I could see Wall of Roots being a decent substitution for STE if you're seeing lots of aggro like goblins. I wish Wall of Blossoms was Modern legal. Some UW Control lists run Wall of Omens so why can't we? lol
I think a huge Goyf is something we're going to have a hard time stopping early game and we may just have to stall until we get down an Acidic Slime or Hornet Queen. I think an interesting sideboard card to test out would be Hornet Nest. Its not necessarily good against decks that run removal like Path to Exile or Terminate but I could see it being helpful in match-ups with lots of creature combat or damaged based removal.
Noble Hierarch Should that be one of our Dorks? Since it speeds up the clock early? I know it's pricey, but is it a strictly better Elvish Mystic for us?
Yes, Noble is mostly a better option than Mystic. She can't chump and kill an X/1 like the other elves can but is that really a big concern? lol
If you've got them, surely make the substitution. But I don't think the Exalted trigger is worth the current ~$80 per copy price tag (at least for someone like me who is playing on a semi-budget) if you don't already own them.
Mystic is used over noble because it can be used for chip damage when its not ramping, and pendlehaven can either make one swing for 2, or save it from, say, a collective brutality. However, if you're not using pendehaven, then an argument could be made for running heirarchs instead. Those exalted triggers really stack up.
Predator Ooze has been doing good work against decks without White. He just straight blanks things like Foundry Street Denizen and Death's Shadow. Garruk hasn't come down enough to form an opinion.
As for the Temur Sabertooth over the Stampeding Serow... Sometimes he's amazing because they kill what you'd like to keep playing. Sometimes he sucks because it's 2 more mana to cast something again... My spiciest play was against a Sliver deck where everything was flying. I had a Boat load of mana thanks to Nykthos, so I bounced Cloudthresher and replayed it twice. THAT cleared the board.
It seems like there is a lot of Aggro in the current meta. Just a quick look at MTGGoldfish's Metagame page, it shows that Humans, Affinity, and BR Hollow One are the three top decks percentage-wise. MTGTop8 has Aggro at 53% in the last two months but it seems like that number may be a bit skewed since it has Jund and a few other Midrange decks sprinkled into the list. Even so, it looks like decks are looking to close out the game faster overall.
I think that unless we see a rise in decks that hate out Humans and Hollow One we're going to have to either shelve the deck or tune it to better deal with aggression. I'd really prefer not to ditch the deck though. Unfortunately Green has very little in terms of removal and the best we've got to work with now is Dismember and Beast Within unless we want to start incorporating some fight spells (Prey Upon, Epic Confrontation, etc.) but frankly, our creatures aren't that great for 'fighting' -- except for Acidic Slime. The other option would be branching into another color and I'm worried that if we do that, we might as well start building Ponza or GBx lists....
Something I stumbled upon that looks cool (but is most likely too janky/has too many moving parts) is Frontier Siege. On Khans we can gain up to 4 extra mana per turn. On Dragons we can turn a Hornet Queen into a tutorable sweeper. If you run Hornet Nest as an aggro roadblock, you can turn those Insects into removal too. Obviously there's the downside of only applying to flying creatures. Maybe Destructor Dragon can be thrown in as an additional Bramblecrush effect. Sounds cool but I could see this throwing off our main gameplan. Still, its fun to throw some new ideas out there
I get run over by things like Hollow One and Combo. Combo seems BRUTAL because they can usually go off even if we get a LD spell cast, or they just keep playing lands and stalling until we miss a LD and THEN go. Specifically Storm and Devoted Druid...
Anything with Remand seems to be a 50/50, but I can sometimes bait them out. D&T and Burn/Mono Red are tough if they get a good start.
Agreed that aggro has always been the crux to this deck as it uses minimal lands to succeed. Mono Red was actually getting easier with things like Trinisphere, and life gain in the form of Primal Command, or even Thragtusk. Hollow One has really become a thorn in our side, and I even made a RG version which included Vengevine because Mono Green was not holding up lately on MTGO. That all being said, I think for Mono Green to succeed in the current meta, we would need to morph it into more of a Devotion type deck.
