Live Play Data

Bastion Protector

· Creature — Human Soldier · Marvel Super Heroes Commander (MSC)

Live Inclusion

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Times Brought

744

Decks Running

360

Median Cast Turn

Drawn → Played

74%

Format

Multiplayer 1v1

74% of drawn Bastion Protectors are cast before the game ends, and the card shows up in 6% of tracked Commander decks across 707 live games on Playgroup Live.

Bastion Protector sits in 6% of tracked Commander decks on Playgroup Live, appearing in 360 of the 6444 distinct decks that have played a tracked multiplayer game. Its function is narrow and deliberate: grant your commander +2/+2 and indestructible for three mana, turning removal-heavy pods into far less threatening environments.

When a copy reaches a player's hand, 74% of the time it gets cast before the game concludes. Median first cast lands on turn 5, which runs a full two turns later than the card's mana value of 3. That gap is largely a timing story: players tend to hold it until their commander is already on the battlefield, making the protection immediately relevant rather than preemptive. The 26% same-turn cast rate reflects a card players deliberate over rather than slam.

Bastion Protector is legal in Commander, Duel Commander, Legacy, Vintage, and Oathbreaker. It is not legal in Modern, Pioneer, Standard, or Pauper. The top commanders pairing with it skew heavily toward Naya and Jeskai color identities, with Cloud, Ex-SOLDIER and Captain America, Team Leader leading the list by raw deck count, signaling that combat-oriented commanders especially value the indestructible upgrade.

At a glance

6% of tracked Commander decks include Bastion Protector
74% of drawn copies are cast before the game ends
T5 median first-cast turn, two turns after its mana value of 3
42% battlefield stickiness once cast
336 distinct players have brought it to a tracked game, showing broad spread
23% draw rate, consistent with a singleton in a 100-card deck

First-cast turn

n=129

16%

15%

19%

36%

T6-9

12%

T10+

Median 5 P25 4 · P75 8 · max 20

On curve 18% (20 / 129 cast on T3) Cast same turn as drawn 26%

The "good card" funnel

744 brought · 336 players

Brought to game

744

Ever drawn

174

Reached battlefield

129

Still on board at game end

74%

Of 744 Bastion Protectors brought to tracked games, 174 were drawn, 129 of those were cast, and 42% of resolved copies survived to end of game.

≥ -4.5pp

Players who cast this card win 25% of the time (n=122) , vs 21% when it never left the library (n=483).

When players drew this card but left it in hand, they won 22% (n=37) — about the same as leaving it in the library. Those players survived long enough to draw it, so the gap above is about the card resolving, not just about surviving.

Observed gap +3.4pp; 95% confidence interval -4.5pp to +11.3pp. Correlational, not causal: powerful payoffs also get cast more often in games you are already winning.

Final zone distribution

183 instances

3.3%

Library

29.5%

Battlefield

33.3%

Graveyard

10.4%

Exile

Most Bastion Protectors never leave the library, a structural feature of 100-card singleton rather than a reflection on the card's power. Of those that do enter play, a notable share end in the graveyard or exile, consistent with opponents targeting it.

Commanders that played this card

in tracked games

1 Captain America, Team Leader 65 decks
2 Cloud, Ex-SOLDIER 63 decks
3 Éowyn, Shieldmaiden 34 decks
4 Anti-Venom, Horrifying Healer 17 decks
5 Inquisitor Greyfax 16 decks
6 Marneus Calgar 16 decks
7 Lightning, Army of One 13 decks
8 Yoshimaru, Ever Faithful 6 decks
9 Aragorn, King of Gondor 5 decks
10 Cloud, Midgar Mercenary 5 decks

Cloud, Ex-SOLDIER and Captain America, Team Leader dominate by raw count, but the list spans ten different commanders across multiple color identities, showing Bastion Protector's broad applicability rather than a single-archetype lock-in.

Frequently Asked

How often is Bastion Protector drawn in a Commander game?

Across 707 tracked multiplayer games where Bastion Protector was in the deck, it was drawn 23% of the time. That figure is normal for a singleton in a 100-card Commander deck. Of 174 instances that reached a player's hand, 74% were cast before the game ended.

What turn does Bastion Protector typically get cast?

Median first cast lands on turn 5, with the interquartile range running from turn 4 to turn 8. The card costs 3 mana, but only 18% of casts land exactly on curve. The 26% same-turn cast rate confirms players frequently hold it in hand for a turn or two, waiting for their commander to be on the battlefield before deploying the protection.

Does casting Bastion Protector correlate with winning?

In 122 participations where Bastion Protector was cast, the win rate is 25%. In 483 participations where it stayed in the library, the win rate is 21%. The delta is +3.4 percentage points. The confidence interval for this figure crosses zero on the current sample, so treat it as an early directional signal rather than a settled result.

Is Bastion Protector banned anywhere?

Bastion Protector is legal in Commander, Duel Commander, Legacy, Vintage, and Oathbreaker. It is not legal in Modern, Pioneer, Standard, Brawl, Pauper, or most other constructed formats. Its rules text specifically references 'commander creatures,' making it a format-specific card with little application outside Commander-variant play.

Which commanders most commonly run Bastion Protector?

By raw deck count in the Playgroup Live dataset, Cloud, Ex-SOLDIER and Captain America, Team Leader lead the list, followed by Éowyn, Shieldmaiden and Marneus Calgar. The spread across 336 unique players and a range of commander identities suggests the card is not dominated by any single archetype. Commanders that attack frequently or sit vulnerable to targeted removal gain the most from the indestructible clause.

How sticky is Bastion Protector once it resolves?

42% of cast copies remain on the battlefield at game end. That is below average for a protective creature, which directionally suggests opponents do prioritize removing it, consistent with how threatening a +2/+2 indestructible commander can be. The final zone distribution also shows a meaningful share ending in the graveyard and exile.