Guarded Heir
Creature — Human Noble
Lifelink (Damage dealt by this creature also causes you to gain that much life.)
When this creature enters, create two 3/3 white Knight creature tokens.
- CMC
- 6
- Mana cost
- Color identity
- W
- Rarity
- uncommon
- Set
- Foundations
- Price
- $0.10
- EDHREC rank
- #17429
Guarded Heir enters with a shield counter and lifelink, making it a two-power blocker that absorbs the first hit for free — real on-board presence for two mana. The cost is ceiling: it never grows beyond a 2/2 without external support, so you're running it for the protection mechanics, not the body.
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 |
In Commander, Guarded Heir is a role-player in life-gain and aristocrats lists — cheap enough to deploy early, durable enough to matter past turn two, and white-black is exactly where you want it. In constructed formats like Standard, Modern, and Pioneer, it competes against a much higher density of efficient two-drops, and a 2/2 with no offensive upside rarely makes that cut outside of dedicated lifegain synergy builds. Legacy and Vintage ignore Guarded Heir entirely; the bar for two-mana creatures in those formats is a different conversation. Oathbreaker mirrors Commander closely enough that the same life-gain commanders pull it in for the same reasons.
Key Combos
Combo lines featuring this card
Price Context
Current price
$0.10 bulk tier
At $0.10, Guarded Heir is deep bulk — you're paying for cardboard, not the card. That price is stable by definition; bulk commons and uncommons don't move unless a combo or format-warping deck emerges, and nothing about Guarded Heir suggests that's coming.
Explore
Sources
Mentioned
Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.