I am currently working on a deck that uses Ballista's, counters, and Rabid Bite. This theme compounded with life gain, should allow us time to get our some serious finishers.
Sorry, was not trying to get off this threads topic, but I think Mono Green can still prevail in the new meta world.. We just have to adapt!
I'm using a bunch of Obstinate Baloths in the sideboard to bring in against some of these more aggressive decks. I'll usually substitute out a bunch of LD spells (and Root Maze in my build) since they don't do as well punishing the decks that only need a few lands. I haven't really played much against Hollow One but it seems like Grafdigger's Cage could help against the recursion aspect of their deck. Seems like we have main deck cards that can already answer the actual Hollow Ones like Reclaiming Vines and Acidic Slime. But if they get enough HOs/Flameblade Adepts out early we may just be too slow. Baloth seems like a decent sideboard card against them too. He gains life to counteract the aggression, is a 4/4 to trade with Hollow One, and is basically cast for free if you get hit with a Burning Inquiry
Curious to hear what you're working on. Sounds like it could be something with Hardened Scales perhaps...? Nature's Way seems like it would be strictly better than Rabid Bite for your new brew. Maybe give that a try.
I think going towards a Devotion-centric deck doesn't really allow for many LD spells/resource denial, which is my personal favorite aspect of the deck. Since you'd need permanents to stay on the battlefield in order to increase the Devotion count you'd probably want more creatures, planeswalkers, and/or enchantments rather than Instants or Sorceries. Seems like with this style you'd also be leaning more towards a Ramp deck of sorts rather than a Control deck. Either way, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on how you'd morph the deck to make it a more Devotion-based Control style.
For those who aren't aware, someone on r/ModernMagic subreddit asked about the current state of Mono Green Control. Neilson chimed in and mentioned that he plans on taking his most recent build to his regionals on June 2nd. Hopefully we'll get an update soon afterwards.
Another interesting note -- Neilson brought up trying out Silent Arbiter, a card I don't think anyone here has considered yet. Could be a good blocker able to slow down some of the more aggressive decks. KCommand is a popular card though and an easy way to kill Arbiter.
What do you all think of Pulse of Murasa in this shell? Low cost, instant, just about hit's Primal Command's life mode, and great synergy with Eternal Witness (another loop that's cheaper/instant, though not as flexible as command). Pulse also sits just outside of Trinisphere range. I think it would give lots of options and some pretty strong early game defense.
Think something very basic like:
T1 Forest + Dork/Sprawl (Fairly common)
T2 Forest + Sakura-Tribe Elder (Ready for block/sac)
T3 Forest + Pulse (hit sac'd STEve) + STEve (Additional block/sac)
So that's potentially 6 life + 2 blocks worth of damage + ramp just for this simple line.
Primal Command is amazing but it doesn't start its thing until mid game+. I think Pulse of Murasa could be a great supplement for surviving early on when command isn't being abused yet.
I mean, I like the idea of Pulse but I have a feeling its just too slow -- at least as a mainboard card. The lifegain is great against stuff like Burn and can help gain enough time to stabilize. If you decide to run it, you may also want to run Fetches so you have something else to get back from the 'yard.
Lately I've been thinking back on something that was said earlier in the thread: Our ultimate goal should be to get to 4/5 mana as quickly as possible so we can immediately start taking opponents off lands. Obviously the nuts is going T2 Acid-Moss but if we aren't hitting 4 mana on Turn 2 I think we need to consider our Plan B to be setting up a 5 mana play on Turn 3. Trinisphere is a good card for our deck but sometimes dropping it T2 feels so sub-optimal. Yes, if you're on the play T2 Trini is very painful for the opponent and buys us a free turn. But if we're on the draw many times its not quite not enough to stop an opponent from having the mana for their next play. And afterwards it feels like we've thrown away our turn and aren't any closer to setting up our lock. I've been thinking we may want another 3-drop to play either beside Trinisphere or in place of it so we can have an alternative play on T2 if we don't get 4 mana, don't have Trini, or if Trini isn't a good turn 2 play.
Some cards I've been thinking about:
Beneath the Sands -- A little more expensive ramp than stuff like Rampant Growth but its still mostly a Turn 2 play for our deck. Not exactly a dead card in the late game like a lot of ramp spells (typical issue for decks like us) because we can cycle it away.
Edge of Autumn -- Very similar to BtS. Still playable T2 if our T1 dork gets taken out early. Cycling it away is basically free as long as we're in a position where we have plenty of lands/mana. Downsides are that it can only really be played for lands on the first 4/5 turns and that sacrificing a land could possibly come back to bite us if we're not careful.
Heartbeat of Spring -- Dropping this on T2 can potentially get us 6+ mana on T3 and 8+ mana on T4 as long as we're hitting land drops and/or have an Arbor Elf out. That's close to Tron status and it essentially catapults us into our late-game strategy. Pretty huge downside in that the opponent gets the effect too.
Vernal Bloom (Not a T2/3-CMC play but at least an honorable mention in my eyes) -- I would love for this to fit into the deck but I think it just doesn't have a good slot in our curve. We're getting the same upside as Heartbeat but opponents are less likely to benefit. There are 5 Forests listed in the top 50 of MTGTop8's list of most played lands in Modern
Extraplanar Lens -- Similar to the two above but also applies to a specific land name and almost all of our lands are basic Forests. Downsides are that we're sacrificing a land and its an artifact that can catch some hate from cards like Kolaghan's Command, Nature's Claim, Abrade, and others that are seeing play because of Hollow One
Overgrowth -- I don't think I like adding in more Sprawl effects (since they become almost useless drawn in the late game) but if we're counting on having at least 3 mana on Turn 2 then Overgrowth probably nets us more mana than adding Fertile Ground.
Awakening Zone -- Pumping out free one-use mana dorks/chump blockers could be decent
...and many others. These are just what I thought seemed most viable.
Anyway, I've just felt like T2/3 mana is a common place for us to potentially stumble in the early game and had been thinking of ways that we could potentially shore up any spots in the deck where we're vulnerable or too slow. If we do go the route with one/some of the cards above, I am a bit concerned about flooding our draws with too much ramp. Fortunately, I think we have the ability to go somewhat thin on threats thanks to Primal Command. The ability to search for any creature means we can sort of play a toolbox-style threat package and pick and choose what we need based on our match-ups. It may just be that we need to figure out a good ratio of Ramp vs. Gameplan cards.
Happy to hear your thoughts. Lets keep this thread active!
Already running azusa and it seems like a nice complimentary package to eternal command.
You could take it a step further with that new card that hits a/e and let's you play an additional land for 1g... Along with black disruption to get you there.
Root Maze is really nice against opponent playing lots of fetch/shocks. Hell, even just a few fetch/shocks. Fetching is essentially delayed two turns -- one to wait for the fetchland to untap and another to wait for the fetched land to untap. Also nice when bouncing lands back with Plow Under and Primal Command since they can't immediately get value with the land once its re-drawn. All that being said, its almost useless if not in our hand for the first few turns of the game. I sort of have the same opinion with Trinisphere, although sometimes having multiples of Trini is good in case an opponent tries to remove the first copy from the battlefield. I thought about maybe putting a list together that could have ways to get rid of multiples like Smuggler's Copter or Azor's Gateway.
Personally, I don't think you need BOTH speed and slowing an opponent down because at some point you need actual payoffs/threats in the deck and adding more 'setup' seems like it'll dilute the deck. I mean, a lot of times even now it feels like there's always a decent chance we draw the 'wrong half of our deck'. And frankly, a lot of decks can play through Spreading Seas, Sea's Claim, and even Blood Moon already and I think you're better off taking lands off the table completely than trying to depend on mana screw.
If you intend on splashing Blue, I don't think you want to run Root Maze. I'd imagine whatever iteration you'd want to build would have some amount of fetches and duals like Misty Rainforest and Breeding Pool and as we've spoken about above, Maze significantly punishes fetching.
Meh, I feel like Choke is just redundant. We're already geared to take an opponent off lands and it just seems like siding this in is just too much. I think I'd rather have something like Carnage Tyrant to come in against control. Worst case scenario, even getting Tyrant Cryptic Command-tapped every start of Combat can open up areas where we can punish them for tapping out.
Already running azusa and it seems like a nice complimentary package to eternal command.
You could take it a step further with that new card that hits a/e and let's you play an additional land for 1g... Along with black disruption to get you there.
Gaining life is nice but a lot of the time it just postpones the inevitable unless you can pose a threat in the meantime. I also really don't see what Dark Heart of the Wood really adds as an endgame/wincon. It seems to me like something better for lifegain would be things like Thragtusk or Kitchen Finks. These are not only threats but are rather resilient and can also be tutored with Primal Command(which also gains life).
I think if you're looking for a decklist with Ramunap Excavator and Azusa, Lost but Seeking, I think you'd be wanting to loop Ghost Quarters, Field of Ruins, and/or Tectonic Edges. Unfortunately, stacking a deck with a lot of non-Forests is going to make it harder to get consistent use out of Arbor Elf and Utopia Sprawl and I think you'd want cards like Tireless Tracker that take advantage of recurring lands but I think thats wandering into the territory of making a totally different deck a la GW 'Value Town'
I just discovered this deck and think it looks like a blast to play. I currently run Amulet Titan and love the green ramp element. With that do you think Explore has a place in this deck to filter a land and replace it potentially with another land/gas. Either is good and ramps you as well. Seems like a great fit in this deck. But I love what you have done and am looking to get the pieces currently.
I just discovered this deck and think it looks like a blast to play. I currently run Amulet Titan and love the green ramp element. With that do you think Explore has a place in this deck to filter a land and replace it potentially with another land/gas. Either is good and ramps you as well. Seems like a great fit in this deck. But I love what you have done and am looking to get the pieces currently.
In the build I'm currently using, I've chosen to run no two-mana cards in order to try and lead to a higher chance of a turn 2 play. I used to run Sakura-Tribe Elder, but going to 11 1-mana ramp cards and a variable number of Simian Spirit Guides has given me a higher chance of either turn 2 Trinisphere or turn 2 Mwonvuli Acid-Moss/Bramblecrush. I've got Vivien Reid and Primal Command as late-game gas finders. Thanks for your continued interest in the growth of Mono Green Control. Tell me if you have any success with it, me and anyone else who chooses to play this deck are interested in potential improvements in our game play/deck building.
I appreciate the reply. I am currently testing 2 versions of this in Untap with one being very close to your list and another I am messing with. Do you have a current version to link to in the main thread? Interested to see where you are at. I like the Hornet Queen MD and have Trinisphere in the side currently. Are you running this main? I agree with the 2 drop statement usually we have 3 mana at that point. And I am currently running 4x Sakura so I would love to hear what you replaced those with.
Did you considered a white splash for Ghostly Prison (and more)? Maybe this can improve your MU against tribal decks. Just need some fetch lands and a Temple Garden I guess.
I think a huge Goyf is something we're going to have a hard time stopping early game and we may just have to stall until we get down an Acidic Slime or Hornet Queen. I think an interesting sideboard card to test out would be Hornet Nest. Its not necessarily good against decks that run removal like Path to Exile or Terminate but I could see it being helpful in match-ups with lots of creature combat or damaged based removal.
