This, and the white version Mesa Enchantress,
are the reason people play decks full of Auras
and actually win. Auras, and other enchantments,
are fun but they sometimes end up in you losing
two or three cards to your opponent's one.
Usually, full-on enchantment-based decks revolve
around "lynchpin" cards like Sigil of the Empty
Throne, or Auraphilic creatures (that's a word
now) like Aura Gnarlid or Gatherer of Graces.
These cards get printed every once in a while
because they're fun, but they're also very hard
to use. Enchantresses like these help power
those decks by feeding them a steady supply of
spells.
Given that Theros has an enchantment theme, it's
a little disappointing that we didn't get a card
like this, either in M14 or in Theros itself.
Perhaps Wizards feared the combos would be too
strong? Casting an Enchantress and immediately
slapping a Fate Foretold on it does seem like
quite the saucy play, now doesn't it?
I first encountered a Verduran Enchantress in
1996 or so. At the time, I didn't quite
understand what you were supposed to do with
her. The Fourth Edition's enchantments were
somewhat inconsistent in focus: were you
supposed to use her in a beatdown deck with
Divine Transformation and Aspect of Wolf? Were
you supposed to cast lots of Circles of
Protection and draw lots of cards and make it so
no color could ever damage you? Not long after
that, though, the Mirage block sets started
coming out, bringing with them powerful
enchantments and support cards. Elephant Grass
alone set Bad Moon fans back years, and
considering they'd only had three years to
design decks at that point, that made a lot more
of a difference than it sounds like.
I think it's unfortunate that competitive
Enchantress decks no longer use this lady. After
all, they wouldn't even exist unless people in
the mid-1990s had fallen in love with her and
brainstormed ways to use her and showed Wizards
of the Coast that people had fallen in love with
her, prompting them to print crazy stuff like
Replenish. But in any setting where people don't
jam-pack their deck with cards that got banned
in historic Standard and Extended formats, she
will not steer you wrong.
Welcome back readers todays card of the day is
Verduran Enchantress a powerful card draw
engine. In constructed formats it’s got a frail
body and is outclassed by other enchantment
drawing. In casual and multiplayer this card
combined with Mesa Enchantress can give you tons
of card advantages, and with Born of The Gods
around the corner even more powerful
enchantments will be introduced exponentially
increasing the power of this creature providing
tons of card draw. In limited its something you
draft around or pick up if your going heavy into
enchantments, the body is frail but if not taken
care of the card advantage can run wild. It does
involve having a large percentage of
enchantments in your deck however. Overall a
powerful casual card.
Today's card of the day is Verduran Enchantress
which is a three mana Green 0/2 that allows you
to draw a card whenever you play an enchantment.
In a low cost enchantment heavy deck this can
add a great deal of card advantage and
battlefield advantage by building up a threat
with a Rabid Wombat effect or something with
Hexproof. The added Theros mechanic of Bestow
and that those cards are creatures in addition
to enchantments adds to the Enchantress mechanic
whether it is this card or the others based on
it. Overall this is a card that will
always see some play in Casual formats and
Multiplayer, but needs a very dedicated design
to really be effective.
In a Limited format this is a hit or miss pick
that depends entirely on having a decent supply
of enchantments to trigger the effect and a
Green baseline to manage the double Green in the
casting cost. A three mana
0/2 is not worth playing unless the effect is
activated, which requires a fortunate Sealed
pool or aggressive drafting in Booster. If
supported this is a somewhat useful blocker, if
the opponent is tapped out or has nothing in
hand, and card draw with a creature attached is
generally worth playing.
Verduran Enchantress was printed in Alpha and I
must give the creators credit on that one. At
first glance it looks like a card that would’ve
been printed much later in MTG’s life. Any
player out there should know that reusable
card-draw is very powerful, especially in
mono-green. Does Verduran Enchantress have
weaknesses? Yes, of course she does! She is easy
to kill, and she has very little offensive
ability. If you think about, there weren’t very
many Enchantments back then either. Verduran
Enchantress was replaced by the Argothian
Enchantress just in time for cards like Rancor
and Exploration to hit the scene. Verduran
Enchantress would be a perfect card to sneak
into the current Standard format, because there
are so many enchantments out there right now!
