Psychic Vortex
Enchantment
Cumulative upkeep—Draw a card. (At the beginning of your upkeep, put an age counter on this permanent, then sacrifice it unless you pay its upkeep cost for each age counter on it.)
At the beginning of your end step, sacrifice a land and discard your hand.
- CMC
- 4
- Mana cost
- Color identity
- U
- Rarity
- rare
- Set
- Weatherlight
- Price
- $3.83
- EDHREC rank
- #14571
Psychic Vortex locks the table into a mandatory discard-your-hand loop every end step — an oppressive symmetrical effect that accelerates milling and hand destruction simultaneously. The cost is real: you're also discarding, which means it wins you nothing without a way to skip your own end step, and Obeka, Brute Chronologist is the cleanest answer to that problem.
Best Commanders
Commanders with the highest synergy
Obeka, Brute Chronologist
Obeka, Brute Chronologist can end your turn before the Psychic Vortex trigger resolves, dodging the discard entirely while opponents eat the effect every turn — that one-sided loop is exactly why the card shows up in over 43% of Obeka lists.
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 |
Psychic Vortex is a Commander card through and through — the symmetrical punishment is most backbreaking in a four-player game where three opponents are discarding to zero every end step while you dodge it. In Legacy and Vintage it's legal but functionally ignored: seven mana for a slow enchantment doesn't compete with the speed of those formats, and opponents can answer it or simply win before it matters. Oathbreaker shares Commander's multiplayer structure, so the same engine applies at a smaller table, though the compressed game length makes it harder to get full value before the game ends.
Key Combos
Combo lines featuring this card
Price Context
Current price
$3.83 cheap tier
At $3.83, Psychic Vortex sits in the cheap tier — a low buy-in for a card that demands a dedicated shell to function. It's a narrow enough card that demand stays contained to Obeka builds, which keeps the ceiling modest.
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Sources
Mentioned
Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.