Just a fun deck, I think. I wanted to craft a deck that ramps, and devastates quickly. I was going for a deck that can be played on multiplayer and one on one (replacing the 4 Tempt with Discovery with 4 Cultivate) Let me know what you guys think!
Well, I just figured with my ETBT "gain" lands, and the Lifeblood Hydras I had a decent amount of lifegain. I would have gone with Whirlwind, but this deck is centered around X spells, what with Rosheen Meanderer and whatnot.
Well, I just figured with my ETBT "gain" lands, and the Lifeblood Hydras I had a decent amount of lifegain. I would have gone with Whirlwind, but this deck is centered around X spells, what with Rosheen Meanderer and whatnot.
I'm not going to say that Hurricane is bad nor that you should cut it but what I will say is that you shouldn't put too much stock in minor synergies. If Whirlwind is going to be a Plague Wind (or something close to that) for 4 mana every time then it doesn't matter if 10% of the time you can curve Rosheen into Hurricane to accomplish the same thing. The former is just always going to be good whereas the latter is significantly more situational. I understand that you can argue that Hurricane doubles as an X burn spell, I won't deny that, but at the same time I agree with Xyx that this deck has the lategame on lock but will probably struggle to handle early pressure. I would not expect this list to hit the midgame with a comfortable amount of HP in a competitive multiplayer setting and as such I would be wary of any spell that would dome myself for a significant amount of damage. That is, I agree that the damage to players, in this instance, is more likely to hurt than help.
If you want to run Hurricanes because you already have them, because you like the art, whatever, go for it. Play whatever you want whyever you want. Still, from a purely "I want to win games" perspective I have to agree that the card that kills EVERYTHING for 4 mana is almost always going to outperform the X spell "with a drawback." This is obviously just my opinion, I'm not stating these as concrete facts, but as someone who's played both cards a fair amount I gotta say that I love the raw efficiency of 4 mana Wraths. You pay your 4 mana, everything that that you care about dies, life is good. After all, the goal is probably to win games while having a good time with your friends; not to maximize the Rosheen synergy.
With respect to the deck itself, the most glaring omission in my mind is Kessig Wolf Run. I personally think that it's strictly better than Primal Rage and would cut them for KWRs and strongly consider shaving some other lands for another 1-2. 22 lands is too few in a deck that's filled filled with X spells because it's virtually impossible to flood out but mana screw is a death sentence. Like, what is your best non-Rosheen critter for 4 mana? A 2/2-3/3 with minor upside? It's not great whatever it is. Even if you hit your first 10 land drops you're still fine with that because all of your threats can soak 10 mana and most of them actively want 6 or more. Personally I would play at least 24-25 lands in this thing (in addition to mana dorks) while stressing that 3-4 of those would KWRs which double as spells in the lategame.
Take "gain lands" with a grain of salt. They do gain you a life but lands that ETBT are no joke in a deck filled with X spells. Is 1 life better than +1/+1 on your critters? Probably not. If you think otherwise, remember that we care a lot more about making 4/4s as opposed to 3/3s than we do making 9/9s as opposed to making 8/8s. Past a certain point X is "so big" that it doesn't really matter but the weakest aspect of this deck is its early game and when all of your threats are X/Xs having ETBT lands is a very real cost. Personally I would probably cut down to ~8 total to ensure that I could consistently fire off medium-sized critters in the midgame. I obviously have no idea how fast or slow your meta is, it's possible for your manabase to be correct, it just strikes me as being a touch too greedy (at least for my tastes).
Is 4 Tempts correct given that this deck also has 4 Rosheens? Wouldn't you rather have more things to cast on turns 1-3? I just don't like the idea of piling the vast majority of your ramp at 4 CMC in a deck that has no solid early-game plan. I feel like this deck will basically auto lose if it doesn't draw an Elf which is why I'd like to see you field something cheaper. Look at Overgrowth for example. Comes down on turn 3, ramps you 2 mana, seems good no? Is it better than a Tempt for ~4? No, obviously not, but doing ANYTHING on turn 2-3 and then casting a Rosheen on 4 is significantly better than casting Rosheen/Tempt on 4 and critters on turns 5-6 only to leave ramp stranded in your hand unused. Xyx already mentioned Joraga Treespeaker, another fine suggestion, but choosing between it and something like Overgrowth or Carpet of Flowers boils down to your personal meta. I normally don't expect people to use dedicated spot removal on a card like Elvish Mystic, that's not a winning line in my books, but something like Joraga Treespeaker is way too powerful to leave alive when cast on turn 1. A bad Sol Ring is still a very good Magic card. Treespeaker is easily better than OG if it doesn't get removed, it's not remotely close, but Overgrowth is significantly more durable. With respect to Carpet of Flowers, the card is either busted or worthless. Against a turn 1 Island with the potential for more it's literally the best card in your deck and if it's producing 2 mana on turn 2 with consistency then it's arguably as good (IF NOT BETTER!) as the best casual Magic card in the game (Sol Ring). Still, it can also do absolutely nothing which is why I can't tell you one way or another whether or not you should play it. You know your meta way better than I do. I mention the card solely because in some metas it's literally going to be ~Sol Ring that continues to scale as the game progresses which, again, makes it basically the best casual Magic card in the game (I'm not going to count things like Contract from Below for obvious reasons). If Island, Island is a reliable opening sequence the only reason to play fewer than 4 is fun/house banned&restricted list/budget/card availability concerns. From a purely "what will win me the most games" perspective it's always correct to play 4.
With respect to the deck itself, the most glaring omission in my mind is Kessig Wolf Run. I personally think that it's strictly better than Primal Rage and would cut them for KWRs and strongly consider shaving some other lands for another 1-2. 22 lands is too few in a deck that's filled filled with X spells because it's virtually impossible to flood out but mana screw is a death sentence. Like, what is your best non-Rosheen critter for 4 mana? A 2/2-3/3 with minor upside? It's not great whatever it is. Even if you hit your first 10 land drops you're still fine with that because all of your threats can soak 10 mana and most of them actively want 6 or more. Personally I would play at least 24-25 lands in this thing (in addition to mana dorks) while stressing that 3-4 of those would KWRs which double as spells in the lategame.
Yup, this. I would run Kessig Wolf Run and/or Rogue's Passage in the manabase. Hydra Omnivore and Savageborn Hydra, in particular, need to be spending some facetime with your opponent, and these two will help you do it.
Left-field suggestion for you, too - there's a guy in my playgroup who rocks a Hydra Omnivore / Rogue's Passage / Grafted Exoskeleton deck. It draws a lot of hate, but I reckon even throwing a single Grafted Exoskeleton in this list would increase the fun quotient considerably (sticking one on Apocalypse Hydra would be a nice guarantee of danger, too).
You're missing what is possibly the scariest hydra ever: Primordial Hydra. I've seen even X = 1 win games.
I wouldn't put too much stock in Hurricane. Your creatures are slow to come out and pretty bad at blocking. You won't be the one with the highest life total.
[quote]Still, from a purely "I want to win games" perspective I have to agree that the card that kills EVERYTHING for 4 mana is almost always going to outperform the X spell "with a drawback."
[quote]Yup, this. I would run Kessig Wolf Run and/or Rogue's Passage in the manabase. Hydra Omnivore and Savageborn Hydra, in particular, need to be spending some facetime with your opponent, and these two will help you do it.
Left-field suggestion for you, too - there's a guy in my playgroup who rocks a Hydra Omnivore / Rogue's Passage / Grafted Exoskeleton deck. It draws a lot of hate, but I reckon even throwing a single Grafted Exoskeleton in this list would increase the fun quotient considerably (sticking one on Apocalypse Hydra would be a nice guarantee of danger, too). Wink
Kessig Wolf Run = Yes, and thank you Grafted Exoskeleton = No. My playgroup would never invite me back. We have a "no infect" policy. Very efficient card, though.
