Background

Background
Card Type
Rules	Commander creatures you own have [...]
Statistics	30 cards 3.3% 20% 20% 20% 20% 16.7%
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type:"Background"

Background is a legendary enchantment subtype introduced in Commander Legends: Battle for Baldur's Gate. Backgrounds interact with Commanders in Commander games.

Description

Monocolored legendary creatures in Baldur's Gate have the ability to Choose a Background to customize your Commander. The bonus comes in the form of an ability your Commander gains or a boost to their Power/Toughness. Backgrounds contribute to the color identity of the Commander. In this way, they function similarly to partner.

Legendary Background cards represent the story that brought your commander to the point where we find them now. They were inspired by the backgrounds created for Player Characters in a game of D&D. The Flavor text is inspired by Dungeon Master's descriptions. The art doesn't feature true ‘faces’. They are occluded or veiled or masked, to help players insert themselves or their commander into the art mentally.

Faceless One

Faceless One is a colorless enchantment creature, and can be your Commander in addition to another background or as the background for another Commander.

Rules

From the glossary of the Comprehensive Rules (June 7, 2024—Modern Horizons 3)

Background

An enchantment type that, in combination with the “choose a Background” ability, may allow a legendary enchantment card to be your commander. See rule 702.124, “Partner,” and rule 903, “Commander.”

From the Comprehensive Rules (June 7, 2024—Modern Horizons 3)

• 205.3h Enchantments have their own unique set of subtypes; these subtypes are called enchantment types. The enchantment types are Aura (see rule 303.4), Background, Cartouche, Case (see rule 719), Class (see rule 716), Curse, Role (see rule 303.7), Rune, Saga (see rule 714), Shard, and Shrine.

Rulings

• Although choose a Background is a new variant of the partner ability, the rules for partner have not otherwise changed. Notably, Backgrounds and cards with choose a Background do not interact with cards which have another partner ability.
• One card, Faceless One, both has choose a Background and is itself a Background. In a Commander Draft which uses Commander Legends: Battle for Baldur's Gate booster packs, you may use two copies of Faceless One as your commanders (see "Commander Draft," above). Note that during the game, the "legend rule" will apply to them if they're ever under your control at the same time.
• If your Commander deck has two commanders, you can include only cards whose own color identities are also found in your commanders' combined color identities. If Renari, Merchant of Marvels and Acolyte of Bahamut are your commanders, your deck may contain cards with blue and/or green in their color identity, but not cards with white, black, or red.
• Both commanders start in the command zone, and the remaining 98 cards (or 58 cards in a Commander Draft game) of your deck are shuffled to become your library.
• If your commander loses the choose a Background ability or stops being a Background during the game, as appropriate, it is still your commander.
• Once the game begins, your two commanders are tracked separately. If you cast one, you won't have to pay an additional {2} the first time you cast the other. A player loses the game after having been dealt 21 combat damage from any one of them, not from both of them combined (although your Background won't usually be a creature anyway).
• If something refers to your commander while you have two commanders, it refers to one of them of your choice. If you are instructed to perform an action on your commander (e.g. put it from the command zone into your hand due to Command Beacon), you choose one of your commanders at the time the effect happens.
• An effect that checks whether you control your commander is satisfied if you control one or both of your two commanders.
• You can choose two commanders that are the same color or colors.
• Many cards in Commander Legends: Battle for Baldur's Gate refer to commander creatures you own. A Background isn't normally a creature, so it won't normally be included in such an effect. If another spell or ability causes your Background to become a creature, however, it will be included. Any effect that refers to your commander or a commander you own or control without specifying creature will apply to a Background that is your commander, as appropriate.
• If you control a Background that grants an ability to commander creatures you own, and you own more than one commander creature, each of them will have that ability. This means, for example, that if you control Acolyte of Bahamut along with two commander creatures you own, the first Dragon spell you cast each turn costs less to cast.

Create a Character

"Create a Character" is a keyword action on the non-legal Heroes of the Realm background card Wizard from Beyond It is a nod to the Dungeons & Dragons team from Wizards of the Coast and means "any nonlegendary creature can choose this as its Background. It becomes legendary and can be your commander."