To be specific, the color combination of red, green and white, which are three allied colors in a row, given their placements on the pentagonal color pie, it’s called a Shard.
This section will be really long, to just let you think about what could possibly be so terrible about this color combination. We’ll be going through every single Naya card, as in the card’s color identity, so anything from a land to the Naya commander you know.
Naya existed for as long as multicolored cards and commanders do, so Legends. There’re 4 commanders here. Only one of which are female, which is certainly a theme to observe. The big one is a dragon who justify its “apex” status by having the keyword trample. You don’t need mana or double blocking to get this bonus so it’s certainly less worthless than you think. One mana lower, you get tokens scaled on your lands. The two cheapest commanders offer buffs to your creatures.
Ice Age block used to have a really awful Naya filter land, but the other cards are admittedly interesting. One is a really big divisible Lightning Helix, and the other is a way to exert snow lands for mana, I kid you not. The next two years’ cards are technically mono green but they have Boros activated abilities to be counted here. They’re both creatures, that ask for 1 mana and/or tapping to activate things, thinks that just give you a shrug.
Invasion is the first big push for multicolored cards, and Naya got a share here too. There are two mana fixing pieces, two creatures with off color activated abilities just like we saw, and lastly a second big dragon, this time the first proper value engine, by 3 mana to make tokens scaled on counting permanents of a color.
Planeshift continues with a one mana fixing piece, three green creatures with off color abilities, admittedly in three different forms this time, a Charm that may highlight a problem with this color combination and lastly a Kavu that hates on Dimir’s … creatures.
Thankfully we got a 5 year break between all that and Naya’s next appearance. Which is in Dissension, to combine the Gruul and Selesnya. Both sides are removals, and you probably don’t know that because there’s a removal split card that’s way more relevant also from Ravnica.
Coldsnap finishes Ice Age’s tradition of gold card too, by having this creature that basically gives spells lifelink. It’s in the same cycle as Zur and two other commanders, that’s the weirdest fact.
Now onto Alara, where Naya got its name really. The leader was an Elf whose face is covered in flowers, so you don’t see her full body. Her card draws big creatures, which is ultimately what all the 3 other Naya creatures in this set offer, actually there’s a last one that oblivion rings lands, like all of them. They’re all Beasts, so keep that fact in mind. There’s also a charm here too, and the big Ultimatum just pumps creatures. Obviously this set wouldn’t work in limited had it not for two mana fixing pieces.
Conflux has one beast, one mana dork and three cards that are monocolored but with off color activated abilities they became Naya. Notably, one of them is white and definitely has an interesting case to use those off color activated abilities.
Alara Reborn is a full gold set, so it does it have fair share of room for Naya. All creatures fall into the camp of wanting to be bigger in one way or another, whether they can get that themselves (4) or they want to get that (1) or they give that to others (1). Lastly there are two enchantments, one is a ramp for a land and the other straight up writes “big creature = you win”.
The Naya cards of the first commander precon for this color combination clearly shows a direction of this color combination, they will give some interesting means for you to focus on, whether they feels stolen from Conspiracy or Simic, but ultimately their payoff always goes back to the creature. Both are still Beasts, so that’s interesting characters for you.
And now onto the first cards of the modern day. You got Samut, who is actually Gruul with a white activated ability, two Dinosaurs from Ixalan and lastly that ancient Dragon reimagined to get two keywords instead of that upkeep cost. While the others still have a lingering of the old school feel, one Dinosaur certainly steps up to the value engine game.
Which is in full force by right after the Bolas arc. Namely, M20’s box topper and the 3 commanders of the second Naya precon. Granted, one furry among these actually tried to be interesting by goading enemy creatures, but well you still need your creatures first to get going.
And now onto the first streak of Naya rep, 3 sets in a row have them. First is a Buy a Box promo (fun fact: two core sets in a row dedicated this slot to a new Naya design. Apparently that’s a solution to not needing to think about Nexus of fate again) that focuses on the two most real life animal ever. The next two once again returns to the interesting means to creature support design template. We did get a 3 sets break until another Naya character show up, this time the first one not in Magic’s IP.
Naya’s biggest ever showing came in the Cabaretti, as in this faction is literally about a big showing in going wide. There’s one piece of mana fixing (the other one is gray frame if you don’t remember), and frankly everything else mentions creatures explicitly save for two creatures that likes keywords and not much else. Do I need to explain further?
Right after that we’re on another Naya streak, safe for one set of UB precon, Unfinity (it may have some syndromes discussed further here) and ONE, which is dedicated for the villains. By this point, the intention is clear, all are commanders that provides either counters or tokens in one way or another. Admittedly they finally tried a different form of Kindred by this point, in the form of Deserts, Auras and artifact creatures. Still doesn’t sound all that interesting right? How about trample damage or group hug?
And now we’re onto the present day. There are five Naya precons in a row in this era, actually one is all reprints but well FF7 could totally fill in. And it’s easier to list the sets that don’t contribute to this streak from LCI forward: Duskmourn, Foundations (its key art should still be kept for this rant’s purpose) and Tarkir. That’s it, granted Eldraine and Doctor Who didn’t care either, because if they did then this is basically a 3 years streak. Only one provides mana fixing, and only one more can’t be your commander, but putting a stat box on it doesn’t sound that hard really, and one is totally just a mono green creature with the Boros mana sink to transform. Something to note, after New Capenna finally giving this color combination an enby character, we finally opened the floodgates to the like of a sapphic woman, a transgender man and an enby… rabbit. Whether it’s due to actual intentions to this “Sheltering” color combination or it’s just the byproduct of pumping so many characters there, I’m not too sure.
In total, there are 104 Naya cards. Of which, 53 are commanders, so exactly over half the cards. Only 47 came from sets dedicated to them (I’ll start with Invasion). To the left is the mana curve of all these cards, granted they aren’t in the same deck since we’re really lacking the lands and it’s handy the one split card have both modes cost 3. To the right is the creature types distribution of this color trio: