Oriss, Samite Guardian
Legendary Creature — Human Cleric
: Prevent all damage that would be dealt to target creature this turn.
Grandeur — Discard another card named Oriss, Samite Guardian: Target player can't cast spells this turn, and creatures that player controls can't attack this turn.
- CMC
- 3
- Mana cost
- Color identity
- W
- Rarity
- rare
- Set
- Future Sight
- Price
- $0.91
- EDHREC rank
- #24086
Oriss, Samite Guardian shuts down an opponent's entire turn — no spells, no attacks — for three mana, which is a remarkably cheap rate for that much disruption. The catch is that grandeur requires discarding another copy of Oriss, making her nearly unplayable outside of niche decks built to abuse the mechanic.
Format Analysis
Where it lives, where it can’t
| Format | Verdict |
|---|---|
| commander | legal |
| legacy | legal |
| modern | legal |
| pioneer | not legal |
| standard | not legal |
| vintage | legal |
| pauper | not legal |
| oathbreaker | legal |
In Commander, Oriss, Samite Guardian is a fringe political piece — the static Fog effect on one opponent is real, but the grandeur cost makes the gameplan fall apart since you can't run duplicates in a singleton format without dedicated tutors and recursion to fake it. Legacy, Modern, and Vintage allow four copies, which is the only context where grandeur becomes reliably triggerable, but none of those formats have ever had a competitive home for Oriss since the effect, while powerful, is too slow and too conditional against the threats those formats present. The card is legal in Oathbreaker, where the smaller deck size marginally improves copy density, but the same structural problem persists.
Key Combos
Combo lines featuring this card
Price Context
Current price
$0.91 bulk tier
At $0.91, Oriss, Samite Guardian sits firmly in bulk territory, and that price reflects the real demand — essentially none outside of collectors and dedicated Oriss-centric brewers. The price is unlikely to move in either direction absent a reprint that spikes interest or a new mechanic that rewards grandeur specifically.
Explore
Sources
Mentioned
Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.