Return of the Wildspeaker

Instant

Choose one —

• Draw cards equal to the greatest power among non-Human creatures you control.
• Non-Human creatures you control get +3/+3 until end of turn.

Discussion (48)

Profet93 on xenaghos semi-optimized

2 days ago

+1 the deck looks pretty good. Low to the ground, got some interaction and instant speed protection. I would try to add a few more pieces of draw to maintain gas.

Lands

Yavimaya Hollow - Protection

Cragcrown Pathway  ^Flip - Utility

Dread Statuary - Man land which can be a creature to be used for a draw spell

Blighted Woodland - Ramp

Ancient Tomb - Ramp

Instants + Artifact + Sorcerries

Beast Within - Removal

Berserk - Fun with malignus, infect creature, removal of opponents creatures, ramp with selvala, etc...

Deflecting Swat - Redirect targetted removal/draw/extra turns, counter counterspells all for free

Momentous Fall - Draw in response to removal

Return of the Wildspeaker - See above

The Great Henge - Draw, ramp, lifegain

No cultivate/kodama's?

Hull Breach - Removal

Creatures

It seems you have your preferences on creatures but here are some other ideas as well...

Shaman of Forgotten Ways - Ramp, wincon

Siege Behemoth - Beater with evason

Somberwald Sage - Ramp

Ilharg, the Raze-Boar - Cheating

Optimator on Jurassic

5 days ago

Some fun cards to perhaps note:

Nahiri's Machinations or Dolmen Gate. Swing Gishath with impunity!

Soul's Majesty and Return of the Wildspeaker are excellent in stompy decks.

Boros Charm and/or Heroic Intervention would be a decent addition. I love running two or three effects like this in decks that tempt board wipes like crazy. Flawless Maneuver too, but it's pricey.

Blood Mist, Duelist's Heritage, Rage Reflection, and True Conviction are all interesting alternatives to Berserkers' Onslaught--each with their own pros and cons. Nothing wrong with Berserker's Onslaught though. I kind of like True Conviction for the lifelink, since Gishath sometimes comes online late and it can give you an extra turn to swing for lethal.

I just noticed you don't have a single board wipe. Even in very creature-oriented decks you sometimes need to put a halt to an emergency. With all your ramp and your commander's ability you can ideally rebuild faster than your opponents. Lots of options there, from the classic and well-costed Wrath of God and Blasphemous Act to even more impactful stuff like Hour of Revelation or Ondu Inversion  ^Flip

slashdotdash on Golos attempt II

6 days ago

Hey there Kronhamilton,

First of all, I like the improvements you’ve made to your deck. It’s already looking a lot slicker and I can see you’ve made some very fun looking changes to how the deck plays.

You’ve got a nice array of threats (I always love to see the Bringers and Ur-Dragon) and a decent amount of ramp which are both a big plus. Additionally, you’ve got the beginnings of some nasty graveyard synergy shaping up, which looks really, really cool as a sort of plan B.

That being said, I’d like to make a few suggestions to help guide you toward a more consistent and powerful Golos deck. Please remember that these suggestions are just my informed opinion, and that I totally respect whatever deck choices you decide to make. I really just want to help you get comfortable with deck building and learning what to look for in a ‘good’ or ‘bad’ card.

Broad Suggestions

I would encourage you to add 2 Lands, 3 Removal cards, and 8 Draw cards. I’d also think about adding 2 more Ramp cards, but that is less critical to the overall health of the deck. Your Threats look great and I think your Sweepers are also appropriate. Anything that synergizes with your graveyard backup plan is great.

There are a couple of things to think about as you play this deck; 1. “Am I happy or sad to be holding this card in my hand or drawing it off the top of my deck?” – If a card seems to constantly be ‘the wrong card’ for the situation, or you can never seem to cast it, or you always play other cards instead, or you tend to die while holding a certain card, then you probably want to think about how well that card fits in your deck and whether or not you should cut it or modify the deck to support it. 2. “What ongoing advantage does this card give me?” – Some cards seem like a decent card based on having decent power/toughness, a fair cost, and some neat keywords or abilities. Just having those upsides alone though doesn’t make a card truly powerful. Instead, try to think about what ways a card can synergize with your deck to create crazy effects or otherwise how it will become more dangerous as the game progresses (like a Quartzwood Crasher, Scute Swarm, or Giant Adephage). Additionally, try to find cards that do multiple things such as Chasm Skulker which gets bigger when you draw cards and also explodes into tokens when it dies, or even Ravenous Chupacabra which deals with a threat and also acts as a blocker when you are facing pressure. The key is finding a way to levarage the most amount of value in each individual card – even a 2 mana ramp spell will set you up to play all of your future spells 1 turn earlier than normal for the rest of the game, which can be an insane advantage when you think about it. 3. “Am I out of options?” – If you can’t seem to find a solution to a problem or you’re ‘running out of steam’, then it is likely that you need more card draw and more ways to create ‘engines’ that accrue value. An example of an engine would be Fertilid + Evolution Sage or Rampaging Baloths + Elemental Bond or Kruphix, God of Horizons + Victory Chimes or Atraxa, Praetors' Voice + Ajani, the Greathearted or Anointed Procession + Endless Ranks of the Dead or Search for Azcanta  ^Flip or Deadbridge Chant or Mind Unbound, etc.

