Part 1 of this set review can be found here: White
Part 2 of this set review can be found here: Blue
Part 3 of this set review can be found here: Black
Part 4 of this set review can be found here: Red
As with the previous four chapters, we are going to analyze Green according to the following rating system:
Constructed Unplayable
This card should not be played in Constructed under any normal circumstances and will never be found in a competitive Constructed deck. Example: Fiddlehead Kami, Hundroog
Playable – Role Player
This card is either unspectacular and competing with cards that do the same thing more efficiently, or useful in only a limited number of decks. For whatever reason (redundancy, lack of better alternatives), the card is good enough to fill a role in a reasonable Constructed deck. Example: Elvish Champion, Zodiac Monkey
Playable — Staple
This card is played in whatever decks and strategies where it would be appropriate, almost without question. When the card is absent, we start asking questions. Example: Llanowar Elves, Ravenous Baloth
Playable — Flagship
This card has a powerful or unique effect, so much so that we build decks around it rather than fitting it into decks. Quite often the presence of this card allows for new archetypes to be explored. In some cases, those archetypes are not very good (but without their flagships, we would never even ask the question). Example: Tooth and Nail, Wild Mongrel
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Battering Wurm
With a mana cost 1.75 times the lower limit of the “must win the game to be Constructed playable” threshold, and a potential size of 5/4, Battering Wurm scores a big, dumb, “Constructed Unplayable” rating.
Big and Dumb Rating: .59
Constructed Unplayable
Beastmaster’s Magemark
After five colors of one of the least Constructed playable cycles in recent memory, I can safely plead that I’m tired of making up cute things to say about the Magemarks.
Constructed Unplayable
Bioplasm
The quintessential Green rare creature, Bioplasm is big… but was accidentally made somewhat clever. This is interesting given that it is creature type Ooze; perhaps if it were creature type Ingenius Dragon Legend I would understand, but apparently a viscid flow of offensive semisolid is what passes for a smart guy these days.
Taken on its face, Bioplasm is simply a dork in the vein of Durkwood Boars, but once it hits the table, this big-and-not-particularly-dumb threat can pair with Green foster child Sensei’s Divining Top to be consistently enormous.
The problem with Bioplasm, though, is that it isn’t particularly good at filling the holes in Green’s plans. Green already has great drops for five mana; in fact, in this block, it has an equally sized 4/4 for four mana that more than gets the job done. In the full Standard, straight Green can get a 6/4 with a better ability, or a 5/5 with a far better set of abilities (given the color’s needs), meaning that this Ooze has a long slide of splinters before it gets to the business end of the bench.
Big and Dumb Rating: 1.07
Playable – Role Player (get in line)
Crash Landing
So this is the Green version of Terror… um… Dark Banishing. Crash Landing is pretty good at what it does. Having gotten about a million Clouded Mirrors of Victory killed by my opponents’ Rend Fleshes over the past couple of months, I can say that three mana removal against five mana threats is not bad at all.
This card should consistently fight Meloku, knock Dragons from the sky over and over, and spit on the Boros deck’s motley array of 2/2 idiots. If I weren’t so scared of what would happen to me if I killed anything bigger than a Legendary Moonfolk Wizard, I’d like this card even more.
Point of reference: In the first 14-0 Swiss performance in the history of the Pro Tour, Ryan Fuller played Wallop, a somewhat more limited, if cheaper, variation on Crash Landing, in his sideboard.
Is life fair? Compare Crash Landing to Spitting Earth.
Playable – Role Player (just don’t go playing this ahead of Putrefy if you can help it)
Dryad Sophisticate
Dryad Sophisticate is the best pure beatdown creature that Green, or any Green guild, picked up in this block (so far)… and that includes Watchwolf.
Rushwood Dryad was singularly the card that made Jamie Wakefield beatdown deck, “Joshie” Green, remotely viable in last year’s Standard. Dryad Sophisticate can do everything Rushwood Dryad can… except that it hits every deck instead of just Tooth and Nail. Even the Mono-Red deck I posted last week has Shinka, the Bloodsoaked Keep for Dryad Sophisticate to crawl across.
