Counter target spell.
, Sacrifice this creature: Counter target spell.
In front of every great wizard is a doomed apprentice.
Change the target of target spell with a single target.
Up and down,
over and through,
back around—
the joke's on you.
Counter target spell. If an artifact or creature spell is countered this way, put that card onto the battlefield under your control instead of into its owner's graveyard.
First the insult, then the injury.
Each player shuffles their hand and graveyard into their library. You exile the top ten cards of your library. Then each player draws up to seven cards.
Draw three cards, then put two cards from your hand both on top of your library or both on the bottom of your library.
Dreams' riches are easily spent.
—Suq'Ata adage
You may put a creature card from your hand onto the battlefield. If you do, sacrifice it unless you pay its mana cost reduced by .
Enchant creature
Enchanted creature has flying.
Flying (This creature can't be blocked except by creatures with flying or reach.)
When this creature attacks or blocks, sacrifice it at end of combat.
"I've seen fog so thick you could cut it, but none that could cut me."
—Tahngarth of the Weatherlight
Target player discards two cards, then draws as many cards as they discarded this way.
Enchant creature
Prevent all combat damage that would be dealt to and dealt by enchanted creature.
Defender (This creature can't attack.)
"Huge walls of ice block further travel. We can't believe they are natural."
—Disa the Restless, journal entry
Flying
: Target creature gains flying until end of turn.
"One moment I was walking along the beach, and the next I was high in the air, staring into a hideous smiling face."
—Tarub, Suq'Ata sailor
"So like men are they: a hardened shell with fragile flesh beneath."
—Selenia, dark angel
Whenever an opponent casts a green spell, you draw a card.
"We can fight with you or against you. After my day, I'd prefer the former."
—Gerrard of the Weatherlight
Target player draws two cards.
"Madness and genius are separated only by degrees of success."
—Sidar Jabari
You and target player exchange control of the creature you each control with the greatest mana value. Then exchange control of artifacts the same way. If two or more permanents a player controls are tied for greatest, their controller chooses one of them.
An opponent chooses one —
• You draw three cards at the beginning of the next turn's upkeep.
• You search your library for a card, put that card into your hand, then shuffle.
Other Merfolk get +1/+1 and have islandwalk. (They can't be blocked as long as defending player controls an Island.)
A master of tactics, the lord of Atlantis makes his people bold in battle merely by arriving to lead them.
Tap all lands target player controls and that player loses all unspent mana.
Counter target spell. If that spell is countered this way, put it on top of its owner's library instead of into that player's graveyard.
"Um . . . oh . . . what was I saying?"
—Reveka, wizard savant
Are merfolk humans with fins, or are humans merfolk with feet?
Search your library for an instant or sorcery card, reveal it, then shuffle and put that card on top.
"To the tutors, a 'poem of sand' was of little account, a 'poem of ivory,' priceless."
—Afari, Tales
Enchant land
As this Aura enters, choose a basic land type.
Enchanted land is the chosen type.
This creature can't be blocked.
The phantom warrior comes from nowhere and returns there just as quickly.
Destroy target creature. It can't be regenerated. Its controller reveals cards from the top of their library until they reveal a creature card. The player puts that card onto the battlefield, then shuffles all other cards revealed this way into their library.
"Ahh! Opposable digits!"
Counter target spell unless its controller pays . If that player doesn't, they tap all lands with mana abilities they control and lose all unspent mana.
: This creature deals 1 damage to any target.
Occasionally members of the Institute of Arcane Study acquire a taste for worldly pleasures. Seldom do they have trouble finding employment.
Each player draws X cards.
"Wealth is a good thing, compared to poverty—your food is better, your robes are softer, and your companions have bathed more recently."
—Kukemssa pirate
If the difference between your life total and target player's life total is 5 or less, exchange life totals with that player.
"The memory of your existence will fade like the final stars of morning."
—Kaervek
Enchant land
Whenever enchanted land becomes tapped, this Aura deals 2 damage to that land's controller.
