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The Wurminator *PRIMER*

Commander / EDH Aggro Arena Casual Mono-Green Multiplayer Voltron

NV_1980

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Artifact (24)

Sorcery (7)

Creature (17)

Enchantment (10)

Instant (5)

Commander (1)

Commander: Grothama, All-Devouring

Land (35)

Planeswalker (1)

Welcome to The Wurminator!

Hi there! Welcome to the primer of my mono-green, Voltron deck, commanded by Grothama, All-Devouring. There be a worm here! A giant example that consumes equipment and integrates the magical power of such baubles into her body, allowing her to shatter opponents in short order. Be careful young planeswalker; do not venture too deep into the forests of Alara, for she will find you, open up her gigantic maw and swallow you whole before you can blink. I play this deck in casual formats. It’s not meant to be used in a competitive fashion, but of course I welcome anyone to try! Feel free to comment on anything you (dis)like throughout this primer; I hope you will enjoy it!

Because sending a magically empowered worm into battle makes me laugh. Joking aside, Grothama’s power- and toughness scores are impressive for a CMC5 legendary creature. This advantage, comes with a catch though; a big bulls-eye on her ass with the words ‘kill me for card-draw’ stitched to it. Bit of a bummer, but protecting her becomes slightly easier in a deck filled with equipment. Also, let’s not forget, creatures on my side can benefit from her ability too. This allows for the use of Grothama in three ways; each a possible path to victory. Either I kill opposing commanders with massive quantities of commander-damage OR I have Grothama fight my creatures for massive boons OR I have my creatures kill Grothama and benefit from the draw she generates. Win-win-win!

I use the following ten parameters to determine the strength of the deck. For each, I allocate a score of 5 (very good), 4 (good), 3 (mediocre), 2 (bad) or 1 (very bad); when totalized this score represents the power rating of the deck (maximum score is 50 points).

  • Mana: indicates the availability of mana sources within the deck.
  • Ramp: indicates the speed at which mana sources within the deck can be made available.
  • Card Advantage: indicates availability of filter- and draw resources represented within the deck.
  • Overall speed: indicates the deck’s potential for pace, based on resource availability and mana curve.
  • Combo: indicates the measure of combo-orientation of the deck.
  • Army: indicates the deck’s creature-army strength.
  • Commander: indicates how much the deck is commander-oriented/dependent (less dependency is better).
  • Interaction: indicates how much this deck can mess with opponents’ board states and turn-phases.
  • Resilience: indicates whether the deck can prevent and take punches.
  • Spellpower: indicates the availability and strength of high-impact spells.

Mana: 3

For the generation of raw energy, a total of eight direct mana generators (three creatures, four artifacts (uncharacteristic for a green deck) and one enchantment) are included, aside from lands. Also, I have included a way to cheapen the casting of green spells.

Ramp: 3

Ramping is featured in the form of creatures and sorceries (eight in total) that allow for additional land drops (some of which will allow for more than one additional land-drop per turn).

Card Advantage: 3

Aside from Grothama being a fantastic potential draw engine by herself, the deck also features four direct draw options, two card filtering mechanisms, two tutors and two means for recursion (both repeatable in the right circumstances).

Overall speed: 4

In ideal conditions, Grothama can be summoned on turn 1, which is pretty frightening. However, on average this deck can muster a very decent speed based on the combination of decently available mana-, ramp- and card-advantage options.

Combo: 3

Not an especially combo-heavy deck, but there are definitely a few doozies in here to elicit a laugh or two (as well as some serious opposition-smackdown of course!). All of these combo’s are centralized around the presence of Grothama and mostly feature the dealing of outrageous damage amounts.

Army: 3

Unlike most green decks, this one features relatively few creatures. Those that have been included can be sub-categorized under resources (six), commander-support (five), army-creators (two) and pure damage (five). All creatures within the latter three categories ought to be combined with the deck’s commander for maximum effect.

Commander: 1

Without Grothama present, this deck cannot use its most important synergies and combos, making the effort to win extremely difficult indeed. Therefore, the deck contains several fail-safes to keep her around on my side.

Interaction: 1

This deck is just about pure Voltron, so there’s not much interaction with the other side. There are a few options for removal and a way to steal opposing creatures.

Resilience: 3

It’s very important to keep Grothama alive to remain effective. The deck contains ten options to grant her indestructibility, hexproof or a gigantic power/toughness boost. I can also protect myself with one of four lifegain options.

Spellpower: 2

There are some significant draw-casts to be used in this deck, along with several spells that really help to increase my overall board-advantage in both mana and draw options.

Total power score: 26

Due to the deck’s lack of versatility, its power score is not particularly high. However, if not inhibited, this deck can cause some serious damage to its opposition within the span of very few turns. Overall, it has a good speed, more than enough resources, some heavy hitters and decent combo/synergy potential.

The key to victory with this deck is to have Grothama, All-Devouring available anywhere between turns 2 and 4, so that she can attack at the earliest opportunity. Her primary goal is to go after the commanders of decks that are strongest against her (most notably, those that are good at army building and stealing). Dependent on how strong I can make Grothama, as well her durability on the field, I then decide to either keep sniping opponents with commander damage OR I use her fight ability to fuel one of the other available win-conditions within the deck.

At least three cards in the starting hand ought to be lands (or two lands and a CMC0 or CMC1 mana rock). This is a must; I are not going to start a game without this hand (even if I have to mulligan down to three cards). The ideal hand would also contain some acceleration in the form of additional land-drop options or filter options.

My victory will depend on Grothama’s first appearance being as fast as I can make it. Hence, I first acquire the resources to cast her onto the field asap. During turns 1 and 2 I will either try for additional land-drops through Burgeoning or Exploration. If those are unavailable, I will opt for mana rocks like Mana Vault or Sol Ring. Ancient Tomb or Carpet of Flowers in my starting hand can work too. Should none of these options be available to us, I either go for a ramping spell like Nature's Lore or Rampant Growth OR I go for early draw/filtering through the use of Mirri's Guile, Scroll Rack, Sensei's Divining Top or Sylvan Library.

By turn 3 or 4, I should have enough resources to summon card:Grothama, All-Devourer. From this point forward, she should attack every turn. Primary targets are opponents with army-building decks OR decks that steal/copy. Secondary targets are opponents without creature defenses to stop Grothama from rampaging through. Tertiary targets are decks wielding creatures that I want to force into blocking Grothama (few players will let 10 commander damage slip by). In order to make her attacks more impactful, I equip her to the best of my ability, giving priority to anything that either gives Grothama trample (Shadowspear, Loxodon Warhammer or landwalk/protection from a color used by one of my opponents (Commander's Plate, Trailblazer's Boots or Sword of Truth and Justice). The early game should end with me dispatching at least one of my opponents.

When the mid-game starts, I have to decide for ourselves whether it is feasible to keep sniping opponents, or whether I need to deploy other win-conditions. For the first option, I want to increase Grothama’s power in order to kill-off opposing commanders as effortlessly as possible (one-shot would be nice). So, I need equipment like Blackblade Reforged, Colossus Hammer, Fireshrieker or Umezawa's Jitte. Another option would be to have Pathbreaker Ibex enter the battlefield and attack, in order to provide tremendous bonus to Grothama’s power. Or I cast Berserk for such a purpose. I can also summon Vigor and make anyone fighting Grothama leave a lasting impression on her power.

For the second option, I need some help from other creatures. Broodhatch Nantuko and Saber Ants for instance, can attack and fight Grothama, thereby instantly generating a large army. This combines particularly well with Vigor on the field, or with Nantuko/Ants being made indestructible with things like Darksteel Plate, Hammer of Nazahn or Stonehoof Chieftain (so that I can keep generating a larger army). I can also use Mossbridge Troll to kill Grothama, after which I can draw a quarter of my deck. Or maybe have Stuffy Doll fight Grothama, after which I can bounce that damage to an opponent.

Dependent on which path I chose during the mid-game, I either reach a point where Grothama becomes too powerful to stop through the equipment she absorbs, meaning everything is taken care off through commander damage, or I manage to use one the deck’s game-winning combos (described in a separate section) to pull out the win.

  • Grothama, All-Devouring + Broodhatch Nantuko/Saber Ants/creature enchanted with Druid's Call + Darksteel Plate/Hammer of Nazahn: equip the Plate/Hammer to Nantuko/Ants/Creature with Call. Attack an opponent with Nantuko/Ants/Creature with Call and have them fight Grothama, resulting in the generation of at least ten insects/ants/squirrels. Due to Nantuko/Ants/Creature not dying during the fight, this process can be repeated during the next attack.
  • Grothama, All-Devouring + Basilisk Collar/Loxodon Warhammer/Shadowspear + insects/ants/squirrels from first combo: equip Collar/Warhammer/Shadowspear to Grothama. Attack with the army of creatures and as a result have them fight Grothama. This will net me at least 100 life (at the cost of my critter-army).
  • Grothama, All-Devouring + Vigor + insects/ants/squirrels from first combo: Attack with my insects/ants/squirrels and have them fight Grothama. The first insect/ant/squirrel deals 1 damage to Grothama, and Grothama deals 10 damage to insect/ant/squirrel. Vigor turns this damage to +1/+1 counters in both cases. So Grothama is now 11/9, while the insect/ant/squirrel is now an 11/11 creature. Repeat for the other nine insects/ants/squirrels. Then I laugh heartily as my invincible army wipes the floor with all my opponents.
  • Grothama, All-Devouring + Mossbridge Troll + Concordant Crossroads/Swiftfoot Boots/Lightning Greaves: with Grothama on the board, I cast Troll. I equip Boots/Greaves to Troll and attack. As a result, Troll fights Grothama and I get to draw a quarter of my deck. Even more fun when one includes a casting of Berserk on Troll to instead draw half one’s deck. Even more fun when one also includes Psychosis Crawler to deal 50 damage to all opponents.
  • Grothama, All-Devouring + Mossbridge Troll + Vigor: tap Grothama to make Troll 25/25. Attack with Troll and have it fight Grothama. Vigor turns all damage to +1/+1 counters, resulting in Grothama becoming 35/33, while the Troll (in its un-empowered state) has become 15/15. Grothama is now strong enough to one-shot opponents with commander damage.
  • Grothama, All-Devouring + Selvala, Heart of the Wilds + Erratic Portal/Temur Sabertooth + Swiftfoot Boots/Lightning Greaves/Concordant Crossroads: this combo needs at least 5 available mana to kick off. With Grothama on the board, cast Selvala and equip her with Boots/Greaves. Pay to use Selvala’s ability to generate ten . Use two of that mana to have Sabertooth bounce her back to hand. Use three mana to re-summon Selvala and one mana to equip her again with Boots. This nets four per cycle. Repeat as often as necessary to generate as much mana as necessary. In case Grothama is the biggest thing on the field (which she often is), use the mana generated by Selvala to keep bouncing Grothama with Sabertooth, each time triggering Selvala’s first ability to draw a card. Keep repeating until the deck has been drawn and now cast everything to close out the game.
  • Grothama, All-Devouring (or another strong creature) + Darksteel Plate/Hammer of Nazahn/Magebane Armor + Ulvenwald Tracker: equip Plate/Hammer/Armor to Grothama. Use Tracker to have any opposing creature weaker than Grothama fight her; thereby assassinating it. Want to make this even more fun? Equip Grothama/strong creature with Scythe of the Wretched and reap souls that have haplessly fallen to strengthen your own team.
  • Grothama, All-Devouring + Stuffy Doll: attack with Doll and have it fight Grothama to deal at least 10 damage to the opponent targeted with Doll. Add Temur Sabertooth to return Doll to your hand once opponent is dead and then resummon Doll to target a new opponent.

Our reliable sources of mana, and some utility:

The cards I use to accelerate mana-availability:

  • Azusa, Lost but Seeking: with the card-draw options presented by Grothama (in case I decide to use her in this fashion), two extra land drops per turn is a great way to quickly deploy my resources.
  • Burgeoning: in a multiplayer setting (which I are always in), this is one of the best cards to have in a starting-hand, especially accompanied by 3-4 lands. Having all these lands available by turn 2 is just insane. Also good when not in my starting hand.
  • Carpet of Flowers: without exception, my playgroup will always feature someone playing blue. People just love this color for its counterspells and draw. So I might as well use their islands to my benefit.
  • Exploration: such a great card; especially in an opening hand, as it accelerates me quickly to speeds beyond my opponents’ capabilities.
  • Llanowar Elves: a mana dork; useful to accelerate stuff in the early stages of the game.
  • Llanowar Tribe: provides on tapping; very decent. Also survives a bit better than the average dork due to having a midrange toughness.
  • Jeweled Lotus: a source of mana that actually enables me to cast Grothama in turn 1.
  • Mana Vault: perfect for my opening hand, as this will most likely enable me to cast a turn 2 Grothama, which is just insane. Also a decent mana source in other situations.
  • Nature's Lore/Rampant Growth: two fantastic ramp spells I can use early.
  • Oracle of Mul Daya: a living Exploration that also acts as a filter; one of the best self-sufficient accelerators ever made and key to making this deck go faster.
  • Sol Ring: a CMC1 artifact that comes into play untapped and grants 2 colorless when tapped; almost the best turn 1 start-up card anyone could wish for.
  • Tempt with Discovery: a ramp spell that can prove to be very beneficial for me (and sometimes my opponents, but that's the risk I are willing to take).
  • Thought Vessel: fits very well with Grothama’s huge card-draw potential.
  • Traverse the Outlands: combined with Grothama (or another of the deck’s strong creatures), both the best filtering and resource-deployment card in this deck.

The mechanisms that provide me with card advantage:

  • Garruk, Primal Hunter: hell of planeswalker that can help me in a number of ways, but in this deck his primary utilization is what he can do in terms of draw.
  • Greater Good: this is so much fun, as it has the potential to completely deny any opposing player from drawing based on Grothama’s leaving the battlefield. It also acts as sort of an insurance system, in case someone still manages to get rid of her; at least I will get some draw out of it.
  • Green Sun's Zenith/Worldly Tutor: superb, cheap-to-use tutors for any creature in my deck.
  • Library of Leng: not card advantage in the form of draw or filtering; but an immunity to discarding (in any way).
  • Mirri's Guile: free filtering during every one of my upkeeps.
  • Rishkar's Expertise: lots of draw and a 'free' summon in one.
  • Scroll Rack: in essence, for just a single mana and a tap, this card increases my hand-size by as many as were in my hand to begin with.
  • Sylvan Library: additional draw at the cost of some life; great in a pinch, especially since I’m allowed to look at what I draw first.

Boosts, companions and artifact food for my lovely worm:

  • Basilisk Collar: this serves multiple purposes. On Grothama, this will ensure everything that decides to fight her dies; most notably useful in case my opposition tries to be cute and get rid of her. This way, the artifact also guarantees some massive lifegain. On any of my other creatures, this will help me kill Grothama (for sure), if I need some card-draw.
  • Berserk: turns anything (and especially my commander) into a frothing, maniacal force of absolute destruction.
  • Blackblade Reforged: for some reason, I have always cared a great deal for Dakkon Blackblade. I could not help ourselves to include his trusty weapon. It just looks awesome and it is wicked powerful.
  • Champion's Helm: fits Grothama neatly when I go full voltron (usually during the early stages of a game). I often switch it to Temur Sabertooth in later stages, as people often fear it more than Grothama once I have reached the mid-/late game phase.
  • Colossus Hammer: one hell of a power/toughness booster, mostly meant for Grothama as it doubles her in size. Useful, as I are going for massive commander damage.
  • Commander's Plate: protection from almost all opposing colors; that makes dealing commander damage a whole lot easier!
  • Concordant Crossroads: cornerstone of some of my combos, as well as just great to have when something large hits the field early; gives a bit of that additional shock-and-awe.
  • Darksteel Plate: having one of my creatures or Grothama become indestructible, is key to some of the combos I are trying to pull off.
  • Exponential Growth: a second berserk than can be made even more ridiculous; in here for the lulz.
  • God-Eternal Rhonas: boosting Grothama to double-damage (in her vanilla state) is almost enough to insta-pop an opponent. Because of Rhonas’ deathtouch, I can also have him fight Grothama the following turn, resulting in me drawing 5 cards (at the cost of having to resummons Grothama). What’s especially great is that this allows me to re-draw Rhonas, if I order the death-triggers of both creatures in such a way that Rhonas’ goes off first.
  • Hammer of Nazahn: fulfills a similar purpose as Brass Squire; though the bonus to damage and its ability to make something indestructible are nice.
  • Heroic Intervention: in case someone feels like taking out my creatures without my approval.
  • Lightning Greaves/Swiftfoot Boots: useful for some combos and just aces should the need arise to protect my commander.
  • Loxodon Warhammer: in here to provide Grothama with trample primary, lifelink secondary and a power bonus tertiary.
  • Magebane Armor: turns Grothama into a 12/12 that can’t be destroyed in a fight; makes her a lot less feasible target for assassination.
  • Scythe of the Wretched: very useful on Grothama; especially when I can make her impervious to harm and force creatures to fight her.
  • Shadowspear: this has been included to make sure Grothama can kill everything; even those that seem impervious to such harm at first. The enabling of trample (and lifelink) are useful too.
  • Stonehoof Chieftain: bad-ass than can also grant my attacking creatures indestructible. Helps my creatures to survive; even when facing off against Grothama.
  • Sword of Truth and Justice: protection and +1/+1 counters for Grothama; wonderful.
  • Trailblazer's Boots: as just about all EDH decks use unorthodox lands, this is the best way to guarantee an unblockable Grothama.
  • Umezawa's Jitte: a very powerful piece of equipment that I can use to assassinate something, gain life or empower the creature that equips it.
  • Unnatural Growth: double my critters' power (and toughness) reliably every turn (including the opponents' turns).
  • Vigor: the ultimate booster and really useful in a deck that features Grothama. It makes her (and any army she brings as company) impervious to damage from any source. More importantly, damage actually makes her stronger.
  • Whispersilk Cloak: making Grothama unblockable is an excellent way to get in commander kills.
  • Zopandrel, Hunger Dominus: the power, … THE POWERRRR!!