Make no mistake, this is a card that needs a deck; she can’t slot into any random stack with Forests. I think that the Sophisticate might do very well with Blanchwood Armor and Zodiac Monkey in an updated Joshie Green.
Big and Dumb Rating: 1.17
Playable — Staple
Earth Surge
What’s really insulting about this card is that it’s symmetrical. If I pull my pants down with a Natural Affinity and invest a whole card in what is obviously one of the worst Crusade effects in the history of the game, why in the name of Morphling the Clouded Atog should my stupid opponent get the same benefit?! I mean, throw Johnny a bone for once!
Constructed Unplayable
Gatherer of Graces
Some people like this kind of stuff. Gatherer of Graces is a Druid, rather than an Enchantress, so don’t expect her to do her own card drawing… but combined with Tallowisp? Maybe if you are very hard working and clever you can make one of the Magemarks playable.
Of special interest is the lack of a mana activation cost on the Gatherer’s regeneration ability. Yavimaya Enchantress showed up in a viable deck or two about five or six years back, so don’t laugh (too loudly, at least).
Big and Dumb Rating: 1.00
Playable – Role Player
Ghor-Clan Savage
A 5/6 for five mana is nothing to scoff at. This card can fight Arashi and live, and dance with a Dragon. The problems are that he’s either a sub-optimal drop, or a simple 2/3 most of the time. Even if a 5/6 can fight a Legendary creature, if it doesn’t do anything else… it can get in line.
You wouldn’t play Ghor-Clan Savage ahead of Arashi or North Side, and you’d probably think twice before playing it in Block. A good deal of the time you’d rather have Bramble Elemental, let alone something sexier and rare.
Big and Dumb Rating: .77
Playable – Role Player
Gristleback
I’ve been waiting for a card like this for some time. When working on decks over and over I’ve been tempted to play Golgari Brownscale because I wanted a Spike Feeder; luckily, I never fell that low, but some decks just can’t cast Loxodon Hierarch.
Gristleback is an interestingly designed creature. It is generally the same size as Spike Feeder… but only gains half as much life. The weird thing is, Bloodthirst gives Gristleback the incentive to go aggro first and reap the +1/+1… but it is a defensive creature. About half the time, this will be simply better than my beloved Gnarled Mass, and the balance of the time, it’s still pretty good against a decent chunk of the metagame.
Though a little small, Gristleback’s conflicted nature does make it a mite dumb.
Big and Dumb Rating: .94
Playable – Role Player
Gruul Nodorog
If this were a 4/4 flyer for six mana, it still wouldn’t be good enough; as it stands, the evasion ability is conditional and requires off-color mana commitments.
Big and Dumb Rating: .72
Constructed Unplayable
Gruul Scrapper
Many years ago my friend Worth Wollpert had a U/R beatdown deck with Frenetic Efreet, Suq’Ata Firewalker, Force of Will… and a couple of Talruum Minotaurs. I loved that deck. I loved all the haste critters, setting up before a Fireblast, but I was unable to fit three power haste creatures into any other deck.
There’s a reason for that.
Gruul Scrapper would never see play in a monochromatic deck, and in G/R it is playing behind not only the soon-to-be ubiquitous Rumbling Slum, but Giant Solifuge. I can’t see this creature appearing in sixty card decks, unless a haste overload archetype appears.
Big and Dumb Rating: .75
Constructed Unplayable
Leyline of Lifeforce
Of all the Leylines, this is the one you want in your opening hand. If it starts the game in play, Leyline of Lifeforce can be a potent ally. If you’ve actually got to tap for it, Leyline of Lifeforce will just draw a permission spell… Depending on which permission spell that is, it can be an effective test spell that actually ends up helping you resolve the threat you really want to drop. The only problem is that in the current environments, there are really annoying cards like Remand. Such cards will prove very difficult to overcome if your (initial) threat is Leyline of Lifeforce.
