells, so great synergy will be easy to find.

Pro: Aragorn, Hornburg Hero can fit nicely in a mostly green and red deck centered around applying +1/+1 counters to Creatures. This is even more true since your attacking Creatures gain First Strike—a great offensive ability. Doubling +1/+1 counters on a Creature is awesome for snowballing your damage output as well.

Con: Renown is an awkward ability. Its reminder text is a long way of saying ‘Give a Creature a +1/+1 counter.’ It’s not the biggest flaw, but excessive text on an MTG card is a pet peeve of ours.

Potential as Commander: Moderate

With a triple color identity, Aragorn, Hornburg Hero is in the Goldilocks zone for Commanders—not too many but not too few colors. On a related note, four mana total for casting is not bad at all! Thanks to being a 4/4 Creature that innately gets First Strike during combat, Aragorn can hold its own in an MTG game without help in many cases.

The Renown effects are a boon to attack-oriented decks (albeit a bit flippant to implement). Since this card will be accompanied by those of the red and green variety, who usually synergize well with offensive tactics, you can put together an impressive front line. You can cast Aragorn relatively early and start capitalizing on its effects shortly afterward. This is pretty good for faster decks.

Aragorn, King of Gondor

Aragorn, King of Gondor is a Legendary Creature—Human Noble with 4 power and 4 toughness that has a mana value of one blue, one red, one white, and one of any color. It has two effects in addition to Vigilance and Lifelink:

When Aragorn, King of Gondor enters the battlefield, you become the monarch.

Whenever Aragorn attacks, up to one target creature can’t block this turn. If you’re the monarch, creatures can’t block this turn.

Pros and Cons

Pro: Vigilance and Lifelink are a nice combination of abilities to have on a 4/4 Creature—which only costs four mana total.

Pro: Automatically preventing opponent Creatures from blocking upon attacking is very strong. Furthermore, it’s difficult to defend against.

Con: The Monarch ability is used cumbersomely here. Since you become the Monarch whenever Aragorn, King of Gondor enters the battlefield (first effect) the first part of the second effect will seldom come up. Most of the time, only the second part of the second effect applies. This isn’t the worst trait, but it can cause a bit of confusion when reading the card.

Potential as Commander: High

Like with Aragorn, Hornburg Hero, Aragorn, King of Gondor has nice stats for a Commander: four mana total to cast, 4s for power and toughness, and a triple color identity. It won’t be tough to cast Aragorn, keep it on the battlefield, or build your deck around it.

While there’s a bit of effect redundancy through the Monarch mechanic, in the end, this card is still great. A Commander that lets your forces attack with near impunity is always a top-tier pick. Stick Aragorn, King of Gondor in an MTG deck that features a lot of offensive red cards and you’re set for a dominant victory.

Aragorn, the Uniter

Aragorn, the Uniter is a Legendary Creature—Human Noble with 5 power and 5 toughness that has a mana value of one red, one green, one white, and one blue. It has a whopping four effects:

Whenever you cast a white spell, create a 1/1 white Human Soldier creature token.

Whenever you cast a blue spell, scry 2.

Whenever you cast a red spell, Aragorn, the Uniter deals 3 damage to target opponent.

Whenever you cast a green spell, target creature gets +4/+4 until end of turn.

Pros and Cons

Pro: All of its effects are good. They also all synergize with other tactics intuitively.

Pro: A 5/5 Creature at a mana value of four total is notably economical—despite the requirement of four different mana colors.

Con: Aragorn, the Uniter falls into the Jack of All Trades conundrum: it’s good at many things but isn’t great at any of them.

Potential as Commander: High

Four total mana for a Commander is quite reasonable. Four colors for the same is close to reasonable as well, though you can get unlucky with Land draws and become unable to cast Aragorn, the Uniter until later than you want. With that said, it’s worth the risk—especially if you insert cards like Evolving Wilds into your deck to offset poor Land draws.

While 5 power and 5 toughness are not stats to underestimate, you don’t need to attack with Aragorn, the Uniter in an MTG game to make use of its strengths. Once it’s on the battlefield, it’ll automatically become a force to be reckoned with. Anything you cast (besides black spells) will trigger one of Aragorn’s four solid effects. Depending on your preferences, you’ll want to stack your deck with cards of certain colors more than others. With that said, the versatility and potential here are very high.

Since Aragorn gets lots of MTG card variations, it can be fun to play against another Tolkien-themed deck. For example, doing battle against someone using Sauron, the Dark Lord as their Commander can be fantastically flavorful. Humans versus Orcs—a struggle famous in Middle-earth, and an entertaining one to see play out.