by Elton Gahr

Created on: November 08, 2009

There are certain cards that simply warp the entire metagame of magic the gathering around them. Cards that are so powerful that the only real question about the card is did wizards of the coast not realize what they were doing when they printed this, or did they want to change the metagame and this was there tool to do so?

In recent years that card was the Tarmogoyf, rare lhurgoyf from the future sight expansion set of magic the gathering. It costs one green and one colorless to put into play and reads "Tarmogoyf's power is equal to the number of card types among cards in all graveyards and its toughness is equal to that number plus 1. (The card types are artifact, creature, enchantment, instant, land, planeswalker, sorcery, and tribal.) "

What this means is that it is possible to put Tarmogoyf into play as a 0/1 creature if you have no cards in your graveyard, but if you have all of them it can be a 8/9 creature for two mana. And while it is very difficult for this card to ever be completely maxed out in power in a deck that plans to use it it is unlikely that it is going to be a 0/1 either.

One of the important things to remember is that cards are not always a single type. A tribal instant would give tarmogoyf a +2/+2 bonus, and an artifact creature would give it another +2/+2, and if you have both in your graveyard then this could be a 4/5 creature even if you only have two cards in the graveyard.

And often this type of scenario took place where tarmogoyf was a 2/3 creature when put into play on the second turn and a 4/5 creature when it attacked on the third. This made it nearly impossible to block because if there wasn't already a creature in the graveyard and you chump block this it becomes even bigger.

If this card targeted only your own graveyard it would be worth playing but it checks all graveyards allowing for it to become allied with black discard, blue counter spell, or red burn and become effective. This also means that even if you don't plan to play with a planeswalker or enchantment there is a good chance that your opponent will giving you even more.

The speed at which this card can hit the battlefield and become huge is disturbing and even if you don't play the tarmogoyf you have to think about what you will do when your opponent does.

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