5 color EDH deck with a strong land theme.
This deck is an absolute blast to play. It's my favorite EDH deck that I've ever built, it has incredibly strong synergy (everything interacts with land), and the fact that I kill people with land just makes me giggle. I never have issues pulling off several different combos/interactions each game. This deck actually wins very frequently, almost always into the late game however (which is fine by me). Many of the interactions I've included are working very well. I'll list a few these interactions, as well as some of my reasons for including the other cards.
First off, the "main" win cons are the scapeshift combo (Prismatic Omen + Scapeshift + Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle
) and Last Stand + Prismatic Omen
. If I'm ever needing to pull one of these off, Demonic Tutor and Increasing Ambition (particularly flashed back, as that fetches two combo pieces) pull them out pretty well. Seismic Assault gets an honorable mention as a primary win con, but I'll explain this in more detail later.
"Secondary" win cons are pretty much everything else, and are actually the bread and butter of the deck. Things like Avenger of Zendikar and Rampaging Baloths really put some pressure on your opponent when you're playing 3 or 4 lands a turn. If anything, it makes them waste their resources (board wipes or spot control) on your secondary bombs, making the primary bombs easier to pull off.
Earth Surge + Rude Awakening
is brutally efficient. I just played a game where I had earth surge out, 14 lands, then entwined rude awakening. I swung in for 56 just with my lands. Needless to say, they were not expecting to be slaughtered by an army of lands. I actually just cut the Earth Surge for Burgeoning, but Rude Awakening is still a fun surprise win con.
Meloku the Clouded Mirror and Trade Routes not only help provide advantage and fuel for much of the deck (bouncing lands to recur landfall triggers, or straight up card advantage), but they also really help feed Seismic Assault and Borborygmos Enraged. Praetor's Counsel is actually the best fuel here though, as is Life from the Loam. In a 3 player game, I cast Prismatic Omen followed by Last Stand with 17 land out, which killed one player outright, then after looting 17 times dumped like 15 more land into my graveyard. I then cast Praetor's Counsel to get them all back, and discarded like 18 land to Seismic Assault to do 36 to the other player.
Since it's a 5 color deck, I've included some pretty versatile spot control. Tri color charms, Chaos Warp, Mortify/Putrefy, I don't really need to explain that. I can't bring myself to play a deck without instant speed responses to disrupt combos.
Sun Titan, Eternal Witness, Crucible of Worlds, and Life from the Loam all help me keep my lands going, be it recurring fallen man lands or destroyed utility lands or whatever. The man lands are actually pretty fun, I've often put some steady pressure on my opponent(s) with Celestial Colonnade or Creeping Tar Pit.
The tutors (Demonic Tutor, Increasing Ambition, and Entomb) are actually intended to pull out Life from the Loam if I'm without it, as loam allows me to really start rolling. Entomb works particularly well for pulling loam out, but entomb also works well for pulling a utility land (such as Child of Alara recursions like Miren, the Moaning Well, High Market and Volrath's Stronghold) into my graveyard to recur later with loam or Crucible of Worlds or something. Miren has also saved my ass in a few games, gaining me emergency life to survive lethal damage. I'm surprised at how useful it's been, rather than just a mindless sac outlet for my general.
With such a high land count (which I feel is actually too low, I just can't bring myself to cut any more of my mainboard for more land slots) I never miss land drops. It also helps feed the main card advantage engine of the deck, which is to play lands off the top of the deck (Courser of Kruphix, Oracle of Mul Daya) as well as things like Azusa, Lost but Seeking and Exploration. Sensei's Divining Top helps to filter lands to the top of my deck so that I can keep playing them off the top of my library. The cycle lands work pretty well as steady card advantage with Life from the Loam, and similarly Cephalid Coliseum can be great card advantage with all of the land recursion.
Kamahl, Fist of Krosa usually functions as a sort of rattlesnake to stave off board wipes. My playgroup quickly found out that I can turn a handful of their lands into dudes in response to their board wipe. He also lets me animate some lands as emergency blockers, or as a quick offense with Earth Surge out. The overrun on a stick actually is nice if you get an army of tokens rolling with Avenger of Zendikar or Rampaging Baloths.
Many of the other cards are pretty self explanatory. I feel as though the deck is in a really good place right now, it's been through a bit of testing and is working very well. It'll continue to be an eternal work in progress though.
On a design note, since the deck is heavily green, much of the mana base is designed to provide green mana as well as additional colors. For example, the 4 buddy lands I included all have green plus one other color, the tri-color lands I included all have green plus 2 other colors, etc. I never end up getting green screwed, which is obviously nice.
Feel free to leave comments and suggestions, opinions are welcome!
