Counting Cards (PDH) (EDH / Commander)

Pauper EDH is an alternative format that uses any uncommon creature as the commander and the 99 are commons.

Here's a straight-forward mono-green deck built around Armorcraft Judge (AJ). In PDH green's greatest weakness is card draw, there's cards like Winding Way and Lead the Stampede but in general it's rough. AJ covers up that weakness at the cost of a deckbuilding restriction — +1/+1 counters.

Therefore the deck is filled to the brim with various creatures that have +1/+1 counters in various ways. Some examples; Ivy Elemental, Servant of the Scale, Duskshell Crawler, Pridemalkin, Longshot Squad.

As you can see the best creatures have +1/+1 counters and some other kind of upside, but the deck straight up also runs cards like (James) Bond Beetle, Ironshell Beetle and Simic Initiate. Not very picky! Maybe there's better inclusions.

There's also an elf sub-theme as there often is in mono-green; Elvish Vanguard, Llanowar Elves (and other 1cmc ramp elves), Priest of Titania, Timberwatch Elf, Ivy Lane Denizen, Devoted Druid and Wirewood Herald. The latter finds the previous two which combo with Presence of Gond, a very low opportunity-cost inclusion.

There's another combo with Devoted Druid that's a bit more convoluted. If Devoted Druid and Urban Daggertooth have +1/+1 counters on them you can equip Viridian Longbow to Devoted Druid, tap to hit Urban Daggertooth, proliferate, put a -1/-1 counter on Devoted Druid to untap it (canceling out the +1/+1) and repeat for infinite proliferation. Very niche but once again very low opportunity-cost to include. The longbow can pick off 1 toughness creatures or shoot anything down with deathtouch from Nightshade Peddler.

A slight synergy is between Ferocity and Phantom Tiger — it makes for an excellent blocker and is tough to block. That said, Ferocity is a dubious inclusion.

The deck is currently untested so I'm unsure how well it finishes games, it goes wide but aside from proliferation doesn't have great mass-buffs. There's Aspect of Hydra, Timberwatch Elf and Wildheart Invoker to buff individual creatures. There's also big creatures like Timbermaw Larva and Undergrowth Scavenger that can pack a punch. I imagine swinging in with an entire board and regenerating whatever's blocked with Broken Fall / Sporeback Troll is viable as well.

On that note boardwipes (e.g. Crypt Rats, Pestilence, Fiery Cannonade) are rough for the deck, especially if they happen before we reload with the commander. The aforementioned Broken Fall and Sporeback Troll can help, there's also Wrap in Vigor but that's it. Fortunately PDH is relatively low on boardwipes.
Also, the deck might need a sac outlet / more fight spells to kill the commander in order to recast it. Needs some testing.

Another weakness of the deck is the very low amount of interaction. Some cuts & additions could easily remedy that, more fights/bites, graveyard hate, modular removal, feel free to include whatever your meta needs. At the moment there's some synergistic cards like Ainok Survivalist (+1/+1 counter), Masked Vandal (Elf sub-theme), Nightshade Peddler (Viridian Longbow), Smell Fear (proliferates) as well as Lignify and Ram Through.

Thanks for reading! If you have any questions or suggestions, please let me know.