I can't say that anything about your list strikes me as overly impressive. I guess my question to you is "what exactly makes this a multiplayer deck?" It's an honest question that I'd like an honest answer to. Why are you picking these cards to field in a multiplayer setting? What about them makes them strong in your meta?
Going back to cards that I listed, it's clear that I'm the kind of guy who likes to play with a lot of Pigeon spells that get stronger as the number of players increases. I mean, I'd play with Multani, Maro-Socerer over Omnath any day of the week. Still, that's not the only thing that I care about. Green decks have always been particularly weak to mass removal, and yours is no exception. Genesis goes a long way to ensuring a swift recovery post-Wrath. While you could always look into something like Momentous Fall or Harmonize, they're not always ideal. Still, I dislike Green decks that are stuck "drawing 1 card a turn." This ties in to my next point, which is that I like Green decks that always have gas. Believe me, these decks look much scarier when they go: turns ~1-4 lands + Sol Rings (could be Treespeakers, Eladamri's Vineyards, anything like this) and then go bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb for the next infinity turns. That usually requires cards like Lurking Predators, Cream of the Crop, Sylvan Library, Defense of the Heart, etc. Hoping to draw threats is never going to be the same as stacking your deck.
Things that I dislike are cards like Beast Within, Mold Shambler and Claws of Wirewood. Small fliers shouldn't be a problem for this deck. If people want to fight you in a creature war, let them. It should be a battle that you win 100% of the time. Now, I have no qualms with a miser's Tornado Elemental to GSZ up if needed, but I really dislike situational spells like the Claws. The Elemental is a great evasive beater with a massive body who will basically always clear the skies. As far as the other cards go, I just hate removal in general. I'd rather slam down another stupid guy and hope to God that I get there with it. Maybe that kind of thinking leaves you open to various Moat effects, but even then I'd much rather play with something like Woodfall Primus. As you can plainly see, I have a hardon for Cream of the Crop, Lurking Predators, and Defense of the Heart, and would rather just field a ton of awesome fatties that can abuse the **** out of them. For every cheap "weenie" spell that you could field, there's an expensive fatty out there that could also do the job.
Seedborn Muse doesn't seem very good unless you're like trying to go deep with your singleton Omnath or something. Giving your team vigilance isn't really worth a card, especially if it's just a small creature that can easily die to random crossfire.
Eternal Witness seems meh in your deck. She doesn't have many great Regrowth targets, and you have no way to recur her (i.e. Genesis). She's a solid card but only if you have something worth getting back (Survival of the Fittest and Defense of the Heart come to mind). I'm not overly convinced that you do.
Ok Tich, we get it, you don't run spot removal in multiplayer. However, in this case it would just be plain wrong to cut the beast withins. Beast within is a green vindicate that answers any permanent in the game, leaving them with a 3/3 beast token that is useless 9 out of 10 times in multiplayer. If anything I would run 4 of beast withins. Tich, I don't know what meta you play in, but to recommend cutting all removal from multiplayer decks in every thread just seems wrong.
