The Best Banish Effects in Commander
Putting your opponents' permanents into the graveyard often just isn't enough. Animate Dead goes for as low as $4, you know, and many decks will account for having their key cards removed with other simple recursion spells. However, the one thing many opponents don't expect is having to use their own removal to combat your removal. Enter: the banish effects.
What Are Banish Effects?
"Banish" is a colloquialism used by Magic players to describe the effect of cards like Oblivion Ring and Banisher Priest. These spells exile a permanent until they leave the battlefield, usually as part of the same ability these days, but they used to be worded as two different triggers, like on O-Ring. These effects are typically found in white, with a few scant others appearing in black, like Brain Maggot and Faceless Butcher, or in blue, like Colossal Whale.
Oblivion Ring
Oblivion Ring is the classic example of a banishment effect, and also one of the best: because its effect is split into two separate triggers, we can use it as the catalyst to any number of infinite enters-and-leaves-the-battlefield combos. With any other banishment effect on the field, the two can enter and re-enter while targeting each other, triggering any enchantress-style effects if you use a Journey to Nowhere.
Besides its ubiquitous combo quality, Oblivion Ring is also just generally good nonland removal. The chance your opponent wants to waste their Naturalize on your banishment effect is typically low in EDH; there are just better targets on the field in the form of Sanguine Bonds and Bow of Nylea.
In the Trenches
In the Trenches combines two of my favorite cards into one mythic rare enchantment. A Glorious Anthem stapled to an overcosted Oblivion Ring sounds a little mismatched, but I love it. While we're limited to one single activation of In the Trenches's banishment ability, the loudly broadcast threat of removal can be a powerful political tool in a multiplayer pod. Great in the early game to give your creatures some more damage to threaten the board, and great in the late game to suddenly double the power of your army of 1/1s. Even greater in the late-late game when you have nine mana to both cast and activate it all at once.
Admonition Angel
Admonition Angel can probably banish more cards at once than any other card on this list. It should, too, if it's going to cost us . This 6/6 flying Angel should be in any Landfall deck with access to white, that's a given. It's even useful in decks without an explicit Landfall theme: any well-built deck should still drop a land every turn, or every other turn, as the game goes long. It doesn't need to targetspecifically permanents your opponents control, either, letting you use it in tandem to combo with your Oblivion Ring.
Battle at the Helvault
Unsurprisingly, the Commander Masters rare Saga Battle at the Helvault is one of the better banishment effects for Commander. For six mana, we're getting at least two Oblivion Rings, and most likely more if we're in a multiplayer pod. Add the powerful Avacyn creature token it creates after its third chapter, and we've got one of the most playable six-mana removal spells ever (sorry, Hex, I still love you). While Grasp of Fate works similarly, getting us a banishment for each opponent, it tops out at three permanents, whereas Battle at the Helvault will hit at most six and create the 8/8 flier.
Banish to Another Universe/Conclave Tribunal/Journey to Oblivion
Of course, one of the easiest ways to make Oblivion Ring better is to make it easier to cast. These three banishment enchantments each function the same, except with different ways to reduce their casting cost. Each has the potential to be cast for a single mana or completely free if we tap enough creatures to convoke Conclave Tribunal. Freeing up your mana for another actual spell to follow up your removal is a guaranteed way to pull ahead of your opponents.
Chains of Custody
A recent development in the world of banishment effects has seen the effect appearing as an Aura and enchanting a permanent you control, exiling the target until it leaves the battlefield, just the same as Oblivion Ring. I suspect cards like Chains of Custody exist to keep this effect relevant in best-of-one games on Arena, where you're not likely to be running enchantment removal specifically. While it is technically a downgrade, Chains of Custody granting your creature ward in addition to removing an opponent's permanent is undeniably useful. The ward ability makes your creature a really unfavorable target, especially if they'll have to invest a whole four mana just to Cast Down it. I wouldn't use this as your go-to protection spell, though, since it really paints a target on the enchanted creature, no matter how well Warded that creature is.
Angel of Serenity
Return to Ravnica's Angel of Serenity is a powerhouse of a card, and it frequently upsets the board state in radical ways. While Angel of Serenity can only remove creatures, it can remove them from the graveyard as well as the battlefield. This stops those pesky reanimator decks from pulling their Grave Titans back out of the graveyard after we've already burned a Generous Gift on it. It's not perfect, though: it costs a ton, at , and it returns the exiled cards to your opponents' hands. This is a better place to return the creatures that were removed from the field, but a worse place typically for the cards that were in the graveyard.
On Thin Ice/Chained to the Rocks
Chained to the Rocks and On Thin Ice are two one-mana banishments that require enchanting a specific land type. Both require a deck that's already committed to one theme or another, but both are unparalleled in their mana-to-removal efficiency, rivaled only by Path to Exile and Swords to Plowshares.
Out of Time
Out of Time might be white's only board-wipe-sized banishment effect in Magic. It doesn't permanently remove the exiled creatures, instead counting down its time counters until it sacrifices itself. But, with a little smart deckbuilding, this spell can slot easily into any deck running proliferation effects to keep the time counters on it, or combine with other blink effects to reset it when it would normally run... out of time...
To the Shadow Realm
Banish effects are unique ways to remove permanents, forcing your opponents to waste their removal on your removal. They've gone through several incarnations over the years, from Aura-based removal to rewordings of their triggers to the activated effect on In the Trenches. Overall, their some of my favorite removal spells in the game, and I urge you to run a handful of them in your enchantress decks out there.
What are your favorite banishment effects? Which is better, Banisher Priest or Fiend Hunter? Let me know in the comments! Thanks for reading!
