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Moxonomy

Lazav, Familiar Stranger

Legendary Creature — Shapeshifter1 generic manaBlue manaBlack mana

Every earlier Lazav was a graveyard mimic that paid for its copying with mill: you fed the yard, then wore whatever creature died into it. This incarnation reroutes the whole engine through crime. The trigger no longer keys off self-mill; it keys off aggression, off targeting an opponent or something they control, and it pays out twice for the same act: a lasting +1/+1 counter that grows the 1/4 body toward a real clock, plus the option to exile a card from any graveyard and, if it's a creature, become a copy of it until end of turn. The once-per-turn clause is the discipline. A crime-heavy deck commits crimes constantly, but the ability fires automatically on the first crime each turn and then sits dormant, so every additional crime that turn is pure interaction with no bonus attached; the counter and the copy come off whatever you happened to point first. The copy being optional and temporary matters as much as the copy itself: exile a threat from an opponent's graveyard, wear it for a swing, then shed it back to a hardy 1/4. The exile clause does quiet graveyard hate on the side, stripping recursion targets while it builds. What makes this version singular is the fuel: interaction is the input. Every removal spell and targeted effect that qualifies as a crime doubles as a trigger, so a long-running shapeshifter identity gets rebuilt on the premise that being a nuisance to the opponent is exactly what feeds it.

Lazav, Familiar Stranger (otj)
OTJ · #216uncommon
Pricing
Normal: $0.27
Foil: $0.33
Oracle Text

Rules text

Whenever you commit a crime, put a +1/+1 counter on Lazav. Then you may exile a card from a graveyard. If a creature card was exiled this way, you may have Lazav become a copy of that card until end of turn. This ability triggers only once each turn. (Targeting opponents, anything they control, and/or cards in their graveyards is a crime.)
Legalities

Format Status

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