Contamination
Enchantment
At the beginning of your upkeep, sacrifice this enchantment unless you sacrifice a creature.
If a land is tapped for mana, it produces 
instead of any other type and amount.
- CMC
- 3
- Mana cost
- Color identity
- B
- Rarity
- rare
- Set
- Mystery Booster 2
- Price
- $6.64
- EDHREC rank
- #7759
Contamination converts a single black creature into a full mana lockout, forcing every non-black land on the table to produce only black mana until your opponents find an answer or you run out of fodder. The upkeep cost is real but trivially managed alongside any token or sacrifice engine — pair it with Maralen of the Mornsong and opponents can't even search for the removal spell.
Best Commanders
Commanders with the highest synergy
Maralen of the Mornsong
Maralen of the Mornsong already stops opponents from drawing cards; Contamination stops them from making the colored mana they'd need to cast whatever Maralen forced them to find, creating a two-card lock that leaves the table functionally frozen.
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 | not legal |
| oathbreaker | legal |
Commander is where Contamination earns its reputation — three or more opponents hemorrhaging colored mana simultaneously turns a one-card enchantment into a near-instant win condition for any black deck running a sacrifice or token engine. Legacy and Vintage both allow it, but a symmetry-breaking stax piece that demands a creature upkeep is slower than what those formats typically want, so it rarely shows up competitively outside of fringe Prison builds. Oathbreaker is legal and the smaller pod size slightly reduces the payoff, though a lock-oriented planeswalker shell can still exploit it. Contamination is a Commander card in practice, full stop.
Key Combos
Combo lines featuring this card
Budget Alternatives
Cheaper options that do most of the same work
Infernal Darkness does the same job for less money — it replaces Contamination's creature upkeep with a cumulative upkeep in black mana, which is a meaningful drawback in longer games but functionally identical in the early turns when you're trying to lock opponents out. Blanket land-hate like Contamination's effect doesn't have a true one-for-one budget replacement, so if the lock strategy is the point, Infernal Darkness is the call; if you just want to pressure colored mana, Magus of the Moon or Choke cover specific colors more cheaply but without the global reach.
Price Context
Current price
$6.64 mid tier
At $6.64, Contamination sits in the mid tier — expensive enough to feel like a deliberate inclusion but cheap for a card that can single-handedly end games. It has held steady in that range because the effect is unique enough that no exact reprint pressure exists to push it lower.
Explore
Sources
Mentioned
Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.