Hydroform
Instant
Target land becomes a 3/3 Elemental creature with flying until end of turn. It's still a land.
- CMC
- 2
- Mana cost
- Color identity
- GU
- Rarity
- common
- Set
- Gatecrash
- Price
- $0.05
- EDHREC rank
- #26489
Hydroform turns any land into a 3/3 blue Elemental with islandwalk until end of turn — a one-shot combat trick that trades card advantage for surprise evasion. At two mana for a temporary, non-repeatable effect, it earns its slot only in decks that specifically reward land animation or need a finisher via unblockable damage.
Format Analysis
Where it lives, where it can’t
| Format | Verdict |
|---|---|
| commander | legal |
| legacy | legal |
| modern | legal |
| pioneer | legal |
| standard | not legal |
| vintage | legal |
| pauper | legal |
| oathbreaker | legal |
In Commander, Hydroform is a fringe inclusion — islandwalk is narrow enough that you need to already be running Island-granting effects to make the evasion reliable, and a 3/3 for a turn rarely changes a board at 40 life. In Pauper it has slightly more traction, where a surprise 3/3 with evasion can close out a damage race, but even there the sorcery speed and temporary nature limit its ceiling. Legacy, Modern, and Vintage have no practical use for Hydroform outside of dedicated land-animation synergy decks, which don't exist at competitive tables. Oathbreaker is the one Commander-adjacent format where a two-mana finisher on an evasive attacker could slot into an aggressive blue spell-slinger shell, but the competition at that mana cost is fierce.
Key Combos
Combo lines featuring this card
Price Context
Current price
$0.05 bulk tier
At $0.05, Hydroform is deep bulk — you're paying for cardboard, not the effect. It won't appreciate unless a future set builds a dedicated land-animation archetype that specifically rewards this kind of effect.
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Sources
Mentioned
Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.