Mono Green

KrovikanMist · Joined: 02 Feb 2007 Posts: 107

4 Birds of Paradise
4 Creeping Mold
22 Forest
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Boreal Druid
4 Sprout Swarm
2 Pendelhaven
4 Overrun
4 Scatter the Seeds
4 Mwonvuli Acid-Moss
4 Wurmcalling

Sideboard
4 Tormod's Crypt
4 Hunted Wumpus
4 Essence Warden
3 Serrated Arrows

Construtive Comments welcome

ChaoticSaint · Joined: 08 Sep 2004 Posts: 8

It seems like it is a quick deck, but it looks as though 2 out of 6 times it would stall out Crying or Very sad

. With the amount of mana producers, I would suggest making room for other small creatures, such as Scion of the Wild, Razz

. He Leads to my next comment as to, "Where's the threat(s)?". Timbermare, Groundbreaker, blanchwood on a BoP is scary. Wurmcalling is decent Wink

, I would fear playing against red though. 2 mana, Pyroclasm, Shocked

.
If your goal is heavy creatures, then throw in some support, Gaea's Anthem? Coat of Arms? Muraganda Petroglyphs? Any of those cards would add spice to the deck.
Lastly, ESSENCE WARDEN SHOULD BE MAINBOARD Exclamation

KrovikanMist · Joined: 02 Feb 2007 Posts: 107

Does Giant Growth see any play these days on ml?

Eldar · Joined: 27 Nov 2006 Posts: 361 Location: Rochester

Honestly selesnya guildmage is better than sprout swarm in most situations and allows you to run a white splash with temple gardens to search for with acid moss and bops also. He will allow you to go agro in control matchups and if you stall out you can just win late game with uncounterable saproling generation instead of one a counterspell just removes.

Benobi · Joined: 08 May 2006 Posts: 10

20 [TSP] Forest (4)
4 [RAV] Birds of Paradise
4 [10E] Llanowar Elves
4 [GP] Silhana Ledgewalker
4 [10E] Troll Ascetic
4 [GP] Giant Solifuge
2 [GP] Dryad Sophisticate
4 [TSP] Scryb Ranger
4 [RAV] Moldervine Cloak
4 [10E] Blanchwood Armor
2 [10E] Loxodon Warhammer
4 [TSP] Might of Old Krosa
SB: 4 [TSP] Stonewood Invocation
SB: 3 [TSP] Krosan Grip
SB: 4 [10E] Treetop Village
SB: 4 [FUT] Thornweald Archer

This has been giving me 4-0's and 3-1's all summer long at FNM (really competitive, lots of tier 1 decks), and I played it to 2nd place in a tourney here. There are lots of subtle points about MGA that people just don't get, because everyone's like, "dur, not top net deck, doesn't have a $200 land base, must be bad!"

- 12 Unblockable dudes. People really don't like when there's a bunch of huge guys coming at them and they can't do anything about it.

- Speed. Turn 1 Birds, Turn 2 Troll Ascetic, Turn 3 Giant Solifuge, anyone?

- Blanchwood Armor. It OWNS!!! at the very least it's +3/+3 for 3, but it can get insane if the game happens to drag on (which it rarely does, because you win so fast). For added annoyance, turn it into lifegain as well with Loxodon Warhammer.

- Simple land base. Doesn't waste slots on mana fixers, and it doesn't take away half of it's own life to get duals in untapped. MGA absolutely thrashes other aggro decks because of this.

- Simplicity. Tuning the deck for your meta can be a challenge, but play is pretty straightforward; you don't have to do a lot of guesswork about your next draws, what they have in hand, etc., so play mistakes are hard to make.

Good Matchups: Gruul, Zoo, Zombie Stomp, Rakdos Aggro (simply faster than they are, not too terribly hindered by their burn spells); Blink-Touch (their targeting effects can't get your creatures)

Decent Matchups: the Rack (depends on how fast they get The Rack out, but usually pretty favorable); Dralnu du Louvre (If you can land an untargetable, you're pretty safe), Dredge (if they combo off ideally, you're sunk. Otherwise, you have a pretty good shot).

Bad Matchups: Angelfire, Solar Flare (Wrath of God and Damnation are real problem cards, hence the Treetop Village in the sideboard. Hard to come back if an Akroma gets in, too.

Overall, though, the deck has more good matchups than bad, and there's nothing unwinnable.

KrovikanMist · Joined: 02 Feb 2007 Posts: 107

they'll just slaughter pact the guildmage in control matchups

Eldar · Joined: 27 Nov 2006 Posts: 361 Location: Rochester

I was simply suggesting how to make the mana ramp green better. Honestly MGA is the best form of mono green atm.

