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Woe Strider

Creature — Horror

When this creature enters, create a 0/1 white Goat creature token.
Sacrifice another creature: Scry 1.
Escape—{3}{B}{B}, Exile four other cards from your graveyard. (You may cast this card from your graveyard for its escape cost.)
This creature escapes with two +1/+1 counters on it.

CMC
3
Mana cost
{2}{B}
Color identity
B
Rarity
rare
Set
Jumpstart Arena Exclusives
Price
—
EDHREC rank
#1681
Buy on TCGplayer
Woe Strider card art
Woe Strider enters with a free 0/1 body attached, then sits on the battlefield as a repeatable, no-mana-cost sacrifice outlet — the rarest and most valuable thing a black creature engine can offer. Shells running Pitiless Plunderer or Endrek Sahr, Master Breeder don't care about paying two every time they need to trigger a death effect; they care about having a free valve, and Woe Strider is one of the best.

Best Commanders

Commanders with the highest synergy

01
Endrek Sahr, Master Breeder

Endrek Sahr, Master Breeder

47.3% of decks · synergy 0.43

Endrek Sahr, Master Breeder floods the board with Thrull tokens and needs a free outlet to sacrifice them before they trigger his self-destruct clause — Woe Strider fills that role while converting every sacrificed token into a scry, turning the mandatory sacrifice problem into card selection.

02
Dina, Essence Brewer

Dina, Essence Brewer

38.1% of decks · synergy 0.33

Dina, Essence Brewer drains opponents whenever you gain life, so the loop only needs a free sacrifice outlet to close the game — Woe Strider provides exactly that without eating mana better spent on life-gain enablers.

03
Grenzo, Dungeon Warden

Grenzo, Dungeon Warden

33.3% of decks · synergy 0.31

Grenzo, Dungeon Warden wants creatures entering from the bottom of the library, and Woe Strider's free scry-and-sacrifice loop lets you stack the deck before each activation while also dispatching bodies that have already done their work.

04

Eirdu, Carrier of Dawn

30.4% of decks · synergy 0.26

Eirdu, Carrier of Dawn cares about tokens and death triggers, making Woe Strider's free outlet and built-in token a natural fit for keeping the engine running without spending additional mana.

05
Juri, Master of the Revue

Juri, Master of the Revue

27.8% of decks · synergy 0.25

Juri, Master of the Revue grows every time you sacrifice a permanent, so a free, repeatable outlet like Woe Strider directly fuels the kill condition — each sacrifice pumps Juri and each scry helps you find the next piece.

Format Analysis

Where it lives, where it can’t

FormatVerdict
commander legal
legacy legal
modern legal
pioneer legal
standard not legal
vintage legal
pauper not legal
oathbreaker legal

Commander is where Woe Strider lives — free sacrifice outlets are scarce at any mana cost, and the enters-with-a-token clause means it never arrives empty-handed into a sacrifice loop. In Modern and Pioneer it sees fringe play in sacrifice-based strategies alongside Claim the Firstborn packages, but the competition for three-mana slots is steep and it rarely makes the cut over more efficient options. Legacy has enough redundancy and speed that Woe Strider is almost never the right choice, and Pauper's legality wall keeps it out entirely. For Commander players running any black death-trigger or aristocrats shell, it's a near-automatic inclusion.

Key Combos

Combo lines featuring this card

5,883 decks
Pitiless PlundererGravecrawlerWoe Strider

Pitiless PlundererGravecrawlerWoe Strider

Infinite LTB; Infinite ETB; Infinite sacrifice triggers; Infinite death triggers; Infinite scry 1; Infinite storm count; Infinite Treasure tokens; Infinite colored mana; Infinite colorless mana; Infinite creature tokens

View on Commander Spellbook ↗
2,415 decks
Woe StriderGorma, the Gullet

Woe StriderGorma, the Gullet

Infinite +1/+1 counters on a creature; Infinite ETB; Infinite LTB; Infinite death triggers; Infinite sacrifice triggers; Infinite scry 1

View on Commander Spellbook ↗

Price Context

Current price

unknown tier

Woe Strider has floated in the bulk-to-low-value range since its release, typically available for under a dollar in most printings. At that price it's an easy pickup — free sacrifice outlets at this rate of play don't stay cheap forever if the card sees a spike in competitive interest.

Explore

Sources

Mentioned

← All cards

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