Cellar Door MTG Card

Innistrad (ISD)
2011-09-30 - Number 218

Jumpstart 2022 (J22)
2022-12-02 - Number 759

Card sets	Released in 2 setsSee all
Mana cost
Converted mana cost	2
Rarity	Uncommon
Type	Artifact

Key Takeaways

Cellar Door contributes to board presence by generating creatures, aligning with strategy and resource maximization.
While demanding specific mana and card sacrifices, its unique effect can disrupt opponent’s deck strategies.
Effective removal and control tactics are crucial to negate Cellar Door’s incremental power and potential threat.

Text of card

, : Target player puts the bottom card of his or her library into his or her graveyard. If it's a creature card, you put a 2/2 black Zombie creature token onto the battlefield.

As if anyone needed another reason to avoid dark, dank cellars.

Card Pros

Card Advantage: The Cellar Door provides a strategic edge by potentially creating additional creatures for your battlefield. This attribute can bolster your army and generate a sustained advantage, essential in outpacing opponents.

Resource Acceleration: Although not directly accelerating resources through mana, this card can effectively translate into resource acceleration by progressively amassing board presence without expending additional cards from your hand

Instant Speed: While the activation of Cellar Door isn’t at instant speed itself, the creatures it has the potential to create can surprise an opponent during the end phase of their turn, preparing you better for your next moves without the need to invest in casting creatures from your hand during your turn.

Card Cons

Discard Requirement: The Cellar Door requires a significant investment of cards. Activating its ability necessitates the discarding of a creature card, which can be a setback when trying to maintain card advantage or if your hand is already depleted.

Specific Mana Cost: While mana versatility is often an asset in deck building, the Cellar Door demands two specific mana types for its activation. This dual mana cost can make it difficult to incorporate into a multi-color deck or those that cannot reliably generate both types of mana.

Comparatively High Mana Cost: Cellar Door’s activation cost can be on the higher side when considering the potential return. Players might find that there are other cards at a similar, or even lower, mana value that can provide more immediate or impactful benefits on the game board.

Reasons to Include Cellar Door in Your Collection

Versatility: Cellar Door offers a unique effect that can serve multiple roles depending on the situation. It’s a useful piece in decks that aim to manipulate the top of the library or benefit from the milling of opponents.

Combo Potential: With the right setup, Cellar Door can be part of an intriguing combo, creating token creatures and potentially thinning an opponent’s deck of critical resources.

Meta-Relevance: Against decks that rely on specific cards or graveyard strategies, Cellar Door can disrupt the opponent while building your board presence with unexpected creatures.

How to beat

The Cellar Door MTG card poses a unique challenge to players with its potential to summon an unstoppable horde of Zombies. Diving into the strategy to conquer this artifact, players should consider removal options. Naturalize, a staple in green decks, affordably dismantles the Door, while red’s Shattering Spree can demolish multiple artifacts in one fell swoop. It’s pivotal to target the Cellar Door before it accumulates a critical mass of undead minions.

Control strategies can also be potent, keeping the Door in check with counterspells like Negate or artifacts that suppress activated abilities, such as Phyrexian Revoker. Timing is essential; these interventions must occur before the Cellar Door turns the tide. With vigilant surveillance and prompt action, the threat of the Cellar Door can not only be contained but completely eradicated, maintaining dominance over the battlefield and preventing the opponent from gaining momentum.

Neglecting the Cellar Door might seem tempting, given its incremental impact, but underestimating its latent power could lead to an overwhelming board state. Smart, preemptive strategies ensure that what lies behind the Cellar Door never sees the light of day, preserving your path to victory.

Cards like Cellar Door

Cellar Door, an intriguing card in Magic: The Gathering, stands out in the array of graveyard manipulation options. Comparable to cards like Codex Shredder, which also permits players to put the top card of a library into a graveyard, Cellar Door takes an additional step by offering the potential to create a creature token. Codex Shredder lacks the token generation but compensates with flexibility, giving players the ability to retrieve cards from their graveyard.

Additionally, we can look at Perpetual Timepiece, another card that steadily fills a graveyard while providing an emergency option to shuffle desired cards back into the library. Cellar Door, while lacking this control, compensates by providing board presence through its Zombie tokens. Ghoulcaller’s Bell is another relevant comparison, offering consistent graveyard filling for all players. Yet, unlike Cellar Door, it doesn’t come with the advantage of potentially converting milled cards into tangible threats on the board.

Ultimately, when examining alternatives for subtle graveyard interaction and strategic board influence, Cellar Door holds its own with its unique token generation, which could tip the scales in a prolonged game within Magic: The Gathering’s diverse metagame.

Cards similar to Cellar Door by color, type and mana cost

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Where to buy

If you're looking to purchase Cellar Door MTG card by a specific set like Innistrad and Jumpstart 2022, 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 Cellar Door and other MTG cards: