Best MTG Star Trek Commons & Uncommons for Draft

Magic: The Gathering | Star Trek introduces ten Limited archetypes, new mechanics, and plenty of recognizable characters, but most successful Draft decks will be built around something less glamorous than mythic rares: reliable commons and uncommons.

A strong removal spell can matter more than a flashy legendary creature. An efficient two-drop can keep an aggressive deck on schedule, while an uncommon that repeatedly generates value can turn an otherwise ordinary collection of cards into a cohesive strategy.

Our early standout commons are Malfunctioning Holodeck, Eject the Warp Core, Command Decision, and He’s Dead, Jim. All four offer interaction that can matter in a wide variety of games, although their mana costs and limitations differ considerably.

Among uncommons, flexible removal, efficient creatures, and build-around cards that work with multiple support pieces deserve particular attention.

This guide highlights the most promising MTG Star Trek commons and uncommons by color, explains when to draft synergy over raw card quality, and provides an early pick-order framework for prerelease and MTG Arena.

Editor’s note: These are pre-release card evaluations based on revealed card text and the expected Limited environment as of October 30, 2026. They are not rankings derived from actual game win rates. Card evaluations may change after the first Draft and Sealed events.

Best MTG Star Trek Commons and Uncommons at a Glance

This is a shortlist rather than a strict pick-one-through-pick-twelve ranking. A removal spell that is excellent in a slow control deck can be less effective in an aggressive strategy, while an apparently narrow synergy card can become a premium pick once your deck already supports it.

Best White Commons and Uncommons

White has several attractive ways to interact with opposing threats, plus creatures that support both the Spacecraft and +1/+1 counter archetypes.

Malfunctioning Holodeck – Best White Common

For three mana, Malfunctioning Holodeck exiles a target nonland permanent an opponent controls until the Holodeck leaves the battlefield.

That ability can answer creatures, artifacts, enchantments, or other nonland threats. Its ward makes removing the Holodeck somewhat more inconvenient for opponents, improving the chances that the exiled permanent stays gone.

The main weakness is that it does not permanently remove its target. If the Holodeck leaves the battlefield, the exiled permanent returns.

Nevertheless, flexible removal at common is extremely valuable in Limited. As an artifact, the Holodeck can also contribute to decks that reward artifact permanents entering or remaining on the battlefield.

Draft verdict: A strong early pick for almost any white deck, especially when you need interaction that is not limited to creatures.

Command Decision – Best Flexible White Spell

Command Decision costs and offers two modes: destroy a creature with power four or greater, or draw a card.

That second mode matters more than it may initially appear. Many conditional removal spells become awkward when an opponent presents no suitable target, but Command Decision can replace itself instead.

It also counts as facing a dilemma because you choose a mode when casting it. That makes it particularly attractive in white-blue decks splashing dilemma synergies, although its strongest dedicated synergy is with effects that reward modal choices.

Its limitation is obvious: it cannot destroy smaller creatures, including some dangerous utility creatures.

Draft verdict: Flexible enough to justify an early selection, but do not treat it as universal creature removal.

Emergency Medical Hologram – Best Early Synergy Creature

Emergency Medical Hologram costs just . When it enters, it puts a +1/+1 counter on a target creature and gains you one life.

The Hologram itself is a 0/1 artifact creature, so it is not a meaningful attacker without support. Its value comes from the counter and from providing an inexpensive artifact body.

In green-white, placing a counter can enable creatures that reward growing your battlefield. In white-blue, the artifact type offers additional synergy while the Hologram can help operate Spacecraft.

It is particularly useful when you already have a creature on the battlefield. In an otherwise empty opening hand, it is less impressive than a conventional aggressive one-drop.

Draft verdict: A valuable synergy piece that becomes better in decks with multiple counter or artifact payoffs.

Brad Boimler, Eager Ensign – Best Counter Uncommon

Brad Boimler, Eager Ensign is a two-mana 2/2 with lifelink.

Whenever he becomes tapped, an effect that would put one or more counters on a permanent you control puts an additional counter of each relevant kind on that permanent for the rest of the turn.

This can substantially improve +1/+1 counter strategies, and it also interacts with charge counters placed on Spacecraft.

Because station taps another creature, Brad can help station a ship while enabling additional counter production during the same turn.

However, timing matters. His ability does not retroactively increase counters placed before he becomes tapped.

Draft verdict: One of the most interesting white uncommons when your deck has reliable ways to add counters.

Dr. McCoy, Surly Surgeon – Best Counters Protection Uncommon

Dr. McCoy, Surly Surgeon puts a +1/+1 counter on another creature when he enters.

His more important ability protects other creatures you control that have +1/+1 counters. If such a creature would be destroyed, the effect instead removes its counters and clears its marked damage.

That provides a powerful defense against some removal spells and unfavorable combat exchanges.

The limitation is that this protection does not stop exile effects or other ways of removing a creature that do not destroy it.

Draft verdict: Particularly strong in green-white counters, where several creatures can benefit from his protective effect.

Best Blue Commons and Uncommons

Blue looks especially interesting in decks that want to play longer games. Its card selection, interaction, and modal effects support both dilemma control and noncreature-spell synergies.

Consider the Prime Directive – Flexible Dilemma Support

Consider the Prime Directive is an important card to examine when evaluating the blue-black dilemma deck.

Its modal design means it can contribute to a dilemma payoff while also performing a useful spell effect. That combination is exactly what blue-black wants: cards that advance the game plan without requiring separate, low-impact enablers.

The key drafting question is whether the spell’s available modes are useful in your actual deck. A modal card is not automatically a premium pick merely because it triggers Seven of Nine.

Draft verdict: A useful role-player for dilemma decks; prioritize its baseline effectiveness before counting synergy triggers.

Cloistered Telepath – Early Defensive Development

Cloistered Telepath provides an early creature option for blue decks that need to survive before their slower value engines become relevant.

That role matters because blue-black control and blue-white Spacecraft can both become vulnerable when they spend their first turns developing resources rather than defending themselves.

An early creature is also useful for stationing a Spacecraft later, provided you can afford to tap it without exposing yourself to an attack.

Draft verdict: Consider cards like this more highly when your deck already contains expensive spells and needs a reliable early battlefield presence.

Highly Illogical – Blue Interaction to Watch

Blue interaction is particularly valuable when it buys enough time to reach a stronger late game.

Highly Illogical is worth examining for decks that prefer controlling the pace of play rather than racing.

When choosing between an interaction spell and another narrow synergy piece, consider what your current deck struggles to answer. A slower blue strategy often needs reliable answers more urgently than another way to generate incremental value.

Draft verdict: Evaluate it against the threats you expect to face and the interaction already in your pool.

Seven of Nine – Best Dilemma Uncommon

Seven of Nine is the clearest signpost for blue-black dilemma control.

Her ability rewards you for facing a dilemma, allowing modal spells and abilities to generate additional card advantage.

That can make otherwise ordinary decisions much more profitable. A flexible spell can answer a threat or improve your hand while also triggering Seven’s ability.

The danger is building your deck with too many weak modal cards just to activate the payoff. Seven is strongest when your dilemma cards are already worth playing.

Draft verdict: A high-priority synergy uncommon once you are confident that blue-black is open and you have access to enough useful modal spells.

Best Black Commons and Uncommons

Black offers some of the most appealing creature interaction in the set. Its removal spells are particularly attractive because they work across multiple archetypes, while its sacrifice and artifact cards offer meaningful synergy.

Eject the Warp Core – Best Black Common

Eject the Warp Core costs and gives a target creature -2/-2 until end of turn.

You can also kick it by sacrificing an artifact or creature. When kicked, it gives that creature -6/-6 instead.

This creates an unusually flexible removal spell. Against a small creature, it is an efficient two-mana answer. Against a much larger threat, it can become powerful removal if you have a disposable permanent.

The sacrifice requirement can even become an advantage in black-red Klingons or white-black Borg, where expendable creatures and artifacts already support the main game plan.

Be careful not to sacrifice a valuable permanent just to remove an opposing creature you could otherwise handle through combat.

Draft verdict: One of the strongest commons to prioritize in black, thanks to its flexibility and synergy potential.

He’s Dead, Jim – Best Reliable Creature Removal

He’s Dead, Jim is a four-mana instant that destroys a target creature and lets you surveil 1.

The effect is straightforward, but reliable removal is extremely important in Sealed and Draft. When an opponent plays a large bomb or a creature that threatens to dominate the game, having a clean answer can matter more than an additional synergy card.

Surveil 1 is a useful bonus, helping improve your next draw and supporting graveyard strategies.

Four mana is not cheap, so you still want earlier interaction against aggressive decks.

Draft verdict: A strong, dependable removal spell for virtually any black deck.

Collective Drone – Best Borg Common

Collective Drone is a two-mana artifact creature whose power equals the number of artifact creatures you control.

It has two toughness, so it can be fragile in combat, but its power can scale quickly when you assemble several Borg or other artifact creatures.

In white-black Borg, this is an attractive payoff because many supporting cards already produce artifact bodies.

Outside that strategy, Collective Drone is less impressive. Without enough artifacts, it may remain too small to exert meaningful pressure.

Draft verdict: Excellent synergy potential, but not a card to take highly before you know your deck can support it.

Automated Warfare System – Artifact Sacrifice Support

Automated Warfare System is worth particular attention in decks capable of sacrificing artifacts for value.

White-black Borg and black-red sacrifice can both make good use of expendable permanents, although their preferred payoffs are different.

The important question is whether your deck consistently produces resources that are worth sacrificing. A sacrifice engine is much less appealing when every creature you control is needed for attacking or blocking.

Draft verdict: A strong synergy consideration once you have enough artifact bodies or repeatable resource production.

Best Red Commons and Uncommons

Red supports aggressive Klingon decks, noncreature-spell strategies, and landfall-based combat. Its best commons should help you maintain pressure or remove blockers efficiently.

Plasma Cascade – Red Removal to Prioritize

Plasma Cascade is one of the red interaction spells worth identifying early in Draft.

Damage-based removal is particularly important for aggressive decks because it clears blockers without forcing your creatures into unfavorable combat trades.

However, the usefulness of any damage spell depends on the toughness of opposing creatures. A removal spell that handles small and medium creatures may become awkward against larger green threats.

Consider your overall removal package rather than taking every burn spell automatically.

Draft verdict: Strong interaction to look for, especially when your deck needs a way to keep attacks profitable.

Planetary Patrol – Red-Green Landfall Support

Planetary Patrol rewards the landfall strategy used by red-green.

Its strength comes from getting additional value from actions your deck already wants to take: making land drops and developing the battlefield.

That makes it appealing alongside land-finding cards and other creatures that become more threatening as lands enter.

Still, landfall cards need to be evaluated for what happens when you miss a land drop. A creature that looks excellent on turns three and four may become underwhelming later when your hand is empty.

Draft verdict: A desirable red-green role-player, but less important in red decks without landfall support.

Reckless Impulse – Card Advantage for Aggressive Red

Reckless Impulse offers an efficient way for red decks to access additional cards.

This is especially valuable in aggressive strategies that can empty their hands quickly. After developing a creature curve and removing early blockers, another source of spells can help maintain pressure.

Cards that provide temporary access to exiled cards do require planning. You need enough mana and time to use those cards before the permission expires.

Draft verdict: Useful for red decks that need additional resources, but prioritize creatures and removal if your curve is not yet functional.

Best Green Commons and Uncommons

Green’s strongest Limited cards often support mana development, creature size, and longer games. In Star Trek, they also contribute to landfall and strange new worlds strategies.

Xenobotanist – Best Green Mana Support

Xenobotanist offers mana development, an important resource for green decks looking to deploy larger creatures or cast spells ahead of schedule.

Mana acceleration is especially useful in Sealed, where bomb rares and expensive finishers often determine longer games.

In green-blue strange new worlds, having appropriate fixing can also make it easier to develop a diverse land base without sacrificing access to your main colors.

The main risk is spending too many early picks on mana support while neglecting the creatures and removal needed to win.

Draft verdict: Strong support for green midrange and ramp, especially when your deck has worthwhile expensive spells.

Xindi Surveyors – Best Landfall Common

Xindi Surveyors benefits from lands entering the battlefield, making it a natural fit in red-green landfall.

The strongest versions of that archetype will use multiple creatures that reward land drops rather than relying on one specific payoff.

That means a card like Xindi Surveyors becomes more appealing when your deck also contains land-finding effects and other landfall creatures.

Draft verdict: A useful synergy creature for red-green, but assess its baseline combat performance if your landfall support is limited.

Saurian Explorer – Land Development and Fixing

Saurian Explorer contributes to green’s mana-development plan, making it relevant in decks that want additional fixing or land-based synergy.

In a format with strange new worlds, cards that improve mana access can have additional value beyond simply accelerating your next spell.

However, do not overvalue mana fixing when your deck already has a stable two-color mana base and few expensive cards.

Draft verdict: More attractive in landfall, ramp, or carefully supported splash decks than in a low-curve aggressive build.

Syndicate Liquidators – Green Counters Synergy

Syndicate Liquidators is another card worth watching when drafting green creature-based strategies.

It can help advance a +1/+1 counter plan, making it especially relevant when paired with white’s counter-supporting creatures.

Its value increases when your deck contains several cards that reward counters rather than just one expensive payoff.

Draft verdict: A useful green synergy pick, particularly when paired with the right white or red support cards.

Best Multicolor Uncommons: When Should You Commit?

The ten two-color archetypes each have signpost cards intended to demonstrate the strategy of their color pair.

