All 4 Karn Planeswalkers in Magic Ranked

Karn Liberated | Illustration by Jason Chan

Karn, the silver golem, the artificial planeswalker, is one of Urza’s greatest creations. Created at the time of the original Phyrexian Invasion, Karn did equal parts good and bad to MTG’s Multiverse. While Karn has been represented in many MTG books, card illustrations, and flavor text, it took a while for him to receive his first planeswalker card, and there aren’t that many Karn planeswalkers overall.

Today, we take a look at all the Karn planeswalker cards printed in MTG. Some are pretty powerful and format-defining, while others are hardly so. We’ll also talk a little bit about the character and the decks you could slot these cards into.

Let’s dive in!

What Are Karn Planeswalkers in MTG?

Karn, Scion of Urza | Illustration by Chase Stone

Karn planeswalkers in MTG are all the different planeswalker cards with the Karn subtype. These are all colorless planeswalkers, and they're mostly tied to artifacts in some way, considering that Karn is the “father of machines” and an artificial being.

As a colorless card, these tend to see play in midrange decks that need some card advantage or that interact with artifacts in some way, like blue-based artifact decks, or just colorless decks that jam as many artifacts as they can.

#4. Karn, Living Legacy

Karn, Living Legacy is a very different planeswalker design. It’s the worst Karn card by a mile, a card that failed to see even regular Standard play, which is where planeswalkers usually land on power level.

It produces tapped, mana-restricted Powerstone tokens with the positive loyalty ability, and the fact that Karn’s card advantage ability needs you to spend mana on it is also weird. The lack of board presence in the form of tokens or any kind of removal effect doesn’t help its playability either.

#3. Karn, Scion of Urza

Karn, Scion of Urza isn’t a bad card by any means. It’s a fine draw engine planeswalker that saw some play in formats like Standard and Pioneer as a really fair card that’ll help you in a long game. It’s a nice option for sideboards in grindy matchups.

This is also the card that created the “Karnstruct”, the 0/0 Construct token that’s as strong as the number of artifacts you control, and that’s also created by Urza, Lord High Artificer. It’s a strong card if you can spawn big artifact tokens, but the lack of removal worsens its playability.

#2. Karn Liberated

A staple of the Modern format for a long time, Karn Liberated is very strong in the Urza Tron decks that can reliably cast it on turn 3, despite the high mana value. From there, you can either nuke your opponent’s lands or their best threats twice with the minus ability, or uptick it to 11 loyalty with the +4 ability and start to get some card advantage. It’s an excellent payoff for fast colorless mana, and an interesting option in true colorless Commander decks including those helmed by Eldrazi.

#1. Karn, the Great Creator

Karn, the Great Creator is the most interesting entry because it’s a rare planeswalker and the card that has the most development and banning problems among Karn planeswalkers. What can I say? Sometimes WotC misses the mark by a lot.

The main problem (and it’s not the only one, mind you) is that locking people’s artifacts out of the game on the passive is outright annoying and powerful, not to mention that it’s a lock with Mycosynth Lattice. You can also kill people’s moxen with the +1 ability and “wish” with the -2. Or use your +1 to beat down with your artifacts and vehicles. This card’s been restricted in Vintage and banned in Pioneer because having an artifact sideboard toolbox available, especially in best-of-one, is very powerful and hard to beat. Decks like Mono-Green Devotion could easily ramp into this card, get card advantage, tutor for whatever they needed the most, and have enough mana to cast a game-winning 7- or 8-mana value artifact.

Karn Payoffs

Karn planeswalker cards are very open-ended, and there’s not a direct payoff for running them. It’s not like you’re playing Elspeth cards, where Intangible Virtue or Anointed Procession should be good options.

Almost all Karn cards interact with artifacts, so an artifact-heavy deck is an obvious home, especially if we consider the Karn creature cards. Another good home for Karn cards is in colorless EDH decks, where you can use them as sources of card advantage, spot removal, and more.

Some interesting examples to make good use of your Karns include:

• Forsaken Monument, which makes you colorless sources produce double the mana, while it gives your colorless creatures and “Karnstructs” +2/+2.
• Zhulodok, Void Gorger is excellent if you want to cascade after playing a Karn Liberated.
• Simulacrum Synthesizer and Urza, Lord High Artificer produce Karnstructs that go well with Karn, Living Legacy or Karn, Scion of Urza.

Who Is Karn?

Karn, Silver Golem | Illustration by Mark Zug

Karn is a silver golem created by Urza and Barrin. At the time, Urza was facing the Phyrexian Invasion, and he thought that the key to stop the Phyrexians was to go back in time to the era of Thran. The Tolarian Academy experiments show that silver was a key element to enable time traveling, and thus, they created a silver golem that could travel through time and space. In short, these time travel attempts ended up doing more harm than good.

Karn ended up receiving Urza’s Mightstone and Weakstone from Gerrard, and he was turned into the first artificial planeswalker. After becoming a planeswalker, Karn travelled through the Blind Eternities and created the plane of Argentum (Mirrodin), which was corrupted by a vestige of Phyrexian Oil he was carrying. That moment spawned all the events involving the Mirrodin and Scars of Mirrodin blocks, the ascension of the Phyrexians, and the more recent Phyrexia: All Will Be One and March of the Machine.

Karn has sacrificed his planeswalker spark twice. The first time, he sacrificed the spark he received from Urza to seal the Time Rifts on Dominaria. Later, it was Venser’s turn to sacrifice himself so that Karn could be liberated, and he became a planeswalker once more. In March of the Machine, Karn sacrificed his planeswalker spark once more to save Nissa and Ajani.

Is Karn Alive? Is He Desparked?

Karn has been very absent from MTG’s story recently. His last printed card was Karn, Legacy Reforged in 2023, which shows him desparked after the events of March of the Machine. Karn gave up his planeswalker spark in the confrontation against New Phyrexia.

What Other Karn Cards Are There?

Karn is an important character to MTG lore, and he’s illustrated or mentioned on dozens of cards. But we only have a few cards that mention Karn by name:

• Karn, Legacy Reforged
• Karn's Bastion
• Karn, Silver Golem
• Karn's Sylex
• Karn's Temporal Sundering
• Karn's Touch

Of these, Karn's Bastion is a very popular utility land for +1/+1 counters or planeswalker decks, especially in EDH. Karn, Silver Golem sees some play in Cubes that have an artifact theme, and it’s especially effective at destroying artifact tokens (Clues, Food, Treasure). Karn's Temporal Sundering sees some play in Commander, too, considering that it’s easy to have a legend around for its main restriction. Karn, Legacy Reforged is also a nice artifact build-around card in EDH.

A little sidenote: Sisterhood of Karn is a Doctor Who card that doesn’t have anything to do with our MTG Karn.

Wrap Up

Karn, Scion of Urza | Illustration by Adam Paquette

So that’s about it for Karn, an iconic Dominarian character whose story goes back to Urza and most MTG sets created in the ‘90s. As a colorless planeswalker, sometimes WotC makes the cards too strong, and the sweet power level spot ends up being closer to Karn, Scion of Urza, playable but not dominant.

What are your favorite Karn cards? Should WotC design colorless planeswalkers that powerful, or is it just a big risk to the game? Let me know in the comments section below, or let’s discuss it in the Draftsim Discord. Check out The Daily Upkeep newsletter to stay up to date on all the latest MTG news.

Until next time, stay safe!