Magic: The Gathering’s collaboration with Avatar won’t get a wider release in the coming days, yet after early access events this past weekend, a low-cost green spell has already exploded in price.
Even during previews, the earthbending cub garnered a lot of attention. A 2/2 that costs one green and one colorless mana, Badgermole Cub includes level 1 earthbending (perhaps the most effective of the four bending abilities in the set). The real boon in its design lies in an additional effect: Each time you tap a creature for mana, it provides bonus green mana.
At its cheapest, Badgermole Cub was available at around $27. Post-prerelease, however, the going rate jumped above $45 and one seller offering as high as $60. The reason for premium pricing for this little creature? Mainly due to the rapid resource generation it provides.
When it arrives play, the cub converts a land into a creature that has earthbending. And with that second ability, while it is not removed, every earthbent land yields two mana instead of one — along with any creatures on your side that produce resources.
The obvious go-to for synergy would be the classic Llanowar Elves, a low-cost creature that produces a green resource. Yet many other mana generation creatures in the game. Another option is a higher-cost choice a 1/3 creature for two mana in comparison.
Using land cards, creatures that tap for mana, and Badgermole Cub, it's simple to summon a massive pricey monster into play within a few turns. The situation escalates exponentially with continued aggression from that point.
By incorporating an additional hue with this approach, cards like versatile mana producers work perfectly that generate any mana color. Additionally, this powerful dryad lets you play another terrain each turn as well as makes all of your lands providing all land types. It's also worth trying such as this six-mana enchantment, at a six-mana investment gives every card you own the power to be tapped for any color mana — even all creatures in play.
Badgermole Cub could be too strong when it comes to ramping up your mana generation, but what’s the endgame finisher in such a strategy? A common and powerful choice is Ashaya. Power and toughness match your land count, plus it turns all of your nontoken creatures into Forests as well as their other types. In other words, all your creatures in play is able to generate two green mana when tapped.
Harmonious Grovestrider provides a high-cost, powerful body that thrives with lots of lands (like Ashaya, its stats match how many lands you have).
This Planeswalker works perfectly in this deck. Her static effect makes every Forest generate an additional green mana. (If you have the cub, that means each one produce triple green.) One loyalty ability is essentially an early earthbend, adding counters on a land, which is great but does not overlap with earthbending. Her -8 ability, however, renders all of your lands unbreakable and allows you to put onto the battlefield all the remaining forests from your library. Once you trigger the ultimate, this typically means game over.
The cub is pretty much essential for any kind of decks using green and Avatar that use Earthbending. By including red and green, there’s Bumi. He has earthbend 4, plus if damage is dealt in combat, each animated land untap and may attack once more. Even though Bumi has emerged as a fan favorite Commander, the cub is set to be one of, if not the most desired card in the Avatar set.
