We're already playing Farseek. Overgrowth actually ramps for +2 while the other spells you mentioned only ramp +1. Overgrowth is particularly good with untap effects (Frantic Search, Treachery, Time Spiral, Palinchron, etc).
Overgrowth actually ramps for +2 while the other spells you mentioned only ramp +1.
I sure hope it provides a stronger effect if it costs three times the mana! Just look at how much mana the cards produce relative to their mana cost (you did this earlier for Fertile Ground and said it's the reason you don't like it): Wild Growth is 1:1 whereas Overgrowth is only 2:3. Also, having to invest 3 mana is not something you can do just like that in order to increase the storm count. If you can spend the three mana and still enchant a untapped land, it will effectively only cost you one mana, but that requires access to 4 untapped mana to begin with. You can do the same with Wild Growth with a single land: you play it and it will effectively cost you one mana. With two lands or more it is much better with Wild Growth, because then you can play it basically for free (tap one mana to play it on an untapped land, tap enchanted land for two mana equals the two mana you would have gotten from tapping the two lands without enchanting in between).
Green Ramp comes in three flavors: creature-based (think Llanowar Elves), enchantment-based (think the Wild Growth as discussed in this thread) and land-based (think Rampant Growth). I would argue that land-based ramp is the least susceptible to disruption, because not many spells kill lands (whereas many spells kill creatures) and because single target spells will not get more than one land at a time (whereas the inherent disadvantage of aura enchantments is the card advantage the opponent generates by killing the enchanted permanent). So one would think that because of this, land-based ramp would be the go-to choice for Cube builders. This is not the case, and the reason is that creature-based and enchantment-based ramp is available at one mana but the cheapest land-based spells cost two mana.
Overgrowth actually ramps for +2 while the other spells you mentioned only ramp +1.
I sure hope it provides a stronger effect if it costs three times the mana! Just look at how much mana the cards produce relative to their mana cost (you did this earlier for Fertile Ground and said it's the reason you don't like it): Wild Growth is 1:1 whereas Overgrowth is only 2:3.
Fertile Ground would be 1:2 which is worse than 2:3. I'm looking forward to Overgrowth, I think it will provide a lot of value when casting Frantic Search, Time Spiral, etc. I like that it ramps two mana in a single card for only 2G, I don't think there's another land enchantment card that produces 2 mana for 3 or less. Wild Growth and Utopia Sprawl may be better, but I'm completely fine with that.
Also, having to invest 3 mana is not something you can do just like that in order to increase the storm count. If you can spend the three mana and still enchant a untapped land, it will effectively only cost you one mana, but that requires access to 4 untapped mana to begin with. You can do the same with Wild Growth with a single land: you play it and it will effectively cost you one mana. With two lands or more it is much better with Wild Growth, because then you can play it basically for free (tap one mana to play it on an untapped land, tap enchanted land for two mana equals the two mana you would have gotten from tapping the two lands without enchanting in between).
Yep, totally agree. The one mana enchantments are likely better while in the process of storming off (there are a few corner cases I can think of, but not enough to say they'd likely be better the majority of the time).
Green Ramp comes in three flavors: creature-based (think Llanowar Elves), enchantment-based (think the Wild Growth as discussed in this thread) and land-based (think Rampant Growth). I would argue that land-based ramp is the least susceptible to disruption, because not many spells kill lands (whereas many spells kill creatures) and because single target spells will not get more than one land at a time (whereas the inherent disadvantage of aura enchantments is the card advantage the opponent generates by killing the enchanted permanent). So one would think that because of this, land-based ramp would be the go-to choice for Cube builders. This is not the case, and the reason is that creature-based and enchantment-based ramp is available at one mana but the cheapest land-based spells cost two mana.
I'm currently playing Farseek, Cultivate, and Kodama's Reach among other land-ramping spells. If Wild Growth, Utopia Sprawl, and Overgrowth all exceed my expectations (which may or may not happen, who knows) I may test Fertile Ground over Cultivate. We'll see what happens.
Are there any other land enchantment spells I'm missing that are worded differently than the aforementioned ones? I searched gatherer and have only come up with the ones we've been discussing.
