MTG Energy, Experience, Rad and Special Counters guide image showing magical player counters, radiation energy, oil machinery, shield protection, stun effects, speed racing, and Commander counter rules.

MTG Energy, Experience, Rad & Special Counters

Most counters in Magic: The Gathering sit on a permanent — a +1/+1 counter on a creature, a loyalty counter on a planeswalker. This final group breaks that pattern in two directions: some counters sit on players instead of permanents, and one modern mechanic that looks exactly like a counter isn't technically a counter under the rules at all.

This guide covers energy, experience, rad, and oil counters, the permanent-based shield and stun counters, and closes with speed — the mechanic that only pretends to be a counter.

This is the nineteenth and final article in our series on advanced MTG mechanics, following our guides to the Ring tempts you and Sagas and partner and eminence.

The Shared Rule for Counters on Players

Before the individual mechanics, one rule governs how several of them interact with proliferate, which we covered in our scry and connive guide: if you choose a player or permanent that has more than one kind of counter, you must add one of every kind they already have — you can't cherry-pick just one type. Choose an opponent with both energy and rad counters, and proliferating them means giving one of each, not one or the other.

Energy

Energy counters sit on a player, not a permanent, tracked with the {E} symbol. They have no inherent rules meaning of their own — nothing happens automatically because you have them. Every effect involving energy comes entirely from the specific cards that grant or spend it.

  • They persist indefinitely. Energy counters don't disappear at the end of a phase, step, or turn — only a small number of cards can remove them once you have them.
  • They're pooled, not tied to a source. Because they belong to you as a player rather than to any single permanent, energy from one card can be spent on the abilities of a completely different card, as long as both reference the same pool.
  • Getting energy and spending it are usually on different cards. Most energy decks mix generators with payoffs, banking counters early and cashing them in on a more efficient turn.

Experience

Experience counters also sit on the player, and work almost identically to energy in structure: they have no inherent meaning by themselves, and only matter because a specific card references them.

  • They survive their source's death. Because experience counters belong to you rather than to the commander that granted them, losing that creature does nothing to the counters you've already earned.
  • They only ever go up in the vast majority of decks. There's no default way to lose experience counters — a handful of specific effects can remove player counters in general, but nothing does it automatically.
  • They respond to proliferate like any other counter, letting you add to your total without needing the granting commander to trigger again.

Rad

Rad counters are the exception in this group: unlike energy and experience, they come with a genuine inherent rules meaning baked directly into the Comprehensive Rules, not dependent on any specific card.

The built-in ability reads: at the beginning of each player's precombat main phase, if that player has one or more rad counters, they mill a number of cards equal to their rad counters. For each nonland card milled this way, that player loses 1 life and removes one rad counter.

  • Land cards milled this way cost nothing. Only nonland cards trigger the life loss and counter removal — a rad-heavy mill that happens to hit several lands does comparatively little damage that turn.
  • It happens after your draw step, not before. Because the trigger is tied to the precombat main phase, you've already drawn for the turn by the time rad counters make you mill — so a thin library from rad counters doesn't cause you to lose from an empty draw the same turn.
  • Rad counters are partially self-cleaning. Each nonland card milled removes one rad counter along with the life loss, so a rad-heavy hand does gradually clear itself out — while also filling your graveyard quickly, which some decks use on purpose.
  • Running out of library just mills what's left. If you have fewer cards in your library than rad counters, you mill everything remaining rather than triggering any special loss condition on the spot.
  • Proliferating rad counters is dangerous. Because rad counters have built-in rules text, adding just one more with proliferate can mean more mill, more life loss, and more graveyard fuel on that player's next precombat main phase.

Oil

Oil counters sit on permanents rather than players — most often artifacts and Phyrexian creatures — and, like energy, have no inherent rules meaning of their own. Whatever an oil counter does is entirely defined by the specific card carrying it.

  • Some cards accumulate oil automatically over time, others require you to cast spells to add it, and payoffs vary from card to card — there's no shared template the way rad counters have.
  • Some cards care about how many permanents you control with oil counters, rather than the total number of oil counters — read each card individually, since the two questions aren't the same.

Shield and Stun: Permanent-Based Protection and Disruption

Unlike the player counters above, shield and stun counters sit on permanents — and both have real, built-in rules meaning.

Shield

A shield counter creates two linked protections at once: if the permanent would be destroyed, remove a shield counter instead; if it would be dealt damage, prevent that damage and remove a shield counter instead.