An opinion can't be "just plain wrong." It's merely an opinion. I said that Beast Within is a card that I don't like, and explained why that is. You can disagree with my assessment, but I'm not "just plain wrong." In terms of my meta, we typically play with 8-10 people. Killing one permanent from 1 player means nothing since each player has a dedicated multiplayer deck and so every threat is massive. Yeah, you stopped one creature (or whatever), but that doesn't mean anything when they all kill you. You're wasting your time and energy. It also does absolutely nothing to creatures that matter, which tend to be big stupid guys like Mortivore, Progenitus, Emrakul, the Aeons Torn, Blightsteel Colossus, etc. If you're playing with a low number of players who have bad decks, then removal can get you by. If you're playing with a large number of players who have good decks, then spot removal will take you almost nowhere. Still, even in the former situation, removal is still always going to be a 1-for-1 tempo swing. I still haven't a heard a decent argument as to why that's essential in multiplayer where the tempo amounts to nothing (virtually) and a 1-for-1 is virtual card disadvantage. Removal also hurts one player but helps all of the others. In a big 8 player game, you've expended a card + mana to destroy one other player's card. 6 people (6 opponents mind you) benefit from that play since you're both down cards and tempo, and they had to invest nothing to reap the rewards. It's the "free rider" problem. If you play removal in your decks that means that other people don't have to because you'll kill key creatures for them. That lets them build stronger decks while you waste your deck slots, time, energy and cards killing permanents. I do not like helping my opponents, so I do not like removal. I also don't consider the "but what if people play cards that you have to answer?" argument to be a very compelling one. What that basically asks is "what if you build a bad deck and try to fight good ones?" Every card played by every player should matter. One thing that I've always said is that multiplayer decks need to be competitive relative to the meta that they're played in. If you "have" to answer X card on turn X then your deck should also produce "must answer" card(s) by turn X. If your deck can't beat a 5/5 flying dragon, but can never pressure the person who plays it as much as he can pressure you, then your deck probably isn't up to snuff. Removal will buy you time, but you'll still always be on the backfgoot since your deck is just plain weaker than that of (some of) the other players.
Removal is often something that weaker play in our meta because it gives them the illusion of doing better. I mean, they survive slightly longer after all. Still, all that ever does is delay the inevitable, because every threat from the better players is so strong that they all end the game. You may stop 1 or 2, but you still eventually go down. That is, removal tends to be a "trap." It doesn't actually make your weak deck better, it just keeps you in the game slightly longer. I've never seen a person with a bunch of maindecked removal go on to win the game. Now, they will almost always "take out" one other player (not literally but figuratively) since it's very hard to recover from massive setbacks and so if people destroy your **** you'll probably lose, but the idea here is that the person who destroyed it all doesn't then will the game either. The guy who wins is the guy who didn't get hated on and does whatever broken thing he's trying to do. Removal doesn't win the game, it lets you decide who loses the game.
EDIT: Bear in mind that none of this applies to decks that naturally synergize with powerful removal spells. I routinely put Grave Pact into my decks with Reassembling Skeleton + Bloodghast + Skullclamp because it keeps the field clear, for free, while I'm naturally drawing a ton of cards. My small, 1 time investment of 4 mana nets me insane card advnatage in the long run by slowly destroying my opponents' fields. I've played with plenty of Red decks that use cards like Flamebreak and Earthquake primarily because they hurt players, but don't argue when they just so happen to clear the field. If you can work strong removal into your deck's natural gameplan, then I don't mind it. There's a reason why I suggested Tornado Elemental and Woodfall Primus to pair with cards like Defense of the Heart and Cream of the Crop. I don't like playing Beast Within for Beast Within's sake when the deck in no way synergizes with the card. The cards that I suggested work with my previous suggestions to build a synergistic deck that works with itself. Every card matters, and every card works towards the goal of playing "infinite fatties" (more or less). I don't want to use a 1-for-1 instant that can't be tutored for/cheated into play via Lurking Predators when there are solid cards that can. Let's just be clear on that distinction.
If you have some solid counterarguments, different takes on removal, by all means. I'm willing to defend my point of view after playing multiplayer almost exclusively for the past 6 years, but I'm also willing to acknowledge the experiences of other players.
Ok, so you play with 8-10 people regularly? In that case, your continued arguments against spot removal make more sense. I could put up a poll here, but I would bet that most people end up in games with no more than 5 people total. In my group, a 5 player game will usually last 1-1.5 hours. An 8 player game must take something like 2.5 hours just to finish, assuming there are no team variants or 'respawning'. I just don't see why you would want to play 1 game a night but whatever.
