A Dragon, a Plant or both?

     This week (tenchnically last week) is Muna week, and the Muna Druids have been blessed with a great spoiler for a new anchored card called Dracaena. Now this cute little dragon is also a plant, so it has a few nice extra interactions as a result. For instance, Yong-Su will count Dracaena as one of the two plants required to get a boost. Anyone who knows horticulture will know that there is a plant called a Dragon Plant, so I have no doubt that this is a little design team humour at hand.

     The most obvious comparison of this card is Sneezer Shroom. The rare Dracaena and Sneezer Shroom are similar cards with the Shroom having 1/1/1 biome stats for 2 mana and the Dragon Plant 0/1/1 biome stats for 3 mana. But you say, that is worse, so why would you want to play that cute little dragon. The answer is the noon time boosts. Sneezy gets only 1 boost at noon, whilst Dracaena gets two. So, the longer that out hero Dragon Plant stays in play, the bigger he’ll get. With a bit of Meditation Training or help from Parvati, Dracaena can grow quite bit quite quickly. These Dragons put weight on easily.

     The most obvious hero to start with is Teiga. She gives a 1/1/1 boost if you play Dracaena first and then the turn after will grow another 2 boosts. So, with nothing else being done, our Dragon Plant will be 3/4/4 on the second turn with no other mana investment, which is pretty good. With other ways to anchor our Dragon Plant friend, it can grow really big really quickly. Obviously the same is true for all the other Muna heroes, but the bonus boost makes Teiga a little more appealing.

     Arjun and Spike would initially seem to be a good combo with Dracaena but alas the ability is a bit of a nonbo with Dracaena. Arjun’s ability works with creatures that cost 3 or less but alas it only works with the card is played, so giving a creature with anchored the anchored ability really doesn’t help it. So, whilst our little Dragon Plant will still be okay in Arjun, it won’t specifically work with his ability.

     Again, it doesn’t appear that Dracaena is specifically linked with Rin either. Rin wants to win forest biomes and Dracaena’s lowest stat is in forests. Now with the boosts it still will gain a bit in the forest, and you hopefully will have forests well covered with your other cards, so its not terrible there but if you have a choice between the Sneezer Shroom and Dracaena you might well pick Sneezy.

     The one area I think Dracaena will be a boon in is in its OOF form. Bravos only has a little anchored of its own with Parvati being the main source. However, Dracaena has anchored in built within it and it would pair well with either Kojo (as the 3 cost is still quite low) and Basira (who will gain extra boosts when it boosts itself at noon). With a boon spell thrown in the mix (Physical Training or Al-in) your little Dragon plant can not only be big, but big for two whole turns. Plus, you can do it all again when played from the reserve. I don’t think that Dracaena will be strong with Atsadi, but it certainly could be played as an early play to hold a side and help you ramp up your mana until you get to the big plays you want to be doing here.