Black Mana Battery MTG Card


Card setsReleased in 4 setsSee all
Mana cost
Converted mana cost4
RarityUncommon
TypeArtifact

Key Takeaways

  1. Gathers incremental mana counters, providing a mana reserve that fuels casting multiple spells or abilities.
  2. Enables instant speed mana storage, offering strategic flexibility without revealing plans to opponents.
  3. Requires a dedicated black mana base, limiting its use but solidifying its role in mono-black decks.

Text of card

oc T: Put one counter on Black Mana Battery. oc T: Add o B to your mana pool. Remove as many counters as you wish. For each counter removed add o B to your mana pool. This ability is played as an interrupt.


Card Pros

Card Advantage: The Black Mana Battery card provides a steady accumulation of stored mana counters, potentially leading to significant card advantage by enabling the casting of numerous spells or activating mighty abilities in quick succession.

Resource Acceleration: By offering a means to stockpile resources, the Black Mana Battery can expedite your gameplay, allowing you to unleash formidable threats earlier than usual or reinforce your board state with additional options.

Instant Speed: While not an instant itself, the Black Mana Battery can be activated at the speed of an instant, giving you the flexibility to adapt on the fly and make strategic moves during critical phases of the match without broadcasting your game plan to opponents beforehand.


Card Cons

Discard Requirement: One notable drawback is that the Black Mana Battery often requires the player to discard a card to activate certain abilities. This can be particularly problematic when your hand is already thin, forcing you to relinquish potentially crucial spells or creatures that could be vital for your strategy.

Specific Mana Cost: This card demands an exclusive commitment to black mana for its activation. This specialized cost restricts it to mono-black decks or those with heavy black mana bases, potentially excluding a wide variety of multi-colored or less mana-intensive strategies from effectively utilizing it within their builds.

Comparatively High Mana Cost: Investing in the Black Mana Battery can be costly. The initial outlay, coupled with the activation costs, can lead to situations where the mana spent does not equate to a proportionate advantage in gameplay. Other cards often provide similar or more immediate benefits for less of a mana investment, making them more appealing choices in a tightly-contested game where efficiency is key.


Reasons to Include Black Mana Battery in Your Collection

Versatility: Black Mana Battery can be a flexible addition to various deck types, particularly those that rely on mana acceleration and storage for impactful later game plays.

Combo Potential: This artifact’s ability to bank mana for future turns creates interesting opportunities for combos, especially in decks that utilize powerful spells or abilities with high mana costs.

Meta-Relevance: In a meta dominated by games that grind out to longer turns, Black Mana Battery can become a key component, providing the necessary mana to execute game-changing plays or gain the upper hand in resource management.


How to Beat

The Black Mana Battery stands out in the realm of mana generation cards. Its iconic feature allows players to store up black mana, providing a reservoir of energy that can be tapped into later. However, this capability isn’t without its counters. The battery, much like other artifacts, is vulnerable to removal spells such as Disenchant or more specific ones like Shatter, which can efficiently dismantle your opponent’s prepared strategy. It’s also essential to consider the timing of when to disrupt the Black Mana Battery; the ideal moment is before your opponent can fully leverage the stored mana for a game-changing play.

Resource denial is another tactical approach. Cards like Damping Sphere can stifle the advantage provided by the Black Mana Battery by making it more costly for your opponent to use that banked mana. Alternatively, a strategy focused on quick aggression can outpace the slower, incremental benefit the Battery offers, putting pressure on your opponent before they can capitalize on their investment. In summary, the Black Mana Battery’s potential can be mitigated by targeted removal, resource denial, or swift, aggressive plays, thereby neutralizing its impact on the game.


Cards like Black Mana Battery

The Black Mana Battery is a unique artifact in MTG that stands out for its ability to store and leverage mana. When weighed against its counterparts such as the White Mana Battery, Blue Mana Battery, Red Mana Battery, and Green Mana Battery, its role is consistent—providing a strategic reserve of black mana over time. However, each Battery aligns with its respective color’s strategy, with the Black Mana Battery specifically catering to decks that capitalize on black mana’s strengths in destruction and resource manipulation.

Another analogous card is the Everflowing Chalice. While Everflowing Chalice doesn’t restrict to a single color, it does share the characteristic of accumulating charge counters to ramp up mana. Both cards offer the flexibility to invest mana early on with the payoff of a larger mana pool in later turns. In contrast, Coalition Relic speeds up your mana base by providing one mana of any color or two with a charge counter, but lacks the capacity to hold and accumulate resources across multiple turns like the Mana Batteries.

