I'm not a huge Garruk Wildspeaker fan in this deck, I did test him in earlier builds. This deck evolved out of a budget deck I created called Budget Green Prison that had a fairly big following involving Black Vise, Winter Orb, Root Maze and Garruk. There was even an article about it that I will post later (if I can find it). My original posting of that deck can be found here. Anyhow, Wild Growth and Utopia Sprawl especially with Arbor Elf simply crank out so much mana that Garruk is not necessary. Maybe as a one of, but his benefits outside of his mana ability are not that great.
Test him again though. Winter Maze is very different deck than Budget Green Prison and I possibly had bad match ups and/or draws. Honestly though, I do not see him as more than a one of.
I also have new info on my latest testings. I've been retesting and Tangle Wire is really nice as 2x slot, it's no Trinisphere but the combination of the two is dope. Wish I had more time but I'll hit up on that later.
I wanted to a little bit more in-depth on my matches, the differences in card choices, and my overall thoughts on the deck.
-1 Omnath (In all my games I had to use my mana up every turn, I couldn't imagine him ever getting above 4/4 consistently. This deck can generate mana *fast*, but not "oh its' turn 4 and I have 9 mana with nothing to do". It might find it's way back in but I didn't like it during my testing.
-2 Masticore (There is a lot of disruption and removal in the format, I'm fairly certain that every smart opponent will wait until after my first upkeep so that I discard a card before removing it. That's so much card disadvantage that I figured Walking Ballista was the card I really wanted. It costs more to ping, but has better "nothing to do, guess I'll use my mana" than Masticore does.)
-1 Thragtusk (never really felt like I needed the lifegain, the only time I wanted this card was against Miracles when they cast Terminus or Supreme Verdict but honestly leaving behind a 3/3 still isn't fast enough to kill them after they cast a sweeper.
-2 Trinisphere (didn't really feel like it was locking down the game at all.)
-2 Umezawa's Jitte (not exactly the right deck for this card. I want to keep my weenies out of combat, and my big beefy threats are big and beefy on their own.)
+1 Polukranos (decided to use this guy over Omnath as the mana sink. I like that he can come out turn 4. I was never unhappy to draw/cast this guy.)
+1 Walking Ballista (Replacement for Masticore. Masticore is cute to shuffle back Progenitus but it's such a double edged sword that can really set you back. Probably 1 more Ballista is needed since without a way to tutor it I never once drew it all 4 matches.)
+2 Forest (I did mulligan tests and wasn't happy with the low number of lands)
+2 Lodestone Golem (Jamming this guy out on turn 2 was one of the stronger plays I got off a few times. Against the blue decks it would always bait out a Force of Will, which allowed me to cast Natural Order next turn. I felt it was more important for our lock pieces to be able to attack)
+2 Garruk Wildspeaker (I feel this was the correct inclusion. At 4 mana, he's the perfect cmc, and he untaps for mana after he's cast, which allows for another +2-3 mana to drop more lock pieces. Making Beasts is important, to make more threats/protection or for sac fodder to Natural Order. And his ultimate won me two games, I don't even need a whole slew of 1/1's out just 1-2 big fatties.
R1: Death and Taxes 0-2
I was theorizing with my mtg friends before the tournament that our mana denial plan shuts their deck down while their mana denial plan doesn't affect us at all. Turns out I was very wrong. They don't care about Winter Orb or Root Maze. Aether Vial does a lot for their deck. Some of their bears (mostly Phyrexian Revoker) can shut off some of our key cards. About the only thing our deck can do that D & T cannot stop is Natural Order into Progenitus (ideally turn 2 but turn 3/4 can work also). From what I remember, Game 1 he got Aether Vial turn 1 and got a good board state with Mother of Runes and Thalia, used Phyrexian Revokers tagged on my Arbor Elves. I did get out Progenitus, but he got Sword of War and Peace on his Thalia, which I couldn't chump block with 'ole 'Proggy, and when it came down to us both attacking, he won the race with life gain. He never once as scared of Winer Orb. Game two after seeing Winter Orb he kept a hand of 3 Aether Vial and 4 land, assuming that there was no way I could stop that. Which is correct when I never drew Pithing Needle; I only drew Krosan Grip and Reclamation Sage, and by that point he was giving his Revoker (tagged on Garruk) pro green on my upkeep (which sucked because I had Reclamation Sage in hand). He also was able to use his Port effectively on my suped-up forest. I probably was a little nervous and made one or two misplays but he also had god hands both games and played perfectly. I also really, really wanted to draw Walking Ballista to snipe his whole team but never drew it.
R2 Elves 2-1
I forget the order or who won game 1/2, I remember the game that he won was off of Natural Order --> Craterhoof for +6/+6. In this matchup, Dragonlord Atarka was the allstar, I searched him out twice and won both those games. Cursed Totem is really good to stall the Elves deck out, but they have access to GSZ and Rexclamation Sage as well, I had a totem get sniped but luckily I had another totem to cast. because we're both combo decks, and my deck has slightly more disruption, I feel like this is more in our favor.
R3 Miracles 0-2
This matchup felt unwinnable.
R4 BUG FoodChain 2-0
This match was interesting. Because his deck is also focused on combo, it means he runs less disruption, which is better for us. Not only that, but some cards he run is dead, for example Leovold doesn't do much because we don't draw extra cards. Our ideboard cards happen to naturally screw over Food Chain (Krosan Grip and Pithing Needle). But the most interesting thing was the turn before he wanted to combo he'd tap out to either cast Food Chain or Misthollow Griffin, and I'd then cast Winter Orb, which means it'd take him another 2-3 turns before he could finally combo off, giving me enough time to win with Progenitus. He actually asked his friend sitting next to him how he's supposed to sideboard against the deck.
Overall thoughts:
-Winter Orb + Root Maze is not a hard lock together. Many times I had both out and still lost. Of the two, Root Maze operated better on its own in a vacuum and has more potential (I could even see cutting 2 winter orb), but is only good when it comes out on turn 1. So many Legacy decks are built around having low/aggressive mana costs; out of 9 games only one of them had a sequence of "play Winter Orb, haha now you have to wait many turns". Winter Orb feels best in decks that also have Stifle and Wasteland, like Canadian Threshold. I sided Winter Orb and Root Maze out of most games, almost to the point where I was wondering why they're included in the first place.
-No card draw felt really bad. No combo protection also felt bad. All it would take is for one key spell to get countered/removed and I'd be in top deck mode. As a Stax deck I get that the idea is for both players to not be doing anything many turns in a row so that I can catch up with cards in hand, but every opponent was always drawing cards and getting out of whatever stax pieces I had on board.
-It does have the "spicy brew factor" that got a lot of people's attention, however once my smarter opponents figured out what I was doing, they adjusted and crushed me. I feel like Winter Orb only worked on the less experienced players.
-The deck feels very weak to counterspells and disruption. It seems the primer focuses a bit too much on magical christmasland scenarios of "I can deploy all these by turn 4 without the opponent casting anything to stop my shenanigans."
-Honestly, I feel like Dragon Stompy is the better lock deck because Chalice + Blood Moon are actual locks that stop the opponent from playing spells, not soft locks (and they can get either one of those out on turn 1). And Elves is the better ramp deck since they can refuel their hand way better and it sucks for budget but Gaea's Cradle just makes 6+ mana by turn 3 so consistently in that deck. As a budget alternative, $380 is mad affordable and can be a good introduction to Legacy because I did at least win two matches. Kudos to Laser Brains for the list to get me into my first Legacy tournament, but I'm definitely going to try and switch gears to a different deck once I acquire the duals (but will continue to play this deck until I do so.)
I can see how this deck would be appealing to people, it was to me as well, but the truth is it's just not a good deck at all. I don't like the idea of people that are new to Legacy buying cards for this deck thinking it is competitive. SOMETIMES it works very well but the majority of the time it doesn't.
Having said that, there's always room for improvement and it's a got some cool stuff going on.
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Always wear protection kids, sleeve up your deck.
LEGACY: Soldier Stompy WW // Blue Stompy UU // Fit Variants BGRW // Sol Land Brews BGRUWC MODERN: Pure Pili-ness GU // Red Devotion RR // Green Devotion Variants GRWUG // U/G Emerge CGU // Lots and Lots of Brews BGRUWC
I think this deck has to use Suppression Field somehow- imagine that vs D N T and Miracles from the discussion above. It looks from the outside as a Tabernacle deck that can't run Tabernacle, which gives the issue of critter control- how does it do it in Green? Dismember?Again I think white looks attractive- Ghostly Prisons and Swords spring to mind. I have played a lot of prison decks, and they can't all run Tabernacle, they can't all run 3 sphere, they can't all run Chalice, they can't all run excellent targetted removal of permanents or hands, but I can't think of one that runs none of them. As you know, I run the Trinity deck from time to time, closely resembling "trinichoke", both of which are in the same field as this one. The interesting thing is that deck simply worked better with a splash, so I am guessing this one may too. I also think Static orb (as additional control) and Garruk could be worth a look. I am sure there is a moderately strong meta deck there, one that can beat some top archetypes, but I think it would need more than one color.
Does this look right? 3 cursed totem seems a lot? Null Rods I could see in a D N T Miracles meta. Guttural Response over say, Choke or Tsunami, seems odd too. Most NO decks like Elves! don't fight the Force decks with counters, they remove the NOs for game 2, which may be something to consider.....
Maybe the deck could morph to Tabernacles, 3 spheres etc. A sort of mini stax. Either way I would not write the deck off as not viable, although I would say it may end up with a higher overall win rate as a more expensive deck. With so few people playing it refining such a list is really difficult, it certainly won't be done quickly.
will start building.
Seeing the pre-Garruk lists really make me wonder how you actually can accrue that much mana underneath the lock.
Like does rampant growth + arbor elf really get there?
For those who have tried Masticore what do you think? I'm prone to playing cheesey drops, and the card makes me feel like a kid again.
Test him again though. Winter Maze is very different deck than Budget Green Prison and I possibly had bad match ups and/or draws. Honestly though, I do not see him as more than a one of.
I also have new info on my latest testings. I've been retesting and Tangle Wire is really nice as 2x slot, it's no Trinisphere but the combination of the two is dope. Wish I had more time but I'll hit up on that later.
Masticore is nuts btw, but certainly a meta call.
Currently Playing:
Burning Reanimator
Eldrazi and Taxes
Bug Threshold
Enchantress
Dead Guy Ale
Combo Zombies
Pyromancer Pox
-1 Omnath (In all my games I had to use my mana up every turn, I couldn't imagine him ever getting above 4/4 consistently. This deck can generate mana *fast*, but not "oh its' turn 4 and I have 9 mana with nothing to do". It might find it's way back in but I didn't like it during my testing.
-2 Masticore (There is a lot of disruption and removal in the format, I'm fairly certain that every smart opponent will wait until after my first upkeep so that I discard a card before removing it. That's so much card disadvantage that I figured Walking Ballista was the card I really wanted. It costs more to ping, but has better "nothing to do, guess I'll use my mana" than Masticore does.)
-1 Thragtusk (never really felt like I needed the lifegain, the only time I wanted this card was against Miracles when they cast Terminus or Supreme Verdict but honestly leaving behind a 3/3 still isn't fast enough to kill them after they cast a sweeper.
-2 Trinisphere (didn't really feel like it was locking down the game at all.)
-2 Umezawa's Jitte (not exactly the right deck for this card. I want to keep my weenies out of combat, and my big beefy threats are big and beefy on their own.)
+1 Polukranos (decided to use this guy over Omnath as the mana sink. I like that he can come out turn 4. I was never unhappy to draw/cast this guy.)
+1 Walking Ballista (Replacement for Masticore. Masticore is cute to shuffle back Progenitus but it's such a double edged sword that can really set you back. Probably 1 more Ballista is needed since without a way to tutor it I never once drew it all 4 matches.)
+2 Forest (I did mulligan tests and wasn't happy with the low number of lands)
+2 Lodestone Golem (Jamming this guy out on turn 2 was one of the stronger plays I got off a few times. Against the blue decks it would always bait out a Force of Will, which allowed me to cast Natural Order next turn. I felt it was more important for our lock pieces to be able to attack)
+2 Garruk Wildspeaker (I feel this was the correct inclusion. At 4 mana, he's the perfect cmc, and he untaps for mana after he's cast, which allows for another +2-3 mana to drop more lock pieces. Making Beasts is important, to make more threats/protection or for sac fodder to Natural Order. And his ultimate won me two games, I don't even need a whole slew of 1/1's out just 1-2 big fatties.
R1: Death and Taxes 0-2
I was theorizing with my mtg friends before the tournament that our mana denial plan shuts their deck down while their mana denial plan doesn't affect us at all. Turns out I was very wrong. They don't care about Winter Orb or Root Maze. Aether Vial does a lot for their deck. Some of their bears (mostly Phyrexian Revoker) can shut off some of our key cards. About the only thing our deck can do that D & T cannot stop is Natural Order into Progenitus (ideally turn 2 but turn 3/4 can work also). From what I remember, Game 1 he got Aether Vial turn 1 and got a good board state with Mother of Runes and Thalia, used Phyrexian Revokers tagged on my Arbor Elves. I did get out Progenitus, but he got Sword of War and Peace on his Thalia, which I couldn't chump block with 'ole 'Proggy, and when it came down to us both attacking, he won the race with life gain. He never once as scared of Winer Orb. Game two after seeing Winter Orb he kept a hand of 3 Aether Vial and 4 land, assuming that there was no way I could stop that. Which is correct when I never drew Pithing Needle; I only drew Krosan Grip and Reclamation Sage, and by that point he was giving his Revoker (tagged on Garruk) pro green on my upkeep (which sucked because I had Reclamation Sage in hand). He also was able to use his Port effectively on my suped-up forest. I probably was a little nervous and made one or two misplays but he also had god hands both games and played perfectly. I also really, really wanted to draw Walking Ballista to snipe his whole team but never drew it.
R2 Elves 2-1
I forget the order or who won game 1/2, I remember the game that he won was off of Natural Order --> Craterhoof for +6/+6. In this matchup, Dragonlord Atarka was the allstar, I searched him out twice and won both those games. Cursed Totem is really good to stall the Elves deck out, but they have access to GSZ and Rexclamation Sage as well, I had a totem get sniped but luckily I had another totem to cast. because we're both combo decks, and my deck has slightly more disruption, I feel like this is more in our favor.
R3 Miracles 0-2
This matchup felt unwinnable.
R4 BUG FoodChain 2-0
This match was interesting. Because his deck is also focused on combo, it means he runs less disruption, which is better for us. Not only that, but some cards he run is dead, for example Leovold doesn't do much because we don't draw extra cards. Our ideboard cards happen to naturally screw over Food Chain (Krosan Grip and Pithing Needle). But the most interesting thing was the turn before he wanted to combo he'd tap out to either cast Food Chain or Misthollow Griffin, and I'd then cast Winter Orb, which means it'd take him another 2-3 turns before he could finally combo off, giving me enough time to win with Progenitus. He actually asked his friend sitting next to him how he's supposed to sideboard against the deck.
Overall thoughts:
-Winter Orb + Root Maze is not a hard lock together. Many times I had both out and still lost. Of the two, Root Maze operated better on its own in a vacuum and has more potential (I could even see cutting 2 winter orb), but is only good when it comes out on turn 1. So many Legacy decks are built around having low/aggressive mana costs; out of 9 games only one of them had a sequence of "play Winter Orb, haha now you have to wait many turns". Winter Orb feels best in decks that also have Stifle and Wasteland, like Canadian Threshold. I sided Winter Orb and Root Maze out of most games, almost to the point where I was wondering why they're included in the first place.
-No card draw felt really bad. No combo protection also felt bad. All it would take is for one key spell to get countered/removed and I'd be in top deck mode. As a Stax deck I get that the idea is for both players to not be doing anything many turns in a row so that I can catch up with cards in hand, but every opponent was always drawing cards and getting out of whatever stax pieces I had on board.
-It does have the "spicy brew factor" that got a lot of people's attention, however once my smarter opponents figured out what I was doing, they adjusted and crushed me. I feel like Winter Orb only worked on the less experienced players.
-The deck feels very weak to counterspells and disruption. It seems the primer focuses a bit too much on magical christmasland scenarios of "I can deploy all these by turn 4 without the opponent casting anything to stop my shenanigans."
-Honestly, I feel like Dragon Stompy is the better lock deck because Chalice + Blood Moon are actual locks that stop the opponent from playing spells, not soft locks (and they can get either one of those out on turn 1). And Elves is the better ramp deck since they can refuel their hand way better and it sucks for budget but Gaea's Cradle just makes 6+ mana by turn 3 so consistently in that deck. As a budget alternative, $380 is mad affordable and can be a good introduction to Legacy because I did at least win two matches. Kudos to Laser Brains for the list to get me into my first Legacy tournament, but I'm definitely going to try and switch gears to a different deck once I acquire the duals (but will continue to play this deck until I do so.)
EDH Decks:
Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
Tajic, Blade of the Legion
Oloro, Ageless Ascetic
Kozilek, Butcher of Truth
Purphoros, God of the Forge
Ezuri, Renegade Leader 1v1
Prossh, Skyraider of Kher 1v1
Hythonia the Cruel
Trying to build:
Jenara, Asura of War
Designing a Custom Set:
Clash of the Cultures: 5 Wedges, 5 Cultures
Providing Artwork for:
Archester: Frontier of Steam
Having said that, there's always room for improvement and it's a got some cool stuff going on.
MODERN: Pure Pili-ness GU // Red Devotion RR // Green Devotion Variants GRWUG // U/G Emerge CGU // Lots and Lots of Brews BGRUWC
As regards the sideboard above
3 Cursed Totem
1 Empyrial Archangel
3 Faerie Macabre
2 Guttural Response
2 Krosan Grip
2 Pithing Needle
1 Ruric Thar
1 Xantid Swarm
Does this look right? 3 cursed totem seems a lot? Null Rods I could see in a D N T Miracles meta. Guttural Response over say, Choke or Tsunami, seems odd too. Most NO decks like Elves! don't fight the Force decks with counters, they remove the NOs for game 2, which may be something to consider.....
Maybe the deck could morph to Tabernacles, 3 spheres etc. A sort of mini stax. Either way I would not write the deck off as not viable, although I would say it may end up with a higher overall win rate as a more expensive deck. With so few people playing it refining such a list is really difficult, it certainly won't be done quickly.