Ramp

Your ramp looks pretty good with 10 dedicated Ramp cards. I’d suggest adding 2 more Ramp spells to really help speed things up early. Examples would be Kodama's Reach, Llanowar Elves, Wild Growth, Farseek, Rampant Growth, Springbloom Druid, etc.

Ramp - 10

• Fertilid

• Palladium Myr

• Solemn Simulacrum

• Cultivate

• Arcane Signet

• Commander's Sphere

• Ketria Crystal

• Raugrin Crystal

• Savai Crystal

• Sol Ring

Not Ramp

• Azusa, Lost but Seeking - you don’t have enough land + card draw to really capitalize on Asuza’s ability.

• Empowered Autogenerator – this card is vastly too slow to be considered a true Ramp card. At best I would call it a ‘Ramp Support’ card, because it is there to slowly help you in the late game, not propel you in the early game like a true Ramp card (Rampant Growth, Farseek, Fertile Ground, Llanowar Elves, Wild Growth)

Draw

Overall, I think your card draw package needs a little bit of love. I want to note I see a lot of ‘looting’ effects like the ones on Teferi, Master of Time or Obsessive Stitcher and while these cards are great for a graveyard strategy they still don’t count as card draw. I’d keep most of these ‘looting’ type cards, but try to find cards that get you about 2 or 3 cards such as Harmonize, Concentrate, Escape to the Wilds, Urban Evolution, Moldervine Reclamation, Deathreap Ritual, Recurring Insight, Mind Unbound, Underworld Connections, Cloudblazer, Mulldrifter, Drawn from Dreams, Return of the Wildspeaker, Harvester of Souls, Momentous Fall, Dream Trawler, Keeper of Fables etc.

Draw - 2

• Bringer of the Blue Dawn (nice)

• Reconnaissance Mission

Not Draw

• Barrin, Tolarian Archmage – drawing 1 card does not really count. If anything, Barrin is like slow, bad removal for dealing with your opponents’ stuff temporarily. If you’re interested in reusing Golos’s land finding ability I would recommend playing Soulherder instead.

• Solemn Simulacrum – He has sort of ‘incidental value’ with his death trigger but doesn’t actively net you a bunch of cards like Keruga, the Macrosage or Beast Whisperer. Sad Robot is still great though.

• Titanoth Rex – still keep this guy because he is a threat that isn’t dead in your hand on turn 5.

• Void Beckoner – same story as the Rex

• Teferi, Master of Time – Teferi’s great, but he is really at his best when you’ve got 4-7 card in hand so that you can throw a bunch of big threats to the graveyard and hopefully draw a reanimation spell. Other than that, Teferi isn’t going to refill your hand so he doesn’t count as true draw.

Removal

Your removal package looks like it needs a couple more additions to keep your deck responsive and able to handle imminent-doom type threats. It is worth noting that cards like Blatant Thievery or Mythos of Illuna can save you in certain situations, but be wary of their crazy mana costs and the fact that they are not instant-speed answers. Examples include Mythos of Nethroi, Beast Within, Price of Fame, Reality Shift, Terminate, Return to Nature, Putrefy, Utter End, Eat to Extinction, Murderous Rider, etc.

Removal – 4 (aim for 7)

• Mortify

• Despark

• Barrier Breach

• Disenchant

Cuts

There are several cards that I would consider cutting first when modifying the deck.

• Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast - he relies very heavily on luck and only interacts with creatures. This makes him good with only 30% of your deck. Additionally, Lukka can’t ‘protect’ himself like Garruk can (making tokens to block for him), nor does he have an immediately accessible removal ability like Teferi. Overall, Lukka is interesting but a little lacking in consistency, defensibility, and power.

Azusa, Lost but Seeking – you don’t have enough land + card draw to really capitalize on Asuza’s ability. Yes, you can use the double lands (like Gruul Turf) to bounce a land to hand and then play that land with Asuza, but realistically that’s such a narrow and relatively tame synergy (in this non-landfall deck, that is) that you would be better off playing a Farseek or a Rampant Growth or even a Fertile Ground.

• Sparkhunter Masticore - This little fellow has a major drawback and no seriously crazy abilities that make him worthwhile. Yes he can deal with planeswalkers, but so can a Murderous Rider or an Eat to Extinction. Yes he can be an indestructible 3/4, but you have to pay 3 mana just to make him indestructible. Under normal circumstances that’s 6 mana for a 3/4 that dodges death one time - a 3/4 just isn’t fantastic. The biggest bad news about this robocat is its “additional cost to cast” ability which means that even if you hit it with Golos’s ‘Rainbow Wheel of Death’ ability, you still have to discard a card for a 3/4. I just honestly think you’d rather have a removal spell (Beast Within, Mythos of Nethroi) instead of this cat any day.

• Pursued Whale - While this whale is kinda cool and he does force combat, he is just sorta expensive for what he does. 7 mana for an 8/8 is pretty standard and giving your opponents tokens (that they could just attack you with or sacrifice to an effect) can be a bad idea in some situations, such as when they have an Beastmaster Ascension or a similar effect on the field. While his semi-hexproof ability (3 more mana to target) seems nifty, that is one of the only really powerful highlight abilities of this card, meaning that ability is protecting a relatively low-powered card. A couple immediate alternatives come to mind for me; Geode Rager to force combat AND keep you safe, and Dream Trawler for a flying, hexproof, lifelinking, card drawing threat.

• Renata, Called to the Hunt - She just isn’t fantastic. You aren’t playing a devotion centric deck in which she might become a 10/10, and your strategy doesn’t really care about 1/1 counters either. I would consider replacing her with a Harmonize or another 3 or 4 drop with more impactful abilities. Heck, even another reanimation spell could be nice like Unburial Rites or Grave Upheaval since your deck seems to have some tendency to but things in the graveyard for later.

• Lorescale Coatl - Cards like this (or his bigger cousin Chasm Skulker) are really designed for “wheel decks” that play “wheel effects” like Windfall or Reforge the Soul. He is fine, but really not much better than that. If you want a threat that can grow faster and do more important things, try Managorger Hydra or even Scute Mob.

• Colossification - This aura is too expensive, taps your creature down, and worst of all is an aura. Auras are generally quite bad because your opponent can destroy your creature and the aura attached to them with one spell – and odds are they’ll do that because it is usually too juicy not to. The fact that you can’t attach Colossification and attack immediately means that your opponents will have a full turn to deal with it before you get a chance to use it (and keep in mind your Colossified creature needs to survive 3 opponents’ turns!). This means you’ll most likely run out of cards in a hurry without accomplishing anything.

• Door to Nothingness - Unlike Progenitus, you can’t reanimate the Door, nor can you get its full value off of the Rainbow Wheel of Death. The only time this card does anything at all is when you literally have 10 mana of the exact color combination necessary to use it. It’s still your call, and I know some people make it a goal to Door their opponents, but be warned: you probably don’t have as much ramp as you need to make this work well. I’d consider supporting this crazy cards (and your many expensive threats for that matter) with a few more ramp spells – Boundless Realms, Migration Path, Circuitous Route, Kodama's Reach, Explosive Vegetation, Zendikar Resurgent

• Azor's Gateway  ^Flip – This card belongs in a very specific variant of Golos. That variant is the Minamo, School at Water's Edge Golos deck which also runs stuff like Vizier of Tumbling Sands, Fatestitcher, Kiora's Follower, and other payoffs like Jegantha, the Wellspring, or Captain Sisay. Especially considering that Sanctum of the Sun (the flip side) adds X mana of only 1 color, I think this card is just rarely going to work like you want it to unfortunately.

• Lathliss, Dragon Queen - Basically, you only have 3 other dragons in the deck so I would either exchange a bunch of cards for more dragons or cut Lathliss, since she will rarely be able to use her best ability (5/5 tokens). Keep in mind, you could also run a bunch of cards with the ‘changeling’ keyword if you wanted to get really funky, in which case you may as well also play stuff like Yuriko, the Tiger's Shadow, Reaper King, Crested Sunmare, The First Sliver but that’s a very slippery and insane slope that I’m not sure you want to get sucked into.

Summary

Nice changes Kronhamilton, I can see that your deck is really starting to shape up as a rampy graveyard-mingling Golos deck, and that’s really cool. I encourage you to try and pay attention to what situations you find yourself in, as that’s often the best way to tell what cards you need to cut or add to the deck for it to work best. As a default, I’d consider making a few of the changes I mentioned in the Broad Suggestion section, as those changes should just generally help with your deck’s consistency.

Please do let me know how you decide to tune your deck – it’s really fun to watch honestly, and I’m always down to help advise you. Other than that, take care and enjoy Golos!

Best,

-Slashdotdash

Profet93 on Xenagos Aggro

1 week ago

Interesting deck +1

Questions about Inclusions

What is your meta like?

