Magic glossary

255 terms in plain words: the nicknames players use for cards and cycles, and the rules words on the cards.

Ability: Text on a card or object that does something. There are three kinds: activated, triggered and static.
Activated ability: An ability written as "cost: effect". You can activate it whenever you could cast an instant, unless it says otherwise.
Active player: The player whose turn it is.
Ad Naus: Ad Nauseam.
Additional cost: A cost on top of a spell's mana cost, such as "As an additional cost to cast this spell, sacrifice a creature."
Alternative cost: A cost you pay instead of the mana cost, such as Force of Will's exiling a blue card. You can use only one at a time.
Any target: A creature, a player, a planeswalker or a battle.
APNAP order: When several players do things at once, the active player goes first, then each other player in turn order.
Artifact: A card type for objects and machines. Many artifacts are colorless.
Artifact lands: Mirrodin's five lands that are also artifacts, the fuel for affinity. For example: Seat of the Synod, Great Furnace. All 5.
Attach: Move an Aura, Equipment or Fortification onto an object. Attaching it to what it's already on does nothing.
Attacking creature: A creature declared as an attacker, until it's removed from combat or combat ends.
Aura: An enchantment that's attached to an object or player, named by its enchant ability.
Banned: A card that can't be played in a format at all.
Base power and toughness: A creature's printed power and toughness, or what an effect sets them to, before anything adds or subtracts.
Basic land: A land with the basic supertype: Plains, Island, Swamp, Mountain, Forest and Wastes, plus snow versions.
Basic land type: Plains, Island, Swamp, Mountain or Forest. A land with one taps for that color even if its text box is empty.
Battle: A card type you attack to defeat. A Siege is protected by an opponent you choose and is defeated when its defense counters run out.
Battle lands (tango lands): Two basic land types. Untapped if you control two or more basic lands. For example: Prairie Stream, Sunken Hollow. All 10.
Battlefield: Where permanents are: the zone in play.
Beginning phase: The first phase of a turn: untap, upkeep, then draw.
Bicycle lands (cycling duals): Amonkhet's duals with two basic land types that enter tapped and can be cycled for 2. For example: Irrigated Farmland, Canyon Slough. All 10.
Blocked creature: An attacking creature a creature has blocked. It stays blocked even if the blocker leaves.
Blocking creature: A creature declared as a blocker, until it's removed from combat or combat ends.
Bob: Dark Confidant.
Bolt: Lightning Bolt. "Bolting" something is dealing it 3 damage.
Bond lands (crowd lands): Untapped if you have two or more opponents, so nearly always untapped in Commander. From Battlebond. For example: Morphic Pool, Luxury Suite. All 10.
Bounce lands (karoos): Enter tapped and return a land you control to your hand, then tap for two mana. Named after the original one-color cycle, which includes a card called Karoo. For example: Dimir Aqueduct, Coral Atoll. All 17.
Breach: Underworld Breach.
Bridges: Modern Horizons 2's indestructible two-color artifact lands. For example: Drossforge Bridge, Silverbluff Bridge. All 10.
Campuses: Strixhaven's tapped duals that can pay 4 to scry 1. For example: Quandrix Campus. All 5.
Card type: Artifact, battle, creature, enchantment, instant, kindred, land, planeswalker or sorcery (plus a few from casual variants).
Cast: Take a spell from where it is, put it on the stack and pay its costs.
Castles: Throne of Eldraine's legendary lands with an ability, untapped if you control the matching basic type. For example: Castle Ardenvale, Castle Vantress. All 5.
Channel lands: Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty's legendary lands you can discard for a spell, like Boseiju and Otawara. For example: Boseiju, Who Endures, Otawara, Soaring City. All 5.
Characteristic-defining ability: A static ability that sets a characteristic, such as Tarmogoyf's power or changeling. It works in every zone.
Characteristics: What an object is: name, mana cost, color, color indicator, card type, subtype, supertype, rules text, abilities, power, toughness, loyalty, defense and hand and life modifiers.
Charms: Choose one of three modes. For example: Izzet Charm, Boros Charm. All 72.
Check lands: Enters untapped if you already control a land of one of its two basic types. For example: Glacial Fortress, Drowned Catacomb. All 10.
Cleanup step: The last step of a turn: discard down to your hand size, then damage wears off and "until end of turn" effects end.
Cloudposts (Locus lands): Cloudpost taps for colorless for every Locus on the battlefield; the other Locus lands, like Glimmerpost, add to the count. All 4.
