Intro
The origin of this deck is simple. I was tired of having garbage luck in commander games and never drawing lands or ramp. So I built an deck entirely around lands and ramp, and it's fairly straightforward. While
Damia, Sage of Stone
may not be the best commander for the job (and it honestly sits in the command zone a decent portion of games), it does provide you with steady card draw to hit your landfalls if you don't have a card like
Tatyova, Benthic Druid
out. Plus,
Damia, Sage of Stone
+
Null Profusion
is a fun mid-game synergy that allows you to sorta fish for lands and other synergy pieces you might be missing.
Early Game
Ramp. Your goal isn't necessarily getting
Damia, Sage of Stone
out as fast as possible. You need to be getting out cards that give you landfalls like
Sakura-Tribe Scout
,
Azusa, Lost but Seeking
, and
Llanowar Scout
. Unless you need the mana quickly, it can sometimes be worthwhile to hold on to cheap one-time land plays like
Elvish Pioneer
until you have more landfall triggers to take advantage of.
Speaking of, obviously you'll want to get out as many landfall triggers as possible.
Lotus Cobra
is a cheap landfall trigger you can use to ramp out some bigger pieces. An early
Jaddi Offshoot
can also get you building up a large health pool for late game protection.
Mid Game
Once you have the ability to play 2-4 lands per turn, you want to be getting out the powerful landfall pieces.
Tatyova, Benthic Druid
is great for keeping the land train going.
Ancient Greenwarden
and
Yarok, the Desecrated
will add to your landfall triggers allowing things to get out of hand really fast. Really, just play out any landfall trigger cards you can while (hopefully) continuing to draw into lands and more ways to play them.
If you're having trouble drawing into ramp, landfall triggers, lands, or really any part of your board state that is lacking, now is the time to play
Damia, Sage of Stone
. As long as you can get cards out of your hand, you'll get to fill back to seven.
Late Game + Winning
Having a solid late game and winning the game really relies on having the right landfall pieces out and ramping out lands like no tomorrow.
Rampaging Baloths
can easily get out of hand and take over a game.
Scute Swarm
is a fun card that can absolutely explode in numbers.
Retreat to Hagra
can help you get out damage to aid in taking down opponents, as well as giving you the health resilience to last late. Many landfall triggers can combine to lead to a win condition with sufficient ramping, and landfall doubling will only bring the end faster.
Fun Cards + Combos
Sea Gate Restoration
is one of my favorite Zendikar Rising cards. While it may be counterintuitive with
Damia, Sage of Stone
, the ability to double your cards in hand can be very powerful if you need lands, or just want a large outlet for all your mana. Not to mention, you may already have 10+ cards in hand from
Tatyova, Benthic Druid
triggers and the like.
Retreat to Coralhelm + Sakura-Tribe Scout
(or any card that taps for lands) can be a neat way to empty all lands from your hand and pop a large amount of landfall triggeres.
As mentioned in the intro,
Damia, Sage of Stone
+
Null Profusion
allows you to fish through your cards for the lands and pieces you want.
Ashaya, Soul of the Wild
makes all your [nontoken] creatures lands. So your landfall trigger creatures also trigger landfalls!
Budoka Gardener
, once it's done pulling you lands, flips into the wonderful
Dokai, Weaver of Life
. With your large land count, you can be making 20/20 elemental creatures for .
Once you have a ton of mana,
Villainous Wealth
can let you steal a bunch of cards from an opponent and play them for free. It's always fun when someone destroys your
Tatyova, Benthic Druid
and
Ancient Greenwarden
so you take the top 15 cards in their deck.
Final Thoughts
This deck is not perfect. It was built with this price point in mind, as well and to fit the meta of my own group. I know Life and Limb + Sporemound
is an easy way to get infinite landfall triggers, but it's risky and requires something like
Krosan Grip
to stop the infinite flow of "Saproling Forests", and I'm not sure if that's quite how I want to play. You could also up the land package significantly, it is a lands deck after all. But I'm far from a magic pro, and I like playing this deck. It's the first deck I've taken really seriously while building and I feel I understand it very well. It plays well and is (mostly) stable. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!