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Hour counter
Time
Counter
Use Count up or down for effect
Placed on Enchantments, Artifacts
Introduced Kaladesh
Last used Unknown Event
Statistics
4 counter creation cards
{U} 25% {B} 25% {U/B} 25% {M} 25%
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oracle:"Hour counter"

Hour counters are a type of counter introduced in Kaladesh. They are used on cards to count down or count up for some effect.

Description[ | ]

Hour counters first appeared on Midnight Oil in Kaladesh. It is an enchantment that enters the battlefield with 7 Hour counters limiting the player's maximum hand size to the number of counters while penalizing discarding via lost life. At each draw step, it allows for the drawing of an additional card while two hour counters are removed from it.

They appeared once again in Throne of Eldraine on Midnight Clock with a different usage. This time the artifact gained an hour counter on each upkeep building up to 12 while having the ability to add additional ones for some mana. When it hit 12, the player would shuffle their hand and graveyard into their library and draw a new hand. Rusko, Clockmaker from Alchemy: The Brothers' War later became the first creature to use hour counters with it directly adding the counters to all Midnight Clocks under the players control whenever the player cast a non-creature spell.

Hour counters appeared on the 2024 Las Vegas Unknown Event test card The Bus Runner which creates a token with 8 of the counters on it with one being removed whenever the token or a gamer is tapped. Once all are removed, the player gains a life while opponents lose a life. Then 8 more counters re re-added. This represents a countdown on the card.

Trivia[ | ]

References[ | ]

  1. Christopher Bellach (September 5, 2018). "Counter Development in Magic Online". magicthegathering.com. Wizards of the Coast.
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