R3wind · Joined: 24 Jul 2006 Posts: 977

To Benobi.

Have you tried 'goyf, Pendlehaven, or Magus of the Moon? Also Quagnoth seems like it would help "fix" the rack and control matchups.

I also like the idea of using Terramorphic Expanse to splash other colors like White for Condemn, Red for Magus of the Moon, Black for Dark Confidant or other goodies. I understand that it is kinda anti-synergetic with Blanchwood Armor.

Just the fact that land d is very minor in the current meta meens that there is little reason to not splash one color. It opens up a lot of cards for the sideboard. I have always felt that the sideboard options are the thing that hold back MGA from being a Tier 1 deck. Heck you really only need to add one Mountain to side Red cards and so on. (If you are playing BoP and Terramorphic Expanse)

I guess that the debate would be if you splash a color what would it be and for what cards/reasons?

Vedrfolner · Joined: 04 Apr 2006 Posts: 1443

Splashes for green aggro:

Blue: Remand and Delay. Sacrifice a little speed for 8 timewalks. Pongify in sideboard.

Black: Terror and Cruel Edict. Kill their Tarmogoyf and Troll.

White: Loxodon Hierarch and Selesnya Guildmage. Lifegain biggie and pump + saprolings.

Red: Demonfire and Char. If nothing else works, drop the silk gloves and just burn them down; simple and efficient.

of those alternatives, blue and red seems most useful.

I have had success with a Green/blue aggrocontrol deck. It is easy to play and destroys other aggro decks.

Benobi · Joined: 08 May 2006 Posts: 10

@ R3wind: Yes, all three of those cards have been tried in my (or other) versions of MGA. Some players like them, some don't. Here's my personal reasons for not including them:

Pendelhaven: Lots of decks run one or two of these because they have a lot of 1/1's, but it cuts down on Forest consistency with Blanchwood Armor. Yes, you can still get away with it, but I'm just the kind of person that would be incredibly bothered by having a non-Forest in my Blanchwood Armor deck. Also, MGA tries to win in the early game by maximizing it's mana-efficiency and beating face while the opponent is still setting up, so you don't really have the extra mana to use its ability that often. There are players that have success with a Michael Jacobs-style land base (4 Treetop Village and 2 Pendelhaven mainboard), but I find that this takes away too much from MGA's primary asset, it's speed.

Tarmogoyf: I will not deny that Tarmogoyf is an amazing card, but in mono-green, most of the stuff you play goes to the board and stays there. When GU plays a counterspell or GR plays a burn spell, they put an instant and another card into the graveyards. When BG plays Smallpox, they put a bunch of stuff into the graveyard! But MGA doesn't really have much way to contribute to the graveyards, so Tarmgoyf is relatively underpowered most of the time.

Magus of the Moon: He's definitely a good card, but it usually goes like this; "since I'm splashing red already, why not throw in some Incinerates as removal as well? And while I'm at it, Burning-Tree Shaman is a cost-effective creature. And maybe Demonfire as a finisher. And how about..." It's not that this would be a bad deck, but you just kinda have to ask, "at what point does MGAr become Gruul?" Plus, more red means less Forests, which means no Blanchwood Armor.

Thanks for the suggestions. I don't mean to shut them down, they're all good and useable cards, this is just my own personal reasoning for not using them.

Winz · Joined: 26 Apr 2006 Posts: 5

A lot of bad cards going around.

A basic build of a mono G deck would look something like,

4 llanowar elves
4 scryb ranger
3 spectral force
3 timbermare
4 ledgewalker
4 troll ascetic
3 loxodon warhammer
4 moldervine cloak
4 call of the herd
2 stonewood invocation
2 boreal druid

3 treetop village
4 llanowar reborn
1 pendelhaven
14 forest

deck runs alot of 4 ofs for consistency. No card draw or tutors means its all top decks.
Birds cant swing. Blanchwood armor can't be recurred. Solifuge gets blocked.

This deck stands a very real chance of doing good during the current meta game. With the exception of dredge.
You have a shot at racing them but you're going to need something more during game two and three.
An immense downside with this deck is with its lack of card draw.
A counter to that would be running Ohran Viper. But he's a bit too slow for an aggro deck. And without any card draw, you have to devote more slots to your sideboard to combat your bad matchups as you're less likely to see them during the game.
With the current meta as it is, if you can find a consistent answer to dredge, you shoulden't have any problems taking this deck to good finish. Especially with all the aggro in the format.

edit: Tarmogoyf sucks in this deck. You have to build your deck around 'Goyf for it to be any good.