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the popular card game’s special Avatar expansion won’t become widely available until later this week, but due to pre-releases this past weekend, an affordable green creature saw a sharp rise in market worth.

From the initial reveals, this small creature drew widespread focus. A 2/2 priced at G and 1 mana, the card includes the Earthbend 1 ability (arguably the best of the four bending abilities in the set). The real boon here is its second ability: Whenever mana is generated by tapping a creature, add an additional green mana.

When first listed, this card sold below $30. Post-prerelease, yet, the going rate has shot up above $45 and one seller offering for sale at $60.00. Why are we seeing premium pricing for this little creature? Mostly thanks to the rapid resource generation it enables.

Upon entering the board, Badgermole Cub converts one land so it becomes a creature that has earthbending. And with that second ability, as long as it remains on the board, those lands generates double mana — plus mana-producing creatures on your side which tap for mana.

An ideal partner to combine with would be Llanowar Elves, a cheap 1/1 that taps to generate one green mana. Yet many other mana generation creatures out there. Druid of the Cowl is a higher-cost choice with stats 1/3 for two mana as an alternative.

Using land cards, dorks that generate resources, alongside this card, it's simple to summon an enormous high-cost creature into play within a few turns. And things just keep spiraling rapidly if you keep the pressure on after that.

By incorporating a secondary color with this approach, examples including Fuel Tank Feaster, Ilysian Caryatid, and Paradise Druid are all great options which produce any mana color. And something like a useful enchantment creature lets you play one extra land every round as well as transforms every land you control providing all land types. You can also consider such as the enchantment A Realm Reborn, at a six-mana investment provides every card you own the power to produce a mana of any type — which covers each creature under your control.

Badgermole Cub may be OP in terms of boosting mana production, but what closes out the game for a deck like this? An often-seen solution is this legendary creature. Power and toughness match the number of lands you control, and it makes your non-token creatures into Forests as well as other subtypes. Essentially, every single creature you control is able to tap for two G if used for mana.

Harmonious Grovestrider provides a high-cost, powerful body that benefits from a high land count (like Ashaya, its power and toughness are based on how many lands you have).

Nissa works perfectly as a go-to Planeswalker. Her static effect allows all Forests produce extra green. (If you have the cub, that means each one produce triple green.) One loyalty ability acts as a form of land animation, putting +1/+1 counters to a noncreature land, handy but does not overlap with the cub's ability. Her ultimate, though, makes your entire land base indestructible enabling you to search for your remaining Forests in your deck. Should you manage to use the ultimate, it almost certainly you win.

The cub is nearly mandatory for any kind of green-based Avatar strategies built around earthbend. If you dip into red and green, you can use Bumi Unleashed. This card features earthbend 4, and when it hits a player to an opponent, each animated land untap and can attack again. Although this card has emerged as a popular Commander choice, the cute little Badgermole Cub is definitely going to remain one of the most, maybe the popular pick in the collaboration.