When was Midnight Hunt Commander (MIC) released?

Midnight Hunt Commander was released in September 2021 alongside the main Innistrad: Midnight Hunt set.

How many cards are in Midnight Hunt Commander?

MIC contains 187 cards spread across two preconstructed Commander decks.

What are the two Midnight Hunt Commander decks?

The two decks are Coven Counters, a white-green deck led by Leinore, Autumn Sovereign, and Undead Unleashed, a blue-black zombie tribal deck led by Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver.

What is the coven mechanic in Midnight Hunt Commander?

Coven is a keyword ability that triggers or grants bonuses when you control three or more creatures with different powers. It's central to the Coven Counters deck's strategy.

What does the Decayed keyword do in Undead Unleashed?

Decayed prevents a creature from blocking and forces it to sacrifice itself at the end of combat after it attacks. Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver creates Decayed zombie tokens when your non-token zombies die, turning the drawback into a repeating engine.

Are the Midnight Hunt Commander decks good for new players?

Yes — they're designed as on-ramps to Commander. Both decks are playable straight out of the box, with clear strategies that are easy to understand, and they reward gradual upgrades as you learn the format.

Midnight Hunt Commander (MIC): Set Guide

Two preconstructed Commander decks shipped alongside Innistrad: Midnight Hunt in September 2021, collected under the set code MIC. Together they make up Midnight Hunt Commander - 187 cards split across a white-green coven deck and a blue-black zombie deck, each with a handful of brand-new cards surrounded by carefully chosen reprints.

If you're new to Commander and want a way in that feels rooted in Innistrad's gothic horror atmosphere, these two decks are a fine place to start.

What is Midnight Hunt Commander?

Midnight Hunt Commander (MIC) is the pair of preconstructed Commander decks released as part of the Innistrad: Midnight Hunt (MID) product line in 2021. Like most Commander precon sets from this era, MIC is designed as an on-ramp to the format - decks you can pick up, sit down with, and play immediately, but which also reward upgrades as you get more comfortable.

The set contains 187 cards across both decks combined, mixing new-to-Commander cards with reprints that support each deck's strategy.

The two decks

MIC contains exactly two decks, each with its own distinct identity rooted in MID's themes.

| Deck name | Colors | Commander | |---|---|---| | Coven Counters | White / Green | Leinore, Autumn Sovereign | | Undead Unleashed | Blue / Black | Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver |

Coven Counters

This deck leans into the coven mechanic introduced in Innistrad: Midnight Hunt - a keyword ability that rewards you for controlling three or more creatures with different powers. Leinore, Autumn Sovereign sits at the helm, distributing +1/+1 counters and unlocking coven bonuses as your board diversifies. The gameplan is fundamentally about going wide with creatures of varying sizes, then converting that board presence into accelerating value.

White-green is a natural home for this strategy. Expect token generation, counter doubling, and the kind of steady, resilient build-up that frustrates faster decks.

Undead Unleashed

Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver leads a zombie tribal deck that turns death into a resource. Wilhelt rewards you whenever a non-token zombie you control dies by creating a 2/2 Decayed zombie token - and Decayed zombies can't block and must sacrifice themselves after attacking, which conveniently triggers Wilhelt again. It's a self-sustaining loop of sacrifice and replenishment that feels very much at home on Innistrad.

Blue-black zombie tribal has a long history in Magic, and this deck draws on that deep card pool. In my opinion, Undead Unleashed has the higher ceiling of the two decks out of the box - the Wilhelt engine generates a surprising amount of momentum once it gets going.

Themes and mechanics

Both decks reflect the mechanical identity of Innistrad: Midnight Hunt as a parent set.

Coven - requires three or more creatures with different powers on your side of the battlefield. Leinore enables this and rewards it.
Decayed - a keyword on zombie tokens that prevents blocking and forces a sacrifice after the token attacks. Wilhelt treats this as a feature, not a limitation.
+1/+1 counters - central to the Coven Counters deck's growth and combat math.
Zombie tribal synergies - lords, payoffs, and recursion spells that reward stacking your graveyard and board with the undead.

Lore and setting

Both decks are set on Innistrad, Magic's gothic horror plane of monsters, mad scientists, and a church desperately trying to hold back the dark. Midnight Hunt tells the story of a world in crisis - the days are getting shorter and the nights longer, threatening to tip Innistrad permanently into darkness.

Coven Counters reflects the human communities fighting back, gathering in protective groups under the harvest moon. Undead Unleashed, naturally, represents the other side of that equation.

Lore aside: The coven concept in MID connects to Innistrad's witches and the bonds they form for mutual protection. Leinore herself is one of those figures - an autumn sovereign overseeing the season's turn as the nights grow long.

Set legacy

MIC sits comfortably in the run of Commander precons from this era, when Wizards of the Coast was refining the formula of shipping two or more decks alongside a main set. Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver in particular landed well with zombie tribal fans and has remained a popular Commander for that archetype.

As on-ramps go, both decks do their job: they're playable immediately, they feel thematically coherent with Innistrad, and they give new players a clear sense of what their deck wants to do from the first turn. Neither will overwhelm a seasoned Commander table without upgrades, but that's by design.