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Protean Hulk

Creature — Beast

When this creature dies, search your library for any number of creature cards with total mana value 6 or less, put them onto the battlefield, then shuffle.

CMC
7
Mana cost
{5}{G}{G}
Color identity
G
Rarity
rare
Set
Duel Decks: Mirrodin Pure vs. New Phyrexia
Price
—
EDHREC rank
#2452
Buy on TCGplayer
Protean Hulk card art
Protean Hulk is one of the most powerful death triggers in Commander — when it dies, you tutor any combination of creatures totaling 6 or less power directly onto the battlefield, often assembling a win on the spot. The seven-mana body is irrelevant; you're running it because Carrion Feeder or any free sacrifice outlet turns a single Hulk death into a deterministic combo, and commanders like Meren of Clan Nel Toth make that happen repeatedly.

Best Commanders

Commanders with the highest synergy

01
Meren of Clan Nel Toth

Meren of Clan Nel Toth

46.8% of decks · synergy 0.42

Meren of Clan Nel Toth is the most natural home for Protean Hulk — experience counters recur the Hulk from the graveyard turn after turn, and any free sac outlet means each recurrence is another tutor-onto-battlefield trigger that can assemble whatever creature-based win condition the deck is running.

02
Henzie "Toolbox" Torre

Henzie "Toolbox" Torre

42.3% of decks · synergy 0.36

Henzie "Toolbox" Torre blinks Protean Hulk into play at a discount and then lets it die to blitz, converting a single cast into an immediate search for up to 6 power worth of creatures — exactly the toolbox payoff the commander is built around.

03

Eddie Brock

32.9% of decks · synergy 0.27

Eddie Brock's symbiote-spawning creates a constant stream of sacrifice fodder, and Protean Hulk slots in as the single highest-value death trigger in the deck — dying once to flood the board with the exact creatures needed to close the game.

04
Slinza, the Spiked Stampede

Slinza, the Spiked Stampede

20.0% of decks · synergy 0.19

Slinza, the Spiked Stampede cares about creatures entering and dying at scale, and Protean Hulk delivers both — its death trigger floods the battlefield with small creatures that feed Slinza's own damage and board-presence payoffs.

05
Karador, Ghost Chieftain

Karador, Ghost Chieftain

20.5% of decks · synergy 0.17

Karador, Ghost Chieftain reduces recursive costs based on creatures in the graveyard, which makes replaying Protean Hulk cheap enough to treat as a repeatable engine rather than a one-shot threat — each death finding the next piece of the chain.

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 not legal
oathbreaker legal

Commander is where Protean Hulk does its best work — the singleton format's abundance of free sacrifice outlets and creature-based combo lines means the death trigger almost always converts into an immediate win or a board state that can't be answered. In Legacy, Protean Hulk sees fringe play in reanimator shells that can cheat it into play on turn one or two, but the format's interaction density makes resolving the trigger harder to guarantee. Vintage is theoretically legal but the power ceiling there makes a seven-mana creature a curiosity at best. Oathbreaker can support Hulk in the right shell, though the smaller starting life total and faster pace make the setup feel slower relative to its Commander counterparts.

Key Combos

Combo lines featuring this card

Price Context

Current price

unknown tier

Pricing data for Protean Hulk isn't available at the moment — check Scryfall or your preferred retailer for current market rates. Given its status as a cornerstone combo piece in competitive Commander, it has historically commanded a premium worth accounting for when budgeting a Hulk-based build.

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Sources

Mentioned

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