I'm really pumped about this general like no other. This is gonna be great in a deck abusing Exort, gain life and big mana pools in general. I need a cabal coffer+allIsSwamp land now.
What I'd like to add:
More Boon Satyr. They might replace a few Tuskers.
More Deadbridge Goliath, more Kalonian Hydra. Don't know where to cut though.
More Nylea's Disciple in the side.
You make some nice points and the evolve on some creatures is pretty sweet, adding nice synergy with the Kalonian Hydra.
However, Gyre Sage is not real ramp in the sense that turn 2 Sage makes no mana turn 3. It has no counters so you cannot drop that 5/5 on turn 3. Isn't that a big problem?
Turn 3:
Against aggro: depending on whether you have Experiment one or the elf turn 1 you either have 4 mana or likely a 3/3 and a 2/3 to block with.
Against control: same, but instead of blocking you attack for 2 more then a caryatid would before the wipe.
Getting a 3/4 or 4/5 out of your mana dork really helps you out.
-If we lose a monster (big drop) against discard (Thoughtseize or Lifebane Zombie) we might get stuck;
The solution is to play plenty of threats. Sylvan Caryatid and Voyaging Satyr aren't. They are good cards but they don't help you much in a tight spot. Gyre Sage is a preferable ramp. Also the reason why I play 22 lands even though 23-24 might make it easier against control sometimes.
The deck is quite vulnerable to discard and removal, black is a though matchup. That's why I recommend Witchstalker mainboard.
-If we get swept, it takes a lot a hard work to rebuild in the face of more disruption;
Indeed. Planeswalker are pretty good here, but Garruk doesn't come cheap. Also, Nemesis of Mortals and Deadbirdge Goliath. Mutavault is also really great. Having 1 or two is often a pretty threatening clock vs control.
-The first wave is smaller as the Selesnya creatures that come out to play at that point;
My solution to this is playing lots of Evolving creatures (Exp One x4, Gyre Sage x4, Elusive Krasis x2) to start blocking. Nylea's Disciple is also a pretty solid SB card against racing decks, especially Red.
I'm not sold on splashing an other color. At first I though splashing Black might be good for Golgari Charm and other utility, but the manabase is really a strong point of the mono list. I don't like Sylvan Caryatid as I said earlier and Shocklands/Temple either slow you too much or deals damage you can't afford against aggro decks.
I see a lot of Fade into Antiquity in the sideboards and I understand the idea of having a way to deal with Gods...but isn't Bramblecrush just world's better than anything else for that slot? Sure it can't deal with a god but it get's just about everything else, including planeswalkers.
If mana costs are an issue then why not just play Naturalize at instant speed? I just don't see any real reason why it's important to pay an extra mana to exile an enchantment or artifact at sorcery speed.
Seriously, educate me if I'm just flat out wrong at my assessment.
You can see that Gods are a non-neglectable subgroup here. I think Red and White Weenie is a good matchup tough, you don't really need to pack sideboard hate for them. I'd go with Bramblecrush, mainly for UW control. Imagine destroying that 3rd land on your 4 turn to avoid the verdict.
No offense meant, but you couldn't be more wrong. If you watched the SCG Open Cleveland, you probably observed the plethora of Mono green decks featured there, nearly all of them used Nykthos as their primary ramp, it allows this deck to actually work.
I meant in the deck that placed well in a tournament. The mana curve was pretty low and only Polukranos used X cost main board. 4 Mutavault is a much better colorless land to run if you go all in aggro like this.
I personally run 2 Shrines to Nyx in a ramp focused deck with 3 mistcutter hydra and heavy costs.
Reverent hunter + BTE seems to work looking at the results. Something like
1: Elf
2: Exp One, Tusker
3: Exp One, BTE, Hunter
9/9, 3x 2/2, 3/3 on turn 3. I can easily imagine getting an hunter in the 7-10 range pretty soon in this deck. That's why Nylea is a 4-of. You really need trample to get HP dissapearing.
Also, Nykthos has no purpose in this deck. Nykthos doesn't really accelerate you for spells under 5 mana. The only use I can see for it is with Garruk post sideboard to dump your newly drawn cards. A single one might be ok for this purpose since you still have 19 green sources and can't have multiples of the legendary land. Edit: Nykthos only shines with X spells (Polukranos, Mistcutter Hydra). There are mistcutter hydras in the side too but in the matchups where this is sided in (blue) you won't have much devotion with Supreme Verdict.
