[Deck] Elven Advantage

[Infinitium]

Masked Admirers used to be tits with SoTF; get Anger + big mana elf, then recur the admirers at a cost of GGG per survival target, and since you got untappers and eventually more PoT/Archdruid this quickly escalated into a manual combo win when you eventually just swung your deck in. You could also do pretty much the same thing with Sylvan Messenger and Symbiotes which was somewhat more mana and deck efficient (Messenger generally > Admirers as a standalone card should you draw it), but wasn't a guaranteed win the way Admirers was. This doesn't work with just the 1-2 activations per turn with Fauna of course, which makes me wonder if it's still worth it.

Glimpse is, well, Glimpse. It usually draws more cards than Messenger even in the lategame courtesy of Wirewood Symbiote, and the fact that it generally wins the game when resolved makes it the deck's equivalent to Lackey, except that it can't be removed or blocked. The 1 mana v. 4 mana is also very relevant because it pretty much nullifies the tempo gain of free counters (and in the case of Daze just nullifies it) Forcing people (sic) to burn a blue card + 1 life on your turn 2 and still have enough mana remaining to play whatever is a very good deal for you all thing's considered.

[GGoober]

I tested out the lists in the thread so far and found that I didn't like Sylvan Messenger a lot. He as good when he's flipping stuff well, but with 4 Symbiotes, 4 Glimpse, 4 GSZ and lands, I draw about 2 cards on average. For the 4-mana investment, I think I'm betting off bouncing Elvish Visionaries. I have been quite amazed by Visionary though. He's very similar to Silvergill Adept in Merfolks (which we all know is completely nuts by now in terms of tempo/board development).

I did find an interesting solution to the Living Wish/Emrakul clunkiness. Elven Advantage can't really play Emrakul MD since it's like saying I have to draw into Emrakul to win games. It can't be tutored with Natural Order and would require Fauna Shaman to be played. I like Rukus' list but I think Fauna Shaman is another turn slower (but the pro is giving more consistency and inevitability). The solution I found was: Fierce Empath.

I'll post the list I'm testing and explain why Empath fits quite nicely.

Lands: 16
14 Forest
1 Gaea's Cradle
1 Dryad Arbor (this is a must, with GSZ, it's not really about acceleration, it's about getting a land drop that may not be insured on turn 2 and turn 3 in a deck packing 16 lands)

Creatures: 37
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Heritage Druid
2 Nettle Sentinel
4 Wirewood Symbiote
2 Quirion Ranger
4 Elvish Visionary
4 Priest of Titania
4 Elvish Archdruid
3 Joraga Warcaller
1 Ezuri, Renegade Leader (not too impressed should be 4th Warcaller which is great comboing for just :G:)
1 Fierce Empath
1 Viridian Zealot
1 Emrakul
1 Regal Force

Non-creature: 8
4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Glimpse of Nature

I'll explain a few reasoning on the differences from Infinitum's list. Infinitum if you can let me know if there're any flaws in my reasoning, I'd appreciate it since I do not play this deck as extensively as you did (just picked it up for 2 weeks)

- Nettle Sentinel: I agree it is bad because it only fulfills the purpose of combo'ing, or swinging once in awhile with lords. Regardless, drawing just 1 Sentinel greatly improves the consistency with Glimpse. I feel that even playing 1 copy in the deck is great since GSZ can fetch it out post-Glimpse when you need to, to fuel that additional mana to go off. There is basically no harm in running 1 copy at the very least since drawing GSZ->Nettle Sentinel can improve that goldfishing. Combo Elves need to run 4 because they are focused on speed, but Elven Advantage is focused on board/tempo development while having the option to combo a turn later. Nettle is decent without comboing as a beater, but once in play (via GSZ, greatly increases consistency).

- No Messengers: I posted the reason above. I think I would prefer to test Multani's Acolyte over Sylvan Messenger. I feel that the 4cmc is steep and only castable when the combo is going off fine, at that point, you either have to completely combo out to win instantly or just pass the turn and attack for the win, and Messenger doesn't necessarily ensure you combo out completely (average elf draws are 2/4 which is like playing 2 Elvish Visionaries).

- No Concordant: I'll get to the reason (see below).

- Fierce Empath:
This is a card that I've tested to be quite successful. Firstly, I he replaced the slot of Sylvan Messenger. Note that on paper this card doesn't seem to generate more advantage than Messenger, but what Empath does is to tutor for win/gas in the form of Emrakul/Regal Force.

Sylvan Messenger post-glimpse combo requires Symbiotes to be truly successful or requires good flips (getting 2 Elves barely pushes the consistency to continue glimpsing). Regardless, if you are using Messenger/Symbiote as an engine post-glimpse to fuel glimpse and draw cards, it is quite expensive: 3G + 3G + Elves costs. However, this is what Elven Advantage has currently because running Regal Force MD would require running Summoner's Pact for increased consistency. With GSZ, one can still fetch out Regal Force and go off, but sometimes you have a ton of mana and need to draw another spell, Empath gives you the option to cantrip one more time fetching Regal Force for 2G when you have excess mana. But the point to go fierce Empath-> Regal Force instead of just Regal Force is to have the Empath in play, which is most likely going to get bounced by a drawn Symbiote from Regal Force to untap a Priest to hardcast Emrakul when you play Empath grabbing Emrakul.

The most important part of Empath is the ability to fetch Emrakul. The reason I've cut Concordant is because I will always consistently get Emrakul online in situations where I've drawn Concordant. Concordant on-the-turn wins usually involve combo phases with enough draws/mana so you get a huge army to swing after comboing. Emrakul also follows the combo phase where you need enough draws/mana. Once you have your mana engine up, GSZ-> Fierce Empath->Emrakul and taking an extra turn is the same as going off on Concordant.

The singleton Empath also functions as another tutor with the elf subtype. If you drew him and not drawn GSZ, you can still tutor for Regal Force/Emrakul to go off.

Let me know what you think. Playing emrakul is sometimes win-moar but I think it's a guaranteed win when you can hardcast Emrakul. The issue in the past is the inability to play Emrakul consistently without using more non-elf cards like Living Wish. Rukus' Fauna Shaman is another approach but I think it's fundamentally a turn slower than this list with Empath.

How do I beat Perish?? lol (I know by not overextending)

[Koby]

How do I beat Perish?? lol (I know by not overextending)

Thran Lens, or splash white for the 1WG Elephant from Alara Reborn that makes your team indestructible. Perish is pretty much always a huge tempo loss. The best way is to anticipate them casting it and slow roll the aggro portion (say, set up a Priest of Titania + 2 elves, then cast everything and alpha-strike with Ezuri or Warcaller.

[(nameless one)]

Since there is a general concensus of not running Sylvan Messanger, and trying to gain tempo/board control, has anyone tried running Winter Orb on the main? It certainly takes advantage of mana-hungry decks while the damage isn't as much on our side of the board.

Also, would adding a single Staff of Domination dilute the deck? Back in the days (just before Alara showed up), I used to run a Beatdown X-land Stompy Elves with a singleton Staff of Domination. Its usually a win if I have it in play unanswered.

[Koby]

I could see making the case for Winter Orb vs slower control strategies (like UW/x CBtop, CFB CB/Top, and Landstill), whereas Thorn of Amethyst is already good vs these decks (taxing all their spells). Both would be good in conjunction, however if I had to chose one, I would chose Thorns as it helps against Combo decks too.

Similarly, Cloudstone Curio and Staff of Domination are both decent cards to run in this deck to give an extra edge. Personally, I would not run them because the Elf plan is usually sufficient. I would sooner run Living Wish for added versatility rather than dilute the deck with an extra "combo" element. This is perhaps my desire to run a more controlling version of the deck rather than a more combo-oriented. This explains my preference for Fauna Shaman in these builds too, as if I can keep one around I will almost surely win (similar to Survival tricks of old).

I also recommend to test out a maindeck Terastodon as the main utility/beef card. I typically find myself destroying my own Forests to be able to build a huge army. If I actually need to remove an opponent's card, I will target the rest of my lands so that I'm not facing Elephants.

Regarding Perish, I found that Masked Admirers helps to off-set the removal. Imagine a scenario where you did lose your dudes to Perish. Rebuying the Admirers with a mana dork allows you to jump back into the game more quickly than otherwise. This all depends on how much of a board presence your opponent has.

[Infinitium]

I really wouldn't cut Crossroads or Messenger. Crossroads is most likely our best win condition since it activates summoning-sick Priests midcombo and is probably the best card in the deck versus decks running mass removal. The only maindecked cards that Emrakul beats that Crossroads doesn't is Glacial Chasm lock and protected Solitary Confinements/Moats. Moat typically doesn't see play even in the decks that can afford it, and Lands/Enchantress are sufficiently good matchups (and essentially byes once you board in Emrakul) that you can afford to ignore them preside. Typically if you get to a board where you can generate those amounts of mana you are going to win the game with any combination of cards in the deck really - no need to weigh down your gameplan otherwise with uncastable fat.

I cold see cutting Sylvan Messengers down to a single copy if you're desperate for space, but -don't- cut it out of the deck altogether. It usually being a 3-for-1 on its own is a big reason why the deck can win topdeck wars even without an engine in place, and unlike Regal Force it's actuallly good versus sweepers. In my experience it's also pretty vital in Glimpsing off since unlike ElfBall your gameplan usually involves playing out most of your hand preglimpse, at which point you often get to the situation where you have enough mana to do whatever but next to none cards on hand. Messenger solves this by being a virtual 6-for-1 Glimpsing off just like that (remember every non-elf you draw will stay undrawn until you use GSZ again, meaning that even a completely dud usually saves you 4 turns of drawing whatever).

Empath is.. eh as far as I can tell. At 3 mana (and requiring at least 7 more to do anything worthile) it needs an already winning board position to work properly, at which point you really have to ask yourself why you aren't running Staff of Domination or Cloudstone Curio and just win by default. Terastodon is good when it resolves, but again it isn't a scaling threat. Sentinel as a 1-of looks good on paper, but when are you really going to sun it up? The decks CMC is too high to reliably win off Heritage Druid/Sentinel alone, if they lack removal for Heritage Druid they'll lack removal for PoT as well and if you're going for the longterm game Symbiote is just plain better.

As far as Curio/Staff goes in general I haven't felt the need to test them, ever. I generally shy away from cards that does that little on their own and 3 mana isn't trivial. They admittedly do have quite the few gamewinning synergies however.

[(nameless one)]

Hey ruckus,

with your MTGO run, did you wish you had something else on your main? What would you have removed?

Also this goes out for everyone, I read somewhere (can't remember if it was the Combo Thread) about running Viridian Corruptor over Viridian Shaman. The reason is using infect as a defense. It can also be used to pull out win while Ezuri is online. Yes, Corruptor itself trying to beat the opponent is retarded but would anyone actually try playtesting this?

[GGoober]

Infinitum, I was thinking in my list to drop the 2nd sentinel to +1 messenger. That way, GSZ can fetch emergency Sentinel when I'm out of untappers/priests to use and continue to fuel a little more elves with sentinel, while having the backup Elvish Visionary on drugs aka Sylvan Messenger. In either case, running a 1/1 split and drawing them naturally is still decent, but there's always the option to grab them with GSZ.

Infinitum have you tested with 8 visionary effects using multani's acolyte? I'm assuming that such a list would require quite a heavier investment on turn 3 (needing more mana) but should be very consistent once you glimpsed. I understand if you do not want to test Empath. Empath for me is mainly to grab Emrakul, or simply draw into him which tutors Terrastadon postboard or Regal/Emrakul force maindeck. He's the only way i think you can run Emrakul MD and consistently draw Emrakul without relying on Fauna Shaman or Living Wishes.

@rukus; sometimes I'm tempted to splash white, giving better postboard sideboard against combo (Teeg via GSZ) and Dauntless Escort via GSZ and perhaps even running Chants against combo/control pre-glimpsing. But I think for 16 lands, Elves already have a very unstable manabase without playing Elves (which so happen are going to get murdered by Perish/firespout postboard). White would give more options, the ability to use mirror Entity (another lord) to go infinite and be an incredible manasink.

[Koby]

ruckus,
with your MTGO run, did you wish you had something else on your main? What would you have removed?

Also this goes out for everyone, I read somewhere (can't remember if it was the Combo Thread) about running Viridian Corruptor over Viridian Shaman. The reason is using infect as a defense. It can also be used to pull out win while Ezuri is online. Yes, Corruptor itself trying to beat the opponent is retarded but would anyone actually try playtesting this?

I was very happy with Wood Elves, so much to the point that I would often forgo recycling Elvish Visionary with Symbiote. Realistically, it only costs "two" mana since it untaps a forest once it resolves. It has the added effect of removing your dead land-draws, and allows you to go into the late game much smoother with the increased resilience against sweepers. I think I had a few games where I had 5 forest out by turn 3 with the synergies of Wirewood Symbiote. Both are good options however.

I found myself boarding out Joraga Warcaller against the decks with removal in place for Krosan Grip. Sometimes, I would board out Priest of Titania as well. Against aggro, I would board out Terastodon and/or Masked Admirers. These were mostly to make room for the extra utility from the SB.

Against blue control, half the battle is knowing how to bait the correct spells and which order to play out your threats. It maybe useful to try to draw out removal/counters by playing Fauna Shaman out first instead of Priest of Titania. Or testing the waters with Visionary instead of rushing out that Shaman. This comes from intuition after playing the deck for numerous months, and playtesting against good opponents will help youi to realize which way strategy works best for you.

I do enjoy this deck for it's incremental card advantage approach rather than the all-in Combo variants. It also allows me to play bad cards like Wood Elves :P

@rukus; sometimes I'm tempted to splash white, giving better postboard sideboard against combo (Teeg via GSZ) and Dauntless Escort via GSZ and perhaps even running Chants against combo/control pre-glimpsing. But I think for 16 lands, Elves already have a very unstable manabase without playing Elves (which so happen are going to get murdered by Perish/firespout postboard). White would give more options, the ability to use mirror Entity (another lord) to go infinite and be an incredible manasink.

I see no reason why splashing colors would be out of the question. I can imagine a few different splashes:

Red splash - Anger, Magus of the Moon, Squee, Devour-Dragon (much weaker w/o Survival now)
White splash - Mirror Entity, Canonist (SB), Chant effects (SB)
Blue splash - Intuition, Brainstorm [Vengevine]

White is probably the best splash at this point, just because of Teeg, Dauntless Escort, and Mirror Entity. However GSZ can't find Entity, which would diminish the utility of that card in your build. I've ran versions that splash both White and Red in the old Survival days, specifically for Silence/Chant against Storm combo, which is a better option than Thorn of Amethyst against such decks.

Most of these splashes require a heavy Fetchland component. 16 lands (not counting Gaea's Cradle) is more than sufficient, however I remember odd-ball manabases that featured 3 Forest, 3 Savannah, 3 Taiga and 8 fetchland before in the old Survival builds. This mana base works much better in builds that don't solely rely on Glimpse as the win-con, and work well for this deck for the purpose of splashes.

Wood Elves helps to stabilize the manabase against sweepers by ramping you out of awkward low-land draws. By recycling Wood Elves, you can force the control player into fighting over marginal elves, and misplaying. It is immensely intimidating to control decks when you have more lands out than they do. :)

I would also consider testing out a Fauna Shaman/Vengevine build of this deck as a mitigation factor for Perish. Elves is already pre-disposed to triggering Vengevine, as Nass/Hatch have demonstrated at the SCG San Jose open.

