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Hello, Nation! Today, I want to talk about those creatures that flesh out your deck, giving you solid threats at the table while also providing other benefits. They aren’t the game-winning creatures like Darksteel Colossus or the early-game utility creatures like Llanowar Elves; they aren’t walls; they don’t work well in aggro decks; and they certainly don’t want to stand back and play defense. This article is dedicated to those midlevel creatures with enough power to go the distance when you need them to, but which also have a role to play on the team beyond numbers. Today, I want to explore the Indrik Stomphowlers of Magic.
Indrik Stomphowler is an iconic card to me. It’s not because the Stomphowler will win the game with the speed of Akroma the Major or Akroma the Minor. It’s not a game-ender like Lord of Extinction. It’s not a card that will scare anyone. How often have you seen a Terminate aimed at a Stomphowler? Exactly. And yet it has enough size to threaten. It can keep back a lot of creatures on defense, and it has just enough size to threaten on offense. 4/4 is a very good place to be: not so big as to draw attention to yourself, but not so small as to have a minor impact on the board.
The Stomphowler is also good as a utility creature. It has value beyond its power and toughness. It contributes to an important part of your game plan. It’s removal for two important types of permanents and doesn’t have to sacrifice for it. It’s twice the size of Uktabi Orangutan, twice the effective ability of it, and for just 2 more mana. This is a great card, and one of the great utility creatures in Green.
What I want to do today is look at cards that remind me of Indrik Stomphowler. Having creatures in your deck that are very pertinent to the red zone while also providing abilities that can be card advantage or valuable is not common. You are usually paying 5 or 6 mana for these small creatures that have useful abilities (like Karmic Guide or Acidic Slime). There is certainly value in these creatures, but there is something to be said for a bigger creature that can crash through for serious damage when it is needed.
Thus, I am rating these cards on three scales:
Smashability – What is the ability of the creature to smash face? Smash through a defense? Contribute to winning the game?
Utility – How useful is its utility? How much will it help you?
Camouflage – Indrik Stomphowler is rarely killed by targeted removal. How likely is this card to fly under the radar?
Here is how Indrik Stomphowler rates (all scores are on the 1-to-5 scale, with 5 being the best/most/highest).
Smashability: 3. 4/4 is solid, but not too spectacular.
Utility: 3. Naturalize for free is really good, and the card advantage is obvious, but there are certainly a lot of other abilities that are much better and many that are much worse, so I give it an average score here.
Camouflage: 5. Very few creatures of this size will go unmolested, but this never gets axed.
Total: 11 (out of 15). How will other creatures fare on the Indrik Stomphowler scale? How will they rate? Let’s take a look.
Smashability: 3. A 4/6 ain’t no better at swinging than a 4/4, except in terms of surviving the swing.
Utility: 3. Recurring an equipment is more limited, but putting it into play is stronger, so I think it’s roughly at Naturalize’s level in overall power.
Camouflage: 5. It’s still unlikely to get killed by targeted removal, because it’s just a 4-power creature.
Total: 11 (I think). It’s a bit tough to evaluate a card prior to playing with it. Perhaps I’ll pop the utility up to a 4 or knock its camouflage down 1 because it gets killed more often due to the extra 2 defense. This is where my evaluation of the card starts.
Smashability: 5. 5/5 plus Flying for evasion is about as good as you are going to get in this category.
Utility: 4. Vindicate is a great ETB ability, and it has a clear power to it.
Camouflage: 3. It doesn’t go as much under the radar, partly because it is a flyer of Dragon size. It doesn’t always get killed off, though, as there are lots of bigger threats running around.
Total: 12. I’d say it’s a bit better than a Stomphowler, and I suspect that you’d agree with me.
Smashability: 3. Just a 4/4 like everybody else.
Utility: 1. Bounce is okay; it’s not useless, but bouncing a creature is not that great. It will rarely be card advantage (vs. auras only, plus token bounce is solid).
