Temple of Malady
Temple of Malady lands in 4% of tracked Commander decks, but when it reaches a player's hand it's played 77% of the time. Every cast instance stayed on the battlefield for the rest of the game.
Temple of Malady is a niche inclusion in the current Playgroup Live dataset, appearing in 80 of the 2,019 distinct tracked decks for a 3.96% inclusion rate. That low ceiling is structural: the card is only playable in black-green or five-color decks, which limits its addressable pool.
Within that pool, the behavior is consistent. 77% of drawn copies are played before the game ends, and the card's battlefield stickiness sits at 100% across 22 cast instances. Lands rarely die to removal, which explains the stickiness. The scry 1 trigger on entry is a soft upside that smooths draws in the early turns. Median first-cast turn is 4, reflecting the mix of opening-hand keeps and mid-game topdecks.
The win-rate delta between cast and uncast participations is +2.7 percentage points (31.8% cast vs. 29.1% library). Both sample sizes are small enough that this is an early directional signal rather than a proven edge. What the data does confirm clearly is that players who draw it tend to play it immediately, and it never leaves the battlefield once it resolves.
- 3.96% inclusion rate across all tracked Commander decks
- 77% of drawn copies are cast before the game ends
- 100% battlefield stickiness across 22 cast instances
- T4 median first-cast turn
- 55% of drawn-and-cast instances played the same turn they were drawn
- 80 distinct tracked decks include Temple of Malady
First-cast turn
n=22The "good card" funnel
108 brought108 copies were brought to tracked games, 26 were drawn, 22 of those were cast, and all 22 were still on the battlefield when the game ended.
Players who cast this card win 32% of the time (n=22) , vs 29% when it never left the library (n=79).
Final zone distribution
108 instances79 of 108 Temple of Malady instances never left the library, a normal outcome for any singleton in a 100-card deck. The 22 that reached the battlefield all stayed there.
Top commanders running this card
by deck count-
1
Dina, Essence Brewer
30 decks
-
2
Ulalek, Fused Atrocity
7 decks
-
3
Teval, the Balanced Scale
5 decks
-
4
Felothar the Steadfast
4 decks
-
5
The Wise Mothman
4 decks
-
6
Winter, Cynical Opportunist
4 decks
-
7
Ygra, Eater of All
4 decks
-
8
Aveline de Grandpré
3 decks
-
9
Hazel of the Rootbloom
3 decks
-
10
Meren of Clan Nel Toth
3 decks
Dina, Essence Brewer accounts for 30 of the 80 decks that include Temple of Malady, making the distribution top-heavy. The remaining nine commanders in the top 10 each contribute 3 to 7 decks.
How often is Temple of Malady drawn in a Commander game? ▾
Across 108 deck participations tracked on Playgroup Live, Temple of Malady was drawn in roughly 24% of instances. That's on par with the baseline expectation for a singleton in a 100-card deck. Of the 26 times it reached a player's hand, 22 were cast before the game ended, a 77% draw-to-play rate.
Does playing Temple of Malady actually improve your win rate? ▾
The early signal is positive but modest. Participations where Temple of Malady was cast showed a 31.8% win rate versus 29.1% when it sat in the library the whole game, a delta of +2.7 percentage points. Both buckets are below the threshold where we'd call this conclusive. The baseline win rate in a 4-player pod is 25%, so both groups are already beating baseline. Treat the delta as directional for now.
Why does Temple of Malady have 100% battlefield stickiness? ▾
Lands are almost never targeted by removal in Commander. Once a land resolves, opponents generally have no efficient way to destroy it outside of mass land destruction, which is rare. All 22 cast instances of Temple of Malady in this dataset ended the game on the battlefield. That's expected behavior for any dual land, not a unique property of this card.
What commanders run Temple of Malady most often? ▾
Dina, Essence Brewer leads by a wide margin with 30 decks in the dataset, more than four times the next entry. The rest of the top 10 range from 3 to 7 decks. The concentration at the top reflects Dina's status as the dominant black-green commander in Playgroup Live's current game sample.
Is Temple of Malady legal in Commander? ▾
Yes. Temple of Malady is legal in Commander, as well as Legacy, Modern, Pioneer, Vintage, Standard, Historic, and several other formats. It is not legal in Pauper or Pauper Commander due to its rare rarity, and it is not legal in Old School or Premodern.
How does Temple of Malady compare to other black-green dual lands? ▾
Temple of Malady enters tapped, which is a real cost in a format where the first few turns of mana development matter. The upside is a guaranteed scry 1 on entry. In slower or more casual pods the scry mitigates the tempo loss. More competitive black-green builds often prefer untapped duals like Overgrown Tomb or Llanowar Wastes, which is consistent with the card's 4% inclusion rate even within its legal color combinations.