Magar of the Magic Strings

Legendary Creature — Minotaur Performer

{1}{B}{R}: Note the name of target instant or sorcery card in your graveyard and put it onto the battlefield face down. It's a 3/3 creature with "Whenever this creature deals combat damage to a player, you may create a copy of the card with the noted name. You may cast the copy without paying its mana cost" and "If this creature would leave the battlefield, exile it instead of putting it anywhere else."

Legality

Format	Legality
1v1 Commander	Legal
Archenemy	Legal
Canadian Highlander	Legal
Casual	Legal
Commander / EDH	Legal
Commander: Rule 0	Legal
Custom	Legal
Duel Commander	Legal
Highlander	Legal
Legacy	Legal
Leviathan	Legal
Limited	Legal
Oathbreaker	Legal
Planechase	Legal
Quest Magic	Legal
Tiny Leaders	Legal
Unformat	Legal
Vanguard	Legal
Vintage	Legal

Discussion (7)

DreadKhan on Rakdos Santa Deck

10 months ago

Well, here is what I found: Anarchist, which seems over costed but will leave you a body you can Blim away, Ardent Elementalist is similar but 1 mana less. Backdraft Hellkite can let you Flashback Offering, but that's one and done as it's exiled after. Biblioplex Assistant has Flying, but that's a bad thing to give an opponent obviously. Bloodthirsty Adversary is another one off. Charmbreaker Devils are one of the more interesting ones, but it's awfully clunky. Efreet Flamepainter seems half-decent, but isn't repeatable. I'm a bit curious if Finale of Promise would work at all, it's annoying that you'd need both types, but if you can copy a Dark Ritual/Seething Song and Harmless Offering you can still do more stuff after. Invoke Calamity might be a fit, it's a lot of mana but is a strong effect. Goblin Dark-Dwellers is a beefy body but probably not something you'd want to donate after. I'm not sure if you could get in for damage with the spell-creature, but if you can Magar of the Magic Strings is pretty interesting. If you can get enough mana together Mizzix's Mastery might work, 4 mana to recast a 3 mana spell isn't terrible I'd say. Ogre Battlecaster might do it's thing more than once with First Strike. I'm not sure if Shreds of Sanity is reasonable, 2R is pretty cheap for this, but having to discard sucks. Revolutionist seems openly bad unless you can cast it via Madness. Spellweaver Helix is cool but might be too janky, but it can generate more Offerings (and another Sorcery I guess). I don't think you have a wide enough board to use it, but if you added more creatures then Surge to Victory could fit. Hope something in that pile I could dig out will work, there are some really pushed options like Yawgmoth's Will and Underworld Breach too fwiw, I guess you could Blim away Breach when you're done with it?

Random thought, but if you're fine with recursion effects maybe Oriq Loremage would fit in here? Probably would require more building around though, but Entomb is a great effect to have stapled to a creature if you've got the right cards.

Yesterday on Can you use Deceiver of …

1 year ago

Following up on a question from a few days ago, what happens if you control a face-down creature that doesn't have morph or a variant, and your Deceiver of Form's trigger goes off? I reveal a Scornful Egotist off Deceiver's trigger.

According to the answer in the other thread, if I control an Akroma, Angel of Fury I've cast as a morph creature, I can flip it face-up for U at which point it'll be a face-up Scornful Egotist until end of turn.

If I control a Yargle, Glutton of Urborg that was turned face-down with an Ixidron, can I spend U to turn the Yargle face-up?

And if so... what happens if I've used a Magar of the Magic Strings to reanimate a sorcery spell as a face-down creature? Can I pay U to turn it face-up as a copy of the Egotist until end of turn? Or do the rules that prevent instants and sorceries entering the battlefield prevent you from turning the card face-up even when it's a copy of a creature card?

TheDaftWizard on Source of Casting a Copy …

1 year ago

Hi! I'm a rules advisor and was brought to this thread by a friend asking me about the interaction between Magar of the Magic Strings and Weathered Runestone. for the sake of brevity, "instant" here will mean either instant or sorcery. Here's what I wrote:

The defining issue of this debate is the fundamental difference in the framework of the game between a Card and an Object. (109.1) "An object is an ability on the stack, a card, a copy of a card, a token, a spell, a permanent, or an emblem." When a card moves zones, it (usually) becomes an entirely new object and loses all knowledge of its previous existence, and (most) effects attempting to refer to that object won't find it if it's no longer in that zone. Therefore, if an effect would both need to refer to information about an object and move that object into a new zone, the effect would necessitate the creation of a "Last Known Information" packet about the object. To be noted is that LKI and an object's Characteristics (as defined in 109.3) are two distinct concepts. LKI contains but is not limited to Characteristics, and Characteristics contains but is not limited to Copiable Values.