[Infinitium]

Sylvan Ranger generally does the same thing cheaper than Wood Elves as long as you run only basics. Splashes are very possible, but ultimately I feel that they just open you up to a new host of problems. As Rukcus pointed out having 4+ lands in play is pretty much your lifeline for longer games as it's what allows you to rebuild once your initial mana elves are removed. If you absolutley need to splash the blue one for Intuition/Vine is proven strong, and it also allows you to run Coiling oracle as visionaries 5+. Spell Pierce also looks decent on paper in the sideboard.

Then again, you could just run more Elves instead of (comparatively narrow) splash cards and just keep to the attrition plan. BTW, I usually bring out Hermit Druids against decks packing sweepers btw; the card is useful for kickstarting your board early but overextending is actively bad here, and Joraga adds up with the the big mana duders and Symbiote to overload the opponents spot removal.

[ScatmanX]

Why can't we just run 1 Teeg and 1 Dauntless Escort SB without the W Splash?
It's a bummer if you draw them, but GSZting them seems great. We don't need W to get them into play.

[Infinitium]

Sure you could, but as you pointed out having uncastable cards makes mulligan decisions awkward, and they're dismal topdecks. I'm currently testing out Wren's Run Packmaster in the Champion spot and thus far it's promising. Granted it's useless miscombo and pushes the deck ever so slightly against the midrange, but on the other hand it's a 3-turn clock on it's own, locks the ground down against aggressive decks and if you champion a big mana or card elf it creates quite the disincentive against sweepers.

[fresscott]

What's your board plan vs. Zoo and Counterbalance? In playtesting I'm having trouble winning games post-board against those decks, especially if they pack Firespout or Grim Lavamancer.

It's entirely possible that I'm simply misplaying in those matchups, so any general pointers are appreciated as well.

[Koby]

Splashing white for Absolute Law would be a good consideration in you're afraid of red removal.

[uncletiggy]

i play a deck very Similar to this except i run two Pack Hunts in it and it's worked wonders for me, just something to think about.

[alphastorm]

have you considered the new card called triumph of the hordes? It can easily win the game on the spot with only a few creatures.

[Infinitium]

What's your board plan vs. Zoo and Counterbalance? In playtesting I'm having trouble winning games post-board against those decks, especially if they pack Firespout or Grim Lavamancer.

It's entirely possible that I'm simply misplaying in those matchups, so any general pointers are appreciated as well.

Vs Zoo I usually don't side at all unless they're heavily GY-dependant (eg mancer + Goyf + KotR), in which case I usually side out Zealot and Viridian Shaman (my current flex spot) unless I'm certain they'll pack Jitte for a couple of Relics. The plan in general is to survive until the mid to lategame, where Zoo generally cannot keep up. Wirewood Symbíote helps a lot here by giving you indefinite chumps (as do Quirion Ranger -> Dryad Arbor in corner cases), and it does help a ton to be able to combo out early, but don' be afraid to use Glimpse aggressively (like drawing 1 or 2 cards at a time) to build up the board through their removal and chumps, also we can generally afford to trade a few creatures for one of theirs due to our superior card advantage. The mathcup isn't great by any means (and gets worse the smaller the Zoo deck gets), but since Zoo also has to be very reactive with removal it's nowhere near as bad as it is on paper.

For countertop decks (and control in general) I generally side out Heritage Druid for Krosan Grips. They will most likely have an answer to your first combo attempts anyhow, and using Heritage to overextend the board (whilst not swinging in for damage) doesn't really help the aggro backup plan because of 'Spout/EE. Siding out a few cards for Relics might also be a good idea depending on their build (I generally go for the flex spot and a few llanowar elves to make room) since it messes with both their big beaters and Academy Ruins/EE should they run it. Generally as long as you can answer CB 1-for-1 and keep them off the EE lock or Jace you should be able to win the long game. What I usually go for to make this happen is trying to keep just enough creatures on the table to force them to sweep it or risk being blown out by glimpse and then try to outdraw and outmana them.

