Copy Spells: 22 Cards For Your Deck!

Magic: The Gathering spells come in all shapes and sizes. This is by design: it makes sure players have the support they need if they want to explore different themes.

Just think of the players who are always anxious to build new Commander decks with legendary creatures that just came out, or how these new cards impact competitive formats. Card diversity is important.

Copying spells are great in all decks, even if they don't focus solely on this mechanic. For instance, they let you reuse the effect of a spell, or put two essential permanents in play.

In this article, we'll show you 22 copying spells you can use in your deck, in many shapes and forms:

- Cards that copy creatures;

- Cards that copy instants or sorceries;

- Cards that copy permanents.

To select the cards for this article, we analyzed how versatile they are, how recursive, how much they cost, and their ranks in EDHRec. We hope this list helps you make your plays even more powerful and shows you new options for your deck.

Without further ado, let's meet a few great copying spells!

Copying sorceries and/or instants means you'll be able to target more than one card with the spell you just cast, such as with a Shock or Faithless Looting, for instance.

Imagine the following scenario. Your opponent is targeting one of your red creatures with a Path to Exile, but you have Flare of Duplication in hand. You can simply sacrifice that creature, copy Path to Exile, and use it against your opponent.

Besides funny, this interaction basically lets you turn the tables on your opponents.

More than just copying a target instant or sorcery, Narset's Reversal returns that spell to your opponent's hand and lets you pick new targets for the copy. You can cast this spell to copy a Brainstorm, Cultivate, or even Demonic Tutor. It all depends on what's better for you in that situation and what your opponent is playing.

Another card you can use to take advantage of the spells your opponent casts is Twincast. By the way, you can use it to copy your opponent's Counterspell and use the copy to counter the original card.

And, as Dualcaster Mage is a creature, it is a great option for many combos you may play in your deck.

Take a look at this example:

With these two cards in hand, you may:

1. Cast Molten Duplication targeting a creature or artifact;

2. While this sorcery is in the stack, you'll cast Dualcaster Mage;

3. Then, target Molten Duplication with Dualcaster Mage's ETB ability to copy Dualcaster itself;

4. Repeat this process as many times as you want to infinitely create tokens, ETB effects, and Storm counters.

Twinning Staff is, actually, a buff for effects that copy your spells. However, we can't ignore that it also copies a target instant or sorcery you control, and that's why we included it in this section.

The only downside to Sublime Epiphany is the fact that getting six mana to use it on our opponent's turn is a bit difficult. However, when we ignore that detail, we can appreciate everything this card does (and it does a lot!).

You can use this spell to counter spells and/or activated abilities, return a nonland permanent to their controller's hand (the iconic "bounce" effect), draw cards, and, what truly matters to us, create a copy of a target creature we control.

To create non-legendary copies of a legendary creature (and this way not have to sacrifice it when you create a copy of it), we have a few options. Double Major copies a target creature spell you control, Helm of the Host is an artifact that creates non-legendary copies of the creature it is equipped to (and is very popular for its combos with Aurelia, the Warleader), and Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker is a popular, chaotic Goblin (and also combos with Helm).

As for Feldon of the Third Path, it is a welcome resource in Mono Red decks, as it creates copies of creatures in your graveyard and gives them haste. Even if you have to sacrifice the copy on the next end step, it is great because it lets you "reanimate" important creatures that are no longer in play.

And the best of all, it doesn't force you to exile the creatures you copied with it.

There are less cards in this section, but they are just as powerful as the cards above!

Drafna, Founder of Lat-Nam is a legendary creature with an activated ability that copies an artifact spell under your control. With this ability, you can, for instance, copy a Lightning Greaves or even Portal to Phyrexia.

The downside is how much activating this ability costs.

When you cast a creature spell, Oltec Matterweaver creates a copy of a target artifact you control. This card is so great in a vacuum that you can use it in many different decks.

Unlike spells that only copy instants, sorceries, or creatures, there are cards that copy multiple targets. They are the stars here!

As it is an uncommon, Return the Favor is the type of instant that doesn't stand out in a set. However, if you cast this spell with Spree, you can change the target of a spell or ability and copy an instant, sorcery, activated or triggered ability. It also lets you pick new targets for the copy.

As for See Double, it can copy a spell or even a creature, but can't be copied. This makes it more balanced and disables possible combos, like the interaction between Dualcaster Mage and Molten Duplication we commented before.

The very accurately named Three Steps Ahead includes three modes. You can use it to counter a spell, copy an artifact or a creature under your control, or to draw two cards and discard one.

No one likes facing Jin-Gitaxias, Progress Tyrant, the blue praetor. Besides letting you counter the first artifact, instant, or sorcery your opponents cast for free, it also can copy your own artifact, instant, and sorcery spells.

Court of Vantress, on the other hand, interacts with a mechanic Commander players like a lot: the Monarch. At the beginning of your upkeep, you can pick an artifact or enchantment, and, if you're the Monarch, you can copy it. If not, you can turn Court of Vantress into a copy of that permanent, except they keep this ability.

The most fun thing about this card is that it doesn't state you have to pick a target under your control. So, you can target enemy artifacts or enchantments and use them against them.

As you must have realized, there are many Magic: The Gathering cards that copy other cards.

There are also, yes, decks that focus on these types of cards, but they're so great overall that you can use them to support decks that focus on other strategies.

For instance, Jin-Gitaxias, Progress Tyrant fits artifact decks, but you can build a control deck with it or even a Stax deck, like Grand Arbiter Augustin IV Commander decks.

And, if you enjoy combos, you can use many of these cards. If you'd like to see more combos, you can check out our own combo tab here at CardsRealm.

Did you like this article and want to see more just like it? Send us your suggestions in our comment section below. We always keep an eye out for new themes and love your suggestions!

We hope you enjoyed reading this article and that you consider upgrading your deck with these cards.

Thank you for reading, and see you next time!