🔗 Share this article

MTG’s special Avatar expansion will not become widely available before the end of the week, but following pre-releases over the last few days, a low-cost green spell has already exploded in price.

Throughout the spoiler season, this small creature drew significant interest. A 2/2 that costs G and 1 mana, the card includes Earthbending 1 (possibly the most effective among the set’s four “bending” mechanics). Its key advantage here lies in an additional effect: Whenever a creature is tapped to produce mana, add an additional green mana.

At its cheapest, the card could be purchased for $26.98. Following the early events, though, the market price jumped above $45 including listings priced at sixty dollars. What explains Vivi prices for this little creature? Primarily because of the incredible mana acceleration it enables.

When it arrives the board, Badgermole Cub turns a land so it becomes a creature that has earthbending. Alongside its mana-doubling effect, as long as it stays in play, those lands produces twice the mana — in addition to mana-producing creatures in your control which tap for mana.

A clear choice to combine with is this one-mana elf, a low-cost creature that produces one green mana. But there are plenty of other mana generation creatures available. Druid of the Cowl is a more expensive alternative that’s a 1/3 costing two mana in comparison.

By playing lands, mana-producing creatures, and Badgermole Cub, you can easily get a very big high-cost monster on the board by round three or four. Momentum builds rapidly with continued aggression from that point.

If you dip into an additional hue using this method, options such as versatile mana producers work perfectly that can make all five colors. Additionally, a useful enchantment creature allows you to put an additional land each turn as well as transforms all of your lands so they count as all basics. Another possibility is something like this six-mana enchantment, which for six mana provides each permanent you control the capacity to be tapped for a mana of any type — including any creature in play.

The cub could be too strong regarding ramping up your mana generation, but how do you win in such a strategy? An often-seen solution has been this legendary creature. Its stats match your land count, plus it turns each creature you own Forests in addition to their other types. Essentially, every single creature you control may tap for two G if used for mana.

Another creature is a costly, large threat that thrives with many terrain cards (similar to Ashaya, its stats are equal to your land total).

Nissa, Who Shakes the World is an excellent fit in this deck. Her passive ability allows every Forest produce extra green. (If you have the cub, so all earthbend forests produce triple green.) Her plus ability is essentially a proto-earthbend, placing counters on a land, which is great though it doesn't stack with earthbending. Her -8 ability, however, renders your entire land base immune to destruction enabling you to search for every Forest left from your library. If you can actually activate this power, this typically means game over.

The cub is nearly mandatory for any kind of green-based Avatar strategies built around Earthbending. When branching into Gruul colors, there’s Bumi. This card features level 4 earthbending, and if damage is dealt to a player, each animated land untap and can attack again. While that version has emerged as a beloved leader, the cute little Badgermole Cub is definitely going to remain among the top, possibly the desired card from this expansion.