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Bender's Waterskin card art
Live Play Data

Bender's Waterskin

{3} · Artifact · Avatar: The Last Airbender (TLA)
3%
Live Inclusion
Buy on TCGplayer
Times Brought
1253
Decks Running
597
Median Cast Turn
4.0
Drawn → Played
72%
Format
Multiplayer 1v1

72% of drawn Bender's Waterskins are cast before the game ends, and once it resolves, 81% of copies stay on the battlefield through end of game.

Bender's Waterskin is a 3-mana colorless mana rock from the Avatar: The Last Airbender set. It sits in 597 of the 18757 distinct decks tracked on Playgroup Live, a 3% inclusion rate that reflects its niche role as a flexible fixer in multicolor and colorless builds.

The card's unusual design earns it a slot in mana-hungry decks: it untaps during each other player's untap step, meaning in a four-player pod it effectively produces mana on every turn cycle. That makes its raw converted mana cost of 3 more forgiving than a Manalith that only untaps once per round. When players draw it, 72% of copies reach the battlefield. Median first cast lands on turn 4.0.

The top commander homes are Avatar set commanders led by Y'shtola, Night's Blessed and Avatar Aang, alongside non-Avatar commanders that lean on colorless artifacts or heavy mana requirements. The dataset is well-spread across 467 distinct players, with no single contributor dominating the sample.

At a glance
  • 3% of tracked Commander decks include Bender's Waterskin
  • 72% of drawn copies are cast before the game ends
  • T4.0 median first-cast turn
  • 81% battlefield stickiness once cast
  • 467 distinct players have brought this card to a tracked game
  • 27% draw rate, consistent with a singleton in a 100-card deck

First-cast turn

n=240
2%
T1
10%
T2
23%
T3
16%
T4
10%
T5
33%
T6-9
6%
T10+
Median 4.0 P25 3 · P75 7 · max 15
On curve 35% (56 / 240 cast on T3) Cast same turn as drawn 35%

The "good card" funnel

1253 brought · 467 players
Brought to game
1253
Ever drawn
335
Reached battlefield
240
Still on board at game end
195
72%

Of 1253 copies brought to games, 335 were drawn, 240 of those reached the battlefield, and 81% of cast copies stayed there through end of game.

≥ -6.5pp

Players who cast this card win 25% of the time (n=216) , vs 26% when it never left the library (n=789).

When players drew this card but left it in hand, they won 31% (n=79) — about the same as leaving it in the library. Those players survived long enough to draw it, so the gap above is about the card resolving, not just about surviving.

Observed gap -0.3pp; 95% confidence interval -6.5pp to +5.9pp. Correlational, not causal: powerful payoffs also get cast more often in games you are already winning.

Final zone distribution

374 instances
2.9%
Library
52.1%
Battlefield
16.6%
Graveyard
6.7%
Exile

Most Bender's Waterskins that finish in the library were simply never drawn, a structural reality of 100-card singleton rather than a sign that players chose not to cast it.

Commanders that played this card

in tracked games

The commander spread runs from five-color Avatar builds down to mono-color and colorless commanders, showing that the card's colorless identity earns it slots across the breadth of the format rather than clustering in one archetype.

Card text
Bender's Waterskin card

Bender's Waterskin

{3}
Artifact
Untap this artifact during each other player's untap step. {T}: Add one mana of any color.
Avatar: The Last Airbender (TLA) · Common · Illustrated by Dee Nguyen

Frequently Asked

How often is Bender's Waterskin drawn in a Commander game?
In 1189 tracked multiplayer games where Bender's Waterskin was in the deck, it was drawn 27% of the time. That is consistent with a singleton in a 100-card deck. Of those drawn copies, 72% were cast before the game ended, and median first cast landed on turn 4.0.
Why does Bender's Waterskin see play when 3-mana mana rocks are generally considered slow?
The untap clause is the key distinction. In a four-player Commander game, Bender's Waterskin untaps three additional times per turn cycle beyond your own, effectively multiplying its output. Decks that can leverage mana on opponents' turns, such as those running instants, flash threats, or activated abilities, get more value than a simple Manalith would provide. That context explains its homes in spellslinger and reactive builds.
Is Bender's Waterskin legal in Commander?
Yes. Bender's Waterskin is legal in Commander, Duel Commander, Pauper Commander, Brawl, Standard Brawl, and most other formats. It is not legal in Oldschool or Premodern, which have set-date restrictions. It carries no bans in any of the formats where it is currently legal.
How sticky is Bender's Waterskin once it resolves?
81% of cast copies finish the game on the battlefield. As a colorless artifact with no combat relevance and no enters-the-battlefield trigger to attack, it tends to be a low-priority removal target for opponents. That durability is part of why players keep casting it: the investment rarely goes to waste.
Does casting Bender's Waterskin improve your win rate?
The win-rate delta between games where the card was cast versus games where it never left the library is small at this sample size, and the confidence interval crosses zero. That means the early signal is directional at best. What the data does confirm is a consistent cast rate and strong battlefield retention. Drawing firm win-rate conclusions requires more observations.
Which commanders most commonly run Bender's Waterskin?
Y'shtola, Night's Blessed leads with the most tracked decks, followed by Avatar Aang and Lorehold, the Historian. The top-10 commander list spans five-color, three-color, two-color, and mono-color identities, reflecting the card's colorless identity: it slots into any deck that wants an additional mana source with upside. The distribution across 467 unique players suggests the signal is not driven by a single dedicated pilot.