As for 'weak decks run removal', I could not disagree with this statement more. I have played a lot of multiplayer for the last 10 years, and most often the game state will end up with 1 player with a dominant board position, usually with 1 or 2 key permanents. Stuff like beast within, which has no real drawback is key for controlling this lead player's setup and giving everyone a chance to come back and take him down. Yes, I could try and rely on my opponents doing this work for me but I am not a gambling kind of person and I like to have the options to deal with things myself. As for card disadvantage, there are a bajillion options out there of removal as cantrips if that is your biggest concern. Synergy has nothing to do with removal, so not sure why you even brought that up. Removal is an answer, and does not need to synergize with anything if it does its job well.
Perhaps the best arguments for removal can be seen in the EDH/commander multiplayer forums, as almost all top decks there run some form of removal for creatures and all other permanents. Basically I don't know of any top EDH decks that don't run removal of some kind.
Ok, so you play with 8-10 people regularly? In that case, your continued arguments against spot removal make more sense. I could put up a poll here, but I would bet that most people end up in games with no more than 5 people total. In my group, a 5 player game will usually last 1-1.5 hours. An 8 player game must take something like 2.5 hours just to finish, assuming there are no team variants or 'respawning'. I just don't see why you would want to play 1 game a night but whatever.
Big misconception. We played 6 games the other night. More players doesn't mean longer games insofar as the players know what they're doing. Everyone plays with fast decks that do broken things such as playing a Hive Mind and following it with multiple Pact of the Titans and whatnot. Games do not last long. People typically attribute multiplayer games to long, grindy games since people usually build decks with creatures and removal. Yes, those decks lead to big stalemates and tons of board resets. Those games run long. In metas where any given person will Tinker out Darksteel Colossus on turn 2, or Show and Tell an Emrakul, the Aeons Torn out, games do not run long. Our record so far is 14 games in one night, and that's not playing until 7am or anything. We all have jobs and other responsibilities, so we're not just staying up until all hours playing Magic.
I have played a lot of multiplayer for the last 10 years, and most often the game state will end up with 1 player with a dominant board position, usually with 1 or 2 key permanents. Stuff like beast within, which has no real drawback is key for controlling this lead player's setup and giving everyone a chance to come back and take him down.
This goes back to my "free rider" problem. I don't want to give "everyone" a chance, I want to give "me" a chance to win. When you "take down" the lead player, all that does is create a new lead player. You're now down cards, and probably have to find an answer to the new King on the block. The idea here is removal is only ever helping you tread water, but may give other players a legitimate shot to win. Again, I think of removal as cards that "let you decide who loses," not cards that "let you win the game."
Perhaps the best arguments for removal can be seen in the EDH/commander multiplayer forums, as almost all top decks there run some form of removal for creatures and all other permanents. Basically I don't know of any top EDH decks that don't run removal of some kind.
My EDH decks definitely all have removal. I don't agree with this argument though. EDH isn't like other formats. EDH decks are very big and very inconsistent. You can't reliably do X by turn X like you can in other formats. Since some decks can do things with a turn 1 Sol Ring to set up Erayo locks or whatever on the 3rd turn, you sometimes need access to removal. In normal multiplayer, that's not the case. You can just build a deck that also wins on turns 3-4 with consistency. In EDH, you can't say anything with certainty, so sometimes you do need an out to a turn 2-3 Erayo + tons of spells. You can't look at one very special format and make blanket claims about all multiplayer play. That's not a fair assessment. EDH is very different from normal formats/normal Magic. It breaks basically every rule when it comes to deckbuilding.
Ok, so it sounds like your playgroup is very unique in that no one plays 'creatures and removal'. I would say your group format is the one that is 'different from normal formats' rather than EDH. I have never encounted a group like what you mention, and I doubt most other Salvation posters have either.
This may be true for you guys who are playing turn2combowin.dek, but what exactly is Peter's meta? Peter, what kind of decks are you facing?
Basically the decks in my signature plus another ~8-10 paper deck's I haven't listed. I provide all the cards and decks for my playgroup with the exception of 2-3 players who run at max 2 different decks each. We generally play 5 person games at a very casual level with lots of beer and laughs. Player skill ranges from Beginner to Very Experienced but no Pros or real combo players. That's why I can generally afford to under-power a lot of my decks, or not use ideal cards that cost me a ton of money.
