Plague Nurse
Creature — Phyrexian Cleric
Toxic 2
: Each other creature you control with toxic gains toxic 1 until end of turn. Activate only once each turn. (A player dealt combat damage by a creature with toxic also gets poison counters equal to that creature's total toxic value.)
- CMC
- 4
- Mana cost
- Color identity
- G
- Rarity
- common
- Set
- Phyrexia: All Will Be One
- Price
- $0.20
- EDHREC rank
- #13634
Plague Nurse puts a free sacrifice outlet on a poisonous body — the moment it hits the table, it threatens to convert itself or any expendable creature into a poison counter on any opponent. In Vishgraz, the Doomhive decks specifically, that combination of infect and built-in sac outlet turns every token wave into a potential kill clock, making Plague Nurse a fixture rather than a flex slot.
Best Commanders
Commanders with the highest synergy
Vishgraz, the Doomhive
Vishgraz, the Doomhive manufactures cheap, disposable Mite tokens with toxic 1, and Plague Nurse lets you cash any of them in to push poison counters through without needing to connect in combat — it's the redundancy that makes the engine consistent.
Format Analysis
Where it lives, where it can’t
| Format | Verdict |
|---|---|
| commander | legal |
| legacy | legal |
| modern | legal |
| pioneer | legal |
| standard | not legal |
| vintage | legal |
| pauper | legal |
| oathbreaker | legal |
Plague Nurse is legal across Commander, Legacy, Modern, Pioneer, Vintage, Pauper, and Oathbreaker, but its real home is Commander. In 100-card singleton, a three-mana creature with a free sacrifice outlet and infect slots cleanly into any toxic or proliferate strategy, and the multiplayer table means one well-timed activation can poison a threat before blockers are even declared. Competitive non-rotating formats have faster, more reliable poison vectors, so Plague Nurse doesn't make the cut there. In Pauper it's legal and fills a niche role in dedicated infect shells, though the format's aggressive infect decks rarely want a three-drop that doesn't swing for face.
Key Combos
Combo lines featuring this card
Price Context
Current price
$0.20 bulk tier
At $0.20, Plague Nurse is deep bulk — you're grabbing it out of a commons box, not budgeting for it. Bulk rares and specialty common reprints tend to stay flat, so don't expect movement unless a major proliferate or toxic commander pushes demand.
Explore
Sources
Mentioned
Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.