Vial Smasher, Gleeful Grenadier
Uncommon · Legendary Creature — Goblin Mercenary · At the table
Your Mercenary tokens trigger Vial Smasher when they enter, even though they are not cards.
Mechanics
The set’s mechanics with worked examples, then every word on the cards.
Outlaws
Assassins, Mercenaries, Pirates, Rogues and Warlocks are outlaws. Having any one of those types is enough.
How it works
- Check a creature’s complete type line.
- An effect referring to an outlaw normally means an outlaw permanent unless it specifies a spell or card.
On the card
Watch out
- Outlaw is an umbrella term, not a separate creature type that replaces the five types.
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Crimes
You commit a crime when your spell or ability targets an opponent, something they control, or a card in their graveyard.
How it works
- The crime happens when the spell is cast or the ability is put on the stack, before resolution.
- Triggered abilities with those targets qualify too.
On the card
Intimidation Campaign
Uncommon · Enchantment · At the table
Target an opposing creature with removal to trigger Campaign’s return ability. Recast Campaign later to drain and draw again.
Watch out
- Untargeted damage or discard is not a crime. Countering your spell does not undo the crime already committed.
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Plot
At sorcery speed, pay the plot cost to exile the card from your hand. Cast it for free at sorcery speed on a later turn.
How it works
- Plotting is a special action, not casting the card.
- Other effects can make cards plotted; they use the same later-turn casting rule.
On the card
Plan the Heist
Uncommon · Sorcery · At the table
Plot Heist while you have mana, then cast it on a future turn when drawing three leaves mana available for another spell.
Watch out
- You cannot cast it on the turn it became plotted. An instant that becomes plotted still follows the plot permission’s sorcery timing.
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Saddle
Tap other untapped creatures with enough total power to make the Mount saddled until end of turn.
How it works
- Activate saddle only at sorcery speed.
- Read the Mount’s attack reward; it can attack without being saddled if otherwise able.
On the card
Trained Arynx
Common · Creature — Cat Beast Mount · At the table
Saddle Arynx before combat to gain its saddled attack benefits, while deciding which tapped creatures you can afford not to attack with.
Watch out
- A Mount is already a creature. Saddle does not animate it like crew animates a Vehicle, and saddling does not itself tap the Mount.
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Spree
Choose one or more modes and add their listed costs to the spell’s base cost.
How it works
- Choose each mode at most once and pay all selected additions.
- The spell’s mana value still comes from the mana cost printed at the top.
On the card
Explosive Derailment
Common · Instant · At the table
One mode costs three total mana; choosing both costs five and can damage a creature while destroying an artifact.
Watch out
- A free-cast effect does not waive spree’s additional costs. You still must choose at least one mode.
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Deserts
Desert is a land subtype that other cards count or search for. Each Desert has its own printed abilities.
How it works
- Two-color Deserts in this set enter tapped and can deal damage to a targeted opponent.
- That targeted enter trigger can commit a crime.
On the card
Outcaster Greenblade
Uncommon · Creature — Human Mercenary · At the table
Greenblade finds a Desert or basic land and grows as you control more Deserts. The searched card goes to your hand.
Watch out
- A Desert is not necessarily a basic land. Do not assume every land-search effect can find one.
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Mercenary tokens
The red 1/1 Mercenary tokens can tap at sorcery speed to give a creature you control +1/+0 for the turn.
How it works
- They are outlaws and can support both attacks and power-based rewards.
- Targeting your own creature with their ability is not a crime.
On the card
Ertha Jo, Frontier Mentor
Uncommon · Legendary Creature — Kor Advisor · At the table
Ertha Jo creates a Mercenary and can copy its targeted ability, letting the bonus help one creature twice or two different creatures.
Watch out
- A newly created Mercenary cannot use its tap ability without haste. The bonus does not add toughness.
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Fastlands
These two-color lands enter untapped only when you control two or fewer other lands.
How it works
- Count your other lands as the land would enter.
- They are useful early but usually enter tapped as your fourth or later land.