Cluestones: Tap for either of two colors. Later, sacrifice it to draw a card. For example: Dimir Cluestone. All 10.
Color: White, blue, black, red or green. A card's color comes from its mana cost or color indicator; with neither it's colorless.
Color identity: Every color in a card's mana cost, its color indicator and any mana symbol in its rules text. A Commander deck must stay inside its commander's.
Color indicator: The colored dot by the type line on a card with no mana cost that still has a color, like many back faces.
Combat damage step: Attacking and blocking creatures deal their damage, all at once (first strike gets its own step first).
Combat phase: Beginning of combat, declare attackers, declare blockers, combat damage, end of combat.
Command zone: A zone for objects that aren't in play but affect the game, like commanders, emblems and some game pieces.
Commander damage: Combat damage one commander has dealt a player over the game. 21 from the same commander knocks that player out.
Commander tax: Each time you cast your commander from the command zone, it costs {2} more for every time you've done so before.
Commands: Choose two of four modes. For example: Cryptic Command, Kolaghan's Command. All 28.
Companion: A card outside your deck that you may put into your hand for {3} once per game, if your deck meets its condition.
Concede: Leave the game, losing it. You can do it any time.
Confluences: Choose three modes, the same one more than once if you like. For example: Mystic Confluence, Fiery Confluence. All 12.
Consult, Pact: Demonic Consultation and Tainted Pact, which empty your library alongside Thoracle.
Control: Who decides what a permanent or spell does. You control the permanents you play, unless an effect changes that.
Controller: The player who controls a permanent, spell or ability right now.
Copy: An object that copies another's copiable values: what's printed, plus other copy effects, but not counters, Auras or other changes.
Cost: What you must pay to cast a spell or activate an ability: mana, life, tapping, sacrificing and so on.
Counter (a spell): Cancel a spell or ability on the stack. A countered spell goes to its owner's graveyard.
Counter (marker): A marker on a permanent or player, like +1/+1, loyalty or poison counters.
Cradle: Gaea's Cradle.
Creature: A card type that can attack and block. It has power and toughness.
Creature lands (manlands): Lands that can turn into creatures. For example: Mutavault, Celestial Colonnade. All 55.
Crypt: Mana Crypt.
Cycling lands: Urza's Saga's one-color lands that enter tapped and cycle for 2. For example: Remote Isle, Drifting Meadow. All 5.
Damage: What sources deal. To a creature it stays until cleanup; to a player it's life lost; to a planeswalker it removes loyalty.
Day and night: Some cards make it day or night. If it's day and the player whose turn it was cast no spells that turn, it becomes night; if it's night and they cast two or more, it becomes day.
Declare attackers step: The active player chooses which creatures attack, and what each attacks: a player, a planeswalker or a battle.
Declare blockers step: The defending player chooses blockers. Each untapped creature can block one attacker.
Defending player: The player being attacked, or who controls the planeswalker or protects the battle being attacked.
Depletion lands: Mercadian Masques' lands that enter with depletion counters and tap for two mana until they run out. For example: Peat Bog, Remote Farm. All 10.
Diamonds: Enter tapped and tap for one color. For example: Sky Diamond. All 5.
Dies: Is put into a graveyard from the battlefield. Said of creatures and planeswalkers.
Dilemma lands: Star Trek's one-color lands: untapped once you have two other lands, and then you choose one of two bonuses as it enters. Star Trek calls choosing a mode facing a dilemma. For example: Federation Outpost, Quark's Bar. All 5.
Discard: Move a card from your hand to your graveyard.
Dockside: Dockside Extortionist.
Double-faced card: A card with a face on each side. It enters with its front face up unless something says otherwise.
Dragonlords: Dragons of Tarkir's five Elder Dragon legends. For example: Dragonlord Atarka, Dragonlord Ojutai. All 5.
Drain: Mana Drain.
Draw step: The active player draws a card. The first player skips it on their first turn in a two-player game.
Dungeon: A card outside the game that venture and the initiative move you through, room by room.
Effect: What happens when a spell or ability resolves, or what a static ability does.
Elder Dragons: Legends' five three-color Elder Dragons, the first legendary dragons. For example: Nicol Bolas, Chromium. All 5.
Eldrazi titans: Emrakul, Kozilek and Ulamog: huge colorless Eldrazi. For example: Emrakul, the Aeons Torn, Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger. All 10.
Emblem: An object in the command zone with abilities, often from a planeswalker. It can't be removed.
