Kheru Lich Lord MTG Card
2014-09-26 - Number 182
2014-09-26 - Number 182s
| Card sets | Released in 2 setsSee all |
| Mana cost | |
| Converted mana cost | 6 |
| Rarity | Rare |
| Type | Creature — Zombie Wizard |
| Power | 4 |
| Toughness | 4 |
Key Takeaways
- Kheru Lich Lord ensures a stream of creatures, leveraging your graveyard for card advantage.
- It magnifies decks centered around graveyard strategies, making it a potent ally.
- The card’s high mana cost and specific color requirements may limit its deck compatibility.
Text of card
At the beginning of your upkeep, you may pay . If you do, return a creature card at random from your graveyard to the battlefield. It gains flying, trample, and haste. Exile that card at the beginning of your next end step. If it would leave the battlefield, exile it instead of putting it anywhere else.
Card Pros
Card Advantage: Kheru Lich Lord’s ability to potentially return creature cards from your graveyard to the battlefield during each of your upkeeps offers a consistent mechanism for gaining card advantage. This can overwhelm opponents with a relentless stream of threats without depleting resources from your hand.
Resource Acceleration: This card synergizes with decks that focus on filling the graveyard, which can act as a resource acceleration tool. The more creatures in your graveyard, the more options Kheru Lich Lord provides for a return to play—turning your graveyard into an extension of your hand.
Instant Speed: While Kheru Lich Lord itself does not operate at instant speed, it can bring back creatures with instant speed abilities or those that can be sacrificed for various instant effects. This allows for strategic plays by reanimating creatures with flash or those who can rise and impact the battlefield immediately during any phase of the game.
Card Cons
Discard Requirement: Kheru Lich Lord’s abilities often revolve around graveyard interaction, which at times necessitates discarding cards to maximize its potential. This element can deplete your hand, leaving you at a disadvantage during the late game when resources are crucial.
Specific Mana Cost: This card demands a specific blend of mana colors for its activation, restricting it to decks that can reliably produce black, blue, and green mana setups. This stringent requirement may not align with decks running on a more varied or limited color base.
Comparatively High Mana Cost: Commanding a sizeable sum of four mana, including three of specific colors, Kheru Lich Lord may be outpaced by other options within the same mana range. Its cost places it in direct competition with other game-changing cards that could deliver more immediate or impactful advantages on the battlefield.
Reasons to Include in Your Collection
Versatility: Kheru Lich Lord’s ability to reanimate creatures offers strategic flexibility. It fits well in graveyard-centric decks, as well as those aiming to make use of creatures with enter-the-battlefield or dies effects.
Combo Potential: This card allows for creative combinations with other cards that benefit from or facilitate graveyard strategies. It can be a key component in powerful synergies, serving as a recurring threat each turn.
Meta-Relevance: In a meta that favors longer games and complex board states, Kheru Lich Lord can provide ongoing value and resilience against removal-heavy decks. Its presence on the board is always a looming threat that opponents must account for.
How to beat
Kheru Lich Lord is a formidable foe on the battlefield, known for using the graveyard as a resource in Magic: The Gathering. This daunting card can bring back creatures from the graveyard at the beginning of your upkeep, which can quickly overwhelm opponents if left unchecked. To counteract the lich lord’s power, you’ll want to have strategies focused on graveyard disruption.
Using cards like Tormod’s Crypt or Leyline of the Void can effectively neutralize the abilities of Kheru Lich Lord by either removing creatures from the graveyard or preventing them from entering the graveyard in the first place. Additionally, cards that exile creatures such as Path to Exile or Swords to Plowshares prevent the lich lord from utilizing those creatures as fuel for its resurrection ability. Counterspells can also play a key role, especially if you can counter Kheru Lich Lord upon its initial casting—mana permitting.
Putting up a robust defense is equally important. Creatures with deathtouch or enough toughness to withstand repeated attacks will force the lich lord’s controller to think twice before attacking. In summary, to combat the Kheru Lich Lord, players must manage the graveyard strategically and be prepared to neutralize threats emanating from it.
Cards like Kheru Lich Lord
Kheru Lich Lord stands out in the realm of graveyard manipulation cards in Magic: The Gathering. It shares space with the likes of Havengul Lich, which also interacts with creatures in the graveyard but offers a different angle of play. Havengul Lich allows you to cast creatures from any graveyard, giving you access to a wider array of options, albeit without the reanimation theme that Kheru Lich Lord provides. The Lord, conversely, reanimates a creature at random at each of your upkeeps but requires it to be from your own graveyard.
