Burn at the Stake
Sorcery
As an additional cost to cast this spell, tap any number of untapped creatures you control.
Burn at the Stake deals damage to any target equal to three times the number of creatures tapped this way.
- CMC
- 5
- Mana cost
- Color identity
- R
- Rarity
- rare
- Set
- Avacyn Restored
- Price
- $0.92
- EDHREC rank
- #11154
Burn at the Stake converts a wide board into a one-shot kill — tap three or more creatures, deal damage equal to three times that number to any target, and most players are dead on the spot. The five-mana cost is real, but in any deck that goes wide, this is a reliable finisher that requires zero setup beyond the board state you already want.
Format Analysis
Where it lives, where it can’t
| Format | Verdict |
|---|---|
| commander | legal |
| legacy | legal |
| modern | legal |
| pioneer | not legal |
| standard | not legal |
| vintage | legal |
| pauper | not legal |
| oathbreaker | legal |
Burn at the Stake is a Commander card through and through — the multiplayer life totals and token-centric strategies of the format are exactly what justify the five-mana investment. In Legacy and Vintage it's theoretically legal but competes with far more efficient burn and combo payoffs, making it a non-starter in those 60-card formats where creature-token armies don't stick long enough to matter. Modern is the same story: the format is too fast and interactive for a five-mana sorcery that requires a board to already exist. Commander is where Burn at the Stake earns its slot, specifically in token decks that can credibly tap eight or more creatures — at that point it's a one-card kill that doesn't require combat.
Key Combos
Combo lines featuring this card
Price Context
Current price
$0.92 bulk tier
At $0.92, Burn at the Stake sits firmly in bulk territory, which is accurate given its narrow playability outside dedicated token strategies. It's not a card that's likely to spike, but at under a dollar it's one of the cheapest finishers available for go-wide red decks — the price is right for what it does.
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Sources
Mentioned
Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.