On the card
Blooming Marsh
Rare · Land · At the table
Playing Marsh as your third land can keep all three mana available that turn.
Watch out
- The condition counts every other land, not just lands with basic types.
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Commander bounties
Bounties are an optional shared Commander mini-game using at least six different bounty cards.
How it works
- Start on the starting player’s third turn. Only the active player can claim one reward in a turn.
- An unclaimed bounty increases its reward, up to level four. Reveal the next bounty at the start of the next turn after a claim.
On the card
Bounty: Lyssa, Sterling Collector
Common · Card // Card · At the table
Read the bounty’s capture condition and claim the current reward when you fulfill it during your turn.
Watch out
- Bounties are not part of an ordinary Booster Draft. When the bounty deck runs out, shuffle all bounty cards to reuse it.
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Glossary
Every word on the cards and in the deck plans, defined once. Find a term, read its wording, then see it on a card.
64 terms · A–ZComprehensive Rules effective Sep 25 · checked Oct 29
Symbols
+1/+1 and −1/−1 counters
CounterA +1/+1 counter adds one power and one toughness; a −1/−1 counter subtracts one of each. These counters stay until removed or the object changes zones.
Watch out: If a permanent has both kinds, matching pairs are removed as a state-based action. A temporary +1/+1 effect is not a counter.
Blacksnag Buzzard
Blood Hustler
Boneyard DesecratorA
Adventure
Card mechanicYou may cast the Adventure half instead of the permanent half. If the Adventure resolves, exile the card; you may later play its permanent half from there, paying the normal cost and following its timing.
Watch out: If the Adventure is countered or all its targets become illegal, it does not resolve and normally goes to the graveyard. You can also cast the permanent half directly.
Brazen Borrower // Petty TheftAffinity
Keyword abilityReduce the generic part of this spell’s cost by one for each permanent of the specified kind you control.
Watch out: It does not reduce the colored mana symbols. Check exactly what the card has affinity for.
Hellspur BruteC
Charge, quest, and time counters
CounterThese named counters track whatever the card’s abilities say. Their names alone do not give a universal bonus or penalty.
Watch out: For example, vanishing uses time counters as a countdown. Read the particular card before deciding what adding another counter will do.
Lost JitteCleave
Card mechanicPay the cleave alternative cost to remove all text inside square brackets from the spell. The remaining text determines what it can target and affect.
Fierce RetributionCounter a spell or ability
Keyword actionTo counter a spell or ability is to remove it from the stack without its effects resolving. A countered spell normally goes to its owner’s graveyard.
Watch out: This use of “counter” is different from placing a marker such as a +1/+1 counter on a card.
Abrupt Decay
Archmage's Charm
Armored ArmadilloCrew
Keyword abilityTap other untapped creatures you control with enough total power to turn this Vehicle into an artifact creature until the turn ends.
Watch out: The crew creatures do not become the Vehicle’s attackers. A newly played Vehicle still needs haste to attack that turn.
Luxurious Locomotive
Mobile Homestead
Unlicensed HearseCrimes
Card mechanicYou commit a crime when your spell or ability targets an opponent, something they control, or a card in their graveyard.
At Knifepoint
Bandit's HaulCurve
StrategyA mix of costs that lets you use your mana on early and late turns.
Cycling
Keyword abilityFrom your hand, pay the cycling cost and discard this card to draw a card.
Watch out: Cycling is an activated ability, not casting the card. Typecycling searches for a specified kind of card instead.
Pest Control
ThornadoD
Deathtouch
Keyword abilityAny positive amount of damage this source deals to a creature is enough to make that damage lethal.
Watch out: It works with a fight or other noncombat damage. Indestructible still prevents destruction.
Ankle Biter
Rattleback Apothecary
Servant of the StingerDefender
Keyword abilityThis creature cannot attack.
Watch out: It can still block and use its abilities unless something else prevents that.
Bristlepack Sentry
Redrock SentinelDeserts
Card mechanicDesert is a land subtype that other cards count or search for. Each Desert has its own printed abilities.
