TCG Playability
Creature — Human Peasant Ally
{2}{B}: Return this card from your graveyard to your hand.
Also known as Dock the ferryman, Xu the fishmonger, and Bushi the river cleaner, depending on what job needed to be done in Jang Hui village.
Merchant of Many Hats is a versatile utility creature that brings real value to recursion-focused strategies across multiple Magic formats. This Human Peasant Ally costs just one black and one generic mana, giving you a reasonable 2/2 body that immediately impacts the board while serving as a recurring resource engine. The true power of this card lies in its activated ability, which allows you to return it from your graveyard to your hand for two black and one generic mana, creating a repeatable value engine that scales throughout the game. This makes Merchant of Many Hats particularly appealing in grindy midrange and control decks that benefit from consistent creature sources, especially in formats where you're looking to outvalue opponents over time. The card slots beautifully into black-based midrange decks, aristocrat strategies, and any archetype that rewards self-mill or graveyard interaction. It's especially potent in limited formats where the combination of evasion through recursion and a reasonable stat line can dominate games. With legal status spanning from Standard through Commander, Pauper, Vintage, and everything in between, Merchant of Many Hats offers exceptional format flexibility. Players seeking a low-cost, repeatable creature that generates incremental advantage while filling a flexible role in creature-heavy strategies will find this card particularly valuable for both casual and competitive applications.
Illustrated by Boell Oyino