It speaks to the enduring appeal and
resonant flavor of the
Ravnica block that people still use
the names of the guilds to refer to various
color pairings. When Ryan here said he had
built a Gruul
deck, I imagined a casual deck of old-time
favorites like Rumbling Slum, Burning-Tree
Shaman, and Scab-Clan Mauler. But lo and
behold, this deck is Standard-legal, and so
I'll keep it that way for him.
This is my attempt at making a super agro
Gruul R/G deck,
and I was wondering what you thought of it?
Is there anything that you would change
about it or is it good the way it is?
Creatures (23):
1 Baloth
Woodcrasher
1 Kazuul,
Tyrant of
the Cliffs
1 Hellkite
Charger
1 Conquering
Manticore
2 Rage Nimbus
2 Ogre
Sentry
2 Overgrown
Battlement
1 Pelakka
Wurm
1 Engulfing Slagwurm
1 Liege of the Tangle
1 Mul
Daya
Channelers
2 Leatherback Baloth
1 Garruk's
Companion
2 Scythe Tiger
4 Llanorwar
Elves
Artifacts (4):
2 Panic Spellbomb
2 Trigon of Rage
Sorceries (1):
1 World at War
Instants (6):
2 Untamed Might
2 Giant Growth
2 Vines of Vastwood
Enchantment (4):
2 Khalni Heart
Expedition
1 Asceticism
1 Bear Umbra
Land (22):
2 Copperline
Gorge
2 Turntimber
Grove
11 Forest
7 Mountain
Thank you for the help
Ryan
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Ryan, your deck looks okay, but I noticed
something that makes me raise an eyebrow and
wonder. You described this deck as being a
"super aggro"
deck. Aggro
doesn't just mean attacking with creatures,
it means being fast. As in, you should have
a creature on the board ready to swing no
later than turn two. Ideally, an
aggro deck has a
mix of aggressive one drops, two drops, and
three drops, and is poised for victory by
turn five or so. Most
aggro decks don't bother including
any card that costs more than five. Your
deck, by contrast, has very few cheap
creatures that are good on the attack, a lot
of expensive creatures like Liege of the
Tangle, and the one thing aggressive decks
avoid like the plague-- creatures with
defender.
Your deck can be made to work, Ryan, but
it's important that you understand that this
is NOT an aggro
deck. What you've built is either a ramp
deck-- a deck that seeks to propagate as
much mana as possible and play large,
devastating spells before the opponent is
prepared to cope-- or a control deck-- a
deck that stalls and endures until the late
game where it can win through wearing its
opponents down. If you can understand that,
and adjust your play style accordingly, this
deck can be a real winner.
So, what you need to do is spend your early
turns biding your time, minimizing your
losses, and developing your mana base so
that you can cast your heavy hitters
reliably and strike once your opponent's
initial push has run out of steam. In order
to do that, you should drop
Garruk's
Companion and Scythe Tiger in exchange for
more copies of Overgrown Battlement and Rage
Nimbus. The Battlement is at its best when
you have more of them, and Rage
Numbus's 5 power
and flying will keep opposing attackers at
bay, or kill off small creatures that you
can kill by blocking. Ogre Sentry can come
out too-- it just doesn't do enough compared
to your other defenders.
Speaking of killing off creatures, I noticed
you have no removal. Rage Nimbus can help,
but you really should have some actual burn.
I'd take out your
Spellbombs and
Trigons, since they grant only
temporary bonuses, and add in some burn
spells. Lightning Bolt is probably the best
choice. As for your instants, they all do
the same thing in different ways. Giant
Growth is the best of the three-- sure, it
can't protect against targeted kill like
Vines of Vastwood,
but the mana cost can't be beat. Vines needs
double green to act as pump, and Untamed
Might will always be more mana than you want
to pay. Go up to a full set of Giant Growth.
You also need to drop
Baloth
Woodcrasher. Sure, an 8/8
trampler for six
sounds good, but that's only if you've
dropped a land. Once you get to six mana,
there's a good chance you're out of lands to
drop, unless you've been drawing almost no
spells. And without a land dropped, it's a
vanilla 4/4 for six.
And speaking of lands,
Khalni Heart Expedition isn't as good
as Cultivate. Yes, the Expedition puts both
lands into play, but you need to play three
lands after drawing and casting it for it to
go off. Cultivate gets you the lands now.
I'd recommend going to a full four-of
of Cultivate as well.
World of War can come out too. It's a neat
trick, but I have a feeling that your deck
usually won't have a lot of creatures out at
once, it'll usually have one or two big
ones, unless one of those is
Kazuul or Liege
of the Tangle.
I like Bear Umbra in this deck, but you also
need to realize that the
Hellkite
Charger/Bear Umbra combo isn't going to work
very often. More often, you're going to draw
one and fail to draw the other. That's not
as big of a problem as it sounds though.
Bear Umbra also combos nicely with the
Liege of the Tangle, to give all your
awakened 8/8's psuedo-vigilance,
and it can simply be used to play a big
spell, swing, then get all your mana back to
play more spells.
Finally, your lands. They look fine, but I
think you should add the other two copies of
Copperline
Gorge. My sources say that they're going for
pretty reasonable prices for a dual land,
and since they want to be dropped early
game, they're of more use of you play four
and can count on drawing one before turn
three.
You've got a lot of one- and two-ofs
in this deck, but I've made my cuts and told
you which of your cards I feel are going to
benefit you the most. It's up to you to
determine what you think deserves to have
more copies put in, and what you think
deserves to be cut.
Good luck!
~BMoor