All these years in, I'm considering adding Wild Growth. I was actually surprised to find it wasn't in when I looked. I've played this card plenty of times, and there's no mystery as to its power level. As we all know, it has advantages and disadvantages compared with Llanowar Elves. Largely everyone plays those, and most don't play Wild Growth. I'll not bother rehearsing the finer points of the comparison.
Does anybody still play this card? I'm thinking its value may have increased over the years as the power of one-mana ramp spells has remained pretty constant, whereas the power of most other things has gone up.
Notably, there are a lot more creature mana-dorks these days, but still few enchantment-based ramp cards worth playing. Weirding Wood is pretty dubious.
The value of these cards also goes up significantly as untap abilities are more available. Another good Arbor Elf variant would drive this card's value way up. Kiora, Behemoth Beckoner again is my friend, and I'm still playing Argothian Elder and Vizier of Tumbling Sands, and it'd be nice to see just a wee bit more of the effect. Elder is still doing his best, but he's getting old for this job. A 2/2 for four just can't make it in today's fast paced society.
I've played it in a lot of different cubes over time and I'd say that its value has stayed relatively the same since there really aren't many synergies to push it (especially new ones). The only relatively new tech that I can think of is untapping the enchanted land with Nissa, Who Shakes the World. These kinds of cards will always be playable, but I've actually been going back to Rampant Growth effects to fuel the graveyard and to have as a ramp alternative to Pernicious Deed, which has really appreciated in value over the past year.
From my recollection, Wild Growth and Utopia Sprawl were never all that popular back in the day. But when I look at lists these days, I see it more than I ever have to be honest. I was asking wtwlf123 about this just the other day on his cube list thread. I'll quote my question and his reply at the bottom here, in case it adds to the discussion.
As you mention untappers, I would say Garruk Wildspeaker is an untapper that most cubes still seem to be playing, so don't forget to factor him in. I personally don't play these effects at 360, as I'd rather have dorks (better with equipment, Craterhoof Behemoth, Recurring Nightmare, Survival of the Fittest, and much else). But I think these go way up in value if you support Oath of Druids/Selvala's Stampede - as then you can't play the dorks, and having 1-drop non-creature ramp seems really good.
[...] I am quite a fan of seeing Wild Growth/Utopia Sprawl in the list, but I am struggling a bit with seeing "what changed" to make these playable. I'm not really noticing any new cards that interact with these in any specific ways. Am I overlooking something? When looking for discussion I found a 10-year old post where you wrote that you prefer dorks over these and wouldn't play them if you didn't run out of dorks. So is the answer that you simply ran out of dorks to add? Are they playing better than Elves of Deep Shadow/Avacyn's Pilgrim?
[...] Nothing has really changed, except the speed of the cube has made 1cc ramp even more desirable than ever. So in that sense, I guess I "ran out of dorks". 1cc ramp is just good, and I already play all the Llanowar Elves I want to. I like them more than the mana dorks that have a drawback or tap for colorless, but not more than the creatures that unconditionally produce colored mana. I do play Pilgrim (in ). Selvala's Stampede is a card that wants green ramp but doesn't necessarily want mana dorks, so that's one new(ish) card that has increased their value.
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We Cubed Wild Growth for 10 years but cut it in the last update. There’s a lot to say about the card, but the general reason we cut it is that (1) mono green ramp benefits heavily from your ramp being creatures. A couple of the strongest cards in the archetype are Gaea’s Cradle and Craterhoof. And (2) “Other” green decks benefit from the ability to color fix.
Our lower tier ramp now includes the following cards over Wild Growth: Utopia Sprawl (5 color), Rift Sower (5 color and creature), and Into the North (5 color and Dark Depths support). I’ll give a nod to Omnath decks which have been doing well for us and benefit more from the aforementioned ramp than from Wild Growth.
The short answer is it almost always better to have a Birds of Paradise/ Llanowar Elves than a Wild Growth/ Rift Sower/ Gilded Goose. They have marginal upside with Uptap/ Pod lines/ Artifact interaction which occasionally comes up.
