Dungeons are weird. When Wizards of the Coast first dropped the Adventures in the Forgotten Realms (AFR) set back in 2021, the collective Magic: The Gathering community basically had a mini-meltdown trying to figure out if venturing into the dungeon mtg was actually good or just a flavorful gimmick that would die in Limited. Most people saw the dungeon cards—Lost Mine of Phandelver, Tomb of Annihilation, and Dungeon of the Mad Mage—and thought, "That's a lot of work for a Scry 1."
They were wrong. Well, mostly.
If you’ve played any amount of Commander or scanned the history of the 2022 Standard season, you know that dungeons didn't just stay in the "flavor win" category. They became an engine. But the problem is that most players still look at the cards and see them as a linear path, when they’re actually a complex resource management game. You aren't just moving a token; you're trying to out-value an opponent who is playing "real" Magic while you're busy playing a board game inside a card game.
The Reality of Venturing into the Dungeon MTG
Let’s get the mechanics out of the way because people still mess this up in paper play. You don't put dungeons in your deck. They live in the command zone or just off to the side, and they don't take up a slot in your 60 (or 100). When a card tells you to "venture into the dungeon," and you aren't already in one, you pick one of the three original AFR dungeons and put a marker on the first room. If you're already in there, you move to the next room. Simple, right?
It gets tricky when you realize that once you finish a dungeon, you get "completion" bonuses. This is where cards like Nadaar, Selfless Paladin or White Plume Adventurer (before the Initiative took over everything) become terrifying.
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The biggest misconception is that you should always go for the Dungeon of the Mad Mage because it has the best "big" rewards. That is a trap. Most games of Magic end before you hit that final level. Honestly, if you're venturing into the dungeon mtg in a competitive setting, the Lost Mine of Phandelver is your best friend because it's short. It's fast. It gets you that "completed a dungeon" trigger for your other cards while providing a treasure or a +1/+1 counter along the way.
Why Tomb of Annihilation is a Huge Risk
Tomb of Annihilation is the "black sheep" of the original three. It’s designed to be high-risk, high-reward. You can take the "Oubliette" path and discard a card, sacrifice a creature, a land, and an artifact. That sounds miserable. In fact, it usually is miserable unless you are playing a specific type of aristocrats deck or a reanimator strategy where discarding a huge dragon is actually a benefit.
I’ve seen players kill themselves with the Tomb. They see the 4/4 legendary God-Horror token (The Atropal) at the end and get tunnel vision. They ignore the fact that their opponent has a board full of 2/2s and they just sacrificed their only blockers to "progress" the dungeon. It’s flavor-accurate to the D&D module—it's a meat grinder—but in Magic, it’s often a trap for players who value "cool stuff" over "not losing the game."
The Initiative: When Dungeons Broke Everything
We can't talk about venturing into the dungeon mtg without talking about the Commander Legends: Battle for Baldur's Gate expansion and the "Initiative" mechanic. This is where things went from "cute mechanic" to "Legacy-defining powerhouse."
The Initiative is basically "Venture 2.0." When you take the Initiative, you venture into a specific dungeon called Undercity. You can't go there unless you have the Initiative. The Undercity is vastly more powerful than the original three dungeons. We’re talking about searching for basic lands, putting two +1/+1 counters on a creature, and eventually revealing the top ten cards of your library and putting a creature onto the battlefield with three +1/+1 counters and hexproof.
It’s absurd.
In the Legacy format, cards like White Plume Adventurer and Seasoned Dungeoneer became so dominant they had to be banned or heavily restricted in various capacities across different play styles. Why? Because the dungeon moves every turn you keep the Initiative. You don't even have to do anything. You just exist, and the dungeon does the work for you. It broke the fundamental rule of Magic where you have to spend mana to get effects. Once you're in the Undercity, the value is free.
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Choosing the Right Path in a Game
When you're looking at your dungeon card, stop looking at the end. Look at the middle.
- Lost Mine of Phandelver: Choose this if you need a Treasure to ramp into a 5-drop next turn. The "Dark Pool" room (each opponent loses 1 life, you gain 1 life) is small, but it breaks stalemates in tight games.
