Stormkeld Vanguard by Aldo Dominguez

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The Green Knight

Gather round the fire, and let’s tell each other legendary tales. Tales of Knights, Dragons, and maidens fair. Tales of big splashy mythics, cheeky commons, and, of course, tales of adventure! Welcome to the EDHREC green set review for Wilds of Eldraine. I’m Josh, and I’ll be taking you through my first impressions of the green cards from the main set, as well as the Commander products.

Throne of Eldraine lingers in the memory of many players as one of the most pushed, powerful sets of all time. How, then, does Wilds of Eldraine compare? We’re going to be looking at every mythic and rare and a choice selection of uncommons for you to consider including in your Commander decks. How did Eldraine fare after the invasion of the multiverse, and what new tricks has the plane of fairytales brought us this time? Let’s dive right in and find out!

Mythics

Blossoming Tortoise

Let’s start with a bang and look at Blossoming Tortoise. This card is absolutely unreal. To evaluate this card, we must first recognize that this is a Tortoise (er, Turtle), and Tortoises are cool. Once we’ve addressed this, we can begin to evaluate the actual abilities of the card itself. Four mana for a 3/3 creature is a little below rate, although its abilities more than compensate for that. The Tortoise mills you, ramps you, reduces the cost of activating your land abilities, and buffs your land creatures!

"Activated abilities of lands you control cost 1 less to activate" is the real spicy bit here. Reducing the cost of land abilities makes lands like Cabal Coffers and Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx easier to activate, as well as the original Castle cycle from Throne of Eldraine, like Castle Garenbrig. Lands like Shimmering Grotto finally excel as budget mana-fixing when the Tortoise lets them take advantage of "Add one mana of any color to your mana pool". Now, you won’t be surprised to hear that reducing the cost of land abilities can lead to some spicy combos, but we won’t spoil those for you here, let the Turtle (er, Tortoise) open doors for you when it comes to making those budget lands better. After all, there are plenty of ways to go infinite these days.

Virtue of Strength

Virtue of Strength is a slightly cheaper, slightly narrower Regrowth that's able to be cast as an Adventure. In the right deck, this could see Virtue of Strength being included instead of cards like Regrowth if you’re running a primarily creature-based deck or if you’d like to return a fetchland to hand to continue fixing your colors. Seven mana sees you casting Virtue of Strength as an enchantment, and I’m not really impressed. The closest comparison to this card is Nyxbloom Ancient, which counts permanents instead of basic lands. Virtue seems a lot fairer and reminds us that green can occasionally get the worst card in a cycle. If you’re running lots of basics, you could consider it, or if you’re dedicated to mono-green. I’m not sure I’m reaching for this mythic, though.

Rares

Bramble Familiar

Mana dorks can do quite a lot these days. An innocuous creature at first, it'll ramp you in the early game before opening doors in the late game. Bramble Familiar’s ability allows you to discard a card (ideally, a Brawn to return it to its owner’s hand). You then have the opportunity to cast Bramble Familiar in the late game to dig for a big game-ending smash or board-impacting creature, or an enchantment or land. This card does notably have to be one of the milled cards, making it a bit narrower strategy than a traditional reanimation effect. It is, however, attached to a cute lil’ Raccoon who provides a lot of utility in the early game.

Elvish Archivist

Hey, my preview card! Green caring about artifacts is a new trend we’ve been witnessing since Dominaria United and The Brothers' War, and this Elf gets bigger whenever an artifact enters the battlefield under your control each turn (but only once each turn). In decks that spit out Food, Clues, Treasures, and Powerstones, this card can get big quickly. Perhaps the most interesting thing about this card, though, is that it’s also an Enchantress: when one or more enchantments enter the battlefield under your control each turn, draw a card, though triggering once each turn. This is a very peculiar Enchantress caring about both, and one that will be welcome to the strategy by getting more powerful from your artifacts, too!

Feral Encounter

Feral Encounter is such an interesting fight spell. I love it. Not only does this card help you destroy a problematic creature, but it also provides distinct card advantage. You can cast this spell even if you don’t have a creature on-board because Feral Encounter will let you dig five cards deep to find one. You can also cast this spell even if you have no intention of fighting anything impactful and you want to draw into your next creature to develop your board state. Plus, all of this attached to a removal spell!? You best believe I’ll be looking to play this.

Gruff Triplets

Gruff Triplets is one of those cards that you never want to see in Limited, but the bar for six-mana creatures in green is very high. The end payoff for Guff Triplets is a 9/9 trampler, which is nothing to sniff at, but I’d probably prefer an Elder Gargaroth for one less mana if I was building green beatdown. You can still get nine power and toughness on the board for one less mana, with the added utility of gaining life and drawing a card. Gallia of the Endless Dance definitely likes these guys, though!

Sentinel of Lost Lore

A toolbox card which will probably see sideboard play in 60-card formats, but does it have a home in Commander? If you’re running an Adventure deck, absolutely. It gives you the utility you need to cast Adventures twice and shuts down your opponents' cards on Adventure. It will never not be relevant to have "exile target player's graveyard" on a card, but I’m not sure if this card is a bit too narrow to see lots of play outside of Adventure-centric decks.

