Unusual MTG Creature Types, part 2: Orc

Continuing my foray into obscure M:TG creature types (begun last week with Sphinxes), here’s one that I bet many modern players haven’t even heard of: Orc. For that matter, many old-school Magic players probably don’t remember Orcs, either. But, as I’ll demonstrate, Orcs aren’t necessarily a forgettable or useless creature type–actually, they have some useful abilities!

What Do Orcs Do?

orcishveteran With only 20 creatures in the entire game bearing the “Orc” creature type, Orcs are a rare and interesting side of Red. Not quite as efficient as Goblins, Orc creatures are often used as support cards for general Red decks rather than being used in a tribal deck of their own. In fact, the most prevalent of Orc abilities is a hindrance–many of them cannot block creatures power 2 or greater, and some have conditional abilities to attack or block based on the color or number of creatures attacking or blocking.

But going beyond Orcs’ handicap, they provide a risk-based control strategy, just like Red likes it. Many Orcs allow you to sacrifice something on your field (a creature, a land, an artifact, etc.) to deal damage, get a P/T bonus to your creatures, or other bonuses. Others deal damage merely by tapping, and some sack themselves to deal damage or destroy lands. There is even an Orc that allows you to look at the top 3 cards of any player’s library (take that, Sensei’s Divining Top!).

Several Orcs are just 1 red mana to play, and the most expensive are Orcish Squatters and Sek’Kuar, Deathkeeper, both at 5 mana. (Mana isn’t necessarily an issue for the Orcs, but since some of them sacrifice land, it’s better that they cost relatively less.) This feature allows them to fit into generic Red decks with a little more ease.

Overall, the Orcs printed thus far offer Red decks some much-needed utility; they aren’t necessarily meant for combat, since most of them are 1/1s or 2/2s. But including a few Orcs may just enable your Red deck to do more control and resource management than it has before–you just have to be willing to take the risk!

More Examples of Orcs

orcishspy orcishlumberjack
orcishcannoneers ironclawbuzzardiers
orcgeneral orcishlibrarian

All card images retrieved from MagicCards.info.

Further Research: Complete Orc List

Find the complete list of Orcs on Gatherer: Orc Search

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