Proud Wildbonder - Seems too unimpactful for 4 mana

Essence Warden - Whats the purpose of this?

Beast Whisperer - Seems cool, I tried him in my build. Does he get a chance to stick around long enough to draw you atleast 2-3 cards?

Ravager Wurm - Is this meta against maze of ith?

Shivan Wurm - Reusing ETB effects or something I'm missing? Seems weak

Voracious Cobra - Gosh this card brings back memories from my childhood. Curious how it's been for you, seems like a card they need to burn removal on if they want a chance of attacking you unless they go wide

Windstorm - Meta?

Unleash Fury < Berserk

Fog - Meta, if so, why not get the new green fog that came out recently?

Soul's Might - Return of the Wildspeaker would better serve you as you can draw cards in response to removal rather than your creature getting removed in response to might being cast.

Suggestions

Ancient Tomb , Castle Garenbrig are ramp

Goreclaw, Terror of Qal Sisma - Trample and ramp

Heroic Intervention - Protection

Selvala, Heart of the Wilds - Ramp and draw

The Great Henge , Somberwald Sage, Shaman of Forgotten Ways are all good ramp

Inferno Titan - Removal

Kogla, the Titan Ape - Removal

Deflecting Swat - Utility! Counter counterspells, redirect targetted removal/draw/extra turns. Very powerful

Rishkar's Expertise, Bonders' Enclave, Elder Gargaroth, Greater Good, Life's Legacy, are all amazing card draw options, especially greater good. Seriously, don't sleep on greater good

I hope the suggestions werent too overwhelming, I just didn't see that much draw and I figured that adding more never hurts.

Mirenheart on Omnath, Locus of Value

1 week ago

You could cut down on the basic lands. if you have enough land ramp, you only really need like 36 lands, which can include your Kazandu Mammoth  ^Flip since it's a land on the other side. I'd suggest something like 2 mountains, 2 islands, 1 plains, something like that. You can also swap Harmonize and Shamanic Revelation with other draw options, since harmonize is like, base level, cheap draw for green, and there's lots of other options for it, and shamanic revelation kinda relies on you getting a token generator, or spending several turns bringing out a bunch of creatures, to get a good number of cards.

If you really want a "draw some cards now" Return of the Wildspeaker costs 1 more then harmonize, but will put in a little more work if you get bigger creatures out, and has the option of pumping your army late game for a potential win.

You can also go without Jungle Shrine, since it's not very searchable, comes in tapped, and doesnt tap for blue. If you need the colors, Exotic Orchard and Path of Ancestry are cheap options that (can) tap for all four colors.

Sultai_Sir on Infinite Mana, Infinite Creatures

1 week ago

Hey man, love the deck! Here's a couple of suggestions:

Genesis Wave: There's not a more spectacular way to go infinite then playing every permanent in your library.

Skyshroud Blessing: A mostly unknown card, but gives hexproof and cantrips with Ashaya.

Rishkar's Expertise/Return of the Wildspeaker/Soul's Majesty: Draw all the cards.

Here's my Ashaya deck: Ashaya: Soul of the Wild: Be-Leaf in Yourself. If you could give me some suggestions, I'd appreciate it greatly. Thanks!

multimedia on Kalamax, the Stormsire

2 weeks ago

Hey, on a budget well done upgrading the precon. Nice upgrades of Ral with Reverberate/Vengeance for the combo, Settlement/Encampment/Drum, Hippocamp, Brainstorm, Dig, Within, Shift, Passage.

Some budget cards to consider adding:

• Narset's Reversal: can be repeatable for two mana to copy any instant/sorcery that's cast. The copy that Kalamax makes can target and bounce the original Reversal back to your hand to cast again on the next turn and Kalamax can make a copy of one instant on each player's turn.
• Expansion / Explosion: another Fork to combo with Ral or a mass draw/damage spell with lots of mana.
• Gravitic Punch: with Kalamax and a Fork this can kill three opponents and cast it again from your graveyard.
• Cultivator's Caravan: three drop rainbow mana rock that can also be a repeatable source of tap for Kalamax (crew 3 is another instant way to tap Kalamax).
• Return of the Wildspeaker: it can draw a lot of cards with high power Kalamax and/or give Kalamax/Drakes/Birds/Elementals +3/+3 or even +6/+6 to potentially kill one/more opponents.
• Roiling Regrowth: like Harrow, but the lands ETB tapped.
• Cascade Bluffs: Double Masters version is less than $4.
• Shivan Reef: Commander 2020 version is $1.
• Rootbound Crag
• Sulfur Falls

If you like any of these suggestions I offer more advice about what cards to cut. Good luck with deck.

chirz2792 on

2 weeks ago

Cool Deck! I'd recommend trying Return of the Wildspeaker, Blackblade Reforged, and Garruk, Primal Hunter.