Being colorless, Karn can generally include cards of any [[color]] in his [[deck]]s, as long as they share a color with the [[event]] node on which he plays.

He has high health, average creature limit, high support limit, and low spell limit. His [[mana]] bonus total is the highest in the game, but it is and evenly balanced across all five colors. As usual with mana bonuses, being good at everything means not being particularly good at anything; even the [[Origins]] Planeswalkers' bonuses are higher on their own [[color]]. Despite the bonuses being twice those of his predecessor, they represent potential difficulty because they can not be raised permanently without outside aid, as [[Karn, Scion of Urza]]'s can.

Karn 2's abilities are all either temporary or conditional, ; the latter dependent on significant or stifling achievements.

Ironically, Karn 2 is not an irrational choice to go up against Karn 1, since 2 can Shatterstorm the Pest tokens supports that Karn Scion so often runsto fulfill the conditions of his ultimate ability, and then bring them back to use against their former owner. Planeswalkers with problematic mana will always lose that handicap in the [[Colors of Magic]] event, but Karn 2 additionally is powerful against flurries of the Paladin Class card that has become popular in top tiers of that event.