The speed of the format is incredibly fast and I've found 2 CMC ramp to be incredibly lucklaster and decks cannot be built these days with opening with 1 CMC ramp.
I've been okay with 2 CMC ramp - refund 1 mana. Talisman/ Signet/ Explore variants as they allow for 2 plays on turn 3 or 2 plays on turn 2 with a 1 CMC dork.
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I'm actively maintaining a comprehensive article to help explain to new cube players how some complex vintage level cards work in a cube environment. Vintage Cube Cards Explained
The short answer is it almost always better to have a Birds of Paradise/ Llanowar Elves than a Wild Growth/ Rift Sower/ Gilded Goose. They have marginal upside with Uptap/ Pod lines/ Artifact interaction which occasionally comes up.
It's odd to see those three cards bundled together. Rift Sower seems incredibly weak to me, and I've never given it serious consideration, though I have a copy-- maybe I'm undervaluing the suspend. I tried it in an elf deck somewhere and found it bad. Gilded Goose I never really believed in, but seems to have proven its value. I'd throw it in to try it if I had one, but it's not a real one-mana ramp card like Wild Growth. It doesn't produce extra mana every turn.
I do agree (and years of testing has proven it true) that Llanowar Elves and Birds of Paradise are typically better than wild growth just because they have a board presence. But I think people are a bit too dogmatic in that comparison. Wild Growth certainly has some advantages (pseudo-haste and dodging creature removal/sweepers). Comparing it to cards like Rift Sower and Gilded Goose only makes me think more of it. Surely it wins those comparisons.
The short answer is it almost always better to have a Birds of Paradise/ Llanowar Elves than a Wild Growth/ Rift Sower/ Gilded Goose. They have marginal upside with Uptap/ Pod lines/ Artifact interaction which occasionally comes up.
It's odd to see those three cards bundled together. Rift Sower seems incredibly weak to me, and I've never given it serious consideration, though I have a copy-- maybe I'm undervaluing the suspend. I tried it in an elf deck somewhere and found it bad. Gilded Goose I never really believed in, but seems to have proven its value. I'd throw it in to try it if I had one, but it's not a real one-mana ramp card like Wild Growth. It doesn't produce extra mana every turn.
I do agree (and years of testing has proven it true) that Llanowar Elves and Birds of Paradise are typically better than wild growth just because they have a board presence. But I think people are a bit too dogmatic in that comparison. Wild Growth certainly has some advantages (pseudo-haste and dodging creature removal/sweepers). Comparing it to cards like Rift Sower and Gilded Goose only makes me think more of it. Surely it wins those comparisons.
I think one thing people overlook is Rift Sower has haste the turn it comes into play. If you're in a Pod deck where CMC matters, the 3 CMC is incredibly strong at changing it into a 4 drop on turn 3.
The bad 1 CMC dork vs 2 CMC dork debate cannot be examined in a vacuum.
- 3 CMC threats in green have become very strong in recent years, and especially with 3 CMC walkers, Courser, Excavator, Tireless Tracker, Reclamation Sage usually represents an additional activation, which is well worth the card disadvantage.
- I've found 2 CMC creature based acceleration into 4 drop on turn 3 is generally too slow for a creature deck - its too slow in a combo heavy environment and are too vulnerable to sweepers.
- Talisman/ Signets are traditionally better than 2 CMC dorks as these don't get hit by sweepers and work for WildFire/ Upheaval/ Artifact decks.
- Goose is a bad dork in a vaccum, but it just happens that most decks in the meta can take advantage of its body + 1 shot acceleration.
- Creature decks by nature should be able to take advantage of random bodies - Anthems/ Pod/ Opposition/ Skullclamp etc. They really should not be clogging their turn 2 with additional dorks.
I been seeing this problem in limited retail drafts recently where a lot of inexperienced players have been drafting a lot good 3 drops that fit their archetype and deck, but without 2 drops/ sacrifice fodder etc. their deck became overly costed threats that were over run by aggressive decks/ out valued by control decks.
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I'm actively maintaining a comprehensive article to help explain to new cube players how some complex vintage level cards work in a cube environment. Vintage Cube Cards Explained
I been told - "The side that gets to spend the most mana usually wins the game".