Discard X cards, then return a card from your graveyard to your hand for each card discarded this way. Exile Recall.
Return target instant or sorcery card from your graveyard to your hand.
"Barrin taught me that the hardest lessons to grasp are the ones you've already learned."
—Ertai, wizard adept
Counter target creature spell.
Nethya stiffened suddenly, head cocked as if straining to hear some distant sound, then fell lifeless to the ground.
Flying
When this creature enters, look at the top four cards of your library, then put them back in any order.
The owl asks but never answers.
This creature can't attack unless defending player controls an Island.
Water is life. Or perhaps it is just something to wash it down with.
Islandwalk (This creature can't be blocked as long as defending player controls an Island.)
"Leviathan, too! Can you catch him with a fish-hook or run a line round his tongue?"
—The Bible, Job 41:1
Flying
Whenever this creature attacks, defending player may draw a card.
She had expected death to roar, to thunder, to growl. She did not recognize it when it came hissing to her side.
, Sacrifice two lands: Draw three cards, then discard one of them.
"To hide the truth is more than folly—it is fatal."
—Sorine Relicbane, Soldevi heretic
Counter target spell with mana value X. (For example, if that spell's mana cost is , X is 5.)
Call it the thinking mage's version of brute force.
Flying (This creature can't be blocked except by creatures with flying or reach.)
Storm crow descending, winter unending. Storm crow departing, summer is starting.
Tap up to three target creatures without flying.
"It is nature that gives us our boundaries and nature that enforces them."
—Eladamri, Lord of Leaves
Return target creature to its owner's hand.
"Vodalian rank is displayed by the colors and patterns of their skin. Beware the color red; that is the badge of the empress's favor."
—Corbio, pearl diver
Defender, flying (This creature can't attack, and it can block creatures with flying.)
When no falcons fly, beware the sky.
—Femeref aphorism
Flying
"No bird soars too high, if he soars with his own wings."
—William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell
Flying
Menace (This creature can't be blocked except by two or more creatures.)
" . . . When the trees bow down their heads, The wind is passing by."
—Christina Rossetti,
"Who Has Seen the Wind?"
Players play with their hands revealed.
If a player would draw a card, they reveal it instead. Then any other player may pay 2 life. If a player does, put that card into its owner's graveyard. Otherwise, that player draws a card.
, : Tap target creature. This creature deals damage equal to its power to that creature.
Some smiles show cheer; some merely show teeth.
Flying
Whenever this creature deals damage to a player, that player discards a card.
Look at target player's hand and choose two cards from it. Put them on top of that player's library in any order.
"An innocent man died because of my anger. That knowledge will haunt me for all eternity."
—Karn, silver golem
Put target creature card from an opponent's graveyard onto the battlefield under your control.
"What you call decay, I call ripening. You'll gain no sustenance from this harvest."
—Kaervek
Enchant land
When enchanted land becomes tapped, destroy it.
, Sacrifice a Swamp: Target creature gets +1/+1 until end of turn.
, Sacrifice a creature: Target creature gets +2/+2 until end of turn.
Sacrifice this creature: Add .
"You are wrong," Volrath said. "I do not hate the living. They often prove quite useful to me." And then he laughed.
Flying (This creature can't be blocked except by creatures with flying or reach.)
Don't be fooled by their looks. Think of them as little knives with wings.
This creature can't be blocked by Walls.
Their stench was vile and strong enough, but not nearly as powerful as their hunger.
Swampwalk (This creature can't be blocked as long as defending player controls a Swamp.)
It moved through the troops leaving no footprints, save on their souls.
Target opponent reveals their hand. You choose a card from it. That player discards that card.
A rhino's bargain
—Femeref expression meaning "a situation with no choices"
Black spells you cast cost more to cast.
"Strength it has, but at the cost of a continuous supply of energy. Such failure can bear only one result."
—Execution order of Endrek Sahr, master breeder