Yesssss That is much more efficient. Primordial will have to wait. I have none of him, but I will def. add in the future.
Thank you all. Very good advice.
+3 Joraga Treespeaker
-3 Elvish Mystic
The Elf trio is a combo I am trying to test its synergy with my Hydras. Joraga is obvious, but Gyre Sage gets buffed every time i play a hydra and adds more mana with each buff. Priest of Titania adds more mana for each elf. I wanted to see if they would help build my mana base while also improving my early game speed.
Bioshift is an instant, that can be triggered upon either turn if my Hydra will disappear anyways. I can use this card to move my counters to Gyre for insane mana addition each term or other options, for only one mana. It has saved me on numerous occasions.
I will give it a shot and see how the builds compare. Thank you for the advice. Have you played this particular build before that you offered? If so how did you fare against removal? Were there any cards you found particularly helpful to add to the side for rounds 2-3?
I have a few ideas I am going to toy with on the new build to see how it fares vs my original build. Thanks again.
I will give it a shot and see how the builds compare. Thank you for the advice. Have you played this particular build before that you offered? If so how did you fare against removal? Were there any cards you found particularly helpful to add to the side for rounds 2-3?
I have a few ideas I am going to toy with on the new build to see how it fares vs my original build. Thanks again.
I haven't played the exact deck no. I'm firmly in the "play to win" camp so I field cards like Genesis Wave, Primeval Titan and Sylvan Primordial where you have Hydras. Tribal decks don't appeal to me unless theyr'e filled with objectively powerful cards and, unfortunately, most Hydras are just big dumb idiots that die to removal. The deck usually fares well against removal mostly because Genesis Wave is such a bonkers card which is why I proposed Lifeblood Hydra for you in your build. You actively want it to die most of the time. The reason why the deck tends to fare well against removal is because a good % of your ramp is Enchantment-based and it's hard to justify killing small mana dorks in multiplayer in general. As long as your creatures are powerful and you have a critical mass of draw spells (6 or more) then you usually have stuff to do. Obviously Lifeblood Hydra isn't Genesis Wave and I won't try and BS you otherwise but it's still a Hydra that's very good against removal which is why I recommended 4. Even if you just have to fire them off at X=3 or 4 that's still fine because those kinds of cards tend to chain into each other extremely well. The first ones are usually small but it ramps up quickly from there.
I agree with your approach on this. I like to leave as little to chance as possible as well, and a few of those cards I can definitely see the potential with them. I will need to playtest this and see how they synergize so that I can see where I may be lacking the most. I would like to attempt to make this as competitive as possible. And see how aggressive I can become with the cards as well.
Also with playing as many lands as I can with them, Thawing Glaciers would be able to be constantly reused to acquire more lands quickly, but I may be becoming too greedy with the land that way. That plus Omnath, Locus of Mana to make even my low cost Hydra deal some considerable damage.
Exploration, Burgeoning and Fastbond are all extremely powerful Magic cards but if you're not drawing cards on a consistent basis then they tend to lose their value relatively quickly. Obviously Fastbond can do silly things with cards like Gush but as a generic ramper it's not as OP as it looks. The problem with these kinds of cards is that while they're very good on turn 1 they're ONLY good on turn 1. If you draw your first one on turn 3 it can easily be a mulligan. Now, obviously if your deck has cards like Life from the Loam they become much more powerful but in a vacuum they can be a bit hit and miss.
Azusa I actively dislike is "normal" decks that have ~24 lands because by the time that you hit 3 or 4 land drops it's hard to still have a ton more sitting in your grip. I find that she's just a crappy Rampant Growth (not even, you have to use a card in your hand) that comes with a useless body a huge % of the time. Now, again, the card is obviously fine if your deck has Life from the Loam or if it's full of Bouncelands but if you're just playing with 24 lands and next-to-no card draw then she doesn't usually accomplish very much.