Magar's ability has you "note the name" of a target instant card in your graveyard, then has you move that card onto the battlefield face down as a creature. Because you targeted an object, moved that object, AND created an effect that would refer to that object, a LKI packet is created containing all possible information about the instant card in your graveyard. Because Runestone only cares if the object attempting to enter the battlefield is a "nonland permanent card, in a graveyard", it will have no issues with this because at all times in which the referred object is in the graveyard, it is an instant card.

The difference between Magar and Garth is that because Garth instructs you to "create a copy of a card defined by name rather than by indicating an object to be copied" (707.13), his CR entry needs to clarify what zone it is in which this new object is being created; in his case, outside the game. However, Magar instructs you to "use the [LKI packet of the object] in the graveyard to determine the copiable values of the copy" (707.14), and because 707.12 says that "An effect that instructs a player to cast a copy of an object (and not just copy a spell) follows the rules for casting spells, except that the copy is created in the same zone the object is in and then cast while another spell or ability is resolving," Magar's ability will need to create a copy of the referred object which, according to the LKI packet, is a card, with the Instant type, in a graveyard.

Therefore, when the ability given to the 3/3 creature triggers, and attempts to "create a copy of the card with the noted name", it would create a new object into your graveyard that contains the copiable values of the LKI packet, then would allow you to "cast the copy"; unfortunately, because of Weathered Runestone, players can't cast spells from graveyards, so the new object will be unable to be moved onto the stack, and will remain in your graveyard until state-based actions are checked and (707.10a) will cause that object to cease to exist.

TL;DR the copy of the instant/sorcery targeted by Magar will be a new object, initially created into your graveyard, then cast from your graveyard and moved to the stack.

Bonus Points: Spellweaver Volute also has you create a new object into your Graveyard; God-Eternal Kefnet instructs you to create a new object into your Library; and weirdest of all, Reversal of Fortune instructs you to create a new object into an opponent's Hand!

Monomanamaniac on Neheb, the Worthy

1 year ago

It's not a tribe I'm familiar with, and I don't have much info on your budget, but I'll give my general suggestions for cuts and adds.

Adds: Deathbellow War Cry it's expensive, but you're going to get so much value.Moraug, Fury of Akoum def not budget, but it's the best minotaur finisher. Didgeridoo not budget, but it'll help save a lot on casting costs. you end up discarding a lot too, you could put in Containment Construct, especially if you put in something like Neheb, Dreadhorde Champion in there. Magar of the Magic Strings looks like you probably have enough spells in there for it to be cool. Lastly maybe Thrill of Possibility could be decent.

Cuts: Black suns zenith, Ruby medallion because you're not mono-red, minotaur explorer because why? Abrade, if you really want that effect then run Rakdos Charm. Besides that I don't see too much that I don't agree with.

Overall it seems like a pretty well put together deck.

Gidgetimer on Source of Casting a Copy …

1 year ago

What you are asking is more clear now. If I had to do a judge call on it I'd say that it is created outside the game and they didn't think to edit 707.13 for an unset. You might have to hit up Jess Dunks on twitter as the rules for Magar of the Magic Strings don't seem to be clear. I think we can all agree that it isn't cast from the hand, exile, command zone, or library. But whether it is graveyard, battlefield or outside the game seems to be up to interpretation.

Minathia on Source of Casting a Copy …

1 year ago

Any card that says, "create a copy of [target, exiled, facedown, noted, etc.] CARD. You may cast this card. [sometimes with new timing/costs]

Magar of the Magic Strings+Delayed Blast Fireball

If the spell copied cares about the zone a spell is cast from, , do the copies have one to reference? Fundamentally, when you create a copy of a card, in what zone does that copy exist in BEFORE you cast it, but after it is created. We know it doesn't just default to the stack, because the first step in casting a spell is to move it from the zone it is in onto the stack.

I've been up and down 707 and I really can't answer this.

707.13 is explicitly for Garth One-Eye. It says the player creates a copy of the card outside the game and casts it from there.

707.14 focuses on Magar of the Magic Strings. The player uses characteristics of that card as it last existed in the graveyard to determine the copiable values of the copy, but nothing on where that copy of a card exists before casting it.

Thoughts?

Quickspell on 32 Sustainable Spells to Burn Body Fat

1 year ago

Thanks enpc, but I do have everything from Vampiric Tutor to Grim Tutor. I specifically did not add them because Dragon‘s Approach by itself already has a repetitive gameplay, so I’m not going to narrow it down to tutoring for Thrumming Stone and be done with it. It’s much more fun to dig with Florian, Voldaren Scion and see if you get lucky. I doubt I‘d ever activate Maskwood Nexus. I’d rather spend that on another DA or even on Magar of the Magic Strings but probably Black Market Connections would be the best option here. What I’m looking for is something like Whirlwind of Thought that gains me cards for casting DA.