Enchantment: A card type for lasting magical effects. Auras, Sagas, Classes, Cases and Rooms are enchantments.
End of combat step: The last step of combat. "At end of combat" triggers happen here.
End step: The first step of the ending phase. "At the beginning of the end step" triggers happen here.
Enters the battlefield: A permanent arriving on the battlefield. Triggers say "when this enters".
Equipment: An artifact you attach to a creature you control by paying its equip cost.
Evoke Elementals (Incarnations): Modern Horizons 2's Solitude, Endurance, Fury, Grief and Subtlety: evoke them for free by exiling a card of their color. Lorwyn's evoke creatures cost mana instead. All 5.
Exile: A zone for cards removed from the game. Cards in exile are face up unless something says otherwise.
Extra turn: A turn taken right after the current one. The most recently created extra turn comes first.
Face a dilemma: Star Trek's name for choosing one or more modes of a spell or ability. Cards that say "whenever you face a dilemma" trigger on any modal choice, a Command or a dilemma land included. Not the same as council's dilemma, which is a vote.
Face-down: A card turned over, with no name, color or abilities: usually a 2/2 creature from morph, disguise, manifest or cloak.
Fast lands: Untapped if you control two or fewer other lands. Great in the first turns, tapped later. For example: Blooming Marsh, Spirebluff Canal. All 10.
Fast mana: Cards that give mana well ahead of curve, mostly free or cheap rocks. For example: Sol Ring, Mana Vault, Chrome Mox.
Fetch lands (fetches): Pay 1 life and sacrifice it to put a land with either of two basic land types onto the battlefield. Usually fetches a shock land or an original dual. Also thins the deck and fills the graveyard. For example: Polluted Delta, Misty Rainforest. All 10.
Fight: Two creatures deal damage equal to their power to each other.
Filter lands: Pay one mana to get two back in any mix of its colors. Shadowmoor's take a hybrid mana; Odyssey's take any one mana. For example: Mystic Gate, Darkwater Catacombs. All 20.
Flip: A coin flip, or turning a flip card from Kamigawa upside down.
Flip walkers: Creatures that transform into planeswalkers, like Magic Origins' Jace, Vryn's Prodigy. For example: Jace, Vryn's Prodigy // Jace, Telepath Unbound, Kytheon, Hero of Akros // Gideon, Battle-Forged. All 13.
Forces: The Force of ... cycle; most can be cast for free by exiling a card of the same color, some only on your opponent's turn. For example: Force of Will, Force of Negation, Force of Vigor. All 7.
FoW: Force of Will.
Gain lands (life lands): Enter tapped and gain you 1 life. For example: Dismal Backwater, Jungle Hollow. All 40.
God monuments: Amonkhet's legendary artifacts that make one color's creatures cheaper. For example: Kefnet's Monument, Oketra's Monument. All 5.
Goyf: Tarmogoyf, and any creature with "-goyf" in its name.
Graveyard: Your discard pile. Destroyed, sacrificed, countered and used cards go here, face up and in order.
Hand: The cards you hold. Seven to start; you discard down to seven in cleanup.
Hexproof: Can't be the target of spells or abilities your opponents control.
Hidden zone: A zone where not everyone can see the cards: libraries and hands.
Hideaway lands: Lorwyn's lands that hide a card under them and let you play it for free once a condition is met. For example: Windbrisk Heights, Shelldock Isle. All 6.
Hondens: Champions of Kamigawa's five legendary Shrines that grow with each Shrine you control. For example: Honden of Seeing Winds, Honden of Night's Reach. All 5.
Hoof: Craterhoof Behemoth.
Horizon lands (canopy lands): Pay 1 life to tap for either color. Later, pay 1, tap and sacrifice it to draw a card. For example: Horizon Canopy, Waterlogged Grove. All 6.
Instant: A card type you can cast any time you have priority, even on another player's turn.
Instant speed: Any time you have priority, the way you can cast an instant.
Intervening if: A trigger worded "when X, if Y, do Z": Y is checked both when it triggers and when it resolves.
JTMS: Jace, the Mind Sculptor.
Kamigawa dragons: Champions of Kamigawa's five Spirit Dragons with a death trigger. For example: Kokusho, the Evening Star, Keiga, the Tide Star. All 5.
Keyrunes: Tap for either of two colors, or turn into a creature for a turn. For example: Dimir Keyrune. All 10.
Keyword ability: An ability shortened to a word or two, like flying or ward.
Keyword action: A game verb with a rules meaning, like scry, mill or investigate.
