Drestlin - On the bright side, at least a one drop is pulling the attention of your opponent's removal spells right? They spend a likely 2-3 CMC to exile/destroy your 1 CMC sounds like a trade in your favor. Mix in Shapers' Sanctuary and you will even get a draw out of it to boot! With Collective Effort and Dromoka's Command I am usually running enough enchantment hate to not need Hopeful Initiate but he is my only way to deal with artifacts and I have used him successfully for that many a time. Usually because their are bigger threats on the board than him.

Radiant_Draconis - I did a little bit of playtesting of this last night and was a little disappointed with Polyraptor. It works to well! I had out a Marauding Raptor and played Polyraptor and it creates an infinite cycle of creating tokens, lol. I mean, I did want to use that combo as a wincon but not because the opponent gets annoyed that I have just been making tokens for the last 5 mins! Pretty sure I am going to have to remove Polyraptor for something else which is sad.

Radiant_Draconis - Ya, I have only been doing MTGO for a few months but Ixalan is one of my favorite sets aswell. I just enjoy a lot of the cards and mechanics introduced in that set.

I will have to try out Temple Altisaur. Seems like there is potential there as that essentially makes the dinos indestructible. Given their bulk I would prefer hexproof but I will take it...thinking of running something like Shapers' Sanctuary to accommodate for the removal I expect to see via MTGO.

I will totally hit you up once I procure the last few pieces of the deck I have posted here. Would be fun to playtest it against another dino deck!

Glad some of my comments/suggestions have merit! When you start a game with Kinjalli's Caller in hand, things just go so much smoother I have found. I think you will enjoy that change but losing Savage Stomp is rough as that is such a good card for this deck!

Radiant_Draconis - Good stuff! Maybe I will see if I can add one more Marauding Raptor in then. Between him and Forerunner of the Empire those are excellent cards to get enrage going and it is great to drop in like Trapjaw Tyrant and clear two creatures from the board. Now if only there was a dinosaur that gave other dinosaurs hexproof or some useful skill! They are so big and costly and in modern, removal spells are so prevalent it is so sad to see a 9 CMC dino get taken out by a 3 CMC instant.

Kinda makes sense you like Heaven / Earth for some personal flair. I mean, you are running a big meteor in a dino deck. Ironic and appropriate! Just wanted to make sure you did know there are options :)

You are preaching to the choir my friend about that high CMC! I have found I gravitate towards heavily aggressive decks by nature but they are not the most fun for my friends to play against. I think this my dino deck I am putting together will be a better mixture of keeping things competitive for them and fun for me. Our decks are pretty different but thanks for the ideas and inspiration to actually put one together!

Do I see Hopeful Initiate in your deck? I am rubbing off on you!

Drestlin - I was surprised you were gunning for Arcus Acolyte so strong! I mean Outlast is ok but I thought maybe you knew something I did not!

There is that legendary creature that lets each creature with a +1/+1 counter tap for land...he costs 3 CMC. Has potential...

On a side note, took out The Great Henge and Tezzeret's Gambit to try out Shapers' Sanctuary and for its cost it is decent. Pretty much nets me like 2-3 draws a game it is played.

Radiant_Draconis - I could see that. Both Huatli planeswalkers have game ending abilities paired with other useful abilities like lifegain or a version of removal. Just a shame they cost so much to get out on the field!

Do you find running 4xMarauding Raptor to be rough at times? You are running 3xTemple Altisaur so that might alleviate my fear but I mean the damage Marauding Raptor provides is great for triggering enrage but is a double edged sword in that regard to as two of them means you can not play creatures with power 4 or less. I am running two because of that fear and healthy recognition of my bad luck.

Lastly, Heaven / Earth is an interesting choice to run. I imagine you are running it primarily for the Earth ability to either clear the board or as a mass enrage trigger but with the Aftermath ability, you have to play the Heaven component first, which feels very situational as you have no creatures with flying so betting your opponent will. I feel like there are so many options for this boardwipe/mass enrage trigger slot that might fill it better like Cinderclasm, Earthquake, Sweltering Suns, Slagstorm, Anger of the Gods, etc. Each of those has a slight different flavor but would allow you to do something similar at a lower cost.

