Live Play Data

Brainstorm

· Instant · Avatar: The Last Airbender Eternal (TLE)

15%

Live Inclusion

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Times Brought

3137

Decks Running

1619

Median Cast Turn

5.0

Drawn → Played

72%

Format

Multiplayer 1v1

72% of drawn Brainstorms are cast before the game ends, and decks that resolve it win at a 34% rate versus 22% when it stays buried, a +12.5 percentage-point lift across 573 observations.

Brainstorm sits in 15% of the tracked Commander decks on Playgroup Live. That figure reflects its restriction to blue color identities, not a lack of enthusiasm: 1619 of 10680 distinct tracked decks run it, and every drawn copy lands in a hand that already wants to cast it.

The cast-vs-library win-rate gap is the most striking signal in the data. Decks that resolve Brainstorm win at 34%, a +12.5 percentage-point premium over the 22% baseline for participations where it never left the library. Both sample sizes are large enough to treat this as more than noise, though the dataset is still growing and the result should be read as a strong directional signal. Median first cast lands on turn 5.0, later than Legacy or Vintage would suggest, because Commander's 100-card singleton means fewer opening-hand hits.

The commander spread is notably wide. 1146 distinct players have brought Brainstorm to a tracked game, and no single player accounts for more than a small sliver of total instances, which means the data reflects genuine cross-meta usage rather than one prolific pilot. Blue-inclusive commanders across tempo, control, and spellslinger archetypes all appear in the top slots.

At a glance

15% of tracked Commander decks include Brainstorm
72% of drawn copies are cast before the game ends
T5.0 median first-cast turn
+12.5pp win-rate lift when Brainstorm is cast vs. never leaving the library
1146 distinct players have brought it to a tracked game, a well-spread dataset
49% of drawn-and-cast copies are cast the same turn they are drawn

First-cast turn

n=624

10%

11%

10%

13%

12%

35%

T6-9

T10+

Median 5.0 P25 3 · P75 7 · max 23

On curve 10% (63 / 624 cast on T1) Cast same turn as drawn 49%

The "good card" funnel

3143 brought · 1146 players

Brought to game

3143

Ever drawn

866

Reached battlefield

624

Still on board at game end

72%

Of 3143 Brainstorms brought to multiplayer games, 866 were drawn, 624 of those were cast, and nearly all resolved copies ended the game in the graveyard as expected for a one-shot instant.

≥ +8.5pp

Players who cast this card win 34% of the time (n=573) , vs 22% when it never left the library (n=1864).

When players drew this card but left it in hand, they won 34% (n=228) — 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 +12.5pp; 95% confidence interval +8.5pp to +16.5pp. Correlational, not causal: powerful payoffs also get cast more often in games you are already winning.

Final zone distribution

958 instances

3.7%

Library

2.8%

Battlefield

64.7%

Graveyard

11.8%

Exile

The overwhelming majority of Brainstorm copies end the game in the graveyard, exactly where an instant resolving to the yard should land. The handful remaining in hand or exile reflect games that ended before they could be cast.

Commanders that played this card

in tracked games

The commander list spans Dimir, Izzet, Simic, Esper, Jeskai, and mono-blue, confirming Brainstorm is spread across the blue Commander meta rather than concentrated in a single archetype.

Card text

Brainstorm

Instant

Draw three cards, then put two cards from your hand on top of your library in any order.

Avatar: The Last Airbender Eternal (TLE) · Common · Illustrated by Arthur Yuan

Frequently Asked

How often is Brainstorm drawn in a Commander game?

Across 2865 tracked multiplayer games where Brainstorm was in the deck, it was drawn 28% of the time. That is above average for a 1-mana singleton in a 100-card deck, partly because many Brainstorm decks run extra draw and fetch effects that thin the library. Of 866 instances that reached a hand, 72% were cast before the game ended.

What turn does Brainstorm typically get cast in Commander?

Median first cast is turn 5.0 in multiplayer games tracked on Playgroup Live. The distribution is spread wide: a cluster of early casts in turns 1-3 from opening-hand copies, and a long tail running through the mid and late game. The p25 is turn 4 and the p75 is turn 7, so most casts fall in a fairly broad window. In duel Commander the median drops, reflecting faster game pacing.

Does casting Brainstorm actually correlate with winning?

In 573 participations where Brainstorm reached the stack, the caster's win rate was 34%. In 1864 participations where it never left the library, the rate was 22%. The +12.5 percentage-point gap is a consistent early signal across this dataset. Win rates are normalized to a 4-player baseline. Sample sizes are solid but the dataset is still growing, so treat this as directional rather than a final verdict.

Is Brainstorm banned or restricted anywhere?

Brainstorm is restricted in Vintage (one copy per deck), banned in Historic and Premodern, and not legal in Modern, Pioneer, Standard, or Alchemy. It is fully legal in Commander, Legacy, Pauper, Timeless, Duel Commander, and several other formats. Its power is highest in formats with fetchlands, which is why Legacy and Vintage treat it differently than Commander does.

Why does Brainstorm have a lower on-curve cast rate in Commander?

Brainstorm costs 1 mana, so casting it on curve means turn 1. Only a fraction of copies are drawn in opening hands in a 100-card singleton deck, which pushes most casts well past turn 1. The low on-curve rate here is almost entirely a drawing-variance issue, not a signal that players are holding the card. The 49% same-turn cast rate confirms players slam it as soon as they draw it.

Which commanders most often pair with Brainstorm?

On Playgroup Live, Yuriko, the Tiger's Shadow leads the multiplayer top-commanders list with 12 decks, followed by Quandrix, the Proof and a cluster of blue-inclusive commanders at 7 decks each. The spread across Dimir, Simic, Izzet, Esper, and Jeskai color identities shows Brainstorm is not locked into a single archetype. Any blue commander that values card selection and hand sculpting is a natural home.