With the Alchemy Bo1 Qualifier Play-In event this weekend, I’ve been trying to find a deck that has a good shot against the various aggressive and creature based combo decks of the format. After trying a few different flavors of midrange and control, I tried this Mono Green Aggro deck and found it to be well rounded against a variety of the popular decks in the format. Let’s dive into the decklist and go over the key cards and strategies as I explain why I think it is well positioned for this weekend.
The main plan of this deck is to curve out and sequence our creatures in a way that gives us the largest Evolving Adaptive, Sharp-Eyed Rookie, and Quirion Beastcaller possible. With big creatures and the Vigilance on Sharp-Eyed Rookie and Sentinel of the Nameless City we are able to easily dominate the board against other aggro decks as we can apply pressure with our creatures while still have defenses in place.
Our four copies of Hard-Hitting Questions and three copies of Archdruid's Charm give us a powerful suite of removal against other aggro decks and the creature based combo decks of the format.
Speaking of those combo decks, the deck has several ways to deal with pesky artifacts and enchantments that other decks don’t have in Bo1. Including the three above mentioned Archdruid's Charm we have four copies of Cankerbloom, which are good early to trigger our Adaptives, Rookies, and Beastcallers, but also help us answer cards like Insidious Roots or Fiery Inscription.
At the “top end” we have Doomskar Warrior which is critical at pushing through damage by giving another one of our creatures a +1/+1 counter, and most importantly trample to get us through opposing blockers and find more threats. In games where we end up with six or more mana, Polukranos Reborn can activate to become a 6/6 Reach, Lifelink to win the race against other aggressive decks or prevent opposing fliers from pecking us down.
Delighted Halfling is usually the right play on turn one over Evolving Adaptive as the next turn we can play out the Adaptive and a two drop to trigger it right away. Be careful with the auto-tapper with the Halfling, as we only play one legendary creature in Polukranos Reborn, it is usually only able to tap for colorless mana, so you may need to manually tap it to pay for your first spell in a turn to make sure you have enough green mana to cast other spells.
The deck is playing only basic Forests and not utility lands such as Mishra's Foundry and Mirrex because of the triple green mana costs of Polukranos Reborn and Archdruid's Charm but also because of our three copies of Flourishing Bloom-Kin whose power and toughness are equal to the number of forests we control. The Bloom-Kin can be played on turn 2, but it is almost always better to play out one our two drops that grow, as the Bloom-Kin can come down on a later turn as a 4/4 or more and trigger our Sharp-Eyed Rookie and Evolving Adaptive. Very rarely it will be better to cast Bloom-Kin as a face-down creature, but there are cases where you need your Hard Hitting Questions or Archdruid’s Charm to resolve and the Ward 2 of the face-down creature can prevent a blow out of being taken out by a removal spell from the opponent.
The deck does struggle against cards like Sunfall and control decks in general, as we have no reach like burn spells or haste creatures to finish the game after they have cleared our board. If you find yourself in the rare case of playing against a control deck, try to pace your threats and keep cards in hand to refill the board after they clear it, and try to get as many clue tokens from your Sharp-Eyed Rookie as possible to refill your hand. If they use a card like Temporary Lockdown, an activation from Cankerbloom or a cast of Archdruid's Charm with the exile ability on the stack will prevent your 1 drops, 2 drops, and clue and map tokens from being locked down.
Overall, I think this deck is well positioned in the meta as it is able to quickly dominate the board against other aggressive decks and can do what other decks can’t do in Best-of-1, which is answer artifacts and enchantments without severely disrupting our game plan. The deck can grind with clue and map tokens, and plays endless must answer threats, pressuring the opponents removal and making them make tough decisions every turn.
The Qualifier is Tomorrow!
The Best-of-1 Qualifier Play-In opens this Saturday at 6am PDT, so there is still time to get some reps in with this Mono-Green deck and see if it is the deck that will qualify you for the Qualifier Weekend on the 23rd-24th. For more deck options, Premium members can get access to the top exclusive decks from Altheriax.