JordoSmith14 - I thought of this deck again recently when I was thinking of of stuff for one of my decks. Boros Charm might be right up your alley as a good utility card being able to hit the opponent for 4 damage, save your entire army from a boardwipe, or provide a knock out punch by giving doublestrike to a single creature. Few things are worse than pumping up your creatures and being a single move from victory than being hit with something like Wrath of God and losing everything.

Drestlin - I am not sure if it helps you but I was getting tired of Conclave Mentor or similar key creatures getting bolted or destroyed so actually swapped out Enter the Unknown for Snakeskin Veil. It has had some value as it has kept creatures on the field which is key and I did not feel like Enter the Unknown was really helping me out the majority of the times I played it. I saw it on your sideboard so know you have thought about it but just want to let you know it is nice for the hexproof and extra counters!

Drestlin - Sounds solid to me. It does not seem like many of the decks you are playing and running heavy reanimation or graveyard janks so losing out on Lion Sash and similar cards like Scavenging Ooze will likely only improve your chances of beating your specific opponents.

Do you like the Outlast ability? I am not a huge fan as it requires a tap of the creature to activate the ability and generally speaking, your and my deck are built to be on the offensive unless we are rebuilding. I would prefer the Training, Bolster, and Mentor abilities over Outlast personally.

I think Oran-Rief, the Vastwood has potential but playing lands that come in tapped 100% of the time will slow you down. Dropping that in exchange for something else that at least has the potential to enter not tapped is an improvement in my book. Hence why those lands are so expensive :(

I noticed you dropped to 19 lands. That seems kinda low even at your ~1.80 average CMC. On a similar but different note, I did some probabilities on how many lands I would have in opening hands and th chances of getting additional lands as I was tired of getting mana screwed...I will throw up the % for 19 lands and include the % of 21 lands in ().

• 0 Lands: 6% (4%)
• 1 Land: 22% (18%)
• 2 Lands: 33% (31%)
• 3 Lands: 25% (28%)
• 4 Lands: 11% (14%)
• 5 Lands: 2% (4%)
• 6 Lands: 0% (1%)
• 7 Lands: 0% (0%)

Subtle changes but you can see how the whole PDF shifts more to consistently having 3 lands in your opening hand for 21 compared to 19. I also did the chances of drawing 0-3 lands given how many lands were in the opening hand. In general, those odds really do not change much but the odds of not drawing a land are the greatest so that is why I want to start with at least 3 in hand. Sorry...kinda rambling!

Radiant_Draconis - I like the edits! Looks like you dropped the average CMC by like 0.5 and swapped out some lands making it likely a bit smoother when playing.

I wanted to ask you thoughts on the Huatli planeswalkers. You are running a total of 5 between the two of them so you obviously much find they have some value. My interest is a bit self-serving as I am putting together a dino deck (Spared No Expense!!!) and could not justify to myself squeezing Hautli in. At that mana cost there are so many great dinosaurs so just wanted to hear your logic.

Ever since I started up MTGO several months ago I had been wanting to try out dinosaurs. Not sure if it the artwork or the love of Jurassic Park but this is my attempt to play a deck that will be fun and hopefully somewhat competitive. If you have some constructive criticism, I am all ears as I am always looking to improve both the decks and my own deck-building ability.

One of the difficulties I found when building a dino deck is their high CMC. To overcome this I have a number of creatures to lower the CMC such as Goblin Anarchomancer, Kinjalli's Caller, and Marauding Raptor and a number of ramping dinosaurs like Ranging Raptors and Topiary Stomper. I am running Goblin Anarchomancer as its runs a bit wider than Otepec Huntmaster although both of them have trouble when Marauding Raptor is on the field. I considered dropping Goblin Anarchomancer entirely and just run additional copies of Marauding Raptor but getting two copies of Marauding Raptor on the field at once is not exactly ideal as it would limit what I could play. In total, I have 8 creatures in the deck that lower the CMC of the dinosaurs and 5 ramping dinosaurs giving me goods odds of being able to hit some of the big guns much quicker than usual.

