Marsh Lurker
Creature — Beast
Sacrifice a Swamp: This creature gains fear until end of turn. (It can't be blocked except by artifact creatures and/or black creatures.)
- CMC
- 4
- Mana cost
- Color identity
- B
- Rarity
- common
- Set
- Tempest
- Price
- $0.17
- EDHREC rank
- #30948
Marsh Lurker is a five-mana 4/3 with fear that requires you to pay one black mana each upkeep or sacrifice it — a steep ongoing tax for a body that doesn't impact the board the turn it arrives. The fear ability is real evasion, but five mana for a vanilla-statted creature with a built-in clock is a losing proposition in any competitive context.
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 |
Marsh Lurker is legal in Commander, Legacy, Vintage, Pauper, and Oathbreaker, but it earns a slot in almost none of them. In Commander, fear is irrelevant against black and artifact creatures — which show up constantly — and the upkeep cost compounds over a long game without any payoff attached to the creature. In Pauper, where commons compete hardest for efficiency, a five-mana 4/3 with a drawback gets lapped by creatures that cost half as much and ask nothing of you each turn. Legacy and Vintage don't even register it.
Key Combos
Combo lines featuring this card
Price Context
Current price
$0.17 bulk tier
At $0.17, Marsh Lurker is deep bulk — the kind of card that ends up in a draft chaff pile, not a trade binder. There's no demand driver that would push this higher, so expect it to stay at or below this floor indefinitely.
Explore
Sources
Mentioned
Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.