Live Play Data

Choked Estuary

Land · Marvel Super Heroes Commander (MSC)

21%

Live Inclusion

Buy on TCGplayer

Times Brought

746

Decks Running

437

Median Cast Turn

Drawn → Played

73%

Format

Multiplayer 1v1

Choked Estuary appears in 21% of tracked Commander decks on Playgroup Live, with 73% of drawn copies played before the game ends and a median first-play turn of 3.

Choked Estuary slots into roughly one in five tracked Commander decks, a consistent showing for a dual land that asks its controller to hold an Island or Swamp to enter untapped. Across 698 tracked multiplayer games, 437 of 2066 distinct decks brought it to the table.

The play pattern is straightforward: 73% of drawn copies reach the battlefield before the game ends, and the median first play lands on turn 3. A strong cluster of casts lands on turn 1, reflecting players who kept it in the opening hand and revealed a basic Island or Swamp immediately. Once in play, it sticks: 93% of resolved copies are still on the battlefield at game end, which is expected for a land with no built-in sacrifice clause.

The card fits naturally in any blue-black or three-color shell that touches those colors. The commander distribution on Playgroup Live is wide, spanning Dimir, Grixis, and Esper commanders, which signals utility across archetypes rather than a single dominant home.

At a glance

21% of tracked Commander decks include Choked Estuary
73% of drawn copies played before the game ends
T3 median first-play turn
93% battlefield stickiness once played
364 distinct players have brought it to a tracked game, a well-spread sample
26% draw rate per game, typical for a singleton in a 100-card deck

First-cast turn

n=143

31%

11%

12%

10%

20%

T6-9

T10+

Median 3 P25 1 · P75 6 · max 18

Cast same turn as drawn 65%

The "good card" funnel

748 brought · 364 players

Brought to game

748

Ever drawn

197

Reached battlefield

143

Still on board at game end

133

73%

Of 748 copies brought to multiplayer games, 197 were drawn, 143 of those reached the battlefield, and the large majority remained in play through end of game.

≥ -10.0pp

Players who cast this card win 17% of the time (n=135) , vs 20% when it never left the library (n=473).

When players drew this card but left it in hand, they won 32% (n=49) — 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 -3.3pp; 95% confidence interval -10.0pp to +3.4pp. Correlational, not causal: powerful payoffs also get cast more often in games you are already winning.

Final zone distribution

227 instances

3.1%

Library

58.6%

Battlefield

16.3%

Graveyard

8.4%

Exile

The vast majority of Choked Estuary instances never leave the library, a structural feature of 100-card singleton rather than a sign the land underperforms when drawn.

Commanders that played this card

in tracked games

1 Y'shtola, Night's Blessed 68 decks
2 Doctor Doom, King of Latveria 44 decks
3 Sauron, Lord of the Rings 23 decks
4 Captain N'ghathrod 17 decks
5 Sauron, the Dark Lord 15 decks
6 Alela, Cunning Conqueror 12 decks
7 Satoru Umezawa 12 decks
8 Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver 12 decks
9 Admiral Brass, Unsinkable 11 decks
10 Marneus Calgar 10 decks

The commander list spans Dimir, Grixis, and Esper, with no single commander dominating, which reflects Choked Estuary's broad utility across any shell that runs blue and black.

Frequently Asked

How often is Choked Estuary drawn in a Commander game?

In 698 tracked multiplayer games where Choked Estuary was in the deck, it was drawn 26% of the time. That aligns with what you'd expect from a singleton in a 100-card deck. Of 197 instances that reached a player's hand, 73% were played before the game ended.

What turn does Choked Estuary usually hit the battlefield?

The median first-play turn is 3. The distribution skews early: the most common single turn is turn 1, capturing players who kept it in their opening hand alongside an Island or Swamp. The interquartile range runs from turn 1 to turn 6, so a meaningful share of copies still land well into the midgame.

Does playing Choked Estuary correlate with winning?

In the multiplayer dataset, the cast-vs-library win-rate delta is slightly negative, and both the standard error and confidence interval span zero. That means we have no directional signal either way from this sample. The win-rate difference could easily reflect deck composition, pod strength, or sample variance rather than the land's contribution. Do not read it as evidence against playing the card.

Is Choked Estuary legal in Commander?

Yes. Choked Estuary is legal in Commander, as well as Legacy, Modern, Pioneer, Vintage, Historic, and several other formats. It is not legal in Standard, Pauper, or Pauper Commander. There are no bans or restrictions to be aware of for Commander specifically.

Why does Choked Estuary see play in Commander over a basic land?

Choked Estuary taps for either blue or black mana, giving Dimir and three-color decks touching those colors a flexible dual land. It enters untapped whenever you reveal an Island or Swamp from your hand, a condition that is easy to meet in the early turns of any deck running a reasonable basic land count. The trade-off compared to a fetch land or shock land is that it requires a specific card type in hand rather than life payment or deck thinning.

How concentrated is the Choked Estuary data across players?

The data is well-spread. 364 distinct players have brought Choked Estuary to a tracked game, and the single heaviest contributor accounts for only 26% of all instances. No single player or playgroup is driving the numbers, which adds some confidence to the directional patterns we see in the dataset.