Arid Archway
Cactarantula
Colossal RattlewurmDestroy
Keyword actionMove a permanent from the battlefield to its owner’s graveyard because an effect or lethal damage destroys it.
Watch out: Indestructible stops destruction. Sacrificing, exiling, and reducing toughness to 0 are different ways for a creature to leave.
Bedevil
Boom BoxDiscard
Keyword actionMove a card from your hand to your graveyard.
Watch out: Discarding is not casting. It does not pay the card’s mana cost or produce its normal spell effect.
Binding Negotiation
Canyon Crab
Collective DefianceDomain
Ability wordThis label groups effects that count the basic land types among lands you control: Plains, Island, Swamp, Mountain, and Forest.
Watch out: Count types, not lands. A nonbasic land with a basic land type can count; a land with none of those types does not.
Leyline BindingDouble
Card mechanicDoubling counters adds as many of that kind as are already there. Doubling power gives a modifier based on the creature’s power when the effect resolves; it does not necessarily change base power or add counters.
Bristly Bill, Spine Sower
Ornery TumblewaggDouble strike
Keyword abilityThis creature deals combat damage in the first-strike damage step and again in the normal damage step if it is still in combat.
Watch out: If its blocker dies in the first step, a blocked attacker does not hit the player in the second step unless an ability such as trample allows it.
Bruse Tarl, Roving Rancher
Omenport Vigilante
Quick DrawE
Enchant
Keyword abilityAn Aura’s enchant line tells you what it may be attached to.
Watch out: An Aura cast as a spell targets what it will enchant. If it later becomes illegally attached, it normally goes to the graveyard.
Buried in the Garden
Demonic Ruckus
PariahEquip
Keyword abilityPay the equip cost to attach this Equipment to a target creature you control. Normally, activate equip only in your main phase when the stack is empty.
Watch out: The Equipment usually stays on the battlefield when the creature leaves. Moving it to another creature normally costs another equip activation.
Assimilation Aegis
Gold Pan
Lavaspur BootsEscalate
Card mechanicChoose one or more modes and pay the escalate cost for each mode beyond the first. Each mode can be chosen only once unless the card says otherwise.
Exile
Keyword actionMove the object to the exile zone. It is separate from the graveyard.
Watch out: A card in exile cannot normally be played. You need a rule or effect giving permission, such as a resolved Adventure.
Aloe Alchemist
Anguished Unmaking
Annie Flash, the VeteranExplore
Card mechanicReveal the top card. A land goes to your hand; otherwise the exploring creature gets a +1/+1 counter and you may put the revealed card in your graveyard. Exploring a land does not normally put it onto the battlefield. Nicanzil supplies a separate triggered ability.
Worldwalker HelmF
Fight
Keyword actionThe two creatures each deal damage equal to their power to the other at the same time.
Watch out: This is not combat. First strike and double strike do not add damage steps; deathtouch and lifelink still affect damage.
Back for More
Decisive Denial
Primal MightFirst strike
Keyword abilityThis creature deals combat damage in an earlier step, before creatures without first strike or double strike.
Watch out: A creature killed in that early damage step usually cannot deal its normal combat damage.
Great Train HeistFlash
Keyword abilityYou may cast this spell when you could cast an instant, including during another player’s turn when you have priority.
Watch out: Flash changes when you may cast it. It does not let you cast from a different zone or avoid its costs.
Ambush Gigapede
Aven InterrupterFlashback
Keyword abilityYou may cast this instant or sorcery from your graveyard by paying its flashback cost.
Watch out: Follow its normal timing. A spell cast with flashback is exiled when it leaves the stack, even if it is countered.
Archmage's Newt
Siphon Insight
Slickshot LockpickerFlying
Keyword abilityAn attacking creature with flying can be blocked only by creatures with flying or reach.
Watch out: A flying creature can block a creature without flying.
Akul the Unrepentant
Archangel of TithesFood
TokenA standard Food token is an artifact with an ability costing two mana, tapping it, and sacrificing it to gain 3 life.