On that note, fixed up the OP to resemble what I have now. I liked the interaction between Lurking Predators and Cream of the Crop, but my LGS only had 1 copy of each.
4x Overgrown Battlement
4x Eternal Witness
4x Joraga Treespeaker
3x Krosan Tusker
3x Forgotten Ancient
2x Mold Shambler
2x Tornado Elemental
2x Penumbra Wurm
1x Magus of the Vineyard
1x Omnath, Locus of Mana
1x Chameleon Colossus
1x Genesis
1x Multani, Maro-Sorceror
1x Indrik Stomphowler
1x Explore
1x Green Sun's Zenith
Instants: 2
2x Beast Within
Enchantments: 2
1x Lurking Predators
1x Cream of the Crop
Planeswalkers: 1
1x Garruk Wildspeaker
Land: 23
3x Tranquil Thicket
1x Sapseep Forest
19x Forest
Cut an Explore for Indrik Stomphowler had way too much mana and no way to GSZ in a nuke for pesky enchantments.
Multiplayer:
MonoBlack
Mono-Red
Cycling
Crush of Wurms
Zoo
Immortal Coil
Control
Reanimator
Mono-G
Cruel Ascension
Landfall
Esper Spirits/Tokens
Phantom Vigor
Not Explicitly Multiplayer:
Allies
Bant
Artifacts
Guilds of Ravnica - Commander 2018 - Core 2019 - Battlebond - Dominaria - Rivals of Ixalan - Ixalan - Commander 2017 - Hour of Devastation - Amonket - Aether Revolt - Commander 2016 - Kaladesh - Conspiracy 2 - Eldritch Moon - Shadows Over Innistrad - Oath of the Gatewatch - Commander 2015 - Battle for Zendikar - Magic Origins - Dragons of Tarkir
Green - Blue - Red - White - Gold
Multiplayer:
MonoBlack
Mono-Red
Cycling
Crush of Wurms
Zoo
Immortal Coil
Control
Reanimator
Mono-G
Cruel Ascension
Landfall
Esper Spirits/Tokens
Phantom Vigor
Not Explicitly Multiplayer:
Allies
Bant
Artifacts
Going back to cards that I listed, it's clear that I'm the kind of guy who likes to play with a lot of Pigeon spells that get stronger as the number of players increases. I mean, I'd play with Multani, Maro-Socerer over Omnath any day of the week. Still, that's not the only thing that I care about. Green decks have always been particularly weak to mass removal, and yours is no exception. Genesis goes a long way to ensuring a swift recovery post-Wrath. While you could always look into something like Momentous Fall or Harmonize, they're not always ideal. Still, I dislike Green decks that are stuck "drawing 1 card a turn." This ties in to my next point, which is that I like Green decks that always have gas. Believe me, these decks look much scarier when they go: turns ~1-4 lands + Sol Rings (could be Treespeakers, Eladamri's Vineyards, anything like this) and then go bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb for the next infinity turns. That usually requires cards like Lurking Predators, Cream of the Crop, Sylvan Library, Defense of the Heart, etc. Hoping to draw threats is never going to be the same as stacking your deck.
Things that I dislike are cards like Beast Within, Mold Shambler and Claws of Wirewood. Small fliers shouldn't be a problem for this deck. If people want to fight you in a creature war, let them. It should be a battle that you win 100% of the time. Now, I have no qualms with a miser's Tornado Elemental to GSZ up if needed, but I really dislike situational spells like the Claws. The Elemental is a great evasive beater with a massive body who will basically always clear the skies. As far as the other cards go, I just hate removal in general. I'd rather slam down another stupid guy and hope to God that I get there with it. Maybe that kind of thinking leaves you open to various Moat effects, but even then I'd much rather play with something like Woodfall Primus. As you can plainly see, I have a hardon for Cream of the Crop, Lurking Predators, and Defense of the Heart, and would rather just field a ton of awesome fatties that can abuse the **** out of them. For every cheap "weenie" spell that you could field, there's an expensive fatty out there that could also do the job.