Camouflage: 5. Just as UTR as our good fellow, the Stomphowler.
Total: 9. It’s not a bad creature, because unlike most Blue ETB bounce spells, it can actually swing for damage. It’s just not at the level of a Stomphowler.
Smashability: 3. First Strike isn’t enough on its own to promote this to 4.
Utility: 5. Gaining life isn’t that good, but gaining 24 in one go is rocktastic.
Camouflage: 5. Who wants to kill the 4/4 First Striker on the ground? Nobody.
Total: 13. A better score than even Angel of Despair, due to the awesome ability it has. Can another card today score higher?
Smashability: 4. 4 power with evasiveness. Nice.
Utility: 5. You get two cards right into play, so even if they are smaller creatures, that’s good math.
Camouflage: 4. Who wants to kill this to trigger it? People with exile cards, so they draw Swords to Plowshares effects a lot.
Total: 13 here again, tied with Ancestor's Chosen for highest-charting creature so far.
Smashability: 4. 5 power plus two 1/1’s is strong, but still on the ground. Sad.
Utility: 1. Do you really think making two Merfolk tokens will change the face of the game?
Camouflage: 5. Why walk into the Shroud ability of it?
Total: 10 total, lower than Indrik Stomphowler. I’m not sure that making two 1/1 dinkies qualifies as “utility,” anyway. It may not even be appropriate for today’s article.
Smashability: 5. In the air, and rocking a minimum of 5/5 body.
Utility: 4. Doling out the damage as you choose to kill multiple targets is nice.
Camouflage: 3. Gets killed.
Total: 12. Has there been another Dragon as good since Time Spiral? The only one in the running to my mind is Flameblast Dragon. Because of its ability, it certainly can be seen bit more as a utility creature than a beater, but as a Dragon, it’s hard to judge it as such. To my mind, and to my scale, it’s certainly on a level about par with the Angel of Despair.
Smashability: 5.
Utility: 1. Preventing damage is about as useful as bouncing a creature—and by that I mean not very useful.
Camouflage: 3. My basic assignment for 5/5 flyers.
Total: 9. It doesn’t completely suck, but the anti–Bogardan Hellkite is not nearly as good.
Smashability: 3. Just as the other 4/4s.
Utility: 3. If I rated this solely on the ability to draw cards, it would be more, but the fact that you have to spend four different colors of mana to get it drops it back down to a 3.
Camouflage: 5. No one ever targets your dude when you have a mana untapped, because you’ll just sacrifice it for cards.
Total: 11. A good, solid, Indrik Stomphowler level of power can be found in the Etched Oracle.
Smashability: 4. The typical score for 5/5’s on the ground.
Utility: 3. While in play (which is what this card is rated on), it can tap to Blaze a flyer, and that’s pretty useful. It sucks a lot of mana and it can only hit flyers, but the reusability is nice.
Camouflage: 3. The more useful Arashi is, the more likely it is to get killed. People with many flyers are not letting this stay in play for long.
Total: 10. Not a bad card at all. If this scale considered abilities that occur when not in play, like cycling or channel, it would be a lot more.
Smashability: 5. A 6/6 that has just cleaned the board out can really swing fast.
Utility: 0. Board-sweepers are in another class, and are not utility creatures.
Camouflage: 2. When you have eliminated the targets at the table, you increase the chance that yours goes.
Total: 7 normally, but it doesn’t score because it should be in another article, “Finding Sunblast Angels.” I just wanted to show you how another creature might score. Similarly, you won’t see Desolation Angel or Desolation Giant or other creatures that are mass removal of any sort in today’s article.
Smashability: 5. A 6-powered Fear creature is very good at smashing face.
Utility: 1. Saving your team is always useful in a pinch, and has some value. Bouncing ETB creatures for another round is also great. Despite that, you really have to have the right deck for this to be included, because it is a major tempo hit.
Camouflage: 2. Like your 6/6 Fear creature isn’t going to get killed?
