In case you weren't sure, one of the strongest phrases in Magic: The Gathering is the following:

"draw a card for each..."

Any time you see those words, there is an opportunity to bust it wide open. "Draw a card"? Great. "Draw three cards"? Better. But "draw a card for each X" means all you need to do is have a bunch of X and you can draw a ton. And drawing cards in Magic is really, really strong.

My jaw hit the floor when I looked at today's Marvel's Spider-Man preview card. Let's take a look together, shall we?

Part Armorcraft Judge, part Coastal Piracy. All we need is a few Modified Creatures and we'll be rolling in cards. Let's take a look at a few ways we can use this fantastic Equipment, shall we?

The Basics

We've got a four-mana Equipment with two different colors in its casting cost. That's limiting right there, and depending on the format can make or break whether it's playable. It's also Rare, which means it won't be finding a home in Pauper!

When it Enters, though, it auto-equips, which gives an immediate boost in Power and Toughness to whatever it snaps on to. That savings is massive.

Should it fall off, it Equips again for 2 mana, which isn't bad at all. It's not quite the same price as a Sword of X and Y, but it's close - just one mana more casting, plus the free Equip.

Whatever's Equipped gets +2/+2, which is normally about as good as it gets in White (the power boost comes from the White, and the draw comes from the Blue). MaRo has said many times they tend to limit Power and Toughness boosts to +2/+2 in White, leaving the larger boosts to Green). Then it gets that wonderful draw ability - if the Equipped Creature does Combat Damage, you draw cards equal to the number of Modified Creatures you control.

So, if our guy can push through and connect, we'll draw at least one card because we have one Modified Creature (the one wearing the Equipment). It's already a decent deal, but if we can Modify a few more Creatures on our board, it can get out of hand pretty quickly.

Commander

Biorganic Carapace will be a house in the correct Commander shell. In many ways, it's just a good card, and would be good in just about any deck which has White and Blue. Drawing cards is good, power buffs are good, and the fact it's an Artifact means it requires its own specific removal to go away - you can Murder my Creature or Wrath of God the board away, but there's my Equipment, ready to link up and swing in again next turn.

Specifically, I'd love to see Biorganic Carapace in a Hylda of the Icy Crown or Kastral, the Windcrested deck. Both of those Commanders put +1/+1 counters on all your Creatures (well, just Birds for Kastral), which means every Creature we have will be Modified. Four or five Birds will mean a new Hand every turn! That's pretty solid.

Galea, Kindler of Hope is a fairly solid and obvious choice, but you have to admit, it'd be strong in that deck. Make sure you've got a few other Creatures to Equip and you'll be golden. The Fifth Doctor and Sonic the Hedgehog (Sonic meets Spider-Man? Yes please!) would also be solid choices, since they drop more counters on things. Galadriel, Light of Valinor, too, could be a fun one.

Eriette, the Beguiler is also an interesting choice. Ramp hard, stick expensive Auras on your opponents' stuff to steal it, then all your stolen Creatures are Modified. Our little Carapace will keep adding fuel to the Enchanted fire, making it harder and harder for our opponents to keep Creatures on the board and we continue to draw more and more cards with each Aura we cast.

It's possible a deck which is attempting to win with Thassa's Oracle or otherwise self-mill might want this card, especially if there's any other Equipment or Auras in the deck. Proliferation of different counters also helps - if you find yourself with a surprising number of Role counters or something, jam the Carapace and watch the cards just flow into your Hand.

One card I'd like to see this one working with is Cathars' Crusade. The sheer number of counters that card spits out means everything - EVERYTHING - will have counters. Draw your deck, baby!

SP//dr, Piloted by Peni is an obvious one, I'd think, given it's from the same set, Modifies a Creature when it Enters, and also cares about Modified Creatures.

Final hot take: there is a very cool Equipment build in Ardenn, Intrepid Archaeologist and Esior, Wardwing Familiar. Partner those two up and you have a heck of a curve - starting with Commander one on turn two, then Commander two on turn three, then our Equipment on turn four which can auto-equip to our Flying Commander and draw a card that very first turn. From there it's a question of balancing evasive threats (there are a lot of flyers in ) and more Equipment, plus maybe a few support cards like Sram, Senior Edificer and Trophy Mage.

