Post WWK - Land Destruction T2?

There's one things I've always hated playing against in tournaments, and that's a dedicated land destruction deck! I've really lost my cool when playing against a deck that is packing 10-15 MD LD spells.. so I figured why not join them! With the printing to Rolling Terrain and Tetonic Edge coming with WWK, I think a GR or BGR ramp deck with MD land destruction could be really good in T2.

Here's a rough idea I was kicking around while at work today:

Creatures: 13
4x Birds of Paradise
4x Acidic Slime
3x Goblin Ruin Blaster
2x Bogardan Hellkite

Spells: 20
4x Explore
3x Harrow
4x Rolling Terrain
4x Lightning Bolt
2x Earthquake
2x Lavaball Trap
1x Comet Storm

Planeswalkers: 5
3x Garruk Wildspeak
2x Chandra Nalaar

Lands: 22
2x Tectonic Edge
4x Rootbound Craig
8x Forest
8x Mountain

Any suggestions?

Build it in Magic Workstation and give it a solo test spin. See how often you get land destruction turns 3, 4, and 5, and how often you have dead cards in your hand.

Lavaball trap probably can't be reliably played at full price with 22 lands (even with the accel and birds). That might be a dead card.

But give it a test run and see how it does.

I might throw together a proxy deck for this weekend, I can try it out and see how it goes. I'm a bit worried I'm not running enough MD removal, I might remove the Lavaball Traps for some more Earthquakes and Comet Storms.

Also, what do you think of a Jund colored version of this deck? That gives me access to Terminate, Lavalanche, and a couple other good spells, but it'd weaken my mana base and make it easier for other LD or disruption decks.

you should also consider adding white for Vengeant, DOJ, and possibly PTE to make your Lavaball Trap easier to activate?

Maybe something like this?

Creatures: 9
4x Acidic Slime
4x Goblin Ruinblaster
1x Bogardan Hellkite

Spells: 24
4x Explore
4x Rampant Growth
3x Harrow
4x Roiling Terrain
3x Lightning Bolt
3x Oblivion Ring
2x Day of Judgment
1x Comet Storm

Planeswalkers: 5
2x Garruk Wildspeak
2x Anjani Vengeant
1x Elspeth, Knight-Errant

Lands: 22
4x Jungle Shrine
4x Naya Panorama
2x Arid Mesa
2x Tectonic Edge
2x Plains
3x Moutain
5x Forest


Edit: Since I'm playing a couple CTP lands now and cutting down on the green I cut the Birds to double-down on my turn 2 acceleration (Explore and Rampant Growth). Like Dan said, I really need to start blowing up lands by turn 3, so this will hopefully let me know if I can actually have the mana for it.

Realistically the Hellkites should be a couple Baneslayer Angles, but I don't have of them, so I'm put down cards I can can actually afford or own.

Land Destruction + Path to Exile = sad trombone

I would downgrade to something like Journey to Nowhere.

-AA

antknee42 wrote:Land Destruction + Path to Exile = sad trombone

I would downgrade to something like Journey to Nowhere.

-AA

I think the general plan is to use Path and then use Lavaball Trap, but I think your idea works a bit better. Rather than Journey though I'd probably play Oblivion Ring, since it can hit planewalkers and artifacts as well.

Edit: Seems like Lavaball Trap is going to be a dead card most of the time, I can't even do the fun Path + Lavaball trap until I get 6 mana, at which point it seems a waste. I bumped up the count of Rampant Growth and Ruinblasters, but I'm thinking I still might want to MD some Earthquakes or another Comet Storm.

Deck seems more like Disruption/Control rather than straight LD, which might not be a bad thing. I've always loved playing non-blue control decks.

antknee42 wrote:Land Destruction + Path to Exile = sad trombone

I would downgrade to something like Journey to Nowhere.

-AA

Good point, i suggested it without having considered the other white removal options and i knew it was probably bad symmetry. Perhaps PTE can be run as a 2 of and journey/o-ring can accompany it. Just seems like PTE is a good security blanket and it makes CERTAIN the threat is gone.

I proxied out the deck last night and did some gold-fishing, and it seems like I can usually start blowing up land consistently turn 3 half the time, by turn 4 most of the time. I think I might be a bit short on win-conditions though, and have a bit too much acceleration that comes down too late (like Harrow and Garruk) without any win conditions. Might end up pulling a few of them for some alternate win conditions like Baneslayer Angel, Martial Coup, Comet Storm, etc.

I actually might have too much LD as well to make this really work, I'm not sure it's possible to have just a straight LD deck with the given card base (all the LD spells have a CMC of 4 or more). I might be better off going for a Disruption/Control build, where I try to screw up their mana base while accelerating mine.

Edit: Might want to consider running Demolish over Acidic Slime, and maybe Everflowing Chalice. Demolish isn't as good as the slime, but it comes down a turn earlier and has easier color requirements.

Jim, have you seen the "Spread Em" deck build?

If not, you want to check that out or variations of it.

With the new manlands in WWK that will be played PLUS the colonnade being playable in the colors make that deck much more viable.