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Magic: The Gathering’s Avatar crossover set will not become widely available before the end of the week, yet following prerelease weekends over the last few days, an affordable green creature experienced a surge in price.

Throughout the spoiler season, Badgermole Cub garnered a lot of attention. A creature with stats 2/2 priced at one green and one colorless mana, Badgermole Cub features the Earthbend 1 ability (arguably the strongest among the set’s four “bending” mechanics). The real boon in its design is its second ability: Whenever mana is generated by tapping a creature, add an additional green mana.

When first listed, this card was available at around $27. After the pre-release weekend, however, the market price escalated to $49.66 including listings as high as $60. The reason for Vivi prices on this adorable card? Mostly due to the explosive mana ramping it provides.

Upon entering play, Badgermole Cub transforms one land so it becomes a creature that has earthbending. Alongside its mana-doubling effect, while it is not removed, each affected land generates double mana — along with other creatures you have that produce resources.

The obvious go-to to combine with would be Llanowar Elves, an inexpensive 1/1 that taps to generate one green mana. But there are plenty of other mana generation creatures available. Druid of the Cowl is a higher-cost choice a 1/3 creature at a two-mana value instead.

Using land cards, dorks that generate resources, alongside this card, you can easily get an enormous and very expensive threat on the board early in the game. Momentum builds out of control by maintaining dominance from that point.

If you dip into a secondary color using this method, cards like versatile mana producers are excellent picks that generate all five colors. Another card, this powerful dryad lets you play another terrain each turn plus makes your entire land base into every basic land type. Another possibility is such as the enchantment A Realm Reborn, costing six mana grants every card you own the capacity to tap and generate any color mana — which covers each creature you have on the board.

The cub could be too strong in terms of accelerating your resources, but how do you win with this archetype? A common and powerful choice is this legendary creature. Its stats are set by the number of lands you control, and it makes your non-token creatures Forests as well as their other types. Essentially, each creature on your board may produce double green if used for mana.

Harmonious Grovestrider provides a high-cost, powerful body which gains from a high land count (similar to Ashaya, its stats are equal to your land total).

Nissa is an excellent fit in this deck. One of her abilities allows every Forest produce extra green. (Combined with earthbend, that means those lands yield three G.) Her plus ability acts as a form of land animation, placing counters to a noncreature land, handy but it isn't redundant with earthbending. The minus ability, however, makes all of your lands indestructible and lets you put onto the battlefield your remaining Forests from your library. Should you manage to use the ultimate, it almost certainly you win.

Badgermole Cub is nearly mandatory in any green-based Avatar strategies built around earthbend. When branching into red-green, you can use Bumi Unleashed. This card features level 4 earthbending, plus if damage is dealt to a player, all land creatures untap for another attack. Although this card has become a beloved leader, the cub is set to be among the top, possibly the popular pick in the collaboration.