Watch out: Food is also an artifact type. Turning a card into a Food follows that effect’s text; the type alone does not grant an ability.
Bristlebud Farmer
Oko, Thief of Crowns
Transmutation FontFood
Card mechanicA Food token is an artifact you can pay two mana to tap and sacrifice for three life. One Food cannot pay two sacrifice costs. A creature that becomes a Food may have summoning sickness for its tap ability.
H
Haste
Keyword abilityThis creature may attack and use abilities with the tap or untap symbol even if you have not controlled it since your turn began.
Watch out: It still needs to be untapped to attack or pay a tap cost.
Cactusfolk Sureshot
Calamity, Galloping Inferno
Cunning CoyoteHexproof
Keyword abilityA permanent with hexproof cannot be targeted by spells or abilities its controller’s opponents control.
Watch out: Its controller may target it. Effects that do not target can still affect it.
Fleeting Reflection
Miriam, Herd Whisperer
Oko, the RingleaderHideaway
Card mechanicWhen this permanent enters, look at the stated number of library cards, exile one face down and put the others on the bottom randomly. Its separate ability says when you can play that card; hideaway alone grants no casting permission.
Collector's CageI
Indestructible
Keyword abilityThis permanent cannot be destroyed by lethal damage or an effect that says “destroy.”
Watch out: It can still be exiled or sacrificed. A creature with toughness 0 or less still goes to the graveyard.
Final Showdown
Lotus Ring
Overzealous MuscleInvestigate
Card mechanicCreate a Clue artifact token. You may later pay two mana and sacrifice that Clue to draw a card. Investigating itself does not draw the card.
Hostile Investigator
Malcolm, the EyesK
Keyword counters
CounterA keyword counter grants its named ability, such as trample, to the object it is on.
Watch out: A trample counter is not a +1/+1 counter. The named ability and the creature’s size are separate.
Dust Animus
Inventive Wingsmith
Vraska Joins UpL
Landfall
Ability wordThis label groups abilities that reward a land entering under your control. The rest of each card tells you its effect.
Watch out: A land entering from a spell can trigger landfall too. The label itself adds no rules; read the actual ability.
Lifelink
Keyword abilityWhen this source deals damage, its controller gains that much life at the same time.
Watch out: This also works for noncombat damage. It uses the damage actually dealt, not simply the creature’s printed power.
Baron Bertram Graywater
Congregation Gryff
Desperate BloodseekerLoyalty counters
CounterA planeswalker’s loyalty is the number of loyalty counters on it. Its loyalty costs add or remove counters, and damage removes that much loyalty.
Watch out: A planeswalker with 0 loyalty goes to the graveyard. Adding more counters does not let you activate it a second time in the same turn.
Jace ReawakenedM
Madness
Card mechanicWhen you discard this card, exile it instead. Its trigger lets you cast it for the madness cost then, even outside normal sorcery timing. If you decline, put it into your graveyard.
Terminal AgonyMenace
Keyword abilityThis attacking creature cannot be blocked by just one creature; at least two blockers are needed.
Watch out: It can still go unblocked. Losing one blocker after blocks are declared does not undo the original block.
Breeches, the BlastmakerMercenary tokens
Card mechanicThe red 1/1 Mercenary tokens can tap at sorcery speed to give a creature you control +1/+0 for the turn.
Brimstone RoundupMill
Keyword actionPut the stated number of cards from the top of the named player’s library into that player’s graveyard.
Watch out: Milling is not drawing. An empty library makes you lose when you must draw from it, not merely when its last card is milled.
Archive Trap
Deepmuck DesperadoO
Outlaws
Card mechanicAssassins, Mercenaries, Pirates, Rogues and Warlocks are outlaws. Having any one of those types is enough.
Caught in the CrossfireP
Plot
Card mechanicAt sorcery speed, pay the plot cost to exile the card from your hand. Cast it for free at sorcery speed on a later turn.
Beastbond OutcasterProliferate
Keyword actionChoose any number of permanents or players that already have counters. Give each chosen one another counter of every kind it already has.