- You can count Force of Will as 2, Treasure Cruise as 3-4, Reanimated Griselbrand as 8 etc.
The player on the play gets to spend 10 mana by turn 4 while the player on the draw only spent 6 mana by then.
Aggro wins the early game because they can usually put 10-12 mana worth of spells in the early game, while control might be able to respond with only 5-6 CMC worth of mana. In the later game, when control takes over, they're spending 6-7 CMC worth of spells a turn, while aggro stalls with only 3-4 CMC worth of spells
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CUBE TOP 10 - Help us vote for the best cards in cube
Green Ramp comes in three flavors: creature-based (think Llanowar Elves), enchantment-based (think the Wild Growth as discussed in this thread) and land-based (think Rampant Growth). I would argue that land-based ramp is the least susceptible to disruption, because not many spells kill lands (whereas many spells kill creatures) and because single target spells will not get more than one land at a time (whereas the inherent disadvantage of aura enchantments is the card advantage the opponent generates by killing the enchanted permanent). So one would think that because of this, land-based ramp would be the go-to choice for Cube builders. This is not the case, and the reason is that creature-based and enchantment-based ramp is available at one mana but the cheapest land-based spells cost two mana.
"What am I looking at? Ashes, dead man."
Fertile Ground would be 1:2 which is worse than 2:3. I'm looking forward to Overgrowth, I think it will provide a lot of value when casting Frantic Search, Time Spiral, etc. I like that it ramps two mana in a single card for only 2G, I don't think there's another land enchantment card that produces 2 mana for 3 or less. Wild Growth and Utopia Sprawl may be better, but I'm completely fine with that.
Yep, totally agree. The one mana enchantments are likely better while in the process of storming off (there are a few corner cases I can think of, but not enough to say they'd likely be better the majority of the time).
I'm currently playing Farseek, Cultivate, and Kodama's Reach among other land-ramping spells. If Wild Growth, Utopia Sprawl, and Overgrowth all exceed my expectations (which may or may not happen, who knows) I may test Fertile Ground over Cultivate. We'll see what happens.
Are there any other land enchantment spells I'm missing that are worded differently than the aforementioned ones? I searched gatherer and have only come up with the ones we've been discussing.
CUBE TOP 10 - Help us vote for the best cards in cube
T2 powpercube Value https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/37t
Does anybody still play this card? I'm thinking its value may have increased over the years as the power of one-mana ramp spells has remained pretty constant, whereas the power of most other things has gone up.
Notably, there are a lot more creature mana-dorks these days, but still few enchantment-based ramp cards worth playing. Weirding Wood is pretty dubious.
The value of these cards also goes up significantly as untap abilities are more available. Another good Arbor Elf variant would drive this card's value way up. Kiora, Behemoth Beckoner again is my friend, and I'm still playing Argothian Elder and Vizier of Tumbling Sands, and it'd be nice to see just a wee bit more of the effect. Elder is still doing his best, but he's getting old for this job. A 2/2 for four just can't make it in today's fast paced society.
Low-power cube enthusiast!
My 1570 card cube (no longer updated)
My 415 Peasant+ Artifact and Enchantment Cube
Ever-Expanding "Just throw it in" cube.
My High Octane Unpowered Cube on CubeCobra
As you mention untappers, I would say Garruk Wildspeaker is an untapper that most cubes still seem to be playing, so don't forget to factor him in. I personally don't play these effects at 360, as I'd rather have dorks (better with equipment, Craterhoof Behemoth, Recurring Nightmare, Survival of the Fittest, and much else). But I think these go way up in value if you support Oath of Druids/Selvala's Stampede - as then you can't play the dorks, and having 1-drop non-creature ramp seems really good.
Our lower tier ramp now includes the following cards over Wild Growth: Utopia Sprawl (5 color), Rift Sower (5 color and creature), and Into the North (5 color and Dark Depths support). I’ll give a nod to Omnath decks which have been doing well for us and benefit more from the aforementioned ramp than from Wild Growth.
The speed of the format is incredibly fast and I've found 2 CMC ramp to be incredibly lucklaster and decks cannot be built these days with opening with 1 CMC ramp.