These can be some of the most rewarding uncommons in the set, but they are also more demanding than a strong single-color removal spell.

A signpost uncommon becomes most valuable when your deck already includes enough support to activate it consistently.

For example, Seven of Nine needs modal spells and abilities, while Locutus, the One Who Speaks prefers an artifact-heavy creature base.

Early in pack one, taking a multicolor signpost can be a reasonable speculative pick. However, once you have enough information about which colors are available, strong single-color cards often keep your options open more effectively.

Star Trek Draft Pick Order: What Should You Take First?

Before the format has reliable game data, we recommend using a flexible pick-order framework rather than assigning precise grades to every card.

These categories are not absolute.

If your deck already has four removal spells but lacks two-drops, an efficient creature can become a more important pick than another piece of interaction.

Similarly, if you are clearly drafting white-black Borg with several artifact producers, Collective Drone may become more valuable than a generically playable creature.

The best pick is often the card that solves the most important remaining problem in your deck.

How Many Removal Spells Should You Draft?

A typical 40-card Limited deck benefits from several ways to answer opposing creatures or prevent them from dominating combat.

As a starting point, aim for approximately three to five useful interaction spells, depending on your strategy and the quality of the options available.

A control deck may want more removal and defensive spells, while an aggressive deck may prefer a higher creature count and inexpensive ways to remove blockers.

Star Trek offers several especially interesting options because some removal cards also contribute to other strategies.

Command Decision is a modal spell that can trigger dilemma rewards. Eject the Warp Core can use an expendable artifact or creature to remove a larger threat. Malfunctioning Holodeck is itself an artifact, making it relevant to artifact-focused decks.

This overlap is important. The best Limited cards often solve a normal gameplay problem while contributing to an archetype at the same time.

Five Common Mistakes When Drafting Commons and Uncommons

The first is taking a signpost uncommon too early and refusing to change colors. A promising multicolor card does not guarantee that the matching archetype will be available throughout the Draft.

The second is overrating synergy cards without enough support. A card that rewards artifact creatures needs actual artifact creatures. A card that rewards counters needs reliable ways to place those counters.

The third is ignoring the mana curve. Even excellent commons become less useful when every creature in your deck costs four or more mana.

The fourth is playing too many conditional answers. Command Decision is flexible because it can draw a card, but relying on it as your only removal spell can leave you vulnerable to smaller threats.

The fifth is treating an early preview ranking as final. A removal spell’s effectiveness depends on the actual creatures people play, while synergy decks can become stronger or weaker as the format develops.

The best Draft players remain willing to adjust their evaluations based on what happens in games.

Best Commons for Star Trek Sealed and Prerelease

Sealed changes how you should evaluate many synergy cards because your pool is fixed.

You cannot count on receiving enough Borg, Scientists, or modal spells to support every signpost you open. As a result, flexible interaction and good individual creatures become especially important.

Malfunctioning Holodeck is attractive because it can answer several different kinds of threats. He’s Dead, Jim remains a dependable response to dangerous creatures, and Eject the Warp Core offers useful flexibility.

After identifying your strongest removal and creatures, look for a two-color combination with enough playable cards to build a coherent 40-card deck.

If a synergy is well supported, use it. If not, playing individually strong cards with consistent mana is usually safer than forcing the intended theme.

For a complete breakdown of the ten archetypes and recommended Sealed deck structure, read our MTG Star Trek Draft & Sealed Guide.

Final Verdict: The Best Star Trek Commons and Uncommons

The strongest early Star Trek Limited picks combine useful standalone effects with opportunities to support the set’s mechanics.

Malfunctioning Holodeck stands out for its broad removal range, while Eject the Warp Core offers flexible instant-speed interaction that becomes particularly appealing in sacrifice decks.

He’s Dead, Jim provides reliable creature removal, and Command Decision is a flexible white spell that also supports dilemma strategies.

Among synergy cards, Brad Boimler, Eager Ensign and Dr. McCoy, Surly Surgeon are especially interesting for counters, while Seven of Nine provides a compelling reason to draft blue-black modal spells.

These are early strategic recommendations, not proven win-rate rankings. Once prerelease and Arena Draft results become available, the most useful next step will be comparing these initial evaluations against actual game performance.

Until then, prioritize interaction, efficient creatures, consistent mana, and synergy cards that improve an already functional deck.

A good crew needs more than a famous captain. In Star Trek Limited, the commons and uncommons are what keep your ship flying.

For more Limited coverage, read our MTG Star Trek Draft & Sealed Guide and MTG Star Trek Mechanics Explained. You can also browse the official Star Trek Card Image Gallery for the latest revealed cards.