The 15 Best Modular Cards in Magic Ranked

Last updated on November 24, 2025

Zabaz, the Glimmerwasp | Illustration by Jason Felix

+1/+1 counters are an essential part of Magic. Creatures and spells have been creating and removing them since the game’s inception, and their uses stretch far beyond mere combat damage. Many abilities make use of +1/+1 counters as a resource, and modular is the perfect example.

One of my favorite things to do in Magic is to put some dice on some cards. The physical act of placing them and the visual sensation of a board full of cardboard squares with dozens of polyhedral dice spread around just gets me going, so much so that I’ve built no less than three decks whose endgames revolve around putting as many dice on as many cards as possible.

The modular mechanic is a great start for any of these decks. I’m so excited to jump into its history and design and dissect some of the best modular cards in Magic. Let’s gear up and dive in!

What Is Modular in MTG?

Arcbound Overseer | Illustration by Carl Critchlow

Modular appears on cards as “modular N,” where N is usually a number (but not always! See: Arcbound Wanderer). A permanent with modular N enters the battlefield with N +1/+1 counters on it. When it dies you can place a number of +1/+1 counters on a target artifact creature equal to the number of +1/+1 counters on the dying modular creature.

I like to think of modular decks as akin to aristocrats decks since both want to constantly sacrifice and resurrect creatures for advantage. The best modular cards help you enable that strategy.

Most of the Arcbound creatures appear as constructs and golems bound together by energies flaring around their joints. This allows their parts to be easily exchanged with other artifact creatures. They donate their power and parts to new creatures each time they die. Reduce, reuse, recycle!

#15. Arcbound Tracker

Cards that care about casting a second spell love to trigger payoffs like Arcbound Tracker, which matches that payoff when modular accumulates those counters.

#14. Arcbound Stinger

Sometimes you just need to trigger a saboteur effect and while Arcbound Stinger is easy to slot into many decks, it's hard for opponents to justify spending a card or two mana to remove it.

#13. Arcbound Javelineer

Arcbound Javelineer is one of the only modular creature with a toughness score. It enters the battlefield as a 1/2 that can remove +1/+1 counters to deal damage to attacking or blocking creatures.

The Javelineer’s utility is useful in a Limited environment and can become an effective rattlesnake to shake at your enemies with the right set up. Best of all, it won’t die if you remove all of its counters for its ability, meaning you won’t lose out on any counters you could otherwise redistribute among your other artifact creatures.

#12. Arcbound Slasher

Arcbound Slasher is a great common hailing from MH2. It’s more fairly priced than many of the other modular creatures, entering the battlefield as either a 5/5 or a 4/4 with haste. I love the interaction of riot and modular on the same creature and I hope to see more crossover between +1/+1 counter abilities in the future.

#11. Arcbound Worker

Ah, the classic worker peon. Arcbound Worker is the simplest Arcbound creature on Mirrodin. As a 1/1 for mana that moves its counter to another artifact creature on death, it’s an appropriately priced card at common rarity you’ll want four of in any modular-themed deck.

#10. Arcbound Condor

Arcbound Condor‘s modular ability doesn't play into its other ability in any meaningful way, outside of the fact that it just wants you to play a bunch of artifacts. It has an “artifactfall” ability that turns new artifacts into removal, though being the only black modular card means it doesn't have as many homes as the rest of these cards.

#9. Blaster, Combat DJ

This Transformers robot either grants modular to your other artifact creatures on the front, or has modular itself on the back, which is relevant since More Than Meets the Eye lets you cast it as Blaster, Morale Booster if you want. The play pattern here is casting it on the back half, moving its counters to another artifact creature, then converting it into Blaster, Combat DJ, who can then pick up extra +1/+1 counters and flip to move them around again. It's a bit convoluted yet a card that's in decent colors for +1/+1 counter synergy.

#8. Power Depot

Power Depot was the first noncreature card with modular. It’s a great color fixer in any artifact deck and I love its reliability as a sacrifice target.

But I don’t think its potential has been unlocked yet. There has to be a way to maximize the modular ability on a land. Crucible of Worlds seems too obvious and I can’t see myself splashing green to Crop Rotation over and over either.

#7. Arcbound Crusher

Arcbound Crusher gets certified big with any artifactfall engine, and trample makes it inevitable. Not sure which engine to start with? How about this all-colorless infinite combo: Add Animation Module and Ashnod's Altar. You still need to put an artifact into play, and any artifact token will do, and pay the first to get a Servo. Since the Altar turns that one Servo into two mana you're on your way to as many death, sacrifice, ETB triggers as you can handle, plus more colorless mana than you need.