Kiki: Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker.
Kindred: A card type that lets a noncreature card have creature types, like an instant that's also an Elf. Called tribal before 2024.
Land: A card type you play, not cast: once a turn, in your main phase, when the stack is empty.
Last known information: When an object has left a zone, the game uses what it was just before it left.
Layers: The order continuous effects apply in: copy, control, text, type, color, abilities, then power and toughness. Within a layer, timestamp order, unless one effect depends on another.
Leaves the battlefield: A permanent moving from the battlefield to any other zone.
Legal target: A target that meets what the spell or ability asks for. If every target is illegal on resolution, it does nothing.
Legend rule: If you control two or more legendary permanents with the same name, you choose one and put the rest into your graveyard.
Legendary: A supertype. Legendary permanents follow the legend rule, and only legendary creatures can usually be commanders.
Leylines: Start the game on the battlefield if they're in your opening hand. For example: Leyline of the Void, Leyline of Sanctity. All 17.
Library: Your deck during the game, face down. Drawing from an empty library makes you lose.
Lieges: Shadowmoor and Eventide's hybrid lords that give +1/+1 to both of their colors. For example: Creakwood Liege, Murkfiend Liege. All 10.
Life total: 20 at the start in most formats, 40 in Commander. At 0 or less you lose.
Lockets: Tap for either of two colors. Later, pay four and sacrifice it to draw two cards. For example: Dimir Locket. All 10.
Loyalty: A planeswalker's life, shown as loyalty counters. Its abilities add or remove them, once a turn, at sorcery speed.
Main phase: The first and second main phases, before and after combat: where you play lands and cast sorcery-speed spells.
Mana: What you spend to cast spells: white, blue, black, red, green or colorless. Unspent mana empties at the end of each step and phase.
Mana ability: An ability that makes mana and doesn't target, like a land's {T}: Add {G}. It doesn't use the stack.
Mana cost: The mana symbols in a card's top right corner.
Mana pool: Where mana waits between being made and being spent.
Mana value: The total amount of mana in a card's mana cost, counting each colored symbol as one. X counts as 0 except on the stack. Was called converted mana cost.
MDFCs (spell lands): Modal double-faced cards: a spell on the front, a land on the back. Play either side. For example: Agadeem's Awakening // Agadeem, the Undercrypt. All 82.
Medallions: Make your spells of one color cost 1 less. For example: Sapphire Medallion. All 5.
Mirage fetches (slow fetches): The older fetch lands: they enter tapped, then sacrifice to find a land of either type, with no life paid. For example: Flood Plain. All 5.
Mode: One of the choices on a modal spell or ability, listed after "Choose one" or similar. You choose as you cast it.
Monarch: A designation. The monarch draws an extra card each end step; deal combat damage to them and you become it.
Moxen (Moxes): Free artifacts that tap for one mana. The five originals are Power; later Moxes have a condition attached. For example: Mox Sapphire, Chrome Mox, Mox Diamond. All 13.
Mulligan: Shuffling your opening hand back and drawing a new seven. In the London mulligan you then put one card on the bottom for each mulligan.
Multicolored: Having two or more colors.
Multiplayer game: A game with more than two players, like Commander.
Necro: Necropotence.
Nontoken: A permanent that's a card, not a token.
Obelisks: Shards of Alara's mana rocks, one per shard, tapping for any of its three colors. For example: Obelisk of Esper, Obelisk of Jund. All 5.
Object: Anything in a zone or on the stack: cards, tokens, copies, spells, abilities and emblems.
Original duals (ABUR duals): Two basic land types and no drawback at all. From Magic's first sets, on the Reserved List, and among the most expensive cards in the game. For example: Underground Sea, Tundra. All 10.
Owner: The player who started the game with the card in their deck, or who created the token or copy.
Pacts: Free now; pay on your next upkeep or lose the game. For example: Pact of Negation, Slaughter Pact. All 6.
Pain lands: Tap for colorless for free, or for either of its colors for 1 damage. For example: Shivan Reef, Underground River. All 16.
Panoramas and Landscapes: Sacrifice to find a basic land of one of three types, tapped. Landscapes can also be cycled. For example: Esper Panorama, Foreboding Landscape. All 15.
Party: One each of Cleric, Rogue, Warrior and Wizard among your creatures: up to four.
Pathways: Double-faced lands: you pick which color side to play. For example: Clearwater Pathway // Murkwater Pathway. All 10.
Permanent: A card or token on the battlefield: artifacts, battles, creatures, enchantments, lands and planeswalkers.
