Card/Deck Green/Blue Landfall

[ravnic]

Landfall is a really cool Simic archetype. I recently introduced it into my cube as the main common ground for and , and while it's still a work in progress, my group and me had a lot of fun with it already, so I wanted to share with you guys.

This deck is mostly a Midrange deck, with sometimes little combo tendencies. For the core, you need landfall abilities. Here are the 11 I run, from those I currently like most to least:



Tatyova was the inspiration for me to add this package and she acts like the anchor card. Beside her I look for payoff cards that are 1) worth going for the extra triggern and/or 2) are useful for other decks and archetypes. Hedron Crab is great for example, because it is a seriously quick win con in the landfall deck but also helps enabling dredge strategies.

Beyond these, there are more options from higher to lower power levels.

Then, you need ways to trigger landfall constantly and at best even more than only once a turn. Green Land based ramp is great and something most cubes already run for general use.



Harrow alone gives you 2 extra triggers. Beyond that, green also offers you ways to add extra lands to the board, even at instant speed.



The Gardener is especially nice, because he also works as a finisher, even just in a ramp deck. When you look into blue, you find a lot of great cards, that return lands to your hand, most of which are generally useful to some degree.



The bouncelands help the deck a lot, because they can bounce themselves in the late game to guarantee you constant landfall triggers. Also, with one of the Scout creatures, a bounceland and Retreat to Coralhelm you can generate infinite landfall triggers even for the combo kill.

For the future, I hope that we get more landfall payoff cards, that are useful in other decks, especially in blue. But I'm pretty confident, that we will get that at least with the next visit on Zendikar.

Do you guys run a theme like this? Could you see yourself trying it out?

 

[Dom Harvey]

I love anything that involves lands switching zones and piling up. A lot of the on-theme finishers (Meloku, Multani, Avenger of Zendikar, Rampaging Baloths, Primeval Titan) are at a high power level, which is great for convincing the power-max crowd to try it but awkward if you're trying to tone things down. A few questions to consider:

- What are you doing with your lands? Decks like this naturally accumulate a lot of lands in play and you need to do that promptly without being run over so there's natural overlap with ramp strategies; are you casting Simic Sky Swallower with the 7 mana your lands happen to produce, or does it matter that you have 7 lands because that means X landfall triggers, Y cards drawn etc?

- How radical do you want to be? You can build Turboland decks that feel like Storm, both in play patterns and in how narrow their cards are, or you can have the usual ramp payoffs attained through actual land count rather than mana rocks or creatures (suggesting a land subtheme grafted into a 'normal' deck). Cards like Courser of Kruphix and Tireless Tracker are exceptional here but will be snatched up by any green deck, so it might be good for some of those payoffs to demand/reward a stronger commitment

I'd consider Wayward Swordtooth as a more balanced version of the extra lands effect with a subgame that's fun and attainable (and not just by you!)

 

[Rowan_CB]

I think Simic Lands is a great archetype that won't be leaving my cube any time soon. For me, I've veered a little bit away from it being a pure landfall deck, and tried to include other ways for drafters to cash in on lands. I know they aren't all the most budget cards, but I'd really encourage you to consider finding room for this package:



These just help make the archetype more flexible. Now if the UG lands player doesn't have a sufficient landfall threat on the board, he or she can still find value in returning their lands to hand, discarding them for value (maybe to Wild Mongrel, Noose Constrictor, etc., or Turntimber Sower, if not Trade Routes), and having options to re-play them for future landfall triggers or other shenanigans.

This package also allows the Simic lands strategy to overlap with Molten Vortex RG/Temur decks Sigh has written about. In my cube, I am also extending that reach into WG through Knight of the Reliquary, Land Tax, Emeria Angel, Planar Birth, etc.

I really like Dom's idea of Wayward Swordtooth in this archetype. Might try to find room for it myself, although green 3s are always brutal competition.

 

[safra]

I also have a graveyard-based version of a lands archetype, but mine's centred in BG and I think higher-power. My key roleplayers (a couple paired cards):


The idea is generally to use Loam as an engine to either find and recur powerful lands (wasteland, volrath's stronghold, academy ruins + engineered explosives, etc) or to set up some kind of Sylvan Safekeeper + Titania swing turn. Since I don't have a lot of actual tutoring in my format, players are more willing to use dredge+yard recursion as a virtual CA engine, and it sets up most of my graveyard-based combos. I used to play The Gitrog Monster instead of Underrealm Lich but I'm hopeful that Lich will be better for those games where you want to keep dredging but have fewer cards in library, as well as helping you find Loam if you haven't yet. Haven't tested the Lich though so caveat lector!

 

[Velrun]

May I suggest Undergrowth Champion?

 

[yan]

cant believe they made nesting dragon red and tatyova blue. i wanna use both tho
gamble to grab life from the loam . red draw to fuel
i wanted to try scapeshift. wayward sawtooth does seem like a cooler azusa

 

[ravnic]

I love anything that involves lands switching zones and piling up. A lot of the on-theme finishers (Meloku, Multani, Avenger of Zendikar, Rampaging Baloths, Primeval Titan) are at a high power level, which is great for convincing the power-max crowd to try it but awkward if you're trying to tone things down. A few questions to consider:

- What are you doing with your lands? Decks like this naturally accumulate a lot of lands in play and you need to do that promptly without being run over so there's natural overlap with ramp strategies; are you casting Simic Sky Swallower with the 7 mana your lands happen to produce, or does it matter that you have 7 lands because that means X landfall triggers, Y cards drawn etc?

- How radical do you want to be? You can build Turboland decks that feel like Storm, both in play patterns and in how narrow their cards are, or you can have the usual ramp payoffs attained through actual land count rather than mana rocks or creatures (suggesting a land subtheme grafted into a 'normal' deck). Cards like Courser of Kruphix and Tireless Tracker are exceptional here but will be snatched up by any green deck, so it might be good for some of those payoffs to demand/reward a stronger commitment

I'd consider Wayward Swordtooth as a more balanced version of the extra lands effect with a subgame that's fun and attainable (and not just by you!)

1) in my experience so far, this deck tends to be pretty mana hungry. You can easily add an extra fattie or two, but thanks to card draw you always have stuff to cast, while all the Land bounce and some expensive abilities like on Thrasios, Triton Hero etc. there are usually many options on how to invest your mana. The one draft where I piloted this deck, l barely could do all I wanted in a turn even in a 20-land deck.

2) I think this is tge most combo-ish archetypes in my meta now, but for normal standards still just a very synergistic Midrange value deck. You draw some extra cards, gain some life and put some extra power on the board, then overwhelm your opponent with your animated lands or some Zendikar's Roil tokens or some fatties.

And to the whole loam topic. I think it is a really cool deck, but I feel like it is still a different one. There are a lot of card overlaps, but one deck wants to put the lands into play for landfall, while the graveyard-oriented version wants to discard and then return them, often only to hand to discard them again. In the beginning we were also running LftL, Worm Harvest and cycling lands, but the one night I had drafted that deck, it felt like I was going for two contradicting strategies. So we decided to cut the cards, that cards about lands being in or going to graveyard for now and focus more on triggering Tatyova and friends.

 

[Rasmus Källqvist]

Here's a pretty ridiculous card that clearly telegraphs the "get lots of lands into play" very explicitly.

 

[yan]

i would like to see that card with persist. like a fixed vorapede

 

[genericco]

What else out there is similar to groundskeeper ? Seems like a powerful combo piece.

 

[sigh]

Really not much tbh. It's a rare effect.

 

[vennythekid]

Might find some ideas tucked away here
https://edhrec.com/commanders/the-gitrog-monster

 

[yan]

wish the awaken mechanic wasnt overcosted. halimar tidecaller

 

[safra]

wish the awaken mechanic wasnt overcosted. halimar tidecaller

WotC themselves draw a distinction between 'design' and 'development', where design is making cards and development is adapting those cards to the limited / standard environment. In my experience players are more willing to tolerate 're-developed' cards than actual customs.

 

[TrainmasterGT]

WotC themselves draw a distinction between 'design' and 'development', where design is making cards and development is adapting those cards to the limited / standard environment. In my experience players are more willing to tolerate 're-developed' cards than actual customs.

I think it's actually 3 parts now: Vision design, Set design, and Play design. Vision design comes up with the idea for the set, works on some of the new mechanics, and builds the frame of the set. Set design actually designs the rest of the set. Play design is the new development team, and they attempt to balance everything.

Interesting fact: MARO is part of vision design for every set now.

 

[Velrun]

i would like to see that card with persist. like a fixed vorapede

Oh no, how will you even begin to fathom to win the game with a card that is merely a trampling 14/14 due to the crippling -1/-1 counter?

 

[Dom Harvey]

needs Undying instead

 

[TrainmasterGT]

Maybe give it "as long as this creature's power is 5 or less, it has Persist"

 

[ravnic]

That card is not really synergistic with the blue land bounce cards anyway. Vapor Snare or Overburden would prefer a simple baloth woodcrasher I'd say.

 

[Velrun]

Suggestion:

 

[Rasmus Källqvist]

This is the flip side. I think I like it, you don't really need to know what the flip side does to wanna draft the front side in this deck.

 

[Velrun]

Well if you do not care about the flip side you can always run Journeyer’s Kite.



However the reason why I suggested Compass is due to the flip which is a really nice ultimate to reach if you complete the quest.

 

[Velrun]

Suggestion:

 

[Onderzeeboot]

That's a big suggestion Velrun :')

 

[Rasmus Källqvist]

Suggestion:

Velrun, if you use the boards in-built [ ci ]-tags for cards they won't be as big as these high-res attachments are. I think I like this card, especially since it ties into a lands-in-the-graveyard theme. I'm just worried it might be a little to good compared to some other cards? Other than that it really does it all; cares about lands, cares about lands in the graveyard, bounces lands back to your hand, is a big meaty ramp target.