The Hydras have assembled, and they have come for revenge!
This deck is made to sqeeze the living hell out of the lands I control by Enchanting them with mana boosters and untapping them repeatedly with Arbor Elf, Magus of the Candelabra and Garruk Wildspeaker, to then play a lot of big creatures. I don't know what usually gets played at modern tournaments, but atleast where I usually play, my opponents have a bit of a hard time taking care of too many big creatures. (I'm first and foremost a Standard player)
The composition goes as following:
I wanted to make a Hydra deck and knew that for it to be able to be competative, I needed a lot of ramp. So whilst making it, I came to think of a poor casual deck I made about a year earlier, where I used Arbor Elf together with Verdant Haven to get an "awesome mana boost". So searching for similar Enchantments, I found the 3 that became my favourites:
Utopia Sprawl was my first choice. It costs 1 mana and gives an additional mana when you tap the enchanted land. It's kind of a mana elf that is a bit more ensured to survive long enough to actually get used effectively.
Overgrowth was my second pick. This is the card gives the enchanted land an explosive mana boost. accompanied with an arbor elf, the enchanted land will produce 6 mana! And the more enchantments on, the more ridiculous amounts of mana will be produced.
Fertile Ground is a card that I at first was unsure of playing. What I really wanted was another card like Utopia Sprawl, and I found one, sadly it wasn't legal in modern, so I compromised and put in only 2. I felt that 8 enchantments wasn't enough so I felt this was a good solution.
Now, like I said, to get more out of the Enchanted lands, I also put in cards capable of untapping the lands.
Arbor Elf was an obvious choice. 1 mana, 1/1, tap to untap target forest. The chances of my Enchantments ending up on a forest are pretty darn high as this is a green deck with just a wee bit of red. Arbor Elf is the main mana hoarder.
I knew that I needed something more to untap the lands, but wasn't too excited to play the Voyaging Satyr as he costs 2 mana to play and I wanted the land untapper to cost 1 mana to play.
So I found Magus of the Candelabras!
He is a slightly less effective version of Arbor Elf in this deck, but as a 1/2 for 1 mana, he can also be used to block opposing 1/1 creatures without having to be sacrificed for the greater good.
Another Pro is that he can untap any land, meaning that if I happened to have to enchant a non-forest land, Magus of the Candelabra will still be able to untap it to abuse the land enchantment.
Going over some playable planeswalkers, I also found Garruk Wildspeaker. He can give 3/3 creatures (mainly for blocking) and he too is able to untap and help abusing the enchanted lands.
Fun Fact: If I were to put every enchantment in this deck on one forest and have all 4 Arbor Elf/Magus of the Candelabra Creatures in play along with a Garruk Wildspeaker, That single land would be able to produce 141 mana!
So all there was to do now was to choose Hydras and the amount of each.
2x Kalonian Hydra, Because every important creature in this deck has counters on it, and Kalonian Hydra will increase the counter amount. He's also a 4/4 Trample for 5 mana that hits for 8 the first attack. Pretty sweet if you ask me.
2x Mistcutter Hydra. He can't be countered. Has protection from blue and has Haste, meaning that playing him the turn after playing Kalonian Hydra will give your opponent a very unpleasant surprise indeed.
2x Hydra Broodmaster is probably the biggest killer in this deck. With the mana boost from this deck, activating the monstrosity for 5, 10 or even 20, isn't that difficult. But taking care of 20 creatures that big on the other hand is. 20x 20/20 Hydras attacking for a total worth of 400 plus the broodmaster who now is a 27/27, should be enough to kill your opponent a couple of times over ;)
4x Primordial Hydra Is the ultimate stress object if you ask me. In each my my upkeeps, he will double in size, and with 10 or more +1/+1 Counters on him, he also has trample, making him a ticking threat that has caused a lot of opponents, as well as myself, extremely stressed out as they see him come closer to being able to crush you in 1 swing. He is the main reason for me wanting to make a hydra deck in Modern.
Then we have the Support cards. These are only here to help the other cards to survive, actually get drawn or simply be more efficient.
2x Hunter's Prowess Increases the punching power of a creature as well as allowing card draw and giving trample. Putting it on a Savageborn Hydra will usually be enough to make the opponent wet his pants.
2x Kessig Wolf Run is here to make everything in play something to be feared as the massive mana ramp enables it to give a rather big boost in power to anything you want. Even Arbor Elf can be a bane to your enemy when boosted by Kessig Wolf Run. But the even greater reason for me to play it is that the boosted creature also get Trample. Something a bit too many of my creatures are lacking for me to be satisfied without it.
2x Raging Ravine increases the Chances of getting the red mana that I want as well as having a "reserve creature" in case the oponent clears the field with something like a boardwipe. The fact that it also grows with a +1/+1 Counter each time it attacks is also nice.
1x Domri Rade Gives a nice little extra card drawer as well as an extra removal as my creatures most often are bigger than my opponents, making the -2 effect quite usefull. And if I'd be so lucky as to get to use the -7 ability, my victory will have been ensured.
2x Archetype of Endurance. Why? because I can play it whithout trouble, he gives a much wanted hexproof ability to all my creatures and gives that without me having to cut down on the amount of creatures, which also keeps Domri Rade at a pleasant value as the chances of hitting a creature with his +1 ability is very nice
2x Ruric Thar, the Unbowed gives me reach, a constant attacker, and something that makes your opponent think twice before playing noncreature spells. Burn decks will usually need to sacrifice about 12 life to take him down as 2 Lightning Bolt are required, and if someone where to do that, He would have done his job. Control decks will simply say "nope" upon facing him. or possibly "scoop".
1x Xenagos, God of Revels is simply here to make my creatures pack an even greater punch as well as giving haste. He works pretty well with Kessig Wolf Run too...
Then I also wanted something to play around with, so I chose cards with high mana cost that can't be countered, as this deck has a great potential to poop out mana. Theese were my choices:
Emrakul, the Aeons Torn. Because I don't think there is any greater way of making your opponent shit him/herself than playing this card as early as turn 3.
Banefire. How about ending the game by burning the opponent for 40 uncounterable damage? Sounds rather lovely to me.
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For control decks I have 3x Choke to empty their mana and 4x Savage Summoning if they are being particulary difficult. 2x Mistcutter Hydra, making 4 in a total, something to completely throw them off.
4x Blood Moon will be a bit of a nuiscance to my deck too, but when facing a deck heavy with non-basic lands, he will suffer more.
2x Bramblecrush Is here to take care of annoying Planeswalkers mainly, but it is rather diverse and can thus be used very effectively on other cards as well!