Some destruction, some recursion and some options that provide wins when combined with Grothama:

  • Beast Within: very versatile and cheap spell in terms of destruction; its consequence can easily be dealt with.
  • Broodhatch Nantuko/Druid's Call/Saber Ants: combined with Grothama, these are all fantastic army creators.
  • Eternal Witness: great way to retrieve many of the one-hit-high-damage cards in this deck; can be made repeatable when combined with Erratic Portal/Temur Sabertooth.
  • Krosan Grip: wipes out an enchantment/artifact without a chance for the opponent to counter.
  • Lignify: beautiful way to disable commanders.
  • Mossbridge Troll: can be made ridiculously large by Grothama (or something else I have that is made large) and have it out against her for some massive draw. Its regenerative ability that does not require any mana, makes it particularly impressive as it makes my Troll immune to just about all damage.
  • Psychosis Crawler: has the potential to deal some massive damage when combined with the draw potential that Grothama offers. Can also be turned into a gigantic creature if I can achieve an unlimited hand-size.
  • Stuffy Doll: it attacks, fights Grothama, and then deals my most important enemy a ton of damage. Can be repeated again the following turn, as Doll is nicely indestructible.
  • Ulvenwald Tracker: this becomes so strong when combined with an equipped Grothama; especially when she has been given Scythe of the Wretched or something that provides lifelink.

Some cards that occasionally make the cut, when the situation calls for it:

  • Spearbreaker Behemoth: indestructibility for a little mana, so not bad. I sometimes exchange Stonehoof Chieftain for it, as against decks with lots of creature removal indestructibility on demand (and not just in combat) can work miracles.
  • Tooth and Nail: included sometimes just because it’s fun to enjoy the looks of dread on people’s faces when one casts this. This will usually replace Soul's Majesty.

This deck is still evolving. The following cards were considered but not added (yet):

I appreciate the time you took to read my primer. Hopefully it was entertaining and useful to you. If so, feel free to leave a +1 and/or feedback of any kind in the comments below. Thanks again!

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Revision 1 See all

(4 months ago)

-1 God-Eternal Rhonas main
+1 Pathbreaker Ibex main
Date added 5 years
Last updated 4 months
Legality

This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)

12 - 0 Mythic Rares

43 - 0 Rares

19 - 0 Uncommons

6 - 0 Commons
Cards 100
Avg. CMC 2.82
Tokens Beast 3/3 G, Insect 1/1 G, Morph 2/2 C, Squirrel 1/1 G, Wurm 6/6 G
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