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Molten Gatekeeper

Artifact Creature — Golem

Whenever another creature you control enters, this creature deals 1 damage to each opponent.
Unearth {R} ({R}: Return this card from your graveyard to the battlefield. It gains haste. Exile it at the beginning of the next end step or if it would leave the battlefield. Unearth only as a sorcery.)

CMC
3
Mana cost
{2}{R}
Color identity
R
Rarity
common
Set
Modern Horizons 3
Price
$0.32
EDHREC rank
#1239
Buy on TCGplayer
Molten Gatekeeper card art
Molten Gatekeeper pings every opponent when a creature enters under your control — stack enough triggers and you're dealing the damage of a Storm Herd without needing to attack. The cost is a three-mana 2/3 with no built-in protection, so it lives or dies on how fast your deck can flood the board, which is exactly why Norin the Wary decks run it in nearly 80% of lists.

Best Commanders

Commanders with the highest synergy

01
Norin the Wary

Norin the Wary

79.0% of decks · synergy 0.71

Norin the Wary blinks himself every single combat step and whenever a spell resolves, turning Molten Gatekeeper into a passive drain engine that requires almost no additional setup — it's the most natural home the card has.

02
Anim Pakal, Thousandth Moon

Anim Pakal, Thousandth Moon

49.9% of decks · synergy 0.42

Anim Pakal, Thousandth Moon generates a stream of tokens whenever you attack, and each one entering the battlefield fires Molten Gatekeeper again, converting combat damage into a second source of chip damage across the table.

03
Zinnia, Valley's Voice

Zinnia, Valley's Voice

43.0% of decks · synergy 0.39

Zinnia, Valley's Voice encourages token creation on a wide scale, and Molten Gatekeeper converts every token ETB into direct damage — the combination pressures opponents even during turns when your attackers are blocked or tapped.

04
The Jolly Balloon Man

The Jolly Balloon Man

46.6% of decks · synergy 0.38

The Jolly Balloon Man rewards playing cheap spells and building board presence quickly, and Molten Gatekeeper adds a damage rider to every creature that shows up — the two together make incremental tempo plays punishing for opponents.

05
Ovika, Enigma Goliath

Ovika, Enigma Goliath

41.1% of decks · synergy 0.38

Ovika, Enigma Goliath creates Goblin tokens whenever noncreature spells resolve, which means every cantrip or ritual also triggers Molten Gatekeeper, layering passive damage onto a strategy that already wants to chain spells.

Format Analysis

Where it lives, where it can’t

FormatVerdict
commander legal
legacy legal
modern legal
pioneer not legal
standard not legal
vintage legal
pauper legal
oathbreaker legal

Molten Gatekeeper is a Commander card through and through — its value scales with the number of opponents, so the three-player damage bonus it generates in a four-player pod is simply unavailable in any 1v1 format. In Legacy, Vintage, and Modern it's outclassed by creatures that either win the game faster or provide more immediate board impact for the same mana investment. Pauper is the one competitive exception worth flagging: token-based commons strategies can loop enough ETBs to make the ping meaningful, though dedicated builds aren't currently mainstream. Commander is where Molten Gatekeeper earns its slot, and specifically in high-frequency ETB decks where it closes games that would otherwise stall out.

Key Combos

Combo lines featuring this card

Price Context

Current price

$0.32 bulk tier

At $0.32, Molten Gatekeeper sits firmly in bulk territory — easy to pick up as a throw-in or from a bulk bin. Its inclusion rate near 80% in Norin the Wary decks suggests demand is consistent enough to keep it from dropping further, but don't expect the price to move meaningfully in either direction.

Explore

Sources

Mentioned

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Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.