Oh, and do keep hands with lots of lands and/or Visionaries to draw into land if you expect them to pack lots of removal, as the easiest way to lose is to not have enough permanent mana sources to fight the hate.

have you considered the new card called triumph of the hordes? It can easily win the game on the spot with only a few creatures.

It could, but having a few creatures and any 4cc mana card (be it natural order, GSZ or Messenger) generally means you're winning anyhow, and TotH is pretty horrible when you're not winning in one shot with it. It effectively fogs your entire team if the opponent runs enough removal and/or blockers to make you deal less than 10 with it.

[Infinitium]

As for an update on what I'm currently, not much has changed really. Still fiddling around with the flex slots so I'm currently -1 Messenger -1 Elvish Champion +1 Viridian Shaman +1 Imperious Perfect compared to my list posted in the OP. Having Shaman maindecked isn't mandatory by any means, but it does give you a very comfortable long game versus Chalice, Affinity and assorted bombs without having to rely on going all in.

Perfect I'm currently liking more than Champion and Hivemaster both; for the extra mana investment you get a very credible standalone threat, it has a bigger immediate impact on the board once it hits and it can still poop out multiple dudes (with a relevant creature type) per turn in conjunction with untappers.

I'm thinking maybe going down to 1 Messenger might be the right call after all; it's still only a GSZ away for most of the situations where you really need it and having both on hand was indeed pretty slow.

Oh, and late reply @Metalwalker: No, I haven't tested Multani's Acolyte in this deck yet. The Echo just seem like a huge tempo sink in all (making it an actively bad 2-drop among other things), and Wirewood is usually the limiting factor in setting up that particular combo anyhow (since it usually just doesn't live if the opponent can help it).

[fresscott]

Thank you, this is excellent and just what I was looking for.

Vs Zoo I usually don't side at all unless they're heavily GY-dependant (eg mancer + Goyf + KotR), in which case I usually side out Zealot and Viridian Shaman (my current flex spot) unless I'm certain they'll pack Jitte for a couple of Relics.

The Zoo list I was testing against was indeed running Lavamancer, Goyf, and KotR next to 4 StP and 4 Bolts - and then added 2 Ethersworn Canonist and 2 Jitte from the board. I guess that's about the worst Zoo configuration this deck could be up against.

I run 3 Masticore in the board so my plan was something like
+3 Masticore
+2 Viridian Shaman
-2 Crossroads
-3 ??? (some combination of Heritage Druid/Messenger/Warcaller, don't quite recall)

I'll try siding in Relics as well. I'm not entirely sold on the Masticores on paper, but they seemed very, very strong once in play.

I'm not sure I'll have the time to test them but Hivemasters might also work. Deranged Hermit, Wren's Run Packmaster? Hmmmm. Maybe.

The mathcup isn't great by any means (and gets worse the smaller the Zoo deck gets), but since Zoo also has to be very reactive with removal it's nowhere near as bad as it is on paper.

My current board plan is to ignore decks like Dredge and Storm and instead try to massively improve the matchups vs. Zoo and CounterTop. I'm not sure that'll work out. But hence the Masticores. They're the best all-round weapon I've found so far.

For countertop decks (and control in general) I generally side out Heritage Druid for Krosan Grips. They will most likely have an answer to your first combo attempts anyhow, and using Heritage to overextend the board (whilst not swinging in for damage) doesn't really help the aggro backup plan because of 'Spout/EE. Siding out a few cards for Relics might also be a good idea depending on their build (I generally go for the flex spot and a few llanowar elves to make room) since it messes with both their big beaters and Academy Ruins/EE should they run it. Generally as long as you can answer CB 1-for-1 and keep them off the EE lock or Jace you should be able to win the long game. What I usually go for to make this happen is trying to keep just enough creatures on the table to force them to sweep it or risk being blown out by glimpse and then try to outdraw and outmana them.

This is good stuff. I'm pretty sure after reading this that I was misplaying and mis-boarding in that matchup (especially wrt what I was siding out).

