Are there any EDH commanders whose colour identity is not solely determined by their mana cost?

Question

Colour identity is not only the colours in the casting cost, but any mana symbols that appear in the rules text (but not the reminder text!). Are there any legendary creatures that have a different colour identity to their card colour?

Answer 1

There are. The color identity rules were purposefully changed in 2010 to allow these legendary creatures to be played as commanders:

• Bosh, Iron Golem
• Memnarch
• Thelon of Havenwood
• Daughter of Autumn
• Rhys, the Exiled

Answer 2

While most cards color identity is in the casting cost, there are many cards that have an identity that does not match their colors. This is true for legendary creatures too and there are many commanders with identities outside the card color. The most common reason is the card has an ability with different colored mana costs, some of the more common ones:

• Jodah, Archmage Eternal - Jodah is red, white and blue by mana cost but has an ability that costs making him all 5 colors for identity.
• Morophon, the Boundless is colorless as a creature, but the cost reduction effect "Spells of the chosen type you cast cost less to cast" make it all 5 colors in identity.
• Golos, Tireless Pilgrim - is another colorless creature with an ability costing making it a 5 color identity commander.(Currently banned in commander)
• General Tazri - a mono white creature that has an ability costing for a 5 color identity.
• Tazri, Beacon of Unity - similar to the older Tazri, she is a white creature with an ability costing , making her identity white because of her cost and all 4 other colors because of her ability.
• Alesha, Who Smiles at Death, Daghatar the Adamant, Shu Yun, the Silent Tempest, Tasigur, the Golden Fang, and Yasova Dragonclaw were a cycle of mono color creatures from Fate Reforged with abilities that cost at least 2 hybrid mana of the other colors in their Khanate, making their color identity 3 colors.

A less common reason is double faced cards, the color of the back face is part of the identity¹ of the commander:

• Archangel Avacyn is a white creature, but the back face is red, making her color identity white and red.
• Esika, God of the Tree is a green creature, but the casting cost of the back side of the modal double faced card, The Prismatic Bridge, makes the commander have a 5 color identity.
• Jorn, God of Winter is a green creature, but the casting cost of the back side of the modal double faced card, Kaldring, the Rimestaff, makes the commander color identity green, blue and black.
• Valki, God of Lies is a black creature, but the casting cost of the back side of the modal double faced card, Tibalt, Cosmic Impostor adds red to the color identity.

And finally there are two possible 0 mana value commanders:

• Asmoranomardicadaistinaculdacar - like any card with no mana cost printed, Asmoranomardicadaistinaculdacar cannot be cast normally. Asmoranomardicadaistinaculdacar has an ability that will give it an alternate cost (and that alternate cost could put it under the first category too) but as this card has no colors from its mana cost, it relies on the color indicator to set the card color, which also is part of what sets a commander's color identity.
• Rograkh, Son of Rohgahh - Rograkh has a mana cost of 0, and unlike Asmoranomardicadaistinaculdacar does not have any abilities with a colored cost. Because of this Rograkh's card color and color identity is completely set by the color indicator circle on the card's type line.

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1. This also applies to cards in the 99, which is why the colorless Elbrus, the Binding Blade can only be in decks that include black, the back side counts for identity and must be included on the commander.

Answer 3

If you are interested in finding a commander with certain colour/colour identity, ScryFall is a powerful search.
You can search for cards that can be your commander (is:commander), and filter them by colour identity (id=WUBRG) and colour (c=WUBRG). It also supports <, >, <=, and >= symbols.

e.g.
Find all commanders with colour identity WUBRG, but with fewer card colours.
Find all colourless commanders with colours in their colour identity.

There seem to be two cycles of commanders of fewer colours than their identity:

• Fate Reforged had a cycle of monocoloured legendary creatures, each with an ability including a cost of hybrid mana of two other colours.
• Unsanctioned (a joke set) had a cycle of monocoloured legendary creatures, each with an ability cost of an enemy colour.

Answer 4

The following Scryfall query reveals that there are, at time of writing, sixty such commanders.

is:commander ((c:0 id>0) or (c:1 id>1) or (c:2 id>2) or (c:3 id>3) or (c:4 id>4))

Ten of them are silver-bordered, leaving the number legal in ordinary Commmander (append f:c to the query) at 50.