Total: Just 8 points for the DE, but in the right deck, its utility jumps dramatically and it is amazing.
Smashability: 5. 5-power flyer. Simple as that.
Utility: 2. Discard at the 7 spot? Do people have cards then? I’d say you see it take out a discard most of the time, but not always. It’s not even a random discard. Meh.
Camouflage: 3. It has the same weaknesses as the other 5-power flyers; it’s much less UTR.
Total: 9 points for a Dragon is never that bad, but it’s not a creature that fits into a lot of decks.
Smashability: 2. Swinging with a 4-power grounded creature is fine, but when even a Gray Ogre can kill you, how often are you doing it?
Utility: 2. Not even as good as Nekrataal, and certainly misses the most important creatures out there, but adequate.
Camouflage: 5. Who wastes removal on it? People with Shocks, I suppose.
Total: 9, but only because it sucks so much in play that no one kills it. I’m not even sure it really counts. It’s in a different class: Good Tournament-Caliber ETB Creatures. (Firemaw Kavu is 2, 2, and 5 as well.)
Smashability: 3.
Utility: 2. Gaining 4 life is only a 1 ability, and sacrificing to regenerate your team is just a 1 ability too. Combine them for a 2.
Camouflage: 5. Who targets a creature you can just sacrifice anyway, especially when it’s only a 4/4?
Total: 10 points, and totally worth playing.
Smashability: 3.
Utility: 1. Each of the recursion abilities is tough to pull off, but pull them both off, and you have something.
Camouflage: 5.
Total: 9 points for our Beast of Recursion Love.
Smashability: 3.
Utility: 2. If you are going to play a card to fetch a land, why not play a 4/4 who does?
Camouflage: 5.
Total: 10, and a good solid score for the underplayed Silverglade Elemental. This is exactly the sort of card I want to expose in this article—a great card that is a useful beater that also smooths your mana.
Smashability: 3. 4/6’s on the ground are the same as 4/4’s in ranking.
Utility: 3. Taking out artifacts every upkeep is good; taking out your own as well—not as good.
Camouflage: 3. If people have artifacts, they will kill this on sight; if not, they won’t. They might even protect it.
Total: 9 is an acceptable score for this Mirrodin original, before the world got all crazy.
Smashability: 2. Being 4/6 is good, but being around for just a few turns isn’t.
Utility: 3. The ability to remove fading counters to destroy multiple artifacts is grand, but you have to do it in a turn or two or else you don’t have enough left for a major impact, so that is a bit more limited.
Camouflage: 5. Why kill a creature with a limited time span?
Total: Another 10. Totally deserved for this underrated card that plays very well with self-bounce or reanimation or recursion. Dust Elemental to the rescue!
Smashability: 1. Combine the fragility of a low-toughness creature with the temporary nature of its fading.
Utility: 2. I love pulling off counters for damage, but they limit its life.
Camouflage: 5. Same questions as above with Woodripper.
Total: 8.
Smashability: 3. Vigilance doesn’t make a 4/4 that much better at bashing.
Utility: 5. The card-advantage potential is massive. The tempo advantage is also massive.
Camouflage: 2. It will get killed with alacrity. It’s not Public Enemy #1, but it’s not that far away.
Total: 10. Despite a very powerful ability and size, it’s too much of a target to be reliably on the level of some of those that have charted higher.
Smashability: 3.
Utility: 3. The ability to shoot stuff is pretty good, but the requirement to discard every turn usually keeps it from being around for long.
Camouflage: 4. Why kill it, when it is often worse for the person who has it? It also has regeneration, which helps to keep it alive. However, it can sometimes it attracts removal that dodges regeneration.
Total: 10. A perfectly acceptable rating for a card that is very hot and cold, depending on the situation.
Smashability: 4. First Strike plus 5/5.
Utility: 1. The ability to shoot just one creature for 3, and only after your upkeep? Slow and limited.
