“You don’t conquer a forest. You either earn its mercy… or become part of its history.” – Autumn Willow

Battleworld’s first outing at The Edge-Man Championship 2026 didn’t just work—it stuck. The 3-vs-3 domain clash has the exact kind of pacing where theme decks get to breathe, politics gets to matter, and the table gets to tell stories again.

Welcome to the Great Wood

In Battleworld, The Great Wood is ruled by Autumn Willow, protector of An-Havva—an entire domain built on Green/Red/White ideals: endurance, ferocity, and the kind of “community values” that can still end with someone being eaten by something with antlers.

Autumn Willow is one of those legends that reads like a dare: a big body, a big cost, and a line of text that quietly turns half your opponent’s hand into decorative coasters.

The Battleworld Mindset

Battleworld isn’t about bringing the sharpest tool—it’s about bringing the right one. With teams, shared domain identity, and a board that’s constantly evolving, decks need to do more than “execute a plan.” They need to negotiate.

The Great Wood participates by:

Caretaker of the Wood

Autumn Willow’s lore has always painted her as a living extension of the Homelands—protective, ancient, and increasingly desperate as the magic sustaining her begins to fade. The stories talk about spectral guardians escorting caravans, and horrors like Hungry Mist and other creations guarding the roads for anyone who enters with the wrong intentions.

Even her artwork carries that “soft power” vibe: Margaret Organ-Kean’s Artist’s Perspective describes choosing a more romantic portrayal, using Kaja Foglio as the model, photographed at sunset to catch that golden light.

All of which is a very fancy way of saying: this deck doesn’t need to shout. It just needs you to step one inch too far into the trees.

Bulletproof, by Design

The pitch for Autumn Willow is brutally simple: a creature that can’t be targeted makes removal like Terror and Swords to Plowshares sit dead in hand. That’s not just protection—it’s card advantage through embarrassment.

And then you pair her with a second headache: Blinking Spirit, which is almost as annoying—slipping back to hand whenever it’s about to be dealt with, turning spot removal into a sad, lonely gesture.

Bonus Battleworld note: since Edge-Man events follow Swedish Old School rules (modern rules framework), we keep things “legend-correct” here—one Autumn Willow, not a playset.

Life, Leaves, and Locked Doors

This list plays like an old-school control deck that learned empathy—then weaponized it.

Life gain as a time machine

• Fountain of Youth, Ivory Tower, Reverse Damage, Spirit Link, Zuran Orb—the classic package that buys you turns until the real game starts.

Resets that punish greed

Soft control that makes combat miserable

• Icy Manipulator is the Great Wood’s idea of border security: nothing dramatic, just a quiet refusal to let the scariest thing untap.

The library engine

• Land Tax and Sylvan Library are the slow, inevitable heartbeat of the deck—hand full, options deep, Ivory Tower quietly smiling.

How it plays

Early Game
You play defense, gain life, and look like you’re “just trying to survive.” (You are. But also: you’re taking notes.)

Midgame
You stabilize with removal and Wraths, start sculpting hands with Library/Tax, and make the board state feel… tiring for everyone else with your removal spells.

Late Game
Autumn Willow arrives like a verdict. Blinking Spirit keeps poking, Willow closes, and opponents discover that “topdeck removal” isn’t a plan when half your removal can’t find a target.

Strengths and weaknesses

Strengths

• Turns a lot of common interaction into dead draws
• Excellent at dragging the game into your preferred pace
• Strong reset button into resilient finishers

Weaknesses

• Slower to win (you’re not racing—you’re outlasting)
• Can struggle vs non-targeting answers and mass effects
• Needs careful sequencing: your defenses are real, but your windows matter

The List

Why Autumn Willow Still Matters