Plaguecrafter's Familiar MTG Card

Plaguecrafter's Familiar - Jumpstart: Historic Horizons

Mana cost
Converted mana cost	2
Rarity	Common
Type	Creature — Rat
Abilities	Deathtouch
Released	2021-08-26
Set symbol
Set name	Jumpstart: Historic Horizons
Set code	J21
Power	1
Toughness	1
Number	18
Frame	2015
Layout	Normal
Border	Black
Illustred by	Nicholas Gregory

Key Takeaways

Forces opponent sacrifices, yielding potential card advantage and disrupting opponent’s in-game strategies.
Accelerates graveyard strategies, setting up for game-changing plays in future turns.
A creature itself, it offers both battlefield presence and versatile interaction with instant speed spells.

Text of card

Deathtouch When Plaguecrafter's Familiar enters the battlefield, choose a creature card in your hand. It perpetually gains deathtouch.

Card Pros

Card Advantage: Plaguecrafter’s Familiar can essentially force the opponent to discard a creature or planeswalker, potentially stripping their hand of valuable resources while you maintain board presence. This effect can tip the scales in your favor, ensuring you stay ahead on cards in play.

Resource Acceleration: If you have creatures that benefit from death triggers or graveyard play, such as those with the scavenge or unearth abilities, this card accelerates your strategy by putting the right resources into your graveyard. This can fuel a variety of strategies and set up powerful plays in subsequent turns.

Instant Speed: While Plaguecrafter’s Familiar operates at sorcery speed, it synergizes well with other instant speed interactions in your deck. It allows you to make strategic decisions at the right moment during your turn, thus maximizing the potential impact of sacrificing creatures or causing opponents to sacrifice when most advantageous to you.

Card Cons

Discard Requirement: Plaguecrafter’s Familiar requires a player to sacrifice a creature, planeswalker, or discard a card when it enters the battlefield. This can be a double-edged sword, especially when you are ahead on the board but limited on cards in hand.

Specific Mana Cost: This card requires one black mana and two generic mana. This specific need for black mana can restrict its inclusion only to black-based or two-color decks with black, potentially limiting its versatility across various deck types.

Comparatively High Mana Cost: While Plaguecrafter’s Familiar has a valuable enter-the-battlefield effect, its casting cost of three mana may be considered high in formats where mana efficiency is key, particularly since other lower-cost cards can provide similar impacts sooner in the game.

Reasons to Include Plaguecrafter’s Familiar in Your Collection

Versatility: Plaguecrafter’s Familiar can be a key addition to multiple deck archetypes. This card can pivot a game’s direction, impacting both creature-heavy and control-oriented decks by forcing opponents to make tough decisions.

Combo Potential: The card thrives in synergy-rich environments, particularly where sacrificing creatures is beneficial. It can act as a catalyst for triggering death-related abilities or enhancing graveyard strategies.

Meta-Relevance: With a shifting competitive landscape, Plaguecrafter’s Familiar adapts well. It’s especially potent in a meta where opponents rely on key creatures or where mana-efficient removal is at a premium.

How to beat

Plaguecrafter’s Familiar is a potent tool in MTG, offering an advantage by forcing each player to sacrifice a creature or planeswalker when no creatures are available. To counter this card effectively, it is essential to manage your board presence strategically. Keep expendable creatures in play to offer as sacrifices, minimizing the impact on your more valuable assets. Additionally, leveraging spells that can remove creatures at instant speed ensures you can react to the Familiar’s trigger, thereby maintaining control of your side of the battlefield.

In cases where the Familiar may repeatedly return from the graveyard, include cards with graveyard hate capabilities to prevent this cycle. Cards like Rest in Peace or Scavenging Ooze can be instrumental in keeping Plaguecrafter’s Familiar and other similar threats at bay permanently. Recognizing the pivotal moments to disrupt combos involving this card is crucial to maintaining the upper hand.

Ultimately, holding back on playing critical creatures until after the familiar has been dealt with, or employing creatures with enter-the-battlefield effects that render a forced sacrifice less painful are sound strategies. By adopting these approaches, you can diminish the advantage Plaguecrafter’s Familiar provides to your opponents, swinging the game in your favor.

Cards like Plaguecrafter's Familiar

Plaguecrafter’s Familiar emerges as a compelling choice for card advantage and creature removal in Magic: The Gathering. It draws a parallel to another notorious card called Fleshbag Marauder, which shares the same effect of compelling each player to sacrifice a creature. However, Plaguecrafter’s Familiar offers an alternative by being a creature itself, providing a body on the battlefield along with the removal utility.

Delving into closer comparisons, Merciless Executioner stands out as well. Much like Plaguecrafter’s Familiar, it marries the concept of creature removal with a creature on the board. Nonetheless, the Executioner lacks the potential upside of the Familiar’s possible benefit from creature-based synergies or graveyard strategies. Next in line is the eponymous Plaguecrafter, which also forces sacrifices and adds the possibility of discarding a card or losing life if opponents can’t sacrifice a creature, proving to be a more versatile yet strict alternative based on the situation.

When analyzing the efficiency and potential of creature sacrifice cards, Plaguecrafter’s Familiar holds its ground as a multifaceted option within creature-based strategies, offering both a presence on the field and a purge of opponent’s creatures, positioning it as a strategic inclusion in Magic: The Gathering decks that focus on sacrifice mechanics.

Merciless Executioner - MTG Card versions

Cards similar to Plaguecrafter's Familiar by color, type and mana cost

Order of the Ebon Hand - MTG Card versions

Where to buy

If you're looking to purchase Plaguecrafter's Familiar MTG card by a specific set like Jumpstart: Historic Horizons, there are several reliable options to consider. One of the primary sources is your local game store, where you can often find booster packs, individual cards, and preconstructed decks from current and some past sets. They often offer the added benefit of a community where you can trade with other players.

For a broader inventory, particularly of older sets, online marketplaces like TCGPlayer, Card Kingdom and Card Market offer extensive selections and allow you to search for cards from specific sets. Larger e-commerce platforms like eBay and Amazon also have listings from various sellers, which can be a good place to look for sealed product and rare finds.

Additionally, Magic’s official site often has a store locator and retailer lists for finding Wizards of the Coast licensed products. Remember to check for authenticity and the condition of the cards when purchasing, especially from individual sellers on larger marketplaces.

Below is a list of some store websites where you can buy the Plaguecrafter's Familiar and other MTG cards: