Ogre Battlecaster
Creature — Ogre Shaman
First strike
Whenever this creature attacks, you may cast target instant or sorcery card from your graveyard by paying 
in addition to its other costs. If that spell would be put into a graveyard, exile it instead. When you cast that spell, this creature gets +X/+0 until end of turn, where X is that spell's mana value.
- CMC
- 3
- Mana cost
- Color identity
- R
- Rarity
- rare
- Set
- Jumpstart 2022
- Price
- $0.22
- EDHREC rank
- #23675
Ogre Battlecaster turns your attacking creatures into a mana engine, converting combat damage into temporary red mana that fuels instants and sorceries mid-swing. The four-mana cost is steep for what is essentially a conditional ritual stapled to combat, so it earns its slot only in decks built to abuse it.
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 |
Ogre Battlecaster is legal in Commander, Legacy, Vintage, and Oathbreaker, but realistically only Commander gives it room to breathe. In Legacy and Vintage, the format is too fast and the payoff too fragile — you need creatures to connect, opponents to not have interaction, and something worth spending the mana on, all at once. Commander is where Ogre Battlecaster finds its niche: go-wide red decks, token strategies, or Ogre tribal shells that can reliably put multiple attackers through and cash the mana into a haymaker spell before the combat step ends.
Key Combos
Combo lines featuring this card
Price Context
Current price
$0.22 bulk tier
At $0.22, Ogre Battlecaster sits firmly in bulk territory — pick it up as a throw-in or out of a bulk box. Bulk rares with narrow applications rarely climb without a breakout deck, so don't expect the price to move meaningfully.
Explore
Sources
Mentioned
Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.