[EDH / Commander] Stormtide Leviathan Board Control

[whywhathow]

Stormtide Leviathan Board Control

This deck (I hope) is about taking control of the board with Stormtide Leviathan and then overpowering your opponents with powerful flyers, being the angels. While I don't have that many actual land cards (24), there are plenty of artifacts, creatures, enchantments that will allow you to ramp and generate extra mana (all of the signets, Chromatic Lantern, Mirari's Wake, Vorinclex, Voice of Hunger). There are plenty of counterspells and additional creatures to protect you while you wait to play Stormtide as well.

[whywhathow]

I'm looking for any feedback this community wants to provide. The big thing is the mana curve for this deck, which is at 4.09. I know that it is high, but is it ok? It's not outrageous, and 47% of my deck is 2-4 drops.

[Morganator 2.0]

24.

Lands.

24.

Not good. Let's fix this.

To be fair, there are decks that can run 24 lands, but they are few and far between, and they have massive amounts of low-cost mana ramp.

I tested 15 hands to turn 3. 12 of them missed their turn 3 land drop, and played no ramp. 2 of them hit the turn 3 land drop, 1 of them had two lands and a ramp card. This is not good.

On a related note, there is a discussion going on about low land counts right now.

So let's fix this. Boost up your land count to (at least) 35 lands. We can always change it after. Then we'll improve the mana ramp. What you have is good so far, with the exception of Burgeoning and Exploration (you need more lands). You'll want to include some one mana ramp cards like Elvish Mystic, Avacyn's Pilgrim, and (if you can afford it) Birds of Paradise.

Once you've fixed this up, we can address the deck itself.

[whywhathow]

Hey Morgantown 2.0,

I really appreciate the feedback. I knew going into it that land might have been a problem, but it was really quite difficult figuring out what to cut to hit that 35 land mark. I haven't put in the creature spells that you suggested since I'm still not sure what else to cut. Also, I know that they are cheap spells, but if you don't get them in the early game (turns 1-4) what purpose do they serve other than chump blocking?

I do look forward to your next suggestions, as they have again been very helpful!

Revision 2

Added/removed cards:
-1 Acidic Slime
-1 Awakening Zone
-1 Bant Charm
-1 Burgeoning
-1 Draining Whelk
-1 Enlightened Tutor
-1 Exploration
-1 Iridescent Angel
-1 Overrule
-1 Sun Titan
-1 The Mending of Dominaria

Changed amounts:
+3 Forest
+4 Island
+4 Plains

[whywhathow]

Sorry for getting your name wrong Morganator 2.0!

[Morganator 2.0]

You know how Kodama's Reach and Cultivate get you 5 mana by turn 4? The one mana elves give 3 mana on turn 2, which gives you a huge early game advantage. Whereas a 2 land hand with Kodama's Reach as your only ramp is risky, it's safe with Fyndhorn Elves. I think they work better than Cultivate and like ramp cards, but that's a whole discussion on it's own.

If you're looking for cards to cut, start with the counterspells. Counterspells are card disadvantage in commander, because you are trading one card for one card, and you had to leave mana open. Removal tends to work better, unless you have a commander that can provide enough card advantage to offset the card disadvantage of counterspells. Jenara, Asura of War is not one of them.

The only counterspell I would keep is Mana Drain. This gives you 8 card slots to work with, so far. For the time being, we'll fill it with mana ramp and card draw. Throw these cards in: Birds of Paradise, Avacyn's Pilgrim, Elvish Mystic, Fellwar Stone, Windfall, Mystic Remora, Rishkar's Expertise, and Abundance.

So at this point, you have both the mana ramp and card draw. Aside from the land base, we have a nice starting point for any strategy you want to try. To go further, I'll need to know three things:

• What is your budget? I'm seeing a budget land base, but expensive cards like Omniscience, Avacyn, Angel of Hope, and Mana Drain.
• Are you happy with the strategy you've chosen, or are you open to other ideas?
• Is this the commander you want to play, or is it just the colors that you want?

Morgantown 2.0

[whywhathow]

Hey Morganator 2.0,

To your first question, my absolute max is 650 USD, with a preferred 600 USD. As with any person on this planet, I would very much like to go under as much as possible. Having said that, I have some friends and coworkers who are excited that I am getting into Commander/EDH and are willing to gift me some cards, and sell me some other cards at reduced prices than at either Card Kingdom or TCGPlayer. This allows my budget to be a bit more flexible than most other people who are just starting. The only issue with this, is that I don't know what cards they'll be giving me and offering me till I have a completed deck list.

For your second question, my original strategy was to shut down people's attack steps/combat phases/combat steps with Stormtide Leviathan, overrunning them with powerful flyers (which is why I'm creature heavy in Angels), and then build around keeping SL alive. However, I found that it is very difficult in keeping something alive in EDH, so I am open to other ideas. SL just happens to be my favorite card in MTG, and was hoping to utilise him in EDH.

For your final question, this is more about the color combination than the commander. Bant has been my favorite option in MTG so far, and I wanted to continue that into EDH. When I was originally designing this deck, I was going to go with Treva, the Renewer and have an alternate win condition be Felidar Sovereign. But then at that point, my mana average was around 5. So I went with Jenara, Asura of War, as it is much cheaper to bring out onto the field and kind of fits with my scheme of overrunning people with powerful flyers. I was thinking of maybe converting to Roon of the Hidden Realm, but I am open to changing commanders. I was also thinking about going to 4 colors, but I just don't like any of those commanders, and the one that I did like, Atraxa, Praetor's Voice, would require a serious overhaul (no real counter generation), and I just don't think its worth it at this point, but maybe in the future doing an Atraxa deck.

Thanks again!

whywhathow

Revision 3

Added/removed cards:
-1 Counterspell
-1 Cryptic Command
-1 Dismal Failure
-1 Dismiss
-1 Grip of Amnesia
-1 Heavenly Blademaster
-1 Hindering Light
-1 Last Word
-1 Rewind
+1 Abundance
+1 Avacyn's Pilgrim
+1 Birds of Paradise
+1 Elvish Mystic
+1 Fellwar Stone
+1 Lyra Dawnbringer
+1 Mystic Remora
+1 Rishkar's Expertise
+1 Windfall

[whywhathow]

Sorry for the typo. It should be Atraxa, Praetors' Voice. Didn't realize that I had the apostrophe in wrong place.

And I scrapped the Roon idea once I started looking at the cards that I had selected, and determined that I didn't enough enter the battlefield effects to justify making him my commander, especially after getting rid of Acidic Slime and Sun Titan.

[Morganator 2.0]

Your strategy with Stormtide Leviathan is an archetype called pillowfort; you use all kind of effects like Propaganda and Lightmine Field to stop yourself from getting attacked. It's fine to use Stormtide Leviathan, just make sure it isn't your only option.

The other thing is that Jenara, Asura of War doesn't really have anything that you can build a deck around, which is what you want to see in a commander. I would recommend one of the following commanders, and I've given a short description of how they are usualy played (you don't have to do these tactics if you don't want to).

Derevi, Empyrial Tactician: Control the board and what your opponents can do.
Rafiq of the Many: Attack with a single, really big creature (Usually Rafiq).
Arcades, the Strategist: Wall tribal. The best offence really is a good defense.
Estrid, the Masked: Enchantments, specifically auras to help with mana ramp and attacking.
Rubinia Soulsinger: Gain permanent control of one other card.
Kynaios and Tiro of Meletis: Group hug. Help everyone so they don't hurt you.

Do a bit of searching and see what you like (TIP: use https://edhrec.com/). Once you know what tactic you want, and which commander, I'll be able to help some more. And if you need help with the first draft of the deck, this thread has some really helpful deck building advice:

https://deckstats.net/forum/index.php/topic,42562.0.html

[whywhathow]

Hey Morganator 2.0,

I've gone ahead and created a Derevi, Empyrial Tactician commander deck. I also plan on creating a few others, using Estrid, the Masked (Bant), Emmara, Soul of the Accord (Selesnya), Treva, the Renewer (Bant), Atraxa, Praetors' Voice (Witch-Maw), Gisela, Blade of Goldnight (Boros), and Queen Marchesa (Mardu), and see which of those A) I like and B) get the best overall feedback on. This will also hopefully expand my color pallet in the future so that I'm not just one dimensional. I did not include the color name for your sake, but for mine.


I'd like to thank you for all of the help that you have been so far, and continue to look forward to your feedback in the future!

New deck link: https://deckstats.net/decks/127154/1231040-bant-trial-deck-2

whywhathow