Permanent card: A card that would be a permanent if it were on the battlefield.
Phase: A part of a turn: beginning, first main, combat, second main, ending.
Pitch spells (free spells): Cast without paying mana, by exiling a card from your hand or another cost instead. For example: Force of Will, Daze.
Planeswalker: A card type for powerful allies with loyalty abilities. It can be attacked.
Play: Cast a spell, or play a land.
Player: A person in the game.
Pod, Twin: Birthing Pod and Splinter Twin, and the decks named after them.
Poison counter: A counter on a player. Ten or more and that player loses.
Power: The first number in the bottom right of a creature: the damage it deals in combat.
Power Nine (P9): The nine most powerful early cards: Black Lotus, the five original Moxen, Ancestral Recall, Time Walk and Timetwister. All 9.
Praetors: The Phyrexian leaders, one per color. For example: Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite, Sheoldred, the Apocalypse. All 19.
Prevent: Stop damage from being dealt. Prevented damage never happens, so lifelink and similar don't see it.
Prime Time: Primeval Titan.
Primordials: Gatecrash's Avatars, one per color, that do something to each opponent when they enter. For example: Sepulchral Primordial, Sylvan Primordial. All 5.
Priority: Who may cast a spell or activate an ability right now. When every player passes in a row, the top of the stack resolves or the step ends.
Public zone: A zone everyone can see: battlefield, graveyards, exile, the stack and the command zone.
Rainbow lands: Tap for any color. For example: Command Tower, Mana Confluence. All 21.
Reminder text: Italic text in parentheses that explains a rule. It has no effect of its own.
Replacement effect: An effect that says "instead" or "skip", or that something enters with counters: it changes an event as it happens.
Resolve: A spell or ability on the stack doing what it says, then leaving the stack.
Restricted: In Vintage, a card you may run only one copy of.
Rhystic, Remora: Rhystic Study and Mystic Remora, blue's tax-or-I-draw enchantments.
Rift: Cyclonic Rift.
Rituals: One-shot spells that give back more mana than they cost. For example: Dark Ritual.
Rules text: What a card does, in its text box.
Sacrifice: Move a permanent you control to its owner's graveyard. It isn't destroyed, so indestructible doesn't stop it.
Saga: An enchantment with chapters. A lore counter goes on as it enters and each precombat main phase; each chapter triggers in turn.
Scry lands (temples): Enter tapped and scry 1. For example: Temple of Deceit, Temple of Epiphany. All 10.
SFM: Stoneforge Mystic.
Shock lands (shocks): Two basic land types. Pay 2 life as it enters, or it enters tapped. Having the types means fetch lands can find them. For example: Steam Vents, Watery Grave. All 10.
Shuffle: Randomize a library.
Signets: Pay 1 and tap for two mana of a guild's colors. For example: Dimir Signet, Arcane Signet. All 11.
Slow lands: The reverse of fast lands: tapped unless you control two or more other lands. For example: Shipwreck Marsh, Deserted Beach. All 10.
Snap: Snapcaster Mage.
Snarls (reveal lands): Untapped if you reveal a land of one of its two basic types from your hand. Shadows over Innistrad had the same idea under other names. For example: Vineglimmer Snarl, Port Town. All 10.
Snow: A supertype. Snow lands make snow mana, which some cards ask for.
Snow duals: Kaldheim's snow lands with two basic land types that enter tapped. Snow cards care about them. For example: Ice Tunnel, Arctic Treeline. All 10.
Sorcery: A card type you can cast only in your main phase, when the stack is empty.
Sorcery speed: Only in your main phase, when the stack is empty.
Source: The object that deals damage, or the object an ability comes from.
Spell: A card, or a copy of one, on the stack.
Spellbombs: One-mana artifacts you sacrifice for an effect, or pay 1 to draw a card instead. For example: Pyrite Spellbomb, Origin Spellbomb. All 10.
Split second: While a spell with it is on the stack, players can't cast spells or activate abilities other than mana abilities.
Stack: The zone where spells and abilities wait to resolve. The last one added resolves first.
State-based actions: Checks the game makes whenever a player would get priority: a creature with lethal damage is destroyed, a player at 0 life loses, the legend rule applies and so on.
Static ability: An ability that's simply true while the object is in play, like "Creatures you control get +1/+1."
Step: A part of a phase, like upkeep or declare blockers.
Storage lands: Save mana on the land as storage counters and spend it all later. For example: Dreadship Reef, Calciform Pools. All 18.
