Live Play Data

Murderous Rider // Swift End

· Creature — Zombie Knight // Instant — Adventure · March of the Machine Commander (MOC)

Live Inclusion

Buy on TCGplayer

Times Brought

572

Decks Running

253

Median Cast Turn

Drawn → Played

71%

Format

Multiplayer 1v1

71% of drawn Murderous Rider copies are cast before the game ends, and the card spreads across 235 distinct players in Playgroup Live's dataset, a sign of genuine breadth rather than a single pilot skewing the numbers.

Murderous Rider sits in 2% of tracked Commander decks on Playgroup Live, appearing in 253 of the 11367 distinct decklists that have seen a logged game. Its double life as a removal spell (Swift End) and a 2/3 lifelink Zombie Knight gives black decks two uses for one card slot, which explains its foothold across a diverse range of commanders.

When a copy reaches a player's hand, 71% of those instances are cast before the game concludes. Median first-cast turn lands on turn 7, which is later than the 3-mana cost might suggest. Only 11% of casts land exactly on curve, with most copies arriving well after turn 3. That reflects the card being drawn mid-to-late game rather than players choosing to hold it. The same-turn cast rate of 39% confirms that when players do draw it, they cast it quickly rather than sitting on it.

The commander distribution leans toward Esper (black-white-blue) zombie and knight tribal builds, led by Y'shtola, Night's Blessed. The data is well-spread: 235 unique players have brought this card to a tracked game, and the single heaviest contributor accounts for just 25% of observations, making the dataset a reasonable cross-section rather than one player's pet card.

At a glance

2% of tracked Commander decks include Murderous Rider
71% of drawn copies are cast before the game ends
T7 median first-cast turn, well past the 3-mana window
235 unique players have brought this card to a tracked game
29% draw rate per game, typical for a singleton in a 100-card deck
11% of casts land on-curve at turn 3

First-cast turn

n=117

50%

T6-9

21%

T10+

Median 7 P25 5 · P75 8 · max 24

On curve 11% (10 / 117 cast on T3) Cast same turn as drawn 39%

The "good card" funnel

572 brought · 235 players

Brought to game

572

Ever drawn

165

Reached battlefield

117

Still on board at game end

71%

Of 572 Murderous Riders brought to games, 165 were drawn, and 117 of those were cast, with the adventure mode sending many copies to the graveyard rather than staying on the battlefield.

≥ -7.1pp

Players who cast this card win 22% of the time (n=106) , vs 21% when it never left the library (n=340).

When players drew this card but left it in hand, they won 29% (n=42) — 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 +1.1pp; 95% confidence interval -7.1pp to +9.3pp. Correlational, not causal: powerful payoffs also get cast more often in games you are already winning.

Final zone distribution

174 instances

12.6%

Library

16.7%

Battlefield

28.2%

Graveyard

23.6%

Exile

Most Murderous Rider instances end up in the graveyard or exile rather than the battlefield, which fits a card that is often cast as Swift End before the creature side ever suits up. Library finishes are low relative to other singletons because observed copies are, by definition, ones that moved.

Commanders that played this card

in tracked games

Y'shtola, Night's Blessed dominates the top-commander chart, but the long tail of Esper and mono-black commanders shows the Rider has found a home well beyond one archetype.

Card text

Murderous Rider

Creature — Zombie Knight

Lifelink When this creature dies, put it on the bottom of its owner's library.

2 / 3

Swift End

Instant — Adventure

Destroy target creature or planeswalker. You lose 2 life. (Then exile this card. You may cast the creature later from exile.)

March of the Machine Commander (MOC) · Rare · Illustrated by Josh Hass

Frequently Asked

How often is Murderous Rider drawn in a Commander game?

Across 565 tracked games where Murderous Rider was in the deck, it was drawn 29% of the time. That figure is consistent with what you'd expect from a singleton in a 100-card deck. Of the 165 instances that reached a hand, 71% were cast before the game ended. The gap between drawn and cast is largely a game-length effect: copies drawn in the final turns often never reach the stack.

What turn does Murderous Rider typically get cast?

Median first cast lands on turn 7, well after the card's 3-mana cost would suggest. Only 11% of casts happen exactly on curve, with the vast majority arriving later because the card is drawn mid-game rather than kept in the opening hand. The same-turn cast rate is 39%, meaning players who do draw it tend to deploy it quickly rather than holding it for a more optimal window.

Does casting Murderous Rider actually correlate with winning?

Win rate when cast is 22% across 106 observed instances, compared to 21% when the card remained in the library across 340 participations. The gap is small and the confidence interval overlaps zero, so treat this as a directional early signal rather than a proven edge. The dataset is growing but not yet large enough to call the delta conclusive.

Is Murderous Rider legal in Commander?

Yes. Murderous Rider // Swift End is legal in Commander, as well as in Legacy, Modern, Pioneer, Vintage, Historic, Timeless, and several other formats. It is not legal in Standard, Pauper, or Pauper Commander. There are no bans or restrictions in the Commander format.

Which commanders most commonly run Murderous Rider?

Y'shtola, Night's Blessed leads the commander distribution by a wide margin in tracked games, followed by Sidar Jabari of Zhalfir and Temmet, Naktamun's Will. All three are Esper (black-white-blue) commanders, reflecting the card's natural home in zombie and knight tribal strategies that want both a removal spell and a recurring creature body. The Rider's synergy with graveyard-matters commanders is a recurring theme across the top of the list.

How concentrated is the Murderous Rider data among players?

The dataset is well-spread. 235 distinct players have brought Murderous Rider to a tracked game on Playgroup Live, and the single most active contributor accounts for a small share of total instances. That breadth means the stats here reflect a genuine cross-section of Commander players rather than one pilot's repeated games inflating the numbers.