The Huntsman's Redemption

Our favourite beefcake Garruk has gotten himself a Saga, and it’s a decent Saga too. Three mana for a 3/3 Beast is not a bad start at all, giving you an on-rate creature for your mana investment. The second chapter allows you to either sacrifice that creature or a spare creature to go and tutor another creature or basic land to hand. Finally, the last chapter lets you push through a bit of damage, giving your creatures +2/+2 and trample. Honestly, not a bad Saga. Every chapter gives you something you want, and it’s definitely a mana-efficient card.

Thunderous Debut

Don’t these big green spells usually come with "This can’t be countered", because boy, getting this countered would feel bad. In modern games of EDH, eight mana is a lot for a spell that doesn’t threaten to win you the game, especially one as disruptable as this. Leave up a mana for a Veil of Summer or cast something like Last March of the Ents instead. While that card might not win you the game either and requires a bit more set-up, the protection against disruption is big.

Wildwood Mentor

A card for token decks, Cadira, Caller of the Small likes this guy as a payoff for when she’s creating a giant Rabbit army. Like with any token synergy card, they’re getting better all the time as we see more Treasures, Food, and Clues. I don’t doubt this guy can get big. It’s a straightforward card with a straightforward purpose, and if your most evasive token needs to get that extra damage through, it’s not a bad call making a Faerie token huge that will be able to deal a bunch of damage to a player. Nothing groundbreaking though here.

Court of Garenbrig

Monarch is welcome in green. We’re running big creatures, so we’re harder to attack, and we can keep card draw for a long time with the right board. We’re also getting to make our creatures a little bigger each turn, which, if we’re not the monarch, helps us out with a big attacker to get it back. If we are the monarch, all those counters get doubled too, allowing us to really putting the pressure on our opponents. I don’t hate this on a three-mana enchantment. I think it comes down early enough to make a difference, draws you at least one card, and is a source of +1/+1 counters (which lots of decks will want).

Giant Inheritance

A persistent threat, reminiscent of Rancor. It returns to hand when it's destroyed, but that also has the potential to leave behind a Monster Role token that gives a creature trample? I dig it. In the late game, it’s a good mana sink, and it keeps even the smallest creature relevant as a potential threat.

Knickknack Ouphe

This Ouphe is a big Genesis Hydra for Auras, providing something a little unique for the Enchantress Voltron decks. Rather than drawing a ton of cards, they can make a ton of mana and grab a bunch of Auras at once to suit up an opportunistic attacker. This is a cool card, and I wouldn’t hesitate to run it in Enchantress Voltron. The fact that you have the potential to turn an innocuous creature into a big threat in a pinch will catch players at least once, and once is all it takes to win a game.

Loamcrafter Faun

Another Satyr, increasing the count for the Gallia deck! This one allows you to ditch your lands from hand in exchange for nonland permanents from your graveyard. This has some utility for the late game, for sure. Mana flooded? Cast this card and swap them all for your permanents that got removed in the early game. Pretty nifty.

Timber Paladin

Something something "eggs", something, something "one basket"... Timber Paladin is a build-your-own Slippery Bogle, albeit lacking one of the key pieces: hexproof! A great attacker but a very removable one. Auras that give protection, ward, etc. will come in handy here because your opponents will be eyeing this one up every time they draw a removal spell. If you can throw the occasional Roles you generate from your other spells onto this creature, I can see it providing value, but I would be wary of suiting this Paladin up.

Uncommons & Commons

Up the Beanstalk

This card is nice; it'll sit around on the battlefield before anyone realises how impactful it will be. A cantrip at first, paying essentially two mana to draw a card. In the late game, you’re looking at a card attached to each big creature we cast, which is super impactful. It also fuels Bargain if it looks like we’re not getting value out of it. Fundamentally, a card I think will see play.

Night of the Sweets' Revenge

Alright, this card rocks, and I’m not just talking about flavor here. Four mana gets you a Food that now taps for green, So at it's floor, this card is a four-mana rock. However, amass enough Food and for seven mana you’re able to ditch this enchantment and give a potentially huge power and toughness boost to your entire board. I have a feeling this card could end a few games, especially in The Shire, of all places.

Tanglespan Lookout

Look out! It’s another Enchantress, specific to Auras! Obviously, Enchantress decks were hurting for card draw, but I jest; it’s worth looking at this one as a nice budget alternative to some of the more powerful Enchantress draw pieces, like Femeref Enchantress or Argothian Enchantress.

Alright! That’s our review for green for Wilds of Eldraine and Wilds of Eldraine Commander. Honestly? I’m not amazingly impressed here. There are some neat cards saturated throughout the rarities, but not a lot that’s blowing me away here. I have a feeling since Throne of Eldraine was such a powerful set, Wilds by association had to be a little bit weaker. But now I ask you: the reader. What did I miss? Which card do you think will be a sleeper hit? Let us know in the comments or you can chat with me over on Twitter.

Joshua Clough

Joshua is a Medical Researcher from the UK. He's played Magic since Dragons of Tarkir and loves all things Commander, the more colours the better! When not playing Commander, he can be found insisting Jund is still a viable deck in Modern and painting tiny plastic miniatures on Twitter @PrinceofBielTan