After starting earlier this week, the Bloomburrow spoiler season hasn’t slowed down at all. Each day MTG players have been inundated with fantastic new cards vying for their attention and hard-earned cash. There’s so much going on, in fact, that it’s surprisingly easy to gloss over some real gems.
Despite being one of the set’s mythic Calamity Beasts, Ygra, Eater of All isn’t insane at first glance. Sure, they’re a quickly scaling threat with decent protection, but their main ability isn’t that useful… right? Thankfully, wrong! Turns out that Ygra’s Food-based ability actually has a lot of utility, and even empowers a near-forgotten Reserved List card!
Ygra, Enabler of Board Wipes
On their own, the ability to turn other creatures into Food seems like a bit of a nothing burger. If anything, it actually seems like a downside since it allows opponents to easily pay Ygra’s ward cost. Admittedly, it does allow Ygra to scale quickly, but the easy removal is nonetheless a concern.
Thankfully, while Ygra might not be perfect on their own, they do enable some insane synergies in Commander. The otherwise unassuming Reserved List card, Seeds of Innocence, for example, turns into a three mana board wipe with Ygra! While opponents will gain a fair chunk of life as compensation, this symmetrical effect is nonetheless cheap and devastatingly effective.
Beyond just clearing the board, Seeds of Innocence also makes Ygra, Eater of All absolutely massive. Should you remove just eight creatures, Ygra becomes a massive 22/22 threat! Thanks to no one having any Food tokens anymore, they’re also incredibly difficult to remove on your turn.
If Ygra, Eager of All is your Commander, this combo allows you to one-shot an opponent through Commander damage. If you throw down Blade of Selves and Mirror Box after wiping the board, you can win the entire game out of nowhere. Not bad for a three-card combo!
Making The Most of It
While Ygra can games alongside a well-timed board wipe, there are plenty of additional synergies to consider. Viridian Revel, for example, turns Artifact/Food removal into card draw. Whether you’re using a board wipe or single target removal, the additional card draw is a welcome advantage.
Similarly, Fangren Marauder can gain you a huge amount of life when removing your opponent’s creatures/Food. Combined with Seeds of Innocence, you could potentially gain immense amounts of life, putting you far ahead of opponents. As we mentioned earlier, however, the ideal Ygra + board wipe combo will end the game then and there.
Still, even if Ygra should be ending games, it’s always nice to have more options. Since this combo doesn’t exclusively need artifact removal, there are definitely plenty of those. Damnation, Toxic Deluge, and Creeping Corrosion would all allow Ygra to pop off and potentially win games.
A Worringly Lucrative Combo
Right now, it’s decidedly unclear whether or not Ygra, Eater of All, is going to take Commander and cEDH by storm. While they do have some combo potential, they’re still an expensive option that requires some finagling. Despite this, many MTG players have nonetheless rushed to buy into this potentially game-ending board wipe.
On TCGplayer, while spikes haven’t happened yet, the supply of Seeds of Innocence, Viridian Revel, and Fangren Marauder are draining fast. Since Ygra’s reveal, hundreds of copies of these cards have been sold, steadily draining the market. Should this enthusiasm continue, it may only be a matter of time before prices truly spike.
Out of these cards, Seeds of Innocence has the potential to spike the hardest by far. Since it’s a Reserved List card, there’s no chance this Mirage card could ever be reprinted. This means that the current supply that exists is all that will ever exist. Should every copy sell out, buying into this combo will become incredibly expensive.
Thankfully, as we mentioned, Ygra, Eater of All doesn’t exclusively need Seeds of Innocence to work wonders in Commander. At the end of the day, this is just another board wipe that hasn’t seen much interest outside of cEDH before. Unless Ygra combo becomes the next big thing, we can’t imagine any price spike lasting too long.
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