Standard Front Page Feature #1

Features Opinion

zandl

25 May 2016

636 views

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Front Page Feature #1

Deckcycled lately?

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In this first installment of my new article series, I’ll be bringing you a fresh deck each Wednesday from our community that happened to pique my interest as it floated down the front page for a deckcycle - no pleading, begging, or contests required. I’ll show you the list, provide you with insights directly from the creator, offer improvements, and even attempt to brew a few variants revolving around the same core strategy.

When am I more likely to see your deckcycles? I’m always taking peeks at TappedOut throughout the day (and night), so there’s not one specific time each week I’m looking for new lists. Deckcycling more often can’t hurt you, though.

The first deck in the series belongs to Javva209, who utilizes a potentially game-breaking card that has seen no real love yet in Standard. The goal of the build is to cast this formidable spell and instantly close out the game in a single turn. The catch? It’s all mono-Green.

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Gaea's Aurora Fueled Revenge

Standard Javva209

SCORE: 80 | 95 COMMENTS | 9015 VIEWS | IN 53 FOLDERS

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4 Jaddi Offshoot
3 Sylvan Advocate
4 Tireless Tracker
2 Greenwarden of Murasa
4 Gaea's Revenge

4 Nissa's Pilgrimage
4 Explosive Vegetation
4 Nissa's Renewal
4 The Great Aurora

2 Cryptolith Rite

19 Forest
3 Blighted Woodland
3 Evolving Wilds

The main goal of the deck is to stall with life-gain and valuable creatures until The Great Aurora can be used with a high number of permanents in play. From there, Gaea's Revenge should be easy to cast and swing with while the opponent’s board and hand are likely in shambles. Gaea's Revenge is no joke of a creature, either, as it’s just large enough to outlive Languish while blanking countermagic and nearly all targeting spells in Standard. I hear 8 power with haste is decent, too.

Part of the reason I think this deck has so much potential to do well in the current Standard environment is that it just doesn’t care what the opponent is doing. A Jaddi Offshoot on turn-1 isn’t likely to receive a lot of heat (drawing from my seven months of experience using it in ramp decks), so it’s safe to assume you’re still going to be fine by turn-5 or so. It’s reasonable to say that a Tireless Tracker will grant more than one Clue token, playing well with Explosive Vegetation to thin out the deck and then enable draws. Nissa's Renewal is a powerhouse on turn-5, staving off any damage dealt so far and providing a massive surge in mana the following turn. Once up to here (or beyond), The Great Aurora slams down, instantly negating everything done on the battlefield by the opponent and netting insane card advantage - that is, unless the opponent somehow had more permanents in play.

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        Creator Insights

What made you want to build around The Great Aurora specifically?

"I love cards that require certain contexts to be good and aren’t necessarily straightforward in terms of how they help you win the game. The Great Aurora changes your typical deck strategy and forces you to take a more roundabout approach to winning a game. This provides a structure that makes both deckbuilding and playing satisfying. The Great Aurora is also a game-breaking spell that’s still Standard-legal. It has major implications not only for the board state, but both players’ game plans. These kind of spells are usually Blue or Black, so it was interesting to see it in a Green ramp shell."

What do you like most about playing the deck?

"The best part for me will always be resolving The Great Aurora with 20+ permanents, a reasonable expectation for the deck. Besides that, Magic is a game played physically across from another person. Surprising that person with this deck brings back that sense of awe everyone experienced the first time they cast a powerful spell when they first started playing."

What are this deck’s toughest matchups?

"For any true ramp deck, it’s going to be the aggro matchup. Ramp decks (especially this one) are built to maximize the amount of permanents they can have out quickly. To fight this, many cards are dedicated partially or solely to surviving the requisite 7-8 turns to cast The Great Aurora."

What might you change about the deck as time goes on?

"The biggest thing I could change would be adding White for Secure the Wastes and Declaration in Stone, both Standard mainstays that might make the deck a bit more competitive. Someone had mentioned using a Stasis Snare on my own Embodiment of Insight so The Great Aurora would suddenly create a bunch of haste 5/5 lands with Sylvan Advocate. It seems like a fun casual/sideboard option."

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        Potential Improvements

• -1 The Great Aurora
• One of the biggest problems I see with the deck is that the curve is (understandably) huge. Without at least 6 or 7 lands, the deck isn’t really doing anything. Even though The Great Aurora is our key card, I think we may need to cut a copy. It’s never something we want to see before turn-5 nor have multiples of at once, but it would still likely come up after thinning out the deck with our ramp spells.
• -2 Greenwarden of Murasa
• Greenwarden is a card with some great potential for value, but we don’t typically want it until after a good portion of the game has passed. At that point, though, we’d be looking to finish the game out quickly with The Great Aurora and Gaea's Revenge, not grinding out value one spell at a time.
• -3 Evolving Wilds
• I understand why Evolving Wilds is here: It thins out the deck to make The Great Aurora more potent, offers landfall for Jaddi Offshoot, and provides two different Clue tokens from Tireless Tracker. What I don’t like, though, is that the land enters the battlefield tapped, essentially leaving us without a land-drop on the turn we play it. In a deck that intends to use all its available mana each turn, this could become a problem. Imagine having 5 lands, Nissa's Renewal, and this.

• +1 Sylvan Advocate
• To avoid getting stuck early on with too many spells we can’t cast, we need to build up the lower curve. Going up to the full playset of Sylvan Advocate will let us more consistently put pressure on attacking creatures while forcing control decks to leave in spot-removal spells after sideboarding.
• +1 Cryptolith Rite
• If we’re going to be beefing up the lower end of the curve with a few more creatures, we should be including another copy of this spell. A turn-2 Cryptolith Rite accompanying a turn-1 Jaddi Offshoot gives us access to Explosive Vegetation or Tireless Tracker + land on our third turn. This type of start is what the deck needs to really outspeed opposing aggressive decks, like G/W Tokens or Humans.
• +1 Nissa, Vastwood Seer  ^Flip
• Nissa finds us our next land-drop for free and draws us an extra card each turn when she transforms. Playing her, similar to a fourth copy of Sylvan Advocate, forces control players to keep using spells after sideboarding that we don’t particularly care about one way or the other, giving us more control and sway in the match. If Nissa lives, that’s a huge gain. If she dies before transforming, we still have bigger things they need to be worrying about. There could be room here for another copy or two, but I’d be hesitant. Nissa needs a lot of help on defense once she transforms and wants to stick around for as long as she can, netting you complimentary lands and spells. I’d also note that you’d want to save your land-drop until after The Great Aurora in case you draw a copy of Nissa.
• +3 Spawning Bed
• Part of what makes Cryptolith Rite so scary in the B/G Aristocrats deck is the synergy it has with Catacomb Sifter’s Eldrazi Scion token. Scions can tap for mana and then be sacrificed to give you 2 mana apiece. At the cost of losing some occasional value from what Evolving Wilds did for us, I think we gain more back in Spawning Bed. Beyond giving us a burst of mana in the mid-game turns at instant-speed, the Scions count as permanents toward The Great Aurora.

This leaves us with the following list:

4 Jaddi Offshoot
4 Sylvan Advocate
1 Nissa, Vastwood Seer  ^Flip
4 Tireless Tracker
4 Gaea's Revenge

4 Nissa's Pilgrimage
4 Explosive Vegetation
4 Nissa's Renewal
3 The Great Aurora

3 Cryptolith Rite

19 Forest
3 Blighted Woodland
3 Spawning Bed

As there was not a complete sideboard with the list, here’s a suitable one for the time being:

4 World Breaker (for ramp mirrors)
3 Hangarback Walker (for other midrange decks)
3 Retreat to Kazandu (for very aggressive decks)
2 Display of Dominance (for Esper Walkers/Control)
2 Nissa, Vastwood Seer  ^Flip (for longer matchups)
1 Zendikar's Roil (for longer matchups)

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        Variants

Eldrazi Aurora

Mainboard
4 Sylvan Advocate
4 Tireless Tracker
2 Nissa, Vastwood Seer  ^Flip
3 Gaea's Revenge
4 World Breaker
2 Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger

4 Nissa's Pilgrimage
4 Explosive Vegetation
2 Nissa's Renewal
3 The Great Aurora

3 Hedron Archive

15 Forest
4 Sanctum of Ugin
3 Blighted Woodland
3 Shrine of the Forsaken Gods

Sideboard
4 Jaddi Offshoot
4 Hangarback Walker
3 Warping Wail
1 Kozilek, the Great Distortion
1 Nissa's Renewal
1 Orbs of Warding
1 Void Winnower

I’m adding a bit of a spin on the original deck by including the inevitable late-game power of the Eldrazi. What allures me to this build is that it can seemingly shift gears at 7 mana and focus on depriving the opponent of lands and beating him/her senseless with Gaea's Revenge without having to rely on Ulamog to get the job done. The Great Aurora into Ulamog, though, will likely end the game on the spot regardless of Ulamog’s survival, since being down 2 extra after a detrimental Aurora is pretty harsh. This deck is probably better suited for a slower meta, perhaps with a lot of control.

G/W Aurora

Mainboard
4 Sylvan Advocate
2 Nissa, Vastwood Seer  ^Flip
1 Linvala, the Preserver
4 Gaea's Revenge

4 Declaration in Stone
4 Nissa's Pilgrimage
4 Explosive Vegetation
3 Planar Outburst
3 Nissa's Renewal
3 The Great Aurora

3 Secure the Wastes

9 Forest
5 Plains
4 Canopy Vista
4 Fortified Village
3 Westvale Abbey  ^Flip

Sideboard
4 Jaddi Offshoot
3 Dromoka's Command
2 Display of Dominance
2 Dragonlord Dromoka
2 Tragic Arrogance
1 Orbs of Warding
1 Greenwarden of Murasa

Since the creator of the original deck wanted to see what it would be like with White added to the mix, here is what I came up with. By utilizing Planar Outburst and Declaration in Stone, we gain a lot of board control we previously didn’t have. Linvala, the Preserver is a spicy one-of that will likely have both its abilities trigger. Secure the Wastes finally gives the deck something to do at instant-speed, all the while potentially fueling a massive The Great Aurora with each token counting toward it. Westvale Abbey  ^Flip extends our reach far into the late-game or just ends it as soon as turn-6 or so. The sideboard offers a few ways to stave off slower decks and ones that make use of Virulent Plague, which is most nowadays.

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Do you have anything else to add? What would you do differently? What do you think? Let me know down below!

Keep deckcycling out there! You never know when I could be eyeballing your list.

Happy tapping, players!
zandl

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