Watch out: You cannot add the first counter of a kind this way. If a chosen permanent has a harmful counter, that kind increases too.
Contagion EngineProtection
Card mechanicProtection from a quality prevents damage from sources of that quality and stops their targeting, blocking, enchanting and equipping. It does not stop untargeted destruction or sacrifice effects.
Resilient RoadrunnerProwess
Keyword abilityWhenever you cast a noncreature spell, this creature gets +1/+1 until the turn ends.
Watch out: Lands are not spells. The prowess trigger can resolve even if the spell that triggered it is countered.
Lilah, Undefeated SlickshotR
Raid
Card mechanicRaid checks whether you attacked with a creature this turn. That creature need not have dealt damage or still be on the battlefield. Read each card’s specific reward.
Heartless PillageReach
Keyword abilityThis creature may block creatures with flying.
Watch out: Reach does not give it flying or make its own attacks harder to block.
Bonny Pall, ClearcutterS
Sacrifice
Keyword actionMove a permanent you control from the battlefield to its owner’s graveyard.
Watch out: Sacrifice is not destruction: indestructible does not stop it. You cannot sacrifice a teammate’s permanent unless an effect specifically permits it.
Saddle
Card mechanicTap other untapped creatures with enough total power to make the Mount saddled until end of turn.
Bounding Felidar
Bridled BighornScry
Keyword actionLook at the stated number of cards from the top of your library. Put any number on the bottom and the rest back on top, choosing their order.
Watch out: Scry does not draw a card. Cards you move to the bottom do not go to the graveyard.
Fortune, Loyal Steed
Holy Cow
Iron-Fist PulverizerSignal
Strategy · DraftRepeated useful cards arriving late may indicate an open color; one card is weak evidence.
Spectacle
Card mechanicIf an opponent lost life this turn, you may cast the spell for its spectacle cost instead of its mana cost. Normal timing and additional costs still apply.
Skewer the CriticsSpree
Card mechanicChoose one or more modes and add their listed costs to the spell’s base cost.
Dance of the TumbleweedsStun counters
CounterIf a permanent with a stun counter would untap, remove one stun counter instead and leave it tapped.
Watch out: The counter does not tap an untapped permanent by itself. Several stun counters can stop several separate untaps.
Shackle SlingerSurveil
Keyword actionLook at the stated number of cards from the top of your library. Put any number into your graveyard and the rest back on top in your chosen order.
Watch out: Surveil does not draw a card. Unlike scry, unwanted cards go to the graveyard instead of the bottom.
Conduit Pylons
Consuming AshesSynergy
StrategyCards helping each other do a useful job.
T
Tap and untap
Keyword actionTap means turn a permanent sideways; untap means return it upright. A tap symbol in a cost means you must tap that permanent to pay.
Watch out: Being tapped by another effect does not activate an ability or produce mana. Creatures normally cannot pay their own tap-symbol costs until you have controlled them since your turn began.
Abraded Bluffs
Ancient CornucopiaTrample
Keyword abilityAn attacking creature can assign excess combat damage to what it is attacking after assigning lethal damage to every blocker.
Watch out: It does not automatically send all damage past a small blocker. Trample on a blocking creature does not send damage to the attacking player.
Treasure
TokenA standard Treasure token is an artifact you can tap and sacrifice to add one mana of any color.
Watch out: A Treasure is not a land. Using it spends the token; it does not remain for another turn.
Fake Your Own Death
Generous PlundererV
Vigilance
Keyword abilityAttacking does not tap this creature.
Watch out: It must still be untapped to be declared as an attacker. Vigilance does not remove summoning sickness.
Claim Jumper
Duelist of the MindW
Ward
Keyword abilityWhen an opponent’s spell or ability targets this permanent, ward triggers. That spell or ability is countered unless the opponent pays the ward cost.
Watch out: Ward is not hexproof: the opponent can target it and choose whether to pay. An effect that does not target does not trigger ward.
Fblthp, Lost on the Range