Sacrifice

Sacrifice
Keyword Action
Introduced	Alpha (mechanic) Revised Edition (keyword)
Last used	Evergreen
Reminder Text	No official reminder text
Scryfall Search
fulloracle:"Sacrifice"

Sacrifice, often shortened to sac, is a keyword action. It means to move a permanent you control to its owner's graveyard.

Description

Sacrificing or saccing is purposely or forcibly removing a permanent from play. This can be due to an effect on the card itself, the effect of another permanent already in play, coming into or leaving play or a spell such as an instant or sorcery. A sacrificed permanent cannot be regenerated. Even though the card Sacrifice was in Alpha, the keyword action of sacrifice didn't show up until Revised Edition.

Strategy

Sacrifice decks leverage the fact that spells that require a sacrifice tend to be cheap to compensate for the card advantage loss, which when coupled with expendable fodder let the deck accelerate through multiple spells every turn. One of the popular tricks is to use red's temporary control effects (which are often cheap as their standard use case only produces damage) to steal their opponent's creatures for sacrifice fuel. As one-mana spells improve and token-making design expand, sacrifice decks have been infamous for both their intricate lines of play and slow gameplay experiences as a result.

One of the first competitive combo sacrifice decks is among the most famous in its history: Prosperous Bloom by way of Squandered Resources.

Rules

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

Sacrifice

To move a permanent you control to its owner’s graveyard. See rule 701.17, “Sacrifice.”

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

• 701.17. Sacrifice
  • 701.17a To sacrifice a permanent, its controller moves it from the battlefield directly to its owner’s graveyard. A player can’t sacrifice something that isn’t a permanent, or something that’s a permanent they don’t control. Sacrificing a permanent doesn’t destroy it, so regeneration or other effects that replace destruction can’t affect this action.

Examples

Example 1

Arms Dealer
Creature — Goblin
1/1
, Sacrifice a Goblin: Arms Dealer deals 4 damage to target creature.

Example 2

Cruel Edict
Sorcery
Target opponent sacrifices a creature.

Example 3

Krark-Clan Ironworks
Artifact
Sacrifice an artifact: Add .

Sacrifice as a resource

Sacrifice an artifact

Black and red are the most likely to sacrifice artifacts to generate an effect.

Sacrifice a creature

Black and red are also the two most likely colors to sacrifice creatures. This is often part of a draft archetype.

Sacrifice an enchantment

Red and green are the two colors that most often sacrifice enchantments. This only tends to get used in sets with enchantment themes.

Sacrifice a land

Red is the color most likely to sacrifice lands.

Sacrifice a permanent

Red is the color most likely to sacrifice any permanent as it's the color that can individually sacrifice them all. R&D are letting black do this a little more.

Forced sacrifice

• Sacrifice a creature (target/each player sacrifices a creature) is primary in black.
• Sacrifice an artifact (target/each player sacrifices an artifact) is primary in red.
• Sacrifice a permanent (target/each player sacrifices a permanent) is also primary in red.

Cards that can't be sacrificed

• Hithlain Rope
• Jon Irenicus, Shattered One
• Slicer, Hired Muscle

Cards that prevent/prohibit sacrificing

• Angel of Jubilation
• Assault Suit
• Sigarda, Host of Herons
• Tajuru Preserver
• Tamiyo, Collector of Tales
• Yasharn, Implacable Earth