Lands:
16 Forest
1 Pendelhaven
4 Yavimaya Coast
Creatures:
4 Devoted Druid
4 Elvish Harbinger
4 Heritage Druid
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Nettle Sentinel
3 Regal Force
Other Spells:
4 Distant Melody
2 Elvish Promenade
4 Gilt-Leaf Ambush
4 Manamorphose
2 Roar of the Crowd |
   Elfball
Redux 2008.
Description of deck by its author
(quoted):
I would go as far as saying that Nettle
Sentinel is my favourite card in the new set. Once you start to see what
it can do with Heritage Druid, it is very easy to get all sorts of
carried away.
Before Eventide, there was a passable "Elfball" deck.
Elfball is a bit of a classic. It first showed up around the time of
Urza's Saga and at the time used Priest of Titania, Gaea's Cradle, and
Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary to generate huge amounts of mana for a big
Fireball. When Onslaught came out, it took a different twist, with
Wirewood Lodge and Seeker of Skybreak enabling Wirewood Channeler to
play really big spells.
These days, the main goal of Elfball hasn't changed.
It generates a lot of Elves and a lot of mana, and eventually kills with
a big spell. What has changed somewhat is the way that it goes about
getting there. For a start, these days generating a lot of Elves has
never been easier, what with all the token producers out there. On the
downside though, there is nothing quite like Priest of Titania now.
The exciting thing about this Elf deck is its
explosiveness. As soon as Heritage Druid comes along to play, you can
always generate quite a bit of mana. The real excitement, though, comes
when you get Nettle Sentinel involved. The Sentinel turns Gilt-Leaf
Ambush into effectively a free spell that builds up your team and lets
you clash. Between Regal Force and Distant Melody, getting into position
to be able to either swarm in for 20+ or Roar for the win is not too
tough, and it can all happen scarily fast.
The way that I normally play this deck is relatively
cagey. If you have five creatures down, then your opponent more or less
has to do something to deal with them, or the plinking will start to
hurt. You don't want to leave yourself too open to mass-removal by
over-committing. Fortunately, Regal Force is a great card to commit
with, as he gives you a second bite of the cherry should he hit play,
letting you draw enough cards that rebuilding post-Wrath of God or
similar isn't so hard. At some point, though, you will inevitably want
to switch gears. Normally this is when you hit your Heritage Druid, who
allows for some frankly stupid turns where far more spells are played
than seem likely. Going from zero to hero is really not that tough once
Heritage Druid gets involved.
Now, there are various ways to go with Elfball, and I
am not 100% that this is the best way, though it is a lot of fun. I've
seen other really interesting builds that use various big pump spells to
both help get the kill and provide huge amounts of mana when played on
Devoted Druid. There are also builds that use the more traditional
Elvish finisher of Overrun to get there. For the best results, have a go
with the deck and tweak it to fit your own style of play. |
