Hand

A player's hand consists of cards that have been drawn, but not played. It is one of six zones of the game.

Description

Flavor-wise, the hand represents the conscious mind of the player as a planeswalker and the starting hand is the first seven items that occur to you when you begin a duel with another planeswalker. The starting hand may be reduced when a mulligan is performed. After the optional mulligan, it is called your opening hand.

Rules

From the glossary of the Comprehensive Rules (June 7, 2024—Modern Horizons 3)

Hand

1. A zone. A player’s hand is where that player holds cards they have drawn but not played yet.

2. All the cards in a player’s hand.

See rule 402, “Hand.”

From the Comprehensive Rules (June 7, 2024—Modern Horizons 3)

• 402. Hand
  • 402.1. The hand is where a player holds cards that have been drawn. Cards can be put into a player’s hand by other effects as well. At the beginning of the game, each player draws a number of cards equal to that player’s starting hand size, normally seven. (See rule 103, “Starting the Game.”)
  • 402.2. Each player has a maximum hand size, which is normally seven cards. A player may have any number of cards in their hand, but as part of their cleanup step, the player must discard excess cards down to the maximum hand size.
  • 402.3. A player may arrange their hand in any convenient fashion and look at it at any time. A player can’t look at the cards in another player’s hand but may count those cards at any time.

Mechanics interacting with hands

Hand size

Mechanics which change your hand size.

Putting cards from hand onto the battlefield

Putting unspecified cards from hand onto the battlefield is an effect that is not used anymore, but it used to be primary green.

Artifacts

Putting artifacts from hand onto the battlefield is primary blue, as it is the "friendly to artifacts" color. White will do it when it involves Equipment.

Creatures

Putting creatures from hand onto the battlefield is primary green, secondary in blue and red, and tertiary in white and black. Green does this effect the most often. Blue will do it usually flavored as transformation, and will return one of its creatures to its owner's hand. When red does this the creature is most often sacrificed or returned to hand at end of turn.

Enchantments

Putting enchantments from hand onto the battlefield is primary white, secondary green, and tertiary in blue. White and blue tend to do this tied to Auras, while green will put out any enchantment.

Lands

Putting lands from hand onto the battlefield is essentially only a green mechanic. Green used to do this all the time. It still does it, but not as often as it used to.

Returning cards from graveyard to hand

The ability to get back any card from the graveyard is primary done in green and usually appears at uncommon or higher in rarity.

Artifacts

Blue used to be the color that returned artifacts from the graveyard to the hand, but the ability is now in white.

Creatures

Black can return any creature from the graveyard. It will often do this as an enters the battlefield effect nicknamed after Gravedigger, as that was the card that did it first. White usually returns creatures with smaller converted mana costs.

Enchantments

Getting back enchantments is primary a white thing.

Instant and sorceries

As blue and red are the spell colors (they have the highest percentage of spells versus creatures), they are the two colors that can get instants and sorceries back (blue primary and red secondary). When there is a choice to separate them, blue leans toward getting back instants, and red leans toward getting back sorceries.

Lands

While green can get back any card, it often gets back lands.

Looking at opponent's hand

The ability to look at an opponent's hand is primary in blue and secondary in black. The latter does it only in conjunction with discarding where it has to choose what gets discarded. R&D has been scaling back on this effect, as it tends to slow down gameplay. This has had the effect of making the ability appear more in black than blue, as they still make the discard spells.

Cards with a special ability in an opening hand

• All leylines
• Chancellor of the Annex
• Chancellor of the Dross
• Chancellor of the Forge
• Chancellor of the Spires
• Chancellor of the Tangle
• Devourer of Destiny
• Gemstone Caverns
• Providence
• Sphinx of Foresight

Mechanics active while in the hand

• Ninjutsu
• Channel
• Cycling
• Madness
• Reinforce
• Forecast
• Transmute
• Bloodrush

Cards with a special ability while in the hand

• Tetzimoc, Primal Death
• Zareth San, the Trickster
• Faerie Macabre
• Waker of Waves
• Simian Spirit Guide
• Elvish Spirit Guide
• Magma Opus
• Creative Outburst
• Elemental Masterpiece
• Calim, Djinn Emperor
• Circling Vultures
• Dodecapod
• Edgar's Awakening
• Guerilla Tactics
• Herd Migration
• Kogla and Yigaro
• Loxodon Smiter
• Mangara's Blessing
• Metrognome
• Nullhide Ferox
• Obstinate Baloth
• Psychic Purge
• Pure Intentions
• Quagnoth
• Radiant Solar
• Sand Golem
• Ajani's Last Stand
• Waker of Waves
• Wilt-Leaf Liege
• Glamorous Outlaw
• Masked Bandits
• Rakish Revelers
• Shattered Seraph
• Spara's Adjudicators
• A-Glamorous Outlaw
• A-Masked Bandits
• A-Rakish Revelers
• A-Shattered Seraph
• A-Spara's Adjudicators
• Cheatyface
• Entirely Normal Armchair
• Holographic Double
• Masterful Ninja
• Standard Procedure