Mo' Forests, Mo' Problems

This article is a long answer to the short question:
“What upsets you about Sylvan Primordial?”

The Aesthetics are Ugly

The shotgun blast of power and toughness values on the primordials looks weird and ugly, and Sylvan Primordial is the worst of the crew. Typically, P/T numbers for high-end creatures reflect the casting cost of the card. If a card costs 5 colorless mana, it might have a 5 somewhere else on the card, or if it’s total converted mana cost is 7, then it might have 7s instead. Setting up multiple instances of a number not only creates pleasant symmetries, it also provides a mechanical clue to players to signal, “Hey, this is a good card,” since constructed playable cards usually need to get at close to their CMC in power or toughness to be worth playing. This is one of the reasons tight cycles usually have similar (or identical) P/T, especially when all members of the cycle have the same cost structure.

I’ve been trying to work out some logic for how the numbers were assigned for the primordials, but I’m stumped. Is there some sort of hidden math code like on Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind? Was there some Development issue that meant Sepulchral Primordial needed to die to Avenging Arrow, but Diluvian Primordial needed to survive? Why does Molten Primordial have worse numbers than Ashen Monstrosity? And why on earth is Sylvan Primordial so much bigger than its siblings? I think it’s kind of neat that it was printed at 6/8 (it’s only the third creature with those numbers), but it comes across as lopsidedly better than the rest of the cycle.

It Does More Than Its Peers

It could make sense to give Sylvan Primordial the best stats if it was otherwise the worst of the cycle, which is probably the case in Limited or regular two-player Constructed, where sometimes there’s no worthwhile target, and the extra land is often irrelevant. But I think the fairest way to evaluate its power is to look at its multiplayer power, and in this arena SyPrime is crushingly better than the rest of the cylce.

Each its brethren does one thing per opponent: an Ashen Powder, a Threaten, a Swords to Plowshares, or a... mono-blue Memory Plunder? (Maybe it’s a card that hasn’t been printed yet.) But Sylvan Primordial gets to double up on effects per opponent; it gets a removal, and it gets to ramp as well. The closest card would be either Mwonvuli Acid-Moss or Bramblecrush, and Sylvan Primordial’s effect is a strict upgrade over either of them, despite both of those cards being solid performers.

Sylvan Primordial also has the fewest conditions required for its maximum effect. Diluvian Primordial needs each of your opponents to play worthwhile spells without too many conditions of their own; otherwise you get stuck with a couple cantrips and an unusable counterspell. Similarly, Molten and Sepulchral require your opponents to play useful creatures; otherwise, you end up overpaying for a Minotaur Aggressor and a second-rate Grave Titan. Diluvian and Sepulchral are also limited by their graveyard dependency; if an opponent has rest in peace, they're just french vanilla beaters. By contrast, SyPrime is almost guaranteed to have easy targets, and the extra lands are unconditionally useful.

This last point leads me to suspect that R&D doesn’t have a good grasp on how powerful mana advantage is in multiplayer games. In “normal” Magic, ramping from 7 mana to 10 is usually irrelevant; the top-of-the-curve finishers typically run in the 5-7 range, and even in decks with X-spells, the difference between a Banefire for 6 damage or for 9 damage is usually academic. But in large multiplayer games (like Commander) respectable creatures usually start at 5 or 6 mana, most decks have X-cost effects or other mana sinks, and decks’ mana curves often top out in double digits. Furthermore, 10 mana is often an important threshold in multiplayer games, since it’s the point at which a player can cast Wrath of God or another sweeper and immediately follow it up with a new threat. As a result of these factors, ramp strategies tend to dominate multiplayer games (especially Commander!).

In ordinary circumstances, this isn’t a problem. Even if a player hits all of his or her early ramp spells and gains a relative mana advantage (in other words, when have more mana than any other player at the table), that player could still be overcome by the confederacy of their neighbors. Getting ahead by 4-6 mana might be good enough to control one or two opponents, but the odds are good the fourth player can break through. Sylvan Primordial changes this dynamic dramatically, since with a little support, it’s possible to gain an absolute mana advantage (where you have more mana than every other player at the table combined). At that point, the group has stopped playing an ordinary game and started playing Archenemy instead.

Its Effect is Mandatory

The other obnoxious aspect is that its trigger is mandatory. The others are templated with an intervening “may/up to” clause, which I think is great since it makes for interesting table diplomacy. Without that intervening “up to” though, I feel like Sylvan Primordial disrespects the social give-and-take that makes multiplayer games (again, especially Commander!) so much fun.

For example, let’s say you’re in a 4-way Commander game. You’re playing a big green monster deck against Ghave, Guru of Spores, Olivia Voldaren, and Rasputin Dreamweaver, and the game’s into the mid-game phase. Ghave just played Doubling Season, which is bad news since it can combo off with the fungus shaman. Meanwhile, Olivia is on the field and equipped with a Basilisk Collar, which prevents you from putting anything threatening on the board. Rasputin’s stuck on five lands and no other permanents, but you suspect he’s holding some sort of countermagic. You have seven mana available and Sylvan Primordial plus a couple Eldrazi in hand. What do you do?

The obvious play should be to slam down the primordial. Doubling Season and Basilisk Collar are both loaded guns, and you need the extra mana to play the rest of your hand. But because of the way Sylvan Primordial is templated, you’re also obligated to Sinkhole one of Rasputin’s land, despite him not being a threat. Not only that, since he’s in the best colors for counterspells and graveyard hate, in the long term you’ll need need him against the black decks, so it’s in your best interests not to mess with him. From Rasputin’s perspective, even if he needs the problem permanents dead just as much as you, he also needs his lands, which leaves him with a tough choice on whether or not to counterspell the primordial. Whatever you and Rasputin decide, one of you is going to have a feel bad moment.

As with the P/T issue, I can’t figure out the reasoning behind the template. My best guess is that the rest of the cycle was easy to make, but for some reason they either stumbled on the green effect, or someone made some last minute changes and lost the original phrasing. Even if it was just a mistake, it’s really unfortunate, because it exacerbates other problems for Commander beyond its effect in-game.

It Encourages Lame Dudes Strategies

Mark Rosewater mentioned in his podcast on the mana system that one of its best features is the restriction of certain cards to certain decks. This innovation usually restricts how many of the best cards you can include in a single deck; if you take the strongest cards in the format and try to shuffle them together, it’s likely your mana base will fail. The evolution of different deck archetypes has also created a restriction by redefining what it means to be the “best” cards within colors; Champion of the Parish and Gather the Townsfolk might be the best cards in a white aggro deck, but Terminus and Angel of Serenity might be the best cards in a white control deck.

Unfortunately for Commander, it looks like this limitation is starting to break down. While the overall diversity of the format is quite high, the anecdata suggests that the “best” staple cards are starting to dominate deck building strategies, especially when it comes to generic Giant Green Monster cards. So instead of using a variety of different strategies, Commander players are starting to revert to the same set of lame stock Big Dudes strategies. Sylvan Primordial’s certainly not the only offender, but it’s the most egregious and most recent example of the trend. It makes me wonder, if Wizards prints 2-3 staple cards per set for Commander, how long will it take before generic goodstuff decks take over the format? Considering that most Commander decks have about 60 unique nonland cards, that probably works out less than 5 more years worth of staple space. While I appreciate the support Wizards is showing for multiplayer, going forward I’d prefer them to stay away from clumsy auto-include creatures. This isn’t to say that I think big, swingy creatures are bad, but please, instead of primordials, give us more cards like Kresh the Bloodbraided, Titanic Ultimatum, and the other Shards block cycles.