Birds Are Finally Real in Magic: Final Fantasy Chocobos Flock Together

Last updated on May 28, 2025

Teshar, Ancestor's Apostle – art by Even Amundsen

The phrase “Birds Aren’t Real” may be a meme, but in Magic, Birds are finally very real – and about to take flight in Commander tables everywhere. Final Fantasy x MTG, the upcoming Magic set that will drop mid-June, will introduce the bird commander that this typal archetype needs to finally spread its wings: Choco, Seeker of Paradise.

And this bird comes with a flock! Final Fantasy is chock-full of powerful cards that combine Choco's two themes: birds, and landfall.

Reading the Chocobo Explains the Chocobo

Choco, Seeker of Paradise is a Bant commander from the Final Fantasy Universes Beyond set: A 3/5 for 1 that comes packed with abilities that reward both Bird typal aggression and Landfall mechanics.

Choco, Seeker of Paradise has an attack trigger that reads:

“Whenever one or more Birds you control attack, look at that many cards from the top of your library. You may put one of them into your hand. Then put any number of land cards from among them onto the battlefield tapped and the rest into your graveyard.”

In other words, if you swing with ‘N' Birds, you get to dig N cards deep, draw your best find, dump any lands from those into play tapped (ramping you), and toss the remainder to the grave (fueling future recursion). Choco, Seeker of Paradise also has a Landfall ability that pumps it by +1/+0, but that's just a small bonus.

Choco and its flock probably won't fly in Standard. “Just needs too much setup to be viable,” notes u/DeathByChainsaw in the reveal thread. But Choco, Seeker of Paradise decks sure seem to have legs in Commander, with MTG players eagerly brewing with birds.

Chocobos Of a Feather Flock Together

Our Bant Chocommander lets us mix bird aggression with explosive land ramp. Choco, Seeker of Paradise rewards you simply for declaring attacks with Birds: even if those 1/1 flyers get blocked or don’t deal damage, you still “look at that many cards” and gain value.

Choco, Seeker of Paradise‘s colors are a vast improvement over the current most popular bird commander, Kastral, the Windcrested. Going from Kastral's Azorius color identity to Choco, Seeker of Paradise‘s Bant let us keep everything that we'd play with Kestral while tapping into green. That gives us bird powerhouses like Derevi, Empyrial Tactician, Falco Spara, Pactweaver, and the bird of birds, Birds of Paradise…

… provides us with access to birds-matter staples like Soulcatchers' Aerie, Flurry of Wings, and Tawnos, the Toymaker… 

… and, of course, green brings some of the best land ramp and landfall cards, with staples like Scute Swarm and Tatyova, Benthic Druid:

And that's just looking at existing cards – Final Fantasy has a good chunk of new bird and landfall toys to play with.

New Bird and Landfall Toys from Final Fantasy

Bartz and Boko: Fans of Final Fantasy V will recognize this duo and, in Magic, this green human bird packs a punch: When B&B enters, “each other Bird you control deals damage equal to its power to target creature an opponent controls.” It’s a flavorful way to depict an army of birds swarming a foe. It also has affinity for Birds, costing less to cast for each Bird you control.

Traveling Chocobo looks like the single most powerful new tool for bird typal: the love child of Future Sight and Panharmonicon for Birds. It lets you play lands and cast Bird spells from the top of your library, and on top of that it doubles all your landfall triggers and Bird ETB triggers. With this out, Choco’s own landfall pump would give +2/+0 per land, Bartz and Boko triggers twice, etc. It basically supercharges every synergy in the deck.

The adorable Sazh's Chocobo is the perfect turn-1 play, It’s also a great target for Traveling Chocobo’s top-of-library casting ability (being a Bird spell) and doubles its counter gains with Traveling Chocobo’s trigger-doubling.

Final Fantasy x MTG also brings Sazh Katzroy himself, not just his chocobo! Sazh's a great bird tutor, or basic land tutor, depending what you need. And “he also pairs divinely with his own Sazh’s Chocobo,” as u/Enlog notes. “Sazh finds lands. His Chocobo has a Landfall trigger that gives her a +1/+1 counter. Sazh gives her another counter, then doubles her counters. If he and the Chocobo attack together after a landfall, then he brings the Chocobo up to very high stats.”

Then we have the power creep: Chocobo Racetrack which puts Zenikar's Roil to shame.

And last but not least, the one and only: Tifa Lockhart. This kick-ass chick's no bird, obviously, but she'd love to attack alongside a big flock that, thanks to Choco, Seeker of Paradise, puts a ton of lands on the board!

Soaring Bird Card Prices

Falco Spara, Pactweaver (Streets of New Capenna) – art by Kieran Yanner

It's hardly news by now that Final Fantasy commanders can spike the price of old, nearly-forgotten cards sky-high, and our Choco, Seeker of Paradise is no exception, with financial-savvy MTG players already betting on birds.

The most clear example is a Judgment enchantment, Soulcatchers' Aerie, which mass-pumps your Birds whenever somebody of your flock's die, and which soared by over 500% almost overnight, rocketing from near-bulk to over $6:

Source: MTGStocks

This 2-mana enchantment in a deck that wants you to full swing every turn is just gas for bird typal decks. In a Choco deck you’ll often be attacking with numerous small birds, and if some of them die to blockers or removal Soulcatchers' Aerie will massively buff the survivors. It essentially turns inevitable casualties into permanent boosts for your flock.

With a similar price pattern, Keeper of the Nine Gales – a bird wizard from Legions with a pesky bounce ability – also jumped from about $1 to around $6. Notice that it's any permanent: You can bounce anything back to hand, from a scary attacker, a troublesome enchantment, or even some utility land.

Source: MTGStocks

And Falco Spara, Pactweaver, who's itself a bird Bant commander but is not too popular as leader of bird typal decks, is seeing wide adoption in the 99s of early Choco, Seeker of Paradise brews, pushing its price up by 400%.

Source: MTGStocks

Other bird staples seem eager to spread their wings: Tawnos, the Toymaker is also moving up a bit from $0.25 to $0.35 according to MTGStocks; Flurry of Wings is also seeing upward action, and the same is true for Celestial Gatekeeper, an old bird from Legions that is like a graveyard insurance policy for your flock.

The early chocobo catches the worm, or so they say, so you may want to keep an eye on these cards.