Cantankerous Keepers

five generic mana one green mana Creature — Elf SoldierPower and toughness4/3

Affinity for Elves (This spell costs one generic mana less to cast for each Elf you control.)

When this creature enters, mill four cards, then put all Elf cards from among them into your hand.

The guards were decidedly less than pleased, upon waking, to find their prisoners escaped.

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Cantankerous Keepers rulings

2026-06-29
Affinity for Elves reduces only the generic mana in the cost to cast Cantankerous Keepers. The colored mana must still be paid.
2026-06-29
To determine the total cost of a spell, start with the mana cost or alternative cost you're paying, add any cost increases, then apply any cost reductions (such as that of Cantankerous Keepers's first ability). The mana value of the spell is determined only by its mana cost, no matter what the total cost to cast that spell was.

Cantankerous Keepers keyword rules

Affinity Rule 702.41

Affinity is a static ability that functions while the spell with affinity is on the stack. “Affinity for [text]” means “This spell costs you {1} less to cast for each [text] you control.”

If a spell has multiple instances of affinity, each of them applies.

Mill Rule 701.13

For a player to mill a number of cards, that player puts that many cards from the top of their library into their graveyard.

A player can’t mill a number of cards greater than the number of cards in their library. If given the choice to do so, they can’t choose to take that action. If instructed to do so, they mill as many as possible. Similarly, the player can’t pay a cost that includes milling a number of cards greater than the number of cards in their library.

An effect that refers to a milled card can find that card in the zone it moved to from the library, as long as that zone is a public zone.

If an ability checks information about a single milled card but more than one card was milled, that ability refers to each of the milled cards. If that ability asks for any information about the milled card, such as a characteristic or mana value, it gets multiple answers. If these answers are used to determine the value of a variable, the sum of the answers is used. If that ability performs any actions on “the” card, it performs that action on each milled card. If that ability performs any actions on “a” card, the controller of the ability chooses which card is affected.