Seedborn Muse doesn't seem very good unless you're like trying to go deep with your singleton Omnath or something. Giving your team vigilance isn't really worth a card, especially if it's just a small creature that can easily die to random crossfire.
Eternal Witness seems meh in your deck. She doesn't have many great Regrowth targets, and you have no way to recur her (i.e. Genesis). She's a solid card but only if you have something worth getting back (Survival of the Fittest and Defense of the Heart come to mind). I'm not overly convinced that you do.
Guilds of Ravnica - Commander 2018 - Core 2019 - Battlebond - Dominaria - Rivals of Ixalan - Ixalan - Commander 2017 - Hour of Devastation - Amonket - Aether Revolt - Commander 2016 - Kaladesh - Conspiracy 2 - Eldritch Moon - Shadows Over Innistrad - Oath of the Gatewatch - Commander 2015 - Battle for Zendikar - Magic Origins - Dragons of Tarkir
Green - Blue - Red - White - Gold
Removal is often something that weaker play in our meta because it gives them the illusion of doing better. I mean, they survive slightly longer after all. Still, all that ever does is delay the inevitable, because every threat from the better players is so strong that they all end the game. You may stop 1 or 2, but you still eventually go down. That is, removal tends to be a "trap." It doesn't actually make your weak deck better, it just keeps you in the game slightly longer. I've never seen a person with a bunch of maindecked removal go on to win the game. Now, they will almost always "take out" one other player (not literally but figuratively) since it's very hard to recover from massive setbacks and so if people destroy your **** you'll probably lose, but the idea here is that the person who destroyed it all doesn't then will the game either. The guy who wins is the guy who didn't get hated on and does whatever broken thing he's trying to do. Removal doesn't win the game, it lets you decide who loses the game.
EDIT: Bear in mind that none of this applies to decks that naturally synergize with powerful removal spells. I routinely put Grave Pact into my decks with Reassembling Skeleton + Bloodghast + Skullclamp because it keeps the field clear, for free, while I'm naturally drawing a ton of cards. My small, 1 time investment of 4 mana nets me insane card advnatage in the long run by slowly destroying my opponents' fields. I've played with plenty of Red decks that use cards like Flamebreak and Earthquake primarily because they hurt players, but don't argue when they just so happen to clear the field. If you can work strong removal into your deck's natural gameplan, then I don't mind it. There's a reason why I suggested Tornado Elemental and Woodfall Primus to pair with cards like Defense of the Heart and Cream of the Crop. I don't like playing Beast Within for Beast Within's sake when the deck in no way synergizes with the card. The cards that I suggested work with my previous suggestions to build a synergistic deck that works with itself. Every card matters, and every card works towards the goal of playing "infinite fatties" (more or less). I don't want to use a 1-for-1 instant that can't be tutored for/cheated into play via Lurking Predators when there are solid cards that can. Let's just be clear on that distinction.
If you have some solid counterarguments, different takes on removal, by all means. I'm willing to defend my point of view after playing multiplayer almost exclusively for the past 6 years, but I'm also willing to acknowledge the experiences of other players.
Guilds of Ravnica - Commander 2018 - Core 2019 - Battlebond - Dominaria - Rivals of Ixalan - Ixalan - Commander 2017 - Hour of Devastation - Amonket - Aether Revolt - Commander 2016 - Kaladesh - Conspiracy 2 - Eldritch Moon - Shadows Over Innistrad - Oath of the Gatewatch - Commander 2015 - Battle for Zendikar - Magic Origins - Dragons of Tarkir
Green - Blue - Red - White - Gold
As for 'weak decks run removal', I could not disagree with this statement more. I have played a lot of multiplayer for the last 10 years, and most often the game state will end up with 1 player with a dominant board position, usually with 1 or 2 key permanents. Stuff like beast within, which has no real drawback is key for controlling this lead player's setup and giving everyone a chance to come back and take him down. Yes, I could try and rely on my opponents doing this work for me but I am not a gambling kind of person and I like to have the options to deal with things myself. As for card disadvantage, there are a bajillion options out there of removal as cantrips if that is your biggest concern. Synergy has nothing to do with removal, so not sure why you even brought that up. Removal is an answer, and does not need to synergize with anything if it does its job well.
