Mono-Green Land Control
Modern Deck Help forum
Posted on April 17, 2018, 9:56 a.m. by StoryArcher
Morning gents (and ladies!), I've been playing around with a mono-green ramp/land-destruction deck which I really love in concept, but can't seem to quite get optimized, so I figured I'd come to the experts...
This is the deck as it stands now:
Creatures (21)
- 3x Acidic Slime
- 4x Arbor Elf
- 3x Elvish Mystic
- 4x Eternal Witness
- 1x Hornet Queen
- 3x Sakura-Tribe Elder
- 2x Stampeding Serow
- 1x Cloudthresher
Sorcery (12)
Enchantment (4)
Instant (3)
- 3x Beast Within
Land (20)
- 17x Forest
- 1x Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
- 2x Treetop Village
Apart from ramping up to destroy my opponent's land and then pounding on him, there is also a soft-lock win con using Eternal Witness, Stampeding Serow and Primal Command which comes up more than you'd think.
While I'm open to any thoughts or suggestions, the primary things I'm struggling with right now are twofold:
1) It never feels smooth. It always seems that I either end up with way too much ramp in my hand or none at all. Is that just bad luck up to this point? I replaced Plow Under, great as it is, with Beast Within to smooth out my mana curve a little.
2) I've got slots for two big creatures in this deck, preferably ones with utility that have effects when they come into play. Right now I'm using Cloudthresher and Hornet Queen - I figure that they give me a nice bit of flexibility and I can hunt for whichever I need in the moment, but they also don't synergize particularly well (not that they need to). I'm considering Thragtusk as well and I've been bouncing back and forth between the three for a while now. I'm also completely open to another option here that I might not have considered.
So far, this deck has been incredibly fun to play, but incredibly frustrating at times as well, and I'd really like to see if I can make it legitimately competitive. I've also considered a more control-tilted version of it, splashing blue for 4x Remand and 4x Mana Leak which synergizes well, but seems to leave me a little thin, trying to ramp OR land destruct OR counter, so for right now that's on the back burner.
Upon further thought my answer was probably not what youre looking for as far as this list goes. It seems at first glance the cards you could replace would be Cloudthresher for another Acidic Slime because Acidic Slime is just a fantastic card all around. You could get hard countered by stuff like Crucible of Worlds so some sort of anti-artifact could be useful like Naturalize. Thragtusk is a great card to help against burn, but you're probably going to lose to aggro regardless of what tech you throw in there. Overall its a solid card to toss into most any green deck. I would highly recommend Wall of Roots or even Sylvan Caryatid to help with defense/mana ramp early game. Since you are probably not going to be able to remove all of their land and continue to remove it to prevent them from playing stuff, more win-cons like another Hornet Queen is probably necessary to ensure you have something to finish the game with.
April 17, 2018 11:25 a.m. Edited.
StoryArcher,
I'm with solarPULSAR ... Mono-G LD is a great budget approach, but if you want to be more competitive you'll need to upgrade to RG or maybe Temur Ponza.
If you're a fan of the Eternal Witness + Primal Command soft lock, I strongly recommend taking a look at Therabbins' deck.
If you want to stick with Mono-G, I strongly recommend creating a deck and adding the link to your OP rather than just listing the cards as you did ... it's much easier to give deck advice when it's organized as a TappedOut deck :-)
Three big suggestions though, for smoother play:
- Tireless Tracker: Card draw, mana sink, and a wincon if unanswered
- Courser of Kruphix: Card advantage and incidental lifegain
- Kessig Wolf Run: Mana sink
Finally, you might want to drop by the PonzaMTG group on Reddit and ask there ... it's a large and helpful community, and always has lots to say about Land Destruction strategies :-)
April 17, 2018 11:30 a.m.
buckeyetron says... #5
next time just post a link to the deck instead of typing out every single card.
April 17, 2018 8:04 p.m.
StoryArcher says... #6
I really appreciate the advice, guys, all of you - thanks!
I'll look into that reddit group. I've always loved land control as a strategy, all the way back to my old Fallen Empires days. I keep bouncing back and forth between mono-green and mono-red, the latter utilizing a personal combo that I never see (Orcish Spy + Millstone) but is devastatingly effective.
April 23, 2018 9:32 a.m.
StoryArcher says... #7
It works shockingly well. Using the combo to selectively filter out land from your opponent's draw (or anything else you like) rather than blindly milling is devastating. Nobody ever sees it coming and it can serve as a cheap and easy soft lock. Usually once I get it in place, especially if I can get out a pair of each, my opponent just scoops and resets.
Additionally, it really gives Roiling Terrain the potential to become a game-winner.
FWIW, the deck I'm using with that particular combo is here:
...and in response to the request of others, the current version of the original deck above is here:
RedmundR2 says... #2
Focusing on land destruction/land control in mono-g is really tough, and nearly impossible to make competitive. The idea of mana ramping is great to get your land control stuff out quickly, but TBH you might be better off doing a rakdos or gruul land destruction deck (the gruul version is known as ponza IIRC) so you can get access to the good stuff like Boom/Bust + Darksteel Citadel, Stone Rain, Molten Rain, and Simian Spirit Guide to get them out quicker etc. Relying on ramp to get your strategy out means you have less hand space for everything else, and green doesnt draw cards well, or remove opponents creatures well. Rakdos land destruction also means you get to run Lightning Bolt and Fatal Push.
April 17, 2018 10:41 a.m.