Endless Cockroaches MTG Card

Portal (POR)
1997-05-01 - Number 92

Endless Cockroaches - Commander 2013 (C13)

Commander 2013 (C13)
2013-11-01 - Number 75

Card sets	Released in 2 setsSee all
Mana cost
Converted mana cost	3
Rarity	Rare
Type	Creature — Insect
Power	1
Toughness	1

Key Takeaways

Grants continuous board presence through its ability to return to your hand after death.
Enhances strategies utilizing death-triggered abilities for accelerated board development.
Ideal for combatting removal-heavy metas due to its recurring nature.

Text of card

If Endless Cockroaches is put into your discard pile from play, return Endless Cockroaches to your hand.

Card Pros

Card Advantage: The resilient nature of Endless Cockroaches ensures a persistent board presence, effectively providing card advantage by returning to your hand upon death. This makes them a consistent blocker or fodder for sacrifice effects without losing resources.

Resource Acceleration: While not directly increasing your mana pool, the tenacity of Endless Cockroaches allows for repeated use of death-triggered abilities or effects that benefit from creatures entering the battlefield, optimizing your plays and paving the way for accelerated growth on the board.

Instant Speed: Though not an instant itself, the return-to-hand ability of Endless Cockroaches pairs well with instant-speed sacrifice outlets. This interaction can catch opponents off-guard, disrupting their strategy at critical moments and providing you a strategic advantage at any point during the game.

Card Cons

Discard Requirement: Endless Cockroaches doesn’t directly ask for a discard, but it does require holding up mana which could lead to missed opportunities or a need to discard if you’re at your maximum hand size.

Specific Mana Cost: Endless Cockroaches demands a precise mana arrangement, specifically three black mana. This requirement could potentially restrict the inclusion of the card to mono-black or heavily black-influenced decks, reducing its versatility.

Comparatively High Mana Cost: With a casting cost of three mana, Endless Cockroaches is costlier than some other recursive creatures. In a fast-paced game, this can slow down your board development, especially when competing against decks that operate on more mana-efficient strategies.

Reasons to Include Endless Cockroaches in Your Collection

Versatility: Endless Cockroaches is an adaptable card that can incessantly return to your hand upon death. This trait makes it a persistent threat in any deck focusing on sacrifice strategies or looking to capitalize on creature death triggers.

Combo Potential: This card has great synergy with numerous sacrifice outlets and death-triggered abilities. Its ability to come back to your hand allows you to repeatedly activate combos that can decimate opponents or rapidly build your board presence.

Meta-Relevance: With the prevalence of removal and board wipes in many games, Endless Cockroaches can offer resilience. This resilience becomes particularly impactful in metas where the ability to recover from other players’ destructive plays can mean the difference between a win or a loss.

How to beat

Endless Cockroaches may seem like an unyielding threat in your opponent’s MTG lineup due to its persistence on the battlefield. Each time the creatures are sent to the graveyard, they make their way back to the owner’s hand, ready to be replayed. This can create a loop of defensive blockers or aggressive forces that seem impossible to exhaust. But don’t be discouraged—there are strategies to stop the swarm.

Addressing the problem directly, exile removal spells are your best choice. By using cards that exile creatures like Path to Exile or Swords to Plowshares, Endless Cockroaches don’t get the chance to return to the hand, effectively neutralizing the threat. Alternatively, leveraging control cards such as countermagic or certain board wipe spells that tuck creatures into the library rather than destroying them, can bypass the cockroach’s tenacious ability. And don’t forget about cards that force a player to sacrifice creatures, since these actions won’t trigger the cockroach’s ability.

Ultimately, the key to overcoming the challenge posed by Endless Cockroaches lies in utilizing the right spells that disrupt the loop and gaining card advantage while minimizing the cockroaches’ impact on the game.

Cards like Endless Cockroaches

Endless Cockroaches occupies a unique niche within Magic: The Gathering’s plethora of creature cards. It shares similarities with resilient creatures like Reassembling Skeleton, which also possesses the tenacity to return from the graveyard to the battlefield. However, Endless Cockroaches offers a different advantage by returning directly to the hand when it dies, allowing for repeated deployment without paying the graveyard retrieval cost associated with the Skeleton.

Moving to the insect theme, we encounter Brood of Cockroaches, which similarly comes back to hand upon death, but with a life loss caveat. Endless Cockroaches offers this recursion without the life loss, granting it a slight edge in terms of sustainability. Moreover, the card Beetleback Chief generates a swarm of creatures upon entry, a one-time effect contrasting the Cockroaches’ ongoing threat. While not directly recursion-based, it can offer a sudden board presence that Endless Cockroaches achieves over time.

Assessing the endless cycle provided by Endless Cockroaches against its kin in MTG, it’s apparent how it can be a persistent nuisance and an asset for strategies revolving around sacrifice and recursion, ensuring a creature presence that’s tough to permanently clear from the battlefield.

Reassembling Skeleton - MTG Card versions

Brood of Cockroaches - MTG Card versions

Beetleback Chief - Planechase 2012 (PC2)

Cards similar to Endless Cockroaches by color, type and mana cost

Mischievous Poltergeist - MTG Card versions

Nettling Imp - Limited Edition Alpha (LEA)

Royal Assassin - 30th Anniversary Edition (30A)

El-Hajjâj - Fourth Edition Foreign Black Border (4BB)

Frozen Shade - 30th Anniversary Edition (30A)

Sorceress Queen - Rivals Quick Start Set (RQS)

Lost Soul - Introductory Two-Player Set (ITP)

Mischievous Poltergeist - Classic Sixth Edition (6ED)

Strongarm Thug - Mercadian Masques (MMQ)

Lord of the Undead - Eighth Edition (8ED)

Hypnotic Specter - Magic Player Rewards 2006 (P06)

Where to buy

If you're looking to purchase Endless Cockroaches MTG card by a specific set like Portal and Commander 2013, 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 Endless Cockroaches and other MTG cards: