Voyager Staff MTG Card

Voyager Staff - Ravnica: City of Guilds (RAV)

Ravnica: City of Guilds (RAV)
2005-10-07 - Number 274

Voyager Staff - Ravnica Remastered (RVR)

Ravnica Remastered (RVR)
2024-01-12 - Number 271

Card sets	Released in 2 setsSee all
Mana cost
Converted mana cost	1
Rarity	Uncommon
Type	Artifact

Key Takeaways

Voyager Staff can disrupt plans but sacrifices utility with one-time use per activation.
Its two mana activation is affordable but fixed, requiring precise resource allocation.
Despite cost concerns, Voyager Staff provides versatility and potent combo options.

Text of card

, Sacrifice Voyager Staff: Remove target creature from the game. Return that creature to play under its owner's control at end of turn.

Voyager staffs are sought by those hoping to find an escape from the sprawling glut of Ravnica.

Card Pros

Card Advantage: Voyager Staff offers a unique twist to managing your board state by temporarily removing a creature from the battlefield. This action can lead to potent combos and surprise shifts in the game’s dynamic, potentially disrupting your opponent’s strategies and tipping the scales in your favor.

Resource Acceleration: The affordable activation cost of the Voyager Staff allows for agile play. By investing only two mana to use, players can efficiently utilize their resources, allocating mana to other spells and abilities, keeping the pace of resource usage versatile and unpredictable.

Instant Speed: The capacity to activate the Voyager Staff at instant speed provides players with strategic flexibility. This can be enacted in response to an opponent’s move, as a defensive maneuver to protect a valuable creature, or as a surprise tactic to remove an opponent’s threat at a crucial moment without preempting your own turn’s plans.

Card Cons

Discard Requirement: Voyager Staff’s activation demands you to sacrifice it, effectively making it a one-time use card. This can potentially leave you at a disadvantage if you’re in need of repeatable or flexible interaction options.

Specific Mana Cost: Rocking a colorless mana cost to play, Voyager Staff may seem versatile, but activating its effect requires exactly two mana, which can be inconvenient when mana needs to be allocated for other spells or abilities during your turn.

Comparatively High Mana Cost: While it’s a utility artifact that provides temporary removal, it costs two mana to both play and activate. In a game where efficiency is key, the total cost of four mana can be weighty, especially when considering that many other removal options in the MTG landscape may offer more permanent solutions at a similar or even lower cost.

Reasons to Include Voyager Staff in Your Collection

Versatility: Voyager Staff offers a flexible removal option that can temporarily deal with troublesome creatures or save your own from removal. Its low casting cost makes it a snug fit in diverse deck builds.

Combo Potential: This artifact holds the potential to create powerful plays when combined with cards that thrive on flickering mechanics or when used to interrupt an opponent’s combo by removing a key piece at a critical moment.

Meta-Relevance: With ever-shifting deck archetypes, Voyager Staff remains a relevant sideboard option to combat decks that lean heavily on specific creatures or strategies, giving players an edge in the current competitive landscape.

How to beat

Voyager Staff is an artifact that offers a temporary solution to troublesome permanents on the battlefield in Magic: The Gathering. By removing a target creature from the game and returning it at the end phase, it can disrupt opponents’ strategies or save your own creature in a pinch. This can be particularly vexing when your opponent employs it to consistently sidestep removal or to reuse enter-the-battlefield effects.

To counter this nifty artifact, consider timing your removal spells or abilities when the creature returns during the end phase, as it will no longer have the protection of the Voyager Staff. Another effective strategy is to target the artifact itself. Artifacts destruction spells like Naturalize or Shatter can permanently remove Voyager Staff from play, mitigating its impact. Keep cards in your deck that can deal with artifacts or utilize strategies that are less impacted by temporary removal. Additionally, playing around the staff by forcing your opponent to use it at a time that’s most advantageous for you can turn its strength into a weakness.

Ultimately, understanding when and how to efficiently remove threats or apply pressure can neutralize the advantage Voyager Staff offers, keeping you a step ahead in the game.

Cards like Voyager Staff

Voyager Staff offers Magic: The Gathering players a unique tool for temporarily removing creatures or other permanents from the battlefield. Its likeness can be seen in the functionality of cards like Ghostway, which exiles all creatures you control and then returns them to play. While Ghostway affects multiple targets, Voyager Staff’s one-time use is a key difference, providing precise control over a single entity.

Another parallel can be drawn with the likes of Cold Storage, allowing you to exile multiple creatures under one artifact. Cold Storage, however, does not bring the creatures back automatically – a player must trigger the return, unlike the automatic process of Voyager Staff. Additionally, Synod Sanctum emulates a similar strategy but provides versatility at the cost of higher initial mana investment and the need for an activation fee.

Assessing these cards alongside Voyager Staff, it becomes clear that each offers a strategic option for either mass or targeted temporary removal. While each card has its nuances, the Staff’s low-cost, instant-speed interaction makes it a handy and efficient inclusion in MTG decks focused on flexibility and precise control.

Cards similar to Voyager Staff by color, type and mana cost

Where to buy

If you're looking to purchase Voyager Staff MTG card by a specific set like Ravnica: City of Guilds and Ravnica Remastered, 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 Voyager Staff and other MTG cards: