Card Talk 32

Cactuar card art

Time for Card Talk! Reminder how this works:

• I go to Scryfall and select 'Random Card'
• I present and blog about the card. I could discuss any aspect: the art, abilities, cost, set, impact on the game, and so on. Stream of consciousness.

Card Talk is a fun, uncurated way to look at Magic's cards, mechanics, history, art, sets, and so on. And of course it exposes some of my own preferences, biases, and memories of the game.

Today's card is . . .

Old Ghastbark—a common creature from Shadowmoor.

Old Ghastbark's mana cost includes hybrid mana (in his case, green or white). Hybrid mana symbols are satisfied by paying either: here, you can pay 3 of any color plus two white, two green, or one white and one green mana to cast him.

Hybrid mana debuted in Ravnica: City of Guilds (2005). Designer Mark Rosewater is proud of the concept, exploring it in more detail in a two-part article series in 2024 (here and here). Hybrid mana's power and limitation is in its flexibility and color identity, respectively.

- Flexibility: you could play Old Ghastbark in a mono-white, mono-green, or Selesnya-colored constructed decks so long as the card is legal in that format. (Other three-, four-, or five-color combinations are also permissible.)

- Color identity: Old Ghastbark is both green and white, which matters for Commander. It can be included in a Commander deck only if the Commander is (at minimum) green and white. It cannot be in a mono-white or mono-green Commander deck.

Old Ghastbark is from Shadowmoor (2008), which was followed by Eventide later that year. These sets featured the darker side of the Lorwyn plane (the lighter side being explored in Lorwyn and Morningtide months prior). These four sets, with their kindred themes and fairy-tale-like setting, were much beloved and recently revisited in Lorwyn Eclipsed (2026).

Finally, I love the Treefolk kindred type; about 120 have been produced to date, largely green (as you'd expect) but also white and black (and even occasionally red or blue). I have two Treefolk decks: a mono-green casual deck and a WBG Commander deck featuring Doran, Besieged by Time:

Until next time . . . keep exploring.