  • Each instance of damage or destruction only removes one shield counter — a creature with three shield counters can absorb three separate threats before it's exposed.
  • Shield counters don't stop sacrifice. Sacrificing a creature isn't destruction, so a shield counter offers no protection against being sacrificed.
  • Unpreventable damage still gets through. If a source specifically says its damage can't be prevented, a shield counter can't stop it, because the counter's protection is a prevention effect like any other.
  • Indestructible can preserve shield counters against destroy effects. If a permanent is indestructible, a destroy effect does not destroy it, so the shield counter normally does not need to replace that destruction. Damage still removes a shield counter normally, because shield counters prevent damage separately.

Stun

A stun counter creates a single replacement effect: instead of untapping normally, the permanent stays tapped and one stun counter is removed.

  • It only affects untapping, nothing else. An untapped permanent with a stun counter can still block, still use non-tap abilities, and behaves completely normally until it would need to untap.
  • Multiple stun counters stack up delay, one at a time. A permanent with two stun counters skips two of its controller's untap steps before finally untapping on the third.
  • Any permanent type can carry a stun counter, not just creatures — a stunned land or planeswalker follows the exact same rule.
  • Putting a stun counter on something doesn't tap it. The counter alone does nothing until the permanent would next attempt to untap; most cards that apply stun counters tap the permanent at the same time, but the two effects are separate.

Speed: The Mechanic That Isn't Actually a Counter

Speed looks and behaves like a player counter, and most players talk about it as one — but under the rules, it isn't a counter at all. Speed is a numeric trait a player can have, tracked similarly to life total, with no counter object involved anywhere.

  • You gain speed by controlling a permanent with "start your engines!" The first time this happens in a game, your speed becomes 1 immediately. This is not a triggered ability, so opponents cannot respond by removing the permanent before you pick up speed.
  • It increases through an inherent triggered ability, not a card effect. Once your speed is 1 or higher, whenever one or more opponents lose life during your turn, your speed goes up by 1, to a maximum of 4 — this can only happen once per turn.
  • It never decreases. Once gained, speed stays at its current value or climbs further; there's no mechanism to lower it.
  • "Max speed" is simply speed equal to 4. Cards with a "Max speed —" line grant that bonus as a static ability for as long as your speed reads 4, which in practice means for the rest of the game once you get there.
  • Because it isn't a counter, proliferate doesn't touch it. Proliferate only adds to counters that already exist on a chosen player or permanent — speed has no counter to add to, so it's completely untouched by proliferate effects.

Quick Reference

Type Lives on Inherent rules meaning?
Energy Player No — card-dependent
Experience Player No — card-dependent
Rad Player Yes — built-in mill and life loss
Oil Permanent No — card-dependent
Shield Permanent Yes — prevents damage/destruction
Stun Permanent Yes — prevents untapping
Speed Player (not a counter) Yes — but no counter object exists

Why These Matter in Commander

Player counters reward going wide across many turns, since they belong to you rather than to any single fragile permanent — an opponent's removal spell can't touch experience or energy you've already banked, only stop you from gaining more.

Rad counters are a real double-edged sword in a multiplayer pod: giving them to an opponent is genuine disruption, but a deck that mills itself deliberately can turn rad counters into a graveyard-filling engine instead of a punishment.

Shield counters are premium protection for a commander you can't afford to lose, since they stop both removal and combat damage without needing to hold up interaction — set it and forget it until the counters run out.

Stun counters are an efficient answer to problem permanents in a multiplayer game, tapping down a threat for more than one turn without needing the removal to stick permanently.

You can find the pieces for these strategies in our full catalogue, or import your decklist directly with our decklist search tool.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do energy counters do anything by themselves?

No. Energy counters have no built-in effect — they're inert until a specific card lets you spend them or grants a bonus based on how many you have. The counters themselves are just a number you accumulate.

Does losing my commander remove my experience counters?

No. Experience counters belong to you as a player, completely separate from any permanent. Your commander dying, being exiled, or returning to the command zone has no effect on experience counters you've already earned.

Do rad counters only hurt me through life loss?

No — the mill itself is a real cost too, since it can remove cards you would have wanted to draw or cast. The life loss only happens for nonland cards milled, but every card, land or not, still leaves your library either way.

Can a shield counter save my creature from being sacrificed?

No. Shield counters only replace destruction and prevent damage. Sacrifice is a completely different event from destruction, so a shield counter offers no protection when a creature is sacrificed, whether by its own controller or an effect that forces it.

If a permanent has two stun counters, does it skip two turns of untapping?

Yes. Each attempt to untap that permanent removes one stun counter instead of untapping it. With two stun counters, it stays tapped through two of its controller's untap steps and finally untaps normally on the third.

Can I proliferate speed?

No. Proliferate only works on existing counters, and speed isn't implemented as a counter under the rules — it's a plain numeric trait, similar to life total. There's nothing for proliferate to add to.

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