Ark of Hunger
Artifact
Whenever one or more cards leave your graveyard, this artifact deals 1 damage to each opponent and you gain 1 life.
: Mill a card. You may play that card this turn.
- CMC
- 4
- Mana cost
- Color identity
- RW
- Rarity
- rare
- Set
- Secrets of Strixhaven
- Price
- $1.26
- EDHREC rank
- #13535
Ark of Hunger forces every opponent to sacrifice a creature at the start of their upkeep — a repeatable, symmetry-breaking edict stapled to a one-mana artifact. The cost is that you're also sacrificing, which is a feature rather than a bug in decks built around Quintorius, History Chaser and similar sacrifice payoffs.
Best Commanders
Commanders with the highest synergy
Quintorius, History Chaser
Quintorius, History Chaser runs Ark of Hunger in over 61% of lists because the forced sacrifice triggers his damage-dealing ability every turn around the table, turning a stax piece into a consistent source of opponent life loss.
Joshua, Phoenix's Dominant
Joshua, Phoenix's Dominant pairs with Ark of Hunger to feed the graveyard and generate recursive value — each forced sacrifice fills the yard while Joshua's recursion engine converts the carnage into board presence.
Alesha, Who Smiles at Death
Alesha, Who Smiles at Death uses Ark of Hunger as a soft board-control tool, thinning opponents' creatures while her own creatures die cheaply and come straight back from the graveyard on attack.
Format Analysis
Where it lives, where it can’t
| Format | Verdict |
|---|---|
| commander | legal |
| legacy | legal |
| modern | legal |
| pioneer | legal |
| standard | legal |
| vintage | legal |
| pauper | not legal |
| oathbreaker | legal |
Ark of Hunger is legal across every major Constructed format but sees essentially no play outside Commander — a one-mana artifact that makes everyone sacrifice is too slow to matter in faster formats where the game ends before it accumulates value. In Commander, the math flips: you're taxing three opponents every turn cycle, which generates three times the pressure at one mana. It slots most naturally into sacrifice-payoff and stax shells, where symmetry is an illusion because you're built to profit from the attrition. In slower, creature-dense pods it can single-handedly lock out token strategies and value creatures over several turns.
Key Combos
Combo lines featuring this card
Price Context
Current price
$1.26 cheap tier
At $1.26, Ark of Hunger sits in the cheap tier and represents strong value for what it does — a one-mana repeatable edict effect would cost several times more if it existed on a more pushed card. Price is unlikely to move dramatically given its narrow Commander niche, but at this entry point there's no reason not to own a copy if the effect fits your build.
Explore
Sources
Mentioned
- Quintorius, History Chaser
- Joshua, Phoenix's Dominant
- Alesha, Who Smiles at Death
Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.