Affinity
GR Eggs GR
UR Storm UR
BR Hollow One BR
WUR Cheerios WUR
G Mono-Green Control G
If you've got them, surely make the substitution. But I don't think the Exalted trigger is worth the current ~$80 per copy price tag (at least for someone like me who is playing on a semi-budget) if you don't already own them.
18 Forest
1 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
Ramp
4 Arbor Elf
1 Elvish Mystic
1 Llanowar Elves
2 Sakura-Tribe Elder
4 Utopia Sprawl
2 Wall of Roots
Land Destruction/Removal
2 Bramblecrush
4 Mwonvuli Acid-Moss
3 Acidic Slime
2 Plow Under
4 Primal Command
3 Eternal Witness
2 Lifecrafter's Bestiary
1 Stampeding Wildebeests
1 Temur Sabertooth
Threats
1 Garruk Wildspeaker
1 Predator Ooze
2 Walking Ballista
1 Hornet Queen
1 Boseiju, Who Shelters All
1 Cloudthresher
1 Fracturing Gust
2 Obstinate Baloth
1 Steel Hellkite
2 Scavenging Ooze
2 Thragtusk
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
1 Tormod's Crypt
2 Trinisphere
1 Troll Ascetic
Predator Ooze has been doing good work against decks without White. He just straight blanks things like Foundry Street Denizen and Death's Shadow. Garruk hasn't come down enough to form an opinion.
As for the Temur Sabertooth over the Stampeding Serow... Sometimes he's amazing because they kill what you'd like to keep playing. Sometimes he sucks because it's 2 more mana to cast something again... My spiciest play was against a Sliver deck where everything was flying. I had a Boat load of mana thanks to Nykthos, so I bounced Cloudthresher and replayed it twice. THAT cleared the board.
Affinity
GR Eggs GR
UR Storm UR
BR Hollow One BR
WUR Cheerios WUR
G Mono-Green Control G
It seems like there is a lot of Aggro in the current meta. Just a quick look at MTGGoldfish's Metagame page, it shows that Humans, Affinity, and BR Hollow One are the three top decks percentage-wise. MTGTop8 has Aggro at 53% in the last two months but it seems like that number may be a bit skewed since it has Jund and a few other Midrange decks sprinkled into the list. Even so, it looks like decks are looking to close out the game faster overall.
I think that unless we see a rise in decks that hate out Humans and Hollow One we're going to have to either shelve the deck or tune it to better deal with aggression. I'd really prefer not to ditch the deck though. Unfortunately Green has very little in terms of removal and the best we've got to work with now is Dismember and Beast Within unless we want to start incorporating some fight spells (Prey Upon, Epic Confrontation, etc.) but frankly, our creatures aren't that great for 'fighting' -- except for Acidic Slime. The other option would be branching into another color and I'm worried that if we do that, we might as well start building Ponza or GBx lists....
Something I stumbled upon that looks cool (but is most likely too janky/has too many moving parts) is Frontier Siege. On Khans we can gain up to 4 extra mana per turn. On Dragons we can turn a Hornet Queen into a tutorable sweeper. If you run Hornet Nest as an aggro roadblock, you can turn those Insects into removal too. Obviously there's the downside of only applying to flying creatures. Maybe Destructor Dragon can be thrown in as an additional Bramblecrush effect. Sounds cool but I could see this throwing off our main gameplan. Still, its fun to throw some new ideas out there
Anything with Remand seems to be a 50/50, but I can sometimes bait them out. D&T and Burn/Mono Red are tough if they get a good start.
Affinity
GR Eggs GR
UR Storm UR
BR Hollow One BR
WUR Cheerios WUR
G Mono-Green Control G
Agreed that aggro has always been the crux to this deck as it uses minimal lands to succeed. Mono Red was actually getting easier with things like Trinisphere, and life gain in the form of Primal Command, or even Thragtusk. Hollow One has really become a thorn in our side, and I even made a RG version which included Vengevine because Mono Green was not holding up lately on MTGO. That all being said, I think for Mono Green to succeed in the current meta, we would need to morph it into more of a Devotion type deck.
