Amplify in MTG: Rules, History, and Best Cards

Feral Throwback | Illustration by Carl Critchlow

Amplify is part of the legion of creature-focused mechanics unleashed during the Onslaught block, which was the creature block.

It's also a bit of a deceptive keyword when it comes to wording: At a quick glance, and even after a careful read, amplify's effect may seem like a triggered ability. After all, these are creatures with enter-the-battlefield effects, right?

Well… not quite.

Let's take a deep dive into what this keyword ability does, how it works, its history, and exactly what type of ability it is.

How Does Amplify Work?

Kilnmouth Dragon | Illustration by Carl Critchlow

Amplify is a static ability that allows you to put a number of +1/+1 counters on an amplify creature as it enters the battlefield, provided you’re willing and able to reveal some cards in your hand that share the same creature type with the one entering the battlefield.

The number of +1/+1 counters is the number of cards you’re willing to reveal, multiplied by N, with N being variable and specified on each amplify card.

For example, Kilnmouth Dragon has “Amplify 3” (N=3 in this case), Feral Throwback has “Amplify 2”, and in Ghastly Remains‘s case N=1 (since it has “Amplify 1”).

Therefore:

• If you reveal two zombies from your hand when your Ghastly Remains enters the battlefield, Ghastly Remains gets one counter per revealed zombie (two counters in total).
• If you reveal two dragons from your hand when your Kilnmouth Dragon enters the battlefield, since N is 3, Kilnmouth Dragon gets six counters total (3×2).

Further caveats:

• The amplify creature that’s entering the battlefield doesn’t count toward the cards you can reveal.
• Similarly, other cards that may be entering the battlefield at the same time as the amplify card don't count towards cards you can reveal.

The History of Amplify in MTG

Amplify is the sort of small-scope mechanic that came and went without making too many waves. A keyword that, as Ford Prefect would say about Earth in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, turned out “Mostly harmless.”

All nine cards with the amplify keyword ability are found in the Legions expansion from the Onslaught block. The Onslaught block was all about creatures and typal synergies, and the MTG designers amplified this vertical theme to 11 in Legions: The set is nothing but creatures. There's not a single instant, enchantment, or sorcery in this particular set; just creatures. And with such a setting, typal mechanics were exactly what the expansion was asking for.

As it would turn out, mechanics from Legions didn’t prove too successful. They weren't terrible; just uneventful. Amplify hasn’t been used again (a fate shared with provoke, another mechanic that only exists in Legions creatures), and the amplify creatures have seen very few reprints.

Is Amplify a Triggered Ability?

Nope. It's a static ability.

The difference between static and triggered abilities can be subtle in this case since the wording is very similar to a lot of enter-the-battlefield effects that are indeed triggered abilities. But the key difference is the specific wording, “Amplify N”. We can refer to Magic's Comprehensive Rules for amplify:

702.38a Amplify is a static ability. “Amplify N” means “As this object enters the battlefield, reveal any number of cards from your hand that share a creature type with it. This permanent enters the battlefield with N +1/+1 counters on it for each card revealed this way. You can’t reveal this card or any other cards that are entering the battlefield at the same time as this card.”

Because the ability is worded as “Amplify N”, it’s a static ability. It doesn't go on the stack (while triggered abilities do), so no player can respond to it.

If you play Aven Warhawk and reveal two birds and/or soldiers, Aven Warhawk enters the battlefield with two counters (and therefore as a 4/4 creature) without giving any player a window to cast anything before it receives the counters.

There's no point in time at which your opponent could kill your Aven Warhawk by dealing just 2 damage to it. Aven Warhawk is never on the battlefield with just 2 health and waiting for an ability to resolve on the stack to put 2 counters on it. Immediately after it resolves (“As it enters the battlefield…”), you reveal the cards and Aven Warhawk gets its counters with nothing going on the stack for this last step.

Do You Have to Reveal Cards for Amplify?

Nope. You can choose to do so if you wish, but you don't have to.

If you'd like to go by the rules, amplify’s rules text reads, “Reveal any number…”, keyword being “any.” “Any” can be zero if you want.

