The Prodigal Player

I’ve been glancing at the Worldwake spoiler pretty regularly over the past few days, mostly pondering various builds of allies for Standard.  It struck me that one of the cards I was most excited about in my various WG allies builds wasn’t an ally at all.  It was this card:

Yes, as you read on, you will find that I am an unrepentant Green player.  And it seems, of late, that Wizards is finally getting around to giving Green some incredibly powerful tools.

In addition to being awed by the elegance of the card’s design, I believe that this card will actually be a competitive staple.  Like the similarly back-breaking Cloud-Goat Ranger and Sieg-Gang Commander, Beastial Menace can create game-winning swings of tempo.  While it doesn’t have the potential evasion or removal utility that the other cards have respectively, Menace retains several of its own advantages.  Most obviously, as a green card, it is far more likely to come down before turn five than either Cloudgoat or Commander.

Part of the reason that Cascade based decks–most obviously Jund–have been able to dominate Post-Lorwyn/Shadowmoor Standard is that the format simply didn’t have an effective answer to the card advantage the Cascade mechanic provides.  Pre-Zendikar, however, if your deck wasn’t packing Spectral Procession, Bitterblossom, Cloudgoat Ranger, or Siege-Gang Commander, chances are good you weren’t doing a lot of winning.  (Or, you were playing 5-color-control…)

In other words, tokens dominated.  More accurately, however, CHEAP tokens dominated.  While Cloudgoat and Commander are obviously hefty mana investments, the assistance of Windbrisk Heights meant that in many cases, you were getting them for free.

Tokens Standard 2.0, (if it happens) involves, on average, much higher casting cost spells; even Join the Ranks costs a whopping 4.  And there are no obvious ways to effectively cheat them into play such as using Windbrisk Heights or Mosswort Bridge.  Wait–Cascade could cheat them into play. The only problem with that plan is that the colors most likely to make tokens (W,G) only have a single cascade spell between them with a high enough CC to flip Beastial Menace or Join the Ranks, or Turntimber Ranger:  Enlisted Wurm.

But hey, that’s not such a bad thing.  After all, WG Tokens and BW Tokens, when they were competitive rarely employed more than four slots to “free” spells, like Heights and Mosswort.

What this potentially means for WG token strategies in Worldwake Standard is that rather than relying on tokens to kill quickly before getting wiped out, the game plan now shifts to slowly gaining inevitability.  Your first wave of guys may get wiped out by a Day of Judgement.  Maybe even your second.

But:  Enlisted Wurm cascading into Beastial Menace or Turntimber Ranger?  Damn.