Another peer is The Scarab God, a card that not only excruciates your opponent’s life total with its upkeep trigger but also eternalizes creatures from either graveyard. Unlike Kheru Lich Lord, The Scarab God gives you control over the choice of creature and turns them into potent 4/4 tokens. This direct power and control often overshadow the stochastic nature of Kheru Lich Lord’s ability.
Delving further, we see the flavorful Geth, Lord of the Vault. While Geth doesn’t bring creatures to the battlefield on its own, it serves to steadily reanimate and swerve control of your opponent’s creatures or artifacts. Unlike Kheru Lich Lord, it focuses less on random reanimation and more on strategic graveyard plundering. Observing these nuanced interactions and strategic differences helps players better understand Kheru Lich Lord’s unique position in the game’s vast card pool.
Cards similar to Kheru Lich Lord by color, type and mana cost
Where to buy
If you're looking to purchase Kheru Lich Lord MTG card by a specific set like Khans of Tarkir and Khans of Tarkir Promos, 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 Kheru Lich Lord and other MTG cards:
- eBay
- TCG Player
- Card Kingdom
- Card Market
- Star City Games
- CoolStuffInc
- MTG Mint Card
- Hareruya
- Troll and Toad
- ABU Games
- Card Hoarder Magic Online
- MTGO Traders Magic Online
See MTG Products
Printings
The Kheru Lich Lord Magic the Gathering card was released in 2 different sets between 2014-09-26 and 2014-09-26. Illustrated by Karl Kopinski.
| # | Released | Name | Code | Symbol | Number | Frame | Layout | Border | Artist |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2014-09-26 | Khans of Tarkir | KTK | 182 | 2015 | Normal | Black | Karl Kopinski | |
| 2 | 2014-09-26 | Khans of Tarkir Promos | PKTK | 182s | 2015 | Normal | Black | Karl Kopinski |
Legalities
Magic the Gathering formats where Kheru Lich Lord has restrictions
| Format | Legality |
|---|---|
| Historicbrawl | Legal |
| Historic | Legal |
| Legacy | Legal |
| Oathbreaker | Legal |
| Gladiator | Legal |
| Pioneer | Legal |
| Commander | Legal |
| Modern | Legal |
| Vintage | Legal |
| Duel | Legal |
| Explorer | Legal |
| Penny | Legal |
| Timeless | Legal |
Rules and information
The reference guide for Magic: The Gathering Kheru Lich Lord card rulings provides official rulings, any errata issued, as well as a record of all the functional modifications that have occurred.
| Date | Text |
|---|---|
| 2014-09-20 | Because the ability doesn’t target any creature card, any creature card (including Kheru Lich Lord itself) put into the graveyard in response to that ability may be returned to the battlefield. |
| 2014-09-20 | If a creature card returned to the battlefield with Kheru Lich Lord would leave the battlefield for any reason, it’s exiled instead. However, if that creature is already being exiled, then the replacement effect won’t apply. If the spell or ability that exiles it later returns it to the battlefield (as Suspension Field might, for example), the creature card will return to the battlefield as a new object with no relation to its previous existence. The effects from Kheru Lich Lord will no longer apply to it. |
| 2014-09-20 | Kheru Lich Lord grants flying, trample, and haste to the creature that’s returned to the battlefield. However, neither of the “exile” abilities is granted to that creature. If that creature loses all its abilities, it will still be exiled at the beginning of your next end step, and if it would leave the battlefield, it is still exiled instead. |
| 2014-09-20 | The ability that exiles the card at the beginning of your next end step is a delayed triggered ability. If the delayed triggered ability is countered, the creature will stay on the battlefield and the ability won’t trigger again. However, the replacement effect will still exile the creature when it eventually leaves the battlefield. |
| 2014-09-20 | The creature card returned to the battlefield is chosen at random as the ability resolves. If any player responds to the ability, that player won’t yet know what card will be returned. |
| 2014-09-20 | The exiled creature is never put into the graveyard. Any abilities the creature has that trigger when it dies won’t trigger. |
| 2014-09-20 | You decide whether to pay as the ability resolves. |
