Meren golgari combo

[Aetherium Slinky]

Heya, I have a few concerns with the deck. To get this moved to the primers section I think we need to discuss these points first.

Draw power. Most higher power decks have double the amount of draw compared to yours. The number of tutors is good but you need to make sure you can hit those tutors, too. Getting just one isn't usually enough. One example that you must include in the single card discussion is Greater Good. It's a sac outlet and a draw engine. If nothing else it's a "discard engine" that fills your graveyard pretty quickly if the creatures you sacrifice are smaller than 3/*.

Granted, some of your combos are one-card combos but I would still feel more comfortable executing my combo with some additional interaction in my hand. Your colours don't get a lot of counterspells so that's not really an option but at least Autumn Veil deserves a spot in the single card discussion if you're not going to include it in the deck. Imp's Mischief is another popular "counterspell" that deserves a mention.

Thirdly you're running really low numbers of mana sources. You don't have all of the MV 1 ramp spells (Llanowar Elves, for example). You've only got 12 pieces of ramp. But most worryingly your deck has only 33 lands with an average mana value of 2.7 which is somewhat high for a lean running high power combo deck. You should either push the average mana value below 2 or add lands and/or ramp.

Furthermore you need to think about your commander more. Your commander isn't essential to the game plan but it speeds it up by quite a lot. I would say you should prioritise getting your commander out as soon as possible so that you can rack up some experience counters. This means that you should be including almost all available MV 1 ramp and the better MV 2 ramp spells so that you can guarantee to get your commander out on turn three.


Then some individual card choices. I would like to see some discussion for these.

You say Eldritch Evolution isn't playable because you can't find Mikaeus, the Unhallowed with it. You can. You need to sacrifice Meren. If you're going to combo off and win anyway it doesn't matter whether Meren survives or not.

Since you're running Deathrite Shaman I don't quite understand why you're not running all the off-colour fetches, too. On that note why isn't Bayou in the deck?

Peer into the Abyss. No doubt one of the strongest "tutors" there is.

If you get your curve below 2 you should also seriously consider Ad Nauseam.

You have Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth but you don't have Cabal Coffers. Any particular reason for this? You have plenty of tutors so if you hit one you can easily tutor the second one, too.

Bojuka Bog is almost actively bad. Not only can it be the target of Deflecting Swat (you end up hitting your own graveyard ruining your own plans) but it also enters the battlefield tapped and isn't even instant speed interaction. You're better off without it.

Crop Rotation is a decent card considering you've got a few important utility lands.

Hermit Druid in general is a powerful card. You can't combo off with it but it can dump a decent amount of cards into your graveyard especially if you include the off-colour fetches.

Survival of the Fittest belongs in this deck. It's a tutor, it's a discard outlet, it's cheap to cast, it's instant speed.


You actually briefly mention budget when discussing Survival of the Fittest. When you're writing a primer you shouldn't consider budget unless it's specifically some sort of a budget primer for a deck that would normally cost thousands of dollars. Instead you should slot in all the goodies and then have a separate discussion for budget options that can replace some of the more expensive cards in the deck. If you need an up to date list of your own deck you can simply copy this version and update the two decks separately. That is what I do.