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Volrath's Shapeshifter
Creature — Phyrexian Shapeshifter
rare
As long as the top card of your graveyard is a creature card, this creature has the full text of that card and has the text ": Discard a card." (This creature has that card's name, mana cost, color, types, abilities, power, and toughness.) : Discard a card.
0/1
Semantic Tags
A permanent with a repeatable activated ability that converts excess mana into value.
A keyword ability that lets a card be cast face down as a 2/2 creature. See rule 702.37, “Morph,” and rule 708, “Face-Down Spells and Permanents.”
A card or token on the battlefield. See rule 110, “Permanents.”
Format Legality
Price history
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Printings (2)
| Set | Rarity | TCGplayer | Card Kingdom | Cardmarket |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vintage Masters#101 | rare | · | · | · |
| Stronghold#48 | rare | · | · | · |
Related Rules
If an ability would produce one or more mana of an undefined type, it produces no mana instead.
Some abilities produce mana based on the type of mana another permanent or permanents “could produce.” The type of mana a permanent could produce at any time includes any type of mana that an ability of that permanent would produce if the ability were to resolve at that time, taking into account any applicable replacement effects in any possible order. Ignore whether any costs of the ability could or could not be paid. If that permanent wouldn’t produce any mana under these conditions, or no type of mana can be defined this way, there’s no type of mana it could produce.
To “tap [a permanent] for mana” is to activate a mana ability of that permanent that includes the {T} symbol in its activation cost. See rule 605, “Mana Abilities.”
An ability that triggers whenever a permanent “is tapped for mana” or is tapped for mana of a specified type triggers whenever such a mana ability resolves and produces mana or the specified type of mana.
A replacement effect that applies if a permanent “is tapped for mana” or tapped for mana of a specific type and/or amount modifies the mana production event while such an ability is resolving and producing mana or the specified type and/or amount of mana.
If a cost associated with a special action, such as a suspend cost or a morph cost, has an {X} or an X in it, the value of X is chosen by the player taking the special action immediately before they pay that cost.
If an object’s enters-the-battlefield triggered ability or replacement effect refers to X, and the spell that became that object as it resolved had a value of X chosen for any of its costs, the value of X for that ability is the same as the value of X for that spell, although the value of X for that permanent is 0. This is an exception to rule 107.3i.
The tap symbol is {T}. The tap symbol in an activation cost means “Tap this permanent.” A permanent that’s already tapped can’t be tapped again to pay the cost. A creature’s activated ability with the tap symbol in its activation cost can’t be activated unless the creature has been under its controller’s control continuously since their most recent turn began. See rule 302.6.
Rulings
If the top card in your graveyard isn't a creature card (meaning a card with the type Creature, which may or may not have other types such as Artifact or Enchantment), then it's just a 0/1 blue creature. Older cards of type Summon are also Creature cards.
If the top card in your graveyard is a creature card, this card uses the listed characteristics, including color and any other types. But, this card keeps the granted ability in addition to those from the card being copied.
If the top card in the graveyard has any other undefined characteristics, then those characteristics are not acquired and the shapeshifter uses the characteristic from its own card.
A copy of a Volrath's Shapeshifter will have the shapeshifting ability.
When it changes forms, any "enters" abilities of the card it "copies" do not trigger.
The ability that sets its characteristics is a text-changing effect.