1
Ambush Commander
4 Elvish Aberration
4 Llanowar Elves
2 Uktabi Wildcats
2 Wirewood Symbiote
3 Wood Elves
2 Blanchwood Armor
3 Giant Growth
3 Hunting Pack
3 Moment's Peace
2 Naturalize
4 Sprouting Vines
2 Vernal Bloom
2 Vitality Charm
19 Forest
4 Tranquil Thicket |
 Forestry
Service.
Description of deck by its author (quoted):
Next up is Hunting Pack. Finally, an uncommon green instant that
creates multiple surprise 4/4 Beasts! We haven’t seen anything like that
since—oh, I seem to be sitting on a Beast Attack. Which is 2 mana
cheaper. Huh.
The cost difference between the two cards is hard to judge. On its own,
Hunting Pack only gives you one Beast for 7 mana. But if you wait until
you opponent plays a spell (which seems pretty likely in a Magic game),
then it’s a pair of Beasts for 7 mana. But you can’t count on it. Maybe
the person you’re playing is in solid control of the game by the time
you get 7 mana and decides to stop playing cards unless you provide a
clear opening. No, you’ve got to take the initiative to unpack the most
Beasts from your Pack. That means playing other spells on the same turn
as a 7-mana card, so that means access to lots (and I mean LOTS) of
mana.
There is another way to go: free spells. Play Land Grant by revealing
your hand, play Invigorate by giving your opponent 3 life, play Vine
Dryad by pitching a card, then spend 7 mana to get 4 Beasts. There’s a
neat deck in there, but I’m not going to build it all the way. If you
have older spells with alternate play costs (and there haven’t been any
since Mercadian Masques), dig them out and see what you can do with
what’s in your collection. I’d be interested in hearing the results.
But back to mana generation. Sprouting Vines is another green Scourge
instant with storm, so that fits right in. Elvish Aberration provides a
forest early in the game or GGG later on. You can’t go wrong with
Llanowar Elves (they’ll rotate out of Standard soon, but I bet they’ll
never rotate out of your living room). And the Wood Elves-Wirewood
Symbiote combo lets you repeatedly return Wood Elves to your hand so you
can fetch a fresh forest from your deck each turn. Vernal Bloom doubles
the forest mana available to you, but Explosive Vegetation is a fine
substitute if you don’t have any.
Now that you have eight million green mana, what do you do with it? This
is where Hunting Pack comes in, of course, and it goes well with any of
the sixteen 1-mana and 2-mana spells in the deck (ten of which are
instants). Uktabi Wildcats threatens to be colossal, and Ambush
Commander turns your forests into an army. (Just watch out for
deforestation techniques like Earthquake or Nausea.) Blanchwood Armor is
a great way to suit up Wood Elves, and Vitality Charm (when not pumping
Hunting Pack) can provide a breakthrough trample effect.
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