A huge part of MTG has always been having better Creatures in play than your opponent. Because of this, and because of the general power creep of the game, Creatures these days have an awful lot going on.
We’re not saying it’s a bad thing, and we actually really enjoy laughing maniacally because our friends forgot about one of the words on one of our cards. In fact, we like it so much; we thought we’d make a list of the cards with some of the most keywords on.
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Creatures that have way too many keywords
Now, each of these brings with it a huge array of abilities on its own, and you can always upgrade these with Enchantments, Planeswalker abilities, or just equipment as you choose.
We’re going to give a shoutout to Vampire Nighthawk here, who is a classic little keyword machine with flying, lifelink, and deathtouch, all on a three-mana card. We see you; we respect you, now let’s get stuck into the actual list.
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Elder Gargaroth
Good old Elder Gargaroth is a five mana 6/6 with vigilance, reach, and trample. To be honest, that would be enough of a reason to put it on the list, but then it also has three separate abilities if it attacks or blocks. Every time it does either of those things, you can create a 3/3 token, gain three life, or draw a card. So, it only has three abilities, but good lord, that’s a lot of extra text.
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Questing Beast
Of course, then we come to Questing Beast, which is a 4/4 for four mana with vigilance, deathtouch, and haste. It also has pseudo-unblockable as long as the Creatures trying to do so have two power or less. Also, you can’t prevent the damage it does. Also also, if it deals damage to an opponent, you can have it also deal that damage to a Planeswalker they control. Also also also, it’s Legendary, which we always forget.
Archangel Avacyn // Avacyn the Purifier
Archangel Avacyn does transform, so you can sort of count that, but we’re not talking about the other side today. This version of Avacyn is a five mana 4/4 with flash, flying, vigilance, and when it enters the battlefield it gives everything indestructible. If you’ve never cast this before, we thoroughly recommend giving it a shot, because it’s always hilarious.
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Brisela, Voice of Nightmares
Brisela doesn’t cost any mana, sort of, but is the combination of two Creatures called Bruna and Gisela, totalling eleven mana, so we can say that they cost that much as a result. Brisela, Voice of Nightmares a 9/10 with flying, first strike, vigilance, and lifelink, who also makes it so that your opponents can’t cast spells with a mana value of three or less. They’re just so much fun to have on your side of the field.
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Akroma, Angel of Fury
Akroma appears three times on this list because she’s absurd, but this version has the fewest keywords of the bunch. Akroma, Angel of Fury is an eight mana 6/6 that can’t be countered with morph, flying, trample, protection from White, and protection from Blue. You can also dump mana into her to boost her power. She’s also absolutely incredible as a win-con in Red and Taxes in Modern.
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Atraxa, Praetors’ Voice
Oh Atraxa, is there anything you can’t do? No, not really. Atraxa, Praetors’ Voice is a four mana 4/4 with flying, vigilance, deathtouch, and lifelink. She also allows you to proliferate at the beginning of your end step, which makes her an excellent Commander for Planeswalker decks, infect decks, +1/+1 counter decks, or even weird group hug variants.
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Samut, Voice of Dissent
Samut, Voice of Dissent is a five mana 3/4 with flash, double strike, vigilance, and haste that also gives other Creatures you control haste, and you can use them to tap another Creature. They’re quite a bit of fun as a Commander, but they’re also just an impressive display of power.
Spirit of the Night
Now we’re getting into big numbers. Spirit of the Night is a nine mana 6/5 with flying, trample, protection from Black, ye olde haste, and first strike when it’s attacking. It’s a huge amount of mana for all of those abilities, but things were different back when it was printed, so be nice to the old thing.
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Chromanticore
Chromanticore is a fun five color five mana 4/4 with flying, first strike, vigilance, trample, and lifelink. It also has bestow, which we’re sort of counting for this. That means you can plop it on a Creature to give that Creature all of those abilities and +4/+4, which is pretty spicy on the right cards.
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Sphinx of the Steel Wind
Sphinx of the Steel Wind is basically an Esper Artifact answer to Akroma and all of her absurdity. For eight mana, you get a 6/6 with flying, first strike, vigilance, lifelink, protection from Red, and protection from Green. That’s a large swathe of abilities that basically guarantees you’re going to laugh in the face of anything that attempts to take it down.
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Akroma, Angel of Wrath
Akroma the second is Akroma, Angel of Wrath. Wrathy is an eight mana 6/6 with Flying, first strike, vigilance, trample, haste, protection from Black, and protection from Red. That’s just so many abilities. In fact, it’s seven whole abilities. Damn!
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Soulflayer
Soulflayer is the first of our ones with not many keywords as such, but then loads of keywords if you do it right. For six mana, Soulflayer is a 4/4 with delve. However, if you use a Creature with flying to pay for the device cost, then it gains flying. That’s the case with first strike, double strike, deathtouch, haste, hexproof, indestructible, lifelink, reach, trample, and vigilance. It’s a lot of work, but it’s hard to argue with.
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Odric, Lunarch Marshal
Odric, Lunarch Marshal is a four mana 3/3 with no keywords on it as standard, but can have first strike, flying, deathtouch, double strike, haste, hexproof, indestructible, lifelink, menace, reach, skulk, trample, and vigilance if you have other Creatures with those abilities. So, you know, that’s a lot of potential keywords, to say the least.
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Cairn Wanderer
Cairn Wanderer is a bit like Soulflayer, but you don’t have to exile the Creatures; they just need to be in your graveyard. It’s a five mana 4/4, but as long as you have a Creature with flying in the graveyard, it also has flying. The same is true for fear, first strike, double strike, deathtouch, haste, landwalk, lifelink, protection, reach, trample, shroud, and vigilance. This is probably easier to manage than Soulflayer, but it costs more mana due to not having delve. It’s also kind of weird-looking, if we’re being honest.
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Akroma, Vision of Ixidor
Here we go, the top of the list of cards with too many keywords, and of course, it’s Akroma. Well, sort of. Akroma, Vision of Ixidor, only has five keywords on them themselves, with those being flying, first strike, vigilance, trample, and partner. However, they also read, “At the beginning of each combat, until end of turn, each other creature you control gets +1/+1 if it has flying, +1/+1 if it has first strike, and so on for double strike, deathtouch, haste, hexproof, indestructible, lifelink, menace, protection, reach, trample, vigilance, and partner.” So we’re counting all of those in this little roundup, which puts them at the top of this list. Well, we think so anyway.
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