Now, you might be thinking that Lifeblood Hydra can solve these kinds of problems but that doesn't actually make sense. What are you going to remove for those kinds of cards? Your Hydras? No, if anything you'd cut ramp for ramp but when you axe the actual ramp in favor of inconsistent, win-more effects and you never get the big Lifeblood Hydras in the first place so the effect remains irrelevant. That's why you typically see ramp decks play ramp cards and Life from the Loam/Gush/Boros Garrison decks play cards like Azusa and Exploration.
Yea that is a fair point. I admit that this is my first deck I have attempted to make competitive that utilizes X costs. So I have to go about it differently than most other decks I would run.
You're probably right. I've never encountered the primordial in a game.
Did run into the bane several times. In the late game I've seen it activated twice in one turn, (while the rest of us was out of answers) that left an impression.
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My meta: 3 or 4 player free for all, anything goes but boring games or broken decks cause a vote to end that game.
I'd like Heroes' Bane a lot more if it had some sort of evasion, personally. I get that it gets big in a hurry, but there are plenty of things that can do that nowadays.
For example, completely not a Hydra, but Sunscorch Regent is a million miles better for the same CC... because it's evasive.
On a Hydra, it's probably Trample you want. If they print Heroes' Bane with trample, I'm onboard.
Heroes' Bane is an interesting one, I have never heard of that one. Yea evasion is always an issue with Hydras. One 2 cost Go for the Throat, Pacifism, or Suspension Field is all it takes to make all that power null and void. :/
Heroes' Bane is an interesting one, I have never heard of that one. Yea evasion is always an issue with Hydras. One 2 cost Go for the Throat, Pacifism, or Suspension Field is all it takes to make all that power null and void. :/
Evasion doesn't protect you from removal, FYI. Those cards work on flyers, too. Evasion gets around blockers.
It's almost strictly worse than Wild Growth/Utopia Sprawl so probably not. They both add +1/+1 but ramp works with your spells/non-hydra critters/Kessig Wolf Run/etc. While Scales is marginally better with Kalonian Hydra if you're doubling your Hydras and connecting with people then an extra +1/+1 probably isn't going to matter much.
Well, plenty of the Hydras add counters to themselves. Hardened gives you +1 not only upon casting but also every time the Hydra grows, which nets you bigger creatures than the +1 mana from Wild Growth effects would (except with Apocalypse).
4 Elvish Mystic
4 Feral Hydra
2 Hydra Omnivore
2 Kalonian Hydra
2 Lifeblood Hydra
4 Rosheen Meanderer
3 Savageborn Hydra
1 Ulasht, the Hate Seed
3 Hull Breach
2 Hurricane
1 Momentous Fall
4 Tempt with Discovery
2 Primal Rage
2 Steely Resolve
4 Kazandu Refuge
2 Mountain
4 Rugged Highlands
4 Temple of Abandon
2 Wooded Foothills
I'm not going to say that Hurricane is bad nor that you should cut it but what I will say is that you shouldn't put too much stock in minor synergies. If Whirlwind is going to be a Plague Wind (or something close to that) for 4 mana every time then it doesn't matter if 10% of the time you can curve Rosheen into Hurricane to accomplish the same thing. The former is just always going to be good whereas the latter is significantly more situational. I understand that you can argue that Hurricane doubles as an X burn spell, I won't deny that, but at the same time I agree with Xyx that this deck has the lategame on lock but will probably struggle to handle early pressure. I would not expect this list to hit the midgame with a comfortable amount of HP in a competitive multiplayer setting and as such I would be wary of any spell that would dome myself for a significant amount of damage. That is, I agree that the damage to players, in this instance, is more likely to hurt than help.
If you want to run Hurricanes because you already have them, because you like the art, whatever, go for it. Play whatever you want whyever you want. Still, from a purely "I want to win games" perspective I have to agree that the card that kills EVERYTHING for 4 mana is almost always going to outperform the X spell "with a drawback." This is obviously just my opinion, I'm not stating these as concrete facts, but as someone who's played both cards a fair amount I gotta say that I love the raw efficiency of 4 mana Wraths. You pay your 4 mana, everything that that you care about dies, life is good. After all, the goal is probably to win games while having a good time with your friends; not to maximize the Rosheen synergy.
