Spiketail Drakeling
Creature — Drake
Flying
Sacrifice this creature: Counter target spell unless its controller pays .
- CMC
- 3
- Mana cost
- Color identity
- U
- Rarity
- common
- Set
- Time Spiral
- Price
- $0.32
- EDHREC rank
- #19011
Spiketail Drakeling puts a Counterspell tax on the table the moment it lands — opponents pay one extra or watch their spell fizzle, and that pressure compounds when you're drawing multiple cards per turn. The cost is a fragile 2/1 body for three mana, but in Alandra, Sky Dreamer decks that are already churning through instants and sorceries, that body is almost beside the point.
Best Commanders
Commanders with the highest synergy

Alandra, Sky Dreamer
Alandra, Sky Dreamer rewards drawing multiple cards in a single turn with Drake tokens, and Spiketail Drakeling turns that same card-draw engine into a soft lock — every spell your opponents want to resolve costs more while you're busy generating a board of fliers.
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 | legal |
| oathbreaker | legal |
In Commander, Spiketail Drakeling slots cleanly into any blue deck that wants cheap interaction without spending a counter — the tax effect scales well at a four-player table where opponents can't easily coordinate to pay around it. Pauper is where Spiketail Drakeling sees its most competitive daylight, since the card pool's interaction ceiling is lower and a three-mana must-answer threat with a built-in counterpunch is genuinely disruptive. In Legacy and Vintage the card is legal but irrelevant — the formats are too fast and too powerful for a 2/1 that asks opponents to spend one extra mana.
Key Combos
Combo lines featuring this card
Price Context
Current price
$0.32 bulk tier
At $0.32, Spiketail Drakeling is deep bulk — you're picking it out of a dollar bin or grabbing a playset for under two dollars without thinking twice. Bulk rares spike occasionally on buyout pressure, but a common with this narrow application has no realistic ceiling to watch.
Explore
Sources
Mentioned
Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.