#6. Scrapyard Recombiner

Another great recursion piece, Scrapyard Recombiner was the first new modular card since Fifth Dawn. It’s not exactly a Tinker on a body but there are still loads of great constructs to tutor up.

The Gearhulk cycle, Hangarback Walker, Walking Ballista, and Myr Battlesphere are all great artifact tutor targets, not to mention a lot of the other modular cards.

#5. Arcbound Shikari

A regular menace in MH2’s Limited environment, Arcbound Shikari was my preferred 3-drop after Arcbound Mouser and Arcbound Prototype. The Limited environment for MH2 made a lot of use of +1/+1 counters on artifact creatures outside of solely modular creatures, too. Esper Sentinel, Knighted Myr, and Bottle Gnomes were all also excellent targets.

#4. Arcbound Overseer

Arcbound Overseer is a great “lord” for your modular robot army. It throws another +1/+1 counter on each of your modular creatures each upkeep. And with a 6/6 body for 8 mana, it’s worth the price.

#3. Arcbound Reclaimer

Arcbound Reclaimer is the chocolate to Arcbound Ravager’s peanut butter. It allows you to recur your dead modular creatures to the top of your library. It’s not as efficient as it could be, but it’s still great considering the ability doesn’t need any mana to activate.

#2. Arcbound Ravager

Arcbound Ravager might be the best modular card. While it only comes with a single +1/+1 counter it’s a free sacrifice outlet for the rest of your modular cards and is an essential enabler when building around modular.

#1. Zabaz, the Glimmerwasp

WotC gave us a commander for all these modular creatures in Modern Horizons 2 in the form of Zabaz, the Glimmerwasp. And Zabaz is great. It adds an extra +1/+1 counter to any modular effect that puts them on your creatures. It gets out of control quick!

Zabaz also offsets the steep price you pay on modular creatures for their relatively small bodies. To top it all off, it’s just 1 mana.

The Best Modular Payoffs

Proliferating those +1/+1 counters is another excellent combo for your modular deck. Throne of Geth proliferates for the low, low price of tapping and sacrificing an artifact. It’s both enabler and payoff in a modular deck and is a cheap alternative to Arcbound Ravager.

The best way to make sure your modular creatures die is to do it yourself. Cards like Improvised Club and Shrapnel Blast turn those weak modular creatures into immediate damage and work great in response to blockers and board wipes.

This one feels tricky. Since most modular creatures are 0/0 and only survive thanks to their +1/+1 counters, they can feel a little weak compared to their mana costs. But hit a modular creature with an animation effect like Ensoul Artifact, Zoetic Glyph, or Katara, Water Tribe's Hope and suddenly you’ve got at least a 6/6 beater to start swinging around.

Of course I have to mention this dastardly duo. Walking Ballista and the classic Triskelion turn those +1/+1 counters into direct damage, and they’re already staples in most +1/+1 counter-themed decks. With all the recursion available to modular creatures, you can easily return them to the field to unleash another barrage. Counter doublers and additional counter cards like Ozolith, the Shattered Spire are unsurprisingly powerful payoffs as well.

The Ozolith gives you a non-creature permanent on which to store your counters and is a good mover of counters as well. Scrap Trawler recycles your modular cards to add lots of resilience to your main strategy, and Marionette Apprentice reaches your opponent's life total directly.

The History of Modular in MTG

Mark Rosewater designed modular to be reminiscent of the spike creatures from Exodus and the chimeras of Visions. The spikes were 0/0 creatures that entered the battlefield with a number of +1/+1 counters that they could remove to activate abilities. Two of the most popular spikes still see some play in EDH decks to this day.

Spike Weaver’s repeatable Fog effect and Spike Feeder’s mana-free lifegain ability are both useful tools in any counters-themed deck.

The chimeras on the other hand are all 4-mana 2/2 artifact creatures with one of four evergreen abilities: first strike, trample, flying, and un-keyworded vigilance. They can sacrifice themselves to put a mythical +2/+2 counter on any other chimera creature and permanently give that creature their respective ability. In modern parlance we’d probably see this represented as the keyword counters from Ikoria.

