Sawblade Skinripper is one of those cards players keep asking about. Here is, in plain words, what its official text says, the rulings published by Wizards of the Coast, and the combos players actually run.
Official card text
Menace, Sacrifice another creature or enchantment: Put a +1/+1 counter on this creature. At the beginning of your end step, if you sacrificed one or more permanents this turn, this creature deals that much damage to any target.
Complete guide
Sawblade Skinripper is a versatile threat that rewards you for feeding your own engine. As both an efficient sacrifice outlet and a source of scaling end-of-turn damage, it excels in decks that treat their permanents as expendable resources. This Human Assassin ensures that every sacrifice not only grows its own power but also lashes out at your opponents.
Powering Up the Skinripper
Sawblade Skinripper features an activated ability that allows you to pay two mana and sacrifice another creature or enchantment to give it a +1/+1 counter. Because this ability has no 'once per turn' restriction, you can use it as long as you have the mana and the fodder to fuel it. Additionally, its Menace keyword makes it difficult to block as it grows larger, requiring at least two creatures to stop it in combat.
The End Step Calculation
The final ability is a triggered ability that checks your actions throughout the entire turn. At the start of your end step, the game looks back to see if you sacrificed any permanents—not just to the Skinripper's own ability, but to any cost or effect, including things like Treasure tokens or Evolving Wilds. If you did, it deals damage to any target equal to the total number of permanents you sacrificed that turn.
Timing Your Sacrifices
A common mistake involves waiting until the end step to sacrifice permanents. The ability has an 'intervening if' clause; it only triggers if you have already sacrificed something before the end step begins. If you enter your end step without having sacrificed a permanent, the ability never goes on the stack, and you cannot sacrifice something in response to make it trigger.
Strategic Damage Distribution
Since the damage ability can target 'any target,' it is a flexible tool for finishing off low-loyalty Planeswalkers, picking off small blockers, or dealing direct damage to an opponent to close out a game. Remember that the count includes all permanents sacrificed, including lands and artifacts, even though the Skinripper's activated ability only consumes creatures and enchantments.
Interaction examples
Solemn SimulacrumWith Sawblade Skinripper and Solemn Simulacrum on the battlefield, you pay two mana to activate the Skinripper's ability, sacrificing the Simulacrum. The Skinripper gets a +1/+1 counter and the Simulacrum's 'dies' ability triggers, letting you draw a card. At the beginning of your end step, the Skinripper's ability triggers because you sacrificed a permanent. It deals 1 damage to any target.
Roaming ThroneIf Roaming Throne enters the battlefield naming 'Human' or 'Assassin,' it will cause Sawblade Skinripper's triggered abilities to trigger an additional time. If you sacrificed three permanents during your turn, at the beginning of your end step, the Skinripper's damage ability triggers twice. Each instance will deal 3 damage, resulting in a total of 6 damage distributed to one or two targets.
Guide written with AI from the official text and rulings. Official English text prevails.
How it works : Sawblade Skinripper
Original English text — Wizards of the Coast / Scryfall
- #1· Wizards of the Coast
If you haven't sacrificed any permanents during your turn by the time your end step begins, Sawblade Skinripper's last ability won't trigger at all. You won't be able to sacrifice anything during your end step in time to have the ability trigger.
No other card is named in this ruling.
Legal formats
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Meta decks with Sawblade Skinripper
No archived Top 8 deck with this card yet.