Perhaps the best arguments for removal can be seen in the EDH/commander multiplayer forums, as almost all top decks there run some form of removal for creatures and all other permanents. Basically I don't know of any top EDH decks that don't run removal of some kind.
Big misconception. We played 6 games the other night. More players doesn't mean longer games insofar as the players know what they're doing. Everyone plays with fast decks that do broken things such as playing a Hive Mind and following it with multiple Pact of the Titans and whatnot. Games do not last long. People typically attribute multiplayer games to long, grindy games since people usually build decks with creatures and removal. Yes, those decks lead to big stalemates and tons of board resets. Those games run long. In metas where any given person will Tinker out Darksteel Colossus on turn 2, or Show and Tell an Emrakul, the Aeons Torn out, games do not run long. Our record so far is 14 games in one night, and that's not playing until 7am or anything. We all have jobs and other responsibilities, so we're not just staying up until all hours playing Magic.
This goes back to my "free rider" problem. I don't want to give "everyone" a chance, I want to give "me" a chance to win. When you "take down" the lead player, all that does is create a new lead player. You're now down cards, and probably have to find an answer to the new King on the block. The idea here is removal is only ever helping you tread water, but may give other players a legitimate shot to win. Again, I think of removal as cards that "let you decide who loses," not cards that "let you win the game."
My EDH decks definitely all have removal. I don't agree with this argument though. EDH isn't like other formats. EDH decks are very big and very inconsistent. You can't reliably do X by turn X like you can in other formats. Since some decks can do things with a turn 1 Sol Ring to set up Erayo locks or whatever on the 3rd turn, you sometimes need access to removal. In normal multiplayer, that's not the case. You can just build a deck that also wins on turns 3-4 with consistency. In EDH, you can't say anything with certainty, so sometimes you do need an out to a turn 2-3 Erayo + tons of spells. You can't look at one very special format and make blanket claims about all multiplayer play. That's not a fair assessment. EDH is very different from normal formats/normal Magic. It breaks basically every rule when it comes to deckbuilding.
Guilds of Ravnica - Commander 2018 - Core 2019 - Battlebond - Dominaria - Rivals of Ixalan - Ixalan - Commander 2017 - Hour of Devastation - Amonket - Aether Revolt - Commander 2016 - Kaladesh - Conspiracy 2 - Eldritch Moon - Shadows Over Innistrad - Oath of the Gatewatch - Commander 2015 - Battle for Zendikar - Magic Origins - Dragons of Tarkir
Green - Blue - Red - White - Gold
Basically the decks in my signature plus another ~8-10 paper deck's I haven't listed. I provide all the cards and decks for my playgroup with the exception of 2-3 players who run at max 2 different decks each. We generally play 5 person games at a very casual level with lots of beer and laughs. Player skill ranges from Beginner to Very Experienced but no Pros or real combo players. That's why I can generally afford to under-power a lot of my decks, or not use ideal cards that cost me a ton of money.
On that note, fixed up the OP to resemble what I have now. I liked the interaction between Lurking Predators and Cream of the Crop, but my LGS only had 1 copy of each.
Multiplayer:
MonoBlack
Mono-Red
Cycling
Crush of Wurms
Zoo
Immortal Coil
Control
Reanimator
Mono-G
Cruel Ascension
Landfall
Esper Spirits/Tokens
Phantom Vigor
Not Explicitly Multiplayer:
Allies
Bant
Artifacts