Extort in MTG: Rules, History, and Best Cards

Last updated on October 22, 2025

Crypt Ghast | Illustration by Chris Rahn

If you want to read this, you’ll need to pay the tax.

Extortion slowly drains you of your ability to survive while bolstering the extorter. The extort mechanic similarly drains opponents while making it harder to challenge your position in the game.

Let’s take a deep dive into this grindy mechanic from one of my favorite blocks of all time!

How Does Extort Work?

Syndicate Enforcer | Illustration by Steven Belledin

Extort is an ability that triggers when you cast a spell while you control a permanent with extort. You can choose to pay a hybrid white/black mana as extort resolves. If you do, each opponent loses 1 life and you gain that much life.

This means that you gain more life per extort in games of EDH than you would in a 1v1 game.

The History of Exploit in MTG

Extort was created in Gatecrash (GTC) in 2013, as the mechanic for the Orzhov Syndicate. Eleven GTC black and white extort cards were designed, including Blind Obedience, a staple anti-aggro card. MTG’s next set, Dragon’s Maze, added two more cards. The mechanic was brought back a decade later, in a few Commander sets and Modern Horizons 3, as well as a single design in Ravnica: Clue Edition. 

Can You Extort Multiple Times?

You can not extort multiple times per instance. If you have two permanents with extort and you cast a spell, you can pay two more hybrid white/black mana to resolve two separate instances of extort. But each instance of extort only triggers once, and you can only pay 1 mana per.

How Does Extort Stack? What About Multiple Instances?

You get a unique trigger for the spell you cast with each individual instance of extort. These unique triggers allow you to pay a mana and drain your opponents. If you have three extort permanents and cast any spell, you can pay between 0-3 to drain up to three times.

But there is a card can give other creatures extort: Pontiff of Blight. If you control Pontiff and other creatures with extort, the instances of extort can stack. Each instance of extort triggers independently, so you can pay two for two drains for each spell cast. The instances of extort can continue to stack for as many cards you have that imbue extort.

Do You Have to Pay for Each Extort?

You have the option to pay the extra mana or not when the extort trigger resolves. If you choose not to pay, the ability resolves and no life totals change.

Does Extort Apply to All Spells You Cast?

It does. If you have a permanent with extort on the battlefield, you’ll trigger extort whenever you cast a spell, and it doesn’t matter if it’s black or white, or which spell you cast. The only non-negotiable clause is that you may only pay either white or black mana when extort triggers.

Does Extort Target?

Extort does not target. The ability specifically says “each opponent”, so no players are targeted and it can get around cards that give players hexproof or shroud, like Leyline of Sanctity.

Is Extort Damage?

Extort is loss of life, so it doesn’t actually deal damage. Effects that prevent damage don’t work against extort. But cards that prevent a player’s life total from changing do prevent the life loss and gain from extort.

How Does Extort Work in the Commander Format?

Whenever you extort in Commander, each player will lose 1 life, and you’ll gain that total amount. So, in a typical 4-player Commander pod, each time you extort, you’ll gain 3 life and your opponents will lose 1 life each. It’s worth mentioning lifegain payoffs like Frodo, Adventurous Hobbit or Griffin Aerie that trigger if you gained 3 or more life in a given turn.

Is Extort Commander Damage?

It’s not. First, commander damage is only considered when a commander deals combat damage to a player, which is not the case here. Also, extort causes life loss and not damage. So, even if you have a legendary creature that can extort, like Sorin of House Markov, it would be considered life loss caused by a commander outside combat.

Does Extort Count for Color Identity?

Extort doesn’t affect a card’s color identity. You can play extort cards in any deck that can play the base card’s color identity, even if the hybrid mana’s second color isn’t in your commander’s color identity.

This is because the hybrid mana symbol appears in the reminder text for extort, and reminder text is not considered for a card's color identity.

Can I Extort Even if the Spell Gets Countered?

Yes. Extort triggers whenever a spell is cast, regardless of resolution. So if you cast a spell and it gets countered, you can still pay the to extort.

