A Durdle's Guide to Gatecrash - Green

We’re still trucking as we have reached the favourite colour of Jamie Wakefield, Timmies and Matt Nass…green! With Gruul and Simic in this set I was hoping for green to get more than it got out of Return to Ravnica, where it definitely felt like it was on the losing end. Will we have to wait for gold cards to get some green goodness? Let’s take a look!

Green

[card]Experiment One[/card]
It might not look like much, but I’ve been testing with this guy and he’s the perfect example of how a card can be made into a powerhouse by the environment in which he finds himself. The curve of Experiment into [card]Strangleroot Geist[/card] into [card]Dreg Mangler[/card] into [card]Falkenrath Aristocrat[/card] into [card]Thundermaw Hellkite[/card] is pretty obscene and in all likelihood leaves your opponent dead. I’ve found that his regenerate ability comes up fairly often but doesn’t shrink him for long, as you just play more guys.

Of course that’s not the only way to evolve our Experiment. If Strangleroot undies, he evolves. Huntmaster evolves him, though sadly only once. [card]Deathrite Shaman[/card] evolves him. He’s a Human, which can help [card]Champion of the Parish[/card] and is pumped by [card]Mayor of Avabruck[/card]. For a seemingly simple 1/1, I expect [card]Experiment One[/card] to ooze its way into constructed decks fairly easily.

[card]Giant Adephage[/card]
Something about this card just bugs me. He’s a big ol’ beater that makes more big ol’ beaters whenever it connects with an opponent, but for some reason I don’t feel this. It’s kind of funny when an opposing Lazav copies an Adephage, but other than that I am having a rather atypical “Meh” reaction to a 7/7 trampler with a cool ability. I guess the token copies will fuel your evolve, and can be populated…no, I’m just not on board. I’ve played with and enjoyed far worse cards, but for some reason I just can’t love this.

[card]Gyre Sage[/card]
I do love mana dorks. Gyre Sage (or Rosemary, as we’re going to call her) is interesting in that as she grows, she lets you cast bigger dudes which in turn grow her which then lets you cast bigger dudes…this Gyre might even go infinite! Oh, did you run out of giant dudes to cast? Rosemary is now probably fat/fat and able to beat down with everything she helped you cast. The last mana dork we had that could beat down was Werebear, and before that [card]Lotus Guardian[/card]. She’s bigger.

I kinda wish she’d been printed as a 0/2 so that she could be more easily evolved, but it’s not like it’s HARD to do so as it stands. There are of course other ways to get counters on her: Bioshift, [card]Gavony Township[/card], [card]Blessings of Nature[/card] and maybe even [card]Master Biomancer[/card] and [card]Zameck Guildmage[/card] can help out.

I will probably have a couple of achievements around growing Rosemary to a certain level, and I know I will be looking for foils, and probably trying to cast [card]Primal Surge[/card] off her back. I’m a big fan of Rosemary, and she will be spending her fair share of thyme in sleeves in my deck box.

[card]Ooze Flux[/card]
As a guy who carries a Spider-Man pencil case full of dice to every event, I am always prepared for counter shenanigans. I thoroughly enjoy them, in fact. Everyone and his dog has already spoken about how you can just remove a counter or two from all your evolve guys and make a huge Ooze, which then regrows all your evolve guys. Sure, we COULD do that. We could also play with [card]Gavony Township[/card], Mikaeus the Lunarch and undying creatures. In Modern we have an infinite combo with 2 Gyre Sages and an [card]Intruder Alarm[/card], or one Sage with 2 counters on it and any other creature with a counter.

We’ve also got Populate of course, but that’s kind of boring. Really I just want to play this with evolve guys and make giant Oozes over and over again for 2 mana. [card]Cloudfin Raptor[/card], [card]Strangleroot Geist[/card], [card]Master Biomancer[/card], [card]Champion of Lambholt[/card], Gyre Sage…yeah, that works. Building it.

[card]Sylvan Primordial[/card]
Hard-casting this will be annoying, even if it does nuke a Tamiyo or [card]Nicol Bolas[/card]. While 6/8 reach is a huge body, it’s not the best you can do for the cost even if it does block and kill almost anything in the format. If you already have seven mana, how much are you likely to need another Forest? Even if you grab a [card]Stomping Ground[/card] or something for fixing, the ability is still not mind-blowing and you wood rather have Crocanura and [card]Acidic Slime[/card]. That might be a slight exaggeration but hey, Crocodile Frog.

Where it might be good is in cheating it into play. He can blow up lands, so playing him turn 4 or 5 from the yard can take your opponent off a colour while providing a bigger threat than [card]Acidic Slime[/card] would. [card]Heartless Summoning[/card] could also be a thing, and with Gyre Sage having 2 toughness he can accelerate you in that deck. [card]Acidic Slime[/card], [card]Deadeye Navigator[/card], [card]Sphinx of Uthuun[/card], [card]Griselbrand[/card] and some utility spells can round us out.

[card]Verdant Haven[/card]
With all the aggro decks around right now, if you’re going to spend your second or third turn doing nothing you had better be gaining some life for doing that nothing. Where [card]Abundant Growth[/card] only provides us fixing (and a card) for G, [card]Verdant Haven[/card] gives us ramp and fixing for 2G, with a small life boost attached. Decks that want to use [card]Ethereal Armor[/card] or [card]Sphere of Safety[/card] can make use of both, though I think the EnBantments deck has a variety of better things to do with 3 mana. I’ve been looking for an excuse to try [card]Sphere of Safety[/card] in a deck, and having this in the format makes me feel safe in that plan.

Even though Farseek and [card]Liliana of the Dark Realms[/card] are both in this format, we are not exactly blessed ith a variety of ways to fix our mana. If you’re not making use of the fact that it’s an enchantment, I might even say that [card]Chromatic Lantern[/card] is better in almost every way. Artifacts are marginally easier to remove but nobody is really playing removal for them right now, whereas [card]Ray of Revelation[/card] is in a lot of sideboards. Lantern also won’t get you 2-for-1ed and fixes all of your mana. It’s also playable in every deck. So uhh…yeah. Play Lantern unless you’re playing [card]Sphere of Safety[/card].

Thoughts on Green

Once again, short shrift for my favourite colour. Nothing that really stands out and only a couple of cards that seem to have any competitive applications. As long as cards like [card]Thragtusk[/card] and [card]Huntmaster of the Fells[/card] are in Standard people will be playing Forests, but there isn’t much in this section to get me excited. Hopefully that changes with the multicolor contributions.