One of Avatar's most adorable MTG cards turns out to be a nasty little force.

the popular card game’s Avatar crossover set will not become widely available before the end of the week, but after prerelease weekends recently, an affordable green creature saw a sharp rise in market worth.

From the initial reveals, Badgermole Cub garnered significant interest. A 2/2 requiring one green and one colorless mana, the card has the Earthbend 1 ability (possibly the strongest within the elemental mechanics available). The major perk here is its second ability: Whenever you tap a creature for mana, add an additional green mana.

Initially, the card was available at around $27. Following the early events, though, the market price jumped to nearly $50 including listings for sale at $60.00. Why are we seeing Vivi prices on this adorable card? Mainly due to the rapid resource generation it enables.

When it arrives play, the cub turns a land so it becomes a creature with earthbend. Combined with its other power, while it is not removed, each affected land generates double mana — in addition to mana-producing creatures on your side that generate mana.

The obvious go-to to combine with would be Llanowar Elves, a low-cost creature that taps to generate G mana. But many creatures that make mana in the game. Druid of the Cowl costs a bit more a 1/3 creature costing two mana in comparison.

Deploying terrain, mana-producing creatures, alongside this card, you may quickly play a very big and very expensive monster on the battlefield early in the game. The situation escalates rapidly if you keep the pressure on from that point.

By incorporating another color with this approach, cards like these mana-fixing creatures work perfectly that generate any color of mana. And something like Dryad of the Ilysian Grove allows you to put another terrain per turn AND turns your entire land base into every basic land type. You can also consider for example the enchantment A Realm Reborn, costing six mana gives every card you own the power to be tapped for a mana of any type — even all creatures in play.

Badgermole Cub could be too strong in terms of accelerating your resources, yet what’s the endgame finisher with this archetype? An often-seen solution already is this legendary creature. Power and toughness match your land count, plus it turns all of your nontoken creatures into Forests as well as their original types. This means, every single creature you control can generate two green mana when tapped.

Harmonious Grovestrider is a costly, large threat that benefits from many terrain cards (as with the previous card, its power and toughness are based on how many lands you have).

Nissa, Who Shakes the World works perfectly in this deck. Her passive ability allows all Forests produce extra green. (If you have the cub, that means each one produce triple green.) Her main ability is essentially a proto-earthbend, putting +1/+1 counters to a noncreature land, handy but it isn't redundant with earthbending. The minus ability, though, grants each land you control unbreakable enabling you to search for every Forest left in your deck. If you can actually activate the ultimate, it almost certainly the game ends.

The cub is nearly mandatory in any green Avatar deck focusing on the earthbend mechanic. If you dip into red and green, consider this legendary card. This card features earthbend 4, plus if it hits a player to an opponent, all land creatures are ready again for another attack. Although this card has emerged as a beloved leader, this small creature is set to be one of, if not the most sought-after card in the collaboration.

Jesse Bennett
Jesse Bennett

Elara is a writer and philosopher passionate about exploring the depths of human thought and sharing transformative ideas.