If you actually get Leyline of Lifeforce into play, you will have to alter your play style in order to reap the maximum benefit. You can drop creatures at will — provided your opponent isn’t packing Wrath of God or some such — but you should assume the opponent is gripping solutions to any non-creature problem you can pose. Of course, if you’ve also got Boseiju, Who Shelters All…
Playable – Role Player
Petrified Wood-Kin
I was about to go into this monologue about Treebeard and carrying Hobbits around, or perhaps the English game Tops Trumps [Excellent! Fear Factor 97, I win. — Craig], but at the end of the day, more people would find that annoying rather than funny. Therefore I will merely say that this card is close to being good enough, but it probably isn’t, unconditionally. I don’t like seven-mana guys very much, but it would be silly to pretend that Green decks today don’t hit huge mana levels consistently due to Sakura-Tribe Elder and his less slithery cohorts. Petrified Wood-Kin can win games going very long because he can come off the top and clean up after an attrition fight, but the question is if he is good enough at that role to merit play.
Clearly this creature is specifically tasked to fighting Blue (it would be a strange metagame indeed if this card were ever correctly played maindeck). Resolving Petrified Wood-Kin, provided you have enough mana, is academic. The issue is what state the game is in once he comes down. Usually, Blue in the late game can fight with its big Legendary creatures, and Petrified Wood-Kin is never going to get past Meloku under any normal circumstances. Given the fact that if you need it to win it probably resolves as a 3/3, so it isn’t fighting Keiga very well, either. Perhaps if this Elemental Warrior were a 5/5 base? I’m not a fan in Standard or any large format. If it sees play, it will be in Block Constructed.
Big and Dumb Rating: .90
Constructed Unplayable
Predatory Focus
The ability is certainly powerful if the opponent plans to block. However we all know that Constructed Magic has very little blocking… most of the decks either block with a single monolithic creature in the late game, do tons of trading early, or don’t block at all. Therefore a card whose sole purpose is to make blocks ineffective seems itself ineffective.
Constructed Unplayable
Primeval Light
The effect of Primeval Light is conditionally incredible. I can think of more than one deck that would have no interest in seeing this card resolve. The problems are twofold: the first deck I thought of, Annex Wildfire, is a mana control deck, meaning that getting to four mana before you are completely blown out by what is essentially a mid-to-late game control deck is a serious question. If you have four mana, either the opponent’s deck wasn’t working or he hasn’t actually played enough enchantments to make this would be a good deal. Secondly, there are more efficient options in Ravnica Block. Sure, they don’t generate the same level of card advantage, but many of these are either instants like Seed Spark that can allow you to tap a land prior to it being stolen (which gives you more flexibility), or much cheaper (many examples). I am not going to say that this card is unplayable, because in an Enchantment-on-Enchantment fight it may serve to be a great tool, but I don’t see very much utility in Primeval Light for any existing deck.
Playable – Role Player
Silhana Ledgewalker
Silhana Ledgewalker is begging to be played. It is only one power worse than Dryad Sophisticate, with an amazing second ability for that creature’s purpose. Can you imagine putting a Blanchwood Armor or Moldervine Cloak on this? It certainly seems sexy… except for the fact that you’ve got 1/1 creatures for two mana in your deck. This guy doesn’t trade with anything, and the second ability is superfluous in the sense that no one would want to aim at it unless something else were already going on. At least Rushwood Dryad/Zodiac Monkey or Dryad Sophisticate already have reasonable cost-to-power ratios.
Big and Dumb Rating: 1.00
Constructed Unplayable
Silhana Starfletcher
This is a wonderful and conflicted card. I suspect Becker is not sure whether to love Silhana Starfletcher or not. Sure, its toughness is greater than its power, and sure, it can block flying, but those do not an automatic love affair make. Right now Jon is saying to himself “but it’s also an elf, not a beloved Spider,” and he is right; like the Starfletcher, Tongo’s Counsel is conflicted.
Silhana Starfletcher has a potent set of special abilities, but they don’t compliment one another. The best accelerators have traditionally cost one mana; this costs three. Moreover, while Silhana Starfletcher offers a filtered acceleration ability second only to Birds of Paradise, actually using that ability erases the rest of the text on the card — he won’t be doing a lot of blocking. All that said, this card is probably reasonable for Block. It can fix mana, pump your position into the giants, and eat a token if need be.
