Magmasaur
Creature — Elemental Dinosaur
This creature enters with five +1/+1 counters on it.
At the beginning of your upkeep, you may remove a +1/+1 counter from this creature. If you don't, sacrifice this creature and it deals damage equal to the number of +1/+1 counters on it to each creature without flying and each player.
- CMC
- 5
- Mana cost
- Color identity
- R
- Rarity
- rare
- Set
- Tempest Remastered
- Price
- —
- EDHREC rank
- #26320
Magmasaur is a five-mana 5/5 that distributes five +1/+1 counters across your board at the start of each upkeep — but eats one of its own counters each turn, dealing 1 damage to each creature and player when the last one goes. The self-destruct clock is the whole design tension: you either exploit the counters before the bomb goes off, or you build around the explosion.
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 Magmasaur earns its keep — the singleton format's slower clock gives you time to exploit the counter distribution, and the 1-damage-to-each-creature-and-player trigger turns into a repeatable board sculpting tool in the right shell. Proliferate commanders like Atraxa, Praetors' Voice can reset the counter clock indefinitely, and sacrifice-matters decks treat the eventual zero-counter detonation as a free board wipe on a schedule. In Legacy and Vintage, Magmasaur is technically legal but sees zero competitive play — five mana for a creature with a self-destruct timer doesn't compete with the speed of those formats. Oathbreaker is the same story as Commander in miniature: viable in the right build, irrelevant outside it.
Key Combos
Combo lines featuring this card
Price Context
Current price
unknown tier
Pricing data for Magmasaur isn't currently available, so check Scryfall or TCGPlayer for a live number. Given its age and narrow application, it tends to sit in bulk-rare territory — worth picking up cheaply if you're building around the counter or damage trigger, but not a card to overpay for.
Explore
Sources
Mentioned
Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.