In terms of triggering the enrage ability, cards like Cinderclasm hit all the creatures going for a mass enrage while others are more targeted like Reckless Rage, Rile, and Savage Stomp. Running Marauding Raptor and Forerunner of the Empire provide some additional enrage triggers as well. In total, I have 12 ways to trigger enrage in addition to combat damage giving me good odds of being able to hit that consistently.

As a good portion of this deck relies heavily on having certain creatures on the field to lower the cost of the big guns or the cards needed to enrage the dinos, I added in a considerable amount of potential extra draws to "search" the deck for what I want/need. Ripjaw Raptor provides draws when dealt damage via enrage, Runic Armasaur provides draws if the opponent relies on activated abilities of lands/creatures. Rile provides a cheap draw while also letting me target an enraged ability, and lastly The Great Henge is a card that meshes well with this deck given the big creatures it fields and also give me a draw ability when a creature is cast. That gives me 9 cards total with draw potential again giving me good odds that I will be able to play one at least and keep the fun going.

Excluding Foulmire Knight you don't have any other ways to get/keep cards in your hand so maybe add Acclaimed Contender to help keep the knights flowing? I feel like one of the weakness of the deck is around turn 3-4 you will be reduced to having a hand of only 1-2 cards and just be limited to what you can can actually do.

ajbshizle - I have a and Haakon deck I am working on and although I like the cards give me access to, I feel like the deck with access to is the better of the two as it gives me so much access to discard abilities such as Olivia, Mobilized for War, Lightning Axe, etc. and draw/discard abilities like Stormfist Crusader, Thrill of Possibility, etc. Between the and also have access to all the madness cards like Fiery Temper and all that just makes it extremely efficient at finding Haakon and getting him in the graveyard.

With that all said, I am assuming with 4xAether Vial to flash him in and 6 ways to get cards in the graveyard you do not find it to hard to get Haakon onto the field but I do wonder if at times you find it challenging to get him in your hand.

Radiant_Draconis - I remembered that as soon as I posted so my bad! Marauding Raptor is great as it drops the cost of creatures AND you are running some enrage too! In my mind I was looking for Otepec Huntmaster or Kinjalli's Caller. Getting at least Kinjalli in the deck would provide you a 1-drop and make those 3-drop dinos playable on turn two. Speed things up a little bit. I am imaginging hitting Kinjalli turn 1...dropping Topiary Stomper for an extra land turn 2 which would open up the playbook on turn 3 as you could have potentially 4 lands out on the field and dinos cost 1 less to play. This brings up my next question, you every had trouble with draws? Seems like you are not running anything to keep cards in your hand so you would hit a wall around turn 3-4 even if you got an ideal hand.

Lastly, I am guessing you are going budget from the lands you are running and the presence of Joiner Adept?

Fun looking deck! I have been wanting to make a dino deck for a while now as there are so many good cards but always get discouraged at the high CMC. Thus my surprise when I noticed you were not running anything to try to drop their mana cost.

just built up my hopes and dreams just to tear them down!

Very disappointing...Sylvan Library is not Modern legal. I was super excited to try that out but it was not meant to be!

Ohhh! I had not seen Sylvan Library before. Kinda a doubled edged sword but has some great potential…I will add that to the long long list of things to try out as it is pretty affordable online :)

I know your pain! So many things to playtest and so little time! At it seems like a good card...

On a side note, I know you mentioned The Great Henge is out of your price range but I am running a single copy and have been able to play it every game I have had it and it is so good...I would not run more than 1 or 2 copies at most but it is a great card if you can get it out cheap. I mean it gives life, mana, +1/+1 counters, and draws! What more could I ask for!?!?!

Tezzeret's Gambit also seems to be a nice fit. How has it faired for you? 2 life and 3 CMC for two draws and a proliferate has been nice. I saw some cards that give draws for less CMC and similar life loss but I like the proliferate. I am only running a single copy of it currently but again think I will try to figure out how to get in another copy. At some point I will have to sit down and figure out what to keep and what to remove but I am enjoying the experimentation so far!