With respect to the deck itself, the most glaring omission in my mind is Kessig Wolf Run. I personally think that it's strictly better than Primal Rage and would cut them for KWRs and strongly consider shaving some other lands for another 1-2. 22 lands is too few in a deck that's filled filled with X spells because it's virtually impossible to flood out but mana screw is a death sentence. Like, what is your best non-Rosheen critter for 4 mana? A 2/2-3/3 with minor upside? It's not great whatever it is. Even if you hit your first 10 land drops you're still fine with that because all of your threats can soak 10 mana and most of them actively want 6 or more. Personally I would play at least 24-25 lands in this thing (in addition to mana dorks) while stressing that 3-4 of those would KWRs which double as spells in the lategame.
Take "gain lands" with a grain of salt. They do gain you a life but lands that ETBT are no joke in a deck filled with X spells. Is 1 life better than +1/+1 on your critters? Probably not. If you think otherwise, remember that we care a lot more about making 4/4s as opposed to 3/3s than we do making 9/9s as opposed to making 8/8s. Past a certain point X is "so big" that it doesn't really matter but the weakest aspect of this deck is its early game and when all of your threats are X/Xs having ETBT lands is a very real cost. Personally I would probably cut down to ~8 total to ensure that I could consistently fire off medium-sized critters in the midgame. I obviously have no idea how fast or slow your meta is, it's possible for your manabase to be correct, it just strikes me as being a touch too greedy (at least for my tastes).
Is 4 Tempts correct given that this deck also has 4 Rosheens? Wouldn't you rather have more things to cast on turns 1-3? I just don't like the idea of piling the vast majority of your ramp at 4 CMC in a deck that has no solid early-game plan. I feel like this deck will basically auto lose if it doesn't draw an Elf which is why I'd like to see you field something cheaper. Look at Overgrowth for example. Comes down on turn 3, ramps you 2 mana, seems good no? Is it better than a Tempt for ~4? No, obviously not, but doing ANYTHING on turn 2-3 and then casting a Rosheen on 4 is significantly better than casting Rosheen/Tempt on 4 and critters on turns 5-6 only to leave ramp stranded in your hand unused. Xyx already mentioned Joraga Treespeaker, another fine suggestion, but choosing between it and something like Overgrowth or Carpet of Flowers boils down to your personal meta. I normally don't expect people to use dedicated spot removal on a card like Elvish Mystic, that's not a winning line in my books, but something like Joraga Treespeaker is way too powerful to leave alive when cast on turn 1. A bad Sol Ring is still a very good Magic card. Treespeaker is easily better than OG if it doesn't get removed, it's not remotely close, but Overgrowth is significantly more durable. With respect to Carpet of Flowers, the card is either busted or worthless. Against a turn 1 Island with the potential for more it's literally the best card in your deck and if it's producing 2 mana on turn 2 with consistency then it's arguably as good (IF NOT BETTER!) as the best casual Magic card in the game (Sol Ring). Still, it can also do absolutely nothing which is why I can't tell you one way or another whether or not you should play it. You know your meta way better than I do. I mention the card solely because in some metas it's literally going to be ~Sol Ring that continues to scale as the game progresses which, again, makes it basically the best casual Magic card in the game (I'm not going to count things like Contract from Below for obvious reasons). If Island, Island is a reliable opening sequence the only reason to play fewer than 4 is fun/house banned&restricted list/budget/card availability concerns. From a purely "what will win me the most games" perspective it's always correct to play 4.
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Yup, this. I would run Kessig Wolf Run and/or Rogue's Passage in the manabase. Hydra Omnivore and Savageborn Hydra, in particular, need to be spending some facetime with your opponent, and these two will help you do it.