Each artifact brings its own strategic advantages to the table, but for those who prefer a focused approach, the Black Mana Battery provides a powerful tool to fulfill black-oriented strategies by ensuring a steady flow of resource that can be pivotal at critical moments in a game.

White Mana Battery - MTG Card versions
Blue Mana Battery - MTG Card versions
Red Mana Battery - MTG Card versions
Green Mana Battery - MTG Card versions
Everflowing Chalice - MTG Card versions
Coalition Relic - MTG Card versions
White Mana Battery - Legends (LEG)
Blue Mana Battery - Legends (LEG)
Red Mana Battery - Legends (LEG)
Green Mana Battery - Legends (LEG)
Everflowing Chalice - Worldwake (WWK)
Coalition Relic - Future Sight (FUT)

Cards similar to Black Mana Battery by color, type and mana cost

Tergrid, God of Fright // Tergrid's Lantern - MTG Card versions
Immortal Coil - MTG Card versions
Trigon of Corruption - MTG Card versions
Dross Ripper - MTG Card versions
Lashwrithe - MTG Card versions
Mukotai Ambusher - MTG Card versions
Pact Weapon - MTG Card versions
Szarekh, the Silent King - MTG Card versions
Cryptek - MTG Card versions
Venomcrawler - MTG Card versions
Plasmancer - MTG Card versions
Skorpekh Destroyer - MTG Card versions
Necron Overlord - MTG Card versions
Lokhust Heavy Destroyer - MTG Card versions
Imotekh the Stormlord - MTG Card versions
Starscream, Power Hungry // Starscream, Seeker Leader - MTG Card versions
Scrapwork Rager - MTG Card versions
Grond, the Gatebreaker - MTG Card versions
The Grim Captain's Locker - MTG Card versions
Barbed Servitor - MTG Card versions
Tergrid, God of Fright // Tergrid's Lantern - Kaldheim Promos (PKHM)
Immortal Coil - Shards of Alara (ALA)
Trigon of Corruption - Scars of Mirrodin (SOM)
Dross Ripper - Mirrodin Besieged (MBS)
Lashwrithe - Commander 2014 (C14)
Mukotai Ambusher - Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty (NEO)
Pact Weapon - Alchemy Horizons: Baldur's Gate (HBG)
Szarekh, the Silent King - Warhammer 40,000 Commander (40K)
Cryptek - Warhammer 40,000 Commander (40K)
Venomcrawler - Warhammer 40,000 Commander (40K)
Plasmancer - Warhammer 40,000 Commander (40K)
Skorpekh Destroyer - Warhammer 40,000 Commander (40K)
Necron Overlord - Warhammer 40,000 Commander (40K)
Lokhust Heavy Destroyer - Warhammer 40,000 Commander (40K)
Imotekh the Stormlord - Warhammer 40,000 Commander (40K)
Starscream, Power Hungry // Starscream, Seeker Leader - Transformers (BOT)
Scrapwork Rager - The Brothers' War (BRO)
Grond, the Gatebreaker - The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth (LTR)
The Grim Captain's Locker - The Lost Caverns of Ixalan Commander (LCC)
Barbed Servitor - Murders at Karlov Manor Promos (PMKM)

Where to buy

If you're looking to purchase Black Mana Battery MTG card by a specific set like Legends and Fourth Edition Foreign Black Border, 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 Black Mana Battery and other MTG cards:

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Printings

The Black Mana Battery Magic the Gathering card was released in 4 different sets between 1994-06-01 and 1995-08-01. Illustrated by Anson Maddocks.

#ReleaseNameCodeSymbolNumberFrameLayoutBorderArtist
11994-06-01LegendsLEG 2741993normalblackAnson Maddocks
21995-04-01Fourth Edition Foreign Black Border4BB 2981993normalblackAnson Maddocks
31995-04-01Fourth Edition4ED 2981993normalwhiteAnson Maddocks
41995-08-01RenaissanceREN 1081993normalblackAnson Maddocks

Legalities

Magic the Gathering formats where Black Mana Battery has restrictions

FormatLegality
OldschoolLegal
CommanderLegal
LegacyLegal
OathbreakerLegal
PremodernLegal
VintageLegal
DuelLegal
PredhLegal

Rules and information

The reference guide for Magic: The Gathering Black Mana Battery card rulings provides official rulings, any errata issued, as well as a record of all the functional modifications that have occurred.

DateText
2004-10-04 Can be tapped even if it has no counters.

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