X-land Elvish Stompy

[(nameless one)]

Hello Everyone,

I do not know if youre all aware of what an X-land stompy deck is. Basically an X-land Stompy deck is an aggro deck that uses as little as 9 lands and have cheap but fat beaters and efficient pump spells to connect to the opposing player.

Over the years, there has been a lot of cards created to make the deck more effective. But at the same time, there are twice as many cards created to nerf the deck's strategy. Because of these turn of events, the deck slowly dropped from Tier 1 to Tier 3 or less.

Elvish Flavor:

One day, one of the stores around my area decided to run a Legacy Tribal Wars tourney. I wanted to play elves as it is my pet deck but my elf deck was geared for multiplayer mode. On top of that, my elf deck rolled over to the much faster Goblin deck and with the freshly released Lorwyn-Shadowmoor Block, the control elements of the Merfolks and Faerie tribes spelled doomed to my Elves.

As I was doing research, I've encountered the shell of X-land Stompy decks. And much to my delight, most of the utility creatures used are elves. It came to me that why not use the advantages the elves had to offer to facelift the X-land Stompy shell. After all the playtesting I did, I have this deck:

7 Forest
1 Pendelhaven

4 Land Grant
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
4 Llanowar Elves

4 Quirion Ranger
4 Heritage Druid
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Priest of Titania
4 Talara's Battalion
4 Wren's Run Vanquisher
4 Imperious Perfect
4 Elvish Archdruid
4 Sylvan Messanger
2 Tribal Forcemage
2 Elvish Champion

Card Choices:

Forest: its a mono green deck. Like a true X-land Stompy build, it only needs a handful

Pendelhaven: protects that 1st turn X/1 mana elf

Land Grant: true X-land Stompy builds run this to fetch land. Its always played for free and creates a great synergy with Talara's Battalion

Mana Elves:

Elvish Spirit Guide: Provides an explosive start. Did i mention that shes an elf? She can also provide a 2/2 body late game

Llanowar Elves: 90% of X-land Stompy decks run this elf, why not this build. After all, it is also an elf.

Quirion Ranger: although not a real mana elf, she is heart of the X-land mana trick. Return a tapped Forest to your hand to untap a mana elf and playing that Forest again to be tapped for mana is never a bad thing. She can also provide combat tricks (unsuspecting Tarmogoyf getting blocked by a 'tapped' deathtouch dude)

Priest of Titania: after all, it is an elf deck. since we run little lands, we need a source of mana and she provides tons of it (given that you have lots of elves in play)

Elvish Archdruid: Priest of titania 2.0. He is so much better because of the lord effect

Heritage Druid/Nettle Sentinel Engine: this is more a back up plan but with my thorough playtesting, this engine provides excellent source for mana. this engine really speeds things up (like a turn 2 with elf lord and 3x 2/2 elves in play)

Beaters:

Nettle Sentinel: 2/2 for G with pseudo-vigilance? sign me up

Wren's Run Vanquisher: 3/3 deathtouch for 1G... again, the essence of X-land Stompy. She also provides creature removal. The drawback isnt really that bad, after all, we are playing elves and we have a drove of them

Talara's Battalion: 4/3 trample for 1G... X-land stompy loves this creature but X-land stompy has a hard time getting this online. It is a terrible topdeck but if you just hold on to that extra Land Grant in your hand, you will do just fine (I can consistently win games with just 2 lands in play). Also, elves dont find it a problem to play multiple spells each turn (and theyre all green spells)

Lords: X-land stompy usually relies on pump spells to deal lethal damage. the problem with pump spells is they only last at the end of turn. with the Lords online, you have indefinite pump (until they leave at least). And each Lord has its own advantage. Elvish Archdruid provides as your Priest of Titania 2.0, Imperious Perfect can provide card advantage in the form of tokens and Elvish Champion laughs at Tarmogoyf like its a wiener. Tribal Forcemage not only provides a great finisher in the form of 'Elvish Overrun', he can also provide toughness tricks.

Secret Weapon:

One of the weakeness of X-land Stompy is it runs out of fuel pretty quick especially with its nature of emptying the hand within the first three turns. It doesnt have any way to draw multiple cards late game. The elvish variant solves this problem in the form of Sylvan Messanger. With the low non-elf count in the deck, it is not uncommon to 'draw' 3 cards. She really makes this deck explosive.

Other mentions that could have/should be in this deck:

Silhanna Ledgewalker: Elf with trollshroud and evasion. with Lords pumping her, she shouldnt have any problems connecting some lethal damage to the opposing head.

Fyndhorn Elves: This is Llanowar Elf's twin, although the most i could suggest is 2/2 split with his twin. running 8 Llanowar Elves actually slows the deck.

Winter Orb: I dont own them yet but if I did, I would definitely run them. They provide control late game and X-land decks is build to make this card one-sided

Im still working on the sideboard as it changes everytime.


The Aftermath of the Legacy Tribal Wars mini-Tourney:

I won 1st place on that tourney, trampling the forementioned Tribes and slivers. Although it wasnt significant and I only won an intro-deck of my choice, I did enjoy the deck.

The deck is also doing great under actual Legacy Tournaments. It recently top-4ed on a 28-man tourney going 4-0 (8-1) (losing to a jank 8-post control-slaver deck because of a miscalculation).

I hope you all enjoyed this pseudo-primer that I've created and hopefully, I'll see some positive feedbacks and suggestions

[TeKo]

Legacy Tournaments with
8-post control-slaver deck in the T8...

[Pulp_Fiction]

Seems viable, make sure to run 4x Simplify and 4x Pithing Needle in the SB to deal with Engineed Plague and Pernicious Deed. Would Glimpse of Nature or Staff of Domination be worth running at all? I have no experience with combo Elves but I have played against them lots of times and they always seem to function like a bad Elf deck that will randomly win on turn 2. Do you find the deck runs out of steam quickly?

[Pastorofmuppets]

I would run Fyndhorn Elves instead of Llanowar elves just to be a nonconformist. Plus I like the art better than any Llanowars other than 7th edition art.:laugh:

[f|i[p]]

I like the concept, however, I think you'll need 4 elvish champions because they simply win you games. Giving your elves forest walk is very very very useful against most decks, since almost every deck runs green for goyf.

Also I can see you producing lots of mana, is there any reason for heritage druid? do you have plans of comboing off as an alternate win con?

I also think V. zealots should be in the deck somewhere as a 3 of.

[Pinni]

Hey there, nice to see more elf decks pop up.


I played almost the same kind of deck, only difference that i had
-2 quirion
-1 talara
-1 wren
-4 archdruid
-1 pendelhaven
+2 Champion
+4 glimpse
+3 forest

What i noticed was that i was mulliganing almost always to 6 -> moved on to more forests, champion are just pure ownage as noted above, forestwalk in the current meta (everywhere) is just so good. you got 4 titanias and nettle + heritage and llanowars, i'd -2 archdruid +2 elvish champion.

But anyhow, more thoughts on your list.

pendelhaven is just crap, you cant fetch it, and its very good wasteland food in a list with 8 lands, and it sure doesnt protect your 1/1. maybe against magma jet or such but... :/ meh.


about sb:

4 Leyline of Lifeforce
2 Caller of the Claw
3 Relic of Progenitus
4 Krosan Grip
2 Winter Orb

is what i have currently, though im thinking about losing maybe one leyline and adding 1 caller more, because elves tend to crash and slow to boardsweeps. (one more reason to run glimpse IMO..)

krosan grip is just way better than simplify..
winter orb against some MBC in our meta etc.

[(nameless one)]

The 8post control slaver wasn't in the top 8. He just managed to beat me because I thought I can beat him that turn, instead he was at one and he banefired me for 20 next turn (yes, I am a noob like that)

the original deck had Staff of Dominations over Elvish Champions and the deck was also well off. But the noob that I am, I like beating faces with my 5/5 mana elves over comboing out for the win. I haven't playtested Glimpse of Nature. Through my thorough playtesting, it came to me that Sylvan Messenger is enough. On top of that, topdecking Glimpse doesn't look fast (although with the sheer speed of the deck, I am barely on topdeck mode because at the time that comes, I probably won the game)

The deck is so fast that it can win by turns 3-4. Hell, my playtest buddies sometimes use this deck to playtest their type1 deck and I still manage to win some games sometimes.

My current sideboard so far looks like this:
4 Leyline of Lifeforce
3 Relic of Progenitus
3 Krosan Grip
2 Pithing Needle
2 Caller of the Claw
1 Thornwield Archer

I know my sideboard looks suboptimal but it changes everytime depending on the meta I am in. I am thinking of siding in the Forcemages and 2 other situational elves in favor or Living Wish (as suggested by Naz over at MTGSal) so I can have a wishboard. Wishing for something I need or something for the win does not sound bad at all. Also if I do this, I can use Viridia Zealot in my sideboard over Krosan Grip, Loaming Shaman over Relics and possibly Gaea's Herald over Leyline of Lifeforce.

[Mystical_Jackass]

It seems like it lacks powerful finishing spells compared to other 10-land decks I've seen.

It doesn't run seal of strength, giant growth, & berserk which seems kinda odd. It seems like it'd be really good, in being how fast it'd come out.. but unlike merfolk or black weenies, it lacks way to stop someone from WoG, Damnation, firespout, pyroclas, etc. So its awesome if someone's unprepared and lacks answers, but if they do it wouldn't take much to stop this deck in its tracks. Also, Chalice & Trinisphere control decks would be difficult if they drop fast.. but then again that goes for almost everything lol.

[(nameless one)]

It seems like it lacks powerful finishing spells compared to other 10-land decks I've seen.

It doesn't run seal of strength, giant growth, & berserk which seems kinda odd. It seems like it'd be really good, in being how fast it'd come out.. but unlike merfolk or black weenies, it lacks way to stop someone from WoG, Damnation, firespout, pyroclas, etc. So its awesome if someone's unprepared and lacks answers, but if they do it wouldn't take much to stop this deck in its tracks. Also, Chalice & Trinisphere control decks would be difficult if they drop fast.. but then again that goes for almost everything lol.

With the plethora of Lords that I run, I believe it's unnecessary to run pump spells. Also it creates some disynergy with the elf theme. Pump spells can only temporarily pump one elf in one given turn. Lords can do that indefinitely and to all elves. Keep in mind that regular X-land stompy uses one or two pumped creature to win while the elves uses a pumped swarm in doing so. Although it has traditional X-land elements in the form of Vanquishers, Sentinels and Battalions

Almost like any decks in legacy, this deck has a bane. And this deck has these as it's bane: CotV and 3sphere.

Board sweepers aren't an issue really. Before my opponent sets up enough mana to play Wrath or Damnation, I could have probably beaten him out of the game. Running a drove of Elvish Lords render Pyroclasms and the like spells obsolete. They would still work if you play it 4 straight turns but who can pull that off? And if it was pulled off, a midgame Sylvan Messanger translates to an Elvish Recall (with the low number of non-elf cards, she's bound to get 3 cards).

One way that helps me get around CotV is Leyline of Lifeforce. 3sphere on the other hand, I just hope that I can outrace it. Did I mention that Krosan grip works well against these two?

[Mall Security Guard]

I know he may seem a bit high on your curve, but what about Lys Alana Huntmaster? 4 mana for a 3/3 body that makes moar elves. Goes really nice on the table with a heritage druid and nettle sentinel, and at this point it may not be a bad idea to squeeze in regal force.

A couple other ideas to chomp on, vitalize and concordant crossroads? Or you could prolly replace regal force and vitalize with Staff of Domination.

[(nameless one)]

I know he may seem a bit high on your curve, but what about Lys Alana Huntmaster? 4 mana for a 3/3 body that makes moar elves. Goes really nice on the table with a heritage druid and nettle sentinel, and at this point it may not be a bad idea to squeeze in regal force.

A couple other ideas to chomp on, vitalize and concordant crossroads? Or you could prolly replace regal force and vitalize with Staff of Domination.

I playtested with Lys Alana Huntmaster thoroughly. Ive also playtested with Wren's Run Packmaster, Wirewood Hivemaster, Wolfskull Shaman and Deranged Hermit (mostly, the token enablers). They seem to be all good but as I playtested, I've realized that theyre all win-more conditions. Plus the fact that you'll never get to play Huntmaster, Packmaster and Deranged Hermit because either you've already won the game or you just cant play it because there are better options.

I do agree with Staff of Dominations. You can play them if you want but as a person who despises combo, I do not run them. Ive playtested them thoroughly and usually, when you play Staff of Dominination, its an autowin. It is not hard to pull off a turn 3 combo-off with Staff of Domination with this deck.

I have a question though:

Should a single Gaea's Blessing enough in the SB versus mill-oriented combos?

[Icapica]

Should a single Gaea's Blessing enough in the SB versus mill-oriented combos?
At least it helps a lot in a deck this fast. High Tide combos aren't common anymore and there are more ways to fight against Grindstone than just Blessing.

Have you had problems with Land Grant? I play Berserk Stompy and don't want to use Land Grant because it's a huge FoW target. Then again, I don't play Battalion so I can't really abuse Land Grant anyway.

[Esper3k]

I'd just like to say that having played Survival Elves for quite awhile, a bunch of Lords isn't necessarily enough anymore to save you from the Red sweepers.

Firespout requires you to have 3 Lords in play to survive it. If you have 2 Lords, all your Lords die off, then the rest of your board dies when they shrink down as well.

Pyroclasm requires 2 Lords and if they spot removal one before/after the Pyroclasm, you're still pretty wrecked.

You may want to consider a white splash for Gaddock Teeg and Absolute Law?

[Koby]

Magnify is a cute trick for both removal as well as a one-shot Lord effect.

It reads: +1/+1 to creatures EOT.

The best token enabler has to be Selesnya Guildmage.

[coraz86]

A lot of the old ten-land Stompy decks ran Bounty of the Hunt. (http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=184534)If you can get ahold of any, I'd definitely slide them in there.

[beastman]

I haven't tested this deck out yet, so I have a question for those of you who have tested it a lot and know the deck well. With all the mana elves and mana producers, how fast can you reach five mana with the deck? I recently went to a T2 tournament(sucks, I know) and a combo elves player was showing me how fast he could get to 5 mana on turn 3. If you can get that much mana so fast with this deck, do any of you think that coat of arms could be playable. It completely hoses all of the sweepers running around, unless you hit a wrath. And you should easily have lethal on the next turn. What are your thoughts?

[Darkenslight]

MY suggestion would be to add Timberwatch Elf as a two-of, for the punching power of massive damage.

[Mall Security Guard]

Honestly if you're worried about red sweepers... a slight white splash might be worth it for A) Burrenton Forge Tender and B) Mirror Entity. Both of them are pretty pro against red sweepers especially when you can make obscene amounts of mana

[(nameless one)]

i really never got affected with red sweepers. Either when they play it, I already have multiple lords or i could just recover with it in time for them to do anything drastic.

I've also playtested Timberwatch Elf and Immaculate Magistrate. By the time they get online and going, you could have swung for massive damage and win. I've also playtested Bounty of the Hunt. The problem with his is the slot availability. Should I drop 4 Lords to accomodate him? Should I drop my main beaters? Maybe some mana elves?

One of the problems with Land Grant is permission spells. Usually, I do not keep a hand with just Land Grant and no land in hand if I am playing against blue (which is way too often). Sometimes, you just risk it. One thing I learned about playing against blue is if you risk nothing, you tend to do nothing, you achieve nothing, you become nothing.

Late game Land Grants are kept in hand. Just in case you topdeck a Talara's Battalion. You do not need more than 2-3 lands to play the deck.

Speaking of blue, once you get a mana elf going, there is no way a merfolk player can catch up.

The deck can reach 5 mana by 2-3 turns, Here are some fine examples (note that I was actually goldfishing while im doing this):

1st turn: Drop a land, tap the land and 'cast' Llanowar Elf
2nd turn: Drop a land, tap 1st land to 'cast' Heritage Druid and tap the 2nd land to 'cast' Quirion Ranger. Tap all 3 elves to add GGG to your mana pool (Thanks to Heritage Druid) to 'cast' Elvish Archdruid. Return a Forest to your hand (Thanks to Quirion Ranger) and swing with a 2/2 Llanowar Elf.

1st turn: Drop a land and tap it, pitch Elvish Spirit Guide and cast Priest of Titania.
2nd turn: Tap the land and cast Quirion Ranger. Tap Priest of Titania for GG, return the Forest back to your hand and untap Priest of Titania (Thanks to Quirion Ranger). Use your land drop to put into play the Forest you return to your hand, Tap it for mana to cast a Nettle Sentinel. Tap Priest of Titania again for GGG (you now have GGGGG floating), maybe play that Sylvan Messanger and hope that you can pull another Quirion Ranger or Heritage Druid to net more mana. Cast whatever is left in your hand and hopefully you have some lords in there. Then swing for something like 16 next turn....

Its fun to playtest this deck. It can do so much. The awesome thing about it is that each other card has this synergy to each other that it doesnt matter what you have for your opening hand (as long as you have a land)

My favorite 1st turn however goes like this:

Drop land and/or cast Land Grant for free, pitch Elvish Spirit Guide and play Talara's Battalion (a 1st turn Talara's Battalion can bring the opposing player's morale down)

[(nameless one)]

Also, I would like to add that Root Maze makes an early game disruption, just in case you are playing fast combos...

[Clark Kant]

I like this deck. Any updates on this list? Did you play with it some more?

How awesome is Elvish Archdruid? I don't have any and don't know if I should pick up a playset.

[(nameless one)]

I like this deck. Any updates on this list? Did you play with it some more?

How awesome is Elvish Archdruid? I don't have any and don't know if I should pick up a playset.

Ive been busy lately, so I havent really playtested as of late

Although Ive made the following changes:

+1 Forest -1 Pendelhaven

The reason for that is sometimes, you wish that you had a Forest to work with Quirion Ranger. Other than that, not much reasoning.

Also, Elvish Archdruid is sick. Not only a Lord, he also subs in for Priest of Titania. In a format with tons of removal, you'll need that 5-8 Priest of Titania or a Lord. It also give your opponent really tough decisions on using his spot removals.

[(nameless one)]

Im going to run this deck to an upcoming tournament. Im still having problems with combo.

any suggestions?

[Gui]

Im going to run this deck to an upcoming tournament. Im still having problems with combo.

any suggestions?

Sideboard options:
- Thorn of amethyst (against storm)
- Pithing needle (against actvation like belcher/painter)
- Chalice of the Void @0 (against few storms and such)

[(nameless one)]

I like this deck. Any updates on this list? Did you play with it some more?

How awesome is Elvish Archdruid? I don't have any and don't know if I should pick up a playset.

Alright, I currently have this list:

7 Forest
1 Pendelhaven
4 Land Grant
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
4 Llanowar Elves

4 Heritage Druid
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Quirion Ranger
4 Priest of Titania
4 Elvish Visionary
4 Wren's Run Vanquisher
4 Elvish Archdruid
4 Imperious Perfect
4 Sylvan Messanger
2 Elvish Champion
2 Tribal Forcemage

The only difference from the old list is -4 Talara's Battalion, +4 Elvish Visionary

Elvish Archdruid is really awesome as not only it provides Priest of Titania 5-8, it is also a Lord that boosts your elves.

From my playtesting, I find that Elvish Visionary isnt that bad as it replaces itself, as well as its not a bad topdeck. It also speeds the process of getting more elves in your hand.

Dont get it wrong, Talara's Battalion is really good but with the inclusion of Elvish Archdruid (the old old list didnt have him), this list is even tighter.

I am still working on my SB... any suggestions?