Left-field suggestion for you, too - there's a guy in my playgroup who rocks a Hydra Omnivore / Rogue's Passage / Grafted Exoskeleton deck. It draws a lot of hate, but I reckon even throwing a single Grafted Exoskeleton in this list would increase the fun quotient considerably (sticking one on Apocalypse Hydra would be a nice guarantee of danger, too).
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Damn you and your flawless logic!
Kessig Wolf Run = Yes, and thank you
Grafted Exoskeleton = No. My playgroup would never invite me back. We have a "no infect" policy. Very efficient card, though.
Yesssss That is much more efficient. Primordial will have to wait. I have none of him, but I will def. add in the future.
Thank you all. Very good advice.
+3 Joraga Treespeaker
-3 Elvish Mystic
-2 Hurricane
+2 Whirlwind
-2 Primal Rage
+2 Kessig Wolf Run
+1 Loxodon Warhammer
-4 Kazandu Refuge
+1 Mountain
+3 Forest
Heres what we are lookin at.
1 Elvish Mystic
3 Joraga Treespeaker
4 Feral Hydra
2 Hydra Omnivore
2 Kalonian Hydra
2 Lifeblood Hydra
4 Rosheen Meanderer
3 Savageborn Hydra
1 Ulasht, the Hate Seed
3 Hull Breach
2 Whirlwind
1 Momentous Fall
3 Tempt with Discovery
2 Steely Resolve
1 Loxodon Warhammer
3 Mountain
4 Rugged Highlands
4 Temple of Abandon
2 Wooded Foothills
2 Kessig Wolf Run
edited for formatting
3x Gyre Sage (1G)
3x Priest of Titania (1G)
3x Mistcutter Hydra (XG)
2x Vastwood Hydra (XGG)
3x Primordial Hydra (XGG)
3x Savageborn Hydra (XRG)
2x Apocalypse Hydra (XRG)
3x Kalonian Hydra (3GG)
3x Banefire (XR)
1x Momentous Fall (2GG)
2x Tempt with Discovery (3G)
2x Loxodon Warhammer (3)
10x Forest
5x Mountain
3x Rootbound Crag
4x Kessig Wolf Run
2x Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
The Elf trio is a combo I am trying to test its synergy with my Hydras. Joraga is obvious, but Gyre Sage gets buffed every time i play a hydra and adds more mana with each buff. Priest of Titania adds more mana for each elf. I wanted to see if they would help build my mana base while also improving my early game speed.
Bioshift is an instant, that can be triggered upon either turn if my Hydra will disappear anyways. I can use this card to move my counters to Gyre for insane mana addition each term or other options, for only one mana. It has saved me on numerous occasions.
You might want to try something like:
12x Forest
2x Mountain
3x Rootbound Crag
2x Kessig Wolf Run
4x Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
3x Joraga Treespeaker
4x Arbor Elf
2x Mistcutter Hydra
4x Voyaging Satyr
3x Primordial Hydra
2x Savageborn Hydra
2x Apocalypse Hydra
4x Lifeblood Hydra
3x Kalonian Hydra
4x Utopia Sprawl
4x Overgrowth
2x Momentous Fall
You might find it more consistent.
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Green - Blue - Red - White - Gold
I have a few ideas I am going to toy with on the new build to see how it fares vs my original build. Thanks again.
I haven't played the exact deck no. I'm firmly in the "play to win" camp so I field cards like Genesis Wave, Primeval Titan and Sylvan Primordial where you have Hydras. Tribal decks don't appeal to me unless theyr'e filled with objectively powerful cards and, unfortunately, most Hydras are just big dumb idiots that die to removal. The deck usually fares well against removal mostly because Genesis Wave is such a bonkers card which is why I proposed Lifeblood Hydra for you in your build. You actively want it to die most of the time. The reason why the deck tends to fare well against removal is because a good % of your ramp is Enchantment-based and it's hard to justify killing small mana dorks in multiplayer in general. As long as your creatures are powerful and you have a critical mass of draw spells (6 or more) then you usually have stuff to do. Obviously Lifeblood Hydra isn't Genesis Wave and I won't try and BS you otherwise but it's still a Hydra that's very good against removal which is why I recommended 4. Even if you just have to fire them off at X=3 or 4 that's still fine because those kinds of cards tend to chain into each other extremely well. The first ones are usually small but it ramps up quickly from there.
Cards that I frequently add post-board include things like Steely Resolve/Dense Foliage, City of Solitude, Calming Verse, Creeping Corrosion, Song of the Dryads (it counts for Devotion), generic hate cards basically. I try to run cards like Reclamation Sage over spell-based removal whenever possible to further the Devotion theme. I also always keep cards like Elvish Visionary, Wistful Selkie/Yavimaya Elder/Courser of Kruphix and Masked Admirers/Eidolon of Blossoms around because I really like playing with cantripping threats that add to Devotion. Eidolon of Blossoms can do serious work if you play with Utopia Sprawl and Overgrowth and let's not forget that Courser of Kruphix is also an Enchantment. Even if you ignore all of that she still just cantrips and adds Devotion but you will pick up extra cards on a consistent basis. My real cards can all win the game very easily so all I need from my cheap durdles is Devotion and card advantage. Even things like Harmonize are fine to have, I've definitely played 2 in these kinds of decks, but I usually try and win with cards like Tooth and Nail or Genesis Wave that leave very little to chance.
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Green - Blue - Red - White - Gold
3 cards I was looking at as well to increase the speed/aggression in the first 3 turns were the following:
Exploration, Fastbond, and Azusa, Lost but Seeking.
Also with playing as many lands as I can with them, Thawing Glaciers would be able to be constantly reused to acquire more lands quickly, but I may be becoming too greedy with the land that way. That plus Omnath, Locus of Mana to make even my low cost Hydra deal some considerable damage.
Azusa I actively dislike is "normal" decks that have ~24 lands because by the time that you hit 3 or 4 land drops it's hard to still have a ton more sitting in your grip. I find that she's just a crappy Rampant Growth (not even, you have to use a card in your hand) that comes with a useless body a huge % of the time. Now, again, the card is obviously fine if your deck has Life from the Loam or if it's full of Bouncelands but if you're just playing with 24 lands and next-to-no card draw then she doesn't usually accomplish very much.
Now, you might be thinking that Lifeblood Hydra can solve these kinds of problems but that doesn't actually make sense. What are you going to remove for those kinds of cards? Your Hydras? No, if anything you'd cut ramp for ramp but when you axe the actual ramp in favor of inconsistent, win-more effects and you never get the big Lifeblood Hydras in the first place so the effect remains irrelevant. That's why you typically see ramp decks play ramp cards and Life from the Loam/Gush/Boros Garrison decks play cards like Azusa and Exploration.
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Green - Blue - Red - White - Gold
Maybe I'm overreacting to a recent loss but Man it gets big fast.
And... Drumrol... It's a Hydra.
My meta: 3 or 4 player free for all, anything goes but boring games or broken decks cause a vote to end that game.
Did run into the bane several times. In the late game I've seen it activated twice in one turn, (while the rest of us was out of answers) that left an impression.
My meta: 3 or 4 player free for all, anything goes but boring games or broken decks cause a vote to end that game.
For example, completely not a Hydra, but Sunscorch Regent is a million miles better for the same CC... because it's evasive.
On a Hydra, it's probably Trample you want. If they print Heroes' Bane with trample, I'm onboard.
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Evasion doesn't protect you from removal, FYI. Those cards work on flyers, too. Evasion gets around blockers.
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But only if you're running those anyway.
(Bramblewood Paragon?)
My meta: 3 or 4 player free for all, anything goes but boring games or broken decks cause a vote to end that game.
It's almost strictly worse than Wild Growth/Utopia Sprawl so probably not. They both add +1/+1 but ramp works with your spells/non-hydra critters/Kessig Wolf Run/etc. While Scales is marginally better with Kalonian Hydra if you're doubling your Hydras and connecting with people then an extra +1/+1 probably isn't going to matter much.
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Alternately you could play a Doubling Season effect.