I've been okay with 2 CMC ramp - refund 1 mana. Talisman/ Signet/ Explore variants as they allow for 2 plays on turn 3 or 2 plays on turn 2 with a 1 CMC dork.
Vintage Cube Cards Explained
Here are some other articles I've written about fine tuning your cube:
1. Minimum Archetype Support
2. Improving Green Archetypes
3. Improving White Archetypes
4. Matchup Analysis
5. Cube Combos (Work in Progress)
Draft my Cube - https://cubecobra.com/cube/overview/d8i
It's odd to see those three cards bundled together. Rift Sower seems incredibly weak to me, and I've never given it serious consideration, though I have a copy-- maybe I'm undervaluing the suspend. I tried it in an elf deck somewhere and found it bad. Gilded Goose I never really believed in, but seems to have proven its value. I'd throw it in to try it if I had one, but it's not a real one-mana ramp card like Wild Growth. It doesn't produce extra mana every turn.
I do agree (and years of testing has proven it true) that Llanowar Elves and Birds of Paradise are typically better than wild growth just because they have a board presence. But I think people are a bit too dogmatic in that comparison. Wild Growth certainly has some advantages (pseudo-haste and dodging creature removal/sweepers). Comparing it to cards like Rift Sower and Gilded Goose only makes me think more of it. Surely it wins those comparisons.
Low-power cube enthusiast!
My 1570 card cube (no longer updated)
My 415 Peasant+ Artifact and Enchantment Cube
Ever-Expanding "Just throw it in" cube.
I think one thing people overlook is Rift Sower has haste the turn it comes into play. If you're in a Pod deck where CMC matters, the 3 CMC is incredibly strong at changing it into a 4 drop on turn 3.
The bad 1 CMC dork vs 2 CMC dork debate cannot be examined in a vacuum.
- 3 CMC threats in green have become very strong in recent years, and especially with 3 CMC walkers, Courser, Excavator, Tireless Tracker, Reclamation Sage usually represents an additional activation, which is well worth the card disadvantage.
- I've found 2 CMC creature based acceleration into 4 drop on turn 3 is generally too slow for a creature deck - its too slow in a combo heavy environment and are too vulnerable to sweepers.
- Talisman/ Signets are traditionally better than 2 CMC dorks as these don't get hit by sweepers and work for WildFire/ Upheaval/ Artifact decks.
- Goose is a bad dork in a vaccum, but it just happens that most decks in the meta can take advantage of its body + 1 shot acceleration.
- Creature decks by nature should be able to take advantage of random bodies - Anthems/ Pod/ Opposition/ Skullclamp etc. They really should not be clogging their turn 2 with additional dorks.
I been seeing this problem in limited retail drafts recently where a lot of inexperienced players have been drafting a lot good 3 drops that fit their archetype and deck, but without 2 drops/ sacrifice fodder etc. their deck became overly costed threats that were over run by aggressive decks/ out valued by control decks.
Vintage Cube Cards Explained
Here are some other articles I've written about fine tuning your cube:
1. Minimum Archetype Support
2. Improving Green Archetypes
3. Improving White Archetypes
4. Matchup Analysis
5. Cube Combos (Work in Progress)
Draft my Cube - https://cubecobra.com/cube/overview/d8i
- You can count Force of Will as 2, Treasure Cruise as 3-4, Reanimated Griselbrand as 8 etc.
The player on the play gets to spend 10 mana by turn 4 while the player on the draw only spent 6 mana by then.
Aggro wins the early game because they can usually put 10-12 mana worth of spells in the early game, while control might be able to respond with only 5-6 CMC worth of mana. In the later game, when control takes over, they're spending 6-7 CMC worth of spells a turn, while aggro stalls with only 3-4 CMC worth of spells
Vintage Cube Cards Explained
Here are some other articles I've written about fine tuning your cube:
1. Minimum Archetype Support
2. Improving Green Archetypes
3. Improving White Archetypes
4. Matchup Analysis
5. Cube Combos (Work in Progress)
Draft my Cube - https://cubecobra.com/cube/overview/d8i