During the design for the Mirrodin block, Rosewater wanted to make use of +1/+1 counters in a similar way to the spikes while also making artifact creatures matter. He wanted to avoid making another cycle of chimeras and wanted to make use of the spikes’ +1/+1 counter synergies by moving counters onto other creatures. The conglomeration of these ideas led to the modular mechanic as we know it today.

The first 12 modular cards were introduced in Darksteel and Fifth Dawn back in 2004, with another 10 to follow in Modern Horizons and Modern Horizons 2. They originally appeared only on colorless artifact creatures but have expanded into red and white with MH2.

Modular was used one-off designs in Modern Horizons 3 and Transformers, on Arcbound Condor and Blaster, Combat DJ, respectively.

Does Modular Go on The Stack?

Modular’s first ability does not use the stack. The creature enters the battlefield with the +1/+1 counters, meaning the ability never triggers or activates. To counter a modular ability at this stage, you’d just need to Essence Scatter the creature spell as it’s played.

Modular’s second ability is a triggered ability, so that uses the stack. An opponent could potentially Stifle the modular ability as your creature dies, preventing the +1/+1 counters from being placed on a new creature. This also means you could use Strionic Resonator to double the number of +1/+1 counters any given modular ability on the stack creates.

Does Modular Work with Exile?

Modular doesn’t trigger if the permanent is exiled from the battlefield. It has to be put into the graveyard from the battlefield, shorthanded as “dies” in the ability’s reminder text. This means that Oblivion Rings shut down your modular creatures and you won’t be able to Cloudshift those modular creatures off the battlefield to move their counters while returning them at full strength.

It’s important to note that the first part of the modular ability happens when the creature enters from anywhere, not just when it’s cast. A modular creature can still survive combat with a Momentary Blink effect.

Is Modular an Activated Ability?

You don’t “choose” to activate it, so modular is not an activated ability. The first half of the ability is static. The permanent enters with the +1/+1 counters instead of having them “placed” on it afterwards. The second part is triggered. When the creature dies, you may put a number of +1/+1 counters on another target artifact creature equal to the number of +1/+1 counters on the dying modular permanent.

Neither of these use a colon to denote a cost and effect, so neither part of modular is activated.

Do Multiple Instances of Modular Stack?

Yes, if a card gives additional instances of modular, the additional instances trigger.

How Can I Preserve Modular Counters After a Board Wipe?

To preserve your modular counters after a board wipe, you want an effect that moves counters onto a permanent that won't get eliminated. Ozolith, the Shattered Spire and Resourceful Defense are great for this. Though it also counts as board wipe protection, phasing like on Clever Concealment retains the counters and attachments on your permanents.

How Does Modular Interact with -1/-1 Counters?

Modular’s interaction with -1/-1 counters is tricky. You’ve probably heard that -1/-1 and +1/+1 counters “cancel each other out,” but what does that mean, exactly?

The positive counters and negative counters do negate each other, but not until state-based actions are checked. So if enough -1/-1 counters are placed on a modular creature to kill it outright, say if your 1/1 Arcbound Ravager gets hit with a Black Sun's Zenith where X=2, then the creature will die.

But when the modular ability triggers it checks “last known information” for the number of +1/+1 counters it moves. Since state-based actions aren’t checked until all effects on the stack are resolved, the creature still has +1/+1 counters on it as it dies, despite the counters normally canceling each other out and removing each other. This means that Arcbound Ravager still moves that single +1/+1 counter to a new artifact creature.

Does Modular Trigger When a Creature With No Counters Dies?

When a creature without counters dies, it does not trigger modular. Vampire Hexmage is an uncommon culprit that can make this happen.

Is Modular Viable in EDH?

Yes, modular is viable in EDH. Outside of the two legendaries with modular printed on them, there are plenty of commanders that work with +1/+1 counters or artifacts. Plus WotC keeps printing cards that do the modular thing anyway like Dockworker Drone and Sin, Unending Cataclysm.

Wrap Up

Arcbound Ravager | Illustration by Chase Stone

The modular mechanic is great fun in Limited and Constructed decks. It synergizes well with a lot of different deck strategies, from +1/+1 counter decks to aristocrats to affinity. It keeps your creatures threatening even after you’ve suffered through your opponent’s removal and allows for interesting combat scenarios as your opponents struggle to permanently neuter your army of constructs.

Did I forget any of the best modular cards? Do you think we’ll see modular again sometime soon? What sort of mechanics could we see combined with modular in the future? Let me know in the comments or over on the official Draftsim Twitter.

Thank you for reading, and happy modulating!