I remember when I first started playing magic the gathering that I saw the card Veteran Bodyguard and decided that it must be one of the best cards in the game. Think about it, a 2/5 creature that only costs two white and three colorless and takes damage instead of me. I could take four damage a turn and it wouldn't do anything. I of course eventually played with the card and discovered that it is as easy to kill as any other creature and that in many ways simply having flying so it could block would be more useful at preventing damage, but so is the way of young magic the gathering players.

Wizards of the Coast has replicated the effect since though, and often in more powerful ways and one of the more recent is one of the most powerful. Purity is a rare elemental incarnation creature from the Lorwyn expansion set of magic the gathering. It costs three white and three colorless to put into play and is a flying 6/6 creature with one very good ability and one designed largely to limit the abuse of this card.

The first of these abilities reads "If noncombat damage would be dealt to you, prevent that damage. You gain life equal to the damage prevented this way."

The truth of the matter is that this is unlikely to ever gain you any life because of an opponent's spell and the reason is simple. No one is going to attempt to use non combat damage to harm you while this card is out, but that isn't a bad thing. Simply forcing an opponent to not use a card has quite a lot of value and the opponent is not the only way to take non combat damage.

The first card I think of is one that has long been a favorite cards of mine, the orcish Artillery. This is a red card that allows you to tap it to do two damage to a creature or player and three to yourself. This is remarkably useful even without anything to mitigate the damage but with Purity out you would instead gain three life, making it a five point swing every time you used this card. There are many others though, most of them red and black.

The other ability reads "When Purity is put into a graveyard from anywhere, shuffle it into its owner's library." this mostly exists to ensure that you can not reanimate this card or put it into play before you have six mana, but there is some value to it as well as it makes decking you much more difficult with cards like this in your library.

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