Camouflage: 3. Again, why bother to kill it? It deals 3 to a creature every turn for a card. That’s very slow and not that good, but when it gets out of hand, it doesn’t have the regeneration protection that Masticore has, and if it does put me in a bad situation, I will kill it before it goes off.
Total: 8. It’s not a very strong card, and I don’t even play it in Abe’s Deck of Happiness and Joy. That means I don’t consider it one of the roughly 2,500 strongest cards in Magic.
Smashability: 3.
Utility: 3. You have to spend a lot of mana and exile a graveyard card in order to shoot for 4, but that’s not bad. It would be higher, but the high discard price keeps it back.
Camouflage: 4. It has all of the advantages of the first one.
Total: 10. While different, I consider its power level to be roughly equal to the original, but because the power level of creatures has risen massively in the intervening years, it’s just not making the same impact competitively. I remember playing in the post–Urza’s Destiny era, and I had four Masticores in my tournament decks, and everyone else did as well. It’s a solid option for your decks if you don’t mind exiling cards from the yard.
Smashability: 3.
Utility: 3. The ability to tap and sac for -4/-4 to a dude is decent enough, but not 3-worthy. Turning all of your creatures into a sacrifice for -1/-1 is also useful and bumps this up in score.
Camouflage: 4. While its self-tap and sac does stop removal normally, when the second ability gets out of hand, it will get killed.
Total: 10 for a very solid entry in the Indrik Stomphowler list of creatures.
Smashability: 3.
Utility: 1. If this were a tap ability, it would be much higher.
Camouflage: 2. It draws a lot of removal when it’s untapped, which plays weird.
Total: 6. If its ability were a tap ability, it would score 10 (3, 3, 4).
Smashability: 3.
Utility: 3. Going off in upkeep is slow, but having the abilities it has for both discard and token-making are strong.
Camouflage: 3. It’s not in anyone’s sight that much, because 1/1 tokens are just 1/1 tokens. You might get it killed more for the random discard than the token-making.
Total: 9. You can build around it to pump its grade. Of course, that’s true of everything.
Smashability: 3.
Utility: 3. While it’s not as good as Masticore due to the 
activation cost, having no discard disadvantage brings the score back up.
Camouflage: 3. This can go either way in a game. It can have little value, or a lot, based on how much Red mana you have and what creatures you are facing on the board.
Total: 9 points for another underrated card for your decks.
Smashability: 3.
Utility: 2. Destroying a land is nice, because there are a lot of troublesome lands like Karakas and Serra's Sanctum out there, so have a plan to get rid of them.
Camouflage: 5. No one kills this.
Total: 10 rating for another underplayed card, but its underplayed nature might owe more to its casting cost than any other reason.
Smashability: 3.
Utility: 3. It can take out an artifact or enchantment twice, but the second time causes you to lose it forever, so it has the same two-for-one ability of Indrik Stomphowler et al.
Camouflage: 4. This is a 5 before it is killed the first time, and a 3 after, so a 4 overall.
Total: 10. It certainly can entice some removal post-Persist in order to fully get it off the board. I’ve noted other Persist creatures will be similarly targeted once that counter gets there.
Smashability: 5. 6/6 plus Trample works very well.
Utility: 4. The exact same as Angel of Despair.
Camouflage: 3. Just like the Angel, it gets targeted as a solid threat, but it’s often not the biggest at the table.
Total: 12 again, just like the Angel. It’s a great card, and you seem to know about it already based on its price. It’s currently going for $5.50 on CSI.
We looked at thirty-one cards that resemble Indrik Stomphowler. These are great cards to use to fill out slots in your deck. While there is a lot of value in a Naturalize effect like Krosan Grip, why not pay 1 or 2 mana more for Wickerbough Elder or Indrik Stomphowler? You’ll add to your creature count with a creature that has enough size to matter. There are certainly places for Acidic Slime and Avalanche Riders for your decks. But why not use some bigger versions where you can?
I hope you found some great cards for your decks! After all, that’s what it’s all about.
See you next week,
Abe Sargent