The problem I have with the bow is that it's a slow card. Barring the synergy with Polukranos, you won't get a big impact on your board position when you play it at first.
Almost everything should already die when it blocks (on turn 4-6 they'll need to block your big baddies if they want some HP left). Getting a counter to win a fight is pricey at 5 mana. Killing a flyer that can block you might come handy but again it's quite pricey.
Of course, it helps a lot with devotion and getting an effect every turn gets good fast. In this aggro variant I'd like better to play a Renagade Krasis for 3 mana or Arbor/Kalonian for 5. It's a solid card in more midrange variants though.
The interaction with Nylea is very good too. Mistcutter becomes unstoppable. It suffers the same problem as the Polukranos combo though, both are legendary and you can't count too much on it.
Also, what's great about running no spells is that Duress doesn't affect you.
Running only creatures at first is a pretty good bet. Giant growth, ranger's guile and bow of Nylea are the main contenders but growth and the bow are quite situational. Guile is to protect the hydra but that's not too good against aggro or red.
The combo of bow + polukranos is nice but relies on 2 legendary. I don't like running more then 2-3 of each so the combo won't come online often enough in the matchup where it matters. I prefer to run it from the side.
Sylvan Caryatid is much worse then Gyre Sage in a slow aggro deck like this where every point of damage matters. Especially with Kalonian Hydra. I still run 1 because I feel I need at least 9 mana acceleration with all the big costs, mistcutter and polukranos. You really need to get 1-2 mana dorks early to get online fast.
Mistcutter is pretty good at triggering evolve too. You can drop it for 3-4 to evolve the gyre sages, and everybody.
Kalonian Hydra is so good that I'm pretty sure I need to run a 4th one, dunno where to cut though.
Karametra's Acolyte and Nykthos are beasts in this deck with mistcutter.
Nylea is a 2-of because I need trample but multiples are very bad (it's indestructible after all) and depending on matchups it's a very hit-or miss creature.
Deadbridge goliath and polukranos fit very well the 4 drop being 5/5, deadbridge is also quite solid against control.
Arbor Collossus is a beast. You need him for stormbreath dragon, otherwise you get slaugthered. Definitely a 3-4 of post side if reach is rellevant. I don't like the 2/2 flash for this purpose. It dies to everything and small flyers should not be a problem since you race faster.
Witchstalker is definitely the next card I want to include. I wasn't sold on him at first but I can forsee black being a very difficult matchup with thoughseize, lifebane zombie and removal that doesn't care about the size of things. Might replace boon satyr. The satyr hasn't proven itself too much, especially being a 3-of. Might go to only 1 for combat tricks.
Big mention to Nemesis of Mortals. This card is your get out of jail card against board wipe.
Good sideboard card in green based aggro deck post board wipe. Allows you to have a considerable threat even if you lose your mana acceleration. Especially good in decks that also run Nylea.
Omenspeaker and Returned Phalanx are the only cards that will prevent this from being an expensive Fog against aggro and midrange.
A bit of a threat against control. Will any control not play Hero's Downfall though? You really need the ultimate after 5 turns, exiling cards is only midly annoying. Might be good enough at exiling finishers to be a sideboard card.
I also don't get the thing with Giant Adephage. Isn't Kalonian Hydra almost strictly better? Attacks for 8 that doubles each turn, trample, 2 less mana cost. He's harder to remove after he hits, blocks better turn 1 and can hit through deathtouch but I'm not sure that's worth 2 mana.
Also playing Worldspine Wurm is cool but that's hard to do without Garruk and it's a bit overkill. There's probably a better target that's more castable and just as hard to remove.
Reverent hunter is quite like a cheaper mistcutter hydra without haste. He can pretty often be a bad draw if you aren't already in a winning position. I wouldn't play him unless we get more GGG goodies later like Predator Ooze.
I feel like decks are forgetting Mutavault. It's a good card to chumpblock or trade mid game. I only play 4 colorless though to avoid the rare case of 1 forest no elf into Tusker.
Gyre Sage feels more solid then the Caryatid since the whole deck enable it. Hexproof is a marginal improvement since they'll run out of spot removal and you don't need ramp that badly. Blocking 2 damage early on isn't that much of a big deal either, especially with the red pump floating around that could be dangerous. The choice is still quite metagame dependent, hence why I play both.
2 Polukranos is on the low side but without the Bow more isn't worth it. I consider the bow to be pretty lackluster without trample. You'll already kill most of the blockers and the ability is slow. Not worth wasting a turn or a card slot unless you really need to kill stuff with Polukranos, sideboard card if I deem it needed.
Deadbridge is non-legend Polukranos with post-board-wipe enabling. Good at racing, good at blocking, good at evolving, good vs control. Still ok vs Ooze.
Karametra's Acolyte + Garruk is VERY nice vs midrange. Loads of mana to deploy an army every turn. Sided out vs control.
I wish I could play more Nylea but I just can't find space. Trample isn't too critical in this list with a lot of creatures and only 2 Mistcutter Hydra. Might cut a Deadbridge Goliath for a second one.
2 Kalonian Hydra/2 Colossus seems right to often get what you need from Garruk at least.
Singleton Guile to make the opponent wary.
Nemesis of Mortals sound very promising against board wipes, something devotion doesn't like. Probably an attacking 10/10 on turn 6 if they wipe turn 4.
Garruk is something I wouldn't like to draw too many of against aggro but against anything else more is better.
What I like about this list is that you can try almost all the cards to see what shines the most. Also the opponent never gets to know what to expect.
Second prerelease, I opened green for no good green cards, rares that are junk in limited (but with good value) and no bombs at all. I made a joke about using the Rageblood Shaman and build a tribal Minotaur deck.
4 Minotaur Skullcleaver later I won the prerelease with a tricolor WRB aggro deck fueled with 2 Read the bones.
Also topdecked my Blood-Toll Harpy two times right when I was missing that last point of damage to win.
Good times.
First prerelease didn't go as well because I didn't go minotaur and chose blue/black instead.
Opened Ashiok the planeswalker both times too.
4 Elvish Mystic
4 Experiment One
4 Kalonian Tusker
1 Sylvan Caryatid
4 Gyre Sage
1 Boon Satyr
2 Witchstalker
2 Renegade Krasis
1 Karametra's Acolyte
2 Nylea, God of the Hunt
1 Deadbridge Goliath
2 Polukranos, World Eater
3 Kalonian Hydra
2 Arbor Colossus
2 Garruk, Caller of Beasts
2 Mistcutter Hydra
2 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
18 Forest
3 Mutavault
2 Nylea's Disciple
2 Witchstalker
3 Nemesis of Mortals
2 Bow of Nylea
2 Savage Summoning
2 Bramblecrush
1 Arbor Colossus
What I'd like to add:
More Boon Satyr. They might replace a few Tuskers.
More Deadbridge Goliath, more Kalonian Hydra. Don't know where to cut though.
More Nylea's Disciple in the side.
Turn 3:
Against aggro: depending on whether you have Experiment one or the elf turn 1 you either have 4 mana or likely a 3/3 and a 2/3 to block with.
Against control: same, but instead of blocking you attack for 2 more then a caryatid would before the wipe.
Getting a 3/4 or 4/5 out of your mana dork really helps you out.
The solution is to play plenty of threats. Sylvan Caryatid and Voyaging Satyr aren't. They are good cards but they don't help you much in a tight spot. Gyre Sage is a preferable ramp. Also the reason why I play 22 lands even though 23-24 might make it easier against control sometimes.
The deck is quite vulnerable to discard and removal, black is a though matchup. That's why I recommend Witchstalker mainboard.
Indeed. Planeswalker are pretty good here, but Garruk doesn't come cheap. Also, Nemesis of Mortals and Deadbirdge Goliath. Mutavault is also really great. Having 1 or two is often a pretty threatening clock vs control.
My solution to this is playing lots of Evolving creatures (Exp One x4, Gyre Sage x4, Elusive Krasis x2) to start blocking. Nylea's Disciple is also a pretty solid SB card against racing decks, especially Red.
I'm not sold on splashing an other color. At first I though splashing Black might be good for Golgari Charm and other utility, but the manabase is really a strong point of the mono list. I don't like Sylvan Caryatid as I said earlier and Shocklands/Temple either slow you too much or deals damage you can't afford against aggro decks.
You might be on to something. It seems god see very little play. Still, from the top 100 of most used cards in standard you have:
#19 Detention sphere
#60 Unflinching Courage
#70 Spear of Heliod
#72 Purphoros, God of the Forge
#74 Chained to the Rocks
#78 Hammer of Purphoros
#83 Whip of Erebos
#85 Heliod, God of the Sun
#87 Ratchet Bomb
#98 Underworld Connections
#100 Bow of Nylea
You can see that Gods are a non-neglectable subgroup here. I think Red and White Weenie is a good matchup tough, you don't really need to pack sideboard hate for them. I'd go with Bramblecrush, mainly for UW control. Imagine destroying that 3rd land on your 4 turn to avoid the verdict.
I meant in the deck that placed well in a tournament. The mana curve was pretty low and only Polukranos used X cost main board. 4 Mutavault is a much better colorless land to run if you go all in aggro like this.
I personally run 2 Shrines to Nyx in a ramp focused deck with 3 mistcutter hydra and heavy costs.
1: Elf
2: Exp One, Tusker
3: Exp One, BTE, Hunter
9/9, 3x 2/2, 3/3 on turn 3. I can easily imagine getting an hunter in the 7-10 range pretty soon in this deck. That's why Nylea is a 4-of. You really need trample to get HP dissapearing.
Also, Nykthos has no purpose in this deck. Nykthos doesn't really accelerate you for spells under 5 mana. The only use I can see for it is with Garruk post sideboard to dump your newly drawn cards. A single one might be ok for this purpose since you still have 19 green sources and can't have multiples of the legendary land. Edit: Nykthos only shines with X spells (Polukranos, Mistcutter Hydra). There are mistcutter hydras in the side too but in the matchups where this is sided in (blue) you won't have much devotion with Supreme Verdict.
Almost everything should already die when it blocks (on turn 4-6 they'll need to block your big baddies if they want some HP left). Getting a counter to win a fight is pricey at 5 mana. Killing a flyer that can block you might come handy but again it's quite pricey.
Of course, it helps a lot with devotion and getting an effect every turn gets good fast. In this aggro variant I'd like better to play a Renagade Krasis for 3 mana or Arbor/Kalonian for 5. It's a solid card in more midrange variants though.
The interaction with Nylea is very good too. Mistcutter becomes unstoppable. It suffers the same problem as the Polukranos combo though, both are legendary and you can't count too much on it.
Also, what's great about running no spells is that Duress doesn't affect you.
4 Elvish Mystic
4 Experiment One
4 Kalonian Tusker
1 Sylvan Caryatid
4 Gyre Sage
3 Boon Satyr
2 Renegade Krasis
1 Karametra's Acolyte
2 Nylea, God of the Hunt
1 Deadbridge Goliath
2 Polukranos, World Eater
3 Kalonian Hydra
2 Arbor Colossus
1 Garruk, Caller of Beasts
3 Mistcutter Hydra
2 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
19 Forest
2 Mutavault
1 Plummet
1 Witchstalker
1 Primeval Bounty
3 Nemesis of Mortals
1 Deadbridge Goliath
1 Ranger's Guile
1 Savage Summoning
1 Bow of Nylea
1 Scavenging Ooze
2 Sylvan Caryatid
2 Arbor Colossus
Running only creatures at first is a pretty good bet. Giant growth, ranger's guile and bow of Nylea are the main contenders but growth and the bow are quite situational. Guile is to protect the hydra but that's not too good against aggro or red.
The combo of bow + polukranos is nice but relies on 2 legendary. I don't like running more then 2-3 of each so the combo won't come online often enough in the matchup where it matters. I prefer to run it from the side.
Sylvan Caryatid is much worse then Gyre Sage in a slow aggro deck like this where every point of damage matters. Especially with Kalonian Hydra. I still run 1 because I feel I need at least 9 mana acceleration with all the big costs, mistcutter and polukranos. You really need to get 1-2 mana dorks early to get online fast.
Mistcutter is pretty good at triggering evolve too. You can drop it for 3-4 to evolve the gyre sages, and everybody.
Kalonian Hydra is so good that I'm pretty sure I need to run a 4th one, dunno where to cut though.
