Darksteel Mutation - Borderless (CMM)

Darksteel Mutation
Casting Cost: {1}{W}
Card Type: Enchantment - Aura

Card Text:
Enchant creature
Enchanted creature is an Insect artifact creature with base power and toughness 0/1 and has indestructible, and it loses all other abilities, card types, and creature types.

Flavour Text:
"Dissent will become perfection."
-Elesh Norn

Artist: Richard Kane Ferguson

Darksteel Mutation is a unique enchantment in Magic: The Gathering that transforms a targeted creature into a virtually harmless insect. It not only reduces the creature's power and toughness to 0/1 but also strips it of all other abilities, card types, and creature types, while making it indestructible.

The card is a powerful form of control, capable of neutralizing even the most formidable threats without outright destroying them. Its ability to render a creature indestructible means that the affected creature's controller can't simply destroy it to remove the enchantment, making it a more persistent and troublesome form of removal.

The flavour text, attributed to Elesh Norn, one of the Praetors of New Phyrexia, emphasizes the twisted ideology of the Phyrexians. They seek to replace all organic life with their version of mechanical perfection, and the text captures their cold, unfeeling pursuit of this goal.

Richard Kane Ferguson's artwork likely illustrates the horrific transformation of a once-powerful creature into a small, indestructible insect. The visual could juxtapose the creature's previous strength with its new, pitiable form, underlining the cruel efficiency of the spell.

In the context of gameplay, Darksteel Mutation offers a valuable tool for white control strategies. It can be especially effective in Commander, where it can neutralize a powerful commander without sending it back to the command zone, thereby locking it in its weakened state for the duration of the game unless the enchantment is removed.