Big and Dumb Rating: 1.00
Playable – Role Player
Skarrgan Pit-Skulk
I like this guy. He’s almost a Bear. Bears you play as 2/2s for two mana, and this one only costs one mana. Green is particularly suited to this Gruul card (it would be much worse for one Red), because Green traditionally plays a high concentration of Llanowar Elves, Elves of Deep Shadow, and so forth against decks that, by and large, don’t have one-drop creatures. If Skarrgan Pit-Sulk is in your opening hand, you have a pretty good chance of setting up his Bloodthirst; this only becomes more likely in R/G because of the automatic inclusion of Kird Ape.
The main issues are that Skarrgan Pit-Skulk isn’t big enough to be a primary threat on his own (he almost always needs Bloodthirst, and therefore a little help), and he is nowhere near the top of the list of available creatures for one-drop status. There is nothing really “wrong” with the Pit-Sulk… but he’s got to wait in line. That relegates him to Block for now, but I don’t know that that is a unilateral death sentence.
Big and Dumb Rating: 1.50
Playable – Role Player
Starved Rusalka
Playing so many Red Decks has given me a lot of respect for lifegain. Some lifegain cards are backbreaking… Loxodon Hierarch and Lightning Helix are the best at present, but I’ve been able to mise slots with less flashy cards like Spike Feeder in the past. Gerrard’s Wisdom was a bright and shining hope during the days of Deadguy Red dominance (even if it didn’t work out so well for the good guys all the time), and more recently, Gerrard’s Verdict has hammered all manner of decks, stealing a point or three or six.
What all those cards have in common is a little something Brian Weissman used to call card advantage. When I Gerrard’s Verdict you and take two spells, that is just stone cold terrible. When I take a land and a spell, I not only pick up the two-for-one, but the three life exchange also counters your next one-and-a-half Shocks… Gerrard’s Verdict is like a three-for-one against a burn deck. What Starved Rusalka lacks is that essential card advantage that made life gain in the past a little more muscular. While you might be able to gain a point while blowing a mana to make a trade, it’s not going to be on the same order as a Spike Feeder taking out a Pup and countering two Cursed Scroll activations at the same time, and for no mana. There will be no quips of “Time Walk your graveyard” when this comes down mid-game. Starved Rusalka just isn’t great.
Big and Dumb Rating: 1.08
Constructed Unplayable
Wildsize
I’ve always liked Giant Growth, but the main reason I liked it was that it was one mana and I could use it to pump past Quicksand, or counter Incinerate on my River Boa even when resources were tight. The problem with this card is that it lacks both of Giant Growth’s main incentives: +3 rather than +2, and one mana versus three mana. Quite simply, Wildsize is not good enough for Standard.
Wildsize is a spectacular Limited card, of course.
Playable – Role Player
Wurmweaver Coil
The Johnny in me loves this card. It has a spectacular picture, it has an exciting set of abilities. Like Tatsumasa, the Dragon Fang, it… hell, it’s basically the Green enchantment version of Tatsumasa, the Dragon Fang, which turned out to be a much better card than we might have originally thought. Dominating, even.
The problem is that Tatsumasa became a strong card due to Godo, not under its own power. As we have no reliable Godo, we have a limited Wurmweaver Coil. Academy Rector is out of print and Auratouched Mage can’t search it up. I’m not interested in spending nine mana and a card for a 6/6.
Constructed Unplayable (unless a new enabler appears)
Guildpact Green is the opposite of Ravnica Green. Where in the big set, Green was the strongest single color, it is fairly pathetic in Guildpact; there is only one card that I am rating as a legitimate staple (but it is a potent, if fragile, doozy). As such, the short list for this color is extremely short:
Dryad Sophisticate
This is the best beatdown creature in the set and the best Green card overall. Period.
Also-rans:
Leyline of Lifeforce
If this is in your opening hand, the game will be played according to strange and challenging rules. Leyline of Lifeforce is not an automatic win against a permission deck, but it should certainly generate a good measure of card advantage if it ever comes online. I would rate Leyline of Lifeforce as a potential sideboard card only.
Gristleback
Sometimes this card is just better than my beloved Gnarled Mass (for Constructed decks). It is a solid role player that will see play, especially in addition to Loxodon Hierarch, or in decks that can’t play the ridiculous elephant.
Up next: The Money Cards
LOVE
MIKE