Seedpod Squire | Zack Stella

When Kindred is the Set's Best Mechanic

Bloomburrow might go down as one of the greatest sets in Magic history thanks to the near perfect combination of its themes, art, and most notably its mechanics, which feel very fresh, new, and yet altogether familiar at the same time!

In a world populated almost entirely of the woodland critters from our storybooks, the themes of community and comradery are present in every single aspect of Bloomburrow. From fantastical art depicting birds dropping swords to mice or rats and otters sharing a joyful moment after finding a glowing rock, Bloomburrow is dripping from top-down with a thematic cohesion reminiscent of a Universes Beyond set. Nothing expresses this more so than the set’s mechanics which, if you’ll allow me, I’m going to talk about endlessly.

We have six new named mechanics in the set, with one of those more being a cycle of cards than necessarily an interactable (for now) mechanic. Two of these mechanics are universal, meaning they're present in each of the five colors and sprinkled throughout the rarities. These mechanics are usually used as iconic expressions of the set, of which offspring and “gift a card” succeed at with WUBRG colors. Like how battles in March of the Machine sold us on the feel of an interplanar invasion, these mechanics sell the set itself, and therefore warrant us diving into them first.

Offspring: "I Am Your Otter"

Offspring is listed on 17 cards in the main set and only on creatures, which makes sense seeing as it represents the offspring of the creature taking up or following in their parent’s footsteps. By paying an additional cost as you cast the creature spell, upon entering you'll produce a token copy of the creature, which is a copy of it in all ways, including mana cost, however with a base power/toughness of 1/1.

Depicted: Take your child to (and from) work day on Bloomburrow

Some of these cards are just an excuse to get a second enters trigger of the parent card, which is merely the floor of the mechanic’s design. However, the ceiling of getting a second triggered ability off of one card is far more interesting in my book. Cards like Iridescent Vinelasher, whose parent-child combo for will deal two damage on every land drop.

Or who could forget BatBob and Bobin™ (copyright pending), who accelerates our card draw by triple for just and two bodies! The fact that you get two bodies out of this one cost means that your opponent has to use two removal spells in order to get you to truly stop having these passive triggers.

Offspring is P-E-R-F-E-C-T. Not just because of how it makes Bloomburrow feel quite literally alive, but when we see it brought back in the future, it will mean we get a child token along with the parent. Which leaves Magic’s future incredibly adorable.

“If you want to stop getting ping’d by my child for 1 damage every time I cast a spell, you’re going to have to go through me” - Otter Karen

Gift - “May I Offer You a Tapped Fish in These Trying Times?”

The second universal mechanic is gift, which is present on almost entirely noncreature spells and is another additional cost that you can choose to pay or not. Just like offspring, each card will do exactly as the card says, but if you pay the additional cost, the card will do just a bit extra. Unlike offspring, the additional cost gives an opponent a resource, which means you'll have to weigh if that additional cost is worth what your opponent will get out of it.

Depicted: The easiest trade deal of all time

For your reading pleasure I have the whole range of gift options right here: card draw, Food token, Treasure token, extra turn (BLC), Octopus (BLC) or my personal favorite, a tapped Fish!

The gift cards will all do something even if you don’t pay that additional cost, and there are a lot of times where that’s just fine and dandy. Sometimes there is only one artifact or enchantment on the battlefield, so you don’t need to give your opponent a free card draw like with Wear Down. While if your opponent is on their last leg, three to the face is well worth the Treasure token with Blooming Blast. This example does bring up something important to note about the mechanic, however. The actual giving of said gift is part of the spell’s resolution, not part of an additional cost. 

A perfect example of the elegance of the gift mechanic is (somehow) best represented with Bloomburrow’s inciting incident and titular theft spell (which is also a crime?) Cruelclaw’s Heist.

Cruelclaw’s Heist will be placed on the stack for the cost of , and then a promise of if you will gift an opponent a card or not. Now this card is on the stack, nothing else has happened and this is the last moment your opponent has to respond before this spell does its thing. Once priority has fully passed, the spell starts to resolve from top to bottom, which means now is when your opponent will draw a card. As we are mid-spell resolution, even if your opponent just drew a counterspell off of your gift, they cannot use it. Your opponent now simply has an additional card in their hand to get your Weasely little claws on with the added ability of being able to cast it later.

The gift mechanic has a lot of play to it and it makes me very happy to see what choice people will make when they play these in multiplayer. Being able to attack one person’s board while giving an enemy-turned-friend a celebratory tapped Fish will lead to some pretty wild turns, but the best gift cards just make it so darn worth it.

Pawprints

Next up is that more-cycle-than-mechanic that I mentioned before which also spreads among the five colors. Each of these Season sorceries are more or less modal spells, but instead of picking modes by paying additional costs, we can choose up to five pawprints' worth of these abilities, and can choose any of these modes any number of times. So go off monarch, spend all five pawprints to make each player sacrifice a creature five times. Or perhaps spice it up with three sacrifices and then some card draw? Casting Season of Loss after combat will typically be the better play, because the second and third abilities will do double work once your opponents choose to throw all those Fish you gifted in the way of your attacking creatures.

