Torpor Orb
Artifact
Creatures entering don't cause abilities to trigger.
- CMC
- 2
- Mana cost
- Color identity
- C
- Rarity
- mythic
- Set
- The Big Score
- Price
- $10.38
- EDHREC rank
- #3264
Torpor Orb shuts off every enters-the-battlefield trigger on the board for two mana — opponents' Mulldrifters and Reclamation Sages go silent, and Phage the Untouchable becomes castable without an Eerie Interlude safety net. The card pulls double duty as a hate piece and an enabler, which is a rare combination at this cost.
Best Commanders
Commanders with the highest synergy
Phage the Untouchable
Phage the Untouchable kills any player who puts her into play from hand without protection — Torpor Orb turns off that trigger entirely, letting you cast her as a clean 7/7 infect trampler with no drawback.
Oswald Fiddlebender
Oswald Fiddlebender's artifact-sacrifice toolbox runs a lot of ETB-heavy artifacts, but the bigger pull is stax: Torpor Orb pairs with Oswald's white-blue artifact synergies to lock down creature-based value engines that would otherwise outpace him.
Magda, Brazen Outlaw
Magda, Brazen Outlaw generates treasures from tapped Dwarves, not from ETB triggers, so Torpor Orb hoses opponents' mana dorks and value creatures while leaving Magda's engine completely intact.
Slicer, Hired Muscle
Slicer, Hired Muscle is a combat-damage threat, not an ETB payoff, so Torpor Orb sits in the deck purely as a hate piece — its two-mana cost fits cleanly into the aggressive curve while taxing opponents who rely on creature ETBs to stabilize.
Lavinia, Azorius Renegade
Lavinia, Azorius Renegade already taxes noncreature spells cast without paying their costs, and Torpor Orb extends that prison to creature ETBs — together they dismantle the most common lines opponents use to recover from a lockdown.
Format Analysis
Where it lives, where it can’t
| Format | Verdict |
|---|---|
| commander | legal |
| legacy | legal |
| modern | legal |
| pioneer | legal |
| standard | legal |
| vintage | legal |
| pauper | not legal |
| oathbreaker | legal |
Commander is where Torpor Orb earns its slot — the format's density of ETB-reliant creatures makes it a meaningful hate piece in most metas, and the Phage the Untouchable combo gives it a proactive home rather than a purely reactive one. In Legacy and Vintage, Torpor Orb sees fringe play against Reanimator and creature-combo shells, but the formats move fast enough that a two-mana artifact requiring setup rarely takes over a game. Modern and Pioneer have enough non-ETB threats that the Orb is mostly a sideboard consideration there, showing up when specific combo decks like Charbelcher variants or creature toolboxes need hosing. Oathbreaker mirrors Commander's dynamic closely, so the same stax and enabler roles apply. It's not legal in Pauper, which is the only format where it's outright absent.
Key Combos
Combo lines featuring this card
Satoru UmezawaPhage the UntouchableTorpor Orb
Target opponent loses the game
View on Commander Spellbook ↗
Kiki-Jiki, Mirror BreakerWormfang MantaTorpor Orb
Infinite turns; Lock
View on Commander Spellbook ↗Budget Alternatives
Cheaper options that do most of the same work
Hushbringer is the closest budget analog to Torpor Orb — it also suppresses death triggers in addition to ETBs, costs one less mana, and typically runs under $1, though being a creature makes it far more vulnerable to removal. If you need the artifact type specifically (for Oswald Fiddlebender tutoring or artifact synergies), there's no clean swap; Hushbringer is the replacement for the effect, not the card type.
Price Context
Current price
$10.38 mid tier
At $10.38, Torpor Orb sits in the mid tier — pricier than most stax pieces but justified by its unique combination of hate and combo enablement that has no true artifact equivalent. It has spiked and retreated before on the back of Phage interest, so $10 is roughly where it stabilizes when demand is steady rather than elevated.
Explore
Sources
Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.