I am currently working on a deck that uses Ballista's, counters, and Rabid Bite. This theme compounded with life gain, should allow us time to get our some serious finishers.
Sorry, was not trying to get off this threads topic, but I think Mono Green can still prevail in the new meta world.. We just have to adapt!
Curious to hear what you're working on. Sounds like it could be something with Hardened Scales perhaps...? Nature's Way seems like it would be strictly better than Rabid Bite for your new brew. Maybe give that a try.
I think going towards a Devotion-centric deck doesn't really allow for many LD spells/resource denial, which is my personal favorite aspect of the deck. Since you'd need permanents to stay on the battlefield in order to increase the Devotion count you'd probably want more creatures, planeswalkers, and/or enchantments rather than Instants or Sorceries. Seems like with this style you'd also be leaning more towards a Ramp deck of sorts rather than a Control deck. Either way, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on how you'd morph the deck to make it a more Devotion-based Control style.
Affinity
GR Eggs GR
UR Storm UR
BR Hollow One BR
WUR Cheerios WUR
G Mono-Green Control G
Another interesting note -- Neilson brought up trying out Silent Arbiter, a card I don't think anyone here has considered yet. Could be a good blocker able to slow down some of the more aggressive decks. KCommand is a popular card though and an easy way to kill Arbiter.
Outdated Mafia Stats
Affinity
GR Eggs GR
UR Storm UR
BR Hollow One BR
WUR Cheerios WUR
G Mono-Green Control G
Think something very basic like:
T1 Forest + Dork/Sprawl (Fairly common)
T2 Forest + Sakura-Tribe Elder (Ready for block/sac)
T3 Forest + Pulse (hit sac'd STEve) + STEve (Additional block/sac)
So that's potentially 6 life + 2 blocks worth of damage + ramp just for this simple line.
Primal Command is amazing but it doesn't start its thing until mid game+. I think Pulse of Murasa could be a great supplement for surviving early on when command isn't being abused yet.
Lately I've been thinking back on something that was said earlier in the thread: Our ultimate goal should be to get to 4/5 mana as quickly as possible so we can immediately start taking opponents off lands. Obviously the nuts is going T2 Acid-Moss but if we aren't hitting 4 mana on Turn 2 I think we need to consider our Plan B to be setting up a 5 mana play on Turn 3. Trinisphere is a good card for our deck but sometimes dropping it T2 feels so sub-optimal. Yes, if you're on the play T2 Trini is very painful for the opponent and buys us a free turn. But if we're on the draw many times its not quite not enough to stop an opponent from having the mana for their next play. And afterwards it feels like we've thrown away our turn and aren't any closer to setting up our lock. I've been thinking we may want another 3-drop to play either beside Trinisphere or in place of it so we can have an alternative play on T2 if we don't get 4 mana, don't have Trini, or if Trini isn't a good turn 2 play.
Some cards I've been thinking about:
Anyway, I've just felt like T2/3 mana is a common place for us to potentially stumble in the early game and had been thinking of ways that we could potentially shore up any spots in the deck where we're vulnerable or too slow. If we do go the route with one/some of the cards above, I am a bit concerned about flooding our draws with too much ramp. Fortunately, I think we have the ability to go somewhat thin on threats thanks to Primal Command. The ability to search for any creature means we can sort of play a toolbox-style threat package and pick and choose what we need based on our match-ups. It may just be that we need to figure out a good ratio of Ramp vs. Gameplan cards.
Happy to hear your thoughts. Lets keep this thread active!
root maze: It crushes fetches, but how does this interact with painlands?
sea's claim
spreading seas
choke: cause screw blue
anyone experimented with something like this?
Heart of the Dark Wood and ramunap Excavator
Already running azusa and it seems like a nice complimentary package to eternal command.