- Dungeon of the Mad Mage: Only pick this if you are playing a heavy control deck and you are 100% sure the game is going to turn 15. The Scry 3 and the "Draw 3 cards" at the end are amazing, but it takes seven ventures to get there. Seven. That’s a lifetime in modern Magic.
- Undercity (The Initiative): If you have the option, you take this. Period. The value floor is so much higher than the others that it’s rarely correct to go anywhere else unless you are specifically built for AFR-style venturing.
The Math of the Dungeon
Think about the mana value. If a creature costs three mana and says "When this enters the battlefield, venture into the dungeon," you are getting a body plus a fractional spell. If you hit the "Scry 1" room, you basically played a creature with a free Opt attached. If you hit the "Create a 1/1 skeleton" room in Tomb of Annihilation, you got a 2-for-1.
The complexity arises when you realize that venturing into the dungeon mtg scales with the number of cards in your deck that support it. One venture card is bad. Ten venture cards are a nightmare. This is because the "completed a dungeon" state is a permanent flag on your game state. Cards like Gloom Stalker or Barrowin of Undurn Abyss become incredibly efficient once that flag is flipped.
I remember a specific match at a Local Game Store where a guy was playing a Selesnya (Green-White) dungeon deck. He wasn't doing much, just poking with small creatures. But he finished the Lost Mine by turn five. Suddenly, his Nadaar was giving his whole team +1/+1 every time it attacked, and his other creatures were gaining double strike. He didn't win because his cards were better; he won because he completed his "side quest" faster than I could deal with his board.
Common Pitfalls for New Dungeon Crawlers
Don't overextend. One of the biggest mistakes I see is players casting venture spells into an empty board just to move the marker. If your opponent is holding up mana, they are going to kill your "payoff" creature before the dungeon completion actually matters.
Also, watch out for the "Styx" effect. In the Dungeon of the Mad Mage, there are paths that lead to nowhere if you aren't careful about your long-term plan. You might need the "Runestone Caverns" to exile cards and play them, but you accidentally veered into the "Muiral's Graveyard" because you wanted a 1/1 token. Plan three rooms ahead. It’s called a dungeon for a reason; you can get lost.
Practical Steps for Building Your Dungeon Deck
If you want to actually win with venturing into the dungeon mtg, you need to stop thinking about it as a fun D&D crossover and start thinking about it as a tempo engine.
- Prioritize "Enter the Battlefield" (ETB) triggers. Use cards like Tassa, Deep-Dwelling or Ephemerate to blink your venture creatures. Why venture once when you can venture three times in a single turn cycle?
- Focus on the Initiative if your format allows it. If you are playing Commander, the Initiative is strictly better than standard venturing. Use cards like Caves of Chaos Adventurer.
- Don't forget the win condition. A dungeon is a tool, not a kill condition (usually). You still need a way to reduce your opponent's life to zero. Dungeons provide the cards and the tokens, but you need the "meat" of the deck to close it out.
- Use the right colors. White and Blue are generally the best for traditional venturing because they have the most "blink" and "evasion" effects. Black is great for the Tomb, and Green is mostly there for the heavy hitters in the Baldur's Gate set.
Ultimately, the dungeon mechanic is about incremental advantages. It’s for the player who likes to track multiple triggers and feels a sense of satisfaction from "completing" a task. It’s not for everyone. It’s clicky, it requires extra cards on the table, and it can be a headache to track in a 4-player game. But if you master the paths, you’re playing a version of Magic that your opponent probably hasn't prepared for.
Most players build their sideboards to beat artifacts or enchantments. Almost nobody builds a sideboard to beat a guy who is halfway through the Undercity and about to drop a free, hexproof behemoth on the table. Use that lack of preparation to your advantage.
Next time you sit down, don't just grab the Lost Mine because it's the easiest. Look at your hand. If you have the resources to discard, hit the Tomb. If you have the time, go for the Mad Mage. The dungeon is only as good as the player walking through it. Be the player who knows the exit.