By the way: As far as mechanics are concerned, the game has no “memory” of which cards you've revealed in previous turns (even though in Magic Arena those cards are marked and shown to you and your opponent). If on turn 3 you play Ghastly Remains and reveal two other zombies in your hand, and the following turn you happen to draw another copy of Ghastly Remains, you can play this second copy and reveal the same two zombies from your hand.

Do Token Copies of the Creatures Get Amplify?

Yes, they do.

You'll have to reveal the appropriate cards when the copy enters the battlefield for its amplify ability to work, of course.

Do Counter Doublers Work With Amplify?

Yep, they do.

Counter doublers like Doubling Season provide a replacement effect. In Doubling Season‘s case, it's worded: “If an effect would put one or more counters on a permanent you control, it puts twice that many of those counters on that permanent instead.”

Replacement effects are static abilities, so if you play an “Amplify 1” creature with Doubling Season in play, the amplify creature enters the battlefield with 2x counters (provided you revealed at least one suitable card from your hand). The “double the counters” effect doesn't go on the stack, and therefore doesn't give other players a window to respond.

By the way: one trick for detecting replacement effects by their wording is the use of instructions to do one thing “instead” of something else, like in Doubling Season‘s case.

Can You Stifle Amplify?

No. Stifle targets activated or triggered abilities. Amplify is neither.

Gallery and List of Amplify Cards

The nine amplify cards that currently exist are all from the Legions expansion. They have never been reprinted, with the exception of Kilnmouth Dragon which has been inducted to the List (for now).

• Kilnmouth Dragon
• Aven Warhawk
• Daru Stinger
• Embalmed Brawler
• Ghastly Remains
• Zombie Brute
• Canopy Crawler
• Feral Throwback
• Glowering Rogon

Best Amplify Cards

Let's preface this section by saying that none of the amplify creatures are something to write epic poems about. They’re clearly designed to work in typal decks, but they tend to lack effects that are powerful, crazy, and/or fun enough to justify their fairly high mana costs.

On the other hand, they are all very cheap to buy – Kilnmouth Dragon is priced at around half a dollar, and all the others are even less expensive.

Kilnmouth Dragon

Kilnmouth Dragon is the most serviceable of the amplify crew. Although, comparing Kilnmouth Dragon with a similarly-costed dragon like Tyrant's Familiar illustrates a bit why big, amplify creatures aren’t too exciting: they aren’t really that impactful, considering their mana cost.

Still, if you have a dragon deck, Kilnmouth Dragon can get some work done.

Also, notice that this big lizard's activated ability doesn’t care how the +1/+1 counters ended on the lizard's back. If you have other ways to put counters on Kilnmouth Dragon, your dragon can still deal damage with its ability.

Kilnmouth Dragon can also slot into a deck commanded by Zirilan of the Claw.

Feral Throwback

If you want to confuse your opponents a bit with obscure mechanics, Feral Throwback provides not just one, but two little-seen keywords: Amplify is one, and the other is provoke (another Legions exclusive).

Provoke forces a block (as long as it's legal; a non-flier can't block a flier even if provoked, for example), allowing a deadlier threat to connect.

And since Feral Throwback has amplify 2, with just a couple of other beasts in hand it grows to a decent size for its cost.

Ghastly Remains

Ghastly Remains provides a bit of recursion, and in a zombie-heavy deck you may have enough walkers in hand to make it a decent threat early on. Ghastly Remains is an okay addition to mono-black decks.

Wrap Up

Zombie Brute | Illustration by Greg Hildebrandt

And there you go: That's our deep-dive on amplify, a deceptively worded static ability (not triggered, okay?) that was spawned in Legions as support for its typal theme.

I’d personally rate this mechanic as “just okay”, but it's hard to separate the keyword itself from the creatures it comes with – perhaps with either better creatures or creatures that care more about counters, it could have been a good one.

On the other hand, it's certainly a great example of the subtle differences in how static and triggered abilities are worded.

If this deep dive into unique mechanics is the type of article you'd like to see more of, please drop a comment below, or stop by the Draftsim Discord and let us know.

Amplify out!