Oh, and do keep hands with lots of lands and/or Visionaries to draw into land if you expect them to pack lots of removal, as the easiest way to lose is to not have enough permanent mana sources to fight the hate.

Very true. I was actually thinking of finding room for either the third Quirion Ranger or another basic Forest. I noticed that if I was taking mulligans it was mostly due to lack of mana/untappers. Haven't kept records on that, however, so I wouldn't be entirely sure.


Finally, what do you think of running a single Pendelhaven? Unfortunately it doesn't take our creatures out of Bolt range, so it may not be worth it.

[Infinitium]

The Zoo list I was testing against was indeed running Lavamancer, Goyf, and KotR next to 4 StP and 4 Bolts - and then added 2 Ethersworn Canonist and 2 Jitte from the board. I guess that's about the worst Zoo configuration this deck could be up against.

I run 3 Masticore in the board so my plan was something like
+3 Masticore
+2 Viridian Shaman
-2 Crossroads
-3 ??? (some combination of Heritage Druid/Messenger/Warcaller, don't quite recall)

My experience is that once you get to untap with enough mana to make Masticore useful you're usually in good shape anyhow, and it does open you up for StP in your upkeep. More than 1 Viridian Shaman is probably overkill as well because of GSZ. Again Jitte represents quite the mana investment for them and again only gets relevant in the lategame (and we have Symbiote and Quirion/Arbor to stall it in a pinch should they lack removal).

I wouldn't cut Crossroads as the card severely punishes Zoo for tapping out at any point in the game - Crossroads, Titania, Elf, Elf, Elf, Symbiote, Elf, Warcaller, kill isn't an uncommon line of play even without glimpse. Against the above list I'd probably just go -1 Zealot -2 Heritage (it's only a 1/1 and doesn't accelerate your turn 2) +3 Relics.

Don't worry too much about Canonist unless they can back it up with a clock. It slows down them as well (albeit not as much as they run instant removal), and it only really shuts down the Glimpse plan.

I'm not sure I'll have the time to test them but Hivemasters might also work. Deranged Hermit, Wren's Run Packmaster? Hmmmm

Again, don't worry about the midgame engines and cards - the difficult Zoo hands are the ones that will kill you and everything you play before the game gets to that point.

My current board plan is to ignore decks like Dredge and Storm and instead try to massively improve the matchups vs. Zoo and CounterTop. I'm not sure that'll work out. But hence the Masticores. They're the best all-round weapon I've found so far.

Dredge is actualy highly winnable even with intermediate boarding, and if your meta also have any amount of Reanimator it's probably worth packing 6 gravehate slots. The sideboard is generally very flexible since the only cards you absolutely need to shore up the middling mathcups are 4 Grips.

Very true. I was actually thinking of finding room for either the third Quirion Ranger or another basic Forest. I noticed that if I was taking mulligans it was mostly due to lack of mana/untappers. Haven't kept records on that, however, so I wouldn't be entirely sure.

The decks manabase is funny like that, trying to balance a relatively low amount of lands with an excuberant amount of killable accelerators - with 8 virtual Llanowars you have 23 mana producers on turn two, and when you factor in Heritage Druids, PoT, Archdruids and untappers that's well over half the deck comitted to mana production (amongst other things). I've tried adding Sylvan Ranger/Wood Elves as a Symbiote target to artificially boost the landcount, but it's hard to justify the spots vs. better accelerants or stuff that actually kills the opponent.

Finally, what do you think of running a single Pendelhaven? Unfortunately it doesn't take our creatures out of Bolt range, so it may not be worth it.

Well, we already run Cradle and Arbor as Wasteland targets so it's definetly viable. Being another out to early Lavamancer/SGC doesn't hurt either, and utility 2/x's are common enough to skewer combat math quite a lot just by having it available. I've seen it been mentioned every now and again in a variety of threads, and in the end it just comes down to that it's hard to quantify whether you win more games with the pump than you lose by being manascrewed. I'd forgotten about it though so I might take it for another spin. Thanks for the heads up.