Karametra's Acolyte and Nykthos are beasts in this deck with mistcutter.
Nylea is a 2-of because I need trample but multiples are very bad (it's indestructible after all) and depending on matchups it's a very hit-or miss creature.
Deadbridge goliath and polukranos fit very well the 4 drop being 5/5, deadbridge is also quite solid against control.
Arbor Collossus is a beast. You need him for stormbreath dragon, otherwise you get slaugthered. Definitely a 3-4 of post side if reach is rellevant. I don't like the 2/2 flash for this purpose. It dies to everything and small flyers should not be a problem since you race faster.
Witchstalker is definitely the next card I want to include. I wasn't sold on him at first but I can forsee black being a very difficult matchup with thoughseize, lifebane zombie and removal that doesn't care about the size of things. Might replace boon satyr. The satyr hasn't proven itself too much, especially being a 3-of. Might go to only 1 for combat tricks.
Big mention to Nemesis of Mortals. This card is your get out of jail card against board wipe.
A bit of a threat against control. Will any control not play Hero's Downfall though? You really need the ultimate after 5 turns, exiling cards is only midly annoying. Might be good enough at exiling finishers to be a sideboard card.
Also playing Worldspine Wurm is cool but that's hard to do without Garruk and it's a bit overkill. There's probably a better target that's more castable and just as hard to remove.
//Main Deck
18 Forest
2 Mutavault
2 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
4 Elvish Mystic
4 Experiment One
4 Kalonian Tusker
3 Gyre Sage
1 Sylvan Caryatid
2 Renegade Krasis
4 Boon Satyr
1 Witchstalker
2 Polukranos, World Eater
3 Deadbridge Goliath
1 Karametra's Acolyte
1 Nylea, God of the Hunt
2 Kalonian Hydra
2 Arbor Colossus
1 Garruk, Caller of Beasts
2 Mistcutter Hydra
1 Ranger's Guile
3 Nemesis of Mortals
3 Pit Fight
1 Ratchet Bomb
2 Fade into Antiquity
1 Arbor Colossus
1 Bow of Nylea
2 Ranger's Guile
1 Witchstalker
1 Garruk, Caller of Beasts
I feel like decks are forgetting Mutavault. It's a good card to chumpblock or trade mid game. I only play 4 colorless though to avoid the rare case of 1 forest no elf into Tusker.
Gyre Sage feels more solid then the Caryatid since the whole deck enable it. Hexproof is a marginal improvement since they'll run out of spot removal and you don't need ramp that badly. Blocking 2 damage early on isn't that much of a big deal either, especially with the red pump floating around that could be dangerous. The choice is still quite metagame dependent, hence why I play both.
2 Polukranos is on the low side but without the Bow more isn't worth it. I consider the bow to be pretty lackluster without trample. You'll already kill most of the blockers and the ability is slow. Not worth wasting a turn or a card slot unless you really need to kill stuff with Polukranos, sideboard card if I deem it needed.
Deadbridge is non-legend Polukranos with post-board-wipe enabling. Good at racing, good at blocking, good at evolving, good vs control. Still ok vs Ooze.
Karametra's Acolyte + Garruk is VERY nice vs midrange. Loads of mana to deploy an army every turn. Sided out vs control.
I wish I could play more Nylea but I just can't find space. Trample isn't too critical in this list with a lot of creatures and only 2 Mistcutter Hydra. Might cut a Deadbridge Goliath for a second one.
2 Kalonian Hydra/2 Colossus seems right to often get what you need from Garruk at least.
Singleton Guile to make the opponent wary.
Nemesis of Mortals sound very promising against board wipes, something devotion doesn't like. Probably an attacking 10/10 on turn 6 if they wipe turn 4.
Garruk is something I wouldn't like to draw too many of against aggro but against anything else more is better.
What I like about this list is that you can try almost all the cards to see what shines the most. Also the opponent never gets to know what to expect.
4 Minotaur Skullcleaver later I won the prerelease with a tricolor WRB aggro deck fueled with 2 Read the bones.
Also topdecked my Blood-Toll Harpy two times right when I was missing that last point of damage to win.
Good times.
First prerelease didn't go as well because I didn't go minotaur and chose blue/black instead.
Opened Ashiok the planeswalker both times too.