You could take it a step further with that new card that hits a/e and let's you play an additional land for 1g... Along with black disruption to get you there.
As I mentioned somewhere in another thread, one of the versions I've tried (and one of my favorites) runs 3 Root Maze in the main:
3 Treetop Village
4 Arbor Elf
1 Elvish Mystic
1 Llanowar Elves
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
4 Eternal Witness
1 Stampeding Wildebeests
3 Acidic Slime
2 Cloudthresher
4 Utopia Sprawl
1 Bramblecrush
4 Mwonvuli Acid-Moss
1 Reclaiming Vines
3 Plow Under
4 Primal Command
Root Maze is really nice against opponent playing lots of fetch/shocks. Hell, even just a few fetch/shocks. Fetching is essentially delayed two turns -- one to wait for the fetchland to untap and another to wait for the fetched land to untap. Also nice when bouncing lands back with Plow Under and Primal Command since they can't immediately get value with the land once its re-drawn. All that being said, its almost useless if not in our hand for the first few turns of the game. I sort of have the same opinion with Trinisphere, although sometimes having multiples of Trini is good in case an opponent tries to remove the first copy from the battlefield. I thought about maybe putting a list together that could have ways to get rid of multiples like Smuggler's Copter or Azor's Gateway.
Personally, I don't think you need BOTH speed and slowing an opponent down because at some point you need actual payoffs/threats in the deck and adding more 'setup' seems like it'll dilute the deck. I mean, a lot of times even now it feels like there's always a decent chance we draw the 'wrong half of our deck'. And frankly, a lot of decks can play through Spreading Seas, Sea's Claim, and even Blood Moon already and I think you're better off taking lands off the table completely than trying to depend on mana screw.
If you intend on splashing Blue, I don't think you want to run Root Maze. I'd imagine whatever iteration you'd want to build would have some amount of fetches and duals like Misty Rainforest and Breeding Pool and as we've spoken about above, Maze significantly punishes fetching.
Meh, I feel like Choke is just redundant. We're already geared to take an opponent off lands and it just seems like siding this in is just too much. I think I'd rather have something like Carnage Tyrant to come in against control. Worst case scenario, even getting Tyrant Cryptic Command-tapped every start of Combat can open up areas where we can punish them for tapping out.
Gaining life is nice but a lot of the time it just postpones the inevitable unless you can pose a threat in the meantime. I also really don't see what Dark Heart of the Wood really adds as an endgame/wincon. It seems to me like something better for lifegain would be things like Thragtusk or Kitchen Finks. These are not only threats but are rather resilient and can also be tutored with Primal Command(which also gains life).
I think if you're looking for a decklist with Ramunap Excavator and Azusa, Lost but Seeking, I think you'd be wanting to loop Ghost Quarters, Field of Ruins, and/or Tectonic Edges. Unfortunately, stacking a deck with a lot of non-Forests is going to make it harder to get consistent use out of Arbor Elf and Utopia Sprawl and I think you'd want cards like Tireless Tracker that take advantage of recurring lands but I think thats wandering into the territory of making a totally different deck a la GW 'Value Town'
In the build I'm currently using, I've chosen to run no two-mana cards in order to try and lead to a higher chance of a turn 2 play. I used to run Sakura-Tribe Elder, but going to 11 1-mana ramp cards and a variable number of Simian Spirit Guides has given me a higher chance of either turn 2 Trinisphere or turn 2 Mwonvuli Acid-Moss/Bramblecrush. I've got Vivien Reid and Primal Command as late-game gas finders. Thanks for your continued interest in the growth of Mono Green Control. Tell me if you have any success with it, me and anyone else who chooses to play this deck are interested in potential improvements in our game play/deck building.
Affinity
GR Eggs GR
UR Storm UR
BR Hollow One BR
WUR Cheerios WUR
G Mono-Green Control G
https://www.reddit.com/r/ModernMagic/comments/94ke70/mono_green_controls_current_state/