Live Play Data

Kodama of the West Tree

· Legendary Creature — Spirit · Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty (NEO)

Live Inclusion

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Times Brought

605

Decks Running

293

Median Cast Turn

Drawn → Played

74%

Format

Multiplayer 1v1

74% of drawn Kodama of the West Tree copies are cast before the game ends, with a median first-cast turn of 5 across 592 tracked multiplayer Commander games on Playgroup Live.

Kodama of the West Tree lands in 293 of the 7796 distinct decks tracked on Playgroup Live, an 4% inclusion rate that reflects its niche as a dedicated payoff for counter and Equipment strategies rather than a generic green staple.

When the card does reach a hand, 74% of those copies make it to the battlefield. Median first cast falls on turn 5, one to two turns later than a naked curve would suggest. That delay is consistent with the card's role: players are building toward a modified board before committing the three mana, not slamming it on curve. Only 26% of casts landed exactly on the card's mana-value turn, and 30% of drawn copies were cast on the same turn they were drawn, both early signals that pilots tend to hold it deliberately.

The commander spread tells the same story. Bristly Bill, Spine Sower leads the top-commander list, followed by The Wise Mothman and Zaxara, the Exemplary. Each of those commanders generates counters or modified creatures as a core game plan, exactly the engine Kodama rewards. The data is well-distributed: 263 distinct players have brought the card to a tracked game, and no single player accounts for an outsized share of observations.

At a glance

4% of tracked Commander decks include Kodama of the West Tree
74% of drawn copies reach the battlefield before the game ends
T5 median first-cast turn, typically after a modified board is established
26% on-curve cast rate, showing players regularly hold it past turn 3
45% battlefield stickiness once cast
263 distinct players have brought this card to a tracked game

First-cast turn

n=103

10%

16%

20%

14%

35%

T6-9

T10+

Median 5 P25 3 · P75 7 · max 15

On curve 26% (16 / 103 cast on T3) Cast same turn as drawn 30%

The "good card" funnel

606 brought · 263 players

Brought to game

606

Ever drawn

140

Reached battlefield

103

Still on board at game end

74%

Of 606 copies brought to games, 140 were drawn and 103 reached the battlefield, with 74% of drawn copies making the full journey from hand to cast.

≥ -12.8pp

Players who cast this card win 26% of the time (n=95) , vs 29% when it never left the library (n=380).

When players drew this card but left it in hand, they won 36% (n=31) — about the same as leaving it in the library. Those players survived long enough to draw it, so the gap above is about the card resolving, not just about surviving.

Observed gap -3.7pp; 95% confidence interval -12.8pp to +5.3pp. Correlational, not causal: powerful payoffs also get cast more often in games you are already winning.

Final zone distribution

151 instances

2.6%

Library

31.1%

Battlefield

37.7%

Graveyard

6.0%

Exile

Most tracked copies finish in the graveyard or on the battlefield rather than stranded in the library, a sign that when this card enters a hand it tends to see action before the game concludes.

Commanders that played this card

in tracked games

Bristly Bill, Spine Sower leads at 19 decks and the list spans mono-green, Sultai, and Gruul commanders, all unified by a counters or modified-creature theme that feeds Kodama's landfall trigger.

Card text

Kodama of the West Tree

Legendary Creature — Spirit

Reach Modified creatures you control have trample. (Equipment, Auras you control, and counters are modifications.) Whenever a modified creature you control deals combat damage to a player, search your library for a basic land card, put it onto the battlefield tapped, then shuffle.

3 / 3

Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty (NEO) · Mythic · Illustrated by Daarken

Frequently Asked

How often is Kodama of the West Tree drawn in a Commander game?

Across 592 tracked multiplayer games where the card was in the deck, it was drawn 23% of the time. That is a typical draw rate for a singleton in a 100-card deck. Of the 140 copies that reached a hand, 74% were cast before the game ended.

What turn does Kodama of the West Tree usually get cast?

Median first cast is turn 5, with the distribution running from as early as turn 1 to as late as turn 15. The card costs 3 mana, but only 26% of casts landed on turn 3 exactly. That gap is mostly deliberate timing: 30% of drawn copies were cast on the same turn they were drawn, which means players who hold it are genuinely waiting for conditions rather than acting on the first opportunity.

Does casting Kodama of the West Tree correlate with winning?

Win rate when cast is 26% versus 29% when the card stayed in the library, a difference of -3.8 percentage points. Both sample sizes are meaningful but the standard error on this delta is wide enough that the direction is not conclusive. Treat it as a directional signal: casting the card does not appear to hurt win rate, but the dataset is not large enough to claim a proven lift.

Which commanders most often run Kodama of the West Tree?

Bristly Bill, Spine Sower leads the list with 19 decks in the tracked dataset, followed by The Wise Mothman (17 decks) and Zaxara, the Exemplary (14 decks). All three commanders generate or care about counters, which maps directly onto Kodama's modified-creature triggers. The spread across 263 distinct players suggests the data is not skewed by a single pilot.

How sticky is Kodama of the West Tree once it resolves?

45% of cast copies finished the game on the battlefield. That is a moderate stickiness number for a three-mana legendary creature. Removal, combat, and board wipes all contribute to the roughly 56% of copies that leave play before the game ends, which is relevant context when evaluating whether additional protection or redundancy belongs in the deck.

Is Kodama of the West Tree legal in Commander?

Yes. Kodama of the West Tree from Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty is legal in Commander with no restrictions. It is also legal in Legacy, Modern, Pioneer, Vintage, Historic, and several other constructed formats. It is not legal in Standard, Pauper, or Pauper Commander.