Hokay, first genesis of a deck idea in my head for the new year.
General idea - play lots of Archers, watch them get big fighting thanks to Rite of Passage, watch people not want to block them, and/or just give them face music with Warstorm Surge.
As always, this is the initial imperfect genesis in my brain. Please make more betterer where possible!
Spells - 14
4 Rite of Passage(Makes fighting stuff fat)
2 Steely Resolve(You no blow my archers off the board, kthx?)
2 Clan Defiance(In case of emergency, burninate)
3 Staff of Nin(Obligatory card draw... about the best I can find in these colours that doesn't involve creature sac or discard)
3 Warstorm Surge(MOAR damage)
Land - 22
1 Rogue's Passage(Surprise alt-win that everyone forgets is on the table)
13 Forest
8 Mountain
I really, really wanted a Fight Land to put in here, but Contested Cliffs only does Beasts, and Arenasucks when you read it properly.
Thanks as always!
Harmonize is the most reliable green draw spell there is as it will always be 4 mana draw 3, plus it even has an elf in the art, lol. There is also Hunter's Insight and my personal favorite Hunter's Prowess which not only fits the flavor of archers, but helps you push through damage but can potentially draw a lot of cards
Ulvenwald Tracker seems like it should be included in any fight related deck.
Setessan Tactics could also be used in case you need to brawl with all your dudes at once.
I second the Harmonize suggestion for card draw. I was going to suggest Soul's Majesty since you'll be trying to create beefy creatures but that'a a nombo with Steely Resolve in play. The Steely Resolve also makes it so you can't ping your own guys with the Staff of Nin so maybe something that would give your creatures hexproof instead would work better.
Thanks guys... I always tend to discount one-shotters like Harmonize, as I like the bankability of repeatable draw more, but playtesting it shows that if I move to four Harmonizes, it runs better than with three Staffs (and card #4 being one of the Clan Defiances).
I've gone with Steely Resolve here a) because I have two copies lying around, but also b) because it comes online much, much quicker than Asceticism, Archetype of Endurance or any of those other things. Asceticism is the usual choice, but you're probably wanting to drop that on Turn 5 - the same time you want to be playing Greatbow Doyen. Resolve obviously fails to protect the Ragebeast, but it does keep everything else out (and TBH, the Ragebeast really only needs a turn to work its magic... playtesting shows dropping Thornweald Archer with Ragebeast and Warstorm Surge out is incredible fun).
It still feels a bit sputtery to playtest with... suspect I might need a tutor or two in here to make it go off more consistently.
Thanks Prid3, some good catches in there. I'd missed Trophy Hunter and Reverent Hunter as they weren't Elves... Reverent in particular is sick with Warstorm Surge and Ragebeast.
Still playtesting this puppy like mad... the Rite of Passages are out now - they're just win-more, unfortunately (as much as it's a beautiful combo). I suspect I might even go to 4x Warstorm Surge and only 2x Ragebeast (Surge comes down earlier, and is less likely to kill my dudes off, as much as the fighting is fun).
I'll throw an updated list up here when I find one I'm happy with!
Play Elvish Mystics. They're Elves, they give you 3 mana for turn 2 (all Archers cost 3 mana for some reason) and they add Devotion. I also think that Slate of Ancestry is good in these decks because you're not beating mass removal anyways and that card is good in stalemates where people are just playing creatures and passing. You're going to lose to the card Wrath of God either way so make them have it because if they don't the card gets insanely out of hand. 1-2 activations is more than enough to completely refill your hand in the mid-to-late stages of the game. You don't have to play 4 or anything but 1-2 is usually sweet. I also think that the first Predator, Flagship is actively good but the ones beyond that are questionable.
+4 Reverent Hunter(Too good to leave out of this deck)
+4 Harmonize(Better card draw than Staff of Nin / Krosan Tusker)
+2 Rowen(Early playtesting showed this thing having a tendency to get stuck topdecking land. Rowen works around this nicely)
+1 Warstorm Surge(More key combo)
+1 Steely Resolve(One more of another key card. I won't be able to keep Doyen on the table in my meta without this)
This feels a lot more consistent (although it still has a couple of topdecking sessions every now and then). I like that Steely Resolve is usually not a dead draw if there's already one out (the second can pick Elves to protect Nullmage Shepherd or Beasts to protect Gruul Ragebeast at a pinch).
It's pretty good at getting rid of land clumps (though I'd obviously much prefer to run G-Waves here, if they weren't busy in another deck). My worry with Slate of Ancestry is that it's going to sink a fair bit of mana, but I'll have a playtest with it in Rowen's slot so you can prove me wrong.
I'm running Silhana Starfletcher here solely because it's an Archer (and will therefore deal out damage with the Doyens). Is it worth sacrificing the speed over the first couple of turns for more damage later on? I suspect I can probably get away with it in my meta (where Turn 1-2 is usually a free pass before the horror starts occuring).
I'm running Silhana Starfletcher here solely because it's an Archer (and will therefore deal out damage with the Doyens). Is it worth sacrificing the speed over the first couple of turns for more damage later on? I suspect I can probably get away with it in my meta (where Turn 1-2 is usually a free pass before the horror starts occuring).
Every Archer is 3 mana so playing a 3 CMC mana dork just seems horrendous to me. I would much rather curve an Elvish Mystic into 3 drop, 3 drop than pray for a turn 3 Starfletcher into a turn 4 Droyen. That sequence is obviously fine but if your deck has twelve 3 drops or whatever it's infinitely more consistent to push for the 1, 3, 3 curve instead. That's how I see it anyways. Slate also gets significantly worse the slower your deck but it's pretty sweet when you just run out dudes for the first 4-5 turns. You definitely won't like the card in slow versions of the deck but if you play a version that has a bunch of 1 CMC mana dorks you'd probably like it.
With Greatbow Doyen, is Red that necessary? I think if you went Mono-G you'd have a better shot at making a more consistent deck. Ulvenwald Tracker would make you fight on command instead of leaning on Fight Club Beast Dude Guy. Though it is more non-Archer blasphemy.
Slate of Ancestry is disgusting in Elfball and you've got enough Elves to make that kind-of work.
With Greatbow Doyen, is Red that necessary? I think if you went Mono-G you'd have a better shot at making a more consistent deck. Ulvenwald Tracker would make you fight on command instead of leaning on Fight Club Beast Dude Guy. Though it is more non-Archer blasphemy.
Slate of Ancestry is disgusting in Elfball and you've got enough Elves to make that kind-of work.
I suspect you're missing Warstorm Surge in the equation here... The creatures are what deal the damage with the Surge, so you point its damage at a creature and the Doyen lets you double up the fun.
With Greatbow Doyen, is Red that necessary? I think if you went Mono-G you'd have a better shot at making a more consistent deck. Ulvenwald Tracker would make you fight on command instead of leaning on Fight Club Beast Dude Guy. Though it is more non-Archer blasphemy.
Slate of Ancestry is disgusting in Elfball and you've got enough Elves to make that kind-of work.
I suspect you're missing Warstorm Surge in the equation here... The creatures are what deal the damage with the Surge, so you point its damage at a creature and the Doyen lets you double up the fun.
More importantly I don't see how Red could POSSIBLY reduce the deck's consistency. You need exactly 1 Red blip to cast your 6 and 7 drops. You could literally play 0 fixing, 0 fetches, 0 mana dorks, just straight-up 8x Mountain and still consistently get there without messing up your early-game Green requirements either. Red is putting absolutely no pressure on your manabase at all.
By the way, have you considered adding Kessig Wolf Run? It turns those lategame dorks into giant threats, especially once you factor Warstorm Surge into the equation. The Power is checked on resolution so you should be able respond to the trigger and beef your dudes up as they ETB... at least I think that's how it works :3. Not 100% sure on that one but it seems to make sense to me.
By the way, have you considered adding Kessig Wolf Run? It turns those lategame dorks into giant threats, especially once you factor Warstorm Surge into the equation. The Power is checked on resolution so you should be able respond to the trigger and beef your dudes up as they ETB... at least I think that's how it works :3. Not 100% sure on that one but it seems to make sense to me.
Oh wow, I hadn't even thought of that... that's evil and glorious.
Yes, it works, and yes I've got a couple lying around...
Yup, although practically all of these are over the mystical $10-a-copy barrier, and hence out of my budget. Obviously, if anyone reading this wants to go ahead and build the Money-is-No-Object Version, these are the cards to go ahead and slot in (because I agree with Xyx... if I had 'em, I'd totally run 'em)!
Three Slates and three Harmonize seems a good split - Harmonize is better earlier if you've drawn the land and not the creatures, Slate is better in the flipside case. I reckon this version is the initial build I'll go with... it's looking slick enough.
Okay, this thing has had a couple of good runs now, and it's behaved very nicely.
My meta is coming to fear seeing Greatbow Doyen hit the table, and Steely Resolve has surprised a lot of people (I haven't run it myself for a while, and people just forget it's there for some reason... I've had a lot of reversed plays because of the Resolve). I've seen a 9/9 Reverent Hunter swing at someone for lethal (he had blockers, but I had the Doyen out, so it was a moot point), I've seen Ojutai get blown off the table by Jagged-Scar Archers...
... about the only thing that has slown it down so far is Planar Cleansing (but that slows everything down). The draw could probably be a little bit more consistent, but it's been OK so far. Only other issue has been discovering that Wolf Run doesn't particularly like you having Steely Resolve out (but I can cope with that... it's here as an alt-win anyway). This build's staying around for a while...
General idea - play lots of Archers, watch them get big fighting thanks to Rite of Passage, watch people not want to block them, and/or just give them face music with Warstorm Surge.
As always, this is the initial imperfect genesis in my brain. Please make more betterer where possible!
Archery Fight Club v0.1
Creatures - 24
4 Greatbow Doyen (Archer lord)
4 Silhana Starfletcher (Archer, Elf, ramp)
4 Thornweald Archer (Archer, Elf, surprise kill with Ragebeast and/or Surge out)
4 Jagged-Scar Archers (Archer, Elf, gets surprisingly fat)
1 Taurean Mauler (Natch)
3 Gruul Ragebeast (First Rule: Don't talk about Ragebeast)
2 Krosan Tusker (Here for land-fixing, card draw and a wide body at a pinch for Fight Club purposes)
2 Nullmage Shepherd (Artifact/enchantment removal, Elf, another body at a pinch)
Spells - 14
4 Rite of Passage (Makes fighting stuff fat)
2 Steely Resolve (You no blow my archers off the board, kthx?)
2 Clan Defiance (In case of emergency, burninate)
3 Staff of Nin (Obligatory card draw... about the best I can find in these colours that doesn't involve creature sac or discard)
3 Warstorm Surge (MOAR damage)
Land - 22
1 Rogue's Passage (Surprise alt-win that everyone forgets is on the table)
13 Forest
8 Mountain
I really, really wanted a Fight Land to put in here, but Contested Cliffs only does Beasts, and Arena sucks when you read it properly.
Thanks as always!
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Major thanks to Traprootkami for the signature.
Ulvenwald Tracker seems like it should be included in any fight related deck.
Setessan Tactics could also be used in case you need to brawl with all your dudes at once.
I second the Harmonize suggestion for card draw. I was going to suggest Soul's Majesty since you'll be trying to create beefy creatures but that'a a nombo with Steely Resolve in play. The Steely Resolve also makes it so you can't ping your own guys with the Staff of Nin so maybe something that would give your creatures hexproof instead would work better.
I've gone with Steely Resolve here a) because I have two copies lying around, but also b) because it comes online much, much quicker than Asceticism, Archetype of Endurance or any of those other things. Asceticism is the usual choice, but you're probably wanting to drop that on Turn 5 - the same time you want to be playing Greatbow Doyen. Resolve obviously fails to protect the Ragebeast, but it does keep everything else out (and TBH, the Ragebeast really only needs a turn to work its magic... playtesting shows dropping Thornweald Archer with Ragebeast and Warstorm Surge out is incredible fun).
It still feels a bit sputtery to playtest with... suspect I might need a tutor or two in here to make it go off more consistently.
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0x Elvish Mystic
0x Thornweald Archer
0x Trophy Hunter
0x Titania's Chosen
0x Jagged-Scar Archers
0x Reverent Hunter
0x Daybreak Ranger
0x Taurean Mauler
0x Greatbow Doyen
0x Slate of Ancestry
0x Predator, Flagship
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Green - Blue - Red - White - Gold
Still playtesting this puppy like mad... the Rite of Passages are out now - they're just win-more, unfortunately (as much as it's a beautiful combo). I suspect I might even go to 4x Warstorm Surge and only 2x Ragebeast (Surge comes down earlier, and is less likely to kill my dudes off, as much as the fighting is fun).
I'll throw an updated list up here when I find one I'm happy with!
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Green - Blue - Red - White - Gold
-2 Krosan Tusker
-1 Gruul Ragebeast
-2 Clan Defiance
-4 Rite of Passage
-3 Staff of Nin
+4 Reverent Hunter (Too good to leave out of this deck)
+4 Harmonize (Better card draw than Staff of Nin / Krosan Tusker)
+2 Rowen (Early playtesting showed this thing having a tendency to get stuck topdecking land. Rowen works around this nicely)
+1 Warstorm Surge (More key combo)
+1 Steely Resolve (One more of another key card. I won't be able to keep Doyen on the table in my meta without this)
This gives us the following...
4 Greatbow Doyen
4 Jagged-Scar Archers
4 Reverent Hunter
4 Thornweald Archer
4 Silhana Starfletcher
2 Nullmage Shepherd
2 Gruul Ragebeast
1 Taurean Mauler
4 Warstorm Surge
3 Steely Resolve
2 Rowen
Other Stuff - 4
4 Harmonize
Land - 22
1 Rogue's Passage
13 Forest
8 Mountain
This feels a lot more consistent (although it still has a couple of topdecking sessions every now and then). I like that Steely Resolve is usually not a dead draw if there's already one out (the second can pick Elves to protect Nullmage Shepherd or Beasts to protect Gruul Ragebeast at a pinch).
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Green - Blue - Red - White - Gold
It's pretty good at getting rid of land clumps (though I'd obviously much prefer to run G-Waves here, if they weren't busy in another deck). My worry with Slate of Ancestry is that it's going to sink a fair bit of mana, but I'll have a playtest with it in Rowen's slot so you can prove me wrong.
I'm running Silhana Starfletcher here solely because it's an Archer (and will therefore deal out damage with the Doyens). Is it worth sacrificing the speed over the first couple of turns for more damage later on? I suspect I can probably get away with it in my meta (where Turn 1-2 is usually a free pass before the horror starts occuring).
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Every Archer is 3 mana so playing a 3 CMC mana dork just seems horrendous to me. I would much rather curve an Elvish Mystic into 3 drop, 3 drop than pray for a turn 3 Starfletcher into a turn 4 Droyen. That sequence is obviously fine but if your deck has twelve 3 drops or whatever it's infinitely more consistent to push for the 1, 3, 3 curve instead. That's how I see it anyways. Slate also gets significantly worse the slower your deck but it's pretty sweet when you just run out dudes for the first 4-5 turns. You definitely won't like the card in slow versions of the deck but if you play a version that has a bunch of 1 CMC mana dorks you'd probably like it.
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Green - Blue - Red - White - Gold
Slate of Ancestry is disgusting in Elfball and you've got enough Elves to make that kind-of work.
Mid-Tier: Marchesa Aggro Rose Asmadi Get Dire Tymna Ikra Woke Women Tiana Aura Angel Ruric Thar SMASH Smasher Kraum Mana Positivity Zur Slides
Filthy Casual: WUBRG Jodah WUBRG WUBRG Fatties WUBRG Gahiji Vigilant Vengeance Ezuri Mysterious Morphs
I suspect you're missing Warstorm Surge in the equation here... The creatures are what deal the damage with the Surge, so you point its damage at a creature and the Doyen lets you double up the fun.
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More importantly I don't see how Red could POSSIBLY reduce the deck's consistency. You need exactly 1 Red blip to cast your 6 and 7 drops. You could literally play 0 fixing, 0 fetches, 0 mana dorks, just straight-up 8x Mountain and still consistently get there without messing up your early-game Green requirements either. Red is putting absolutely no pressure on your manabase at all.
By the way, have you considered adding Kessig Wolf Run? It turns those lategame dorks into giant threats, especially once you factor Warstorm Surge into the equation. The Power is checked on resolution so you should be able respond to the trigger and beef your dudes up as they ETB... at least I think that's how it works :3. Not 100% sure on that one but it seems to make sense to me.
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Green - Blue - Red - White - Gold
Mid-Tier: Marchesa Aggro Rose Asmadi Get Dire Tymna Ikra Woke Women Tiana Aura Angel Ruric Thar SMASH Smasher Kraum Mana Positivity Zur Slides
Filthy Casual: WUBRG Jodah WUBRG WUBRG Fatties WUBRG Gahiji Vigilant Vengeance Ezuri Mysterious Morphs
Oh wow, I hadn't even thought of that... that's evil and glorious.
Yes, it works, and yes I've got a couple lying around...
Yup, although practically all of these are over the mystical $10-a-copy barrier, and hence out of my budget. Obviously, if anyone reading this wants to go ahead and build the Money-is-No-Object Version, these are the cards to go ahead and slot in (because I agree with Xyx... if I had 'em, I'd totally run 'em)!
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-4 Silhana Starfletcher
-2 Rowen
-1 Harmonize
-1 Mountain
-1 Forest
+4 Llanowar Elves
+3 Slate of Ancestry
+2 Kessig Wolf Run
... which gives us...
4 Greatbow Doyen
4 Jagged-Scar Archers
4 Reverent Hunter
4 Thornweald Archer
4 Llanowar Elves
2 Nullmage Shepherd
2 Gruul Ragebeast
1 Taurean Mauler
4 Warstorm Surge
3 Steely Resolve
3 Slate of Ancestry
3 Harmonize
Land - 22
2 Kessig Wolf Run
1 Rogue's Passage
12 Forest
7 Mountain
Three Slates and three Harmonize seems a good split - Harmonize is better earlier if you've drawn the land and not the creatures, Slate is better in the flipside case. I reckon this version is the initial build I'll go with... it's looking slick enough.
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My meta is coming to fear seeing Greatbow Doyen hit the table, and Steely Resolve has surprised a lot of people (I haven't run it myself for a while, and people just forget it's there for some reason... I've had a lot of reversed plays because of the Resolve). I've seen a 9/9 Reverent Hunter swing at someone for lethal (he had blockers, but I had the Doyen out, so it was a moot point), I've seen Ojutai get blown off the table by Jagged-Scar Archers...
... about the only thing that has slown it down so far is Planar Cleansing (but that slows everything down). The draw could probably be a little bit more consistent, but it's been OK so far. Only other issue has been discovering that Wolf Run doesn't particularly like you having Steely Resolve out (but I can cope with that... it's here as an alt-win anyway). This build's staying around for a while...
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