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Life is Like A Hurricane

Commander / EDH Combo GU (Simic) Lifegain Primer Ramp

Cloudius

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Land (42)

Utility (6)

Removal (4)

Land Destruction (3)

Ramp (21)

Tutor (6)

Card Draw (4)

Extra Turn (2)

Commander (1)

Commander: Tatyova, Benthic Druid

Extra Land (6)

Recursion (6)

Wincon (6)

Counterspells (3)

Maybeboard

Wincon (3)

Land (1)

Utility (1)

Welcome to the #1 Most Upvoted Tatyova, Benthic Druid deck on Tapped/Out!



Life is like a Hurricane

- Tatyova Spellslinger


Upvote for Sexy Azusa

Tatyova, Benthic Druid is one with nature...

This is a unique Tatyova, Benthic Druid deck that focuses on

  1. Land ramping hard to achieve a good threshold of mana;

  2. Summoning Tatyova, Benthic Druid as early as possible to kick start the value engine. We can often drop Tatyova in turns 2 or 3 with the right opening hand and draws;

  3. Drawing into key combo pieces using Tatyova, Benthic Druid's ability and Blue Card Draw Spells; and

  4. Finish the game through the different lines to victory the deck has to offer.

This is different from some Tatyova, Benthic Druid decks as the deck:

  1. Runs very little creatures (slightly more than 10 creatures, including the Commander);

  2. Does not focus on "Landfall" mechanic; and

  3. Does not run the Retreat to Coralhelm combo as it relies on creatures and does not fit the "Spellslinger" theme.

Tatyova, Benthic Druid is extremely well suited to helm this deck:

  1. Her Simic color identity is great - granting us the much needed land ramp and offering card draw and control;

  2. Her life gain and card draw abilities synergizes well with the land ramp and combo themes of the deck respectively.

Tatyova, Benthic Druid believes in the force...

This deck is perfect for you if you:

  1. Are obsessed with Instants and Sorcery;

  2. Are perfectly fine running a deck with very low creature count;

  3. Like chaining together a lot of spells enroute to victory; and

  4. Like to win via combo instead of combat damage.

This deck is not suitable for you if you:

  1. Like amassing a huge army; and

  2. Like turning your creatures sideways for the win;

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Tatyova, Benthic Druid is omnipotent...

The deck offers many different lines of victory and can be explosive once it starts to combo off.

Big X

The deck can generate obscene amounts of mana using untap spells like Early Harvest, Turnabout, Rude Awakening or through Kydele, Chosen of Kruphix or Lotus Cobra. The mana can be channeled into the different following win conditions:

  1. AOE spells like Hurricane and Squall Line (trying to get my hands on a copy of Borrowing the East Wind too for redundancy);

  2. Make your opponent draw his/her entire deck using Stroke of Genius; or

  3. Draw tons of cards while Psychosis Crawler is in play.

Infinite Turns

Required:

Any combination of cards that allow you to play at least 3 lands per turn (e.g. Azusa, Lost but Seeking) in play;

Crucible of Worlds or Ramunap Excavator in play; and

Walk the Aeons in hand.

  1. Cast Walk the Aeons, sacrificing 3 Island to pay for the buyback cost;

  2. In the extra turn, play the 3 Islands from graveyard;

  3. Rinse and repeat for the win.

Mother Nature Fights Back

Animate our lands with Rude Awakening, turning them into a massive army to swing in for the win.

Control

Land Destruction

  1. Crucible of Worlds and Ramunap Excavator synergize well with Dust Bowl, Strip Mine and Wasteland, allowing us to repeatedly destroy our opponents' lands each turn.

  2. Coupled with cards that allow us to play extra lands each turn, we can effectively deny our opponents of their land resources!

Board Control

  1. Words of Wind is tailor made for this deck! Once the card draw engine starts churning, the access to a huge mana pool allows us to bounce a ton of permanents back to hand, keeping our opponent's board in check.

  2. This deck also runs several and low cost artifacts that can be played repeatedly. Tapping and bouncing mana positive artifacts like Mana Crypt, Sol Ring, Mana Vault and Grim Monolith ramps us too.

Tatyova, Benthic Druid is not alone...

Here are the different Custom Categories and explanation of individual cards, as well as why certain popular cards were excluded.

Ramp is the heart and soul of the deck as it not only accelerates our game plan by granting us loads of mana but also synergizes well with Tatyova, Benthic Druid's abilities.

Baral, Chief of Compliance - I consider cost reduction pseudo-ramp. Baral is especially powerful for a spellslinger deck which relies on chaining together instants and sorceries for the win.

Chrome Mox / Grim Monolith / Mana Crypt / Mana Vault / Mox Diamond / Sol Ring / Thought Vessel - Mana rocks package. They often help power out a turn 2/3 Tatyova.

Cultivate / Farseek / Harrow / Journey of Discovery / Kodama's Reach / Nature's Lore / Rampant Growth / Skyshroud Claim - Standard land ramp package.

Early Harvest / Rude Awakening / Turnabout - It is common for us to have twice or even thrice the number of lands as compared to our opponents. These spells allow us to untap our lands for that extra mana boost to keep the combo going or to finish the game. They synergise well with Scapeshift and Splendid Reclamation too, which puts the lands into play tapped.

Kydele, Chosen of Kruphix - Coupled with Tatyova's explosive card draw mechanic, Kydele often adds tons of mana when tapped.

Lotus Cobra - Another prime target for Green Sun's Zenith. Fetchlands are the Cobra's best friend and it goes crazy with Scapeshift or Splendid Reclamation.

Notable Exclusions

Animist's Awakening, Hour of Promise, Pir's Whim and other ramp spells - The choice of ramp spells is a matter of personal preference beyond the staples like Cultivate and Nature's Lore. Feel free to include those you prefer and let me know how they fare in your play testings!

Three Visits - The exorbitant price is the only reason why this was not included. A much needed reprint tbh!

Budoka Gardener   / Llanowar Scout / Sakura-Tribe Scout / Skyshroud Ranger / Walking Atlas - Left them out to keep to the "creature-lite" theme. I also prefer spells that fetches lands from my library into battlefield over these creatures that put land from hand into play.

Azusa, Lost but Seeking - One of the prime targets for Green Sun's Zenith. Having her out early almost certainly spells game over for my opponents if they don't have an answer for her.

Exploration - Drawing this in the opening hand is like a dream come true...

Oracle of Mul Daya / Wayward Swordtooth - Cause we need as many "extra land per turn" effects as we can find.

Summer Bloom / Journey of Discovery - One time use but can accelerate us fast. A turn 1 Summer Bloom would allow us to cast our commander on turn 2!

Notable Exclusions

Enter the Unknown / Explore / Urban Evolution - I prefer permanents that allow us to play extra lands instead of spells that grant one time effects. Summer Bloom is included as it lets us throw down up to 3 lands at the cost of just . Journey of Discovery is versatile and can double up as a basic land tutor.

Rites of Flourishing - Not a fan of symmetrical, group-hug type effects.

Hurricane / Squall Line - Who would have imagined these as the wincon for a deck! They're hardly used in most decks to begin with. Generate tons of mana and churn them into a massive Hurricane and mown your opponents down! With Tatyova, Benthic Druid's built in life gain, we're usually out of harm's way. There's also Glacial Chasm as a backup.

Psychosis Crawler - "Draw a card, Gain 1 life...Draw a card, Gain 1 life..." Now why not make that "Draw a card, Gain 1 life, Opponents take 1 damage..." Now that's sweet!

Rude Awakening - It's common for us to have 15-20 lands in play. An end turn Cyclonic Rift followed by an onslaught of animated lands means certain death for those who dare stand in our way!

Stroke of Genius - Given the drawing power of this deck, it is extremely rare for us to win via milling our opponents, as we'd usually draw into our other Wincons, but this is an option nonetheless.

Words of Wind - Turns your tremendous drawing power into board control by making all players bounce permanents they control. The game is yours once you're able to bounce several lands they've in play per turn. Also bouncing lands for us is awesome as we can replay them for more card draws/bounce. The deck also runs several and low cost artifacts which are perfect targets to bounce.

Notable Exclusions

Aetherflux Reservoir - Swapped the Laser Canon for more AOE-type effects like Hurricane.

Blue Sun's Zenith - Most players would prefer to run Zenith over Stroke of Genius as the former is reusable and both cards get the job done. There're a lot of active discussions in the comments below on these 2 cards. I've went with Stroke for two main reasons:

  1. Baral, Chief of Compliance would help reduce the base casting cost of Stroke of Genius from to . In a big turn when we chain many spells together, every mana counts and the reduction helps alot.

  2. I prefer Stroke's base cost of over Zenith's .

Borrowing the East Wind - A underused card that is difficult to find and is expensive only cause of it's limited print and circulation. May include it for redundancy if am able to get hold of a copy.

Retreat to Coralhelm - This is an extremely popular Wincon card for most Tatyova, Benthic Druid decks. I've intentionally left this out to try a path less traveled and to adhere closely to the Spellslinger theme.

Land Tutor

Crop Rotation - Versatile tutor that grabs you any land. My usual targets are Ancient Tomb if I need more ramp, Strip Mine if I need to go "Land Destruction" mode or any fetchlands for extra card draws.

Scapeshift - The staple in most land ramp decks. Draws us tons of cards if Tatyova's in play.

Creature Tutor

Green Sun's Zenith - Our sole creature tutor in the deck. The usual suspects I grab are Azusa, Lost but Seeking, Lotus Cobra, Ramunap Excavator or Sylvan Safekeeper.

Instant/Sorcery Tutor

Mystical Tutor / Personal Tutor - Extremely critical for keeping our combo going. Synergises well with Tatyova's card draw mechanic so we can often draw the cards the same turn we tutor for them.

Others

Muddle the Mixture - Tutors for any 2 CMC goodies.

Notable Exclusions

Chord of Calling - Being an instant makes it more versatile than Green Sun's Zenith. However, as the deck is "creature-lite", I don't benefit much from the "Convoke" ability and the base cost of almost always make Chord of Calling more expensive to cast compared to Zenith.

Long-Term Plans - After testing, the 2 cards "delay" doesn't gel well with the deck as part of our card draws involve cracking fetchlands, which require us to shuffle our library thereafter.

I only play a handful of card draws in this deck as Tatyova, Benthic Druid's card draw ability is sufficient majority of the time.

Horn of Greed - A redundancy for Tatyova just in case she gets removed repeatedly or hated out via Pithing Needle or the likes and we aren't able to draw timely answers for them.

Pull from Tomorrow- Draw X cards, play more spells, drop more lands, draw more cards... "this is the cycle that "never ends"... Yes it goes on and on my friend..."

Stroke of Genius - Functions like another Pull from Tomorrow when not used as a wincon.

Time Spiral - Being able to draw a fresh hand of 7 and untap 6 lands is often sufficient to keep the combo engine going.

Crucible of Worlds / Ramunap Excavator - Extremely powerful when combined with Fetchlands (draws you 2 cards per Fetchland with Tatyova in play) or Strip Mine and friends.

Eternal Witness / Regrowth - Standard Recursion package to bring back an utility card or wincon.

Noxious Revival - allows us to pay 2 life instead of , which is great as every mana counts when we're comboing off for the win. Being an instant, you can cast this with Tatyova's card draw trigger on the stack to immediately draw the card you recur.

Splendid Reclamation - Great synergy with Scapeshift, draws you tons of cards with Tatyova in play.

