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Moxonomy

Gixian Puppeteer

Creature — Phyrexian Warlock3 generic manaBlack mana

The trigger reads like a Phyrexian answer to a specific deckbuilding question: what if the drain payoff and the reanimation payoff lived in the same body? The drain hangs entirely on your second draw each turn, a deliberately narrow condition. It does nothing off your natural draw step; it demands a second draw, from a cantrip, an extra-draw enchantment, a wheel, whatever engine you can assemble, and swings four points of life every time you hit it (two off the opponent, two onto you). That first line rewards a whole subarchetype of draw-doubling that black rarely gets to be the engine for. The death trigger is the second half of the sell: this is a recursion piece that wants to die, dragging a small creature back with it as it goes. The mana-value-three-or-less cap keeps the payload squarely on cheap utility bodies, so it is always something modest (a sacrifice outlet, a value ETB creature, a one-mana hatebear) rather than a bomb, and the "another target" clause means it cannot simply return itself. Put both halves together and you have a card built to be traded away, feeding a sacrifice shell its next body on the way to the graveyard. The 4/3 frame is almost incidental; the design wants the creature dead, not swinging, and pays out best when it is being spent rather than kept.

Gixian Puppeteer (prm)
PRM · #105702rare
Pricing
Normal: $2.25
Foil: $1.38
Oracle Text

Rules text

Whenever you draw your second card each turn, each opponent loses 2 life and you gain 2 life. When this creature dies, return another target creature card with mana value 3 or less from your graveyard to the battlefield.
Legalities

Format Status

Standard
N/A
Pioneer
Legal
Modern
Legal
Legacy
Legal
Vintage
Legal
Commander
Legal
Pauper
N/A
Brawl
Legal
Historic
Legal
Alchemy
N/A
Timeless
Legal
Standard Brawl
N/A
More formats
Old School
N/A
Premodern
N/A
PreDH
N/A
Pauper Commander
N/A
Oathbreaker
Legal
Gladiator
Legal
Penny Dreadful
Legal
Duel Commander
Legal
Future Standard
N/A
COMPETITIVEBRAWL
Legal
TLR
N/A
Printings elsewhere

Other printings

4 sets
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