Strip, Waste: Strip Mine and Wasteland.
Subtype: The words after the dash on the type line: creature types, land types, Equipment, Aura and so on.
Summoning sickness: A creature can't attack or use {T} abilities unless you've controlled it since your most recent turn began. Haste ignores it.
Supertype: A word before the card type: basic, legendary, snow, world, ongoing.
Surveil lands: Two basic land types, enter tapped, and surveil 1. From Murders at Karlov Manor. For example: Underground Mortuary, Thundering Falls. All 10.
Swords: The Sword of X and Y equipment: +2/+2, protection from two colors, and a payoff when the creature hits a player. For example: Sword of Fire and Ice, Sword of Feast and Famine. All 11.
Swords (StP), Path: Swords to Plowshares and Path to Exile, white's one-mana exile removal.
Tainted lands: Odyssey's lands that tap for colorless, or for two colors if you control a Swamp. For example: Tainted Field, Tainted Isle. All 4.
Talismans: Tap for colorless, or for either of two colors for 1 damage. For example: Talisman of Dominance. All 10.
Tap lands (taplands) and Guildgates: Any two-color land that simply enters tapped. Guildgates are the ones with the Gate type, which some cards care about. For example: Dimir Guildgate, Submerged Boneyard. All 40.
Tapped: Turned sideways after use. A tapped creature can't attack or block.
Target: Something a spell or ability chooses with the word target. It must be legal when chosen and again when it resolves.
The initiative: A designation that ventures you into the Undercity. Deal combat damage to the player who has it and you take it.
The Ring: The One Ring.
The ring tempts you: Choose a creature as your Ring-bearer; each time, the Ring gains another ability, up to four.
Thoracle, Lab Man: Thassa's Oracle and Laboratory Maniac, which win with an empty library.
Threshold lands: Odyssey's lands with a bonus once seven or more cards are in your graveyard, like Cephalid Coliseum. For example: Cephalid Coliseum, Barbarian Ring. All 6.
Thriving lands: Enter tapped; you choose a second color for it as it enters. For example: Thriving Isle, Thriving Grove. All 5.
Timestamp: When an effect started or an object arrived. Within a layer, later timestamps apply on top of earlier ones. Equipment gets a new one each time it's attached.
Titans: Magic 2011 and 2012's six-mana giants that trigger on entering and attacking. For example: Primeval Titan, Grave Titan, Sun Titan. All 5.
Tithe: Smothering Tithe.
Token: A permanent that isn't a card, made by an effect. It stops existing if it leaves the battlefield.
Tomb: Ancient Tomb.
Toughness: The second number in the bottom right of a creature: the damage it takes to destroy it.
Tri-lands: Enter tapped and tap for any of three colors, with no land types. For example: Arcane Sanctum, Nomad Outpost. All 10.
Trigger: When a triggered ability's event happens, it triggers and goes on the stack the next time a player would get priority.
Triggered ability: An ability that starts with when, whenever or at.
Triomes: Three basic land types, enter tapped, cycling 3. Fetch lands can find them. For example: Ketria Triome, Raffine's Tower. All 10.
Tron (Urza lands): Urza's Tower, Mine and Power Plant. With all three out they make 7 mana. For example: Urza's Tower, Urza's Mine, Urza's Power Plant. All 3.
Turn order: The order players take turns, clockwise from the starting player in most games.
Type line: The line under the art: supertype, card type and subtypes.
Ultimatums: Three-color sorceries with three pips of each color, from Shards of Alara and Ikoria. For example: Cruel Ultimatum, Genesis Ultimatum. All 11.
Unblocked creature: An attacking creature no creature blocked.
Untap step: The active player untaps their permanents. Nobody gets priority, so nothing can be cast.
Upkeep step: After untap. "At the beginning of your upkeep" triggers happen here.
Utility lands: Lands that do something besides make mana. For example: Strip Mine, Cavern of Souls.
Verges: Always taps for one color. Taps for the second only if you control a land of a certain basic type. For example: Gloomlake Verge, Hushwood Verge. All 10.
Vivid lands: Enter tapped with two charge counters; spend one to tap for any color. For example: Vivid Creek. All 5.
Wishes: Get a card you own from outside the game, usually your sideboard. For example: Burning Wish, Living Wish. All 44.
X: A number you choose, usually as you cast the spell, then pay for.
Zone: A place a card can be: library, hand, battlefield, graveyard, stack, exile and the command zone.

Open in Mana Dork