Loss

There is no way to manipulate or interact with the pawprints themselves, which is why I consider it more of a cycle than a mechanic. They're not counters which stick around for later, like energy, nor can you copy the spell itself to get ten pawprints to spend seven on one and three on the other. In fact, when you copy it, you still have to keep the same modes that you chose on the original as per the rules of modal spells. Also note that your opponents will know what modes you are choosing as you cast it and have time to react accordingly (usually with tears/crying) after you pay the costs and place it on the stack.

Not depicted: The red-headed stepchild of the bunch

Kindred as a Mechanic

Now we get to the real…nuts and vegetables of the set, with our first look at the kindred mechanics. Bloomburrow has ten factions within it that are very reminiscent of the Ravnica sets, as each kindred has its own set of mechanics that play incredibly well within their two-color pairs.

I believe that Bloomburrow explores the depth of the two-color pairs in a more exciting way than we've seen before. With a new generation of Magic players entering the game with WOTC’s current direction, Bloomburrow will be a foundational set, which will influence the understanding of color combos like , , and and how they work together for years to come.

Forage

Forage is the new mechanic for the -aligned Squirrels of Bloomburrow. It plays around directly with the evergreen Food tokens, in which you pay the forage cost by either sacrificing a Food token or exiling three cards from your graveyard. Used as an enter trigger, an additional cost, or as an activated ability cost, forage runs the gamut of uses in just the eight cards that it's present on. While this mechanic itself is unique in its own right, as calling out Food tokens specifically to be used is pretty interesting, the overall theme of Bloomburrow revolves around sacrifice and graveyard usage.

Foraging requires either Food or cards in your graveyard, which is where the rest of the Squirrels come in. The signpost legendary squirrel, Camellia, the Seedmiser, is the perfect synergy of these themes and a true view into the reap and sow/life and death aspect of that Bloomburrow explores.

Expend

Expend is an interesting one that deserves a bit of a deeper look. It's a new mechanic that asks you to keep track of something almost entirely new: how much mana you've spent on spells this turn. This is another mechanic, much like crime, in which you've technically always been doing it, but you need one of 12 total permanents on your battlefield in order for it to matter. You expend 4 as you spend your fourth total mana to cast spells during a turn. Spending mana to activate abilities or pay costs for cards like Propaganda will not count towards expend. The fact that it's only permanents that care about this as well is equally important, because that means they will not be on the battlefield in time for you to see that fourth mana used if that mana was used to cast that permanent itself.

"Oh no, did we miss the party?"

The fact that expend cards are all permanents also plays very much into the theme of creatures being the focus, and buffing them to hit harder as well. All of these Racoons are big, beefy, and get even thicccer when you start expending by casting even more big’uns. With expend currently counted either at 4 or 8, there will certainly be some turns where you'll have to set up the big swings. But once you get there, your enemies won't last long.

Valiant

Last, but the opposite of least, we have what I feel is the most succinct mechanic ever made: valiant. Valiant is present on only nine permanent cards, but each of them screams “This is !” While mentor from Guilds of Ravnica gives us the flavor of generals like Aurelia, Exemplar of Justice leading the guildmaster’s favorite soldier to simply hit harder, we have never quite gotten the feeling of getting strength from someone Believing in You.

What makes this my favorite mechanic of the set is the enablers, and how they play into the visualization of how the valiant mechanic works. Imagine, would you, being a little Emberheart Challenger and being granted the legendary Cragflame from Mabel, Heir to Cragflame herself? You would pick up that sword and inspire others to join you in your fight! A Heartfire Hero being chosen by the Manifold Mouse to hit twice is going be ready to risk it all for their friends. The Roughshod Duo showing up in the nick of time to buff the Seedglaive Mentor to crash in with trample? Radiance could never.

Round Up

There we have it! I hope you enjoyed my deep look into Bloomburrow’s mechanics and hopefully I conveyed exactly why I feel so strongly about this set. I truly do love it and I'm not the biggest woodland critter fan. Yet the set’s marriage of themes, art direction and, clearly, the mechanics are making me just so happy. Let me know how you feel about Bloomburrow’s beautiful design and if anything I’ve said strikes something in you.

More Bloomburrow Content:

The Over/Under - Predicting the Popularity of Bloomburrow Commanders

Bloomburrow Set Review - Enemies & Wedges

Bloomburrow - A cEDH Set Review

Kurohitsuki

Commander Content Creator with over 50 decks looking for any excuse to play them! EDH has been my gateway to expression for the past decade and that's not looking to change any time soon! Catch me on Twitch.tv/Kurohitsuki where I'm always jamming games every week!