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the popular card game’s special Avatar expansion won’t get a wider release in the coming days, however following prerelease weekends this past weekend, a low-cost green spell experienced a surge in price.

Throughout the spoiler season, Badgermole Cub garnered a lot of attention. A creature with stats 2/2 requiring a single green and one generic mana, Badgermole Cub includes level 1 earthbending (perhaps the strongest within the elemental mechanics available). The real boon in its design is another power: Whenever mana is generated by tapping a creature, it provides bonus green mana.

Initially, this card sold for $26.98. Following the early events, yet, the going rate jumped to $49.66 with at least one listed for sale at $60.00. What explains premium pricing for this cute lil guy? Mostly thanks to the explosive mana ramping it enables.

As it hits play, the cub turns one land into a creature that has earthbending. Combined with its other power, if it stays in play, every earthbent land generates double mana — plus any creatures you have which tap for mana.

The obvious go-to for synergy includes this one-mana elf, a low-cost creature which can be tapped for G mana. Yet there are plenty of other mana generation creatures out there. Druid of the Cowl is a higher-cost choice that’s a 1/3 costing two mana in comparison.

Using land cards, mana-producing creatures, alongside this card, you may quickly play an enormous and very expensive creature on the board by round three or four. And things just keep spiraling exponentially with continued aggression from that point.

If you dip into another color in this strategy, cards like versatile mana producers are excellent picks which produce any mana color. Another card, a useful enchantment creature allows you to put an additional land each turn AND turns your entire land base providing all land types. Another possibility is such as a card called A Realm Reborn, costing six mana grants each permanent you control the ability to be tapped for one mana of any color — even each creature in play.

The cub could be too strong regarding boosting mana production, yet what closes out the game for a deck like this? An often-seen solution has been Ashaya. Its stats match how many lands you have, and it makes all of your nontoken creatures into Forests in addition to their original types. This means, each creature on your board may generate two green mana by tapping.

Harmonious Grovestrider is another expensive, beefy creature that thrives with many terrain cards (similar to Ashaya, P/T are based on the number of lands you control).

Nissa is an excellent fit as a staple. One of her abilities causes all Forests generate an additional green mana. (If you have the cub, this results in each one yield three G.) Her main ability functions like a form of land animation, placing counters on terrain, a useful effect though it doesn't stack with earthbend. Her ultimate, on the other hand, renders all of your lands immune to destruction and lets you draw out all the remaining forests in the deck. Should you manage to use that ability, it’s pretty much you win.

The cub is a must-have for any kind of green Avatar deck that use the earthbend mechanic. When branching into red and green, there’s Bumi Unleashed. He has earthbend 4, and when damage is dealt to a player, all land creatures untap and may attack once more. Although this card is a beloved leader, this small creature will surely stay one of, if not the most desired card from this expansion.