Teferi's Honor Guard MTG Card

Mana cost
Converted mana cost	3
Rarity	Uncommon
Type	Creature — Human Knight
Abilities	Flanking
Released	1997-02-03
Set symbol
Set name	Visions
Set code	VIS
Power	2
Toughness	2
Number	22
Frame	1997
Layout	normal
Border	black
Illustred by	Cecil Fernando

Key Takeaways

Protects valuable creatures, offering indirect card advantage, and secures their presence on the battlefield.
Allows for strategic play, ensuring mana-producing creatures or abilities persist, enhancing your game plan.
Shields creatures from instant-speed removals, granting confidence to play creatures with lesser risk.

Text of card

Flanking (Whenever a creature without flanking is assigned to block this creature, the blocking creature gets -1/-1 until end of turn.) o Uoo U Phase out

"They may seem ceremonial, but their swords are still sharp." —Kipkemboi, Kukemssa pirate

Card Pros

Card Advantage: Teferi’s Honor Guard not only offers protection for your valuable creatures but also helps maintain card superiority by deterring opponents from targeting your creatures with removal spells. This indirect card advantage ensures that your key pieces remain on the board to execute your strategy effectively.

Resource Acceleration: Although not directly impacting mana resources, Teferi’s Honor Guard can be considered a form of resource acceleration. By protecting your creatures from targeted abilities, it ensures that your creatures, which could have mana-producing abilities or other value-generating effects, stay in play to accelerate your game plan.

Instant Speed: While Teferi’s Honor Guard itself may not be an instant, the creatures and spells it protects gain additional value by being safeguarded against instant-speed removals and interaction from your opponent. This allows you the flexibility to safely play creatures on your turn and hold up mana for instant-speed responses without the fear of losing them to a surprise spell.

Card Cons

Discard Requirement: While Teferi’s Honor Guard doesn’t require discarding as part of its own abilities, it’s worth noting that in a deck centered around the guard, the need to keep other cards to protect or complement it might indirectly cause tougher discard decisions when facing hand disruption tactics.

Specific Mana Cost: Teferi’s Honor Guard demands a precise mana combo of one white and one colorless to cast. This necessity restricts its seamless integration, mainly affecting mono-color decks or those not aligned with white mana strategies.

Comparatively High Mana Cost: For a cost of two mana, players might expect more immediate board impact. Despite the guard’s prowess in stifling opponents’ enter-the-battlefield effects, there are competitive alternatives for protection or control at a lower mana cost. Players must weigh the guard’s strategic value against other cards they could cast with two mana.

Reasons to Include Teferi’s Honor Guard in Your Collection

Versatility: Teferi’s Honor Guard is a flexible card that can be easily slotted into many white-based decks. Its ability to shield your valuable creatures from harmful “enters the battlefield” effects of your opponents’ cards can be a game-changer, making it a protective inclusion in control or midrange decks.

Combo Potential: By restricting the triggered abilities of your opponent’s creatures, Teferi’s Honor Guard allows you to tactically disrupt their game plan. This can be leveraged to your advantage, potentially in combination with your own creatures or abilities that bypass such restrictions, creating unmatched board states.

Meta-Relevance: As the game environment shifts and evolves, certain cards rise in prominence due to their ability to counter popular strategies. Teferi’s Honor Guard has the potential to stand out in a meta rife with creatures that rely on entry triggers, making it a strategic defensive measure against prevalent deck types.

How to beat

Teferi’s Honor Guard is known within the MTG community for its ability to stifle opponents’ strategies that rely on creature-based triggered abilities. This card sets a barrier that prevents such abilities from resolving whenever a creature enters the battlefield. To outmaneuver Teferi’s Honor Guard, players should consider shifting towards actions that don’t trigger upon creatures entering the battlefield.

Instead, focus on casting spells that operate directly from hand or graveyard, use activated abilities or deploy a board wipe to remove Teferi’s Honor Guard from play without triggering its controlling effect. Incorporating non-creature spells like sorceries or enchantments that can manage the board or change the state of play is also a viable strategy. Cards with flash that can be played at instant speed allow for tactical responses, providing a pathway to neutralize the Honor Guard’s disruptive presence.

In essence, by pivoting away from the typical creature-centric strategy and adapting a nuanced approach with diverse spell types and responses, players can circumvent the challenges posed by Teferi’s Honor Guard, maintaining the flow of their own game plan while carefully dismantling their opponent’s defenses.

Cards like Teferi's Honor Guard

Teferi’s Honor Guard stands out as a unique creature within the realms of Magic: The Gathering. It’s often compared to Tocatli Honor Guard due to their shared ability to silence opponents’ creatures’ enter-the-battlefield triggers. Yet, Teferi’s Honor Guard offers something more – it comes with a slightly sturdier body, making it a more robust presence on the battlefield. While both cards can disrupt many strategies, the added survivability of Teferi’s Honor Guard might tip the scales in its favor during creature confrontations.

Another card worthy of comparison is Hushbringer, a diminutive flyer with a similar dampening effect on creatures entering or leaving the battlefield. What Hushbringer lacks in size, it compensates for with its evasive flying ability and broader impact on death triggers, something that Teferi’s Honor Guard doesn’t address. This makes Hushbringer a versatile choice, particularly against decks that hinge on graveyard strategies.

In summary, while Teferi’s Honor Guard is a compelling choice for shutting down enter-the-battlefield effects, evaluating its role alongside alternatives is crucial. Each card offers a distinct advantage in the complex tapestry of gameplay strategies available to players of Magic: The Gathering, enriching the game’s tactical depth.

Hushbringer - Throne of Eldraine Promos (PELD)

Where to buy

If you're looking to purchase Teferi's Honor Guard MTG card by a specific set like Visions, 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 Teferi's Honor Guard and other MTG cards: