#5 mana value

[magicwurms]

Dreadwurm

Wow, that name wasn't taken? Dreadwurm is from the recent set Zendikar Rising and is illustrated here by Lius Lasahido. It's not terrible enough a card that I have an affection for it that way and it isn't reliable enough in Standard to have a place in my tryhard decks so it's nice to give it a spotlight here!

Indestructible has its benefits though! as long as you have a land to play you can safely attack with Novablast Wurm for a cool nigh-unblockable 12 damage a turn.

Dreadwurm isn't just a wurm either, it's a wurm horror, which I can agree with. It fits nicely in my cube where wurm tribal is the green thing and horror tribal is the black thing!

Dreadwurm was also treated to a fancy alternate art version in Zendikar Rising, which sells the horror even better. I would dread that too. This version is by Anato Finnstark, whose art really immersively uses dramatic shadows and light to make some epic images.

I have to say, I was super excited when my very first Zendikar Rising set booster contained both this and Grakmaw (I'm a hydra fan too). I was so satisfied with it I never bought another pack...

[magicwurms]

Got my Defiler of Vigor in yesterday, and though Ebay is an expensive place to buy magic cards, my favourite thing about it is seeing what random commons get chucked in to protect the spensy mythic! In this case it was a Dancing Scimitar (in beautiful white border), a foil ZNR Illusion token (I have a use for this, ayy) and...

As usual, I judge my ‘luck’ in prerelease with whether I get the common wurm from the set in any of my packs. For DMU I did not... but at least now I’m feeling lucky!

I can imagine this reasonably priced monster is a menace (or vigilancetrample, I spose) in draft! And that art is gorgeous...

[magicwurms]

After a wurmless 9 months, there’s nothing like a little compleation to breathe new unlife into things

I feel like I don’t need to say much to justify why this is bonkers good, and immediately jumps near the top of the pile for most powerful Wurms ever.

As we know, chunky life-gain is a core part of Wurm mechanical identity (more on this later), so it easily offsets the Phyrexian mana payments. It’s also five mana! That’s like, nothing, by Wurm standards. For me, it’ll curve nicely into my Wurm commander of choice, Teneb, and becomes a 7/7 trampler on turn six, which is already ludicrous.

In four-of formats, the ability stacks- so you can have a turn 5 6/6, cast another on turn six for a 7/7 and a 6/6, then cast two (!) on turn seven for a 9/9, 8/8, 7/7 and a 6/6, for the low cost of 20 life...

+1/+1 counter strategies don’t tend to do much with Wurms, given they’re already huge and you won’t often have many of them, but it’s obviously a nice bonus and lets you be even more aggressive.

Chase Stone’s art here is haunting (the reflections on the scales are something else) and I especially enjoy/dislike the trypophobic eyes. This is probably a compleated Argothian Wurm, but it could be related to many Dominarian subpecies. The name appears to be a reference to Vigor, which also grants huge numbers of +1/+1 counters.

[magicwurms]

Winding Wurm

What a inquisitve little fellow! Tony DiTerlizzi’s art for Winding Wurm makes it look not much bigger than a Serpopard, but the stats on this thing! A solid 6/6 ... for just 10 mana!

I can forgive everything about how inefficiently costed this for how cute the art looks. Not sure about its goat-like, Craw Wurm-like disdain for foliage though. The card is from Urza’s Saga and has never been reprinted. Now, some would say the echo cost is a little extortionate but to that I say: if don’t pay up and sacrifice it after it’s served its role as a very strong blocker, it’s a prime repeatable reanimator target, trigger to make your Gravetiller Wurm a cool 8/8 for 6 the next turn, terrible gift to Role Reverse, or my favourite Magical-Christmas-Land use: triggering Aid From The Cowl’s Revolt ability and peeling an Impervious Greatwurm off your library on your end step. All for the low price of 5 plus an optional another 5!