Card

Pithing Needle

Artifact


As Pithing Needle enters the battlefield, choose a card name.
Activated abilities of sources with the chosen name can't be activated unless they're mana abilities.

Occasionally a skaab remembers too much of its former life. Luckily, there's an easy cure.


  Innistrad: Midnight Hunt Promos (PMID)
#257s, Rare

Illustrated by: Ovidio Cartagena

Rulings

  • 2005-06-01
    If you name a card that has both a mana ability and another activated ability, the mana ability can be activated but the other ability can’t be activated.
  • 2005-06-01
    Pithing Needle affects cards regardless of what zone they’re in. This includes cards in hand, cards in the graveyard, and exiled cards. For example, a player can’t cycle Eternal Dragon or return an Eternal Dragon from their graveyard to hand if Pithing Needle naming Eternal Dragon is on the battlefield.
  • 2009-10-01
    Once Pithing Needle has left the battlefield, activated abilities of sources with the chosen name can be activated again.
  • 2012-10-01
    Activated abilities include a colon and are written in the form “[cost]: [effect].” Triggered abilities and static abilities of the named card work normally.
  • 2005-06-01
    You can name any card, even if that card doesn’t normally have an activated ability. You can’t name a token unless that token has the same name as a card.