I run only a handful of removal spells in this deck, mainly to deal with cards that interrupt with our game plan.

Capsize - Targets any permanent and can be used repeatedly. It is common for us to be able to bounce at least 3 permanents per turn by mid game.

Curse of the Swine - "I'm not a fan of Blightsteel Colossus, here's a 2/2 green Boar Token for you instead..."

Cyclonic Rift - Blue staple, need no further introduction!

Words of Wind - Synergises extremely well with Tatyova's card draw ability, allowing us to bounce several permanents per turn, it's usually game over once opponents start to return their lands.

Notable Exclusions

Beast Within - This was a tough call as it allow us to target permanents. Opted for Capsize for its re-usability.

Pongify / Rapid Hybridization - Opted for Curse of the Swine as it can hit multiple targets at once and is an Exile effect, allowing us to deal with indestructible creatures too.

Dust Bowl - Trade your basic land for opponent's Gaea's Cradle? I'm sold!

Strip Mine / Wasteland - Crucible of Worlds and Ramunap Excavator are their best friend, giving our opponents recurring nightmare. Throw in "play additional land" effects like Azusa, Lost but Seeking and we can severely cripple an opponent's mana base.

Notable Exclusions

While having more redundancy is good, the lands only provide colorless mana when tapped. I ended up running just the 3 above, opting for more sources that produces or instead.

Field of Ruin - It ramps other unaffected players in a multiplayer game which ain't ideal.

Tectonic Edge - Can only target players with at least 4 lands, which is restrictive.

I run a very tiny Counterspell package in the deck, mainly to protect my key wincon cards or to counter spells that are highly disruptive to our game plan.

Force of Will - One of the best "free" counterspells in the game, allowing you to counter a key spell even when you're all tapped out.

Mana Drain - Counterspell and Ramp all 1 in card.

Muddle the Mixture - Doubles up as a tutor.

Notable Exclusions

Arcane Denial, Counterspell and friends - The deck's primary wincon is by chaining spells together to resolve a huge Hurricane. Given the deck's card draw and tutor capabilities, we are often able to bring Boseiju, Who Shelters All into play so our key spells are well protected.

Pact of Negation - I prefer Force of Will over Pact but if you play in a counter heavy meta our don't have access to Force, you can add this to the deck.

Foil - In theory, it work great with the deck as we almost always have extra land cards in our hand to discard. is a high casting cost for a counterspell so we almost always want to cast it for its alternate cost.

In reality, I personally find that Foil only shines in mid-late game. During early game, we're ramping hard and every land drop counts (ramps us and draws us cards). The critical spells we need to set up the combo are also usually casted during early game.

Thwart - Same reasoning as above as we need to reach a 3 islands threshold before we can cast it for its alternate cost.

Forbid - We almost always have a full hand and certainly have cards to discard for the buyback cost. I just prefer the lower CMC Mana Drain and Muddle the Mixture for its ramp and "transmute" abilities respectively.

Just 2 cards in this category.

Time Warp - Any extra turn card works fine in this slot. Use this strategically and not just to "draw an extra card". Sometimes, we just need that extra untap step to combo off for the win.

I run Time Warp cause its the lowest cost (both in card price and casting cost) compared to other alternatives and it doesn't get exiled after use, so Eternal Witness, Regrowth and Noxious Revival can recur it back.

Walk the Aeons - Combos with Azusa, Lost but Seeking, Crucible of Worlds/Ramunap Excavator and 3 Islands for "infinite" turns.

Notable Exclusions

Capture of Jingzhou / Temporal Manipulation - Almost identical as Time Warp, but with a huge price tag.

Temporal Mastery / Temporal Trespass - Higher casting cost (though the latter has "Delve") and the spell is exiled after use.

Expropriate - At a whopping 9 CMC, it's a "win more" card imho.

Nexus of Fate - Was included in the earlier version of the deck. We are sometimes able to draw into the card again and take 2-3 turns consecutively but once again it's a "win more" card imho.

Savor the Moment - Lower casting cost than Time Warp but we don't get that untap step, which is critical for our combo to work.

Amulet of Vigor - Works well with Scapeshift, Splendid Reclamation, Simic Growth Chamber and other spells that put lands into play tapped.

Exhaustion - It's essentially a mini Time Warp when used on an opponent who just tapped out to cast a big spell and swung all his/her creatures at you, buying you an "extra turn" to dig for answers or to go for the win.

Glacial Chasm - Protects you from AOE effects like Hurricane and lethal damage from opponents'creatures. Crucible of Worlds and Ramunap Excavator let you replay this from graveyard without having to pay the cumulative upkeep.

Lightning Greaves / Sylvan Safekeeper- Offers protection for our key creatures. Greaves allow Kydele, Chosen of Kruphix to "hit the road running" the turn she's summoned.

Turnabout - Extremely versatile card. Often used to untap our lands to generate more mana but when push comes to shove, can be used to tap down our opponent's creatures, artifacts or lands.

Ancient Tomb - I consider this "Ramp", at the price of 2 life is well worth.

Bant Panorama / Terramorphic Expanse - Fetches for basics, supplements the fetchlands in the deck.

Boseiju, Who Shelters All - Makes our key instant/sorcery spell uncounterable, extremely important when playing against counter heavy decks.

Breeding Pool - Simic shockland, fetchable via Nature's Lore and most fetchlands.

Command Tower / Flooded Grove / Hinterland Harbor - Color fixing.

Dust Bowl / Strip Mine / Wasteland - Land destruction package as explained in earlier section.

Flooded Strand / Misty Rainforest / Polluted Delta / Verdant Catacombs / Windswept Heath / Wooded Foothills - Fetches that finds us either Forest, Island or both. Each of these draws us 2 cards and gains us 1 life with Tatyova, Benthic Druid in play.

Glacial Chasm - "Our Death denied" as explained in earlier section.

Reliquary Tower - The deck features explosive card draw power and tower lets us keep all the goodies in our hand without the need to discard them.

Simic Growth Chamber - It's usefulness is situational. Works extremely well with Amulet of Vigor, otherwise, it's just bounces a land for us to re-play for an extra card draw. Can be replaced by any land of your choice.

Notable Exclusions

Dryad Arbor - Excluded only because I currently don't own a copy of this card. It goes right into the deck once I get my hands on one.

Scalding Tarn, Evolving Wilds and the other Panoramas - Can be added if you need more fetches. I feel 8 is just about right for me at the moment.

Temple of Mystery - Scry 1 ain't strong in this deck plus it comes into play tapped.

Thawing Glaciers - Re-playable fetch. I don't like the fact that it comes into play tapped.

Tropical Island - Out of my budget. If I tell you my birthday, will you get me one...

... pretty pretty please! Show

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Updates Add

Added Horn of Greed — Sept. 10, 2018
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Added

  1. Horn of Greed - Redundancy for Tatyova, Benthic Druid.

Removed

  1. Long-Term Plans - While it tutors for any card, putting it 3rd from the top actually hampers our card draws via fetch lands or any interactions that requires us to shuffle our library thereafter (e.g. casting land ramp spells like Cultivate).
Added Amulet of Vigor & Simic Growth Chamber — Sept. 5, 2018
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Casual

97% Competitive

Top Ranked
  • Achieved #6 position overall 5 years ago
Date added 5 years
Last updated 3 years
Legality

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

3 - 0 Mythic Rares

42 - 0 Rares

18 - 0 Uncommons

15 - 0 Commons
Cards 100
Avg. CMC 2.57
Tokens Boar 2/2 G, City's Blessing
Folders Cool Decks, Cool Decks!, asdfdasfsadf, tatyova, Creative Decks, Interesting Decks, Good decks, Decks I Want to Build, edh decks, 75% Optimized EDH Decks
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