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the popular card game’s collaboration with Avatar won’t become widely available until later this week, however due to prerelease weekends over the last few days, a low-cost green spell saw a sharp rise in market worth.

Throughout the spoiler season, the earthbending cub drew a lot of attention. A creature with stats 2/2 priced at a single green and one generic mana, the card has the Earthbend 1 ability (perhaps the best within the elemental mechanics available). The real boon in its design is an additional effect: If a creature is tapped to produce mana, you gain one extra green mana.

Initially, this card could be purchased below $30. Following the early events, yet, its value escalated above $45 including listings as high as $60. Why are we seeing premium pricing for this little creature? Mainly thanks to the rapid resource generation it provides.

Upon entering the board, this creature converts a land into a creature that has earthbending. And with that second ability, while it stays in play, those lands yields two mana instead of one — plus any creatures you have which tap for mana.

An ideal partner for synergy includes this one-mana elf, a low-cost creature which can be tapped for one green mana. Yet there are plenty of creatures that make mana in the game. Another option is a higher-cost choice that’s a 1/3 for two mana instead.

Deploying terrain, mana-producing creatures, and Badgermole Cub, it's simple to summon an enormous and very expensive creature on the battlefield within a few turns. The situation escalates rapidly if you keep the pressure on from there.

By incorporating a secondary color using this method, cards like these mana-fixing creatures are excellent picks that can make any mana color. Another card, a useful enchantment creature lets you play another terrain each turn AND turns all of your lands providing all land types. Another possibility is such as this six-mana enchantment, at a six-mana investment provides every card you own the capacity to produce one mana of any color — which covers all creatures under your control.

Badgermole Cub could be too strong regarding boosting mana production, however what closes out the game for a deck like this? An often-seen solution is Ashaya. Its power and toughness are set by the number of lands you control, and it makes all of your nontoken creatures Forests in addition to their other types. This means, each creature you control may tap for two G when tapped.

This additional option is another expensive, beefy creature that benefits from many terrain cards (as with the previous card, P/T are equal to how many lands you have).

Nissa fits really well in this deck. One of her abilities allows every Forest tap for one more G. (Combined with earthbend, this results in each one yield three G.) One loyalty ability acts as a proto-earthbend, putting +1/+1 counters on terrain, handy though it doesn't stack with the cub's ability. Her ultimate, though, renders each land you control immune to destruction enabling you to put onto the battlefield every Forest left in the deck. Should you manage to use that ability, it almost certainly game over.

The cub is a must-have for all green-based Avatar strategies built around the earthbend mechanic. When branching into red-green, you can use this legendary card. It possesses earthbend 4, and when damage is dealt to a player, all land creatures untap for another attack. Although this card has emerged as a popular Commander choice, the cub is set to be one of the most, maybe the popular pick from this expansion.