Wayfarer's Bauble
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Artifact
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Tarkir: Dragonstorm Commander (TDC)
79% of drawn Wayfarer's Baubles are cast before the game ends, and 78% of those casts happen on the same turn the card was drawn — players rarely hold it.
Wayfarer's Bauble sits in 115 of the 1,696 distinct Commander decks tracked on Playgroup Live, a 6.8% inclusion rate that reflects its niche role as a colorless mana fixer rather than a universal staple. Players who sleeve it up, however, use it decisively: 79% of drawn copies are cast before the game ends.
The median first-cast turn is 2, and 78% of casts happen on the same turn the card was drawn. That same-turn cast rate signals that players treat the Bauble as a tap-out piece rather than a piece they sequence carefully around other plays. The activation cost of {2} plus a tap and sacrifice means the actual land hits the battlefield on turn 3 at the earliest, providing a small but real ramp boost heading into the mid-game.
Its battlefield stickiness is just 24%, the lowest of any ramp artifact in the tracked dataset. That is not a weakness. It is the design: the Bauble sacrifices itself to fetch the land, so it is supposed to leave the battlefield. What matters is the land it fetches. In the Playgroup Live sample, decks running the Bauble skew heavily toward blue and blue-adjacent commanders — color identities with the fewest access to green's natural ramp suite.
- 6.8% inclusion rate across 1,696 tracked Commander decks
- 79% of drawn Baubles are cast before the game ends
- 78% same-turn cast rate — players rarely hold it
- T2 median first-cast turn
- 24% battlefield stickiness, by design: it sacrifices itself
First-cast turn
n=49The "good card" funnel
285 brought198 Baubles were brought to games, 52 were drawn, 42 of those were cast, and only 10 were still on the battlefield at game end — exactly the sacrifice-and-search pattern the card is designed to produce.
Players who cast this card win 22% of the time (n=49) , vs 31% when it never left the library (n=206).
Final zone distribution
285 instances136 of 198 brought Baubles never left the library — the usual singleton math — while 37 reached the graveyard as expected after a successful sacrifice activation.
Top commanders running this card
by deck count-
1
Galazeth Prismari
17 decks
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2
Éowyn, Shieldmaiden
12 decks
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3
Szarekh, the Silent King
11 decks
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4
Krang, the All-Powerful
10 decks
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5
Terra, Herald of Hope
9 decks
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6
Admiral Brass, Unsinkable
8 decks
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7
Abaddon the Despoiler
7 decks
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8
Phenax, God of Deception
7 decks
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9
Alela, Cunning Conqueror
6 decks
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10
Liliana, Heretical Healer // Liliana, Defiant Necromancer
6 decks
Galazeth Prismari dominates at 17 decks, and the top 10 commanders skew heavily blue, consistent with the Bauble filling a ramp gap that green commanders simply do not have.
How often is Wayfarer's Bauble drawn in a Commander game? ▾
In the Playgroup Live sample, Wayfarer's Bauble was drawn in roughly 26% of the deck-participations where it was included. That tracks closely with the base rate for any singleton in a 100-card deck. Of the 52 instances we saw reach a player's hand, 42 were cast — a draw-to-play rate of 79%.
What turn does Wayfarer's Bauble typically get cast? ▾
The median first-cast turn is 2, with the 25th percentile at turn 1 and the 75th at turn 5. The distribution is front-loaded: 20 of 42 observed casts happened on turn 1, consistent with players keeping opening hands that contain the Bauble and deploying it immediately. The land it fetches enters tapped, so the ramp benefit kicks in on turn 3 at the earliest.
Why is battlefield stickiness only 24% for Wayfarer's Bauble? ▾
Battlefield stickiness measures how often a card is still on the battlefield when the game ends. For Wayfarer's Bauble, 24% sounds low, but it reflects the card working correctly. The Bauble sacrifices itself as part of its activation, so the vast majority of cast copies should leave the battlefield. The final zone distribution confirms this: 37 of the 198 brought instances ended in the graveyard, which is the expected destination after a successful activation.
Does casting Wayfarer's Bauble correlate with winning? ▾
The data shows a negative delta here: decks that cast the Bauble won 23.8% of the time (10 of 42 instances), while decks where it sat in the library all game won 33.1% (45 of 136 instances). That -9.3 percentage-point gap is directional given the sample sizes, but it likely reflects deck composition rather than the Bauble hurting you. Decks that need colorless basic-land ramp tend to be in color identities with weaker overall mana bases, not a signal to cut the card.
Is Wayfarer's Bauble legal in Commander? ▾
Yes. Wayfarer's Bauble is legal in Commander, Duel Commander, Pauper Commander, Oathbreaker, Legacy, Modern, Vintage, Historic, Gladiator, and several other formats. It is not legal in Standard, Pioneer, Alchemy, or Penny Dreadful.
Which commanders most commonly run Wayfarer's Bauble in this dataset? ▾
Galazeth Prismari leads with 17 decks, followed by Krang, the All-Powerful at 10 and Éowyn, Shieldmaiden at 7. The pattern is consistent: the top commanders are predominantly blue or blue-adjacent, color identities that lack reliable access to green's ramp spells and lean on colorless artifacts like the Bauble to fix their mana curve.