Casual

If you're a 60-card Casual player, Biorganic Carapace is surely a solid choice for a deck or two. A few ideas:

Spirits: Spirits are cheap and very often fly, plus they're super synergistic. Even with no other Modifications, the power boost and single card is worth the price of admission. Figure out a way to stick some counters on a few things and you're in great shape. There's a similar effect with Rogues, though you'd have to splash the White to get there. Oona's Blackguard makes sure every Rogue enters with an extra Counter, so there should be plenty of Modifications to keep the cards moving.

Birds: Similar to Spirits, but a touch more expensive and fussy. Unlike with Spirits or Rogues, the Carapace wouldn't be a top-end in this deck, but it would be a solid role-player, and Birds carry Equipment well since they mostly fly.

Decks with Ajani: If you're building a casual deck with many versions of Ajani, he tends to put counters on things. This will slot right in, assuming the colors are right, making sure you keep drawing.

I have a hot take for this one, too. Ever since I first saw it, I've loved a deck by Jacob Van Lunen using Shorecrasher Mimic and Bant Charm. The idea is you skip turn one for a tap Land, play a Mimic on turn two, then start attacking for five every turn after that, triggering the Mimic with a slate of spells which are Blue and Green. He went into White to make the whole deck Bant, and Bant Charm - especially with its ability to remove threats from the 'field - was a key component of that... but so was Favor of the Overbeing, which gave the Mimic an additional +2/+2 and two abilities. The deck also played Bant Sureblade, Rhox War Monk, and Rafiq of the Many, and I still have a version which runs all of those, plus a copy of Nadu, Winged Wisdom and Uro, Titan of Nature.

The point is, it runs a bunch of Creatures, plus this Aura, which Modifies those Creatures. A couple of copies of this in place of a Creature or two would be great; they wouldn't trigger Shorecrasher, but you'd more than make up for it the next turn with the extra cards you drew. Here's my decklist, modified to add a couple copies of Biorganic Carapace.

Bant Mimic | Casual | Mark Wischkaemper

• Creatures (12)
• 1 Nadu, Winged Wisdom
• 1 Rafiq of the Many
• 1 Rhox War Monk
• 1 Shanna, Purifying Blade
• 1 Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath
• 3 Bant Sureblade
• 4 Shorecrasher Mimic

• Instants (17)
• 3 Applied Biomancy
• 3 Decisive Denial
• 3 Simic Charm
• 2 Bant Charm
• 2 Brokers Charm
• 2 Quandrix Command
• 2 Snakeform

• Enchantments (7)
• 3 Crystallization
• 4 Favor of the Overbeing

• Artifacts (2)
• 2 Biorganic Carapace

• Lands (22)
• 2 Forest
• 2 Island
• 2 Plains
• 4 Razorverge Thicket
• 4 Seachrome Coast
• 4 Seaside Citadel
• 4 Tranquil Landscape

Buy This Deck Export text

Super fun, super splashy, and the Carapace slips right in. It won't be broken, but it'll be super solid and help you have legs if the game starts to drag.

Constucted

Let's be honest: This card is not strong enough for Modern or Pioneer, much less Legacy or Vintage. A deck that wins on turns 0 - 5 is unlikely to have any use for an Equipment that doesn't win the game on its own and costs four mana.

That said, I can see it as a one-of in a Standard deck which utilizes Counters or Equipment reasonably heavily. While it's likely a deck running Blue will probably just run a spell that draws them cards, a deck already running a few Equipment or Auras, or reliably sticking counters on its Creatures, might want a copy here as a way to push through some extra damage and refill before going in for the kill.

Limited

On the other hand, this thing is an absolute beast in Limited. Snap keep it Pack one Pick one and force the colors, drafting flyers and other evasive Creatures. Prioritize anything which puts counters on stuff, and don't go overboard with Equipment and Auras - let the fact that it draws a single card be enough, and if you luck into a few more, great. Limited is slow enough that just one extra card a turn will often put you miles ahead, and the fact many people don't run any Artifact removal in their main board will just make your position stronger. I'd even consider hate-drafting it if I knew I already had a decent deck and didn't want a strong uncommon in the pack, and I might consider switching on pack two if I opened this but was already in another color combination. The fact it snaps on to whatever you've got, gives an automatic decent boost (this will often take something out of damage-based-removal range), and draws you extra cards makes it very, very strong.

That's a Wrap

Thanks for exploring Biorganic Carapace with me! I'm excited to brew with this card, and I expect to see it showing up in several decks in my future. How do you want to use this card? Let us know on socials! I'd love to hear some different ideas.

Thanks for reading.