Mono Green Ramp Aggro

[4eak]

After my Krosan Tusker challenge, I decided I really liked a list IBA had made. In the end, I really fell in love with the ramp more than anything. My interested waned until M12, which resparked my interest in the deck with Dungrove Elder. Here's the list:

// Land - 20
1 Dryad Arbor
19 Forest

// Ramp - 18
3 Search for Tomorrow
4 Veteran Explorer
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
4 Yavimaya Elder
3 Primeval Titan

// Loves-me-some-Forests - 8
3 Dungrove Elder
3 Beacon of Creation
2 Rude Awakening

// Tutors - 12
4 Natural Order
4 Living Wish
4 Green Sun's Zenith

// Other Tutor Targets - 2
1 Wickerbough Elder
1 Progenitus

// Sideboard
SB: 1 Maze of Ith
SB: 1 Primeval Titan
SB: 1 Viridian Zealot
SB: 1 Eternal Witness
SB: 1 Dungrove Elder
SB: 1 Vexing Shusher
SB: 1 Bojuka Bog
SB: 1 Acidic Slime
SB: 1 Ambush Commander
SB: 1 Elvish Skysweeper
SB: 1 Mold Shambler
SB: 1 Gigapede
SB: 1 Caller of the Claw
SB: 2 Beast Within

Ramp-up, stall with creatures that you want to block with anyways, and drop bombs. The Wishboard is a mess. Feel free to tell me how to clean it up.

Any ideas? Maybe Birthing Pod? I don't know how best to go about it. Maybe 1x Seedguide Ash to Pod-ramp up to Titan? What do I cut?




peace,
4eak

[Prkchpsndwiches]

I would actually cut the Living Wish. I am a big fan of the card, but never got it to work. I'd play 4 Pattern of Rebirth instead. You have 8 sac dudes : ). It also helps with beast within. Here's your 3/3 dude, go ahead and attack, I'll just block and get my progenitus!

Also your only sac outlet for Veteran Explorer is NO. I would add another outlet, splash black for Cabal Therapy maybe or just cut the explorer. I actually like tusker a lot. I'd put him in any mono green deck.

Your deck is really dead to combo. I'd recommend some Mind Break Traps in the board, maybe Trinishpere and Mental Misstep?

I also think Terastadon is a better target than Wicker.

Thrun is also nice to have vs. Blue decks!


Just some thoughts! :)

P.S. Sorry for the choppy reply. I'm at work, so I don't have a ton of time to compose my response properly.

[dsck]

I'd definitely run some Jitte's in the main. Maybe Thrun/Kitchen Finks in the board as tutor targets?

[4eak]

I would actually cut the Living Wish. I am a big fan of the card, but never got it to work. I'd play 4 Pattern of Rebirth instead. You have 8 sac dudes : ). It also helps with beast within. Here's your 3/3 dude, go ahead and attack, I'll just block and get my progenitus!

That's interesting. I consider Living Wish to be the best Tutor in the deck. Natural Order forces me to sac my board and GSZ is limited to targets in the deck. The flexibility of Living Wish has been really important in my experience, particularly in a color which lacks library manipulation and relies so heavily upon playing somewhat 'bad' cards in great quantities as its ramp.

Can you give more reasoning as to why you don't like Living Wish?

Pattern of Rebirth is a very bad version of Natural Order. The fact that Lightning Bolt beats it in response (unlike NO), or RFG removal at any time, is a big strike against it. What is worse, though, is that it isn't immediate, with the exception of STE (I often won't have the mana with Yavimaya Elder to both play PoR and sac).

In the situation you explained, if they didn't or can't answer a Pattern of Rebirth, they certainly aren't going to swing with the 3/3 into my enchanted creature. That would be a mistake, and they would know that.



Also your only sac outlet for Veteran Explorer is NO. I would add another outlet, splash black for Cabal Therapy maybe or just cut the explorer....Your deck is really dead to combo. I'd recommend some Mind Break Traps in the board, maybe Trinishpere and Mental Misstep?

Sometimes I do have problems getting Veteran Explorer to the GY. I'm not sure I agree with your solutions here.

For Black, I have nothing against running Bayou's, but I do have problems with running fetchlands -- Therapy is 'okay'. It only really shines in matchups that I'm not really even trying to answer, namely, combo, which I feel is a small spectrum of the metagame that is okay to throw. I'm basically not going to answer combo. Unfortunately, Therapy doesn't actually work towards the rest of the gameplan of the deck.

Cutting Explorer seems problematic. It is a card that is extremely useful against aggro-decks, buying me much needed time to build the ramp. More importantly, it serves as the best 1-drop in the deck.

Give the deck a spin, and then let me know.



I also think Terastadon is a better target than Wicker.

I'm going to disagree here as well. Terastodon is often a terrible card to see in your opening hand or top deck (and we already have one of those), and its effect isn't that good. I generally want to spend the majority of my Natural Order's on NOProg. When I do need to answer a permanent, it is almost exclusively Artifacts and Enchantments, which Wickerbough Elder answers. Wickerbough Elder is an acceptable topdeck, and almost always available from GSZ.

That said, I think you are right that I need Terastodon, but I don't like him in the main. Terastodon looks like the perfect candidate for the Wishboard. A couple times I wished I could Living Wish for him.


Thrun is also nice to have vs. Blue decks!
Indeed. I do want him in the deck. My problem is that in the main, I basically can only get him from topdecks (not common enough) or tutoring with either GSZ or NO.

If I'm going for Natural Order, Progenitus is better.

If GSZ is going to resolve, then Dungrove Elder is almost always better. To have the 5 lands (and you might have even more) to GSZ for 4, makes Dungrove a 5/5 Hexproof which rapidly grows, something much better than regen, particularly with hexproof.

Living Wish is the only tutor that makes sense for him. If I resolve the Wish, I won't necessarily resolve the Dungrove Elder. And, assuming I don't go for Vexing Shusher (amazing in this deck) because of opposing removal, then Thrun makes a lot of sense.



I'd definitely run some Jitte's in the main. Maybe Thrun/Kitchen Finks in the board as tutor targets?

What would you take out for Jitte and why?

Finks was in there originally. I never tutored for him. When I need lifegain, it is usually more than 2 or 4 life as well. Oracle of Nectars is better, but even that isn't worth it because of sickness.



peace,
4eak