So I was working on this week’s Top Decks and my good friend Paul Jordan insisted that I write about the G/W decks that did so well in Honolulu (sorry – you will have to wait until Thursday to read about those if you haven’t seen them yet).
However as you know I am a crazy lunatic when it comes to building decks, and the thought of summoning Thornling was pretty insane to me… I mean imagine Thornling wearing a Behemoth Sledge! I couldn’t get that image out of my brain. So of course I procrastinated tonight and have not as of yet completed my Top Decks article… But I did produce a new deck!
    
G/W Mana Ramp
2 Behemoth Sledge
4 Kitchen Finks
4 Fertile Ground
3 Garruk Wildspeaker
2 Rampant Growth
4 Ajani Goldmane
4 Cloudgoat Ranger
2 Martial Coup
4 Path to Exile
4 Spectral Procession
4 Twilight Shepherd
5 Forest
6 Plains
4 Treetop Village
4 Windbrisk Heights
4 Wooded Bastion
sideboard:
1 Behemoth Sledge
4 Cloudthresher
4 Aura of Silence
4 Hallowed Burial
2 Martial Coup
As you can see Thornling did not actually make the cut, unfortunately 🙁
The mana might need a little bit of work… I’ve had some issues getting my Green when I need it, but nothing serious so far.
The sideboard probably needs lots of work. Rhox Meditant and Captured Sunlight as a combo are probably better than the insane number of overcosted Wrath of God sweepers I have been consistently trying to side in. Hallowed Burial, now that I think of it, is probably kind of dumb relative to good old Wrath of God… I mean I am the one going for the persist combo, right?
Another thought is to reduce the curve a little bit to play Knight of the White Orchid and a set of Borderposts… But I haven’t thought that far into the future yet.
The deck is like halfway between a Jund Mana Ramp deck (note the Garruk Wildspeaker + Fertile Ground goodbadness and G/W Tokens. The Jund side allows me to play Jund-expensive super pricey cards like Martial Coup and Twilight Shepherd; from Tokens side I trade in the Overruns for some more expensive board controlling cards, while completing the Garruk package.
And what about Twilight Shepherd? She hasn’t been seen since G/W Little Kid!
Basically I wanted to integrate the Murderous Redcap-style B/W Persist engine into my deck, and Twilight Shepherd has persist. Meanwhile it is also a nice spell in general! This card has elicited numerous on-the-spot concessions.
Okay, quick testing…
Only five matches tonight (I do have to finish Top Decks, after all).
1. Some Kind of Beatdown
He was playing some kind of beatdown cards. I don’t really know the difference between these decks sometimes. Was it Jund Aggro? It didn’t look like Five-color Blood, anyway. Regardless, super easy.
1-0
2. G/W Tokens
This was a W-L-L.
Game Two I got stuck on three comes-into-play tapped lands (Treetop Village and double Heights) and a Fertile Ground and he was able to play two Spectral Processions and two Cloudgoat Rangers while I was diddling around trying to make my first Planeswalker.
Game Three I think I just screwed up. I had active Garruk and he had some Cloudgoat action (maybe two). I could have played my second Ajani (he had previously attacked one down) and instead I played a Cloudgoat Ranger. He of course had an Ajani and super-sized his squad and squashed me. I blocked to be able to have lots of mana the subsequent turn in case I drew Martial Coup but instead I just lost. Pretty sure I had that one if I understood the deck / matchup a little more.
Interestingly he played two Paths Game One and I played two Game Three and you can see how that went. Those of you with more experience… Is Path to Exile terrible heads up? I figured I needed it in case of Gaddock Teeg.
1-1
3. Jund Cascade
Some kind of a not memorable win. He had cards like Bituminous Blast rather than Broodmate Dragon. I just played the tempo game against his Putrid Leech and eventually he was going to be kold to me Windbrisk Heights and Behemoth Sledge… he just was.
Now that I think of it, I should probably just play four Chameleon Colossus in this deck, especially if Elves is the popular deck right now. Chameleon Colossus is great v. Jund, Faeries, Elves, Five-color Blood, and Mono-Black Rogues all.
2-1
4. Bant
This was the Noble Hierarch / Rhox War Monk kind of deck.
Game One I milked his board and set him up for Martial Coup into Kitchen Finks + Ajani Goldmane lock.
Game Two he shocked me with a Negate for my turn three Garruk Wildspeaker… but I was still able to dominate his little guys. A little tense because he can sometimes play a little close to the life total, but a win in two.
3-1
5. B/R Aggro
I could have lost either game. In fact one of them I pumped all my guys instead of realizing I was one eight and could have died to double Flame Javelin… But I was lucky and just didn’t. In general if you stick Ajani and some guys they are in miserable shape. I even shipped to six in Game Two, with no Green Mana for about eight turns, and pulled it out without a ton of difficulty.
4-1
So there you have it – Super scientific 4-1 including wins over every deck (Faeries, Cascade, etc.). So look no further!
🙂
I think the deck is worth a little more time, though. With some Chameleons I think it could be a good time.
LOVE
MIKE
Currently Reading: Day of Vengeance (Countdown to Infinite Crisis)
9 comments ↓
Wow Rhox Meditant actually seems rather insane against Bloodbraid Elf
It’s almost like a Civic Wayfinder
I think Garruk is given a bad rap.
Your criticism of the card is justified, why play a two card combo on the off-chance you pump ridonkulus mana on a turn for a big spell? Especially when said mana can result in a crippling blow of card disadvantage and tempo loss by just bouncing/blowing up the enchanted land.
But there’s another problem that people also don’t take into account when playing the Garruk+Fertile Ground combo, and that’s tunnel vision. This is something that causes folks to be overly focused on/dependent on the mana production combo in order to get things done. This however, over looks Garruk’s innate card advantage engine in its beast production, 9 power worth of creatures is nothing to sneeze at, especially if said 9 power comes from only one card, but requires 3 to get rid of. (Maelstrom Pulse being the exception, but that’s just a reason why the pulse is good) Garruk can admirably stand on his own w/o ramping for mana by just pumping out creatures like an Elspeth with an Expiration date.
In a Jund Ramp deck I play with, I have Garruks, but no Fertile Grounds to speak of. Most of the time, I would drop Garruk on 3, and produce a Beast, The following turns, I probably produced more 3/3s which put increasing pressure on my opponent, especially since most of them didn’t have a Caldera Hellion or Firespout in their 75. Granted, my Jund deck was geared much differently than yours, and thus played a little different.
I guess I made that long winded post to suggest you cut the Fertile Ground, while keeping the planeswalker. I suggest going with the Jund Ramp package your already familiar with, which in my opinion should work out a lot better than the enchantment based ramp.
I’ve been goofing off with a Naya Ramp deck inspired by the successes of Jund Ramp. Really I just wanted an excuse to try out Realm Razer. This turns out to be a pretty bad plan unless I don’t play Wrath of God since my opponent always has more in the Battlefield than I do. I think a token-type deck with Razer could work, but I don’t see why that would be necessary.
I like this take on G/W Ramp a little better, but it definitely needs to be tweaked for Faeries. I think we have pretty good anecdotal evidence that Path can be bad in the mirror. I could see O-Ring being a decent inclusion.
Does this deck beat Jund Ramp?
So Mike, did you get briefed on combat ahead of time? How does this affect Thornling, who didn’t make it into this sdeck to begin with?
Please comment on the rules changes. I’ll refrain from soap-boxing, but they make me want to cry.
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