Can You Pay Extort with K’rrik?

Yes, you can! K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth allows you to pay 2 life for each black mana symbol in a cost. The black mana in the hybrid white/black mana cost for extort counts, and you can opt to pay 2 life instead of the black portion of the hybrid mana for extort.

Is Extort Good?

Extort was a good ability in Limited, never really saw play in Standard outside of a few incidental cards like Blind Obedience or Crypt Ghast, and is fantastic in EDH, since the ability scales up with the number of opponents.

The downside for extort cards is the power level. Since there are so few cards with extort, and no mythics, it’s hard to justify playing cards with extort in a card pool the size of EDH. Extort can do a lot of work in lower power level Commander groups, but I’d avoid playing extort cards on power level alone against mid or high-level EDH decks.

Galley and List of Extort Cards

• Basilica Guards
• Basilica Screecher
• Blind Obedience
• Crypt Ghast
• Kingpin's Pet
• Knight of Obligation
• Life Insurance
• Pontiff of Blight
• Sorin of House Markov / Sorin, Ravenous Neonate
• Syndicate Enforcer
• Syndicate Heavy
• Syndic of Tithes
• Thrull Parasite
• Tithe Drinker
• Treasury Thrull
• Vizkopa Confessor

Best Extort Cards

#6. Life Insurance

You need a steady amount of lifegain to justify running Life Insurance, or at least a reliable plan to use all those Treasure tokens before you die to your own enchantment. The joke here is that you can use the mana from your Treasures to pay for extort, which recoups the life loss from creatures dying.

#5. Syndicate Heavy

Syndicate Heavy just asks you to gain 4 life a turn, which you can manage by extorting twice in a Commander pod, or extorting once and gaining a life elsewhere. It’s a solid 4/4 that can convert life into clues, and it’s a nice fit for decks aiming to exploit lifegain/life drain, or EDH decks like Teysa, Opulent Oligarch, which benefit from life loss and clues. 

#4. Blind Obedience

Blind Obedience was the only extort card to see Standard play. Controlling white decks that want to restrict haste creatures with incidental lifegain used Obedience to help get to the mid and late game.

#3. Pontiff of Blight

Pontiff of Blight gives all other creatures extort, so it can let you drain players quickly without having to play any other cards with extort. In token-heavy decks that can generate lots of mana, Pontiff can quickly drain an entire table. Unfortunately, a 6-mana 2/7 isn’t hard to answer so it’s a fragile card to build around in any meaningful way.

#2. Crypt Ghast

Mono-black decks leverage Crypt Ghast‘s secondary ability to double their mana. A few interesting swamp-heavy decks tried to play Ghast in Constructed, but even the decks that did use the extort as a bonus didn’t have it as a main feature.

#1. Sorin of House Markov / Sorin, Ravenous Neonate

This Modern Horizons 3 flipwalker jumped right to the top of the list, giving you a strong lifegain payoff on top of an already great defensive body with extort. Extort's meaningful for transforming Sorin, but also amplifies the damage ability on the planeswalker side, which can take players out if you've gained enough life in a single turn.

Wrap Up

Knight of Obligation | Illustration by Ryan Barger

Extort is a solid mechanic that won’t wow anyone, especially in terms of power level, but it can create incidental value that makes killing you tougher at low opportunity cost. I loved extort in Gatecrash and Dragon’s Maze Draft, and I'm glad it's made a few guest appearances in other sets.

It’s a very flexible mechanic, viable in aggressive and defensive decks alike, and whose flavor isn’t necessarily tied to Ravnica. I hope we see extort return in a modern set in cards with higher power level, or as a main mechanic in a lifegain Commander precon, for example.

What do you think of extort? Do you play any extort cards in your decks, or is extort just a fun piece of Magic’s history to you? Let me know in the comments down below or over on the Draftsim Twitter.

That’s all from me for today. Stay safe, stay healthy, and I’ll see you in the next one!