Carnophage
Creature — Zombie
At the beginning of your upkeep, tap this creature unless you pay 1 life.
- CMC
- 1
- Mana cost
- Color identity
- B
- Rarity
- common
- Set
- Exodus
- Price
- $0.57
- EDHREC rank
- #25786
Carnophage puts a 2/2 on the board for one black mana — the most efficient stat-line at that cost in the color. The catch is a life payment every upkeep, which is a real cost, not a footnote: skip it once and you've got a 2/2 that can't attack or block.
Format Analysis
Where it lives, where it can’t
| Format | Verdict |
|---|---|
| commander | legal |
| legacy | legal |
| modern | not legal |
| pioneer | not legal |
| standard | not legal |
| vintage | legal |
| pauper | legal |
| oathbreaker | legal |
In Legacy and Vintage, Carnophage competes in hyper-aggressive black shells where the game ends before the life drain becomes lethal, and a 2/2 on turn one genuinely threatens. Pauper is where it sees the most sustained play — mono-black aggro at common rarity has few one-drops with this body, and the upkeep cost is manageable when you're ending games by turn four. In Commander, Carnophage is almost never correct: 40 life doesn't save you from the incremental drain, the board scales to three opponents, and a vanilla 2/2 stops mattering around turn three.
Key Combos
Combo lines featuring this card
Price Context
Current price
$0.57 bulk tier
At $0.57, Carnophage is bulk — you're paying for cardboard, not scarcity. It's been printed enough times that the price won't move meaningfully in either direction regardless of demand.
Explore
Sources
Mentioned
Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.